In the Eye of the Beholder

I have some dear younger friends who are still in their teens.  They have captured my heart with their love for God.  I want to encourage them to celebrate life and the uniqueness of who they are.  I don’t want them to waste time wishing they were someone else.  I want them to enjoy who they are and who they are becoming.  They are each beautiful and each different. 

When I search for words to encourage them, I think back on my own life.  What did I need?  What do I wish I had known when I was their ages?  So many things! 

I started out a natural blonde...no complaints here...2 years old

I wasted so much time in my early years lamenting my perceived lack of physical beauty…wishing my eyes were larger and more defined, my eyelashes longer, my body lighter, my hair thicker and blonder, my legs thinner, my feet more narrow, my breasts perkier…and the list goes on…

There were days I cried out to God and said, “Why did you make me ugly?!?,” and, “Please, God, make me pretty!”  I thought that no one would ever love me because I wasn’t pretty enough. 

7th grade...asked for the Dorothy Hamill cut and here's what I got...

As an adult, I look around at married couples and I see that they come in all shapes and sizes and various levels of “perceived” beauty…and whose perception are we talking about, anyway?  Clearly beauty is in the eye of the beholder and beauty is more than skin deep.

Have you ever met someone whom you thought to be quite ordinary-looking and as you grow to know their heart and mind they transform into a person who is quite attractive?  It happens often.  We can be shallow and short-sighted when it comes to beauty.

The Beginning of the Awkward Years...

Will it never end?!?

When I was in High School, I was most depressed about it all.  I tried hard to look like other popular girls who had the beauty stamp of approval.  My class pictures were always a disappointment to me.  Too much make-up and too much trying to look like someone else.  I was cursed (so I thought) with impossibly fine hair.  This was a fate worse than death in the “Big Hair” 1980’s.  In an effort to make my hair look thicker, I did the curling iron roll around my face and sprayed it.  From the side, I looked like I was wearing a sausage.  What was I thinking?

Oh Yeah...looking cool with the brown boots and gray suit...

 

My early attempts at "Big Hair"

In college, I hot-rolled first thing in the morning and I went back to my room before lunch everyday and hot-rolled again.  (I am talking curlers for those of you who don’t remember).  Then I would tease and spray and try hard to get the biggest hair I could.

Sadly, my insecurities were only reinforced by the men I chose to date in those early decades of my life.  After I had been in therapy for a few years and was feeling somewhat more confident, I dated a man who challenged all that confidence.  (Isn’t that how the enemy works in our lives?)  After an argument in the car on the way to visit his parents for the weekend where he criticized my choice of clothing (“You know that sweatpants aren’t flattering on you”), and the gift I had lovingly made for his mother (“I’m just not sure that she will like it but she will feel obligated to display it”), he said to me, “I grew up looking at pornography and I’d always imagined that I would eventually end up with a Playboy centerfold or a Miss America…I am just having a hard time dealing with reality.” Ouch!

25-ish

Yes, that really happened.  And yes, that set me back a little, although I knew that it was utterly ridiculous to buy into those words which were lies on so many levels…there it was, another message that I was somehow “not enough.”  For the record, we eventually broke-up.  That was a toxic relationship for both of us, although I believe he has grown and changed (as I have) and turned out to be a great husband for someone else.  Timing is everything, and the timing was not right for us.  No woman should have to combat those lies from a man.  We hear these kinds of lies in our heads without the help of a partner egging us on.  If you are hearing words like that from a significant other and you are not married yet, run away as fast as you can!  If you are married, seek counseling!  Find ways to build yourself up and be encouraged if you can’t get it from your partner. 

Now, as I look at pictures of myself in my 20’s, I think, “She is beautiful!”  Whatever was I thinking?!? 

What was I complaining about?

But who are you, O man, to talk back to God?  Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, Why did you make me like this?  Romans 9:20

What I didn’t know back in the day is that all women have this inner doubt…this wondering of “am I pretty enough?” at least sometime in their lives if not all through it.  Even the so-called beautiful people have self-doubt.  It’s part of the curse of humanity; part of the lies that Eve embraced from the devil himself.

I wish I had not wasted so much time fretting over the way that I looked.  I was beautiful…how sad that I did not enjoy it!  And yes, there is more to beauty than outward appearance.  I hope (and believe) that I am growing in beauty.  Although physical beauty can fade in degrees throughout life, inner beauty can increase exponentially.  There is no limit on how beautiful our hearts and spirits can become as we grow in the grace and knowledge of God.  Yay!

As I glanced in the mirror this week at work, I saw some lines in my face that I didn’t like.  I saw some signs of aging.  I am 48 years-young after all.  That voice in my head said, “It’s all downhill from here, Janice.  You are in the years of fading beauty.”  I will choose to yell out loud, “Get behind me Satan!” (after I get home from work…not sure what the co-workers would think of this.) :)

Okay, so it is what it is.  Some aspects of physical beauty do fade.  But I want to learn from my past mistakes…this, after all, is a way of redeeming them.   I look back 20 years ago and I see a lovely young woman who was quite pretty who thought she was ugly.  I don’t want to be a 70-year old woman looking back at a 48-year old woman who, though her beauty had begun to fade was still attractive and didn’t appreciate it.  It’s all relative, isn’t it?  It’s ridiculous to harbor negative thoughts!  Stop the insanity!

The Bible says in Psalm 139:

For You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful.  I know that full well.  My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place.  When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, Your eyes saw my unformed body.  All the days ordained for me where written in your book before one of them came to be.

When Jesus was tempted in the wilderness with lies from Satan, he quoted scripture to combat the lies.  He gave us a great example to follow.  He created me in my mother’s womb.  There are some characteristics of me that were meant to be.  My height, my eyes, my hair, my basic shape…these were created by God.  I can choose to thank Him and celebrate my uniqueness.  I’m done lamenting.  I am choosing thankfulness.

My new motto is “to play the hand I’m dealt.”  Make the best I can today of what I have been given and then move on…focus on growing in other ways.  I told my young friends about the serenity prayer.  I think it’s a good one when it comes to this topic…

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.  Reinhold Niebuhr

I mentioned earlier that I hated my school pictures all through Jr.High and High School.  Picture day was so stressful for me…I would try hard to look good and I was always disappointed when pictures came back.  In the non-digital era, you didn’t know what you would face several weeks after picture-day when the teacher handed you your picture packet.  There would be your fate for the yearbook and for all to see.  Of course I prayed about it every year, as I prayed about everything in my life. 

Most Recently...July 2013

It was several years later, when people began to comment to me about how photogenic I was.  I didn’t believe them at first.  Even today, at 48, people continue to tell me I am photogenic.  It makes me laugh every time, because I know it is a little joke between me and God.  He has graciously chosen to humor me in this simple request.  I do believe He has a great sense of humor.  After all, He created humor.  He must be pretty funny…

Charm is deceptive and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.  Proverbs 31:30

Happy Father's Day

Paul Lawrence Senior Picture

Dear Daddy,

I love that your favorite color was brown.  It’s because you were always a farmer in your heart…brown is the color of the earth.  Brown is the color of dirt, foundation, sun-drenched skin, worms, tree bark, mountains…it is simple and rich at the same time.  Like you.

You and I were so different in many ways.  As I grow older, I see that there are ways that I am more like you than I understood when you were here.  There are so many questions that I would like to ask you.  When I was mature enough to truly want to know you, you were already fading away.  You stopped knowing my name about 6 years before you left us.  It was too late to get my questions answered.

Maybe when we meet in Heaven, we will talk.  Maybe my questions won’t seem so important then.  Maybe then we will just enjoy each other.  That is okay, too.

Daddy and me, 1964

I didn’t find out until after your funeral that you were a football star at the same High School that I attended!  I would have loved to ask you about that.  When we cleaned out the house to sell, I found the clippings, which I still have to this day.  What other secrets did I not know?

When I asked you what attracted you to Mom when you first met her at that dance pavilion, you smiled and said you liked her tight sweater.  I laughed at your honesty.  But I know that there was more to the story.  A marriage of over 50 years is built on more than sweater size. 

Wedding Day November 29, 1952

I know that you loved her like no other and you trusted her completely.  You gave her your paycheck on Wednesday nights and you never thought about money afterwards…you never even wrote a check.  She was your finance manager and your household manager and you did not question her decisions.  She gave you an allowance for gas money and that was it.  That was all you needed.  Fortunately, for all of us, she was skilled at stretching a dollar and saving.  The house was paid off when I was 11.  We were never in debt.  You were a great team.

Paul, 14...Diane, 12...David, 10...Janice, 3

You weren’t a guy who wanted toys.  You didn’t care about the finer things in life.  You got socks and underwear for your birthday and Fathers’ day…sometimes a new tie for church.  (Okay, so on this point we are different!) 

I remember the only time I saw you spit-out food was when you first tried caviar on your 25^Th anniversary.  No, you were a sardine kind-of-guy.  (This drove my cat, Alexander, crazy.  Even though he was an outside cat, in the middle of winter he could smell the sardines when you would pop open the tin in the kitchen.)

You were tired when you came home from work.  When you were on the daytime shift, you would eat dinner and then soon fall asleep on the living room floor after the evening news.  In this, we are alike (except for the living room floor part).  When you were on the evening shift, you would be putting on your work boots on the front steps when I was coming home from school.  It was hello and goodbye.  You would have your brown bag “lunch” beside you on the step, probably a bologna sandwich and an apple packed lovingly by Mom.  Usually a couple of homemade cookies were in there, too.  Your favorites were molasses cookies.  Or if us kids had eaten all the homemade cookies, there would be Fig Newtons.

Old habits die hard...with granddaughter Stephanie

Our newspaper didn’t come until after you left for work.  It’s funny to think about now, but our town had an evening paper instead of a morning paper.  Mom would write notes to you on the top of the newspaper about anything that had happened after you left for work.  You would read her notes and the newspaper when you got home (long after we were all asleep) and then you would go to bed.  It was a regular thing…newspaper with mom’s notes to you at the top.  I wish today that I had kept one of them.  (Yes, I do have hoarder tendencies...I attach emotion to things that stir my heart.)

You were tired on “working” days.  On weekends, you spent as much time as you could outdoors.  You picked up sticks in the yard regularly.  You mowed and weeded and maintained two beautiful gardens.  We had fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, cabbage, onions, peppers, potatoes, carrots, beans, strawberries, grapes, rhubarb, and raspberries!  We also had two apple trees.  This was normal for me then…I thought everyone lived like this.  I thought nothing of it.  Today, I am in awe of the bounty of your work and your farmers-thumb.  Mom canned and we ate from your gardens all year long. 

Stephanie and AJ and Grandpa's Garden

Watering the crops with Steph and Joey

Flowers were always planted around the house

Our time together was outside.  I would walk with you down the long dirt road to our neighbor, Clarence’s farmhouse.  Clarence lived there with his Aunt Minnie.  How I wish I had a picture of the two of them.  Minnie had arthritis bad and she wore housecoats with her rings pinned to them.  One day I complimented one of her rings and she took it off and put it on my finger.  It was a perfect fit, and it was my birthstone, a Ruby in a 10K gold antique setting.  I still have it to this day.  Minnie and I would sit on the old porch swing together and talk.  I was just a little girl but I sensed that Minnie liked my visits and I liked Minnie.  Give this girl jewelry and you have a friend for life!

Clarence and Minnie's before it was torn down

 

Clarence, your best friend (other than Mom), was quite a character with his farm clothes and suspenders, his round wire rim glasses (before they were popular) and his pipe extended from his mouth like a permanent fixture.  He had a huge old farm tractor with a mowing attachment which he used to trim the brush between our dirt road and his.  He had pigs and chickens.  I loved throwing apples that had fallen on the ground from his apple orchards into the pig sty and see them run (run as much as pigs can do) and squeal and grunt and swallow them whole.  I remember you taking me to the barn after piglets were born and you helped me up to see over the fence.  The huge mama pig was lying on her side with ten or so tiny piglets sucking their breakfast.  You were in awe of nature and you loved sharing it with me.  Just like when you trimmed our pine trees into gumdrop shapes and you would find a bird’s nest…you would wave me over quietly to show me the babies with their necks outstretched and their mouths opened wide, waiting for worms to be deposited.

Overgrown and abandoned

The very last time we saw Clarence's farm...

Where the pigs once lived...

I loved Clarence and Minnie’s ancient house with the antique stuffed velvet living room furniture covered in sheets and the main room’s stacks and stacks of National Geographic’s.  I don’t think Clarence ever threw one away.  I bet he shared them with you, Dad, because the one time my college friend and I played trivial pursuit with you, you knew the names of obscure rivers in Africa!  You whooped us good.  And you never went to college.  Why did I not realize before that you were an intelligent man?  You were so quiet and unpretentious.

I loved drinking the crisp, fresh water out of Clarence’s well with you in that old tin cup that he kept in the well house.  It was ice cold and the best water I have ever tasted to this day.   I loved walking through his orchards and hearing you tell me the names of the trees and leaves.  (We did this one time for my school project.)  I loved walking through the plowed cornfields and searching for arrowheads with you.  I didn’t make time for it very often, but if I wanted to be with you, that is where you would be.

I remember the day Clarence died.  He had been in the hospital for quite some time and we had visited him there.  I thought it so strange to see him in pajamas and without his hat and pipe.  Was it really him?  Days later, you were on the floor in the living room reading the paper and Mom came in the room to tell you that Clarence had died.  You stared at the ground and you were silent.  I wish now that you could have cried.  I knew that you were so sad.  You were taught not to show emotion and you were good at it back then.

Gum Drop Trees where many-a-bird was born

Winter Memories

I was happy for you when you retired from your job as a machinist.  You came full circle.  You were free to be outside as much as you wished and you chose to spend time helping your son, Paul, on his farm.  He had the life you might have chosen for yourself if things had worked out differently.  You never spoke words of regret.  You never complained.  I wish I had asked you about that, too. 

All 11 Grandchildren together...

  

You were always a good dancer, but you danced more after you retired.  You were more playful after you retired.  And as you got older, you had more of a sparkle in your eyes.  (Maybe it was always there, but I started really noticing it at that time.)  You were a fun grandpa for your grandchildren.  We all enjoyed your presence.  Do you remember that day when your grandkids were playing outside and and they wrote out in giant chalk letters on the cement, "the nicest man lives here!"? I remember.

Erin and Andy pretending Grandpa is a horse...

As your mind began fading, your playfulness increased.  Sometimes you would spontaneously begin dancing a jig.  One day, when asked why you were dancing, you replied, “I have grasshoppers in my pants!”

He was saying something funny...

My favorite memories of you were Sunday mornings in our Baptist church.  After I moved away and came home to visit, the times became fewer and more precious.  I loved hearing you sing.  You had amazing rhythm and timing as a dancer but you could not carry a tune for the life of you.  I loved hearing you sing because I believe that you meant what you were singing.  You were worshipping.  A lot of men who can’t sing simply don’t sing.  They stand in church and move their mouths as if they were singing, but they never sing.  You sang with your heart.  It was beautiful to me.  I think it must have been beautiful to God, too.  I remember one of the last times I heard you and Mom singing and I knew that time was rushing by and that soon there would be no more Sunday mornings in church with you and Mom.  I am grateful that I understood that and I cherished the moment.   I heard you singing one of my favorite contemporary worship songs, “...This is my daily bread…” I took a snapshot with my heart.  When I close my eyes, I can hear you. 

I love you, Daddy.  I love you even more now than I was able to back then.  I appreciate you more now.  I didn’t think I wanted an “ordinary” life like yours.  I thought there was something more glamorous out here for me.  I didn’t see that your “ordinary” life was quite extraordinary.  You were like your favorite color brown…simple and rich.  I didn’t know that the two went together.  But you did.  You lived it. 

One of the last Father's Days we shared

Breathe

Written By Marie Barnett (sung by Michael W. Smith and many others, including Dad and Mom and me)  

This is the air I breathe
This is the air I breathe
Your Holy presence living in me

This is my daily bread
This is my daily bread
Your very word spoken to me

And I, I'm desperate for you
And I, I'm lost without you

Happy Mother's Day

I looked at the calendar, Momma, and I counted the years...10 whole years since you left us.  It doesn't seem that long ago.  Time is moving faster and faster.  I heard someone say once that time moves faster as you get older because of perspective...when you are 10, 1 year is 10% of your whole life, so it can seem like time passes slowly, especially waiting for Christmas or a birthday.  One year is a much smaller percentage of life for me.  But, oh, I don't want to forget that the years are precious.  The years are a gift from God.  Sometimes I will them away with my impatience and longing for I-don't-exactly-know-what.  Life is happening now; today.  I want to learn to live more fully in the moment.

She was beautiful and young once, my Mom...

She had dreams...dreams of having a husband and a family.  She told me once that a husband and a family is all she ever really wanted, all that she prayed for.  She made a mistake when she was young and longing to be loved.  She eloped with a man against her mother's wishes.  He was not a safe person.  He abused her verbally and physically and in less than 2 years she escaped back to her mother. That must have been hard for her, to have a made a mistake that she feared was so great that she would never have the family of her dreams.  She had a hard time forgiving herself.  I know, because she only mentioned this once to me, and I was never to discuss it again.  How much shame she felt in her mistake. Secrets like this take on a power of their own. There is ample grace in God's arms for mistakes. He knows full well that we will make them. He provided a Saviour for us because of it. Yet some of us (me included) have a hard time receiving grace and a hard time giving it to ourselves.

Oh, she loved God and she believed Him for her salvation, but I think she had a hard time forgiving herself.  So she prayed...she prayed and hoped that she would meet a kind man to be her husband and to grow the family of which she dreamed.  In the meanwhile, she got a job a the Bell Telephone Company as a telephone operator. On the weekends, she went dancing at the pavilion at Cascade Park.

And lo and behold, God had a man waiting for her.  A man who loved to dance.  A man who loved the color brown and loved farming the land.  He loved farming more than anything until he met my mom. Then he loved her more.  He loved her enough to get a job in a mill with no windows and no air conditioning.  He loved her enough to buy her a house and to provide for her and their family of 4...to love her over 50 years until the day he breathed his last breath. 

Dolores Jean Patterson and Paul Lawrence

So, Mom told me that all she ever wanted was a husband and children and God had answered her prayers.  She had 4 children all together...and of the 4, I was the last in line.  I was born exactly 11 years after my oldest brother, Paul, 10 years after my sister, Diane, and 7 years after my brother, David.

Janice and Mom

In our Sunday Best

These pictures of me and Mom are probably Sunday mornings.  Every Sunday we attended First Baptist Church.  Mom was fiercely loyal to the Baptist Church...She was a lifelong member.  It was and still is a great place to worship.  I loved my time there, too.  I am grateful for a mom and dad who took me to church where I learned much about Jesus and about the Bible.  Even today, the verses I learned as a child have never left me and have proved a solid foundation for my faith journey.

I always loved her and never could imagine life without her.  When I was a child, I loved to sit on her lap and put my head on her chest while she read a book to me aloud.  I loved feeling her breath on my cheek.  I loved her familiar smell; her softness.  When I grew bigger, we would sit in bed together, side by side, while she read one of her historic novels, I would be reading one of my little golden books.  I would stare at the same page indefinitely until she turned the page of her book.  I must have driven her crazy...I would ask over and over..."Mom, did you turn the page yet?"

I remember her working hard at home.  There was laundry for 6, cleaning, cooking, snapping and canning beans, canning cherries, tomatoes and jam, gardening and school issues with 4 kids.  I remember her singing along to the radio while she ironed clothes.  When I was very young, we had one of those old-time washers with a big wringer and an open tub.  She would have to feed the clothes through the wringer with her hands and a stick.  One time, she got her finger stuck in the wringer...who knew laundry could be dangerous business?

I would be by her side wherever she was...I played in the basement with my dolls while she did the wash. When she watched Let's Make a Deal and had lunch, I would pretend to be a contestant and jump up and down and scream whenever a prize was won.  I was her shadow.

I am sure she missed me some when it was time for school but it was probably nice for her to have a break from me being under her feet.  I remember my very first day of school in first grade.  Our parents were supposed to come at the beginning of the day for registration and to meet our teacher.  She wanted me to have the full experience and to be excited about riding the bus, so she dropped me off at the bus stop and met me at the school.  Looking back now, that makes me smile.  She even thought to ask an older kid on the same bus route to allow me to sit with her on that first day so that I would feel more comfortable.

There weren't many African Americans in my little town.  My mother was concerned about how I would react if there were any in my classroom.  So she prepared me by making me practice smiling and saying hello in case there were any kids who looked different than me.  I can still remember the conversation and her drilling me.

I had a long walk from the bus stop down a gravel road.  It would ice over in the winter.  I remember I would often see my mother's face in the kitchen window, watching for me to come down the lane after school.  One day, the road was so icy that I feared falling.  So I crawled home on my hands and knees (in knee socks, no less!), pushing my lunchbox in front of me and then crawling after it.  I can still see my mother's face in the kitchen window cracking up laughing...she watched me crawl all the way to the front door.

At least twice a year, my mother took me clothes shopping.  Once before school started and once before Easter to get an Easter dress and other spring clothes. These trips were very special to me where I had her undivided attention and had opportunity to get pretty new things.  She took pleasure in buying "nice" clothes from JC Penney.  She believed in the best quality that we could afford.  She took pride in not buying us clothes at discount stores that she said would fall apart.

In addition to her love for reading, I also inherited my mother's budgeting skills (though not so much her frugality, I am afraid).  She never worked outside the home after marrying my father and she was able to manage the household well on his modest income.  Every two weeks was payday and grocery shopping.  In addition to staples, she would usually buy a favorite cereal and a bag of chips, some soda, and maybe a carton of ice cream...but we were admonished not to open the chips and the soda or the ice cream too soon because there would be no more until the next payday.  Usually we didn't eat them the first weekend, we would wait a few days at least.  The anticipation was half of the fun.

She did her budget for the month by hand on a piece of white paper where she drew the lines herself.  I have a copy of the last few.  She kept them in the kitchen drawer.  I remember her sitting at the kitchen table going over the numbers and adding out loud.

I was mean to her sometimes.  I would go back and do it differently if I could.  I had an insatiable appetite for clothes and nice things...things we could not afford.  I gave her a hard time about it.  She gave me everything she could give but I always wanted more.  Sometimes I made her cry over it.  We both cried...me, the spoiled child and her, the mom who just wanted me to be happy.  She sacrificed her own material desires many times for me and our family.  She really did love me, probably more than I will ever understand.

In later years, I took great pleasure in taking her shopping when I would go home to visit.  I loved buying her clothes and attempting to spoil her, although I understand that I could never match all that she had given me.

These are just snippets of memories...there is so much I could say about the uniqueness of her.  She had a wonderful laugh that sounded like hiccups to me.  We had fun times as a family bowling, playing miniature golf, visiting the farm shows in the summer and fall...and always picnics.  Mom's potato salad was the best!  We also had fun playing cards and games and just sitting around the television set together.  Just being together was good.

At the Lawrence County Fair (early 1990's)

As much as I appreciate her love for me, I am perhaps most blessed by how she loved my father.  He had her whole heart.  She loved him purely and completely.  I cannot imagine what life is like for those whose parents don't love each other.  I will always believe that my parents' greatest gift to me was loving each other.  Home was the one place where love and commitment were constants.  It was a comfort to know that they weren't going anywhere.  They were in it for the long haul.  In fact, it is hard to talk about Mom without talking about Dad.  They were inseparable.

My Mom was full of love and devotion.  She laughed a lot, too.  I think they are both laughing in this picture.

So, Momma, you left us 10 years ago.  I knew it was inevitable, but still, the timing surprised me.  It was just 8 months after Dad had passed on.  Maybe I shouldn't have been surprised at all. 

I will always love you, Mom.  I will always thank God for you.  I believe in His providence and in His sovereignty...and I believe He gave us to each other.  He picked you to be my mom and he picked me to be your "surprise" girl.  You are missed today and always.

For You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother's womb.

...My frame was not hidden from You when I was made in the secret place.  When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, you eyes saw my unformed body.  All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.  NIV Psalm 139:13, 15 & 16

Timing Is Everything

Yesterday, I was reminded that timing is everything.  For everything there is a season.  God sees it all.  And yes, I do believe that all things work together for good for those who love Him and have been called according to His purpose.  Romans 8:28

I still don’t know why I am where I am for this season but it feels right.  It feels comfortable.  It has been the easiest transition for me people-wise that I can remember.  Truly, there has always been difficulty for me in adjusting to new jobs…learning the lay of the land…political pitfalls and all.  So far, this place feels like low-drama.  No office queens to maneuver…no curmudgeons...just good people.  Thank you, Lord.

As I was talking yesterday with Brian, the man who formerly had my position, I was again reminded that timing is everything.  The Corporate Controller turned in his resignation on November 29^th.  Brian was approached in early December to take the Corporate Controller position, which left the Regional Controller position open at that time.  In early December, I was fully invested in my former job with no thoughts of leaving. 

Over Christmas vacation, as I prayed, I held out my hands, palms up, and told God that I was fully committed to my current job, but that I was willing to let go if it be His will.  I added that He would need to “kick me out of the nest” to make it clear that my time there was done. 

On January 3^rd, my second day back from Christmas vacation, I was “kicked out of the nest.”  Even as I was hearing the words, my heart was comforted by knowing that God was answering my prayers.  He had prepared me and I was ready to go, even though my heart had been fully vested.  I am a loyal person and a creature of habit.  It is sometimes difficult for me to make changes in my life.  

So, meanwhile, nothing had been done at my current job to fill the Regional Controller position.  It was January 20^th when I saw the position posted on Linked In.  I had never applied for a job on Linked In before and I hardly read the job description.  As it was a Sunday, I was probably clicking on anything that said “Controller” in order to fill my weekly quota for unemployment, to be honest.  There were some other things in the works and I was more focused on those jobs and confident that one of them would come through.

I got a call about a week later from the company’s HR contact, and I almost didn’t return the call.  I assumed the job was at the parent company’s location, north of the city, and I didn’t want to drive that far.  I waited a day to call back.  When I did, I discovered that the location was actually 5 miles from my home.

After 2 interview sessions and a personality test, I was offered the Regional Controller position on February 22^nd and I started work on March 4^th.  I had two months of rest, time with friends, and learning to trust God more.  It was time I wouldn’t trade for anything.

Timing is everything.  Thank you, Lord, for your perfect timing.  I will choose to trust You more…

There is a time for everything,
    and a season for every activity under the heavens:

    a time to be born and a time to die,
    a time to plant and a time to uproot,

    a time to kill and a time to heal,
    a time to tear down and a time to build,
     a time to weep and a time to laugh,
    a time to mourn and a time to dance,
     a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
    a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
     a time to search and a time to give up,
    a time to keep and a time to throw away,
     a time to tear and a time to mend,
    a time to be silent and a time to speak,
     a time to love and a time to hate,    a time for war and a time for peace.  Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 NIV

Good Friday Good News

It is hard to imagine what the disciples and followers of Jesus went through on the first “Good” Friday…

They had just celebrated Passover with Jesus the night before.  He had transformed their lives.  They had left everything behind to follow Him. 

Now, it seemed all for nothing.  He was crucified…hung on a cross…humiliated and torchered.  Stripped, literally, of all human dignity. 

They did not have the whole story at that moment.  This was the lowest point in life for them, surely.  They did not have the gift of history…the whole of Scripture… the comfort of knowing, at least in part, the “why.”

Once when I was watching a clip of the Jesus movie, I saw the chaos and the fear in the faces of the actors as Jesus was crucified…it became more real to me in that moment.  How devastating this day must have been.  How hopeless it must have seemed.

How ironic, that because of this seemingly devastating day in history, I can have HOPE.  How like God to turn the world upside down, to bring life out of death, to bring Hope out of hopelessness.  He has done this for mankind.  He has done this for me.

I am a life changed because of that first Good Friday.  Are you?

He was delivered over to death for our sins, and was raised to life for our justification.  Romans 4:25

...He will swallow up death forever.  The Soverign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces; He will remove the disgrace of His people from all the earth.  The Lord has spoken.  Isaiah 25:8

The NutriBullet

So, I succumbed to the late-night infomercial on the NutriBullet.  I am proud to say that I did not pay “6 easy payments of $19.99.”  I went to Bed, Bath, and Beyond and used a 20% off coupon (did you know that they never expire, despite the expiration date?) and paid just $80.  My first time to use it was one day in February, around 2:00 PM.  I decided to make a green smoothie for a late lunch.  I loaded up the Large cup with Kale, Spinach, Pineapple, Strawberries, Banana, and Blueberries.  I locked the cup in place on the base and pressed down with eager anticipation…and…nothing!  No action whatsoever.  I am obviously hungry as it is 2:00.  I am frustrated and disappointed…and determined to not waste the ingredients already in the large cup.  So I unplug the unit, grab the receipt, and head down to Bed, Bath, and Beyond.  I walk in looking like a hungry, crazy lady in sweatpants, disheveled and no makeup, holding a NutriBullet full of unprocessed food.  “Someone please help me!  I am trying to make my lunch and this thing will not work.”  A young clerk gave me a bewildered smile and told me to leave it at the front desk and go ahead back and get a replacement.  She plugged it in to make sure it did not work.  Then I unpacked a new one and locked the cup in place on it.  A satisfying “Whir” ensued...yippee!  Lunch was ready.  I left the store carrying my lunch and the replacement base.  Mission accomplished.  It was delicious! 

Since that day, I have been enjoying green smoothies for breakfast whenever I have the ingredients on hand.  Here is what I enjoyed this morning:

A fistfull of Kale and Spinach

Several slices of Fresh Pineapple

1 Avocado

Several large spoonfuls of Frozen Blueberries

1 Tablespoon of Chia Seeds (The IT food of 2013!)

Dried Goji Berries (just what I had left)

Water

It tastes plenty sweet with the pineapple.  Sometimes I pour pineapple juice in as well if there is any at the botton of the container.  The avocado is caloric  BUT so nutrient-rich it is worth it! (read more about it here)  Plus, it thickens the Smoothie.

The Beauty of the smoothie is that you really don't need a recipe...just pick foods rich in nutrients, pick something to thicken it (Avocado, Banana, Coconut Oil) and pick something naturally sweet (pineapple, blueberries, strawberries, etc).  This is my new favorite breakfast.

Note:  As always, click on anything in this blog high-lighted in Blue and a link will open to a new window.

PS  A shout out and thank you to my friend, Kim Burdick, for treating me to my first green smoothie and showing me the ropes...

Tennis Lessons

I love my Saturday tennis lessons.  It is a small group; usually 4 of us.  We are taught by Bill O'Boyle (yes, happy St. Patrick's day to a true Irishman!).  My very first tennis team was captained by Bill's wife, Kim.  As a team, we took weekly lessons from Bill .  He has taught me much of what I know about tennis strategy. Yesterday, Bill and Kim wore green to our tennis clinic.  I did, too, but totally not thinking about St. Patrick's day.  How fun!  Today I wore a bit of green to church and then went to lunch solo to Hickory Tavern and was given a beautiful green t-shirt for being one of the first 50 customers.  I am wearing it as I type...

Back to tennis lessons...I love the drills and play that we do.  It gets me out of bed on Saturday and gets me moving.  Although, my body doth protests!  I am slow to move...arguably the slowest of the bunch each Saturday.  Sometimes I stand and yawn.  Literally, I yawn and hold my racquet casually like it's an umbrella and not a weapon to help me win.  Truth be told, I vacillate between caring about winning and not caring at all.  I play because I love to play.  I like to win.  I very much like to win. But I have taught myself not to care too much.  I often don't stand a chance to win and I am afraid that if I care too much and lose too often that I will quit playing.  I want to play for the love of it.  Sometimes playing to win can be painful.  Like in life, I just want to enjoy the journey and not be SO concerned about the destination.

Maybe what I need is a sports psychologist.  :)  The funny part about my method is that sometimes I win in spite of myself.  Bill O'Boyle says that I lull my opponents...I make them think that I have given up, then I go for the kill.  I take them off-guard. That is my (subconscious?) strategy for winning, and it works sometimes.  It works unless my opponents play strong and offensive.  When they hit hard and come to the net, and they make me run...I eventually lose.  I can't move fast enough and I can't keep up their fast pace.  If I am allowed to set the pace slower, I can lull them and then hit a winning shot.

One Saturday in December, I was so tired that I yelled, "I've got nothing left!"    For the remainder of our lesson, Bill called me "Nuthin'Left"  Here comes Nothin'Left! Watch out, Nothin'Left is serving!  We laughed so much over that.  But then I got a second wind.  I won some points.  I was serious when I said that I had nothing left. But with laughter, somehow I got renewed energy.  Enough to make the others think I was pretending so that I could lull them off-guard, Bill would say.  But truly, I regretted saying that I had nothing left as soon as it came out of my mouth.  That is not something you let your opponents hear.  And as there is power in words, I don't want to be known as "Nothin'Left."  Reminds me of "Much-Afraid," the character in Hannah Hurnard's classic book, "Hinds Feet on High Places." 

Yesterday, more laughter ensued when one of the clinic participants, MJ, asked Bill how she could be more like me.  She wants to win so badly and she is an excellent tennis player.  She is much faster than I am and she hits much harder.  But during one round, I actually won more points that MJ and Kim.  MJ admires how laid back I am on the court.  At one point, she and Kim pretended to be me and stood there on the other side of the net yawning big yawns.  It was SO FUNNY when MJ asked how she could learn to be more like me.  Kim said, "Bill...she actually wants you to teach her how to play like Janice!"  Like there was a Janice-method.  Ha!Ha! I am the worst of the 4 of us.  Bill then pointed out that I try to slow them down.  If I get them to play at my pace, I can place the ball and take them off-guard.  They have to be on the offensive and hit at a hard pace to beat me, which they did in the second round that we played.  Whoever sets the pace has a better chance of winning.

Like many things in life, there is a spiritual analogy here that I don't want to miss.  I am a Christian and I have a Biblical world view.  I interpret the world though my belief in Jesus Christ and all that the Bible says about Him and about life.  It is clear in scripture that I do have an opponent in life.  I have an enemy and his name is Satan.  (Sometimes I have another enemy and her name is Janice!  But I am working on that.)  Satan is the enemy of God and all of God's children.  He is a rebellious angel who took other angels (now demons) with him in his fall from glory. He is conniving and deceptive.  He manipulated Eve who invited Adam to follow suit. He continues to deceive and add confusion to our world.  He loves best to strike when I am off-guard, when I am lulled into complacency.  

I think most people would admit that there is evil in this world.  Some of the atrocities committed, one human being to another, are unspeakable.  Surely Satan and demonic forces are behind much of it.  But I think he is so clever, he prefers to be more subtle than obvious pure evil.  He knows that he is better off disguising himself as an angel of light.  2 Corinthians 11:14 says ...for Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.  He prefers to try to keep us busy or confused or distracted to the point of forgetting about spiritual things.  He prefers that we do not even believe in him, for if we deny the reality of evil, we can easily deny that we need a Savior.

Be self-controlled and alert.  Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.  Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.  1 Peter 5:8-9

I played a doubles match today.  I decided to play to win.  I gave it my best and I was alert (no yawning).  I made the choice to show up physically and mentally. When I arrived at the court I told my partner..."I came to win!"  She laughed and said, "Does that mean you're going to move?"  Like I said earlier, I am not the fastest player on the court...I am never the fastest.  But I can be clever.  I can play to win.  I am sorry to say that we did not win.  But because I was present...I played hard...I moved as best I could...I feel good about it.  I am not sad.  I am not terribly disappointed.  I don't feel like quitting.  I feel like trying harder again tomorrow.  And I will.

Maybe I did learn more than I realized at the time yesterday at tennis clinic. Whether I acknowledge it or not when I am on the court, I am in a game where the object is to win.  I can choose to own it and play to win or I can ignore my desire to win.  But that doesn't change the reality of the game.  In fact, if I ignore the fact that I am in a competition, I am almost certain to lose, especially if I am playing someone of equal skills.

I am also in a spiritual battle daily.  I can acknowledge it and prepare for it or I can ignore it.  But ignoring it doesn't make it go away.  Pretending it is not real doesn't make it so.  I could decide that gravity is not real and jump off of a 10-story building...and I would find out quickly that gravity is an immutable law.  So it is with Truth.  So it is with light and darkness.  I am so thankful for Truth in the person of Jesus Christ, who "...for the joy set before Him He endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." Hebrews 12:2

Playing tennis is a joy.  An even greater joy in my life is following Jesus.  Never a dull moment, but always worth it.

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power.  Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes.  For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.  Therefore, put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.  Ephesians 6:10-13