Henri Nouwen's Hope

If ever a place could steal my heart away from my Texas homeland, it is the mountain range opposite the Windegg Inn, in the countryside high above Innsbruck, Austria. Last summer in the middle of the college tour we chaperoned, after experiencing London's Tower, Shakespeare's cottage, Paris' Eiffel Tower and the Louvre, our tour bus climbed the quiet hills and negotiated the narrow hairpin turns into the Austrian countryside that led to the inn. We were transported from the marvels of man to the marvels of God that sunny afternoon.

Across from the inn was a small chapel, above the inn a pasture with belled sheep. Across the way was a mountainside chalet. Uniting everything was the lush green carpet of grass interspersed with wildflowers.

And the mountains.

My eyes and my soul were drawn to the mountains. I wanted to drink in the ever changing display of light and clouds. I just could not get enough. It was difficult to close my eyes to sleep that night. My soul was overwhelmed with delight.



"I lift up my eyes to the hills— where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth." Psalm 121:1-2 New International Version

It was such a gift to be there, I wanted to share it with you.

Have a refreshing day of rest.

It's Alive, It's Alive!!!!

After what has seemed like an interminably harsh winter, Spring has finally arrived at Iron Acres. How do I know? Well, there are certain signs to look for, our own regional harbingers of new life.



The absolutely first thing to bloom in our part of the Frozen North is snowdrops. Our neighbor catty corner to us (southern directional term meaning her house is diagonal to ours and across the street) has snowdrops planted around her mailbox. Dear Miss Alice is gone now, but these clusters of delicate, tiny drops of white at her ancestral home are a fitting and hope filled memorial.






Then there are the new shoots of daffodils emerging, promising a second wave of blooms. The ones planted close to our concrete foundation on the south side seem to burst through ground and bloom first. I think the concrete holds and reflects the sun's warmth. This is the perfect place for the modest greenhouse of my dreams. I just haven't had the heart to dig up the peonies behind the daffies to make way for the greenhouse.



Today we experienced the warm bracing high of thiry-nine degrees fahrenheit, (we're having a heat wave!!) accompanied by blue skies and cottony white clouds.



Quite a contrast from the dreary dull grey of a few weeks ago.



The maple branches in the front yard are pregnant with swelling buds that will soon turn into green leaves.



Last but not least is the sound of peepers. Peepers (also called pinkletinks on Martha's Vineyard and tinkeltoes in New Brunswick, Canada according to Wikipedia) are tiny frogs whose breeding season begins in March. The saying around here is that winter is officially over once peepers have been heard three successive evenings. The mating call of the male frogs can be both delightful and cacophonous, depending on their concentration in the area.

My Dear Professor and I went out for our weekly date night last night and were talking about how much we both enjoyed the sunshine and relative warmth of today. I wondered if the hope and joy that Spring brings can be as fully appreciated by "sunrise-ers" (younger folks whose future lies before them) as it is by "sunset-ers" (older folks whose retirement lies before them).

This I do know. Spring is a good thing. And I am so grateful it is finally here.

The Holy Grail of 1956

News flash!!! The Godzilla like rubber monster of economic crisis is threatening Girl Scout cookie sales!!!

Iron Acres is a Girl Scout free zone. Not by choice, I just don't think the local scouts venture very far outside of Hooterville, even though Iron Acres is only 5 minutes from town. Hmmm. I haven't thought about Girl Scout cookies in a long time.
I really enjoyed my Girl Scout years, especially one certain cookie campaign. . .



The year was 1956. Every girl scout worth her weight in sandwich cookies was out to fill her sales quota to win the prize of a lifetime: an innocuous round green and white button with the numerals 56. Many a sleepless creative night must have gone into that idea. But it was a winner. At least in 1956. Try that today and you would get laughed out of your green and whites. This was an older, simpler time. A round tin button looked like the holy grail to a shy, awkward, tall 9 year old girl.

Keep in mind that if I had my dna tested it would come up completely void of the competition marker. I am genetically competition challenged, pathologically apathetic.

But this was different. It called forth something hidden deep in the abyss of my soul. I don't know why or how, but I wanted that button. Bad. REALLY bad. So bad that before the time was up I had palmed off 56 stinking boxes of stinking Girl Scout cookies to every relative, neighbor, or stranger who would answer the door and gaze down through my cat's eye glasses into my imploring dark brown eyes.

With pity. Lots and LOTS of pity.

My reward for which I worked so feverishly, that round piece of tin and paint, is still in my possession. And my competition challenged genes quickly reestablished themselves in the decision making pecking order. That button taught me something about myself and life.

For one brief shining moment, I took on the impossible and made it happen. Okay, the neighbors and strangers and family made it happen. But I committed myself to something big, for me, and saw it through successfully.

It also taught me that I didn't want to be a door to door sales person when I grew up--an important fact I forgot until AFTER my Junior Achievement experience in high school. But that is a story for another day.

Gourmet Chefs and Girl Scout Cookies , Girl Scout Cookie Sales in Jeopardy, Vintage Girl Scout

How Iron Acres Got Its Name

It truly amazes me how life imitates art. Take for example Iron Acres. It was named after the 60s sitcom Green Acres, which was about a couple from the city who long for the peace and quiet of the country only to find chaos. I never watched the tv show when it was on the air. I was in my high school intellectual stage and above formulaic physical comedy. I really wish I had paid attention.

I was raised in a big city in Texas. Now, when I say big city I really mean it. Population was about 2 MILLION. A BIG city. With freeways and rush hour traffic and all that.

My Dear Professor was raised in a small south Texas town. Population about 3 HUNDRED. By small I mean everyone knew everyone. You were not allowed the extravagance of anonymity.

We met, fell in love, and married in the big city. But when I was in that intellectual phase in high school I longed for country life. I had a picture of the country as bucolic bliss, that is, until Truman Capote wrote that book about the two guys who murdered a whole family on a Kansas farm. After that I decided the big city was fine, thank you very much.

Shortly after we had purchased our country paradise in the Frozen North, but before we moved here, I had the chance to watch an episode of Green Acres. My eyes were opened. I had a sense of dull forboding about the move. Then we unpacked and that foreboding became a reality.


(that's me on the porch, and my Dear Professor showing off the mule)

Everything was fine until the night I drew a bath and to my horror saw the tub fill up with tomato soup. The tip off should have come when we were shown the small array of tanks and filters and pumps and injection systems that stood between the water as it came into the house from the well and the spigot in the kitchen. But I was young, relatively speaking, and inexperienced and didn't realize that the presence of a miniature municipal water treatment plant in the basement translated to something was SERIOUSLY wrong with the water coming out of the well.

Since then I have had a crash course in water treatment and we have dug a new well, which is a trip in itself--have you ever had a conversation with someone who does "water witching" for green fees at the local municipal golf course? We have also made peace with the, ahem, eccentricities of country living. One of the annual rituals of Spring is skunk breeding season.

Anyway, just for grins and nostalgia's sake, I was surfing the net the other day and caught bits and pieces of an old Green Acres episode. I was stunned by the comparisons between that series and the life we now live:

Green Acres Cast of Characters vs Iron Acres Cast of Characters
a highly educated lawyer--check (in his former big city life, my Dear Professor was a lawyer)

a domestically challenged exotic and fashionable wife--check(well, at least the domestically challenged part)

eccentric neighbors--check(I guess I haven't told you yet about the woman at the end of our road who unsuccessfully tried to electrocute her husband by rewiring the washing machine)

locals wary of anyone with a college education--check(this is coal country, anyone who has a white collar is automatically suspect)

a highly evolved pig--check(a friend has a highly evolved sow named Spots whom I have attended in birth twice--the sow, not the friend. Baby piggies are SO cute!)



The resemblance is uncanny. I never realized we were living in Hooterville!

(Is it just me, or do you hear the theme from Twilight Zone playing softly in the background?)

My Dear Professor

Remember Tolstoy's three questions? Did you take on the challenge?

The one closest to me that day was my Dear Professor. My favorite photograph of him is this 30 year old portrait with his Dad and his firstborn son. Three generations of men. It's my favorite because my Dear Professor tends to get very self conscious in front of a camera. He says it is PTSD from too many Christmases trying to shield his eyes from the glare of the stadium lights his mother used to take silent movies of her precious son and daughter. He understands, along with Brangelina and all the other famous couples, how worrisome the paparazzi can be.

Only in his case it was the mamarazzi.

And she could be every bit as determined to get the shot as the camera wielding madmen on the hunt for a photographic pound of celebrity flesh!



I truly love this photo for my Dear Professor's total lack of his own self awareness, his emotional nakedness, a glimpse of his soul through the perfect alignment of his eyes, the camera lens, and my eyes. His tenderness for his firstborn.

It will always be a special moment for me.

A few days ago we were enjoying a deep conversation. Deep conversations are a new experience for us both. We lived together far too many years, each immersed in our own concerns, living parallel lives. The story of how that changed I will save for another day. But change it did, about four years ago. We are only now beginning to understand ourselves and each other and discovering a treasure there.

This is a recent picture of my Dear Professor, book in hand.



I love this picture just as much as I love the other one, but for a different reason. My Dear Professor loves reading as much as I love watching movies. For many years I did not understand how his quest for truth and understanding are an important part of who he is; that in dismissing that, I was failing to appreciate the man he is.

There was a time when I could truthfully say that this man, this partner of many years, my anchor, my love, would have a difficult time having to choose which to save first out of a burning building, his books or his wife.

I can say that no more. In the newness of our 31 year relationship I know that he loves me more than his books. And I love him, his mind and his desire for truth more than . . .

Texas.

The Wearin' O' the Green

Spring is tentatively advancing on the Frozen North, so it seems rather appropriate to celebrate a holiday whose traditional color is green at a time in which Yankees begin to see that color again on the landscape.

Although I am not Irish, nor have a desire to don a green 'fro or flashing green necklace or down some green beer, I am grateful for the influence of St. Patrick on the spiritual traditions of western civilization.

I've never been to Ireland, but that hasn't stopped me from appreciating that wonderful country's music. It began early in my life. My mother sang the "Irish Lullaby" to me as an infant. It was the only lullaby she ever sang.

In the 60s at the height of the folk music craze I discovered the music of the Clancy Brothers in the beautiful love song, "Will Ye Go Lassie, Go?"

Lucky Charms cereal and Irish Spring soap aside, Ireland has always fascinated me. Its people have managed to weave beauty out of sorrow, and still maintain a healthy sense of humor. My current favorite music from the Emerald Isle comes from Robin Mark, a worship leader and songwriter from Belfast.

Of course, I would be remiss for leaving out the Muppets version of Danny Boy;

or an old Gaelic Blessing:

Deep peace of the running waves to you.
Deep peace of the flowing air to you.
Deep peace of the smiling stars to you.
Deep peace of the quiet earth to you.
Deep peace of the watching shepherds to you.
Deep peace of the Son of Peace to you

or a glimpse of the magical green country that inspires the poet's rhyme and the singer's tune:

It's Because I Wheeze

My mother wheezed when she laughed. My sister iPodite and I took great delight in pointing that out. Actually, the sound of her laughter would produce even louder, unrestrained cackles from us. Sometimes the hilarity reached such a high that it produced a mad dash for the special room in the house with porcelain fixtures.

That was back in the day when only one special room with porcelain fixtures was considered necessary in a house. (hmmmmm--interesting choice of words.)

I say that to say this. I now wheeze when I laugh. I don't know if it's due to cleaning out the chicken coop once too often without a face mask, or mixing caustic soda and bleach for the water system, or just a natural part of, ahem, aging. I wheeze.

And my dear Principessa takes great delight in pointing it out. In fact, she enjoys producing it. Often. At least once a week she calls me and asks, "have you checked out icanhascheezburger lately?" (note: for those who may be reading this from Mars, icanhascheezburger is a mindless website full of mildly to hysterically funny, captioned pictures of various and sundry animals.)

Thereupon the usual answer is no, and we are off to the computer to view an endless number of cute kitty pictures with often humorously misspelled quotes. She says it's funnier when she views it with me.

That's because I wheeze.

I dare you not to.


see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Back in the Day

We will forever be indebted to the creators of the Star Wars films for giving us a new storytelling cliche, "a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. . . "

When I was a little girl growing up on the cutting edge technology of television, we still listened to radio. I remember one big event that brought them both together. One night the Walt Disney Show held a simulcast on radio and tv. That was really ahead of its time--BEFORE stereo, even!

Mom had a wonderful old RCA victrola cabinet that contained a record player, an am radio, speakers, and space on the bottom to store her 78rpm record albums. Her favorites were Jose Iturbi, Judy Garland, and classical music. I listened to all of it as a child, and loved every minute.

What I REALLY enjoyed were the Sunday morning broadcasts of the local newspaper comic strips. I can almost hear the announcer's voice as he gave the page number and began reading Red Ryder. Even after I learned to read for myself I still tuned in.

If you are feeling nostalgic, you can go to this website and create your own comic page which you can view on their site, by email, or rss feed. Here's a sample.

LITTLE LULU



B.C.

What's in a Name?

(NOTE: www.wordle.net generates literal word pictures from your text input. It's fun!)


Names are important. They tell us something about the namee. As young parents my Dear Professor and I took great care in the choice of appellation for our 3 children. We didn't want the little scudders to end up with a name too easily mocked. Son 2 proved himself so adept at the practice that he never called our cat the same name twice. For 15 years. (The poor thing went to its grave suffering from extreme identity confusion.) And this was the child who officially named the animal in the first place. [ed. note: Upon reading this, Principessa informed me that it was SHE who named the cat , NOT Son 2, although there are a host of other things for which he can take the blame.]

I "enjoyed" a succession of nicknames in my childhood. In elementary school it was Geronimo and Giraffe, the former being based on alliteration with my first name, the latter on the former as well as my 3 inch growth over one summer that left me towering over everyone. (if you are as confused as I am about the use of former and latter in a sentence see this.)

There must have been a fire sale on the name Judy the year I was born because in my high school class there were at least 3 and sometimes 4 of us. It was very confusing until some doofus singled me out to have the rare privilege of being referred to by my last name. That was my first year in high school. The second year my name became Queenie, based on my "regal bearing" rather than the fact that I was a supporting character in a Frank Capra movie about gangsters in New York City (Pocketful of Miracles).

When we moved to the Frozen North, all of our first names (with the exception of our firstborn whose name was comprised of only 4 letters) were reduced to the first syllable. Regardless of what that syllable was. Why do Yankees do that? Are they in too great a hurry to use the whole name?

The TV series Lost has raised nicknaming to a new art. One of the main characters has so distinguished himself by his expertise in this field that the series website offers a Sawyer nickname generator.

But the major crisis in naming comes the day your first grandchild arrives. What do you want that wonderful bundle of preciousness to call you? For the rest of your life. In PUBLIC. My confusion and indecision ended that day Beatiful Mommy came up with a good suggestion. She had noted my signature on emails and asked why not use that? Mommo it was.

And how on earth did I end up with the one nickname I actually picked out for myself, sort of?

As a joke. Our early computer games came with a short list of high scorers named after the Marx brothers. All their names ended with "o". The rest is history.

And for the record, as any grandparent will attest, it really doesn't matter WHAT your grandchild calls you. It is enough that they call.

Oh Be Careful Little Eyes What You See

I never cease to be amazed at what can be found on the internet. After writing about Uncle Wiggily the other day, I did a search on Howard Garis, the author, which led to a wonderful website full of old illustrations and cartoons. How old? Well, certainly older than ME!

Of course, one thing ALWAYS leads to another, and I ended up at a flickr page devoted to my other favorite children's book:


My copy is just as lovingly worn as this one, and I remember every picture. While watching the slideshow of the book, I suddenly became aware of the how its illustrations have shaped my idea of the perfect home and the perfect life. Kinda scary, isn't it?

Here I am fiftysomething years later in the country on a small farm that has been home to many of the animals with whom Mr. Flibberty-Jib held conversation. My desire for that lifestyle can be traced back to Mr. Flibberty-Jib. A glimpse of his white house with green shutters and climbing pink roses still touches something deep within me. It beckons me into the story and through that front door. I can smell Mrs. Flibberty-Jib's roast beef right now!

How many of my foundational assumptions about life and happiness were planted by something I saw as a child? A picture is a very powerful thing. Even now. Especially on the internet. We can see anything and EVERYTHING . . . instantly. Every now and then a search goes terribly wrong and we are thrust into the presence of something that gives new meaning to the term graphic violence.

What happens in the mind of a child who views internet images that their mind is incapable of understanding? What stories are they being beckoned into? How do we protect them? How do we protect that child still within ourselves?

"O be careful little eyes what you see."

Picture(c) 1947 By Gertrude Crampton, illustrated by Eloise Wilkins, www.pigeonderby.blogspot.com/2006/06/stinky-kids-books.html
 

The Three Answers

I am becoming increasingly aware that life in the most complete sense of the word is found in the little moments that are so easy to overlook--a child's request to have his picture taken, a glance at the stirrings of Spring outside my window, a walk in the park, the still small voice of my Creator as he persistently and lovingly pursues my heart.

Leo Tolstoy, the same Russian novelist who gave us Anna Karenina and War and Peace, also wrote several collections of short stories. One is entitled "The Three Questions". In that story, a king determines that he can cope with anything in life if he can answer three critical questions:

What is the best time to begin everything?
Who are the best people to listen to?
What is the most important thing to do?

After seeking and being disappointed by the wisdom of many scholars, the King turns to a nearby hermit. He comes to the hermit disguised as a poor man and spends the day helping in the garden. After a long silence, the hermit finally responds:

The most important time is now.
The most important person is whoever you are with.
The most important thing is to do that person good.

I have hopes of spending today in the awareness of these three answers.

Won't you join me?

Dear Aunt Gussie Plus Aunt Susie's Kittens Meet Uncle Wiggily

It's interesting how we each view our experience as normative. But to quote George Gershwin in Porgy and Bess, it ain't necessarily so. There is a Grand Canyon of differences in world view, culture, and language understanding lying (laying?) between my mouth and your ear. Or my monitor and yours.

As I may have mentioned before (wink, wink) , I grew up in Texas surrounded by two generations of the deep south (Mother and Grandmother, both Georgia gals). Their speech and that of my Dad, a native Texan, was peppered with all sorts of phrases that became commonplace to me. I used them often growing up but to this day, I must admit, I don't really know what half of them mean. If you can shed some light on this, please feel free to comment.

By the way, the comment section below is always open. Feel free to jump into the conversation anytime. I would love to hear from you. (hint, hint)

Mom's favorite phrase was a statement of commitment to a plan of action--"if it hair lips every dog in Georgia". I always figured (hmmm, I suppose the word figure is a figure of speech?) that meant there must be a passel(a whole lot) of dogs in Georgia, but as a child was uncertain that a bunch of hairy lipped dogs would matter all that much.

Grandmother was partial to (fond of) "bless your heart" and "ugly as home made sin". If someone was as ugly as home made sin, I suppose their heart needed to be blessed. Of course, because of my tender years I never was educated as to what home made sin was in particular. I could only guess. And did that mean that manufactured sin was nicer looking?

I neither had an Aunt Gussie, nor an Aunt Susie, but they were always addressed when a stressful situation arose, as in, "dear Aunt Gussie plus Aunt Susie's kittens!". If I heard "Katie bar the door", I knew someone was in BIG trouble, hopefully my sister (hi, iPodite :) and not me.

My Dad, although of kind and gentle nature, gravitated toward the more violent phrases. I wish I had a nickel for every time he said, "for Pete's sake". Even in THIS economy I would be wealthy! I asked him once who Pete was, and why Pete should be so honored. He just smiled and shrugged his shoulders. When Dad was really perturbed about something he would query,"what in the Sam hill?" Again, we, or at least I, was neither acquainted with a Sam nor the location of his mystical hill.

Dad worked hard for a living repairing commercial laundry equipment and boilers. When the day's work was particularly difficult, he would describe his fatigue as "I feel like I've been rode hard and put up wet". That's a cowboy term(I think) for a well exercised, sweaty horse. If the horse is not properly cooled down, brushed, and blanketed before being stabled for the night it can develop some serious respiratory problems.

Take one imaginative child, give her a colorful language void of the raunchiness and violence of modern expletives, add a sprinkling of bedtime stories filled with Uncle Wiggily's Travels, a collection of the adventures of an elderly rabbit gentleman and the fanciful names of the creatures he encountered, and you end up with an adult that STILL thinks literally, and gently.

In case you did not have the privilege of accompanying the elderly rabbit gentleman in your youth, here is an excerpt from the end of one of his tales (no pun intended, really!)

"So that's all for the present, if you please, but in case my fur hat doesn't sleep out in the hammock all night, and catch cold in the head so that it sneezes and wakes up the alarm clock, I'll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily and the water lillies."

Any Questions?

Last summer my Dear Professor and I, along with other members of the faculty, had the privilege of chaperoning some 50 college students on a trip to Europe. It was a COLLEGE trip. There is a big difference in pace between a COLLEGE trip and a regular trip . . . for OLDER people . . . like my Dear Professor and I.

It sounded like such a wonderful idea, and it was. But as in most things, the devil was hidden in the details. What they failed to tell us was that this was a WALKING trip. It should have been described as a FORCED MARCH through Europe. My pedometer died the first day. Literally. It ran out of numbers.

The shear strength of will required to survive each day reminded me of our family trip to Disneyworld a few years ago. The Zombie like gaze and shuffle of the adults as we boarded the monorail to leave the park after a day of Walt's wonderful worlds is permanently seared into my visual memory, and not unlike how we must have appeared at the end of each day on that college trip.

The students were a delightful group of young people, the European countryside was gorgeous. I'm glad we went while we had the endurance to do so (and I will probably bore you to tears with the details on another day.) But what I really want to share with you now is the secret that helped fortify us for a day of foot torture and visual delight---Nutella.

Nutella is full of creamy, chocolaty, hazel nutty goodness. It is served as part of a continental breakfast, along with tea, wonderful hearty breads, and sometimes cheese and sandwich like meats. And I will admit to slipping a small packet or two into my backpack for our day trips. It was for survival.

Nutella has the power of the Aztecs to revive a faint maiden, er, matron in times of stress. When my steps would falter later in the day, Dear Professor would wave it under my nose much like the ammonia vials of old were used to revive the fainted.

Imagine my delight to discover this precious commodity can be found in your local supermarket (or at Amazon.com if you are into major acquisitions of the stuff.)

In gratitude for this wonderful chocolaty elixir of the European, and as a contrite act of repentance for not appropriately celebrating World Nutella Day on February 9, I offer the following public service announcement:

This is Nutella.
This is Nutella on bread.

Any questions?


Nutella picture couresy of Wikimedia Commons, © Christophe Jacquet, 2004

Memories Are Made of This

I identify a lot with Eve. It took me every bit as much work to convince my Dear Professor to admit an Atari console into our house as it did for Eve to convince Adam to eat that apple, or tomato, or whatever it was. That old Atari was an antiquated machine by today's standards (remember Pong?), but every bit as mesmerizing. Years afterward I can still see the image of my Dear Professor, the anti Atari poster boy, playing an extremely competitive game of Pac Man with Son 1 (and enjoying every minute!)

That was how it began. Through the years a succession of game machines have paraded through our household. All three of our brood--Son 1, Principessa, and Son 2--have enjoyed electronic gaming with each other and their friends. We even have the "I saved the Princess" patches to prove it! I tried to stay up with the kids, but fell far behind. Especially with the Civilization series. I just didn't understand the paradigm.

Then along came the Wii. I remember the first commercials and wondering, what on earth was that all about? I was as ignorant of Wii gaming as the powers that be are of how to fix our current economic situation. But there was hope for me on the horizon.

One summer, while visiting my sister, iPodite, in a land far, far away from the Frozen North, she suggested we do some bowling on her new game machine, a Wii. In my day I was a decent bowler, having been on a team in high school, so I said, bring it on.

The first task was to create my mii, my game character. That was a lot of fun. I could see this could be trouble. After a few warm up games of bowling and tennis I was hooked. The following Christmas our family gift was a Wii system. Life has not been the same since.

iPodite suggested we try a game called "Endless Ocean", one of the first "online" games for the Wii. I cannot tell you how many hours we spent, she in the land far, far away and me in the Frozen North, visiting each other's boat and diving together. And training our fishy friends, and discovering buried treasure, and riding WHALES! And learning about sea creatures we didn't know existed.

(yes, that's mii, with my dolphin friend--& I was nerdy enough to snap a pic for posterity!)

It was a lot of fun, and a wonderful bonding experience for two sisters who never really had much of a relationship until well into our thirtysomething year. Son 2, our resident gaming expert, turned up his nose at the mention of the Wii, calling it an "entry level system for old ladies."

But that was about to change. Enter the release of Super Mario Kart, a game that was a favorite of all our kids when they WERE kids. Son 2 sidled up to me one day last fall and suggested that Super Mario Kart was not a bad idea for a Christmas gift. Well, you can probably guess the rest.

We spent last Christmas together in North Carolina: me, Dear Professor, Son 1 and Beautiful Mommy, the Sprittles, Principessa, and Son 2. The highlight of that time for me, second only to the birth of Sprittle number 3 the day after Christmas, was the sight of our 3 grown children, plastic mini steering wheels in hand, playing Super Mario Kart with the older 2 Sprittles playing right along.

As Dean Martin once sang, memories are made of this.

Words

I think I have already warned you that I love words. Some words tickle my ear, some make me think. Others touch my heart. I REALLY like words that make me think or touch my heart. I call those "words with life" because they resonate deep inside me and set off an emotional response. They leap off the page grabbing my face in their hands as if to say, "this is important, you need to pay attention" like Son 2 used to do as a toddler when he thought I wasn't listening to him.

This is my favorite picture of Son 2. He was playing with his cars and said, "Mommy, take my picture." I am so grateful I was paying attention that day.



For a few years now I have been collecting quotes that I read in a book or hear in a movie. Words that grab my face and say, "you need to pay attention". I would like to share them with you, with the hope that they will encourage you as much as they have encouraged me.

You will find these little gems in the right column at the top of the page. I hope you enjoy them.

To paraphrase those noted philosophers of a bygone age, the Bee Gees, "it's only words, but words are all I have to give my heart away."

Freedom to Run

It is two weeks since I returned from my trip to North Carolina to visit Son 1, his beautiful wife, and our three wonderful Sprittles (grandchildren that is-- Boo, Bee, and Colonel Mustard). They are 4 years, 3 years, and just a tad over 2 months, respectively. Colonel Mustard, the baby's nickname, was conferred upon him one day by his older brother Boo while watching Beautiful Mommy change the Colonel's colorful diaper. I just love those Sprittles!

The point is that my small suitcase is still waiting to be unpacked. I don't know why I have such an aversion to unpacking a suitcase. Maybe it's because I'm incredibly lazy, or I am lacking a place for all the stuff that's in there. I accumulate stuff way too easily.

(Would you excuse me for a minute? I need to go unpack that suitcase, right now!)

I had the privilege of caring for my Dad in his final year this side of eternity. A few years before he came to live with us I noticed something strange occur. One day he started going through his stuff and giving or throwing it away. Although possessing the right hairline or( lack thereof), Daddy was no Mr. Clean. This was not normal behavior!

My sister and I went into an immediate panic--we were afraid he might find little meaning in some important family memento, and our meager inheritance end up on the curb with the yard trash. But we shouldn't have worried. When the time came to empty his house we found plenty he overlooked. (for example, he never met a screwdriver he didn't like. Or cameras or electronic gadgets. The man LOVED electronic gadgets.)

I think I am beginning to understand a little of what must have been going on behind Dad's urge to purge. Well into his eightieth year, he had left forty way behind and was almost down the other side of "the hill". Intuitively he felt the marching orders from his Creator had arrived, and like others of the Greatest Generation, he was obeying them without question.

In order to save his ebbing energy, he was unpacking for his final journey.

I believe our lives can be divided into three seasons. The first 40 years is spent in acquisition of experiences, achievements, and possessions on our upward climb of "the hill", everything we think will make our lives comfortable and happy. The second comes at the top of that hill, a chance to survey all we've accomplished and begin to sort through what is really important. It's there we identify all those non essentials our youthful inexperience had valued: the pretense, the fears, the volume of stuff we thought would make us happy but didn't.

The final season is one of increasing freedom as we jog casually down the hill we had struggled to climb, resting along the way to enjoy the view, our relationships, and unpack another silly encumbrance we had never before questioned. Like the caterpillar in its cocoon we are preparing to morph into a beautiful new creature no longer bound by the gravity of this earth. Caterpillars need cocoons and lots of food. Butterflies only need the flower's nectar and the wind.

I have a new appreciation for St. Paul's admonition in Hebrews 12:1(New International Version):

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."

And that's just what Daddy did. He let go of all this transient world views as important in order to firmly grasp the reality of the eternal world on his horizon. He was unpacking for the journey. It was his way of conserving his strength for the last leg of the race, marshaling every ounce of energy he had left for that final burst through the finish line.

Unpacking for his final journey gave him the freedom to run.

Keep the Change

There are all sorts of things associated with change--money, weather, culture, thinking, mood, marital status, seasons of life. The common element shared by all kinds of change is that, for the most part, we don't want it. We would rather life stay just like it is, thank you very much. Keep the change.

It's been like that for a long time. Just ask Columbus, the guy who was supposed to discover America only it was the Bahamas, (which is where I would like to be right now), or the Republicans(can't say Party, they're not in the mood for that at the moment), or the parent of a teenager with a new learner's permit.

We just don't like change. It's not comfortable. And the most important thing in life is comfort. Right?

But change is required for personal and societal growth. We must be willing to give away something good(or bad) in order to receive something better. Can you imagine what life would be like if we had said "no thanks" to Johannes Gutenberg's printing press, Thomas Edison's electricity, John Harrington's flush toilet, or Al Gore's internet?

There is a LOT of change swirling around our blue marble of a planet right now, not the least of which is in the realm of spirituality. Phyllis Tickle(author, scholar, and religion editor for Publisher's Weekly) has outlined some of that, as well as a lot of church history in a presentation entitled "The New Rose". The video is about 41 minutes long, but worth every minute. The ideas she offers in the realm of society and religion are important to ponder, whether you agree with her or not.

It all reminds me of an old Girl Scout song we used to sing, "make new friends, but keep the old; one is silver and the other gold." We need both silver and gold to get to the Bahamas. (And a boat. A nice BIG boat.)

I'd better keep the change.

Rocky Mountain High, Colorado

Third on my list of favorite things (statewise) is Colorado. If you have never been to Colorado you need to go. Right now. And listen to John Denver on the way.

Colorado is Rocky Mountain vistas, the Garden of the Gods, the Gold Rush and John Denver. In short, all sorts of awesomeness. Well, I wouldn't really call John Denver awesome, but he did write some nice tunes about Colorado.



If I were banished from Texas for the rest of my life, with no hope of reprieve, I'd run to Colorado. Better make that drive.

Colorado has the best skies next to Texas (and France).

Colorado is summed up in two words, (three if you count the article "the") the Rocky Mountains.

I grew up in Houston, Texas where the highest point of elevation is the top of the highway overpass. Flat, flat, and more flat. Below sea level flat. One might speculate that deprivation is the most efficient way of producing appreciation.

I really appreciate the mountains.

Mountains give me a new perspective. Mountains are breathtaking, literally. (Try hiking in the Rockies for 15 minutes and get back to me, ok?)

Mountains are just about the only entity(besides God) that is bigger than Texas. (Alaska doesn't count because it is mostly frozen water. Ask any Texan.)

I love all three. Mountains, God, and Texas. And not necessarily in that order.

What do you love?

Do Feminists Faint?

Do feminists faint? In this postmodern, equal opportunity, (insert appropriate contemporary cultural adjective here) world, do women hold the same sensibilities they did in the world of Tolstoy, Dickens, Austen, or Margaret Mitchell? Is today's woman made of harder stuff than their eighteenth and nineteenth century ancestors?

Name me one work of, say, Austen, or Dickens, in which an important female figure did not swoon upon the mention of a harsh word or at the news of their (insert appropriate male relationship term here)'s sudden death. Times up! Did you think of one? It's interesting to ponder.

Hollywood has forever etched the scene of a swooning Scarlet O'Hara on my feeble brain. In fact, somewhere in my brain's adolescent archives I think I equated fainting with femininity. That is, until I experienced that magic moment myself. As a teenager. In a high school biology class. No death or harsh words involved. Not even a lecture on reproduction. Just all out, utterly awful embarrassment.

I remember I was seated at my desk taking notes while the teacher was talking about . . .whatever. And then I was hanging over the side of my desk with my arms dangling. Neither Rhett nor Mr. Darby was anywhere in sight. The boy sitting behind me looked down and said, "are you ok?". According to him, it appeared that I was leaning over to get a book out of that little cave in the seat of the desk where you stored all your books instead of your locker because you were afraid you wouldn't have time to get back to your locker to collect your books before the next class. Sorry, for a moment I was back in high school English class reading those intricate and lengthy sentences with which George Eliot began Silas Marner. (I don't know if any of her female characters fainted.)

The teacher sent me to the nurse and the nurse sent me to our family physician who diagnosed me as having a bad cold and being dehydrated. He sent me home to rest and drink lots of water.

I am grateful that at least I was sitting down and spared the humiliation of falling ungraciously to the ground with my skirt (yes, Virginia, those were the days before the pantsuit rebellion) up over my head.

Real life is never as artistic as the novels or movies portray. Just painfully embarrassing. For at least 15 minutes.

More than Texas

As I scoured the internet for material appropriate to yesterday's celebration of Texas Independence Day, I had to stop more than once and recompose myself. (recomposing one's self is much easier and more likely than decomposing one's self.)

Brief bursts of homesickness(for Texas, of course) seem to come more readily the past few months than the previous 26 years of life here in the frozen north. Perhaps it is just a longing for spring after a very cold winter.

I tell my grandchildren that I love them more than Texas. Someday they'll understand.

One year, on our annual pilgrimage back to the promised land(Texas) from the frozen north(Pennsylvania), my Dear Professor, Sons 1 and 2, the Principessa and I visited the Hermitage, the Tennessee home of Andrew Jackson. Jackson was know as the first "working class" president, and his term of office saw many controversies.

What bothered him most however, was the one that surrounded his marriage to Rachel Donelson. She had been unhappily married to her first husband, Lewis Robards, who had petitioned the Kentucky legislature for permission to sue for divorce.

"Andrew and Rachel confused the permission to sue with an actual declaration of divorce. They married in 1791, not realizing Rachel was still legally married. Robards finally sued for divorce in 1793 citing Rachel's 'adultery' with Jackson. The Jacksons remarried in 1794, but the embarrassing and often malicious gossip persisted. Rachel Jackson died a few weeks before her husband's inauguration and Jackson blamed her early death on stress caused by the public discussion of their supposed immorality during the campaign." State Library of North Carolina

In the midst of the Hermitage's beautiful garden is Jackson's tribute to his wife Rachel, and what I remember most about our visit:

Her face was fair; her person pleasing; her temper amiable; her heart kind. She delighted in relieving the wants of her fellow creatures and cultivated that divine pleasure by the most liberal and unpretending methods. To the poor she was a benefactor; to the rich an example; to the wretched a comforter; to the prosperous an ornament. Her piety went hand in hand with her benevolence, and she thanked her Creator for being permitted to do good. A being so gentle and so virtuous, slander might wound, but could not dishonor, even death when he bore her from the arms of her husband, could but transport her to the bosom of her God.

I want to live my life in such a way that it would inspire a tribute like this.

And for my children and grandchildren to know that I loved them (and Jesus) more than Texas.