Dance in the rain

Lightning

Never

Strikes twice-

So they say.

Caught in the

Deluge

Do we run for cover

Or shall we

Dance

In the rain?

The community of Magrath is mourning the loss of 4 teenagers today, following a tragic accident early Sunday morning. I admit to shedding a few tears when I read the newspaper article. My own sons are not much older & live in the same community, and it hit just a little too close to home. My heart has been heavy today, grieving with those families, and I longed to call my boys up, pull them close and tell them again how precious they are & how much I love them. I raised my face heavenward again and thanked God for keeping my children close in His perfect care. I am eternally thankful He granted me the blessing of them in my life, and I daily pray for their safety & well-being, especially my sons who are becoming men & beginning to make their own way in the world.
This tragedy got me to thinking, again, about how short & uncertain life can be. We worry and guard against illness and aging, but our days are numbered and there is little we can do to alter that hour. And so I think, perhaps, we should take note, and tell the people we love we love them. Tell our friends we appreciate who they are & what they add to our lives. Never waste an opportunity to let someone know they matter to us. Savour life, fall in love, dare to dance in the thunderstorm & chase the rainbow when the sun breaks through the clouds.

So, to you who I count among my friends, know today how much I love & appreciate you & all you add to my life. You are each a unique & precious treasure. I cherish you.

Belle of the Ball

To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour. (Wm Blake)

It has been an interesting few weeks, ego-wise. A week ago I ordered my first pair of progressive lens glasses….now, I’ve worn corrective eyewear since I was 10, and getting my first pair of glasses was nothing if not traumatic, but I have come to embrace them as fashion accessories & a part of my “look”. But having to face bifocals or progressives seemed to underline something my calendar & I disagree on-I’m getting older. Don’t get me wrong, I really have no problem with my age, or with aging at all, but I still don’t like reminders that the clock is ticking, especially since I feel like I just got to the party.

I was always a shy, quiet mouse, and I still like to maintain some anonymity but that being said I have also been having some fun enjoying my single status. I may have mentioned before that I have filled out a profile on a dating website, at first simply out of boredom & curiosity, but I have discovered I like meeting people, and have had some interesting conversations & made new friends, with people (ok , men) I wouldn’t have met otherwise.

A couple of weeks ago as I was changing at the gym, I smiled to myself, recalling an email I had just received, and the thought crossed my mind; “Funny, I had to wait all these years, into my 40s, to feel like the Belle of the Ball.” I had no sooner finished shaking my head at how preposterous that seemed when I “heard” that familiar whisper, reminding me “you have always been the beautiful belle at MY ball.” Now, whether of not I am beautiful is not the point here, that is truly in the eye of the beholder, but the truth is we all want to believe we are beautiful, special, admired, sought after….and to be honest there has been enough rejection in my life, in yours too, I’ll wager, to make you question it.

As I have matured, as I have stopped relying on others for my peace & my joy, I have discovered new confidence. Part of my email signature is a quote from Dr. Seuss, that reads: “Be who you are & say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter& those who matter don't mind.” There is truth in those wise words, not to discount discretion & tact, of course. Shakespeare wrote; “This above all, to thine own self be true And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man. (Hamlet Act I scene 3)” I used to joke about embracing my “inner nerd”, saying that I was never going to fit in with the “cool” or popular crowd (high school can be brutal) so I might as well create my own persona. And I did, but time & a critical partner eroded that until I lost myself.

But slowly I have been unearthing the girl I once was, allowing her to speak freely, letting the inner beauty of my unique self shine. I am not supposed to be like everyone else, I was “fearfully & wonderfully made” in the image of God. He gave me these gifts, this mind, this wit, and this body. Why should I not embrace it?

Jesus taught that we are to love our neighbour as ourselves. (Mark 12:31). I grew up being taught this profound truth, but was well past childhood & youth before it struck me that first we must love ourselves. Not in vanity or selfishness, but as a beloved child of God. If we do not love ourselves, but instead put ourselves down, refusing to see value in who we are & what we do how are we to appropriately and adequately love our neighbours? Truth is, we can't.

So, do me a favour. Go, take a long look in the mirror. Look deep in those eyes & see who God sees. You ARE beautiful. You ARE precious & beloved. Now say it. Go on, no one's listening.

Where the Road has led me

Standing alone here,

On this rocky shore

Your endless ocean,

Water lapping at my feet

The sun brightens

Grey sky’s foreboding

I shiver

Neither cold nor afraid

Breezes whisper

Forgotten hopes & dreams


I haven't had a lot to say lately, but it has been a time of peace & rest, as I have sought new things. And this is where the road has led. And so I have paused, with a choice-do I waver at the shore or do I plunge in?

So He said, "Come." (Matthew 14:29)

Adrift

Adrift,

On this River,

Rootless & untethered to shore or sky

Sun blazing overhead;

this feels like freedom

But when clouds gather...

sweet solitude becomes gnawing isolation

I reach for You-

Be my anchor,

My place to moor; A safe harbour in the coming storm

Capturing the Unicorn

I haven't written anything, in what seems like ages. I have begun many times, only to discard the results as the distractions of the day & my ever wandering mind create a muddled mess of my thoughts & words. I suppose I could say then, that life has been good, peaceful, steady, with no new crises to push me into a prayerful or meditative place. Then again, the steadiness of my days also means no grand adventures or startling revelations. My sleep has been deep and dreamless, my days filled with the monotonous business of living. We are in the midst of the last languorous days of August. In a week school begins again, and life will assume a new rhythm, and I find I am torn between wanting summer's lazy torpor to linger and longing for the structure & purpose that comes in autumn. (Maybe, though, that is just the eternal student in my heart, eager to go back to the business of learning)

In any case my heart still longs to write, even if the thoughts that dance behind my eyes refuse to let me find words to express them. Fear and doubt torpedo my ideas, and the more time that passes the more I manage to convince myself that returning to my writing should be some kind of genius, although in truth to me it is not so much what I write, but that I write. Like prayer the more I do the easier it becomes. On Sunday morning, at long last, the idea, the metaphor I had been wrestling with finally let me grasp it. I reached into my bag, retrieved pen & notebook and poured out the phrases-not the prose I had been unable to tame, but my surprising first love, poetry.

In a caragana bower, under a sun bleached summer sky,

Weaving a garland of goldenrod and sage brush,

Prairie grass and wild flowers;

The endless song of grasshoppers and killdeer, the murmuring breeze, the cry of the hawk,

Circling overhead

No maiden, I, but pure in heart

Waiting for that rare & elusive Unicorn,

Is it you? Is this finally the mythical beast, Resting in my arms?

Goodbye/Hello

Goodbyehello

It seems as though all my life

is letting go-

saying goodbye

Always endings, closing doors

Every hello tainted by an inevitable farewell

You stand behind me,

Murmur hello against my neck

Your arms around me are a promise

Reminding me goodbyes are blessings;

“God be with you”

A prayer until we meet again.

Closed doors mean opened windows

Hello, hello

My oldest son has been away, visiting his girlfriend for the past 3 weeks, but was scheduled to come home today. I noted with a wry smile his Facebook comment yesterday: "Packing sucks". and felt a twinge of sympathy for her this morning when her status lamented; "another adventure ends".

As I prayed for a safe journey for him I could not help but think that I have been saying goodbye to my sons for all of their lives; they were 1 & 3 when their dad & I split and not long after a judge deemed them better off in their dad's care.

My son is grown now, in the fall he starts university. Thankfully he will be starting here, at our local school, but he has been talking about schools further afield for some time now. I am infinitely proud of my smart and handsome boy, and I have always known, as mothers do, that one day he would leave and build a life of his own. But I am not ready. I have had so little time with him, to teach him the things he needs to know to truly be a success. From the first moment I held each of my children and said "Hello" we have been moving toward these goodbyes.

Goodbye is a bittersweet word. I am one to linger at the door, unwilling for a visit to end, to always have something more to say on the phone. I have said goodbye too many times, although in most cases there has been opportunity to say hello again. It's been more than 25 years since I left my dad enjoying his breakfast on a Sunday morning not realizing it would be my last chance to say goodbye. I miss him still.

It's interesting that "hello" has little etymological meaning. Other languages' greetings seem to translate to "good day" , but goodbye was once "God be with you", a blessing, a prayer against the dangers faced in the world.

My subject matter may sound a little melancholy, especially for a beautiful summer day. I am not at all feeling melancholy. August has just begun, but summer has reached its halfway mark. The days are growing shorter, soon the routine of a new school year will begin. Change is in the wind, I can feel it. I have never been one to embrace change, but I am learning to, to see it as an adventure rather than a trial.

As I was considering goodbyes this morning I realized while every hello is inevitably followed by a goodbye, every goodbye also leaves us open to new things. Saying goodbye to friends who are moving to a new stage in their lives, be it physically or metaphorically creates a space for new friends to come in and enhance our lives. For me saying goodbye to unhealthy marriages allowed me to rediscover myself to say hello to a new adventure, to new relationships.

As I thought about how the losses, the goodbyes, in my life have opened the door for new, and often unexpected blessings, I was reminded too that there is one hello, that will never end in goodbye. When we say hello to Jesus as our saviour He promises to never leave us or forsake us-to never say goodbye. Hello, forever friend, hello

Strike the Ground...

I've been thinking a lot about the things we ask for, whether we ask in prayer or by holding a hope or a dream in our hearts, or even the casual things we speak in "wishful" thinking. I have always been a dreamer, visions of palatial homes, adoring children, devoted spouse, friends gathered around my table filling my fantasies since I was in my teens. We all have our secret hopes & dreams, and the saddest realization of my adult life came when I was asked what I wanted and I could not answer. The pain & loss, the heartbreak I had suffered, that we all suffer, in living in a broken world had stripped my dreams from me. I was surviving, but I had forgotten how to dream, Worse than that I had begun to believe I didn't deserve the dreams I recalled in fragments. Somehow I had started to think everyone else merited happy homes with devoted spouses, family and friends, fulfilling careers, all of the good things our hearts were designed to long for.

I cannot begin to tell you how often I have stamped my feet and shook my fist heavenward in frustration; crying out for it to be "my turn". I never expected life to be fair, but neither did I
expect to so often feel passed by. It is a strange dichotomy, believing God is a Father who longs to pour out the blessings of heaven on me, and still believing I've been overlooked & forgotten.
As I write this I find brought to mind the image caught in my mind's eye last spring. I don't recall just what I had asked to be shown, but I saw a huge chest, the kind we often associate with pirates. I reached tentatively into that chest and chose a few items to adorn myself...and suddenly the contents of the box were being poured out over my head, piling up at my feet, more than I could ever have imagined or hoped for.

I wonder sometimes if we, even once believe God wants to give us the desires of our hearts, think we should (there's a word we could lose, "should"-but that's another post) only pray for BIG things-health & healing, world peace, the big ticket stuff, not our everyday needs & longings, as though God only cares about the so called important things. If He knows when a sparrow falls, knows the number of hairs on our heads, why would he not care that we ache for a companion, for jobs we find satisfying, for things beyond our daily bread. Why are we satisfied with enough, or good enough, when the abundance of heaven is ours?

Yesterday I was reading a passage in 2 Kings 13:15-19:
¹⁵ And Elisha said to him, “Take a bow and some arrows.” So he took himself a bow and some arrows. ¹⁶ Then he said to the king of Israel, “Put your hand on the bow.” So he put his hand on it, and Elisha put his hands on the king’s hands. ¹⁷ And he said, “Open the east window”; and he opened it. Then Elisha said, “Shoot”; and he shot. And he said, “The arrow of the LORD’s deliverance and the arrow of deliverance from Syria; for you must strike the Syrians at Aphek till you have destroyed them.” ¹⁸ Then he said, “Take the arrows”; so he took them. And he said to the king of Israel, “Strike the ground”; so he struck three times, and stopped. ¹⁹ And the man of God was angry with him, and said, “You should have struck five or six times; then you would have struck Syria till you had destroyed it! But now you will strike Syria only three times.”

As I read it a again it occurred to me that we do what the king was doing, asking, in ignorance for "enough", when we could have asked for so much more. I pray differently now. Many of the deep desires of my heart are still so deeply buried they may as well be forgotten, but I have asked of my Father, who knows all that I be given these things too-and sometimes I find myself with some wonderful gift in my grasp, and I realize that I had no idea it was just what I had always wanted until it was mine.

Are you bold enough to "strike the ground" beyond what seems reasonable? I am.