Hallelujah!

I've been sidelined by a foot injury for six weeks now. Something called a neuroma, or maybe sesemoiditis, my athletic-trainer sister tells me. Whatever you call it, it has been a major cramp in my style since I haven't been able to run or even walk much. But finally, FINALLY this week things are looking up. For one thing, I got a different pair of shoes that doesn't pinch or squish and lets my poor old foot spread out wherever it wants. For another, I haven't worn high heels or dress shoes for days (except a couple hours for church). Or maybe it was just a matter of time. Whatever the reasons, I'm back at it--my foot feels good and I've been able to go out walking a couple of times with no painful results. Yippee!

Perfect timing--now maybe I can exercise off the 3 pounds I gained over Thanksgiving before I put on 5 more at Christmas. :p

Can I figure out how to post a photo?

Let's see! This is a photo of me and my family at oldest son Joseph's graduation last spring.

Sometimes it's really, really hard to be around teens.

A couple of the kids at school got caught doing something they should not have been doing, and my response has been all over the map--from anger to compassion to apathy and back again. How could these kids be so DUMB? Why do they run after other gods as if their lives depended on it? Why are they so blind to the good news that is right in front of them--that they don't have to be trapped in the crap of this world, they don't have to look for cheap thrills to spice up their lives, and they don't have to thumb their noses at whatever segments of the adult world have offended them. I ask myself how we in our little Christian school have let these kids down. What could we have done differently? What should we do now? How do we help them see how very ugly and sordid those things are that they consider so appealing? How do we show them their wounds and help them see the Healer?

I'm convicted of my own cowardice and silence in not more boldly holding out the word of life.

I'm making progress...

For awhile now, I've been working on my cardiovascular fitness. Mostly that means I walk...a lot. I haven't exactly become what one could call buff, and I won't be running marathons anytime soon, but I'm here to tell you that those fitness experts who say walking isn't real exercise are wrong. True, nobody ever got fit walking a quarter mile a day at a pace of 2 miles per hour, but if you really get your buns moving, walking can provide a great workout. A leisurely stroll won't cut it, but fast walking that gets the heart rate up has been for me the perfect conditioning exercise, a great stepping stone to running. I spent all summer walking...four and five and six miles a day at a pace of say twelve to fourteen minutes per mile...with the hope of someday working up to running. My goal was to be able to run a mile nonstop before the summer's end, and my bigger goal is to someday run a whole 5K. I started by jogging a quarter mile here and there during my walks. I'd run awhile, walk awhile. And the running wasn't all that hard. I walk so fast and furiously that it was almost a relief to break into a run at times! The mile milestone came and went. I kept at it. After awhile I could run 1.5 miles, and I thought that was about my limit. Not bad, I thought.

So today I hit that mile-and-a-half mark and decided to just keep going. I finally had to quit when a thunderstorm and an uphill grade arrived at the same time. When I looked at my pedometer, I discovered that I'd gone 2.5 miles!! That's farther than I've run for YEARS. And I owe it all to walking. My bad feet would have given out long ago if they hadn't gradually gained strength from walking. Now they rarely bother me. I'm beginning to think that the 5K goal isn't as far-fetched as I thought it was!!

Sing with me now--put one foot in front of the other...

I survived the first week of school...

One week down--35 to go. That makes it sound like I hate school, like I'm a kid counting down to the day the pain stops. While I can't say I'm entirely thrilled to be teaching school or sending my kids off to school, it isn't THAT dreadful, either. It's just a lot of hard work. I'd rather have the freedom to sleep in, spend my time how I wish, choose for myself which people to spend time with in a given day, enjoy the luxury of feeling guilty for not accomplishing tasks that no one but me cares whether they get done or not anyway, interact with my kids on my own terms, not gathered around a mandatory science fair project that both they and I detest. I'd rather have no responsibilities except to please myself and decide for myself how I will order my world. Or anyhow that's what my tired mind and body sometimes tell me at the end of a long hard day. Really, though, I'm mostly finding these days that work is a good thing. Taking responsibility is a good thing. Accepting willingly tasks I wouldn't choose for myself is a good thing. Growing up is a good thing.

It's been a long time coming. I've spent too many hours resenting things I had to do or situations I had to handle but didn't want to, too many hours wishing for something different. This year is somehow different. Maybe it has to do with accepting and finding beauty in powerlessness while simultaneously accepting and finding beauty in responsibility. I don't have a choice; this year I HAVE to work so we can make ends meet. Consequently, I HAVE to send the kids to school even though we'd all rather go back to homeschooling this year. I HAVE to get up early, I HAVE to supervise everything that goes on in this house while Steve is away, I HAVE to eat right and exercise if I want to stay healthy, I HAVE to forge relationships with stuents and co-workers. Those are not situations from which I can remove myself--I'm in them and have to be in them. I have no power, in these areas, to make my life different.

Choice comes only in how I respond. Responsibility comes in acknowledging the effects of my response. I can chafe (and rub myself raw in the process) or I can rest. I can spend my time fighting what is, or I can look for God in it and "do the work He has given me to do before the night comes when no one can work." He assigns; I respond with effort and enthusiasm and gladness, or I respond with whining and complaining or apathy. I invest myself in staying, or I invest myself in running away. In a very real and strange way, I'm beginning to see the beauty of staying. I'm working harder than I ever have in my life, doing things I don't necessarily always love. I have less free time, less freedom, fewer big choices open yet more small decisions and responsibilities that land on my plate--and in spite of that I have more peace, more joy, more love, more trust that God is in his heaven and what I thought was wrong with the world might not be so wrong after all. The unchosen tasks of a day are his assignment to me; accepting the loss of my right to choose for myself has opened my eyes to see his good gifts. I'm seeing them everywhere lately--the love of God poured out in Christ Jesus is all around me, in me. Life can be hard, but God is so, so good.

I guess it's true: it's in losing my life--losing myself in him--that I find it.

Oy!

Yes, I'm still alive...just no time to post. School started today with a half day that I felt WAAYYY less than half ready for, to be followed tomorrow and the next day by an all-school overnight campout. Which I have to pack for right now, so ta ta for now. :-)

Happy Birthday to me!!

At 11:11 p.m. tonight I turn 42 years old. I'm lovin' it--I'm old enough to face facts, young enough to want to; young enough to seek beauty, old enough to know what it is; young enough to run, old enough to be impressed with myself when I do; old enough to have seen God's mighty hand, young enough to expect miracles; young enough to speak my mind, old enough to have one! ;-)

At a loss for words...

I'm in an odd place of having so much to say that I can't get myself to say any of it. Too many thoughts and events and ideas--too many activities and changes and plans. In the past week I delivered my firstborn to college and got word that my husband will at long last be switching jobs. So there will be big holes in my house this fall--Joseph eight hours away in Nebraska, Steve in Memphis five days of every week. I like change--the freshness of new possibility--and these changes are not unwelcome, but I don't like the distances change can bring and the fluctuations between anticipation and grief that they often stir in me. Neither of those emotions leaves me completely in the present. Anticipation hopes for future joy; grief mourns the end of past joy. Both take me out of today, which has joys of its own that I miss when my eyes are elsewhere.

There's a robin hopping unsuccessfully after bugs in the flowerbed under my window. It spreads its wings and hunkers close to the ground, then flies away. Now a swallowtail butterfly flitters from roses to cotoneaster. Gorgeous.

I might not have words for all of the hopes and ideas and events and fears that fill my past and future, but I can enjoy today and see God in it.

Getting excited....

This weekend Matthew and I are going with a group to a festival in Stratford, Ontario. There are some great plays on the bill this year. We've got tickets for Oliver, Henry IV, and Twelfth Night, (not all plays are Shakespeare, obviously) and just now I was perusing the website to see if I could find a way to afford adding Much Ado About Nothing as well. It looks like we might be able to get 2 tickets for $20 each, thanks to the fact that Matt is less than 29 years of age. That's an even better rate than what we paid for student tickets for the other plays! I do have to get him a state ID that shows both his picture and date of birth, so we're off to do that bright and early tomorrow. Then we pack up and leave at 3 a.m. on Thursday. I plan to sleep on the bus, believe me!

Feelings...

All summer I've been paying attention to feelings. This is not as easy as it sounds, given that I'm an emotion-challenged person who just kind of bulls forward regardless of my own or anyone else's feelings. Isn't life all about "do the right thing"? None of this FEELINGS stuff for me, thank you very much! Of course that's hogwash; we all have feelings whether we pay attention to them or not. So this summer I have been paying attention and have felt a sense of peace and wellbeing that I didn't expect. In my inattention, I had allowed a small pot of discontent to simmer constantly on the back burner--not enough to be called "unhappiness" or to warrant a major life overhaul, just a thumb on the scale that let problems and concerns weigh me down unnecessarily. Paying attention has restored the balance because now I notice and mark and fully live the moments of joy and triumph and peace, too. Now I've got an overflowing cup to go along with my simmering pot!

I've learned a few things about myself along the way. At the heart of my discontent, I've found, is one of two feelings: a feeling of deprivation or a feeling of fear. I've discovered that what's behind that nagging feeling that all is not right in the world is too often a disappointment with what I have--I feel that I don't have enough money or food or time or love or respect or talent. I want more. And yet the wanting more is not so much because the thing itself is inherently good but rather because I expect it to fill up a space where emptiness is causing me pain. It's not that I want the thing itself; it's that I believe the thing is owed me, and the fact that I don't have all I am owed or all I think I need gives me pain. It's the feeling of having a good withheld, like when everybody else gets a piece of candy but I don't. The opposite of feeling deprived is thankfulness, and I need to cultivate it because it doesn't come naturally to me!

The opposite of faith is fear. Sometimes I'll realize that my brow is creased and my hands are clenched and my jaw is tight. Some call it stress, but I'm learning to call it fear. Usually I don't know what I'm afraid of, but I know that my body and heart are sitting at the edges of their chairs, looking out for the worst, anticipating pain or difficulty.

I never thought of myself as fearful or discontent. I was surprised by the hold these have over me, their power in my life--surprised also at the joy of being freed from their power by the forgiveness found in Jesus. He truly does give rest to those who are heavy-laden. I'm feeling that rest so much more now that I'm also letting myself feel the fear and am turning in trust to Him whenever it strikes.

Now I know why David said, "WHEN (not IF) I am afraid, I will trust in you."