Here is a poem my grandmother taught my mother, and my mother taught me.
For the want of a nail, the shoe was lost;
For the want of a shoe, the horse was lost;
For the want of a horse, the rider was lost;
For the want of a soldier, the battle was lost;
For the want of the battle, the war was lost,
All for the want of a nail.
10 June 2009
04 June 2009
The Subtance of Things Hoped For
Her daughters scurry around in a dither, as usual, carrying on up to five separate conversations at the same time--and, they will proudly add, keeping track of every word. I don't even have to be there to know how it will be.Grammy will quietly find a corner of the table, a chair, spread out her crosswords or just sit quietly watching as two or three out of eight birth control methods that didn't work empty countless lunch-size containers of chocolate pudding, mix the pudding with crumbled Oreo cookies and a gummy worm, and putting it all back in with a (washed) silk flower coming out the top.
Or another day, she'll laugh while seven out of seven remaining fight over which one is Mom's Favorite. Or Daddy's Favorite--and my mom, the perfect number seven, wins this one because, after all, Daddy bought her a scooter (motorcycle?) when he wouldn't let any of the others have one.
She'll happily go along with almost anything, but when she puts her foot down, everyone knows she means business.
Like the time she loaded up the first six kids in the Jeep and took herself out to learn how to drive. Driving lessons hadn't gone so well the first time around, and everyone refused to teach her. (Had she driven into a creek? Or was that another ancestor?) But she wouldn't take no for an answer, and by the time she got back, she could drive that Jeep like nobody's business.
Like the time she loaded up the first six kids in the Jeep and took herself out to learn how to drive. Driving lessons hadn't gone so well the first time around, and everyone refused to teach her. (Had she driven into a creek? Or was that another ancestor?) But she wouldn't take no for an answer, and by the time she got back, she could drive that Jeep like nobody's business.
She remembered every birthday, every Christmas. The story is that she sent all her children Valentine's cookies every year, but we grandchildren never heard a peep about it. There were at least some among our aunts and uncles who hoarded these famous cookies, and the younger ones didn't get a taste of them until near-adulthood.
Upon moving from one of my childhood homes, I sent her a picture of what it looked like out my window, asking her to paint it for me. She had taken painting classes, I think, several times through the years. She granted my request, and it still sits in my bedroom today, the view looking just like I remember it used to, with every pine tree and every branch as it always was.
Then she had problems with her wrists, got too weak to paint, even to write letters. Ah, those letters....
"It's raining rain today," she'd begin, and continue on with all the news and little acrobatic stick men illustrating the events of the day.
But I got the call this week--hospice took over, she's hardly awake during the day, and we're not sure how long it will be...
A visit now, while she sleeps the days away and hardly wakes for breakfast, would barely yield a few moments for us to connect. And since there's quite a distance between us and the traveling complicated, I've already seen her for the last time.
It was in the fall, and I had flown down for a weekend, just a short time with just the two of us, mostly. We went to church together, ate together, visited with the aunts and uncles together. I saw her in the middle of the night, light shining over her perfect up-right posture as she read her Bible until she could go back to sleep, faith unshakable.
That's what she would want my faith to be right now, while we all begin to miss her--utterly unshakable, the substance of things hoped for, the certainty of things not yet seen.
02 June 2009
Climbing the Ladder
I stand at the top, gazing at the landscape from the height of the monster I've just climbed.
I start these things easily, remembering with the first few steps that I am, sometimes, afraid of heights.
Breathe deeply. Don't stop. Look at the next step. Don't focus on how far you have left to go--let that be peripheral while you focus on the details of the moment. Then at the top, see how far you've come.
It takes work to conquer the fear. Is the top worth the price? Absolutely, and I come down the same way I got up: one steady step at a time.
I start these things easily, remembering with the first few steps that I am, sometimes, afraid of heights.
Breathe deeply. Don't stop. Look at the next step. Don't focus on how far you have left to go--let that be peripheral while you focus on the details of the moment. Then at the top, see how far you've come.
It takes work to conquer the fear. Is the top worth the price? Absolutely, and I come down the same way I got up: one steady step at a time.
14 May 2009
Only Connect
I wake up in this city I called home for twenty years, and after morning prayer and reading, after breakfast, after all the familiar morning routines in an unfamiliar house, I dash to the car and turn the key.
It feels a little like getting my driver's license after the second try, and setting out for the dentist's office--the dentist I had been seeing for a decade already, whose office I could picture in my mind but not for the life of me find from the driver's seat.
Yes, lost (again) in familiar territory.
I know the roads I want, I know the roads I'm on. How to make them somehow connect, to get from one set to the other? I can't recall for sure.
I do recall my mother as I pass the freeway entrance I want with no (legal) way to get to it. New to this same town two decades ago, she took that entrance and ended up driving "as fast as she could in the wrong direction."
We laughed then, wondering how our mother could be that silly. I laugh now, realizing I'm that silly, just like her, and having known the town for a long time, I find less excuse for my sillyness than she could claim. Far less excuse.
But I drive on, thinking that the same thing often happens in our faith. We know the roads themselves, but perhaps we don't always know how the roads connect with each other--we know parts of the Bible, but not how to connect them; we know how to pray in the morning, but not how to pray continually throughout the day or how to let our morning Bible reading encourage us in the stress of the day; we know how to surrender in one moment, but not in the next.
We know where we want to go, but not how to get there from where we are.
Or perhaps we travel a road that seems familiar all the way, yet we aren't sure why this road, above all others, is the one we need to be on. Still, we trust that our Father in heaven knows the plans He has for us, that He will give us wisdom in making all the connections we need to grow in faith.
12 May 2009
Shell
I only hope the little fellow made it out alive, and spends his time between meals singing to the neighbors.
04 May 2009
Golden Threads
"Christ has linked His teaching, not only with the day of rest, but with the week of toil...In the plowing and sowing, the tilling and reaping, He teaches us to see an illustration of His work of grace in the heart. So in every line of useful labor and every association of life, He desires us to find a lesson of divine truth. Then our daily toil will no longer absorb our attention and lead us to forget God; it will continually remind us of our Creator and Redeemer. The thought of God will run like a thread of gold through all our homely cares and occupations. For us the glory of His face will again rest upon the face of nature. We shall ever be learning new lessons of heavenly truth and growing into the image of His purity." Christ's Object Lessons, 26, 27
29 April 2009
May I take you for a walk?
Pretend you're with me, even though you're not. Pretend we can spend the hour together, wandering my favorite block, my route through Revelation. (For I memorize while I walk, you see.)
We'll go up the hill toward the cemetery, craning our necks to look at the sky through the canopy of barely-budding trees, and maybe even run into a friend or two along the way. (Who knew so many people would walk in the cemetery of an evening?)
On our own again, we'll slow down to listen as the water ripples under the bridge, nourishing as it goes. "His voice," we'll recall, "is as the sound of many waters." Yes, even His voice feeds the soul as its sound waves pass through, simply for the listening. And with the nourishing comes strength to be, to grow, to do, to bear both burdens and fruit.
We'll stop here. I'll sit on the cement beside the creek, wishing with all my heart that the barbed wire fence had never been strung across the edge of the bridge. How I miss dangling my feet over the edge, freely, as I did when I first started college here. We'll pray here, too, and perhaps I'll even hear your voice while we both pray, if I have your number and I can get you on the phone.
Another evening, we might stop here, in the light, to open hearts to the light of God's glory, seeking Him, knocking on heaven's door (or was that opening our hearts' doors, that He might come in and sup with us, and we with Him?), asking for the blessings only God can give.
Another day, the sun might be out, and we'll go walking again--in the morning this time. It'll be so beautiful out that it will seem like heaven, but for the budding goat heads.
Do enjoy the spring with my any time. It's my delight to have you.
We'll go up the hill toward the cemetery, craning our necks to look at the sky through the canopy of barely-budding trees, and maybe even run into a friend or two along the way. (Who knew so many people would walk in the cemetery of an evening?)
On our own again, we'll slow down to listen as the water ripples under the bridge, nourishing as it goes. "His voice," we'll recall, "is as the sound of many waters." Yes, even His voice feeds the soul as its sound waves pass through, simply for the listening. And with the nourishing comes strength to be, to grow, to do, to bear both burdens and fruit.
We'll stop here. I'll sit on the cement beside the creek, wishing with all my heart that the barbed wire fence had never been strung across the edge of the bridge. How I miss dangling my feet over the edge, freely, as I did when I first started college here. We'll pray here, too, and perhaps I'll even hear your voice while we both pray, if I have your number and I can get you on the phone.
Another evening, we might stop here, in the light, to open hearts to the light of God's glory, seeking Him, knocking on heaven's door (or was that opening our hearts' doors, that He might come in and sup with us, and we with Him?), asking for the blessings only God can give.
Another day, the sun might be out, and we'll go walking again--in the morning this time. It'll be so beautiful out that it will seem like heaven, but for the budding goat heads.
Do enjoy the spring with my any time. It's my delight to have you.
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