forgive me. i'm not strong.

prepared for the storm.....

a sweet, young 24-year old friend of mine is facing a possible diagnosis of lung cancer. we are praying for a miracle. this is one of the recent email exchanges i have had with her cousin - a close friend who i've traveled with to bulgaria many times.

rhonda: as a result of this situation with Lisa, i went to the bookstore today to find some books on how to develop a better (more effective?) prayer life. jan

jan: That is exactly what the Lord has been speaking to me about (one of the many things). I have been amazed as I listen to Aunt Joyce (Lisa's mom) tell me how God prepared her in advance for this storm (He even gave her specific scriptures for this time); she did not know what the storm would be but He prepared her. That happened because she has a powerful prayer life. Joyce has such an intimate relationship with the Lord that she see God's powerful hand at work in and beyond this storm and she has that relationship because she spends time with Him. I love you friend. Rhonda

i am going to the hospital to visit lisa friday. i CAN'T WAIT to meet her mom!!

remember......

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden,
and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me,
for I am gentle and lowly in heart,
and you will find rest for your souls.
For my yoke is easy,
and my burden is light.

(borrowed from the new york henniroses.....and Jesus)

just give me a minute....

i was helping out in a class today and one of the three-year-olds had a meltdown. i mean a serious meltdown. that was why i was in the class. in anticipation of her daily meltdown. she fell apart and laid down on the floor beside the cabinets and kicked her feet and screamed and cried and yelled. loudly. whenever another child would approach she would yell a bloodcurdling yell and scream at the child to leave her alone! she screamed for her mama and her daddy and her granma and anyone else she could think of who might rescue her. the teacher quietly ushered the rest of the students from the room and i stayed behind. after a few words offered in a quiet voice, i finally convinced her get off the floor and pull herself together and rejoin her class in the hall.

i came home thinking that sometimes i want to do just what this little girl did. and i'm sure my daughter feels the same. that mentality of wanting what you want when you want it. and if you don't get it you stomp your feet, scream at the top of your lungs and lay down on the floor and flail and strike out at anyone who doesn't get it and tries to talk you out of your tantrum.

i so want things to be different for my daughter. i still want what i want. and i want it for her. and sometimes when it hits me in the middle of my daily routine that it isn't to be, i want to drop to the floor and have my tantrum right in the middle of carpool. and if i thought it would work, i'd do it. man, would i.

happy birthday, alyssa!

thirty-one years ago today our daughter, alyssa, entered this world - a beautiful baby with blonde peach-fuzz for hair. do you know that because of a strained relationship with my mother i had been in counseling for most of my pregnancy as a result of the 'fear of having a daughter'. the fear of not knowing how to be a mother to a daughter. my desire was to love her unconditionally, embrace her individuality, celebrate her spirit and simply find joy in who she was and who she would become.

i had experienced a still-birth 5 years before she was born. at 8 months gestation, due to an insufficient placenta. in those days when a dead baby arrived, it was quickly whisked away to some phantom nursery (morgue) never to be seen again. it was not mentioned. it was as if it had never existed. nurses didn't linger bedside to comfort and talk it out. oh, they were nice enough but 36 years ago there was that belief that if you didn't talk about it, you could pretend it didn't really happen. the live babies that were brought to other mothers at routine times of the day passed my room, their cries of hunger piercing the silence of my room. the baby who was cradled in his mother's arms as we rode together in the elevator down to the lobby was gently put in a carseat for the ride home. i waited for my husband to bring the car around to the front, our carseat noticeably absent. the nurse standing behind my wheelchair never uttered a word.

so when alyssa arrived, i immediately fell in love. the symptoms were so acute, it was truly like i was lovesick as i could not eat for 2 weeks. i hardly put her down; i fed her and then rocked her, almost until the next feeding. she hardly cried - heck, she never had to (and you know, after a while when i DID put her down she hardly cried - i like to think it was because the first couple of months of her life she laid so close to my heart for so many hours of the day - just as she had for 9 months. when her brother arrived she was only 27 months old. one day when he was about 3 weeks old she somehow wrestled him out of the swing and carried him across the tile floor to me in the kitchen. "he was crying" she told me. after i started breathing again, i thanked her for loving her brother so much. she was spirited. by the time she was two years old she would NOT wear velvet and would NOT wear anything with smocking on it. that pretty much lasted through her entire childhood and adolescence. she had her own sense of style and i always thanked God that we never fought any battles about her choice of dress - she was modest and appropriate. whew!

we experienced the normal ups and downs of parenting and there were good times and bad times but there was never any question of how much i loved my daughter. there was NOTHING she could have done that would ever have diminished my love for her - no matter what it was.

i love to write and i have written a newspaper column in years past. but my daughter has surpassed me in skills and the depth of her writing. i am speechless now to express how much i love her and how proud i am of her. this experience we are going through right now is the most painful i've ever been through. i hurt for her more than i ever hurt for myself. i feel each and every emotion she expresses. i feel the joy she expresses and the pain. because we are separated by hundreds of miles, i read her blog daily and experience her anxiety, her joy and her hope. maybe that is because i held her next to my heart for so many hours and days when God first sent her to our family.

"before i held you in my arms, i held you in my heart. that is where you began and where you will always be." (unknown)

happy birthday, alyssa! we love you!

be still and know.......

please check out heather's post on this blog dated february 23, 2008. she answers questions as clearly as any seminary-trained pastor could.

http://especiallyheather.com/

looking over my shoulder.....

still waiting for the other shoe to drop. trying to be obedient and faithful and encouraging and supportive and wise. will things ever get better? is God through? is there something else coming? when thoughts push themselves to the front of my mind, i am able to shove them hard back to where i want them to stay. i can go to the high school theater production, disciple weekend, work, target, starbucks and all the other routine neighborhood haunts and escape for a while. but it never goes away. and i want it to. for her. for us.

we went to target the other day. i told my husband that the difference between men and women is that every pregnant woman who walked by, every woman pushing a baby in a cart was a sad reminder to me of our daughter's loss. all he saw was cereal and bottled water and packaged lunch meat.

why doesn't it go away? am i obsessed? am i obsessive?

i think church is easier as i sing the words to the songs. then i sing the words "your grace is enough, your grace is enough" and my throat closes and i can't sing any more. if i stop singing i won't cry. is it the Holy Spirit speaking to me in those words and in my tears? i've always told other people i believed that. now what do i believe?

i want to go back. i want to be sitting in the little church on the corner of northwest highway and midway road. i want to see my little boy reach his hand in granpa's pocket knowing he will pull out a handfull of skittles that will help him get through the sermon. i want to be at my mother-in-law's little frame house by love field on a sunday afternoon. i want to be sitting at the table eating sunday dinner with the whole family before the cousins good-naturedly fight for the red afghan and comfy couch. i want to be sprawled in the backyard trying to whistle through blades of grass. i want to see the littlest ones talking to the ceramic statue of the 'little boy' who stands silently in mamer francis' garden. i want to see my little girl and her cousins playing on the sidewalk and rumaging in the "barn" for treasures.

i want my family close and for nothing bad to happen. i want things to be different.

lyss, my shoes don't fit either.