Moving as a way of life

I live in a house that was once occupied by my husband, his former wife and their two children. I made the choice to live here with my eyes wide open, knowing it would be wierd & probably a little uncomfortable, but “worth it.” The kids experienced so much transition last year. I mean, imagine finding out your Mom is gay, your dad gets remarried, you get a step-mom, all of that. I figured anything we could keep constant would be good. Their address(es) and school were two areas where nothing changed last year.

But it has been REALLY wierd and uncomfortable for me to live here. In spite of “redecorating” three rooms (our bedroom, office and the dining room), I am not at home here. First of all, my husband’s ex-wife still owns half of the house. Ick, right? Then, there is the intensely creepy thought that she and he had sex in what is now my bedroom. That is just ICKY to think about. I thought maybe that by living here I could take the edge off of those realities, but that has not been the case. Add that to the fact that I freaking hate living in the SoCal burbs, and I’m ready to move. Again.

But damn. I have lived in nine homes since I was 24 (I’m 36 now). That number only includes places I lived for six months or more. If you added in all the “interim” places I stayed or visited (from between 3 weeks to 4 months) that number goes up to fourteen. Moving is practically a way of life for me. And those nine homes since 24 include two that were in Africa and South America. Packing and unpacking. . .although I dislike it as much as the next person, I have done it so much that it is nearly second nature.

But I’ve never moved “en famille.” I hope it’s not worse than normal moving. We are hopefully putting the house up for sale this spring. We are also praying that the housing market around here stays somewhat afloat. I just can’t believe after making this big move in June from my fabulous Eagle Rock digs out to the burbs, I’m gonna do it all over again. I don’t know what we’ll be able to afford or find, but it looks like moving again is in the cards. Pray for me, k?

Tasha the dog spins around and around and. . .

I’ve written before about how my dog is uber-old, has horrible arthritis, bone spurs and a brain tumor. She’s been doing this thing for the past few years where she spins endlessly before she can manage to lay down. When she was younger, she would spin two or three times and plop down. My step-son counted fourteen spins the other day.

She was slowly spinning on her rug behind my computer a few days ago, and I took some pictures for posterity. She stops mid-spin sometimes and just stares into space. I think her doggie dementia must kick in while she’s spinning. She looks exactly like a person who has walked into the kitchen but has NO idea why they are there.

Here she is, frozen in mid-spin:

I think she forgets how many times she’s turned around, so she has to start over.

Sometimes I wonder if God looks at me and sees the same pattern. Spinning, spinning, forgetting, spinning . . .

Me and my Tracy Lord, Bryn Mawr self

Recently, I applied for a very part-time job at a church.  Don’t ask me why.  OK. Ask me why.

Why, you ask?

Well, several reasons.  The job looked like something that wouldn’t involve any damn church meetings.  Also, I apparently suck at “church planting” or “emerging church” stuff at the moment.  In addition, church jobs involve something really cool that the God-stuff I’ve been investing my time in lately does not: dinero.

And dinero is something we lack around here, people.

This job application requested that I provide them with a recording (in any format) of me preaching.  Game on.  I love to preach.  So, I recorded myself preaching using Garage Band.  When I played it back, the voice that came back to me was totally familiar – I knew it was me.  The surprise was my diction, my elocution.  Good Lord.  I sound like I just left Bryn Mawr.  I sound like Tracy Lord.   I sound like I wear pearls to bed, like I went to Sidwell Friends, like my mother is friends with Martha Stewart.  I sound like I can afford to shop at Dean & Deluca for dinner.  My speaking cracked me up.  I have never heard anyone speak like that from a pulpit.  Ever.

I’ve been trying to figure out how to upload it to a website somewhere so other people can hear what it sounds like when a Bryn Mawr girl turns Evangelical.   However, I am not so savvy with the tekkie things.  I will keep trying, because the world deserves to hear something that funny.   The sermon isn’t bad, either.

It is funny when I learn something like this about myself.  I love the illumination.  I love knowing what I sound like.   I also don’t mind that I sound like a blue-stocking who found Jesus.  I am so much less critical of myself (in some ways) these days.  It is genuinely interesting to me.  My best friend did mention that my smarty-pants diction combined with a little nervousness can make me sound a little uptight sometimes when I preach, and that was good to know too.  Learning to relax in my preaching will be a good journey.  But my diction just is what it is.

Yours,

Megan Tracy Lord, Bryn Mawr ‘94

Home Ec – refinishing the table

In the spirit of actually doing what I said I would do – here is a picture of the oak table before I refinished it.

Yeah, nobody can mess a table up like me! Please note the huge, black iron stains from the iron teapot.

Now, here it is today, in all its refinished glory:

I am pretty happy with how it turned out. I decided not to use any polyeurathane, in spite of my husband’s urgings that I do so. That crap is toxic, y’all! So, I just used some all natural wax on it after I sanded it. I know the color is not perfectly even, but it is good enough.  Good enough!  I love not striving for perfection in stuff like this anymore.  I’m trying to save my striving for things that are slightly more important than oak tables.

The lion and the lamb . . .

The picture painted in Revelation and other books of prophecy are pretty lavish in their descriptions of how fabulous things are.

You know, the child will put his hand on the nest of the adder,

the lion will lay down with the lamb . . .

All that stuff.

Apparently, Bunkis and BBC have been hitting the Scripture bong again, and are enacting their version of the lion and the lamb.

Of Blogs and Bibles

Today I had a grumpy morning with the children. They were just being children – fussing about how much cinnamon and sugar goes on toast, clothing options, etc.

Sometimes we’re all, children and adult, just contrary. Well. To a degree. I guess none of us adults has thrown a complete crying, screaming fit because we couldn’t wear a striped shirt. Then again, probably very few adults have their wardrobe choices curtailed by an unimaginative dress code, either.

But I wasn’t feeling resilient this morning. I hadn’t had my tea. I just wanted to wake up and have normal conversations with everyone. No “discussions.” So, after a few minutes of testy discussions, I took my tea and went to my google reader to see what the blogs were up to. I was so happy, because my favorite blogger had a new post, and she hasn’t been posting much lately. I read it. It was nice. I read a few other posts here and there. Then, my google reader was empty.

I closed the browser and sighed. I said to my blank screen, “can’t you satisfy me?” I actually laughed out loud after I said that. I realized I was using blogs to distract me from how I was feeling. I knew I needed input from somewhere. I intuitively knew that I wanted some satisfaction from words. But I was looking to the wrong words. My little daisy Bible was sitting on the desk next to my monitor. I picked it up and read this week’s lectionary readings.

The Gospel reading is from the first chapter of John. John the Baptist says (v.29), “Look the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” Right there I was hooked again. The Bible for me is like a dynamic, strange, endlessly fascinating, illuminating conversation with the most interesting person I’ve ever known. Today, when I read that, my mind went immediately to that oft-repeated phrase – that Jesus somehow takes away sins. I find that thought so interesting and so strange. What does it mean exactly? I know the traditional, orthodox answer, which I hold as a gift from the past. But how can I deepen that understanding, know what it means for real, for me, for my friends? He takes away sin in general? From me? Where does he take it? How? And, what then? And why a Lamb, a reference to sacrifice and dependence, first? He’s a shepherd, too, right?

And then I read the Old Testament reading, which was from Isaiah 49. In verse 4, Isaiah has the Messiah say, “I have labored to no purpose; I have spent my strength in vain and for nothing. Yet what is due me is in the Lord’s hand, and my reward is with my God.”

Isn’t that outrageous? The Bible is incredible. It is full of this kind of despair and “FORGET IT!” kind of sentiment. When combined with an equally outrageous trust in God, it is a potent mix.

When I read the Bible, I know I will never be done plunging all of its mysteries. There will always be more for me to see, to learn and be amazed and baffled by in it. Already I feel pulled to spend more time researching and praying over those passages.

No one can rock it like God. No one has so much to say to me that is so encouraging, bizarre and wise. That is His job, to be loving and mysterious. The Bible kicks ass.

That said, let me affirm that I love reading good blogs. They can be a great blessing. Sometimes the rawest, most honest thing I “hear” all day is from a blogger – like this one from Melissa in Ohio. Sometimes the silliness of my fellow Christians just gives me a great laugh.

But nobody rocks it like God. Love you, God.

At the corner of my actual life

Life is weird. God is big. Strange things happen. You may end up standing at a corner, wondering how this is your life.

In 2000*, I signed up for a course to be trained in how to be a spiritual director. It was called Centerpoint. We met once a month and shared what God was doing in our lives and learned about how to listen to one another. It was a good group and it is where I met my bestest friend ever. (We didn’t exactly click while we were there, but that is another story.) The church where the group was held was an hour from where I lived at the time. It was in a town I had never heard of, San Marino. It was on the Northwest corner of two big streets. After that group, I never went back to San Marino and forgot all about it.

Fast forward seven years. I’m engaged to my husband and we were trying to find a good cake for our wedding. I didn’t want something boring and I didn’t want inedible fondant, so someone recommended a Chinese French bakery in San Marino. It was on the southwest corner, right across the street from where the church is. They did have taro cake (yum), but we decided against it. (Chinese French baked goods ain’t cheap, my friends.) I thought it was kind of weird that I ended up back on that same corner again.

Now, fast forward eight months from the cake incident. I have an interview with an academic enrichment center. Are you ready for this? It is on the northeast corner of that same intersection. Weird, weird, weird.

I stood there a few days ago, and looked at the church. And looked at the bakery. And looked at the academic center. This is my life. A weird, unexpected set of circumstances that brought me to each corner. These days, I feel like God has sort of forgotten about this daughter of His. I know that He hasn’t, but that is how it feels. I stood at that corner and nearly cried. What am I doing with my life? Church, bakery, academics, spiritual direction, wedding, SAT tutoring. . . Lord Jesus, help this girl out. Help me to see what path you want me to lay down to walk to that fourth corner. Cause I ain’t got NO clue, Rabbi.

*Bwana: is that right? Or was it 2001?

Eternity

Jesus mentioned it more than a few times. I have to say, normally, eternity just doesn’t really enter into my consciousness. But for some reason lately I’ve been thinking about it. It’s a strange concept. Time that neither ends nor begins. Ouch. It hurts my brain to try and grasp it.

The other day the kids and I were talking about how old my great-grandmothers lived to be. Their average age when they went to heaven was about 100. My people (at least the female ones) live for a looong time. I said something to my husband about how I was sad that I might be a widow for a long time, since he is 12 years older than I, and men. . . well, you know. Men just don’t seem to be able to hang on as long as the women. Not that we can predict anything in this life. I was just thinking about it as a possibility.

His response was that he planned on spending eternity with me. I told him (because I am sometimes maybe not the sweetest girl on the planet) that Jesus said there wouldn’t be “giving in marriage” and so forth in heaven. He was very saddened by that.

“But,” said I, “I’m sure if it is not marriage, it’s something better!”

He looked sad. And unconvinced.

The thing is, even though John (in Revelation), Ezekiel, Isaiah and others cover what heaven/ eternity is like, it is hard for us to imagine things so outside of our reality. The thing that sounds the best to me is the continuous worship. It sounds so awesome to join in with angels and everyone in singing and rejoicing to and with God. It seems like it would be so joyful and amazing and fun.

So many of our human interactions are difficult, messy and confusing. I imagine in our eternal “bodies” our relationships with each other will not be those things. It will be free and fearless. I’m curious to know what it will be like.

In the meantime, I hope some teeny piece of the kingdom leaks into the relationships I have now, in this pre-heaven, earthy place.

Testimonies and theology

Recently in church we had someone tell us a story. It was a true story about her parents. They were church planters all of their lives, and never saved for their retirement years. Whenever anyone would ask them about the wisdom of this plan, they would reply, “seek first His righteousness . . .and all these things will be given to you.” (Matthew 6) When they retired from church planting, the wife decided to teach school in her retirement. They looked for a house near her work, and found the perfect house for sale. However, they could not afford it.

As they were talking to the real estate agent, someone from a cell phone company happened to be canvassing the neighborhood to find people who were willing to have a cell phone tower in their back yard. Out here in Cali, they often make these towers look like fake palm trees. Of course, the family agreed to the tower tree, and they were able to buy the house. Later, another cell phone company approached them, and now they have two cell phone towers in their backyard. They call them “the money trees.”

This is a sweet story, is it not?

However. The theological conclusion that was delivered with this sweet story was this: God is faithful and works in mysterious ways to make circumstances good for people who trust Him.

The problem with that theological conclusion is that then the opposite of that statement needs to be false. But it is not.

God is faithful, yes. He works in mysterious ways, yes. He works out circumstances so that they are good for those that trust Him: sometimes.

I feel like this is dangerous to do in church, celebrate something like this, and not give some time to other, less straightforward stories about life with God.  A story like this is next door to the truth about God.  But it presents a warped picture of God and His people.  Sometimes people are super faithful and trusting and God doesn’t work like this.

A serious percentage of the Psalms are not what you would call content.  They cry out to a God that is working so mysteriously that His people are frustrated and lost.  Sometimes they say something like, YET I will praise You, God.  This means in spite of dire circumstances.  If no cell phone towers had appeared, that couple probably still would have praised God, because they were faithful followers of His.  But we don’t hear that kind of story very often.  I feel like there should be a balance in church testimonies.  The good, the bad, the ugly and the beautiful.  It would be a much more honest reflection of the people of God’s experiences with Him.

What do you think, innerweb?  Do you just love stories like the “money trees?” Or. . ?

I’m back, from outer space. . . sanding tables

Dang.  It has been a long time since I posted anything.  I was visiting my parents, who don’t have the innerwebs at their house, and then I had a “cold,” if by “cold” you mean debilitating, life-sucking, depression-inducing, snotty virus.  Ugh.  I feel much better now.

When I got back from living abroad (almost three years in Africa and South America), one of the first things I bought with my “real job” funds was an old, round oak table.  I loved that table so much.  It is heavy and very farmhousey, very un-Pottery Barn.  After I’d had the table for a few years, I had an iron teapot that I used a lot, and I used to clumsily set it on the oak tabletop.  Woops.  This caused dozens of round, black stains from the iron pot.  After the first few, I was like, eh, who cares? I’ll sand it and re-finish it and it will look fine.  Uh.  That would be fine.  Except.  Except I said that to myself over and over again for SIX YEARS.  I took that table with me in no less than six moves in eight years, too.  I’m pretty sure that in the last six years I’ve had a few hours on  my hands that I could have been working on that table.

At last, yesterday, I got the sandpaper, the electric sander and my gumption and took the tabletop out to the garage.  It was so satisfying sanding away the past.  Also, I LOVE messy jobs, so it was fun getting all sandy and dirty.   And my husband helped!  I am used to being around men who, when it comes to projects like this, either a) take care of something for me or b) let me do whatever I want and leave me to it.  It was nice to work on it with someone for a change.

The tabletop still needs to be oiled and I guess it needs some polyeurathane (sp?) too.  It feels so amazing to actually have done something that I’ve been meaning to do for that long.  I am the world’s most fantastic procrastinator. Ever.  I rule the world of procrastination.

I hope this bodes well for 2008.  I hope 2008 is a year of doing things that I meant (or mean) to do, using far fewer of my many procrastination skills.

Pictures of the table to follow.