Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

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Puzzled

I have high unrealistic expectations for putting together a jigsaw puzzle with my family. I announce the plan on a Friday or Saturday, let the children choose which one we’re going to do, and fantasize about all the family bonding we’ll be doing as we puzzle over the pieces and find the right home for each one.

Inevitably, though, my expectations crash and burn.

“I hate puzzles,” my 9-year-old daughter screams. (She doesn’t.)

“I’m too tired,” my husband declares. (He is. I get it.)

Meanwhile, my 7-year-old son is turning the calm, peaceful idea of completing a puzzle into a game complete with scoring. He gives himself points for all the pieces that are ALREADY TOGETHER in the bag, then counts as his the pieces that I put together, as long as he agrees that they all go where they are supposed to. <—WHAT IS THIS MADNESS?

Then the kids get bored and decide to go play the card game “War” with my husband who has enough energy to flip cards and mediate arguments, while I sit alone at the dining room table, staring at the pieces, willing them to move to the right spots without much effort on my part.

It doesn’t help that our current puzzle is a mosaic–you know, a picture made up of pictures.

In my best moments, I relish being left alone for a few minutes while my mind focuses on this task. It’s a distraction but it’s also work for my brain, and I’m approaching an age where I’m beginning to worry about how sharp my mind will be in the years ahead.

In my worst moments, I am silently cursing my family for abandoning me to this project that was my idea but I’ve now come to dread. I wail in my mind about how unfair it is that nobody is helping me, and then when they do lean over to help, I bark about them being in my light.

Maybe none of it would bother me so much if I wasn’t feeling so puzzled about life.

Months ago, Phil and I felt like God was giving us a clear picture of what the next steps would be for us: Buy a house. Move to the city. See what I’m up to there. We thought it was a good idea, so we started putting the pieces together. Asking for help. Telling people the plan.

Then my husband lost his job. And got a job in the city. Our van broke down. And family helped us fix it.

We are still on track, we thought. We signed up for classes for first-time homebuyers. We called a real estate agent recommended by a friend. We gave our information to the bank. Yes, we thought. The puzzle is coming together.

But the bank had bad news, or at least not good news. We couldn’t get approval for the amount we needed, even though our credit was good. On paper, we don’t have enough income to cover our debts, even though we can pay all our bills and on time. It was discouraging. A blow. Maybe we would have to postpone this next step.

We called the real estate agent back and she encouraged us to try another route. Call a mortgage broker, she said. She gave us the number of someone she recommends. The embers stirred to life. Maybe it wasn’t all hopeless.

Then came the letter from unemployment. When my husband was out of work for three weeks at the start of the year, we applied for benefits because we didn’t know how long it would be. We had no back-up plan. The little bit that we got for a few weeks ensured that our bills were paid. It was just enough. Now, the unemployment office says they overpaid us and they want the money back. It’s money we don’t have tucked away. We still just get by on what we have.

This is the part where if life was a puzzle on my dining room table, I would have flipped the table. (I have repressed anger issues. See also: Nine on the Enneagram.)

I am currently having a silent curse-fest with God, though He can hear me, so it’s not exactly silent. It goes something like this:

What gives, God? We are following the picture. We are trying to put the pieces together and YOU ARE NOT HELPING. I thought we were in this together. I thought this was going to be fun! Why is it so hard? I can’t do this anymore. I quit. Except I don’t really quit because I have to have the satisfaction of seeing this to the end. Leaving a puzzle unfinished is not in my repertoire, so You win. I’m going to see this through. But, c’mon. A little help here?

I don’t actually believe God has left me to solve this puzzle all by myself. And yes, I do sometimes shrug off the help He provides. I am a classic case of help-me-never-mind-I-can-do-it-myself.

The key to this mosaic puzzle, I’m finding, is to focus on the small pictures. As I find the pieces of the small pictures that fit together, the big picture starts to become clearer.

Maybe there’s something to that. (Okay, there’s definitely something to that.)

Most days I don’t want to participate in the small-picture puzzle of following God on this journey. Let’s just get to the big picture, God! I want to be living in the city in a house that is ours (and the bank’s!), looking for how He is working in the city.

But there are things that have to be put in place between now and then.

So, I’m putting this mosaic puzzle together piece by piece, day by day, with or without my family’s help, and the same is almost true for the life mosaic. It is piece by piece. Day by day. But I am not on my own.

We are in this together, and God is not absent, even if it feels like He is no help at all.

What if you could be more you?: Review of Loveable by Kelly Flanagan

I make it no secret how much I love to read, and though I cannot guarantee that my tastes in books will align with yours, I generally try to review and recommend only books that are worth your time. You can be mostly assured that if a book makes it to the review space on my blog, then it’s been worth my time.

Even then, there is the rare book that rises above the worth-your-time category and rests firmly in the you-must-read category.

Loveable is one of those books.

First, a couple of things you need to know:

  1. I received an advance copy of the book from the author and my opinions in this review were not influenced by that act.
  2. I went to grade school, middle school and high school with the author which means I am as excited for the release of his debut book as I would be my own. True story.
  3. Kelly is a psychologist with an eye for the divine in the world. His blog posts are some of my favorites. You might have even seen him on the Today show because one of his posts went viral.

Now, the book. What I’m about to say is rare:

You NEED to read this book.

About once a year, I read a book that I consider a must-read, and if I consider it a must-read, then I can’t stop talking about it or recommending it. Just recently, I recommended a book I read three years ago and can’t forget. Last year, I attended a writing conference for the first time so I could tell the author who was the keynote speaker how much one of his books changed me. If I consider a book must-read, I am practically evangelistic about it. (Annoyingly so, I know.)

If I could only recommend one book this year, it would be Loveable. And yeah, I understand that it’s only March. But what Kelly has to say here is not just important. It’s life-changing.

I have a lot of favorite lines in this book, so I won’t list them all here. But I do want you to get a sense for what the book is about and what it can do for your soul.

This was one of the first lines to speak to me:

From there, Kelly leads us through three acts of this play we call life: Worthiness, Belonging and Purpose. And he reminds us that this is not a linear, straightforward climb up a mountain. It’s more like circling the mountain on the way to the top. We will likely cycle through these three acts more than once in life.

It’s a beautiful journey. By first recognizing our worth and then reaching out to others, pursuing our passions (i.e. finding our purpose) becomes more meaningful because it is deeply rooted in a confident sense of who we are and have always been

Kelly speaks often of the Little One inside all of us, and I will admit that at first that seems awkward. But, when we examine our wounds and the needs we have, it’s not hard to accept that there’s a Little One who needs to know he or she is loved and accepted. (Fair warning: you might need to read with a box of tissues in one hand and the phone number of a good therapist in the other.)

To get the most out of this book, read with your heart and mind open to the possibility of a changed life. And while Kelly is a professing Christian, this book is accessible to those who might not share that belief.

Have I convinced you? If not, then hop on over to Ann Voskamp’s blog and read an excerpt from the book. Then decide. I hope you will say yes for you.

P.S. In case you’re curious, the other books I almost always recommend as must-reads are Outlaw by Ted Dekker and Sleeping in Eden by Nicole Baart. Both fiction.

Mr. Rogers was right about the whole neighbor thing

It was my usual Tuesday in the city except nothing about the city is ever “usual.” Take, for example, the truck circling the block advertising Swedish socks. Multi-colored socks dangled from a wire in the back window of the box truck. At first, we had mistaken it for a balloon truck because of all the bright colors. But no. It was socks. I am still trying to figure out why someone would sell socks from a truck in the middle of the city and what is so special about these socks. Maybe next time I’ll ask.

But my usual Tuesday mission was followed by an unusual path to a local restaurant. I had won a gift card to the restaurant during our city’s restaurant week, and I needed to pick it up. Lunch dates are good motivation for new adventures. Generally, I stick pretty close to my familiar downtown spots: market, library, the parking garage, the church where our refugee classes meet. But the restaurant was just a short walk north, so I hoofed it.

When I slowed down for a woman helping a man take careful steps on the sidewalk, a toothless man sitting on a step nearby asked me if I had any change. I generally carry little to no cash on me, so I stopped, looked him in the eyes and told him I was sorry but I didn’t.

“Have a good day,” I said.

“Yeah, right,” he replied. It wasn’t sarcastic I don’t think.

As I made my way to the restaurant, I thought that I probably had a few cents of change in my purse and I would try to dig them out. I finished my errand at the restaurant, which is a bit fancy and now I’m nervous about eating there, and I headed back the way I came and fished out all the change I could find.

It amounted to 39 cents. But it was something.

When I passed the man again, I leaned over and told him I’d found some change after all. I introduced myself and asked his name.

“Ray,” he said. “It’s nice to meet you, Lisa.”

In our city adventures, I’ve met a few of the regulars who ask for money and I look for them time and again. (I hesitate to call them homeless because I don’t know for sure, and even though our city is cracking down on panhandling, I refuse to turn away when someone asks for something I can give them.) Now that winter is over, I keep my eyes out for Jonathan and Woody, but I haven’t seen them in a while. I worry that winter was not kind to them.

I’d never met Ray before today.

But Ray is my neighbor.

—

Matthew Henry via Unsplash

I rode the bus in to the city today. The first time I did this, I was the only one on the bus. The last couple of times, there have been others. Today was the fullest I’d seen it. There were six of us. Three got off at the community college. Another woman and I get off at the same stop. I’d seen her once before. I should ask her name. She, too, is my neighbor.

I ordered a breakfast burrito from the Puerto Rican stand at market. The Square system wasn’t working properly so it took us several tries before I could pay. As I waited for my burrito, I ordered a coffee from my usual spot. They, too, were having trouble with Square and told me the coffee was on them today. I tracked down my husband and asked him for some cash and tucked $2 in their tip cup. I appreciate the gesture of free coffee but they deserve to be paid for their work.

I don’t know the names of anyone who pours my coffee or of the woman who makes my breakfast sandwich. I still have a lot of work to do in this whole neighboring business. But they too are my neighbors.

I found an open seat–a rarity on market days–at a table near the windows. I took up just the room I needed knowing that someone I didn’t know was going to ask to sit with me. This is the way of market. You don’t get to hog the table all to yourself. If there are open seats, you ask to sit there. It is almost cafeteria-style except I like to think of it as–you guessed it–neighborly.

I’d been there a minute when a man asked to sit at the table. Another joined him. Both of them pulled out newspapers. I complimented them on practicing a dying art, that of reading newspapers.

“There’s nothing in there,” the man grumbled. “75 cents and nothing but news we don’t want to hear.” I smiled, remembering the same complaints of the hometown newspapers I worked for in Illinois. Some things never change. He went on to talk about one of the articles about a fight that happened at a restaurant in the city. No one was getting charged in the incident. He blamed the race of the people involved. Then he moved on to talk about sports. It’s college basketball tournament season, if you didn’t know. I asked if he had a favorite team.

“Notre Dame,” he quickly replied. He told me about how his dad rooted for Notre Dame and all the other teams he and his dad followed through the years. I told him we were die-hard Chicago fans. I asked his name.

“Bob.”

I told him mine. He told me he’d lived in the city for 30 years and things were changing, not always for the better. He lamented the lack of affordable housing.

“A one-bedroom apartment is $700! Who can afford that?”

I nodded. As I finished my sandwich, I wished him a great day, then I walked over to the church where our refugee classes meet. It had been three weeks since the last time I’d been there. Certain travel restrictions that are enacted and blocked and enacted and blocked have made the service of refugee resettlement a bit more chaotic and unpredictable than usual. So, our classes no longer meet weekly but for a two-week block once every month.

I had missed the international interaction. We had a full class of Cubans and Haitians, and I said out loud in tentative French that “I speak French a little bit.” It is the next courageous step for me, practicing my limited French in front of real-life people who in this case speak Creole but understand the French mostly. There were children and I often find myself their entertainer because the parents are trying hard to listen and understand and the class is long for little ones. We took a short break and as we reconvened, we realized one of the kids had wandered off. It’s a big church so we spread out. I found the little guy down a hallway on the same floor as our class. He was quick and sneaky, as only children are and we were all relieved to have found him.

One could argue that it isn’t our responsibility to keep watch over the children but I believe more and more what other bloggers have written: There is no such thing as someone else’s child. No such thing as other people’s children.

I am a mother who has entrusted her children to other caring adults who treat them as their own. These Haitian moms deserve nothing less. They, too, are my neighbors.

—

Nina Strehl via Unsplash

Jesus told a story about neighbors in that often-quoted story about the Good Samaritan and in it, he expanded the definition. There’s a whole history between the main characters of that story. In short, the Samaritan had no reason to be kind to the man who had been beaten and robbed because their people were basically mortal enemies. (I’m sure we can’t relate.) But Jesus gives the story a twist. It’s not the suffering man’s own people who help him. It’s the one who is supposed to be his enemy. That guy–he’s the neighbor, Jesus says.

And I’m starting to ask myself the question: Who isn’t my neighbor?

The woman who lives next door and erects a pro-Trump display. She’s my neighbor.

The people at church who express different beliefs about politics than I do. They’re my neighbors.

Bob, the guy who makes racial comments and can’t afford rent in the city, he’s my neighbor.

So is Ray the guy asking me for spare change. And the Haitian mom trying to concentrate on a class in an unfamiliar language. And the lady on the bus who gets off at the same stop. And the bus driver. And the barista. And …

I remember Mr. Rogers asking the people on the other side of the screen if they would be his neighbors. He couldn’t see us, but he knew we were there. We’d never meet him in person or live next door. But he invited us into his life.

Wherever life takes us in the course of a day, we’ve got a chance to be neighborly. And might I suggest that it could be the most important job we do in these times?

And might I also suggest that being a neighbor is easier than it sounds?

Today I gave what I had: some spare change, my name, a little bit of time. None of those things is dramatic or eventful, and even now, I am exhausted from the effort of giving these things away. You don’t have to do a lot or everything to be someone’s neighbor.

Start by giving what you have, even if it’s “just” your name.

The part where the dream looks dead

Spring was just a week away. And we got slammed with a blizzard.

The days are getting longer. But the darkness feels like it’s all-encompassing.

This is the part of the story where things don’t look good for the hero. Where you hang on to the tiniest thread of hope that somehow, he’s going to come through this. But you really aren’t sure.

This is the part where the dream seems as good as dead.

Photo by Dikaseva via Splash

—

Months ago now, or maybe it’s been longer, we felt like God was nudging us to consider a move into the city. We currently live in the suburban-like developed-yet-rural area outside the city limits. And we are being pulled into the heart of the city.

We wanted to buy a house. Move this summer. Live happily ever after.

This is the part where the dream seems like it could die.

The part where the bank calls back and they sound like they wish they could do more but they just can’t offer you much in the way of a loan. And it’s not because your credit is bad (it’s near perfect) or you have sketchy job history (it’s stable in the same industry). It’s because of technicalities. Debt on your record that you currently don’t have to pay because of income requirements and weekly bonuses that don’t count because you haven’t been at your job long enough.

This is the part where you manage to end the call before you burst into tears. Where you stand in the kitchen and stir the pots on the stovetop for dinner and let the tears fall.

The part where you start listening to the voices, the mean ones in your head that tell you things you shouldn’t believe. They sound like your chiropractor, a working mom, who when you complain about the schedule changes this week because of the snow, says, “But you work from home, so it doesn’t matter, right?” She doesn’t meant it to be mean, but you hear her words as criticism. Combined with the call from the bank, you think, “Maybe I should give up this whole writing thing and get a real job. One that actually pays the bills. What kind of fool sits at home writing all day, dreaming of the day when her words will be in the world and maybe just maybe bring a little bit of money with them?” It doesn’t help that you might be on the verge of losing a project you’ve spent 18 months working on.

This is the part of the story where you were just starting to feel good about life again. Hopeful, even. And now the demons are back. The old feelings of anger, bitterness and despair are rising, and you’re questioning all the events from the past you can’t change. Why did they have to happen the way they did?

The voices also say this is the part of the story you shouldn’t tell. You should wait till there’s resolution, one way or another, because OMG, Lisa, dramatic much? You are Chicken Little and the sky is falling and you are telling everyone before you can think it through.

And yet this is the part of the story that makes the story.

Think about it: In your favorite movie or book, there’s probably a moment when the dream looks dead. The goal, unreachable.

Tara is ruined. Westley is dead. The ring is in the wrong hands. Hogwarts has fallen. (Forgive my oversimplifications.)

What would a good story be without a moment of doubt?

—

That these feelings should occur during Lent is no coincidence. Our family decided to cut out TV for this span, not because we think it will make us more holy, but because we often find ourselves turning to it as a distraction. And I’ve never wanted a distraction so much as I have this week. I want to zone out, live someone else’s life through the screen, and forget about my own problems.

But the TV isn’t an option. So I’m forced to feel. And deal.

Lent feels like a slow march to death sometimes. Even though Easter is coming, we have to go through Good Friday to get there and Good Friday is the darkest point of the story. The dream, the hope, the promise is dead. And there’s nothing anyone can do but mourn.

Until two days later, when we see that death is not where the story ends. The story ends with life. Rebirth. Resurrection.

Photo by John Silliman via Unsplash

I’ve read enough stories to know that it’s true. This part where things are all wrong and it seems devoid of hope is not the end. (But it’s still hard to believe that in the day-to-day.) The seed in the ground, buried under dirt, is not the end. It’s the beginning. The only way to life.

This is the part where the dream seems dead. It’s just a part of the story, and however long it lasts, I will try to see it as such. An end to this story is coming and I will remember this part of it.

Because what kind of story would it be without the part where all seems lost?

What if you lived?: Review of Life After by Katie Ganshert

Any time Katie Ganshert’s name is on a book, I know two things:

  1. I will lose sleep because I *have* to get to the end; and
  2. The journey from start to finish will be deep and sometimes dark but never without hope.

I have long been a fan of Ganshert’s work. She has birthed some of my favorite fictional characters and her books are ones I don’t easily forget. These things are all true of her newest novel, Life After. (Disclaimer: I received an advance copy of the book through the Blogging for Books program. Review reflects my honest opinion.)

In Life After, Autumn Manning is the sole survivor of an “L” train bombing in Chicago. A year after the tragedy, she is stuck in an obsessive cycle of “why.” Why did she live when 22 others didn’t? Though her physical life was spared, she isn’t really living. Until the daughter of a victim begins writing her letters and one day, Autumn replies.

The girl’s father, Paul Elliott, who lost his wife in the train bombing, wants to put the whole tragedy behind him. He forbids communication between Autumn and his daughter, but their lives continue to intersect and both Autumn and Paul have to face their grief, fears and some hard truths in order to go on with living a full life.

Ganshert’s writing is to reading what exquisite food is to eating: it’s a luxurious treat. But it’s not so fancy that you’re distracted by the word choices.

Here are a couple of my favorite lines. They both happen to be dialogue, but the narrative portions are beautiful, too.

“You know what I think?” Pop said, scratching the whiskers on his chin again. “I think that the second we find ourselves asking ‘Who am I?’ is the second we become the perfect person for the job.”

And, this one:

“I guess that’s what life is, though, isn’t it? A whole bunch of little moments that don’t seem significant or life-altering at the time, but when you look back …” She shook her head. “I don’t know. They become the most profoundly beautiful things.”

Life After is not a light-hearted, feel-good beach read type of book, and that’s not necessarily an insult. It’s fiction, yes, but it’ll take you on an emotional trek through the valleys of grief and post-trauma stress. And it’ll leave you with the hope that even the worst things life can throw at you can turn into good things.

You can find out more about the book here, which includes a look at the first chapter.

The element of surprise

I do not always like surprises.

Ben White via Unsplash

One time, many years ago, I had to work on my birthday, the same day a group of friends usually gathered at my house for an evening of laughter and Trivial Pursuit and who-knows-what-else. They decided to go bowling. I gave one of them the key to my house so they could gather there afterwards if I didn’t make it to the bowling alley. After a trying day of journalism, I pulled into my driveway. The house was dark, and I assumed my friends were still bowling. I dragged myself up my steps, opened the door and made a shocking discovery.

The lights turned on as if by magic and my living room was full of my friends yelling “Surprise!” I have a picture of the look on my face, which is somewhere between terrified and annoyed, not the sort of delightful expression one might expect. I remember exclaiming, “Oh my God!” which I later regretted because I thought maybe I had taken the Lord’s name in vain. (I think He has forgiven me on that by now.)

I was glad my friends had cared enough about me to throw me a party. I am seldom caught off guard. They executed the plan perfectly.

Read the complete post at Putting on the New, where I blog on the 12th of each month.

The only time I’ve ever loved ice-breaker games

Introverts hate ice-breaker games. It’s a fact. Okay, I hate ice-breaker games. You know what I’m talking about, right? The games where you’re sitting in a group of near-strangers and a leader announces some game designed to help everyone get to know each other, and if you’re an introvert like me, you try to fade into the background because you’d rather just pair up with one person and ask them a billion questions about their life instead of trying to figure out what kind of inanimate object you are or state what kind of vegetable you like or–the worst–remember the names of everyone in the group.

Ice-breaker games. I thought I gave those up after college.

I showed up to the biweekly women’s group for refugees thinking we were going to make crafts, which I wasn’t excited about, but I’ll do just about anything for these women, including make crafts. As it turns out, the person who was supposed to lead us in arts and crafts had cancelled the day before and we were initiating a back-up plan. Ice-breaker games.

The announcement didn’t cause me as much anxiety as it used to, so I take that as a sign that I’m growing and changing. I sat down next to a Somali woman who was attending the group for the first time. I asked about her family and we cobbled together a conversation in simple and broken English. I explained to her what was going to happen, that we were going to play some games. And the first game was “Two Truths and a Lie.”

At least I was familiar with this ice breaker. It’s a youth group/church camp favorite. (Which I now find hilarious that we simultaneously teach our kids not to lie and then encourage it as part of a game. Side track. Sorry.)

I was so busy typing the statements of the first participants–who happened to be the staff and volunteers–into Google translate and trying to help my new friend decipher which one was a lie, that I didn’t realize my turn had come. I’m a writer, so I’m good at making things up. If it had been three lies, I think I would have felt good. It’s the truths part that is harder for me. So I spit out three things: 1. I have not lived in Pennsylvania my whole life. 2. I love coffee. 3. I have three children.

Most of the women guessed number 1, and in my head, I got confused about whether I had stated a truth or a lie, so I said, “yes, number 1. No, wait, I grew up in Illinois. I only have two children.” We all laughed and I was not embarrassed at my mistake.

When my Somali friend’s turn came, she said her three things. We encouraged all the women to speak their statements in English, which was more the intent of the game than the getting to know you part. The group leader said, “Okay, so which one is the lie?” We all tried to guess and my Somali friend said, “What is this ‘lie’?” She had told us all truths.

This pattern would repeat for the next several women who said they did not want to lie, and this was my first clue that I was about to experience something completely different where ice-breaker games were concerned. When Americans play this game, we exaggerate things. I have five brothers or six kids or I’ve flown around the world. These women told us things like I have 10 brothers and 8 sisters and my mother is dead and I had no idea if any of them were false.

Until one Cuban woman reminded us that sometimes an obvious lie is just what we all need to connect.

She spoke confidently but her English was still difficult to understand. We heard that she was someone’s wife but we asked her to repeat. “I am Donald Trump’s wife,” she said again, and all of us who understood doubled over with laughter. The Somali woman next to me wanted to know what was so funny, so I said, “She said she is the wife of the American president.” Her face broke into the widest smile I’ve ever seen and she cackled.

“Donald Trump! Oh no, no, he no good! Obama, yes. But Donald Trump, no!”

Her laughter spread to the rest of us and we spent several good minutes filling the gym with laughter. It was a holy moment for me because in any other setting, someone would have been offended by our laughter. But it was so free, and we all agreed that it was a ridiculous statement and sometimes laughter really is good medicine. None of us needed to speak the same language to understand the laughter.

Frank McKenna via Unsplash

When we had composed ourselves, the game continued and we all survived. Our next game was the one where we say our name and what kind of fruit or vegetable we like. We did not make everyone remember the previous statements, but apparently the “fruit or vegetable” part of the exercise was lost in translation because some women said they liked fish, chicken or chocolate. Whatever. We continued to play.

Then, we all stood and held hands and our leader told us to jump in and out of the circle, left and right. It was another exercise in chaos as left and right were sometimes mixed up. Then she threw a twist into it where we had to follow her directions but say the opposite. There was a lot more laughter, and the joining of hands is something powerful that I forget.

Tim Marshall via Unsplash

Our final game was charades, of sorts. We were divided into two groups and given a stack of animal pictures. We had to act out the animal for the other team to guess. Our first one was a sheep and no one was moving, so I got on my hands and knees and started saying “baa.” This is not normal behavior for me. Not the going first or the pretending to be a sheep. We acted like monkeys and elephants and roosters and cows and puppies and it was a ridiculous way to spend the afternoon.

Maybe there are no monumental takeaways from all of this except that I have literally never enjoyed ice-breaker games as much as I did that day. And that sometimes the only common denominator we need is laughter. And hand-holding.

First Friday Five {March}

March is a green month to me. When I think of March, I think green. Maybe it’s because of St. Patrick’s Day or maybe it’s because spring officially begins. Maybe it’s the proliferation of green foods that aren’t naturally green. (I’m looking at you Shamrock shake and green eggs and ham.)

Whatever the reason, it’s the first Friday in March. Winter has been kind of a dud, and while I know we’re not out of the snowstorm woods just yet, I can’t help but breathe a little easier. We made it through winter. We made it.

Here are some of my favorite things from the past month:

  1. Spring-like temperatures. I’m sure you didn’t see that one coming. We had numerous abnormally warm days in February, and I know I maybe shouldn’t be too excited about that because it means the world’s climate is out of whack. BUT I have young kids who were able to spend hours outside on a couple of Saturdays, and we took a Sunday outing to a local wildlife preserve to see thousands of snow geese that annually stop there during migration. I’m happiest when I’m outside or at least have the option of being outside. This little warm stretch will get me through to for-real spring now.
  2. A live-stream of ocean exploration. It’s technically over now, but for the last couple of weeks of February, NOAA live-streamed an exploration off of American Samoa every day for hours. It was fascinating to see an area of the world that few people get to see. Amazing creatures. Even the scientists were amazed and impressed. Here’s the link, in case they show highlights and you want to check it out: http://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov
  3. Vegetables. It’s way too soon for a garden, and I’m not sure what our plans are this year, anyway, but my husband started working for a produce company at the end of January and one of his benefits is a fresh produce allowance every week. Generally when the budget is tight, we don’t buy as many fruits and vegetables, especially if they are out of season. But having a connection to a local company, even if the produce isn’t local yet, has been an unanticipated blessing. We’ve got apples and oranges, kale, more mushrooms than we can use in a week, potatoes, and squash. We’re still trying to eat sort of seasonally, and I look forward to the expanded choices in the weeks and months to come.
  4. Ordinary adventures. I hate to even call them adventures, though they are adventurous for me. I started riding the city bus this month, and though I’ve only done it a few times, it’s a few more times than in the entire rest of my life. And I’ve been attending a women’s group for refugee women in our community, practicing my French occasionally with the Haitians I meet. I’m re-learning French on an app but using it in person with someone is scary but also helpful. I’m trying to be less afraid and more open to new things, even if they are unfamiliar or uncomfortable.
  5. Friends. I’m used to being independent and letting my husband take the brunt of all my venting. More often than not, lately, I’m texting friends when I need to vent or need some encouragement. With Facebook off of my phone, I feel like texting is one way I can stay connected throughout the day. (But not to an annoying degree.) I’m trying to have at least one friend date a week and be more aware of how long it’s been between get-togethers.

What have you been up to this month? Favorites you’d like to share?

A year without Internet (and so much more): Review of What Falls From the Sky by Esther Emery

I find it no coincidence at all that I finished this book the day before our family gives up television for Lent. It is not the same thing as giving up the Internet for a whole year, which is what Esther Emery writes about in What Falls From the Sky: How I Disconnected from the Internet and Reconnected with the God Who Made the Clouds. But what I read about her experience without Internet has plenty of immediate application.

All I knew about the author when I picked up this book was that she lives off-grid in a yurt in Idaho. Of course she would go a year without the Internet, I thought. No problem. But the yurt in Idaho is where her story takes place now. The story she tells in her book takes place years earlier, when her fast-paced life in theater collides with personal crisis and a cross-country move. When she and her husband live in Boston and she realizes she doesn’t want a cell phone anymore, it turns into something more than giving up her cell phone. She decides to give up the Internet entirely. (Disclaimer: I received a free copy of the book through the Booklook Bloggers program. Opinion reflected in review is my own.)

I was struck by a few of her observations, including one she learns from a study that people are wired to have no more than 150 friends. Her thoughts turned immediately to the Facebook friends she left behind when she abandoned the Internet, and it was my first thought as well. She wrestles with wanting to write about her Year Without Internet and post it on the Internet so people know what she is up to (she calls it the Unblog) and it leads to probably some of my favorite observations and questions:

So emerged my position statement, the philosophical heart of the Year Without Internet. I do not believe that advanced communications technology is required to have a full and vibrant connection to the world. I do not believe that I have to be digitally connected in order to be happy. I believe I could do just as well, or maybe better, with something real.

This was my position, but if I were to now want to prove the position right. I would have to get out of my house. I would have to greet people in person, get to know my neighbors, have fascinating experiences, and invite people over for dinner. But I don’t feel like doing any of those things. Without the Unblog, I don’t feel motivated to do any of those things … because no one is watching.

I wonder if this was true in times before our time. Was it impossible to imagine putting effort into something if there were no eyes to look at it? Was this true that a life seemed meaningless if it was lived in a place where it could not be seen? (p. 44-45)

I think about how much time I spend on social media telling other people about what I’ve been doing, and I wonder how much of it is really necessary.

Toward the end of her journey, as she is learning to play guitar, she realizes that doing a new thing terribly is its own kind of skill.

I have found the one thing that I can always be good at. I can always be brilliant at this. I can always, no matter what, under any circumstances, be an absolute beginner.

I have to sit with these words because I do not like not knowing how to do a thing. How would I be different if I approached life with the gusto of being a brilliant beginner?

The book contains themes including faith awakening, forgiveness, family trials, social anxiety and neighborliness, but it’s not clinical or prescriptive. It’s a peek at one woman’s experience and how the world opens up for her, and it carries with it the hope that the world can open for us, too.

You don’t have to give up anything to get something out of this book, but by the time you’re finished reading it, you might find you need some things a little less.

 

 

Cosmos, Coldplay and Communion

It was a Saturday night in the city. A chill in the air because it was February but not enough to keep people from being out and about. Maybe the city never really sleeps. I don’t know.

We hustled against the chill, the sun already setting. Warmth waited behind the heavy wooden doors. My husband questioned whether we should use these doors to enter a church we’d never been to, but I figured if they were unlocked, they were meant to be used. I might have been mistaken. The moment we stepped inside, attention was on us and we were directed to the sanctuary. We felt no shame, only inclusion.

This was an old church in the heart of the city, one we’d only ever seen from outside. So, to find it as beautiful on the inside as out was no real surprise. But some of the walls glowed purple with light. We walked the main aisle to a pew with a door on the aisle side. Foreign territory for our open pew practices in other churches. I have no vocabulary for the proper names of the fixtures of this church. Maybe it is time to learn.

We fidgeted a bit in our seats that were less than comfortable for a family of four. My legs barely touched the ground. We sat towards the middle of the room and soon the pews all around were filling up. Was this normal for a Saturday night, or did the musical selections have something to do with it?

The musicians opened the gathering with two songs from the band Coldplay. The whole service would be filled with their music, and it was the main reason we had come. I had to see and hear for myself how a church with ancient liturgical traditions incorporated modern music into the worship of God. It was a melding of the seemingly secular with the sacred, and I could hardly contain my excitement.

Soon, we were standing as the rector (is that his title?) walked the aisle. I was grateful we were in the middle so we could watch others for the standing and sitting cues. This, we are not used to.

He opened with a reflection that included the word “cosmos” and my soul stirred. I have a thing for words, you know, and some words hold such power all on their own. They need no explanation.

Cosmos.

It is a science word, sort of, and a mystical one, for sure, and I cannot recall a time when I have ever heard it spoken in a church. I looked up its definition just now, to be sure I understood its meaning. “The universe seen as a well-ordered whole” is how it is described. See Merriam-Webster’s definition here.

It is an old word. And it is the opposite of chaos. I have often felt that it is the kind of word Christians might be afraid of. I see no reason to fear it.

—

I could name one Coldplay song, probably, before that night, though as the service continued, I recognized more and more of the melodies and lyrics. These were not the kinds of songs we could all sing along to, not like the old hymns of the church or the contemporary praise songs. But I was okay with that. I needed to listen for a while, to let the words water my soul thirst. Though the music was contemporary, this was not like a concert. Not in the least. The songs were chosen specifically for the part of the service in which they were played.

As the time for communion neared, my anxiety swelled. I’m never sure what to do with my kids during communion. I refuse to force them to say a set of words to prove their faith in God. There will be no pressure from me for a confession of faith or the reciting of a “Jesus prayer,” whatever that means. I only want to live a life of faith as best I can in front of them and encourage them to do the same. They have never not known about God, a church family, and a life of faith. I want them to be the ones to choose whether they take communion or not.

At the church we regularly attend, this is rarely an issue because they are in their children’s classes when we take communion. But I always worry when they are with us and it’s a communion Sunday. If they take it, will people talk? If they want to take it, and I tell them “no” because I’m worried about what people think, what does that say to them about how God receives them? Aren’t the little children allowed to come to Jesus?

Since it was an Episcopal church this night, I also didn’t know if that meant it was sort of like the Catholic church, where children must be confirmed to take communion. All of these thoughts occupied my mind as we prepared for communion. You see how holy I am.

I had nothing to fear. The very first person to take communion was a child younger than ours, and the woman holding the communion wafer, bent down and offered it to her with joy. There was no hesitation. And I breathed a sigh of relief. This, this, is what I want for my children. If I could go back and do it again, I would have them baptized as infants. Not because I want to take away their ability to choose. Not because I think it will save them. But because I want them to know they are part of God’s family. They are His, wholly and completely. They have a part in the kingdom, then and now.

Communion was still a bit awkward as we made our way to the front. We needed to hold our hands in front of us, we learned, to receive the wafer, and our son, who did not catch on to this, did not receive communion but was blessed by the rector, who smiled at our son. Our daughter took her wafer and ate it, saying it tasted like a sponge. My husband and I took ours with the wine in the cup, another practice I almost envy, if one can envy another church’s spiritual practices.

Roberta Sorge via Unsplash

I enjoy a glass of wine now and then but was raised in a faith community that shunned all alcohol consumption. We remain part of that denomination today, whose rules have changed, but there is still a part of me that feels I cannot be authentic about alcohol. I still feel like I might be “found out” someday. When your church serves wine for communion, there is little debate about whether the people who are part of your community will have an issue with the wine bottles in your house.

The words of Coldplay’s “Yellow” matched the act of communion in a way I would never have thought. And when the rector led us in a post communion prayer that said, “in this holy sacrament, you give substance to our hope,” I nearly wept. The wafer. The wine. It is not just a ritual but tangible hope. If hope is hard to pin down, then the act of communion can give it form. This, this bread, this wine, this is what our hope looks like.

—

As the service came to a close, we danced. I know, it sounds crazy. But it was like we were celebrating, and it was not just some emotional high created by upbeat music. I wouldn’t necessarily call Coldplay’s music upbeat, not all of it, at least. But it was a response to the communion, to the words we had read together about what we believed.

We were “sent” with a hymn, Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida” and the room almost pulsed with life as we sang together this popular song and left the sanctuary for the world outside.

It’s as powerful today as I think back on it as it was that day weeks ago. It’s been a while since God has felt so real to me inside a church. (And that is more a commentary on me than the church.)

A week or so after our first visit to this church, we received a large envelope in the mail. I had filled out the connection card because when we move to the city, there is a good chance this faith community will be one we are involved with. Inside the envelope were two name tags, one for me and one for my husband. (Our son is upset that the children didn’t get any name tags.) They are already including us, and they don’t even know us. We have not had to prove ourselves or sign any statements. We are already part of them.

I think about how this would go over in some of the evangelical churches I know. How if after one visit we sent name tags and said we could not wait for them to become more involved in our community. I think most people would run screaming or throw them away. Maybe not all people, but I definitely would feel pressured. Somehow I don’t with this church, though. I have felt included from the moment we stepped through the heavy wooden doors.

Greg Rakozy via Unsplash

I don’t know what it all means yet. For me. For us. Lent is approaching and we might find ourselves back at that church on Ash Wednesday to receive the ashes, a sign of death, I think. I don’t always know why I want these practices or what they mean entirely. But I need some grounding in this topsy-turvy world and all I know to do is go back. Back to the practices and creeds that survive generations, that connect me to Christians past, present and future. I need solid footing.

I need Cosmos in the face of chaos.