Failure is not an option

August 8, 2012 By

I knew a girl that trained for the Olympics.  She got permission to cut out early from school to spend eight hours in the gym.  Her parents were insanely rigid and no one really invited her to play dates or to have ice cream sundaes.  She couldn’t come anyway because she was training.  She was always training.  Her father died young. I always thought he bottled all the angst and misery and fear of watching his twelve-year old girl fail or turn or miss a handoff and one day he just couldn’t take it anymore.  He put a gun to his temples and blew it all away. Just tiny bits of stress scattered into the ether.

In a tiny way, amidst the cheers and clapping and proud faces, I see the pain in the eyes of all those collective Olympians, their young hearts beating rapidly under their overbuilt bodies with sparkles on their eyelids.  After all – the brass ring of winning looms so high.  Some of these tiny girls – leaping and hopping and tumbling on a national stage before their sixteen birthday – don’t even have arms long enough to reach out and grab it. They haven’t built up the maturity to handle the fleeting moment when the edges of their fingers touch it, but it slips past their grasp.  It reminds me of Gollum in Lord of the Rings, wanting something so bad it becomes a longing that’s seared into you.  After a while it’s nothing but an empty, haunting noise in one’s twisted throat.

The announcer introduced a young Romanian.  Her eyes had that steely gaze of one who knows exactly what she wants.  She had won silver four years earlier, but not grabbing that ring had left a hole in her heart.  I wanted to clasp that poor girl into my arms.  I wanted to hand her journals of pink butterflies and banana splits and afternoons lounging around under oak trees reading mystery novels.  I wanted to give her back a childhood and tell her it’s just a silly piece of metal, coated with only shreds of worth.  But her stare was so unyielding.   It was a hopeless cause.

She mounted the balance beam so assuredly.  She had done this so many times, and in so many ways.  Through injuries and bad days and being yelled at.  When she was hungry and longed for a day off and when her legs were pinching and burning and red like fire.

And then she fell.

It was just a simple turn – the announcer said.  But there she went, cascading down in slow motion to the padded mat below, chalk puffing up around her tiny feet as she hit. She rose slowly, as if her life’s work had been for naught.  As if all she ever wanted had come crumbling down around her feet.  The grief was printed on her face.  Her arms rose to the beam again to climb back on, but it was a dead baby now.

Her eyes haunted my dreams that night.  I thought of how one might not ever recover such an epic failure.  These are champions.  They overcame great hurdles in their rise to glory.  And yet there is that looming dread of going home empty handed.  The oiled finger that couldn’t grasp the ring.  The missed opportunity that would never again present itself.

As I was telling my husband about it that night, he stopped reading and thought about it for a moment.  He said he felt failure was an overused word.  We might miss opportunities, or do things we regret, or take paths that might later need redirection.  “But failure is final,” he said.  “And it’s not over until the end of the game.”

I thought about our lives.  The raising of our children.  The tenuous bonds of marriage and friendship and being the one others count on.  Our eyes grow so focused on being good at it, and choosing the right paths, and winning.  Sometimes there is that moment you almost let it overtake you.  Like the father who put the gun to his head and gave in.

But God expects more than this.  We are all built to be champions.  And someday, there will be that second we step onto that balance beam and our feet fall flat underneath us.  It is that moment we must find the inner strength to rise again.  Through the grief.  Through the defeat.  Through the brokenness. We must stand proud and tall on that beam, and with all the energy left in our tired bodies we must clap those hands together, look high to the sky as our backs arch in beauty, and land squarely on two feet.  We will regroup.  We will not let this define us.  We will dismount after the fall.

If you look closely enough, you’ll see a shiny little ring dangling from your fingers.  Funny thing is, by then it doesn’t seem to matter.

—

http://www.flickr.com/photos/96434059@N00/with/1017675131/#photo_1017675131

Filed Under: Inspirational, Motherhood, Religion, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , , ,

Let’s find a way to coexist

July 27, 2012 By

In an abstract world, controversy is fun.  Everyone picks a side and argues their points, shooting down the other side with logic and theory.  It’s high school debate meets law school meets logic games, stirred together with a nerdy competitive streak and a sense of humor.  Someday soon, I’m going to host a dinner party where people are forced to pick a position out of a hat.  They will be forced to argue that particular side over a chocolate flourless torte and coffee and hear the other side’s arguments.  Maybe it will encourage people to think that every coin has two sides.  That we are all made with different thoughts rattling around inside our brains.  And that’s a good thing.

But then there’s real life.  Whether you’re getting donuts or pumping gas or eating waffle fries – you are constantly being judged.  Judged for your appearance, or haircut, or bumper sticker.  Judged for what you appear to believe.  Judged for what you say to your children or what organization you donate to.  You are tarred, and feathered, and left to die.

In real life, you have to pick a side.  There’s no room to scratch your head and see that two differing opinions have their own independent merit.  There is no ability anymore, with the advent of cable news and talk shows and celebrity obsession and facebook, to think someone who has a strict religious code who can’t wear pants or must never cut their hair has the right to think that way.  They are crazy, or need to keep to themselves, and they are wrong on every social issue that varies from yours.  Don’t give those people money.  Pray they don’t vote.   Make sure they keep to themselves – oppressed and put in the corner where they belong.

Aside from being a carnivore or vegetarian, if someone believes differently than you do on an issue such as same-sex marriage or abortion or any issue touching upon race or worship, that person is deemed to be wrong.  They are so wrong that they are borderline evil.  You don’t want your children playing with their children.  You don’t want to live around them.  You don’t really want them to maintain a successful business or have a long, healthy future or even make it through a string of green lights.  They contribute to hate.  They fuel all that is wrong with the world. You want them to fail.

When did we grow so angry?  When did we stop seeing the value of differences, and embrace our ability to come to our own rational decision?  Come on.  Let’s all put our big girl pants on. Maybe we don’t see eye to eye, but let’s find some common ground.  Let’s search for a middle area where we can all walk around without spitting or seething or giving each other dirty looks.  So I believe in God and you don’t.  So I think one way and you another.  That’s okay.  I still like that purple shirt you’re wearing and I think you deserve to a good night’s sleep.

There is evil in the world that must be stopped.  Hitler murdered Jews.  It was not only acceptable, but mandatory, to do whatever it took to stop him.  The same goes with leaders in today’s world that commit genocide or murder children or encourage rape or sexual trafficking.  If one person says, “let’s all hate Hispanics and do them harm,” obviously our overarching moral compass will react with “hell no.  That’s wrong and I’m not going along with it.”

But for goodness sakes.  The fact that one person believes one way and other differently makes this entire world a more interesting place.  If someone supports Cause A that differs from your personal belief system, donate to Cause B that is in line with what you believe.  Take care of your own family, and your own life. Then go about your business.

If only our world was a fairy tale, we could all eat torte and debate about controversial issues and go home happy and fulfilled at the end of the night.  We would embrace the unique talents and styles and thoughts of those around us without being so hateful.  We could simply agree to disagree.  We would find a way to coexist.

You know that funny little plastic bracelet that kids used to wear?  They handed them out at church camp and Sunday school.  It said “what would Jesus do?”  It’s been overused and vilified, but it’s a legitimate question.  How would Jesus handle all these differences?  How would he deal with all these competing moral dilemmas?

I’ll bet he would love, and forgive, and love some more.  Jesus certainly didn’t apologize for his beliefs, but I’ll venture to guess he didn’t walk around tripping those who thought differently. He might have known in his heart they were wrong.  But I’ll be he didn’t stare them down with hate like they had a disease or paper their houses.  I’ll bet he didn’t call them ugly names or start a Disciple-wide boycott.  He did his best to spread his own message of salvation, love, and forgiveness to the poor, distraught, and sick. If others didn’t like it, that was fine.  Let the chips fall where they may.

Let our lives be more like that of Jesus – filled with peace, and logic, and patience.  Let us not fear that which is different.  Let us coexist, for goodness sakes, so we don’t live like a bunch of savages.

—

photo credit: <a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/auntiep/407993029/”>Auntie P</a> via <a href=”http://photopin.com”>photo pin</a> <a href=”http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/”>cc</a>

Filed Under: Love, My life, Religion, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , ,

my colorful life

July 25, 2012 By

Today, I thought I’d paint a picture of what my life is like.   

The big news of the week was that our six-year-old girl lost her front tooth.  I videoed her trying to say “silly sally went to town, walking backwards, upside down” so I could hear the funny whistling lisp she developed.  It was all so crazy pink with the swollen gums and her tongue sticking out.

That night, my daughter recounted the story of not beating all the other girls in art class because they put their peacock feathers on the canvas already and she was slower to cut them out.  I told her art was not a competition.  She’s so red that girl, flaming with desire to be the best, and fastest, and quickest at everything.   Sometimes you just need to slow down and take your time.  Or try new things even when they don’t come out perfectly the first time around.  She’s not daring for fear she might not come out on top.  We are working on experimentation.

I had a crazy burst of energy the other day, in part due to the explosion of vegetables from our garden.  I peeled and cut up four large butternut squash, their bright, orange flesh so clean and cheerful.  I sautéed asparagus and made a salad with cucumbers and tomatoes with an aged balsamic dressing.  I stole a friend’s recipe for pasta with capers and cream sauce and the plate was bursting with color.  My kids picked out all the bowtie pasta and left all the rest, but I threatened them with something that I now can’t remember and they ended up eating all the spinach.  Funny how all that spinach wilts down to nothing when you cook it.  A tiny little mass of vitamins that can be gulped down in two bites.

Then a few nights later, I was frustrated that a new bottle of organic tearless wash was bobbling around in the bath, filling with water and making it run out when I tried to use it.  That was the millionth time I’d warned my daughter about letting soap ruin in the tub.  I was so upset I yelled for both children to immediately exit the bathroom and transport themselves immediately into pajamas.  I muttered something about how much money was wasted and having to always repeat myself. All that yellow Burt’s Bees soap diluted and ruined. It was all his fault, my daughter said.  She likes to stand around and watch him do things and then blame him for it later.  You’re older and wiser.  I expect you to set an example.  It’s a broken record, that conversation.

Almost every night this week, my son has decided that the only possible way he can sleep, now that he’s graduated from the crib to a normal bed, is to be velcroed to his mother at all times.  The moment I inch away, he is awoken from a deep slumber and begins to cry out my name.  He is buried in a blue patchwork quilt and is wedged between a pillow I got at pottery barn that says “Discover” but all that blue matches his longing mood. It’s been a long week of hauling a two-year-old back to bed, telling him that he is loved but mommy has her own sleeping place, requesting that he instead cuddle with his bear or stuffed horse, and if all else fails to go sleep in his sister’s room.  I try and break up the blackness of night with a nightlight and warm kisses, but all that crying makes me sad. I want to curl up next to him and feel his soft breathing until the end of time.

My husband is out of town for a funeral, which means he left work undone at the office and must catch up upon his return.  I have a girl’s dinner and got a babysitter, which means that I’ll have to fork over so much green for one night just to not hear “mama hold me” or “can I watch just one more show” or “I don’t like spinach” or “I didn’t do it.”  It’s worth it.  It’s always worth it to catch my breath and laugh over swollen glasses of wine and good company.

I am reading Angela’s Ashes, which is so sad and it fills me with an ache that children have to grow up around all that brown drabness, with diapers that are never changed and dirt that is never washed away.  I worry about the negative overtones of Disney movies and the stereotypes of Barbie dolls and stress about not having enough Vitamin D in my kids’ diet and then I read that Frank McCourt stole bananas just to stop his twin brothers’ hunger pains.  I am filled with a sense of loss for his childhood.

I had a crazy work situation happen Monday afternoon.  The entire day was relatively quiet and I could have dealt with that particular crisis better at any other time of day, but of course it happens at 4:30 pm, which is the witching hour at my house when all hell breaks loose and my children act like wild animals.  I was trying to convince an attorney to withdraw a subpoena when my daughter comes running in screaming about her brother drinking something he shouldn’t.  I see him sucking from a juice box that was somewhere in my daughter’s room.  Where did that come from?  How long has it been there?  Is it molded?  Oh for goodness sakes. I rush over in between saying “uh huh” and “why exactly do you need our particular witness for this case” to run over and grab the juice from my son.  At the moment I grabbed it, he threw it on the ground and it just so happened my foot came down on top of it, and in that perfect storm, purple juice went spraying all over the wood floor.  I wanted to scream, but I ran to the front porch and politely asked counsel to repeat that last part.  The one about the Family Code.

All in all, my life is very colorful.  It starts out such a blank white canvas when my two feet get out of bed and I pad over toward the coffee machine, like the computer screen that is blank until my fingers find a way to fill the page.   I love the richness and hues and the depth of all these stories.  The fire and melancholy and stillness all run together like watercolors.  My life is full of light from any angle.  You could let it dry and hang it on a mantle, scratching your head and saying,

My, my. What a beautiful piece. 

Filed Under: Inspirational, Motherhood, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , ,

Why Does God Demand Praise?

July 18, 2012 By

Lately, something has been tugging at my heart.  It’s the simple question of why God seeks out his own praise. The very idea that the ultimate creator, healer, and master of our souls has a need for his own people to fall down on their feet for His glory seems a bit preposterous.  Why the demand for it?  I understand that we should desire to worship God, but shouldn’t it just naturally flow from our hearts, like giving Christmas gifts or thrusting a dollar bill out our window to the homeless guy?

This singular thought, along with the absurdity that donuts come with sprinkles (they add no flavor/they are a distraction/what’s the point) have been taking over my brain.  Actually, the donut deal just entered into my head once, while praising God is a constant, in case you think I give God and donuts the same amount of mental energy.

But I needed to dive deeper into the issue of forced praise.  I wanted to bounce the logic around in my brain and get my fingers around the words.  Words that could be strung together into thoughts I could relate to and believe in. I don’t want to just pick the answer that sounds most logical.  I desire to seek truth.  So I went to Google, which is my go-to when trying to determine if a battery is still good or how to get my son to take a nap.

As it turns out, CS Lewis already addressed this issue.  But of course.  He creates magical worlds in closets where children eat Turkish delight and get conned by ice queens.  It’s only natural that he would have tackled this perplexity as well, and better than I could ever do.  But back to my own mental brainstorming, because we are on the topic of arrogance and all.

I devised the following possible reasons for why God demands praise.  They are:

(1)  He’s God, so let’s just not question things.  Wear your best bonnet to church and eat the fried chicken, for heaven’s sake.  K?  We’re good?

(2)  It’s like gravity – we can’t help but be drawn to worship (But why is God asking for it?)

(3)  Praise is pleasing to a parent’s ear (“I love you mommy!”  “This is the greatest beach vacation ever!”) because it shows that the child is living in joy, so God demands praise because He has a desire for us to live in joy (very close)

(4)  We need to submit our own ego and by praising God it’s the ultimate expression of humility. God knows this and thus demands praise for our own good.  (This just sounds patronizing)

(5)   “Demand” is a bit old fashioned.  It’s more like “God desires it.”  (Now I just feel like I’m making things up)

God doesn’t need to prove to anyone else his own self-worth.  Who would he need to prove it to?  There are no other gods, or deities, or higher powers greater than God himself.   But God is completely God-centered.  First he says you shall have no other gods before Him (Exodus).  Then Jesus walks in and says “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John).  Dude.  Every time you turn around you’re reading about how God wants to be recognized, respected, worshiped, honored, and revered.  Doesn’t he get enough praise?  I would like for my children to tell me I make the best meatloaf, but sometimes you just love them anyway without such high expectations.

We tend to align praise with compliments, such as “you sure are beautiful,” or “I really think you are a wonderful housekeeper,” or “I sure wish I could be more like you.”  These are praising statements, and no one should really ask for them because that’s just plain rude.  But if you tell me these things, I won’t exactly throw you out on the street.  I might just pour you more coffee and invite you over more often.

Think about the things you really love.  Praise comes escaping from your lips before you can even think about it.  As Lewis puts it, “the world rings with praise.”  Think about a book you recently read you just loved.  The words fell off the page like brilliant jewels, and the story captured you from the first page to the last.  You can’t wait to sing its praises.  You can barely stand not to talk about it, and refer your friends to it. “I think we delight to praise what we enjoy,” Lewis continues, “because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation. It is not out of compliment that lovers keep on telling one another how beautiful they are; the delight is incomplete till it is expressed. It is frustrating to have discovered a new author and not to be able to tell anyone how good he is; to come . . .upon some mountain valley of unexpected grandeur and then to have to keep silent . . . to hear a good joke and find no one to share it with. . .”

God is self-centered.  He has nothing to hide.  He has no errors to overcome or blemishes to patch.  He truly the center of the universe.  And God knows that not only do we come into communion with him through worship, but that the consummation of our relationship with Christ requires such praise.  Not if we want to.  Not if we have time, but all the time, every day, when the sun rises and the oak tree branches sway.  This is something God expects because he loves us so extremely, and so passionately, that he will seek us out through the cold depths of unbelief and sin.

Only by diving in full throttle, with our souls open, can we begin to comprehend such a love.  Such a bitter ache.  Such a bleed that did not come rushing out, but dripped out one drop at a time while salt was thrown on the wound.  Because through the sting, we begin to see what’s coming.  We feel the salve of his glory.  He is inviting us into his kingdom, and that is the very opposite of selfish.

I’m not sure why donuts have sprinkles, or why my children don’t stay in their own beds at night.  I don’t know what God’s ultimate plan is for my life or why I stay up until the wee morning hours pondering such things.  I only know that God is so glorious that it makes my heart want to rip apart in little shreds. I want for people to know of Him, and sing to the rafters, and dance with joy. I feel complete and full and happy. I suppose this is me, praising Him.

That God.  He’s a sneaky one.

Filed Under: Inspirational, Religion, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , ,

Goliad

June 24, 2012 By

A second novel popped into my head today.  We were driving back from the beach, a hair north of Goliad and a million miles away from our vacation.  My husband was tired, sipping on Whataburger coffee and rubbing his eyes.  I was thinking of the week ahead.  Of laundry and swim lessons.  Of sunscreen and fruit salad. My husband was no doubt thinking of work.  Meetings and time entry and upcoming cases and such.  But there it was, a grand oak tree standing alone in the middle of a field of hay grazer.  A beautiful plot, springing up from nothing.

Sometimes stories are buried, like hidden treasure.  They surface when the wind changes and they start to bore a hole inside of you until they get out.  A story was buried there, outside of Goliad, Texas, where the Texas Revolution first began. Maybe ghosts of fallen soldiers whispered it to me, their words trapped inside twisted mesquite trees, floating around grain silos and rusted barns.  Theirs is a story of a deeply tangled family and what really matters. It all starts with a dying man, and goes from there.

I will write that story.  Amidst the diapers and the “stop throwing a fit right now or there will be no television” lectures and the defensive driving classes and the leftover macaroni-and-cheese.  Somehow I’ll find a way to run upstairs like a quiet attic mouse and start tapping it out. Character by character, chapter by chapter.  Novels aren’t born in a day.  They unfold slowly.  After all, the author has to fill in the color to characters they have only sketched in their mind in charcoal.

I told my husband about it.

“Sounds great,” he muttered.  Sort-of like if I asked him whether my shoes matched my dress or whether he wanted to eat tacos food for dinner.

But this story is beautiful.  I wish others could see it, intricately stamped and burned into my soul like a tooled leather belt.  They will.  Years and years from now, they will.

Filed Under: Texas, Uncategorized, Writing Tagged With: , , , , ,

Letters to my agent

June 5, 2012 By

Dear Literary Agent,

I wrote a lovely novel, and I have no doubt you’ll clamor over your desk and spill your morning coffee just to reach the phone to hear all about it.  It’s about anonymous letters and love and friendship – tantalizing themes that have never before surfaced in the history of fiction.  I just know you’ll say yes.  I’m at the gym, so if I don’t pick up my phone just rattle off a message.

Love and kisses,

Me

Two months later. . .

Dear Literary Agent,

It’s the strangest thing, because I didn’t hear back from you.  That’s odd.  Did you get the World’s Greatest Manuscript as an attachment to the email I sent? Oh, wait.  Maybe it’s because I work on a mac and it didn’t convert.  And if you’re like all those other fancy-pants agents, you’re probably just on an extended vacation to Italy.  I’ll await your reply, about how much you love my writing and want to meet up for tea.

Best,

Me

Six months later. . .

Dear Literary Agent,

It’s me again!  I never so much as received an out-of-office message, or a rejection, or a kind brush-off from you, so I don’t know if you received my novel or it landed in some spam slush pile, never to be revived.  I can’t possibly imagine that four years of my life were wasted, and that you read it but didn’t actually like it. That’s so absurd I’m cracking myself up!  See how good I am at humor?  Well here’s to perseverance.  I’ll try and track down your personal cell phone number and pretend I’m you at the dog groomer to get your home address.  Toodles!

Me

Two years later. . .

Dear Literary Agent,

You didn’t have to get a restraining order, for goodness sakes.  That was a bit extreme.   I was only papering your front lawn with the pages of my manuscript so you’d notice me.  So you’d read my words.  So I wouldn’t be invisible. I love what you did with your spare bathroom, by the way.  White subway tile is really a good choice regardless of your personal style.  And the towels were so nice and thick. Were they Ralph Lauren?  I know I wasn’t technically invited in, but I just really needed to pee so I found an open window.  But we’re old friends, right?  So why in the world did you find it necessary to send me all those strange legal documents about keeping fifty feet back?  What’s that all about?

Me

Well into the future . . .

Dear Literary Agent,

As it turns out I did need all those medications you suggested.  Thanks to your referral to the police, the mental hospital, moving, and for changing your identity.  Finally, I sought the help I needed.  I’ll never again send you a manuscript, because I clearly see now that you don’t appreciate my writing style.  I know it’s not me, really, but it’s just my genre’s really not your thing.  That being said, I do have a project in mind that I’d love to tell you about sometime, if you’re willing. I can tell from your silence that you’re dying to hear more.

You know what’s odd?  This email bounced back the first time I tried to send it, like the address doesn’t work anymore.  What’s up with that?  No worries.  I’ll figure something out.  You know, I might just try another agent.

Filed Under: Humor, Uncategorized, Writing Tagged With: , , ,

brown paper stories

May 16, 2012 By

I hate to use the word artist to describe myself.  I’m not covered in tattoos and don’t work a night shift at IHOP.  I’m not struggling to make ends meet, recovering from a drug habit, or walking around with paint on my elbows.  I’m a lawyer, for goodness sakes.  The amount of artistry it takes to craft a well-rounded, persuasive argument is only appreciated by a select few.  To everyone else, lawyers are just suits whose mouths open and shut and money comes funneling into their pockets every time they answer the phone.  As if.

But even now that I’ve made a conscience decision to walk away from practicing law, it’s hard.  Hard to call myself a writer.  Hard to create things simply for the pleasure of creating them.  I feel a need to aim that ambition, the same one that fueled me through honors classes and bar exam courses and clerkships, directly into the heart of the creative process.  It’s not good enough just to write.  Any fool with a laptop can do that. I need to be validated.  I need to be paid.  I need for this to mean something.

But art is subjective.  What makes one person laugh or cry or want to call their mother might be pure drivel to another.   My husband read a blog post once that I found particularly emotional and decided to point out an inverted quotation mark.   Thanks, dude.  Glad that hit you right there in the ticker.

When I was writing my novel, I stayed up into wee hours of the night pouring my heart into the story.  I went away for writing weekends.  I traveled to Upstate New York and rode cabs alone in Manhattan and hired babysitters in the stale Texas heat just to finish.  It took almost four years of painstaking rewrites and hundreds of deleted pages.  An editor helped me comb out the background narrative and useless rookie mistakes.  But then, I expected my hard work to pay off.  I would find an agent.  I would get published.  My words would matter.  

And yet here I sit, after putting two children to bed and wiping off kitchen counters and throwing in yet another load of whites.  I don’t have the look of an artist, sitting here in black-rimmed glasses and an oversized t-shirt, with a box of triscuits and a jar of peanut butter by my side.  I instead resemble a slightly-crazy person, ignoring reality and doing what I didn’t think possible:  I’m giving in to my instincts. I’m not published.  I don’t have tangible validation.  And yet I keep on going because I simply cannot imagine a world in which I have to stop.  I put my hands over my ears when that small little voice starts screaming in my head.  No one cares.  Quit while you’re ahead.  You’ll never make it as a writer.  Damn you, little voice.  You are meaningless.

I thought perhaps I’ve not been praying enough, or listening enough, or being present enough in this writing process.  I stopped myself tonight, standing right in front of the microwave, and prayed that God would reveal to me the best path.  How I should be reaching people.  Or perhaps learning not to care so much about what those people think.  After all, I can’t move mountains.  My name might not be in marquee lights. But I can certainly speak with passion – words driven straight from the heart that was formed and blessed by God in my mother’s womb.  My heart is ravenous with emotion.  My soul is aching to be heard.  My hands tremble at the thought of writing about sadness and joy in a way that has never been done before.

And then it comes to me: God’s listening.  I create simply for the joy of creating.  My words are an offering and a sacrifice, and I can imagine no other audience that matters more.

I am an artist. I offer up these small gifts, my brown-paper stories filled with sparkling words.  And that matters, even if no one else is paying attention.

Filed Under: Inspirational, Religion, Uncategorized, Writing Tagged With: , , , , ,

Pioneer daydreams

April 20, 2012 By

I often daydream that someone from the pioneer days transported through time and landing in our modern culture.   One random Tuesday, they were strapped to the plow, or making hotcakes, or shucking peas, and the very next minute they are sitting in the front seat of my Chevrolet Tahoe, next to gum wrappers and sippy cups, confused and bewildered that we are whizzing down a paved road at sixty miles an hour.  I pat them on the hand and say “Welcome, my dear friend, to 2012. This is how we roll.”

In this quirky daydream of mine, I’m a time traveler interpreter, explaining to this person how modern society can be found wearing pajama pants at the grocery store, or that fried potatoes can be purchased in little stick form while waiting in our vehicles and sitting in a long line, handed to us though a little window by someone with a bad attitude and a nose ring.  I show them pictures on my iphone while we’re stopped at a red light and take them to Kerbey Lane for omelets.

While others think I’m doing something productive while waiting in the carpool line, like listening to a book on tape or praying for wisdom, I’m actually explaining to this mythical traveler friend of mine how we got to this place.  What has changed for the better through the decades and what, sadly, is left hollow and empty.

Most often I invite this person to visit when I see something strange, like when I’m driving in West Texas through a field of wind turbines or when I hear some random lady at Starbucks order a doubly-dip-mocha-frappylicious with two shots, served at 130 degrees. What would they think? I swear.  It’s as if we have developed an entirely new language.  Supersize it.  Facebook.  X-box.  Oscars.

It might not be normal to have imaginary friends visit from the 1870s.  But then again, we live in a strange place and time.  Someone should peer through the window, rub away the dust, and see what society is doing with all this modern progress.   Are we moving forward, or just faster, toward our own level of insanity and sugar and money-fueled depression?   I like the idea of living in an era that’s filled with reading, and singing, and being happy to get a stick of candy in one’s Christmas stocking.

But strangely, I don’t feel the need to be transported to their world.  I kinda like the fact that they show up here, and I can brag about how we get to ride on airplanes and order strawberry smoothies at Jamba Juice.  I can imagine what it’s like in their world, the rising with the chickens.  All that scrubbing and baking and weeding.  There is no popcorn at the movies or trips to Maine.  There are no girl nights or glasses of wine.  No nail salons or highlights.  And a life without any make-up or sparking water?  No Advil or paper towels?  Their days would be filled with mosquitos and chores.  Itchy bonnets and eerie solitude.  Any era that required you sleep in the same room with your children I’m not going to live in.  My vote’s on air conditioning and king-sized beds.

I think there must be a blend of the two worlds.  A little hot and a little cold, folded together to form a peaceful haven.  This is the world I want to live in.  The slow in-between.  A world where the strange is put in perspective, the bonnets are left in the closet, and children have room to roam the wide open spaces of our modern lives.  And at the end of the day, we rest easy in our down comforters, thanking God for grocery stores and gas-powered engines.

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sore backs and sunburns

April 3, 2012 By

This past weekend, our family decided we’d do something practical.  Worthwhile.  Healthy.  We decided that two adults and two children under the age of six could so totally build a garden large enough to feed a small nation.  With extra-high raised beds.  And dirt that needed to be shoveled in truckload at a time.  Of course we had no experience with this, but that’s never stopped optimistic folks like us.  How hard could it be?  Well, for starters, here’s the expanse of land in our back yard we started with.

There’s like, trees in the way that required complete removal.  And prickly weeds.  It was supposed to be hot and I had emails a-waitin.  But I didn’t want to be a game killer, so I went inside and put on my best “let’s build a garden” ensemble while wondering if we could break for an early lunch.  Maybe a picnic?  Sun tea?  But our son was totally into it.  He was all “dude, hand me a rake.  I’m all over this.”  Of course he’s not yet two, so he tires out easily.  And his version of helping is dragging things around and jumping.  He was always screaming for water and has the audacity to need things like snacks and clean diapers.  We really have no use for him.  But he is so adorable all covered in dirt that we let him hang around anyway.

And yes, that is a drink kuzi on his arm like a power shield. I have no idea how kids come up with these things.

Finally, we ask our daughter to help out.  After all, the reason for the garden to begin with was prompted by her school’s insistence that we do a family project.  A project which is due in two days and has not yet been detailed in any way.  A project that must be crammed together by tomorrow night on a poster board, complete with one-hour photos.  “Can you at least act helpful?” I asked. “For the pictures?”  She sat there scowling at me with flushed cheeks, begging to go inside and play with her dolls.  Finally, after screwing in exactly one board and raking some dirt, she claimed her exhaustion was simply overwhelming.  When we ignored her, she finally just disappeared.  We assumed she was safe since we didn’t hear screaming, and she later reappeared to obtain permission to eat a Popsicle.  She was really a helpful addition to our powerhouse labor team.

So after we hauled and hammered and leveled for two solid days (my husband really did most of the work.  I got tired and needed water breaks and had to deal with diapers), we finished.  Here it is before we decided to use our superhuman strength to fill all the raised beds with dirt.  I am learning to hate dirt.  Why is there a need for so much freaking dirt?

The next time we decide to tackle a project regarding overall health and wellness, we should make smoothies.  Or recycle even more.  After all, we can buy spinach at the grocery store, and all we got outta this deal is sore back and sunburns.  But at the end of the day,  I looked at my two little people, and decided that it was good.  Good for them to get so dirty.  Good for us all to be together.  Good for us to show them that work is hard, and bounty doesn’t come from nothing.

Here’s to good.  Here’s to our first garden ever.

Here’s to fresh spinach and cursing over hail.

We really are country folk now, I suppose.  Lord help us.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

diamond dust

April 2, 2012 By

I am no stranger to eye surgery.  I’ve had so many of them you’d think it would be easier just to rip the thing out and replace it with wood puddy.  I’m sure all eye cancer survivors are familiar with this feeling. But the last one was different.  It could have been because I was at a different place.  Or used a different surgeon.  Or, quite possibly, it could have been the fact that I was awake the entire time.

It all happened in a blur – the doctors telling me that I had a cataract that simply must be removed, that my eye was dangerously close to exploding with excess pressure, that my retina would forever be damaged.   The procedure had to be done sooner rather than later or face rather ugly consequences.  But I was pregnant – over six months so – and I didn’t want to do it.  But there I was, faced with the choice of having surgery while pregnant, IV drugs and anesthesia seeping into my son’s developing little brain, or waiting as each long day stretched on to see if my eye would blow up like a defective bomb.  Did they think I’d risk anesthesia drugs when I wouldn’t even eat feta cheese for fear my unborn child might get botulism? That’s crazy talk.

So I asked the logical question.  Can I do it without anesthesia? After all, Lidocaine would numb up the eye so I couldn’t feel any pain.  Right?  “Uh, I guess,” the doctor said.  He said he had a heart patient once that couldn’t have anesthesia or his heart would stop, and that guy lived.  This was his one eclectic example.  Awesome.

But on the day of surgery, it wasn’t a joking matter. A much older nurse walked in and repeated that I was to have eye surgery with only a small amount of IV anesthesia.  “You are mistaken,” I said loudly (how did I know she wasn’t actually hard of hearing?).  “No anesthesia,” I said.  “None at all.”

Another nurse came in to start an IV, which is apparently a requirement whether you have drugs or not, and we all listened with a fetal heart rate monitor to my little boy, kicking and spinning happily in my belly, oblivious to the word outside the womb. Finally, I saw the surgeon.  But instead of assuring me that this would be fine and my decision to go IV-free was a noble one – he thought it might be wise to let me know that moving, even a slight bit, could have disastrous consequences.  I didn’t find this little lecture particularly comforting.  Does one tell an astronaut that one false move might mean he’s forever thrust into the abyss of space, never to return to the life and family he knew?  Not helpful.  But there he goes, telling me to be still.  Like moving during awake surgery would be something I planned on doing.  “Can’t you tape my head down with duct tape?” I asked.  He snickered at that, which I thought was a perfectly reasonable request.  “Won’t do any good,” he replied.  “If you were going to move, no tape would hold you.”

Then, as my face turned to the color of copy paper, he told me that since my eye was full of oil (to hold up my tired and radiation-damaged retina), which is “not like normal folks,” it was also possible that his incision might cause the oil to come rushing out like slicing a hole in a water balloon, running into places it shouldn’t.  “That would be a real emergency,” he said.  He waits until now to tell me this? “Well let’s try to avoid that,” I said, seeing my husband out of the corner of my good eye kicking the floor.

Finally, I was wheeled to the OR.  Along the way, I was lectured by the anesthesiologist that at any time he would start IV anesthesia if I couldn’t handle the pressure, or got too anxious.  “I’ll be just fine,” I lied, thinking about oil oozing out of my eye and into my brain, laughing and dancing with freedom.

The temperature in the OR felt something like Alaska in the dead of winter, so they covered me with warm blankets.  They began to strap probes to my chest and someone stuck a breathing tube in my nose.  “What the heck’s that for?” I asked, but everyone was so busy they didn’t answer.  Then, I realized why.  After wiping half my head down with iodine, they stuck a piece of plastic down around my face with a hole in it in the center to expose the surgical field.  The rest seemed to cling like saran wrap and came down on all sides.  It now made perfect sense why all the nurses were asking me if I had claustrophobia.  I think perhaps I do, just a bit, when my face is covered in plastic so that the only way I can breathe is to assume oxygen is coming in through the tube in my nose.  Huh. Didn’t see that one coming.

 

So there I was, sucking down oxygen, my arms secured to my side with Velcro straps, waiting.  Dear Lord.  I just can’t do this on my own.  Finally, after a few shots of a numbing agent, the surgeon went to work.  I tried to imagine I was lying on the beach in Aruba the summer my husband passed his bar exam, the night we sat on the sand and watched the moon edge into the night sky.  I used those tips they gave you in yoga and childbirthing classes, relaxing and breathing in deeply.  I told God that this effort was for my unborn child, which should count for double, so maybe this thing could just hurry-on-up.

Then, I heard my surgeon ask the nurse for an instrument (I’m making up the words of the instruments since I don’t remember the exact medical terms).

“I need a 2.75 septical,” he ordered.  Pause.

“We have a 2.8 septical, Dr. Walters,” she said clearly in response.

“I actually need the 2.75,” he replied.  Suddenly I’m ripped from Aruba and I’m back in an operating room, feeling like I’m participating in my own nightmare.  I wanted to yell at the nurse.  “He wants a 2.75!  Give him what he wants, damnit!”  I was screaming on the inside. I thought I might be shaking. Suddenly, the nurse’s voice reappeared.

“Here it is, doctor,” she said, as she must have been attempting to hand it to him.  Another pause.

“Actually,” he said, “I don’t trust your instruments.  Can you rip open my emergency kit?” he asked someone in the distance.  “That one there, right by the door?  Reach in and grab by 2.75 septical.”

Of course, the emergency kit.  During surgery where I can’t move or my eye oil will come oozing out and bad things will happen.  And I’m freaking pregnant.  Does any of this shock me?  Of course not.  That’s exactly my luck. But I am usually not awake to hear about it.

Annnnnd, he was in my eye again, doing something important.  Suddenly, I was sweating.  Why was I covered with so many blazing hot blankets?  I couldn’t find the moon anymore. And my nose had a sudden itch that couldn’t be scratched.  After what felt like an hour, I tried to speak.  Being fearful that talking might make me somehow move, it sounded more like “whaddadon.”

“Well right here, I’ve got an instrument with diamond dust on the bottom,” he said, emphasizing the word diamond like it was supposed to be really impressive.  “I’m just doing a little scrubbing.  You’ve got lots of debris in here I’m trying to get rid of.”

“I sure like diamons,” I muttered through my clenched jaw.  He snickered at that one.

Eventually, it was over.  They ripped the plastic off my face, unhooked my arms, and let me breathe good ‘ol OR air without a breathing tube.  As I was wheeled back to the post-op room, where my husband was waiting, I felt strangely normal.  “Pretty easy,” I lied.

My son is two years old now, full of energy and strength.  He is a wanderer, my boy.  He likes to be outside, exploring and running and feeling the dirt in his hands. He is strong.  He is healthy.  He is perfect.  I use my eye to wink at him, my precious son, as he runs around the back yard with disheveled hair.  I have my hand on my hip, about to stir up a batch of brownies.

“Ya’ll be careful on that slide,” I’ll yell through the open window.  My heart is filled with a surge of love as I see him.

Diamond, or no diamond, I am so incredibly rich.  I am filled with so many blessings I feel like my soul might burst instead of mere oil.  I am lucky to survive.  I am lucky to be linked with such a strong, beautiful man.  I am lucky to have two children who take my breath away on a daily basis.

But truth be told, it’s not really luck.  I’d have run out by now given the comedies of my life.  I think instead it’s grace, and a love greater than one I’ve ever known. God was there then.  He is there now.  Guiding and holding me still when my body is full of tremors and doubt and fear.

Sometimes that love is too overwhelming for me to take in, like a basket full of diamonds twinkling in the light of the afternoon sun.  I sure like diamonds.  They remind me of things that are pure, and unchanging.  Things that last forever.

Filed Under: Eye, Health, Humor, Motherhood, Uncategorized Tagged With: , , , ,

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