Noticing More Beauty

I was crying on the shoulder of a friend recently - the kind of friend who lets you enumerate your entire list of grievances but then makes sure you know all the responsibility to change belongs to you.  And so with her it is safe to tell of the recent strain between The Man and I. Nothing monumental, just all the little things lately - us both under the pressures of moving and babies and parenting struggles - that added up to the blanket statement, "I just feel like he has let me down." As soon as the words were past my lips, I was instantly transported back in time to the competition a few weeks ago at the ballroom. The junior dancers had no more than 120 seconds to impress the judges with their routines of precise footwork, elaborate twirls, and daring aerials. Each couple combined skill and risk to present a jaw-dropping performance. One particular display of Latin and high steps and red skirt included a maneuver where the male lead twirled his beautifully clad ...

My grandmother was dying, and I wasn't quite sure I was up to the task of enduring it. The hospice nurse came in and spoke to her, the one struggling for the breaths, "Good job, JoAnne, you're working at it." Then the aside to us, the daughter, and the three daughters of the daughter, "We labor to enter this world, and we must labor to leave it as well." And suddenly I saw it all differently. I sat with the baby in my lap (does one bring an infant to a deathbed?! - but bringing one twin meant the kids at home could manage the other, and so it was that one not half a year into life was there in the presence of death). The baby helped me see it. As I had labored to bring her and her partner-in-utero from the darkness of the womb in to the sunshine of that September day, so Grandma was laboring to leave this dark world and enter in to the light of her Savior's presence. And then I knew what we could do. We could take the lead of the hospice ...

Part one: I spend most of my time nursing these days, and the short gaps in between are difficult for me to fill with intentionality; but today I must, I must write and record in order to remember and learn. Such things are a shame to forget. "I miss you, Heavenly Father." I said it the way I tell The Man I miss him, after days of activities, needs, and busyness make me forget the feeling of "us." In fact, I said it to him recently as well. But this time when I said it to him, instead of a mere fact, it had guilt hiding in the undertones. Guilt because my days never seem to include moments to make him feel that he is the most important person in my life. And then when he greets me with an unexpected, "I love you," instead of feeling joy, I turn to guilt and disbelief. I have trouble believing that he still loves me unless my action seem to deserve it. And I discover I am trapped in works-based righteousness again. With my husband and with my Father. Do...

I have thought to write this over the years, but I have always chickened out. Today I will say it. I read a repeat of a heartbreaking headline yesterday: "Baby Suffocates in Hot Car." I can never read the articles; they are too awful. And I always feel horribly sick to my stomach. And I can't read them because after the article usually come the comments. The comments where perfect strangers to the people involved berate them publicly for being the worst of parents, neglectful monsters, and worthy of death or worse. I assume because you are all my friends that you have never (nor would) post any such thing in such an instance, but be honest, have you ever thought those things?! I'm here to tell you (and risk losing friends in the process) that if you've ever thought (or said) those things, you need to say them to me. No, I've never lost a child to suffocation in a hot car, but... I could have.  I could be the one being called those terrible names. When ou...

...after a conversation with my mother who taught me to appreciate it: When I taught the poetry class last fall, the curriculum described poetry, in part, as "compressed thought." And so it is. Good poetry, at least, prevents you from saying "getting rid of things" to propel you to a better word such as "eradicate." And then it challenges you to use it in conjunction with other works like "enumerate" or "predicate." All the while, demanding further restraints of dactyl or pentameter. It would seem, at first glance, that the number of literary requirements upon good poetry would make it almost impossible to achieve something noteworthy, and yet there are hundreds (thousands) of poems that exquisitely capture the emotions of universal moments better than entire volumes often do. Poetry expresses only what must be said about a topic and does it more eloquently. The constraints improve the product. And such is life - or can be... ...

As I overheard him reading theology (Wayne Grudem's Systematic) to a few of the kids yesterday, I was struck with the thought that I may have truly married a "man after God's own heart." Oh, he is certainly not the picture of perfection - I have lived with him enough years to know that. And yet... at the end of the day, Joshua wants God as much as anyone else I know. I have spent years looking over his shoulder, fearful of and judgmental over the things he has allowed himself to get caught up in; and at the same time, I have worked so hard to keep my own external image squeaky clean. But... If I take a step back and look at the heart of this man, he is every bit a David! His sins may be obvious and even egregious. He may even be able to ignore his own guilt for a time. But when confronted with the truth, his heart for God wins every time. Josh knows the closer he is with God, the farther he is from sin. And so, where I dabble in a relationship with God, ...

Rejoice always,   pray continually,   give thanks in all circumstances;   for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.  1Thessalonians 5:16-18 Always.... All... Really? Surely not! I got the diagnosis of Gestational Diabetes last week. I know it isn't a life-threatening condition. I know all traces of it will most likely fade as the babies emerge. I know I can produce healthy babies even in the midst of it. But... I don't want it! I've had six full term pregnancies with no hint of GD, and I don't want to be constrained by what I can and cannot eat. I don't want complications and blood draws (needles!!). I don't want labels that make me feel unhealthy.  But... When I reached for my list of things to give thanks for, the only thing I could think to write was Gestational Diabetes. Not one other thing could I shake out of the pen. Or perhaps I couldn't because I actually refused to write GD there. I wasn't thankful for it. I resented it. But....