Memories

Woke up last night to a strange sound that took a few minutes of foggy thought to identify….rain. The house has a metal roof, so the pinging is just a tad different from a regular shingle roof. Still, a nice sound. And there is a queen size bed here, so it isn’t so bad when Vin comes running in, scared of the lightning and thunder.

I woke up in the morning from a vivid dream about my grandparents. We were having Thanksgiving at their house….my husband and kids, and I remember some other aunts and uncles…..but mostly I remember my Grandparents. Grandma was still sick, so Grandpa was doing the cooking. I could literally smell his old cologne. I could smell the stuffing, and heard the buzzing of the electric knife cutting the turkey. I recall the wiggling-puppy-feeling inside as I came and stood next to him in the kitchen and put my arm around him as he put an arm around my shoulder. “Finesse” is what my nickname was. We all had them. All twenty-some grandkids had a nickname. How I miss them.

They finally sold the house. I suppose that is what called the dream up from my subconscious. I am trying to be happy for the house to start again….to have a new young family living there when it has been well over 80 years since a young family lived there. I may get over losing the house.

I don’t think I’ll ever get over losing them. Grandpa was gone so suddenly. “At least he didn’t linger” people said. Grandma struggled along for so long, sick and suffering. “At least you were prepared and could say goodbye” people said. People should always ALWAYS shut up at funerals. In three years, two people who thought everything I did was great were gone. You don’t get a lot of people in your life who think you are great. You don’t get a lot of people who spend their best “free” years running around to piano recitals and basketball games and college plays on the other side of the state, taking pictures of you with your head cut off most of the time, all the while offering you pop and Bugles to snack on.

My Grandparents made a lot of memories for us. They made each birthday meaningful and each Christmas too. Grandma was fair to each of us to a fault: if one grandkid got something, every grandkid got something….and thus traditions were born. Grandpa gave us each an identity…a special name of our own. We weren’t just one of the grandkids, we were individuals. As we got older, he enjoyed us more. Neither of them ever judged any of us….whatever haircut or life choice or weird date we showed up with, they just accepted it without the slightest bit of criticism.

Nearly every time we pass a cemetery, Vin says mournfully, “That reminds me of Great Grandma.” He was old enough to remember her funeral and it must have made a big impression on him. We try to explain that we don’t have to be sad….Grandma is all better in Heaven. But on some level, he must read me that I am still sad.

Sharon Osborne called and wants her hair back

I was talking to my mom the other day and realized she didn't know I got my hair cut, so here's a pic for you mom.

And for my sisters, do you remember the time we stayed at Grandma's house and she let us play in that spooky little attic and we found the pink vinyl box that we were sure it was Barbies? Then we opened the box and.....SCREAMED.....because it was HAIR!

Yeah, my haircut, a lot like Grandma's wig.

She would love it.

Great blog

This is the blog of guy we knew in college. I don't remember him being this funny, but then again, I hung out pretty exclusively with two guys who did a great "Crash Test Dummies" impersonation.

Seriously, made me laugh out loud. twice.

Cross promoting the emerging church conversation on Robb's Grenz

I am referencing a conversation here that has been going on on Robb's blog regarding the emerging church. I can't get it out of my head and I want to say some things, maybe for shock value or something....okay, here it is...

What's the big deal about Absolute Truth? I believe in it (I guess : ) but I'd like to keep that on the QT, really, when it comes to most unchurched people. And with churched people, I think it only adds to the "We are right and everybody else is wrong, we are "in", and all of them are "out," I am chosen, they are screwed/I chose Jesus, they choose hell apparently," etc etc etc mindset. It's so condescending, especially to people who are generally open to just sitting down and talking most things over, whereas we (as a church-whole) are so marked in our mission that we have onlyl been successful in making caractures of ourselves. Maybe I sound a bit aggressive, but I keep hearing this attack over and over again..."they don't believe in absolute truth." I'm asking the question...so what? Isn't it possible that you could be saved and not believe in absolute truth?

"But how can you prove that Christianity is right?" you might ask. Well, are we supposed to? Wouldn't it be far better to tell them a story that moves their heart? To introduce them to Someone they literally cannot resist? To relate to them rather than convince them?

It's been awhile since college...I just can't remember why it is so important.

today's adventures....

Found my way to Pea Ridge, AR, just up the road from us, to go to a sale first thing this morning. I kept trying to defrost, but the car wouldn't get warm. It was dark still and the road was very curvy and full of traffic, and I was still bleary eyed. It helped when I figured out how to open the lid in my MARE travel mug (thank you Donna). It helped even more when I realized in the light of day and three sales later that the AC was on, not the defrost.

Turned out to be a very tomato day : these were my finds for the morning... three pieces of japanese ceramic tomato ware and the cool pewter tomato sugar bowl. Might have to keep 'em!

The kids took a walk down the lane to see the llamas and Hank, and then met Theodore Bunny who lives next door. He belongs to Alyssa, our hosts' daughter, but Vin calls her "The Sister." She had a good laugh over that.

Heard from my "baby" sister Ashley finally. They were hit badly by hurricane Wilma in Florida, but their house is safe. She said it was pretty scarry. The 7-11 down the street from them is destroyed with lots of other things, and they are glad to have the power back on. It was good to hear from her.

theological quiz...and I'm not telling where I landed.

I found this quiz online (I don't know if it's the same one, Donna) and took it. I'm not sure if I feel safe enough to confess where I landed. Robb will probably yell at me....no...he's postmodern, He will think there is value to what I believe..... : )

Keep an eye out for old TV Guides...

So Vinny got it into his head, in his typical bulldog fashion, that I absolutely had to buy a stack of old TV Guide magazines at the auction on Saturday. The top one featured Adam West as Batman, and Vinny loves all things Superhero. The crowd was exhausted and super-saturated by the sheer volume and diversity of items at this sale, and I won them for a buck. In the stack is a '67 Star Trek cover, which I discovered on eBay to be selling for about 50 dollars. It may be a fluke, but I think I'll get my buck back!

Donna brought this quote to my attention...

How baffling you are, oh Church,
and yet how I love you!
How you have made me suffer,
and yet how much I owe you!
I should like to see you destroyed,
and yet I need your presence.
You have given me so much scandal
and yet you have made me understand sanctity.
I have seen nothing in the world more
devoted to obscurity, more compromised,
more false, and I have touched nothing more pure,
more generous, more beautiful.
How often I have wanted to shut the doors
of my soul in your face, and how often
I have prayed to die in the safety of your arms.
No, I cannot free myself from you, because
I am you, although not completely.
And where should I go?
-Carlos Carretto

one other thing

this is the link to my about me page on ebay (I got my first negative from a lady that never paid me!) I posted a pic of the outside of the house with the rock garden out front. The pic is very big and I still have to figure out how to make it smaller, but it is a good clear shot of the "front" of the house, which faces a long lane behind a gate. (you have to get out of the car every time you go out or come in to keep the animals inside).

Inside and from the french doors....

Out my window...

this is the view from out my bedroom window where the sun rises each morning

I'm Back!!!

HI EVERYONE! I'm back online! We had quite a run around, but eventually landed on netzero, a dial up (ugh) which isn't too bad and it only costs about 15 dollars a month as opposed to 50 for cable....but enough about commercials.....I've missed you all so much!

And OH the ADvenTurEs wE HaVe hAd!

From dog food pinging the windsheild in Indianapolis to a Border Collie convention at the hotel...

from exploring the charming and welcoming Hollyhock House to unloading the truck in just 2.5 hours (Thank you A & Jaye T, Don, Donnie and Steve)...

from meeting Charles (an ER doctor) and Phyllis (WHO EVER SAID SOUTHERNERS TALK SLOW?) our gracious hosts, to meeting their 32 animals including Hank the Horse, who is allergic to hay....

from getting Mattie caught up in school to Robb finding a job (Assistant Manager of a Christian Book Store!...starting today!)....

from finding my "subculture" of fellow junkers at the estate sales just north of us EVERY WEEKEND, to attending an auction of an antique store/flea market building being EMPTIED (I actually gave up in exhaustion...and there were only about 100 people there)....

from meeting new friends and support at Fellowship Bible Church to having our first Vintage Fellowship business meeting (We voted to make the Marshalls and the Ryerses the leadership team)....

from fighting with the ants and mice to having bad dreams about the spiders.....


I have missed you all so much! I will be posting pics asap ....and for all of you's that we still owe money...don't break our thumbs yet.... and for all of you that we have your stuff, boxes are going out soon... and don't tell Denise, but they say we can stay until after Christmas so we don't have to move at the holidays.....wow, we just have soo much to talk about!

the 3 am jitters

Well, it's about 3:30 am and I am awake. I got so tired from packing the truck in my sleep that I had to get up and take a break. My arm is pretty sore from bouncing off the ramp (rather ungracefully), and I have a very sore throat. I wish I could say everything I own is on a moving truck, but it didn't all fit. I guess that is a metaphor for something, but hubby would say I just have too much junk.

I don't have words or energy left to express something of my feelings at this moment. Something like shame for working my friends so hard. Something like gratitude (or maybe awe) that they would try so hard. Something like terror of the unknown, complete grief for all I'm losing, hope for a future. I have no reason to expect anything from God, but I can't help hoping that He will somehow come through with exactly what we need at the zero hour. It will be a while before I can write here again, so call this a cliffhanger for now. Perhaps by the time I can write again, something will have "given" and we can all take aim at how good God is to us.

call it cheesy, but I am reminded of that old line from a hymn...

"I don't know about tomorrow, but I know who holds my hand."

Please please please

well, on the advice of Ben the Realtor in Arkansas (who will henceforth be known simply as Ben the Realtor), I tried to light a fire under my agent here. So she called last night at 9:30 p.m. to tell me that the house is being shown today. They were to show it between 9 and 10 am, so pray that something comes of it. There is also an open house on Thursday for other agencies to see the house.

Knowing that someone was going to walk through my house and have an opinion of it sparked some pretty strong emotions for me. I cried for a while and I'm too tired to blog all about it now. It's the first time we've shown the house and it's also the first time the house has been nice looking and "put together" and may I just project a little....HAPPY...for quite a while.

Today we are going to have alittle fun, get Charleigh's ears pierced, get Vin's hair cut and run some other errands.

I am now offline at home and can only blog when I can get access to another computer. I will try to write when I can.

Just today, tomorrow and Thursday to get through til Robb comes for us!

so i just realized

The reason I keep making impossibly long and detailed to do lists is because I don't want to get it all done. When I get the list done, I have to leave and I don't want to go. Feeling some sympathy for Lot's wife.

Another morning as a perfect heathen

Having another fine Sunday morning as a complete heathen...Okay, maybe not complete heathen, since I do plan to attend church later this morning, but it still feels weird not to be there at the crack of dawn wondering who is going to show up, making coffee and cutting fresh flowers (as if anyone ever noticed). Oh well. Last week, we attended with my sister and brother in law, and the kids picked out their old Easter clothes to wear (translated we only go to church once a year), we didn't know any of the songs, and we dropped the offering basket. It was a fresh experience all right, but very disconcerting. I'll file that away to help new people at Vintage Fellowship. It frankly takes a lot of guts to show up at a new place, even when you go with friends and family.

I was right...ahah!

hope I linked this right, but the NYT affirms my hunch.

Alias

I have been a huge fan of the show Alias since the show's inception (as well as j j abrams' other shows Felicity and Lost). Abrams has a bad habit, though, of leaving the writing to others during the second or third season (to start his next project), whereupon the show really "jumps the shark." I was not as excited about this year, though I did tape it and watched this week's episode this morning.

Though I feel halfhearted about the story-line since 1.) the real life romantic lives of the actors ruined the chemistry and 2.) Jen Garner is pregnant with Ben Affleck's kid, not Michael Vartan's. ( I don't care how good an actress she is, I can't get that out of my head. ) 3.) Since Sidney and Vaughn got mean. Part of the appeal was the girl next door/ boyscout 'real self' vs. their double lives as spies. Now that they are all just bad people, I can't relate.

However, I would like to make some call as to who "the body" is: I'm going with Vaughn. I know his chest was full of bullets, but nobody dies on Alias (kind of like the A-team...remember?). That will make it easier for Sidney to live happily ever after at the end of this season. Of course, I wouldn't mind if "the body" wasn't anyone important and "Will" took time off the overly sexually charged "Kitchen Confidential" on FOX (I have friend who's a cook who says he hates shows that try to make cooking sexy...it's not.) ....anyway, yeah, "Will" could easily reprise his role as the hopeful and lovestruck "friend with potential."

All I can say for certain is that if it doesn't get better soon, I'll have to change the ringer on my phone. Maybe the "A-team" theme....

God is watching over us...

The person who stopped to help Sara in the pouring rain, she let Sara sit in her car while they waited for the police to come. Sara accidentally left her purse (translated credit card) in the car. She called Camp Bayouca where someone there gave her their credit card number and paid for enough gas to get her home to BBC safe.

A guy stopped at the garage sale today. He asked how much we were asking for the house and then asked for a tour (I forgot that my realtor frowns on this). So, it turns out that "Gary" lived in Fayetteville, AR for 6 years, and also lived in Foxboro, MA (where Mattie was born) before moving to Ithaca. He was quite impressed by the house. It's the first time the house has been shown.

I made it to the Post Office with ebay boxes (that I was late shipping) at about 4:27, (they close at 4:30) and was able to pay in cash for the shipping costs the exact amount that I made at the garage sale today (minus the 6 cents that T.P. chipped in (Going to miss this kind Postal Employee)

The Song ....

Oh, yeah, and if you are tempted to believe that a song is not such a big deal, U2's "Who's Going to Ride Your Wild Horses" was the song that made me choose Robb. I was in the car with my high school boyfriend (on a break during my Freshman year of college). This song came on and I realized that I was with a guy who didn't feel this way about me and wouldn't know how to if he tried. But Robb "got" me and this song at the same time....

You're dangerous 'cause you're honest
You're dangerous, you don't know what you want
Well you left my heart empty as a vacant lot
For any spirit to haunt

Hey hey sha la la
Hey hey

You're an accident waiting to happen
You're a piece of glass left there on the beach
Well you tell me things I know you're not supposed to
Then you leave me just out of reach

Hey hey sha la la
Hey hey sha la la

Who's gonna ride your wild horses
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea
Who's gonna ride your wild horses
Who's gonna fall at the foot of thee

Well you stole it 'cause I needed the cash
And you killed it 'cause I wanted revenge
Well you lied to me 'cause I asked you to
Baby, can we still be friends

Hey hey sha la la
Hey hey sha la la

Who's gonna ride your wild horses
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea
Who's gonna ride your wild horses
Who's gonna fall at the foot of thee

Oh, the deeper I spin
Oh, the hunter will sin for your ivory skin
Took a drive in the dirty rain
To a place where the wind calls your name
Under the trees the river laughing at you and me
Hallelujah, heavens white rose
The doors you open
I just can't close

Don't turn around, don't turn around again
Don't turn around, your gypsy heart
Don't turn around, don't turn around again
Don't turn around, and don't look back
Come on now love, don't you look back

Who's gonna ride your wild horses
Who's gonna drown in your blue sea
Who's gonna taste your salt water kisses
Who's gonna take the place of me

Who's gonna ride your wild horses
Who's gonna tame the heart of thee.

Seriously, U2...amazing

I've been wanting to blog about U2's performance on Conan O'Brian last night all day...some random thoughts....

Bono has really big feet!

The best example of truly postmodern Christians I can think of, complete with an amazingly beautiful optimistic dispensationalism. I am a glass half-empty-girl myself, but I find optimists crazy-attractive. As much as I believe that the world really stinks sometimes, they believe just as thoroughly that tomorrow is another day wherein something great might happen. Bono is wildly optimistic about how much an Irish rock star can accomplish for good in his lifetime....He reminded me what this is all about again....what all this headache of packing and church stuff and being apart from Robb and all the other misery is about....to accomplish something that reflects in some small way how much God has given us and how we can reflect His grace to the needy ones around us. Call it hero-worship or falling for a celebrity if you want, but I think that that is what a musician/poet is for....to call attention to the details in life we can't express or don't notice, and therefore remind us of the greater picture. To "give some words to what we almost feel" as Chris Rice said. It goes without saying that Robb is an optimist, and I would follow him to the end of the world....he makes me believe crazy and wonderful things are possible.


Seemingly so serious, in their all-black clothes and deep, still lyrics, they made me laugh out loud. "In the year 2000" is Robb's favorite Conan bit, and having The Edge with that gooney necklace thing was just so dang funny. I felt deeply happy and satisfied for the first time in days. They made me believe again that this world is a pretty nice place in spite of sin and illness, because at least we can still laugh and create and do rightly by others. Lighten Up, Girl!

I'm always wary of celebrity-worship. Let's face it, our culture is so vulgar that way. But Jesus was famous. Sometimes people are just so very good, you can't help standing there with your mouth open, just being amazed. I remember the glory days of Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls. I could have cared less about the NBA, but there was just something about how great Jordan was, that I was sucked in. I couldn't help being interested. U2 is that way for me....they are just so good at what they do, I can't help hanging on their every word. Maybe because, like Jesus, they are good at maintaining some mystery. I maintain 2 percent skepticism....Bono could be the antichrist afterall. Leading the charge to erase the national debt in 36 poverty stricken countries, uniting the likes of radical Hollywood stars with Right wing conservatives to eradicate AIDS in Africa, not to mention his work regarding Apartheid in South Africa could make a guy pretty popular all over the globe. But I'll try to be optimistic. They could just be a great band.

The acoustic "Stuck in a Moment"....so good. Made me want to cradle my guitar and touch base with my soul...

"Some things you shouldn't get too good at...Laughing, Crying and Late Night TV....."

Sara's in a ditch

I'm not joking...just got a call that she hydroplaned her car in the rain and is stuck in a ditch near Bellefonte, Pa. Someone stopped and called her a tow truck, but she only had four minutes left on her cell phone, and isn't planning on coming home now. Let's pray her car is still drivable and she can get back to bbc okay.

A new game...

I must say, we have missed an obvious source of amusement. We should be playing an enormous game of balderdash by coming up with meanings to the weird words....

I'll start....

zofms: the little springs used inside clicking pens

we should have had an auction

that's all I have to say. I'm too tired from packing, cleaning, organizing, and trying to disperse all this stuff to write any more.

hospitality

Some people are just so good at hospitality.

Take my sister and brother-in-law....they just have a standing agreement with me to come and go as I need to. I walk in the door and the kids scatter to play and I can help myself to anything I might need. Before I can even blink, they've served up my kid's plates, even cutting Charleigh's food into little bites before I can even think what I need to do next. A glass of something cold is always handy, and Cathy always makes a nice dessert to enjoy a little later. Then we all go downstairs and get comfy on the couch or recliner to watch tv or movies. Comfortable like a pair of broken in jeans and a soft t-shirt.

My friend Mary is an artist. Every time I step into her home, Lucy comes barking to welcome me (or scare me off?), and it smells nice....like flowers and old books and snickerdoodles. Her palette is her house. She paints it with old-world and timeless china, pewter, pottery and linens. The dog barking may be loud, but there is a hushed quietness and calm that she and her husband have imposed on the house with their own character. My room here is the perfect shade of green, and snuggling down in the iron bed seems like I've slipped between the pages of one of my beloved L. M. Montgomery novels.

My friend Donna has a hospitality of self. She welcomes you to be yourself, to say what you really think, and to try out new ideas just by saying them out loud. She's casual, brassy, intuitive. If you don't talk, she can almost guess what you are thinking and save you the effort of talking at all.

I'm grateful.

What my mother taught me

Our dear friend and mentor, Dr. Carter, was an amazing person and a real character at times. Sometimes when things would happen behind the scenes at his churches or at the college, things that were less than honorable, less than right and just, I would ask what he thought about it. He would clamp his lips together with obvious effort, or sometimes stick out his tongue and bite down on it. The first time he did this, I had to ask..."What are you doing????"

"I'm practicing what my mother taught me," with a twinkle in his eyes.

"What's that?"

"If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all."


So I'm practicing what Dr. Carter's mother taught him.

Moving on...

So it turns out tomorrow did turn out to be another day, and a pretty nice looking one at that. I have already tackled most of the enormous stack of dishes, and plan to give the dog a bath and finish up some little things before we head over to Rockford. I rounded out my mini-depression last night by watching part of the Barbara Mandrell story on the Womens' Entertainment network (yeah, pretty bad), but also, by finishing one of the best books I've ever read, Don Miller's "Searching for God Knows What." He ends the book with an explanation of how "Romeo & Juliet" is a picture of God's love for us. He references Baz Lurhmann's movie version because it shows so many religious icons and symbols in every scene, especially the last one where it looks more like a wedding than a suicide: it's a picture of how we are united with Christ through our death, not just to sin, but also our physical death and our togetherness in heaven. Miller gives me an even great appreciate for Shakespeare and his amazing layering of both crass cultural slang with depths of theological value. But more than that, as I lay there reading, fighting back tears of lonliness, loss, fear, laziness....I realized that I often feel God's love for me through my house and husband. In fact, sometimes they can obscure my view of Jesus because I allow myself to focus so much on the gifts, not the Giver. Last night, with Robb away and my sweet little house stripped bare, I sensed His presence and I went to sleep feeling loved, not just knowing it in my head.