On 2009.

2009 has been a rough year, a sad year. A year of lots of transitions. Lots of hardships. And lots of changes for me and for my family. Truthfully, it has also been a year in which I have seen the blessings of the Lord in my life in some fruitful ways, but it will always be marked as a hard year, still, in my heart and mind.

But all in all, 2009 is done. Over. Emptied out of all of me.

I was writing about this today in my journal and noted:

"...everything I've been through still lingers. Because God doesn't work in in days, in years, in segments of time..."

Lord, enable me to keep trusting. Enable me to keep loving your grace and finding your compassion. Enable me to grasp and always see the blossoms and blooms more than the weeds and the thorns. And Lord, lay to rest this year.

His Hazelnut Coffee.

I'm sitting with my feet propped in front of the fire at Panera, my body cushioned in the big leather chair beneath me, and my fingers typing on the keys. My Bible and journal coat the table next to me, stacked underneath this phenomenal read of mine lately The Church Ladies by Lisa E. Samson. It beckons me. But I've got a Hazelnut coffee already dripping in me and a Cobblestone Muffin padding my morning caffeine. It's my favorite thing in the morning. To cove away at Panera in the quiet of others muffled voices, wrapping around me just like the soft blue of my new North Face fleece.

I've been thinking about lots of things. About starting my new journal endeavor: Letters to My Daughter, and waiting for just the right time to prime it. And thinking through the beauty of this Church Ladies novel, and how it calls all great literature and self from me. From its literary prose to its profound way of connecting women from the churches of Mount Oak and its dealing and walking with grief. It clamors me with its portrayal of mid-life women and marriages and the role of prayer. The role of prayer most of all. Of these women's Monday Nights prayer, propelled by the stirrings of a widow who knows nothing of shy, but outfront walks in the Lord's way and slowly ripples it into the lives of other women who simply are called to come and pray. To eat, fellowship, share the real, and pray. And I want that. I need that. I love that.

I've been thinking about scriptures and verses that are pricking and prodding at me. About Proverbs and Agur's straight words in Chapter 30 about children and fathers. About His Eye Is On The Sparrow and it's lyrics sung so evoking in Sister Act that it continues to linger in me and on my itunes. And how this book I'm reading pointed out and connected the verse of God watching the sparrow, and that in Matthew 10, He's watching the sparrow fall (p.102), but the Lord still knows the sparrow amidst the fall... and what that means to me.

I'm thinking about life and my responses to it. How to be in relationships and take responsibilities in it. How to garden my heart with good, and reap the harvest of what I choose to sew. How to walk carefully through it, learning to prune what needs to be prune, accept what weather and wisdom comes, even if it's not want I want to grow or want to hear. I've been learning to want to be wrong sometimes, and want to stand corrected. I've been asking my roommates to do so to me, and close friends, and a few relatives. To tell me not just what I want to hear, but what I need to hear. To call me out, even it if hurts both of us. I want to be someone who is willing to be jarred and slowly, though it takes time, learn to accept what is truth and wrestle with myself to cut away the pieces of me that prickle at it. I want to be someone who sees my own faults and my own defenses and my own hardened heart as much, or I should say, as more, than what I see others. And that when I tell stories, I tell not only my own part, but portray the whole of the story. In truth, also examining and giving what others may see in me and where I should stand corrected. I want to be someone who grows a garden and is willing to let grow what comes, to cut away the chaff, and to see the smallest of flowers that beckon to bloom along the way.

I am learning.

And God keeps cutting away the chaff. By use of himself and his people. For that, I am thankful. And will continue to be wanting of chiding and cutting until I am useful in His hands.

And I want to be someone who learns how to stand in the gap. How to stand in the gap for me, in myself, and for others. Who sees where others need me to stand in the gap of their lives, and protect and speak on their behalf. To acknowledge what is just in life and relationships and be a protector of them. And to do so also for myself and in my life. And to have the courage to take response to stand and bridge the gap myself when it is needed. Whether its what I want to do or not. But because it is what's right and honorable to do.

This long flow of words may be confusing to readers, but it is necessary for me. It is the words of my journal put to a much nicer, neater, flowing context that the last days of pages actually portray. It is the thoughts and stirrings of my heart through long hours driving, and moments of Garrett's napping, and me learning of what God is teaching me. It is the calm of my heart on this Panera morning, and letting the quiet of His hazelnut coffee speak to me.

Me, SunDried Tomatoes, & Home.

I know I am home when I am doing this: cooking with sun-dried tomatoes. They are my all-time favorite ingredient. And I know I am home in Charlotte, when I can buy them in bulk from a beautiful section of not just a grocery store, but Harris Teeter -- "my Harris Teeter" as I ordained it and later found that is also how it is marketed. To the point that I even had mom take my picture by 'my' Harris Teeter when she came to visit that May. So I went to Harris Teeter, the 'Taj ma Teeter' as it is coined in South Park, and bought sun-dried tomatoes in bulk.

Cooking with whole wheat pasta, organic chicken, and a smearing of garlic alfredo fused with oregano, basil, and a hefty amount of sun-dried tomato and garlic pesto, I elaborated on my pasta favorite and spooned it into my Italy bowl. Add a glass of Moscoto, a good napkin, and my winter burning candle 'warm vanilla and sugar', Alison Krauss, and writing again on this blog, and then I know, I'm home.

Song In The Battle.

"And this is my prayer in the battle

When triumph is still on it's way

I am a conqueror and co-heir with Christ

So firm on His promise I'll stand"

~ Desert Song, by Hillsong

And They Came.

Once again, I steal from Sara. In It's a Wonderful Life, George is at the bottom of his barrel and the uncle says to the villagers, "George is in trouble" and they came.

I am still struck by this craft. "And they came." Because all I see is the friends who flew in to care for the funeral. I don't think I'll ever get over this, or minimize its magnitude.

"And they came."

From Washington State, from California, from Colorado, from Indiana, from Illinois, from D.C. My friends, who have very little money, bought emergency plane tickets, booked it on over to Grand Rapids, and showed up for me. No mention of the cost. No care of the dollar. No concern about their work, their schedules, their own schemes and cares.

They simply, came.

I will never be given a more special gift. Some landed for less than twelve hours and saw none of their own friends or family while 'home'. One dear friend showed up with her mom, only for me to find that her mom had gone to visit her in D.C. and when they heard the news, they both booked tickets back to come and share with me.

I can't imagine. I can't ignore. I can't not see such a special gift. Such an imploring message of my friends. I would have never thought, I would have never expected. But I will never forget.

And so that line from the movie comes back through Sara Groves last night, and it is its own message marked clear. For when I think of it, I think of my friends, and I think:

And they came.

The Cot.

Sara Groves shared a statement from Rwanda: "You better have four good friends" because in Rwanda the ambulance consists of a cot with four friends that carry it.

She remarked on this cultural analogy, saying that we all must have these 'four good friends' because sometimes we all spend time in the cot, and sometimes we are the carrier of the cot.

I loved this encompassing picture of friendship. I love being able to be willing to be in the cot and accept and be loved by friends. And I pray some day I am strong enough to carry the cot too.

Estrangement & Awareness

I have never understood families that live with estrangement. Stories are told of sisters who don't talk to sisters, parents who don't talk to children, and relatives who purposefully don't see each other for years. I've heard good Christians remark on their own families with this same notion and always wonder what came to be and how they can live with the divide.

I am standing on this bridge of a change of phase in my life and reflect on this notion. I think I have never understood it because the family I grew up in lived with a great awareness of each other. We lived with a way that put the other, that put family, before the self. And this awareness called for compassion, consistency, caring, and a selfless desire to hope the best and care the best for the other. As decisions and thoughts were made and formed, it was always a family decision and nothing was made without the family in cohesion about it. We were a unit, one.

The starkest story to prove this point was my twenty second and twenty third birthdays. Both birthdays, I cried. The twenty second I was a college graduate, living under my parents roof, with no job. Feeling the void of leaving college life and seeming to have nothing to prove my worth as a result. So I struggled. Most people forgot it was my birthday, barely any cards or phone call received.

And I walked through the lodge house in the morning and mom was packing a cooler and dad was washing down the boat. Mom smiled and matter-of-factly stated, "Your dad was thinking about going boating today. We were thinking maybe of going to Gull Lake. What do you think?"

Dad wasn't thinking about boating. Dad was thinking about me. It was his way of caring and reaching out to me on my birthday. He knew that my favorite thing in the whole world was to go boating, especially on a different lake. So he passed it off as commonality, but really, it was his 'dad' way of caring beyond measure and lifting me out of my birthday and making it be special.

My twenty-third birthday was the same. Another year back under my parents roof, no friends around, a job quit and none ahead, and feeling like a failure. I remember saying "I don't even have a cool car to drive. I just wish there was something, anything, cool about me right now." But dad, once again, was hooking up the boat and just so 'decided' it might be a nice day and he was getting antsy and wanted to go boating on a different lake. So 'he just so happened' to put a few skis and life jackets in and mom 'just so happened' to pack some Diet Cokes and Doritos so we 'just so happened' to go boating on my birthday as a family of three.

These special memories of family awareness are held so special to me. A deep, caring sense of each other and each other's needs and talking and communication, and silent concerns shown through remarkable ways.

Other decisions were made and noted as such: curling in the family room to talk about how we all felt about changing churches when I was in elementary school, or touring a new house on Ivanrest to see how we all felt about moving.

But its this family awareness that is necessary, that keeps one together. Its the need for communication, care, and concern, that puts the other before the self. At any age, at any stage. It is this matter that makes all feel important, keeps estrangement at bay, and makes ones family feel like family.