2010 Day 1 - Change

I've made some changes and I have a new blog. You can find me here from now on ....

http://annsopendoor.wordpress.com/

The end of Chapter One

This year is almost over.

This is the year that I called Chapter One. We may be 50 somethings and we may have been married 35 years and we may have moved many times but even so..... it was right to call this year Chapter One.

This last month has epitomized what this year is about.

As Thanksgiving and Christmas approached we stopped to talk about starting over with these holidays. So many times down through the years these holidays have been subject to any thing other than what would be lifegiving to our own little family - for many reasons that I won't try to deal with. Yes, sometimes it was great - but a pattern of a great holiday followed by a not so great holiday gets old.

This year Larry and I talked about starting again. We talked about where WE want to go with these holidays. We walked in agreement with each other letting our hearts connect in purpose and direction. That's bigger than you might know, dear reader, and there is such hope and peace in that.

The other significant thing about these last two months is that God dug deeper into the deepest parts of me by turning my attention to the issue of shame. This was a hard one to tackle but absolutely necessary to understand why I could not seem to get over some things and why I kept reacting to people and words and situations. (I've concluded that I am a very, very deep person. : ) )

So I am here at the end of chapter one with a better understanding of hope.

I'm looking forward to chapter two.

Thinking things.

Thinking things and wanting to write.

Writing helps me to organize thoughts that are fleeting and fly away. But not today I guess.

Interconnected thoughts make stories hard to tell - points become cumbersome.

Maybe never important to any other soul but important to me. Ultimately it's enough to know.

I love this - this being able to look a something I consider a "failure" and my reaction to it and then to trace the action and the reaction to the roots that produced such fruit.

It arms me - gives me weapons to use against an unseen enemy that works diligently to steal, kill and destroy in my life.

And did a good job for many years - still meeting the costs of 20+ years of inability.

It's wonderful now to at least be armed with knowledge and understanding.

I am still new. In previous posts I spoke of going backward to something more like a child. I'm still there in some ways. But also...ready to grow up. To become.

The word deliberate comes to mind. I'll see over time how that gets applied in my growing up process.

Flip Flop Transformation

Last year - May 1 - I blogged about my willingness and desisre to become a flipflop wearer. I guess I have succeeded in this endeaver even tho I would still not put them at the top of my list of preferred footwear.

They're just so stinkin' easy tho.

So here's my dirty flip flops from last year - still good AND I got me a new pair for this summer. These new ones are the kind that have the thick cushy sole and I thought they might be good for wearing in my kitchen. I think they're going to be good for that purpose.

Gotta keep evolving.

More on Growing Up

Well, I am settled into my new job, my new routine and it's looking like I'm going to have some good down time in this place also. Not as much and perhaps in time other duties will come my way. I'm enjoying making this task mine and organizing it and that's something that will continue for a while but it will be done the easy way - as I go. I'm enjoying this new place in every way. It became apparent that my previous position and location in the building wasn't going to be satisfying for the long term. It was too lonely for one thing. Now I have people to talk to. That's a nice thing. And I look up from my dest and through the glass wall of the office in front of me I see windows and sunshine. MMMMMMmmmmmmm.

I'm thinking this means I will have a little time for this blog.

I'm such a navel gazer. That's why I need to write. I need to get what's inside to the outside.

Anyway.....

My journey within the journey that has to do with me growing up is, of course, continuing. Father, in that wonderful way of his, is bringing those little tidbits of wisdom and understanding through conversations with friends and family and sometimes they don't even know how instrumental they are in my life. Or maybe they do???

But I'm seeing something in this growing up thing that I hope I can relate here.

As I "grow up" the goal is actually to be much the same person as I was before. I'm speaking here of my relating to people. The difference will be that the source of that person and my relating to others will be not from the roles I was trying to live out but from that place deep inside where the living water flows. I have - to the best of my ability - dropped what I saw as "roles" in my life. These things were not what I WAS but what I WAS DOING. I was not ready on the inside to be doing what I was doing on the outside. What I WAS DOING was not wrong or bad but it was not coming out of that place that I so desire - the place where doing comes out of being.

I am learning to be and to learn to be in some of these things I had to go to the beginning and get a fresh start. I'm curious now to see how this journey is going to continue. I'm curious to see what Father's fathering method will be.

Laughing at me

Ha

I have to laugh at me.

I look at my previous posts and my laments about not changing and still don't change. As the man said....Who will free me from this body of death?

Well, I'm not giving up.

Doggonit.

When I grow up

So, little girl, what do you want to be when you grow up??????????

That question continues to ring in my head like a tune recently heard and not easily discarded.

Hmmmm, I say to myself. Could it be that this question is one my Daddy is asking me. My heavenly Daddy? You know, I've been a Christian for 33 years and only now do I feel comfortable calling him Daddy. Hey, it was a pretty big move to go from God to Father. But I don't do these things because it sounds good - I have to know that I know that I feel it deep within me. I consider this a great progression as I understand that he really wants us to come to him as little children. I am only just now at that point.

So again - the question rings - what do I want to be when I grow up.

WELL, I think I have an answer to that now.

I want to be an artist and to bring artistic expression into all that I do. I want to live in the world of art and history and museums and literature and philosophy. I don't mean that it's a big deal to me whether I'm a money maker or not. Money seldom motivates me so if I talk about selling something it's really because I'm competitive enough to want to know if what I do is as good as the next guy. But ideas of success aside art is the area I would like to walk in - just like some do in business and some do in the military.

I don't see this as any kind of contradiction to my life as a Christian either. If God is all in all then these things are all expressions of Him in the earth. Depends on the person - not the vocation so much.

How hard this is at 50+. My mind is largly untrained and undisciplined. The axons I have grown are for other activities and thought processes. It's hard to be beginning again - now - to do those things that are so much easier as a child. When you're a child you can work at a child's level and every thing you do is great. When you are a chronological adult and you do things that are on a child's level it's discouraging. And it's just hard to change habits.

Why didn't my parents see this and train me up in such things? Well, I am not and was not as a child one of those extremely focused and driven ones so I doubt that such a desire seemed anything more than just passing childish fancy. Like playing with cars turned out to be. Our home was not filled with artistic things or music that I remember much (although Mom and Dad had some old albums that we had great fun with as young teenagers). I do remember Dad mentioning Dr Spock and I think they took his teachings way too much to heart. You know, those ideas about letting children just grow up without too much instruction. So I'm sure that if I, as a child, had been one of those that found my own way to do such things I would have grown more in these areas. We did have good books in the house and that was my outlet - the unreal world. It was so much easier there.

So now I am here today and I have the choice of just setting it all down and just being what I've become which would be much easier - and not at all bad - or I can set my face to just continue in my slow, meandering way to become.

I choose the latter. It's an uphill battle full of disappointments and frustrations. But HEY - If I live to be 100 then what's 5 years given to the recapturing of a childhood that got lost.

This is very painful processing today - for me it seems that facing an old habit and choosing a new one is always painful. Ok - the more I do it the less painful it gets. I'm thankful for this blog/journal/personal diary sort of thing that I do. I feel much better than I did when I started writing. Funny - I could never get this same release with a notebook and pen.

Last night and the night before Larry and I watched a video by Dr. Paul Hegstrom about the brain and how it works and how it renews and what happens when we make a decision to start a new thing or to change a habit, etc.

Amazing how God made us and how involved our physical bodies are in the transformation process. And it helps to explain why it's not easy. It takes three years for a new axon to be fully formed in the brain. And the old axon containing data about the old way will even try to absorb the new one. So we're trying to change and our very brain matter is fighting against it.

In a previous post I said that I felt as though I'd been asleep for 50 years and am just now waking up. Maybe another way to put that feeling is that I feel like I've gone back to being a child. And I believe this has been God's setup. When I turned 50 I knew that I knew that there was more going on than more wrinkles and gray hair. In God's economy 50 is the year of Jubilee - the year of starting over. I've started over and I feel it as I walk through my land and I'm going through a stage - yes a stage - of childhood. How strange. Last night's conversation - prompted by the video - was about taking another look at the homes we grew up in - our parents - events - those vague things you remember and have heard about that time down through the years.

Pieces of a puzzle being brought to their places. The fragmented soul being called back to itself.

As I said, I willingly embrace this journey. I can trust my Father now.

Patience pays off

My job is evolving. Maybe transforming is a better word. Just about the time I'm figuring out how to make my work last most of a month I'm offered a completely different position in the company. I think this one will keep me as busy as I would like to be.

No details yet. It's just that the boss came in this afternoon and started explaining this particular process to me - even using a marker board - and I figured they were going to take some portion of that process and add it to what I've already been doing. But NO. Then he starts telling me how this particular job has been being handled in another city and they want to bring it in house. The lady who is doing it doesn't want to move to Dallas. Sooooo they offered it to me.

Didn't have to think about that one very long.

Thanks

Going up.

The staircase outside my apartment door. I always look to see what the light is doing.

Epiphany moments

A nod to my brother just older than me for his contribution to my journey.

Thanks Neil.

As I was conversing with him about my blog and some of these experiences that I'm having in what seems like rapid succession sometimes he said "epiphany". I know that word and my initial reaction was that it was not the word but it continued to work in my mind so I thought I better look it up. You know - just in case I didn't know something that I thought I did. It happens.

Here is definition #3 from the Merriam Webster Online dictionary:
3 a (1): a usually sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something (2): an intuitive grasp of reality through something (as an event) usually simple and striking (3): an illuminating discovery, realization, or disclosure b: a revealing scene or moment

That's what's happening as I walk along this transformatin journey. Epiphany moments. Sometimes I feel as though I've been asleep for 50 years and am just now waking up and seeing and really seeing and experiencing the world I live in. It's wonderful.

It's also a little scary sometimes. I wonder if this is what it feels like to be a child trying to negotiate the world. I'm making mistakes that a 50+ year old woman ought not be making. It's not really comfortable and this morning I was thinking about maybe even just shutting down this blogging until I grow up some but then what is the point of blogging about your journey if you are going to leave out chunks of it.

This is not comfortable right now.

Larry got this description of progression from somewhere -

We are unconsciously incompetent
We are consciously incompetent
We are consciously competent
We are unconsciously competent

I feel like I am in stage #2. I am conscious of my incompetence as a person.

I am conscious of my need for a Father who will help me grow up. For about 30 years I have been unconscious of this need and so I did not let him help me grow. I did not work with him but rather like a petulant child I worked against him.

It's a good thing I'm living to be 100 (my plan- I don't have a word from the Lord on that).
Hopefully I will have a few years as an adult before I'm done.

Micro self examination

A strange a funny place this is.

I'm sure there is a reason for it.

It seems my pendulum has swung from one side all the way to the other.

What I mean is - when I was growing up I was truly oblivious to the world around me and to myself also. I never really stopped to think about things much. I didn't question things. Now I do. I think about a lot of things and I think sometimes I come across like the absent minded professor but the deal is that I may not be paying attention to what others are because I'm thinking about something or noticing something.

I like this micro self examination right now in spite of any pitfalls. Maybe in time I will increase in my ability to do mental multi-tasking.

Three things come to mind right now from this weekend that are that sort of me looking at me thing.

** Saturday afternoon we took the grand girls down to the pool. (Unbelievable that Xandra is turning 12 and Schigh will be 14 in a few months!!!!!) As I was talking with a couple of ladies that I met just then we noticed a young guy with his guitar just outside the pool area. I was told that he had lived in the apartments for a while and often came down to the pool are to play his guitar. He came in later and I watched him walk. I couldn't imagine doing my "growing" where people could actually watch me. He was home, among people he knew - people who had been watching him grow up and learn the guitar. People who had shared some of his growing up years.

Suddenly I was very aware of how hidden my life had been and how - by comparison - much of it was on display now and I was living in closer contact with people than ever before. To go to the pool in a complex like this is not the same as having one in my back yard and this would be my preference just because I'm me. Even to walk around with my camera is to do so knowing that people see me. Somehow a yard with it's legal boundaries gave me a sense of privacy and aloneness. I've thought of this as I would go down to the car for something and I'm not dressed nice and don't have my makeup on and I'm hoping no one sees me. It's easier to do that when you have a yard and a drive way but in these apartments I can't hide my self so easily. I don't want to be on company manners and appearances all the time so I'm working on this.

I've started wearing my hair in a ponytail a lot. Something I've always done when alone but I would take it down to answer the door just because I that not the way I wanted to be seen. LOL

I had a feeling - when Larry and I ended up in an apartment - that God was going to immerse us in community in a different way. I've expected this to be a different experience and I'm keeping my heart open to receive both the lessons and the people themselves in the way that needs to be. I'm walking slowly as I get to know my neighbors and trying not to make any assumptions.

So I'm very aware of this process and that's why I'm calling it micro examination. Me examining me as I think others might see me. Me examining my surroundings whether people or events.

**The second incidence had to do with a response that came out of me to someone else. I'm not going to tell the story but just say that it was a moment (afternoon actually) as I processed a response that I didn't feel very good about. But I was very aware of living "closer" to this someone than before and the push/pull of a growing organism called a relationship. Being more involved in the actual "life" of a couple of people who already have a relational history with each other. I'm welcome there but I have to learn how to let some past things go and function in the actuality of what it is now.

**The third thing is cooking. I'm sort of a hit and miss cook. You can get a good meal or a bad meal or anything in between at my house but I like to do it, I guess, because my love language is acts of service and I find in me this desire to cook for people and feed them. So I've started doing that and it's turned out OK but not top job. Not like what I have in my heart to do. So this is a place that fits in to my learning/growing in community dynamic. I see and feel that as I do it. I think I'll grow in my abilities and I'll find that thing that is my expression in this area. But I'll know in my heart that serving up a meal is more than the sum of what you see on the table.

This self examination of my self is not new as I've been doing this since the beginning of my healing journey which began in the mid 90's. But it is different. I believe the focus now is not so much on how God heals a person but how he transforms a person.

Also....

I believe there is a focus on how he is transforming people into communities and communities into his body. I'm actually fascinated as I observe this process. I cannot define any of it but it's like various cells in the body are are becoming bones, muscle, sinew, etc. which are coming together to form arms, legs, etc. which will then find their places with others and come together to form this one living, breathing, earth touching, being. And I'm sure there are more phases than that. He has shown me this big picture more than once over the years in different ways. I just happen to be the organism that is under the microscope during this phase of the evolutionary process of understanding. I happen to be the one that I can look at most closely.

So if I seem to be too navel gazing for comfort - well - I probably am. But I'm not going to stop this process and being this way. I believe it is God's expression in my life. It is a way that He talks to me and reveals himself to me.

I've had friends down through the years who were always looking to other people or other places for the "move of God" that they wanted to get into. For many years I have felt that the greatest move of God that I could be in was the one happening in my own life. I felt that I didn't have to go anywhere else for this. I guess maybe I've missed out on seeing God in other ways in the earth because of this but I'd still rather know that my own life is where I find him most intensely.

Yeah - I'm definitely OK with this even with it's weirdness.

New Life in the Garden

Last week a conversation. Us and our daughter. Language Barriers interfered with the making of plans. We said.... She heard.... and there was missed opportunity and there was hurt.

Last night a conversation. Me and my daughter. Language Barriers began to be overcome. Understanding came. Can't undo what is - that gets consigned to opportunities missed.

Last night beauty came from the dying of old thought patterns - old behavior patterns. New life for the future.

Newness springs from the detritus of the old and grows in the fractal/garden of our life.

Death and Loss and Beauty

These pictures were taken in Kansas City, during that period of time when the weather was thinking about spring but all around was the signs of death from the winter. I had gone out that day because the temperature was bearable and I had cabin fever. I went to a favorite park to what I could see.

Among many other beautiful or interesting things I saw these leaves - these brown curls holding strong to their limbs - not yet ousted by the new.

last years leaves making one last statement about their own beauty

So is death beautiful?

OR

Can anything beautiful be found in that place?

We all experience death.

Sometimes our people die. People we love. My parents did and even though sometimes I wish they were still here - there was much beauty to be found in that place before the new had even begun to spring forth.

Two of the most amazing experiences of my life.
























There are other deaths that we deal with also. The death of a dream or a plan or a hope.

Not to mention that for some hope is lost entirely. I don't know that there is any beauty to be found there because to lose hope entirely is to give up on God and every other possibility.

It does happen.
























But the death of dreams is a common one, I believe, in the world of humans. We live for dreams. We are told to dream and never stop dreaming and, you know, "it's never too late".

I have found that there is beauty to be found at such times. If those dreams are not founded on reality - if they are houses built on sand and not on the Rock then they need to die.

I have found it hard to let some dreams die. Especially the ones having to do with family. But sometimes you must let the dreams go just like you let the people go when they die. I am experiencing this type of death in my natural fractal/garden even as I am experiencing new life in a spiritual fractal/garden.





















The beauty I see in this death is that it releases life that needs to come forth.

Here is where trusting God and his ways is most important - and where the great struggle of so many years of my life has been.....there is a period of time in which no life can be seen. If beauty is going to be found at all it must be found in the moment - even the moment of death.

Father told me in 2004 that I would learn to live in the present moment. So I must live in the place where I see only the dried up remains of what was.

I need to open my eyes to see what a nice color the brown is. I need to look close enough to really see the curls. I need to stop long enough to appreciate the unique shape of each leaf - each group of leaves.

There is a verse that speaks of us seeing the face of God without a veil over our face. Looking fully into his face and being transformed in that moment. I heard this scripture quoted the most during the days of the soaking meetings where we would get together and sit in the presence of God and worship. Those were good times.

But I found that being able to see the face of God in the types of things that would be symbolized by the dead leaves are the transforming times of my life.

So I live in this present moment, acknowledging my grief until God's touch can completely heal it, but no longer fighting for my dream.

Time to let go - even where I love.

Community = love = community

Conversation this past weekend with friends about community. The word kept coming up - It's about love.

About Love.

And what do we really know about love anyway? As I pondered this thought that finally got past my mind into some deeper places, it occurred to me that we are going to find out how much we DON'T know about love.

God's kind of love.

He has given us the gift of each other. Not just for fellowship and feel good but to challenge our notions of righteousness.

Painting

The following is something I received in my email at work this morning. As I read it I kept thinking about the post I wrote this morning before leaving for work. I kept thinking about us painting and is that nuts or not and it's like this email spoke to my heart - confirming once again, that it's not just OK that we paint - it's REALLY OK that we paint. This is what we do for US. It's what we can do to feed our souls and spirits at almost every stop along the way of our life - our life that has required certain things of us and not allowed other things to happen. So the quote is long and it really has to do with relationships because it's National Friendship week but since it did minister to my heart in this other way I thought I'd post it as the continuation of my thoughts about painting.

Will You Dance With Me?

READ THIS VERY SLOWLY.... IT'S PRETTY PROFOUND.

Too many people put off something that brings them joy just because they haven't thought about it, don't have it on their schedule, didn't know it was coming or are too rigid to depart from their routine.

I got to thinking one day about all those women on the Titanic who passed up dessert at dinner that fateful night in an effort to cut back. From then on, I've tried to be a little more flexible.

How many women out there will eat at home because their husband didn't suggest going out to dinner until after something had been thawed? Does the word 'refrigeration' mean nothing to you?

How often have your kids dropped in to talk and sat in silence while you watched 'Jeopardy' on television?

I cannot count the times I called my sister and said, 'How about going to lunch in a half hour?' She would gas up and stammer, 'I can't, I have clothes on the line, My hair is dirty, I wish I had known yesterday, I had a late breakfast, It looks like rain.' And my personal favorite: 'It's Monday.' She died a few years ago. We never did have lunch together.

Because Americans cram so much into their lives, we tend to schedule our headaches. We live on a sparse diet of promises we make to ourselves when all the conditions are perfect!

We'll go back and visit the grandparents when we get Steve toilet-trained. We'll entertain when we replace the living-room carpet. We'll go on a second honeymoon when we get two more kids out of college.

Life has a way of accelerating as we get older. The days get shorter, and the list of promises to ourselves gets longer. One morning we awaken, and all we have to show for our lives is a litany of 'I'm going to,' 'I'll let you know,' 'I plan on,' and 'Someday, when things are settled down a bit.'

When anyone calls my 'seize the moment' friend, she is open to adventure and available for trips. She keeps an open mind on new ideas. Her enthusiasm for life is contagious. You talk with her for five minutes, and you're ready to trade your bad feet for a pair of Roller blades and skip an elevator for a bungee cord.

My lips have not touched ice cream in 10 years. I love ice cream. It's just that I might as well apply it directly to my stomach with a spatula and eliminate the digestive process. The other day, I stopped the car and bought a triple-Decker. If my car had hit an iceberg on the way home, I would have died happy.

Now...go on and have a nice day. Do something you WANT to.....not something on your SHOULD DO list. If you were going to die soon and had only one phone call you could make, who would you call and what would you say? And why are you waiting?

Make sure you read this to the end; you will understand why I sent this to you.

Have you ever watched kids playing on a merry go round or listened to the rain lapping on the ground? Ever followed a butterfly's erratic flight or gazed at the sun into the fading night? Do you run through each day on the fly? When you ask ' How are you?', do you hear the reply?

When the day is done, do you lie in your bed with the next hundred chores running through your head? Ever told your child, 'We'll do it tomorrow.' And in your haste, not see his sorrow? Ever lost touch? Let a good friendship die? Just call to say 'Hi?

When you worry and hurry through your day, it is like an unopened gift....thrown away..... Life is not a race. Take it slower. Hear the music before the song is over.

It's National Friendship Week. Show your friends how much you care. Send this to everyone you consider a FRIEND. If it comes back to you, then you'll know you have a circle of friends.

To those I have sent this to... I cherish our friendship and appreciate all you do.

'Life may not be the party we hoped for...but while we are here we might as well dance!

The question of painting

Monday morning. Back to work.

Work?

What then would I call a weekend of painting and putting and going up and down stairs and running errands.

The stuff is almost all in its proper places. Everything is almost in order. The painting is almost finished.

I love the feeling of being washed in quiet, restful blue as I sit in my bedroom at my computer. Window to the right letting in light and giving me a view of the world.

I love the feeling of quiet energy that I get when I go into the great room ( ; 0 I like the thought of a great room in an apartment) and I walk into the earthy Dijon mustard and ochre colors there.

I would not have done the painting. It would have been too much for me and I wouldn't have required it of Larry - so I am very grateful to him for doing this painting.

You could say we're nuts for doing all this in an apartment - a temporary home. But the reality is that we are nuts anyway. We're nuts because of other things too - why should this be different?

Color is important to us. It speaks to us about us and it energizes us.

Larry's room is deep green. I don't know what green it is because it's something our daughter mixed up for her house. Again the feeling I get when I walk into his man space is quiet.

I love that. I love the message in that.

Where am I???

I'm feeling like the person who wakes up and has to take a few minutes to realize where she is and how she got there.

I can't believe it's only been 12 days since I last visited here.

A recap to bring me up to speed.....

The day after my last post we signed the lease on our apartment. A very lovely apartment with 9 foot ceilings and a fireplace; a lovely, large living/dining area; a patio that Honey the cat will surely lay claim to as her own. I'm sure she'll let us sit out there - she likes it when we are all together; two bedrooms, each large enough to accommodate more than one purpose - important since there are only two and no office. The kitchen comes under the heading of OK but we'll work with it and bring it up to speed. Our view is either the trees behind or another apt complex to the side. Lest you groan over looking at apartments, let me just say, they are some very nice looking apartments, neat, clean, built symmetrically so they're easy on the eye - a restful view - and not too close.

The weekend right after signing the lease I had a photography workshop at the Dallas Arboretum to attend. Two very long days as well as a lecture Friday evening. Larry painted. Shannon helped some. The living/dining must be painted again. We were going for yellow, of course, but were looking to tone it down with a nice Dijon mustard sort of color. Somehow we ended up with French's yellow mustard on our walls. It was an amazing yellow. It didn't look that way on the card! I like yellow but that's too bright even for me. The conclusion is that the light is too bright for it so poor Larry will have to repaint. If he doesn't do it this week I'll help him this weekend.

We finally spent our first night there this Friday night. The official move in, I guess, because you can't base that on when the furniture arrived. Larry decided that since he'd be driving back and forth with the painting going on that he'd bring a truckload every day. So he did that and a couple of times friends helped with big stuff - thanks Bobby & Drew - and Phil for those last two peices on Sunday. I took off from work Monday and Tuesday last week and made trips there every evening after work the rest of the week and by this Saturday we had the place looking much better as far as stuff being put in places. Then we went back to our daughter's house and got more, and there is yet more to get. When I left this morning it was chaotic looking. But there is some organization - you just have to know where it is.

What a process. I'm thinking of the day that I sat in front of the house in KC two years ago and said how this move was supposed to go and I MUST had said that we would have movers - I know I said we would have a house all ready - everything that I said WOULD be HAS NOT been in this move.

See me floating in the Lazy River of Serenity.

It's as though God said.... we'll see who's in charge and who has the right to make declarations. (I'm thinking it's not me.) But at the same time he has blessed us in so many ways - the biggest being the apartment itself. We love it. It is so peaceful and comfortable. And also the peace we've both had even tho dealing with things NOT being what we would be more comfortable with. Blessings of his grace.

We are also blessed to be close to our friends and still not far from our daughter or our grandchildren. Our son is moving around some - it's just nice to know he's back in this area rather than in Nebraska.

Oh yes - we have a garage also which we use for storage. Don't think we could do this without that. SUCH a blessing.

Friday night I had a real - although not paying - photography gig. My daughter works for a technical college and they had a banquet for the teachers in the area that allow them to come and speak in their class and I was the event photographer. It was fun. I learned a lot. I don't think I hit absolute perfection but they turned out very good and I know some things I will do differently in the future.

Saturday evening we spent with some friends that live close now. That's our goal. One of them. Time with friends.

So - I've been busy. Busy. Busy.

Oh - and another new thing I want to make note of. I said I was getting more political. Well, I wrote my representative this morning about a bill concerning dogs and asked him to oppose it. It's really a ridiculous bill - but I won't go into that here. I just wanted to note that as a first.

Resting with God

I have a book called "God Calling". If you've never read this book I would recommend it to you. It's a devotional. The story behind it is that two women prayed daily and wrote down the things that God said to them. OK - there's more to it than that but I can't remember the particulars. But these things in the book are not just their organized thoughts as are so many books but they are the things God said the way God said them.

I have a widget on my IGoogle page that quotes from that book. I am especially appreciative of today's because Larry and I are looking at some new beginnings and you know how it can be with new beginnings. There are always extra perceived needs when there is a starting over and you want to carry on life as usual through the new beginnings.

Several of the quotes on that widget have been very encouraging but this one really caught me today especially as it comes on the heals of some conversations about resources and directions:

"All work that results from resting with Me is miracle-work. Claim this power."

We have, more than once, had to remember the difference in waiting FOR God and waiting WITH God. This quote focuses on RESTING with God to produce work. Expression rather than doing. Yeilding rather than obedience. And it helps me to remember right now, right at this moment, that if we are truly walking something out with him then what we need will be where we need it when we need it to be there.

We have, more than once, walked something out with him but not always successful in doing it his way - not waiting, resting with him. That is our focus right now. We trust our hearts as we always have but hopefully with some gained wisdom and maturity that will enable us to walk it his way the whole way.

He is a good and faithful Father and we can trust him.

Plowing ground

How appropriate that during this time of Father working in the garden of our Family - Father and Daughter find themselves tilling up her backyard and planting new grass.

Thanks Father

Turning towards the bottom of the bridge

I've spent a couple of days pondering where we are. Two days ago we secured an apartment to live in. We'll be there at least a year. I couldn't get Larry to commit to 10 years. Image that. : )

His heart still wants a house and my heart doesn't really care anymore. I guess for his sake it's a good thing it's on the second floor or I'd probably be wanting to stay there for the rest of my life. The real deal is that God must be in control of that so if he doesn't push to go and I don't push to stay then God CAN be in control of it.

So I see us - Larry and I - this couple who have been standing on this bridge, looking over the side at the life happening - life that reaches up and touches us now and then - and now we turn and start walking toward the bottom of the bridge and we'll keep walking and walking further and further into this new land. Now we'll be a part of the life that's here and how that will look one can only speculate. Ok that would be me - Larry is not given to speculating on maybes.

There are things we both want to accomplish and hopefully there will now be opportunity for such things.

We'll paint the walls in this new place using colors that life us. We'll set up our own spaces and enjoy time together in our common space. Yes, we have concluded that personal space is good for both of us to have. We are who we are and no amount of understanding of who we are is going to make us less that. We're good with that.

You would think I'd feel elated and a part of me does. I'll miss my daughter and even the dogs and Elvis but I'm a woman like any other and I need my own kitchen, etc. I do really love this particular apartment even if doesn't have a gas stove. I'm happy that we got it. It's even right at the Lake. (Nope - can't see the lake.) But part of me is well....not. Not unhappy - just not elated. I'm trying to figure out the change in my emotional approach to events like this.

There is something quieter in my inner landscape. The rollercoaster is giving way to something more like a carousel or even something else.

It's been a long time since I've been to a water park but I remember being in a stream of moving water that went around the park. You could walk slowly with the current or get on an air mattress or whatever but the current kept moving you. You'd bump into people maybe, if it is busy, but mainly it was just a soft ride. In this stream that is my life I can know that Larry and I will always be there to bump up against each other. We have a way of finding each other's sharp edges and hard places - which are less and less all the time - but still we are in the stream together. I want to be in this stream with him. OK - yeah - there are some nice soft places to snuggle into also. ; )

I guess it's possible to make the stream exactly what one wants but would one have to be entirely alone to do that? Hmmmm That's not what I'm looking for at all.

I think that's probably a good description of how I feel on the inside as I think now of life and it's ups and downs. I no longer look for utopia or perfection or the "this is it" thing. OK - I did sort of try with the 10 year thing and maybe a part of me will keep trying. But I know now that whatever comes it is not "it". There is no "it". There is only today and what you have today and understanding that what you have today can disappear tomorrow so it's better not to have hope in any of the circumstances that you are presented with today. Receive them, enjoy them if you can, endure them if that's the best you can do but know that circumstances are not really in your control. That sounds kinda yuck but I don't feel yuck as I say it - just matter of fact. Maybe that's just my perception of life.

I did really suggest to Larry that we make a 10 year commitment to just living in this place. I cannot tell you how tired I am of moving and living with the idea that we can't make any plan that does not include some thought about tomorrow's changes. Let us remember however that nothing in this transition has gone the way I planned it so why should this.

But still the roller coaster that would have in the past begun to roar at the moment Larry very honestly said he couldn't/wouldn't make such a commitment never even turned over it's engine. I sat on the carousel for a little while but then I quietly and without fanfare found myself in the stream.

Interesting what 35 years of craziness can do for a person - if said person is looking in the right direction for help and answers and I did finally learn to look up. Look up. No matter what the sides are doing - even if they are undulating wildly - I can still look up. Yes I know this is scriptural, etc., etc., but God had to make this personal for me.

I'm not saying I won't spend some more time on the carousel but right now I'm in the stream. We'll paint and fix up and settle in and live kingdom life in that Dallas apartment and one day - maybe in a year (I'll sigh but I'll hope then that the moving if finally over) - maybe in four years (I'll sigh even bigger because that is the pattern I would so love to break but still it might mean that the moving is really over) - maybe in ten years (I'll sigh just because of the effort of moving but if we make it that long then surely we are buying that house that we will stay in till the end) we'll move into a house and that really will be the last move.