Five Minute Friday - Worship

Writing again this week with Lisa Jo Baker and the Five Minute Friday Crew. This blessed, beautiful place where we open our hearts and let words and tears and the inner workings of our lives bleed and flow and dance across the virtual pages. Yes, this community opens wide and invites you in to share. Come and visit and read. You will be blessed.

This Week: Worship

Go

It’s still anniversary week, so I’m working out a way as I write to make this prompt fit! Bear with me …

Before him, I just didn’t really get it. I didn’t really understand what a relationship would be like when you added the God factor. In theory I did. I grew up in the church; raised by faithful parents who loved the Lord and taught me the way things were supposed to be. I’d heard the phrase about being “unequally yoked” for the longest time and thought I understood the concept.

I’d been dating for a long time. I used to joke that I didn’t have any real addictions – didn’t have a problem with drugs, didn’t really drink all that much, didn’t have any vices. Just boys. Then men. That was enough. Bad boys and bad men can be as much of an addiction as anything else, so I suppose in that twisted little way that was mine. And it wasn’t much of a joke.

When he and I met, I was pretty damaged and had wandered far off the path. My faith was frail and battered and was held up only by the strong foundation that had been planted long ago. In the early days, we even went to church together and served in different ministries, and yet all the while, there was a huge piece missing.

If I’m being really honest, it really wasn’t until our desert journey began that we discovered that deep, spiritual awakening together that you often read about, hear other people talking about, and maybe dream of encountering one day. It wasn’t until everything else was stripped away from our lives and we had nowhere to turn except to Him that we began to embrace the lives that we were meant to live. It wasn’t until we had almost nothing that we were able to look around and see that we had everything that we needed.

This life of active worship: where you discover that thanksgiving precedes the miracle; that surrender is the key to fulfilled living; and that the deepest faith comes from living a life of moments connected to the sacred in the everyday – these are our discoveries. This is our sacrifice. This is our transformation.

Placing God in the center of our marriage and of our lives; placing the worship and service of Him and to His creation at the top of our list; understanding that we want to live and serve each other in our marriage as Christ would – that has made all the difference. And we are blessed.

Oh come, let us worship and bow down;
let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker!
For he is our God,
and we are the people of his pasture,
and the sheep of his hand.Psalm 95:6-7

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How to Join
Want to know how Five Minute Friday got started and how to participate? All the details are here. No editing or second guessing. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.

I'd love to connect with you some more - stop on by the Three Bees Facebook Page or connect with me on Twitter @3BeesBlueBonnet. Let's continue the conversation!

Behind the Scenes - The Wedding and the Renewal

It was the most perfect August day. It had been raining nonstop for nearly all the week before. Dark clouds had hung heavy and swollen in the sky, unleashing unfamiliar, unseasonable rains from time to time. It was a summer for coats and scarves. And then the sun broke through.

All that rain birthed a veritable Eden in our friends’ backyard. The grass was thick and lush and greener than anything I’d seen in a long time. Everything was blooming. It was the most perfect August day.

Of course it was hot – and then muggy. And everyone running around in long sleeves, and tuxedos, and dressy dresses that sometimes clung to the skin in damp patches. I was organized beyond belief. With my folders and charts and timetables and everything in order. Everything had been planned to a tee – the perfect shades of purple and green, just the right candles (enough to clean out the local World Market stores) in mix and match glasses with hand-crafted bead charms. The perfect shade of lavender and periwinkle hydrangeas – scoped out months (well, years, honestly) in advance – and silently snipped away on a covert midnight mission to the suburbs. Just the right hue of Chanel for my lips: not too pink, not too red, not too much of anything but beautiful.

It was elegant but casual. And run by an organized woman (control freak) – me – which mean I could be seen before the wedding, enjoying friends and family as they arrived. Greeting them barefoot on the lawn and then running back to fan Shawn before he overheated. I handed out hugs and directions and didn’t take a moment to sit down – except to sign the marriage license. It was all under control. I was ready to do this.

And then it was time.

Standing at the back of the garden, hearing Twila Paris’s The Child Inside You cue up and watching my friends start walking down the garden path, and all of a sudden, I couldn’t breathe. All the direction and control disappeared into the summer air as it was my turn to walk down the path to meet the man I was going to marry. That was such a surprise  – did not see that coming. I wasn’t having doubts. I wasn’t afraid. I just couldn’t believe it was really happening and that it felt so very real.

I heard the familiar words of the ceremony that we had crafted together. I heard the scriptures we had picked out. And then it was time to say the vows.

I, Rebekah, take you Shawn,
To be the husband of my days,
The companion of my house,
The friend of my life,
And the father of my children.

We shall bear together
Whatever trouble and sorrow
Life may lay upon us.
And we shall share together
Whatever good and joyful things
Life may bring us.

With these words,
And with all the words of my heart,
I marry you,
And bind my life to yours.

Three short paragraphs that would change the rest of my life. This was the no matter what. The even if. The it doesn’t matter, we’re in this.

Marriage is serious business and lots of hard work to do. There are days that it will feel like you are just bearing up under the trouble and the sorrow – those can be long hard days. But there are always good and joyful things to balance them. The important thing to remember is that once you’ve made that commitment, your lives are bound and you become one with each other.

The girl in the picture that stood barefoot in the grass that day is not the same woman who writes today. She doesn’t yet know some of the hard things that will come her way. She doesn’t yet know the desert journey she’ll be asked to walk. She doesn’t know the frustration or anger or grief she will be asked to battle with and bear.

But she also doesn’t know about the amazing little child she’ll carry and give birth to. She doesn’t know what a faith journey this man will go on, and how much he’ll learn along the way. As much as she loves him at this point, she can’t even imagine the spiritual leader he’ll become, or how he’ll pray for her and support her in the coming years and show her that love is a verb. And she has no idea of the things – small and large – that he will do on a daily basis to make her journey into physical struggles with chronic illness so much easier.

This man, who is the husband of my days, the companion of my house, the friend of my life, and the father of my children, he is amazing. We have walked through so many things that I could never imagine. They have shown us that we shall and can bear together whatever trouble and sorrow life may lay upon us. And that we shall and will share together whatever good and joyful things life may bring us. May there be more of them.

I do not have much of anything, but I have my words. Always my words. So once again, with these words, and with all the words of my heart (every last one of them), I marry you, Shawn Pierce, and bind my life to yours. Always.


I'm linking up with Crystal Stine and company again today; joining the Behind the Scenes link up. A place to make a connection beyond the Pinterest perfect ideals; to look past the edges of the photo to the real life behind it; to say hi, this is me in all my messy real-ness. Sounds like a good time to me.

I'd love to connect with you some more - stop on by the Three Bees Facebook Page or connect with me on Twitter @3BeesBlueBonnet. Let's continue the conversation!

August 27th (or The Story of Our Life) - the beginning of Anniversary Week

So far back in the day it might not even be funny.
Oh wait. It is kind of funny.

It's anniversary week this week, so you may see me writing about marriage, and weddings, and dates, and things like that. In the process of beginning the fall cleaning in my house and making the discovery that I need stop saving for special days and celebrate life now, I found an old copy of an online journal that I had been published in years ago. You'll have to keep that in mind when you read the poem below because it talks about "eight years ago" which was more like thirteen years when this was published and is actually nineteen years this year. Whew.

I always have more to say about this amazing man I married. You can read a little bit more about our story here, and discover some of the things that keep us close. You'll find out that our story is framed in grace, and how grateful I am for that grace. You'll also learn that some of the little things — like we haven't had cable television in over two years (is that all?) and that we're doing just fine without it.

But mainly what you should know is that I didn't believe in a lot before I met him. I did't believe in love any more. I was burned out and done. I didn't have any hope. And then he came along ...

August 27th (or the Story of Our Life)

It was eight years ago yesterday
That I walked through shoulder-high dahlias
Next to a tall blonde I really didn’t know—
And found a new use for my kitchen counter.

I remember the me back then,
Why trust? Why hope? Why bother?
Thought the walk in the flowers would be
Just another thing.

But before I knew it, my toothbrush had a roommate
And 350 square feet seemed far too small
For six feet two plus five foot seven,
And a dinning room table became a necessity.

Two years later after brushing death with a comb
And three bees in a blue bonnet,
I rode back and forth between city and ocean
Trying to decide if trust, hope, and bother were real.

Fast-forward three years to a garden—
Technicolor green grass like a carpet that only comes from Washington rains
Barefoot with hijacked hydrangeas—the perfect shade of purple.
I cried. I can’t believe I cried. Hope.

If you had told me eight years ago yesterday
That a superwonderful flip on my kitchen counter
Would have led to bestfriendship and love
I would have laughed and rolled my eyes twice into
the back of my head.

Now I just laugh because I can’t believe
The showers of blessing that came to the cynic
Who didn’t believe
In Hope.

Not that there’s not a cynic left (don’t kid yourself, this is not Cinderella),
But not about this. The path that started eight years ago yesterday
Had been a-hell-a-bumpy and twisty
But I still have two arms around me and my best
friend by my side.

And dahlias still bloom.
And rains in Washington still paint the grass
Green like I’ve never seen.
And hope lives here.

Five Minute Friday - Last

Writing again this week with Lisa Jo Baker and the Five Minute Friday Crew. This blessed, beautiful place where we open our hearts and let words and tears and the inner workings of our lives bleed and flow and dance across the virtual pages. Yes, this community opens wide and invites you in to share. Come and visit and read. You will be blessed.

This Week: Last

Go

The light fades earlier; a little more each day. This is the hardest part of summer for me. Saying goodbye to the light that has lingered all the way past nine o’clock in the evenings. Stretching out across the sky in an artist’s palette of rose, gold, and lavender. It’s the tipping point into Autumn. The beginning of the turning of the season. And I just want it to linger a bit longer.

I find I am this way with so many things. Not just seasons. Not just summer. Anything that brings a smile, which stirs up joy, that makes happiness overflow until it runs in rivulets down your cheeks, I just want it to hang on. I want it to last. I remember feeling that way standing around the campfire at youth camp – arms flung around my friends; singing praises into the night sky until we were hoarse. I wanted to stay on the mountaintop. I remember feeling this way when visiting family that I haven’t seen in years. We stay up late curled up on sofas with warm mugs of coffee or tea or cider and pretend that we’ll sleep in another life. I want to stay in the warmth of their love.

I wrote about something similar earlier this week. About hanging onto things – keeping them for the someday that was never coming. Stockpiling soaps, and, lotions, and notebooks, and all kinds of goodness knows what else, trying to make them last for some future date that was never going to come.

Photo by earl53

I’m thinking hard about the now. About how these moments need to be seized now. How the things that should be made special should be made special now. The smiles we share, the joy we feel, the love we share – it doesn’t work to try and hold it in a bottle and save it up or store it up. We honor it, and multiply it when we use it and share it now. When we take the love that we have been given and we bless others with it now.

God gave us gifts to use and share to edify each other, and lift each other up, and encourage those around us, and He gave them to us to do those things now. He’s given us an abundance of blessings in our lives – even if we feel that we are among the very least (we have so much more than we know) – and He’s given us those blessings so we can reach out and touch those who are broken, and needy, and without Him … now.

As I write, the thing that comes to mind so strongly is that the only way we can make these gifts and blessings last, is to give them away.

It is a risk.
It is scary.
It makes us vulnerable.
But it is what we are called to do.
Reach out.
Do it now.
Be the miracle.

I pray that Christ will live in your hearts by faith and that your life will be strong in love and be built on love. And I pray that you and all God’s holy people will have the power to understand the greatness of Christ’s love—how wide and how long and how high and how deep that love is. Christ’s love is greater than anyone can ever know, but I pray that you will be able to know that love. Then you can be filled with the fullness of God. With God’s power working in us, God can do much, much more than anything we can ask or imagine. To him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus for all time, forever and ever. Amen. Ephesians 3:17-21 NCV

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How to Join:

Want to know how Five Minute Friday got started and how to participate? All the details are here. No editing or second guessing. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.

I'd love to connect with you some more - stop on by the Three Bees Facebook Page or connect with me on Twitter @3BeesBlueBonnet. Let's continue the conversation!

What You Do On The Hard Days

Her email came on a hard day. The day that each joint in my hand felt like it was the size of a river rock and stretching for the letters A, Q, and P sent pain knifing up my fingers. The day my spine didn’t want to seem to straighten – no matter how much I stretched out. The day my hips were so tight I couldn’t lift my foot more than an inch or two off the floor and needed my husband’s help to get my leggings on.

I have a lot of hard days. And I don’t like to talk about them. Dealing with weakness doesn’t come easy for me. I despise it. Despite knowing that my weaknesses turn me into a broken pot for God’s glory and work to shine through, it often still makes me feel like the crisped, curling edges of burnt paper on the inside. I can’t escape it. I’m not done untangling what this new chronic condition is going to be like. I don’t know what the new normal is going to be, but I’m going to have to figure it out.

One of the hardest parts about it is feeling alone. Feeling older in my body than I should be and not having too many souls in my circle that can relate to any of this. One of the leaders of my online writing group had an excellent post about it on her blog: What Sick People Wish Healthy People Knew. There was so much to relate to. She got a plethora of supportive comments. And one that made my skin crawl.

You said it; you are NOT going to get better. As long as you keep being negative, you will never. get. better…. You are your biggest enemy if you're negative about your health …. Try doing this: look at yourself in the mirror every day for two weeks. You need to tell yourself that you are healing and getting better. You need to tell yourself at least 3-4 affirmations a day. If you are too sick to do this, I feel really bad for you because you are trapped in your own misery.

Just breathe. You can’t fix ignorance. You can’t gift empathy. You just have to feel sorry for someone like that as they squelch in their self-righteousness and hope that when they’re in need of grace, people around them will be far more giving than they were here.

The writer’s response was so smart and full of grace. I can only aspire to respond half that kindly. I’m still in the realm of – well, to be honest – I’m not going to write it out here because it’s that bad. But I’m working on it. Thank you for grace.

What wasn’t bad, in fact, what was overwhelmingly amazing, was the email I got from a new friend - another member of this online writing group. We met through the (in)courage community that I’ve enjoyed talking about here on my blog – home for the hearts of women – and have cheered each other on through Five Minute Fridays and other blog posts. We’re discovering we have a lot of things in common; chronic conditions being one of them. I reached out – a little tentatively – asking basically, “how do you do it?”

A hug, encouragement, a list, sprinkles of love, experience, grace, and prayer, traveled one thousand, six hundred, and seventy four miles over the Internet to land on my desk via Facebook and forced me to spin my chair around at work for a moment so no one would see the tears that threatened.

You have to have walked a path like this – anything where someone says, “I know what you’re going through,” and you know they really mean it, to know how very much this message meant. To hear someone else who shares my faith, my love of writing, and other things dear to my heart talk about understanding the daily pain, frustration with insurance companies, and that horrible feeling in the grocery store where you have to pull over to the side so an elderly shopper can get by you because you can barely walk? That is lifesaving.

Lifesaving is important. As is patience. With myself – and with those around me because I don’t seem to have any right now. And clinging willingly and desperately to a God who knows each pain and wound as if it were His own.

He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.
Isaiah 53:3-5

Nothing soothes a battered soul like the calm of someone who has walked the path and truly understands. It’s one of the things that our trials and struggles do for us; teaching us compassion and empathy for others. The ones for whom we can come alongside. I hope that as I come to terms with this new normal, that I’ll be able to take my lessons and be that compassionate voice and shoulder for the next someone I meet who’s struggling with hardship.

Wherever we are today, it’s likely that we are the small percent of the world with more resources than most; more blessings than most; and more fortunate times than most. What can we do with all of that abundance? Whether it's something as simple as using our experience to come alongside someone who is hurting; who needs our compassion, or stretching to a grander scale and making an impact on our world, we can do it.

We can reach out.
One person at a time.
We can bring the healing.
We can be the miracle.

What will you do today?

Christ's Love is Greater Than Anyone Can Ever Know

I've been exploring this idea of Hello Mornings. Not officially joined yet, but I have the study - it's Ephesians, which is always wonderful. As I've been reading through - taking the first moments of my day to sink into the Word, I came across Ephesians 3:19 & 20. Again. I've read them so many times, and they always speak to my heart.

And recently, my friend Melissa went on on a trek up in the mountains and came back with some amazing photos that I just loved and wanted to borrow. She's been kind enough to let me use one of them here. I'll often have these images on the Three Bees Facebook page and would love to have you join me there too.

Take this to heart and may it bless your day today.

Behind the Scenes - Celebrate Life

It was going to be a cleaning kind of day. A haul-all-the-crap-out-and-get-it-organized or throw it away kind of day. It was also a day of anticipation – this unprecedented cleaning was brought on by the idea that an online friend would be coming for an in real life visit. In three and half months. Yes. It’s going to take me about that long to get it done. This “guest room” hasn’t served that purpose for about six years. In the absence of annual visits from my mom, it has transitioned from guest space, to office/workout room, to that place we put everything that won’t fit, to the room we can’t let anyone see. But that’s all going to change.

My sweet sister volunteered to come help be my hands and fingers and other moving parts that aren’t working so well right now. Not to mention lending her objective eye and fantastic gifts for efficiency organization. And while she was on her way, I was so inspired, that I started on another small corner of the house – the back end of my closet that hasn’t seen the light of day in many months.

I used the word “amazing” a lot that day as I posted updates on Facebook about our progress. And it was. For good and for not-so-good, it really was amazing to discover all that we did. I knew I was a saver (not quite a hoarder – it’s not that ugly yet), but something hit me as I dug deep and threw things out.

I save too many things for special days.

Special days that never materialize. Because I keep waiting for someday. It was oddly ironic to find two bottles of brand spanking new philosophy™ body wash called Celebrate Life and Celebrate You languishing in my closet celebrating absolutely nothing. As I read the little blurb on the labels, I was reminded again about why it’s so very important to seize the day. To make every day the special day. To celebrate now.

Celebrate Life

Every day is a gift just waiting to be unwrapped. Miracles can be found around every corner, when we open our eyes wide enough to see them. A tiny seed finds hope in a bloom. A fierce storm finds peace at the end of a rainbow. A wandering caterpillar finds new life, when it discovers its wings. An innocent child finds delight when he discovers his toes. Life is worth celebrating when the small miracles of today bring us hope for tomorrow.

Celebrate You

You are one of a kind, there will never be another you. Celebrate you. You have gifts and talents that are uniquely yours. Celebrate you. You are a star child sent directly from the heart of God. Celebrate you. You are a light in the life of those closest to your heart. You make a difference in the lives of many. Celebrate you. You are admired and adored, and you don’t even know it. Celebrate you. You are loved like crazy. Celebrate you.

Because seriously – what was I waiting for? A better bathtub? Better hair? A better body? Let’s not laugh. What did it say right there? Every day is a gift just waiting to be unwrapped. Yes it is. Not waiting to be kept waiting in the back of a closet for “just the right time.” Not waiting at all. Right now.

This day, I’m committing to no more purchases that I hold for only special occasions. There is only so much of this life I am allotted, and I want to enjoy all of it and bless everyone in it as much as I can while I’m in it. Because the other thing I need to remember is that it’s not just about me.

It’s about connecting with my world and with my community. With the people who make me smile and make me laugh. With the people who hold me when I need to cry. And the people I haven’t even met yet who need me to step out of my comfort zone and make a difference in their lives.

It happens now.

Time to come out of the wrapped up, closeted dark, and into the light of the real world.
Time to be part of the world.
Time to participate and live and celebrate and give thanks.
Time to look for miracles.
Time to be the miracle.



I'm linking up with Crystal Stine and company again today; joining the Behind the Scenes link up. A place to make a connection beyond the Pinterest perfect ideals; to look past the edges of the photo to the real life behind it; to say hi, this is me in all my messy real-ness. Sounds like a good time to me.

I'd love to connect with you some more - stop on by the Three Bees Facebook Page or connect with me on Twitter @3BeesBlueBonnet. Let's continue the conversation!

Five Minute Friday - Small

Five Minute Friday. Such an amazing group of women to get to know and write with. They bless me. And I’ve never met a single one in person. Hope to someday. Someday soon. I’ll gather together with them and it will be a welcoming, encouraging, beautiful time of community. All these writers. And today we write about …

This Week: Small

Go

I used to think I had to do things the big and perfect and – let’s face it – Martha Stewart way to get it right. I used to think that for a lot of things. Holiday dinners. Gifting. Writing. Journaling (hah, the one place where you should be able to let it be messy and imperfect because no one else is going to see it). Friendship. Parenting. Work. Church. I thought you had to do it big to make it matter.

Yes, I’m an admitted perfectionist. Perhaps a reformed perfectionist after all this time. But I did used to buy into that whole idea of grandiosity. Even when I couldn’t afford it (oh wait, I still can’t afford it), even when it wasn’t practical, even when it wasn’t right. It was supposed to be right. That’s what they said.

I stopped listening to them.

Finally.

Maybe it was some time after Martha Stewart went away and did her time. Maybe it was seeing that she could still pull it off after being in jail. Maybe then I thought I just shouldn’t try to play in that sandbox.

Or maybe it was when the biggest smile I ever got from my daughter was not after a pile of grandiose presents, or a ridiculously over-the-top-party, or too much money spent on clothes she would soon forget about. But after one summer day of sitting on the lawn chair in the back yard and bird watching. Just watching the birds, and seeing which ones we could identify out of my bird book. Then coming out again at night – the warm afternoon fading into crispness and snuggling under a blanket to count the stars. And singing the moon song.

That was enough. Her small body turning into me; her little hand coming up to my cheek; smiling in the darkness and saying, “Mama, this was my best day ever.”

I see the moon and the moon sees me
I see the moon and the moon sees me
I see the moon and the moon sees me
Shine on the one who is dear to me

Tears in the moonlight, and one of my best lessons ever.

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How to Join:
Want to know how Five Minute Friday got started and how to participate? All the details are here. No editing or second guessing. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community

Five Minute Friday - Lonely

For the first time in months, I am writing my Five Minute Friday on Friday. Usually, I am online until midnight east-coast time with friends I have yet to meet in real life. Friends that I have made in the midst of this writing community. Friends who surround and encourage me. But last night I shared my time with some real life girlfriends as we celebrated a milestone as one of our number became a grandmother for the first time. This gathering of hilarity and comfort was a respite at the end of a difficult week. But in the midst of it all, I couldn’t help but sneak a peek to see what the prompt from Lisa-Jo Baker would be; I couldn’t quite leave the habit of my Thursday night vigil:

Write for five minutes flat. Don’t over think. Don’t over edit. Post it. Link it. Share it. Visit the writer ahead of you – share the encouragement, share the love. Come back and do it again next week.

This Week: Lonely

Go

Sometimes our most difficult moments of isolation come when we seem most surrounded. Our lives pulse and surge with business and activity; we are organized to the enth degree – always on the go; we are planned and calendared out for weeks and months at a time. Play dates, dinners, meetings, doctors appointments, family gatherings, small group nights, girlfriend nights out. Good times. Even when difficult times strike, we hardly have time to catch our breath, because there is no pause button – there is hardly time to gather our strength to go on.

Because that’s what it so often feels like, doesn’t it? That we just have to keep going on.

We don’t have time for the aching that wells beneath us. That sharp stab that strikes in the line at the grocery store as you look at the carts around you and imagine the dinners, breakfasts, and snacks in the lives you’ll never visit and you think, “no one knows.”

No matter what it is: chronic illness, a death in the family, extended unemployment, a child in trouble, feeling friendless, or just not knowing where to turn, it is so easy to feel as if we’re the only one going through the hard times.  And in a sense, we’re right. Our individual lives mean that each situation looks a little different. But we’re never alone.

Our friends around us have been through something. Maybe not our exact something, but most, if not all of us have known suffering. And even if we’re feeling completely friendless and alone, there is One who will not leave us who has truly known suffering and has compassion for us.

But he took our suffering on him and felt our pain for us. Isaiah 53:4a

Compassion’s roots literally mean “to suffer together” and herein lies the balm for that awful ache and stabbing pain. Together. Alongside. With. In community.

We are not meant to be alone. We are created to be together – to support and nurture each other. To have compassion for one another.

Take a moment this week to look around you. There may be someone in the middle of their busy life who is hurting and feeling alone; who needs someone lie you to reach out with a hand or a hug or a kind word. It’s amazing how sometimes that’s all it takes.

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How to Join:
Want to know how Five Minute Friday got started and how to participate? All the details are here. No editing or second guessing. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community

Happy Birthday, Heidi

Dear Heidi,

When I woke up today, at least three electronic devices I own reminded me that it was your birthday. As did my calendar. As did my memories – as they have for many years.

You’ve been on my mind and heart so much this summer – connected by text and email and phone; by prayer and memory and love; by family and history and experience. We have so much of it together, and I want to celebrate you today.

You, who are there from my earliest childhood memories – Sunday School at Kalihi Bapist; seeing who could swing the highest on the swings (they don’t make them like that anymore, do they?); playing  Charlie’s Angels with Malia – everyone always wanting to be Jaclyn Smith’s Kelly Garret. I remember summers when our moms traded off taking kids – a smart move – but all I remember is how much fun we had. Whether skating and biking on the smooth level sidewalks at your house or roaming my backyard to climb the mango tree and gather leaves and berries for our imaginary games – we never had a cross word or a bored moment. Well, maybe one cross word. The only fight I can ever remember in our entire time together (and I couldn’t tell you what it was over) had us locked in a death grip in your living room, digging fingernails into each other’s arms with merciless intent. I guess we got over that one pretty quick.

I know we diverged for much of school time, but we never really lost touch, did we? The gift of families that stay close and an island that doesn’t let you get far away. I remember evenings out for dinner or a movie that would wind up on the lanai at my parent’s house – sitting out until way too late, just talking and talking.

What a blessing and a surprise to discover that you’d moved here to the Pacific Northwest – not long after I did, and we got to connect again. It was one of those times when time doesn’t stop and you really can just pick up and keep going from the last conversation. Was that at my thirtieth birthday in the park?

And now look at us – married with kids – and we’ve still got this connection that I just can’t live without. Enough time has passed that you moved from childhood best friend, to lifelong friend, to soul sister (thank you Train), to just sister. Our brothers roll their eyes and say, “what?” and not everyone gets it, but that really doesn’t matter at this point, does it? The gift of being “women of a certain age” is you can do whatever you want and call it good. And I think we’re there (sadly? finally?), and we’re doing it, and it is good.

You are my first phone call when tragedy strikes, my first email when joy explodes. Your wisdom and experience with counseling children in schools makes you my best resource for navigating a school system that at best – makes me a little crazy. Your faith in the face of life-threatening circumstances inspires and encourages me. There is no one else with whom I take all the censors down - all of them - and very few with whom I can be the truly real me. What a gift that is.

I love seeing our kids grow up together – although it’s always true that I wish we were a little closer and saw each other a little more. Our sister dates are
times I live for – whether its dinner and a movie again, or just a nice long camping out session at Barnes and Noble (Borders, we miss you so much!) to look at cookbooks and talk. I laugh that we still have stories to tell – old ones – that we have not heard yet. And laugh harder when we remember the stories that overlap that we’re oddly not a part of.

This history, this interweaving of our lives has become so much more than biology for me. Maybe I would feel this even more if we shared real DNA, but I’m not sure. Ours is a chosen, deliberate friendship sisterhood, grounded in faith, that spans a lifetime and is still looking forward to more.

So on this day. On your birthday day. I wish you happiness, health, peace, and more joy than your life can contain – so that you can continue to spill your amazing joy and encouragement into the lives of people you touch.

Love you girl

Five Minute Friday - Story

This wonderful space. This joyful Friday writing community. I look forward to this each week ... not losing my days in pining, but becoming more giddy in anticipation of the fun to be found in the Thursday night Twitter Party - where hearts meld, women pray, laughter echoes in virtual rooms, and friendships are birthed and nourished because of shared faith and a passion for words. These are the Five Minute Fridays. The prompt goes up from Lisa Jo at midnight on the East coast. We write. We post. We read. We share. We encourage.

This Week: Story

Go

and this is what i say to him
every time
when i am tired,
or bored,
or sick,
or just in need of some kind of comfort
that only he knows how to give –
i say
tell me a story about when we first met.

sometimes he laughs.
sometimes he rolls his eyes.
sometimes he says – no, but you know all the stories.

and my grown up self falls away and
i have to tease and say,
tell me.
please.

and then he’ll start in that voice
that could record movie trailers
or make commercials –
the kind that would sell snow in antarctica
or rice in china
or whatever kind of odd analogy they used to come up with –
that kind of voice.

he’ll talk about standing on the second floor looking down on me while i was typing
about seeing me in the lunch room
same thing all the time – chicken, rice, and peas
(heaven help us, we still eat the same thing now)
seeing the books I was reading and thinking
yeah, I read those too
bet I’d like her.

he’ll talk about first dates in the park
walking in shoulder-high dahlias
egg salad done just right;
fried chicken;
first kisses.

he runs his hands over my hair and remembers
a little bit later
when things got scary and complicated –
a treacherous drive in the midst of
january ice
when i was blue
and not breathing.
feeling terrified and helpless
trying to figure out what came next
as they descended on me with
tubes, needles, tape –
results that change a life.

but he remembers that i got to keep life
so we have a life
and he calls it a miracle
every day since then.

i don’t know if every day has felt like a miracle
except when he reminds me
in the retelling.

and there are others.
and it is our history.
it is our story.

and now she likes to hear them too,
this little bit of hyphenated us.
she likes the stories too –
the ones that include her –
and says,

daddy,
tell me a story about
when you first met me.

Stop

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