Thank(mas): Intolerance

(if you wanna know what's going one, click here.)

My fantastic friend Amy took me to this awesome
Italian place in Murphy - with GLUTEN FREE PANINI and
GLUTEN FREE PUMPKIN CHEESECAKE.

No, not intolerance as a political statement. Intolerance within the digestive track the Lord gave me.

That is my daily intolerance of gluten and lactose. Today I am thankful for them, and here are ten reasons why.

1) It is NOT an allergy, so at no point will ingesting gluten or lactose cause me to swell up and die.

2) It helps me save loads of money at coffee shops, or in snack aisles because I can't eat hardly anything.

3) It makes me WAY more appreciative when someone takes the time to make, fix, or find a gluten free option for me. (i.e. my mom making bread, my friends finding a restaurant with an actual gluten free menu, not just a salad bar, camp taking the time and money to buy me gluten free bread, pizza crust and pasta all summer, and Ms. Janet and Tanya taking the time to fix it!)

4) It has taken away a pride thing for me. I used to be proud that I would happily eat anything placed before me, that I was not a picky eater. I thought being a lactose intolerant celiac would drive me bonkers, but in reality I have learned to be even more flexible.

5) It lets me instantly bond with people with the same intolerances.

6) I have two sisters, a brother, and a mom - who are all, at the least, gluten intolerant. We get to swap ideas, new restaurant options, and just an over all inability to eat 60-80% of the food in a store.

7) It has made me realize how much food we have in America that is pointless. Who the heck needs "grab cans" of mini oreos, or 89 types of cereal? Our system is consumed with pleasing everyone, so very few people have any sense of eating because we need to survive, everyone just wants the food that they like. Ridiculous. And at times, gluttonous.

8) It lets me be creative. You don't always have the obvious options, sometimes you eat tater tots and stir fry, but its so much fun to figure out!

9) It is a great conversation starter, with new friends who watch you eat for the first time, waitresses and baristas, kitchen staff.

10) It is a part of me and the way God made me, so I love it, because doing anything less is telling God I think He made me wrong. That is a colossal flub of life. I like to avoid those.

Thank you Lord, for making me. The gluten intolerant gift and all.

(see next post here)

Thank(mas): Technology

(if you wanna know what's going one, click here.)

When I was about nine it struck me that my family was growing up, and we wouldn't always be close together. I remember telling my mom that night that I wished we would stay young forever.

What I didn't count on at age nine were a couple things that make growing up way more exciting than sad. One, as you grow you learn and change along with life. Our family is changing, and sharing it with each other. Its fun to watch us become husbands, wives, parents, counselors, professors, or social workers. Its fun to continually appreciate our 6 (or now 8) unique personalities and all we can learn from each other.

Second, is technology - which helps us share our lives. At nine, I didn't know or didn't realize that there was technology like cell phones, or internet, and laptops were the stuff of legends.

Cell phones allow me to easily and immediately communicate with my parents, siblings and friends, all around the country.

They allow me to get pictures like this in the middle of a work-day. (Which makes the day just a little happier)

Facebook lets my siblings and I have one continuous digital conversation that we can add to when each of us have time.

Facebook lets my camp family share updates, articles, pictures or stories quickly with everyone. 

Facebook lets my family share pictures of what is going on in our lives.

Skype lets me see the face of people on the other side of the country. To see their reaction, to let non-verbal cues be a part of communication again.

I can edit videos of my life to share with others. I can store photos. I can quickly write thousands of words and save hundreds of documents.

Technology is a gift of our age, that makes separation that much easier. 

(see next post here)

Thank(mas): Repetition

(if you wanna know what's going one, click here.)

Today I acknowledge the gift of repetition. 

I thought of this today around email 45 of an identical 150 or so that I had to send out for my job.

Repetition sends mixed signals. 

When I repeat the same schedule with my two year olds, they learn it and get more comfortable and are more at ease in the absence of their parents, because they know what to expect.

When I do the same routine every morning, I don't forget things, 

like brushing my teeth. 

But, when you do the same thing day after day, you can get bored, tired, irritated, or even sloppy with your work.

More often than not, we think of repetition as the last one, boring, 

but I challenge you to think of what we could never have, without repetition. 

Change.

If we don't have anything to change, then change does not exist. 

Or if everything is always changing, change itself becomes a repetition. 

No, I am thankful for dull, boring repetition, because without it, I could never fully appreciate breaks, or changes, or rest, as much as I appreciate it now. 

Against the canvas of repetition, other things tend to pop.

If you click on the "Thank(mas)" tab on the bar above and look at the right side of the screen, you will see the word, "Thank(mas)" repeatedly, and as a result the words like, "job", "music", or "car", will jump out to you.

If you look at a huge open field, with one person standing in it, 

your eye will automatically go to the person.

When you spend your day exactly the same way for five days, 

how much more do you treasure the two days you have off?

So maybe repetition doesn't send mixed signals,

 maybe we just forget what life would be like without it,

 and what an amazing gift it is. 

(see next post here)

Thank(mas): Car

(if you wanna know what's going one, click here.)

Today I acknowledge the gift of my car.

(Or rather, the car I am using for transportation purposes at this present juncture of life.)

In April of 2011 I rear-ended a green pick-up truck from Virginia at a stoplight on my way out of town. Nothing serious - I was going less than 15 miles and hour at the time and didn't even realize I had hit them till my hood curled up in front of me. However, it was a big enough hit to total my already low-valued car and end my minuscule career as a car-owner.

Since then I have survived off rides, walking, buses, and borrowed cars. These cars, an old Nissan that someone gave our family (and was also my first car), an old Plymouth someone gave our family, and a decent Buick that, you guessed it, someone gave our family, have been a blessing at various points in my life. 

The Buick is one of two cars that that belong to my father. Two because our neighbor willed them to him an old blue Chevy, and a decent white Buick, when he passed away. My father in turn drives a tiny, low power, high gas, no air condition or radio, curmudgeon of a truck. He's a pretty great father.

All last semester, when the Nissan was on its last legs, Dad let me drive the Buick. This summer at camp I didn't have a car (thanks all for the rides) and when I came back home to work, I got pre-approved for a car loan, but didn't want to rush into anything.

Dad surprised me on Labor Day by suggesting (where he had previously suggested loan) that instead of getting deeper in debt, I just take over expenses on the Buick, since we're all trying to save money. It would help him by cutting down on insurance, and maintenance bills, and help me by allowing me to just focus on my school loan.

The Buick takes me nearly 250 miles a week on average, between my three jobs, running errands, visiting people (like my grandmother) and it does so faithfully.

It has heating and air conditioning, and a working radio that has allowed me to attach a cd player to, so I can have music of my own choosing wherever I go. (See previous post on music).

The backseat holds my extra jackets, discarded cd's, a box of tissues, books for my classes and all the packages that tote from work to the post office.

I absolutely love that it takes me to see so many people I love. And helps me give rides to even more.

I am mostly appreciative that so far, it is a literal gift from my father, to be able to use it and it is also a blessing to be able to drive it, and be mobile, and it is a gift from God that cars were even invented, so that Buick is a gift, upon a gift, upon a gift.

All of them gifts, acknowledged.

(see next post here)

Thank(mas): Music

(if you wanna know what's going one, click here.)

Living Room Dance Sessions

Today I acknowledge the gift of music.

Of people who began it, reworked it and presented it through the ages.

Of being able to sit in the summer and listen to a chorus of crickets and bullfrogs and imagine someone hearing the same thing thousands of years ago, and trying to duplicate it on their own crude instruments.

Of Christmas music that can make the whole room feel warmer and more cheerful.

Of being able to dance to music when I am energetic, confused, or overwhelmed: let the rhythms of the songs decide my movement.

Of watching my friends who study it find so much joy in the theories, beats, and history.

Of music as a reflection of the people who write it, and the way it can tell the author's story.

Of music as worship and expression of praise.

Of music in all the ways it changes, reveals, and grows.

Of music, as a gift.

(see next post here)

Thank(mas): Job

Little snapshot from my all-time favorite job: Camp

I suppose I should begin this "Thank-mas" (see previous post here), by acknowledging the gift received in my job.

Or rather jobs.

They are almost all out of my comfort-zone, and not at all what I would say I was made to do.

But then, I wasn't made for a job. I was made to worship God and serve Him and that is not tied to anything other than the attitude of my heart.

So I will again re-list all the gifts that I have found in this job, because I severely dislike the feeling of dread that has begun to creep in every Sunday night.

1) The jobs were all put in my path, I didn't have to search for them (I hate job hunting - too many options for my head and I get quickly overwhelmed)

2) The jobs are helping my financial situation creep back into the black post-graduation.

3) The jobs are filling out my resumé way more than a 40-hour a week waitressing job would.

4) I am learning more about so many types of people and how to work with, and communicate with them, as well as learning how to appreciate them and the way God formed each of their personalities.

5) God has used the gap of brain-space left by the lack of school to work on my heart and allowed me to submit more of myself to His control.

6) The previous gap has allowed me to spend more time on artistic endeavors like painting, crocheting and video editing.

7) I am learning, to work a job that I don't necessarily love, because it needs to be done.

8) While challenging, I find a lot of joy in teaching dance classes to intellectually challenged adults, and taking care of toddlers, and wrangling early elementary school kids, and I find joy in never knowing if I will be working with ESL students, filing papers, making copies, making calls, writing post-cards, writing lesson plans, or tutoring essays when I go in for a 3-hour shift.

9) Friendly co-workers that give me energy as soon as I come into work.

10) More so than before, I appreciate time-off, breaks, and my all-time favorite job, Strong Rock Camp.

I know there are countless more gifts that I will continue to find, or already have and are just not at the forefront of my mind. The main part is this: I see the gift in my jobs, and am truly grateful for them, and all they are teaching me.

(see next post here)

The Overlapping Holiday

grat·i·tude noun \ˈgra-tə-ˌtüd, -ˌtyüd\

1 : the state of being grateful : thankfulness

thank·ful adjective \ˈthaŋk-fəl\

1:conscious of benefit received

joy noun \ˈjȯi\

1. a : the emotion evoked by well-being, success, or good fortune or by the prospect of possessing what one desires :delight

b : the expression or exhibition of such emotion : gaiety

2: a state of happiness or felicity : bliss

3: a source or cause of delight

I love looking up definitions of words that we use every day. Words that we throw around this time of year, like “gratitude” and “thankful”. We in America have one day a year dedicated to reminding ourselves to be “conscious of a benefit received”. 

I love that our country has a holiday dedicated to gratitude.

I have been reading (slowly) Ann Voskamp’s book, “One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are.” As the title may suggest, the main idea of this book is to find gratitude, eucharisteo, in every day life. It is this Eucharisteo that is the theme of this post and the subsequent holiday.

“Eucharisteo, thanksgiving, envelopes the Greek word for grace, charis. But it also holds its derivative, the Greek word chara, meaning “joy.” Charis. Grace. Eucharisteo. Thanksgiving. Chara. Joy.” - Ann Voskamp

As we leave the holiday centered on thankfulness and go into the holiday centered on joy (The best way to spread Christmas cheer is...?) I am striking a blow for freedom. Freedom of the holidays. Why not combine both of these ideas into one mega-holiday?

To say that this weekend has been all fun and joy would be a lie. It has been one of the most frustrating Christmas decorating sessions ever. From lights that suddenly stop working, to seat-belt citations, sickness, weariness, it just trying me, but I am also finding joy, because I know that in frustrations, I can exercise eucharisteo. It seems fitting. Because in the challenge I have found purpose. Overlapping the holidays.

“Joy is the realest reality, the fullest life, and joy is always given, never grasped. God gives gifts and I give thanks and I unwrap the gift given: joy.” -Ann Voskamp

For the month or so leading up to Christmas I will be purely highlighting different aspects of my life that I am thankful for; people, places, structures, lessons, hardships, joys, abstract or concrete. 

I challenge you, whoever you are who read this, to do the same. Overlap your holidays and say thank you, abide in eucharisteo and find joy.

(see the next post here)

35,000 Feet

Good Morning Hartsfield Jackson International Airport

I am writing this from the skies. Technically by the time you read it I will have landed, because I am not paying for in-transit internet. 

I am by no means a veteran of the skies, but I like flying more and more every time I do it. 

I love checking in and imagining all the fascinating people the skycap’s get to see. 

I love wandering through the massive concourses and atriums, and think about the people that designed and built them. 

I love standing in line to go through security with hundreds of other people, all just hoping we won’t get pulled for a random pat down or bag search. 

I love that I can traverse forty different back routes through the mountains of North Carolina, but I have to follow signs and take trains to make it from security to my gate.

I love seeing all the different people move around me, and knowing that each and everyone of them has their own unique story going a million different directions, but for this one moment we are united in need get to the top of the escalator, board a plane, make it to Denver. 

I love sitting in the plane and see the sky and the horizon meet in a snowy haze. 

I love watching the clouds underneath me look like homemade whipped cream, fresh from the beater.

I love thinking about the people in the houses, towns, and cities below me going about their lives; taking their kids to school, grocery shopping, cleaning houses, going to work, drinking coffee, meeting new people.

I love seeing the patches of fuzz where we have allowed the earth to remain free, and trees to grow.

I love seeing rivers snake through the earth, connecting country and commercialism.

I love how the slow passing of the landscape paired with the knowledge that we are doing in 2 and half hours, what takes some people two and a half days. 

I love that the turbulence almost comforts me, because of my childhood growing up in old cars with poor suspension. 

I love watching the conservative sexagenarians, engaged in conversation with the thirty year old shaggy redneck.

I love the way I want to get germaphobic if I think about how many people sat in these seats, or breathed this same air, or leaned their head against this same window.

I love that I can’t wrap my mind around how a craft that makes a house looks small, gets itself off the ground and stays in the air, but God made a people who not only understand it, but invent it. 

I love the ever present reminders of how little I know, and how little I control. 

But I think most of all - I love where I am going. Usually to see family, but this time even more so, to meet my niece and see my brother, the father, for the first time. 

Mississippi River

Me on the other side of the Mississippi for the first time!

Hello Denver.

Hello CALLIE!

Home is Where I'm With You

God has replaced Philip Philip's voice. Exemplifying what my Mom says, God's truth can be everywhere.

I realized the other night that almost every time I refer to a decision or move I have made in the past I say, "we went", "we did". The "we" I am referring to is not another person, or my schizophrenic personality, it's God.

This has not been a conscious shift, but a gradual and sure one. I trace a key origin of the idea to my third summer at camp. This summer was the last one before I moved away from home for the first time. During the dedication that we have the night before the campers come, my director spoke about God as Abba. Abba is the name that the Jewish children would call their fathers, much like our "daddy", he said.

I have been blessed with a fantastic father. My whole life he has gone with me. Carrying me as a child, leading me as I approached adolescents and walking alongside me as I have come awkwardly stumbling into adulthood. As such, one of my least favorite things about going to school was moving five hours from him.

That night God began transformation of my ideas of Himself. God was my daddy. He goes with me, stronger, wiser, more loving and more able to teach than my earthly father will ever be. I went to school that fall in a shaky revelation that I had a daddy who would never leave.

Over the past two years, God has time and again reiterated this concept to my soul, so that it is now nearly impossible for me to imagine going anywhere on my own. "I" am now a forevermore a "we". I have become less reliant on things I always thought I'd need, because my concept of "home" is changing. "Home" is no longer limited to an address, a town, or a building.

My "home" is steadily becoming God, therefore my earthly equation of "home" has and is becoming not a structure, but His body.  My parents house is home because they are there and because my brothers and sisters will return there. But I can meet my brothers and sisters in a restaurant in a city I have never been to before and feel equally at home.  Camp is a home, not for where it is, but for the people within the gate. I can spent a weekend with member of my camp family in Athens (first time there) and as I drove away, all I could think was, "I have not felt so at home in a while."

All of this has come to the forefront of my mind and heart in the last few months as God has put me in the place of circumstantial isolation. I am five hours from friends at school, an hour and a half to three hours from camp family, and even experiencing the longest isolation from my brothers and sisters that I ever have.  It has felt like pieces of my heart being ripped away, but now I am seeing that is is God pruning and trimming my vine (John 15).

God is taking away crutches of anything in my life that I have been unconsciously giving glory to. In my mind I have never felt so alone, but in that, God has redirected my heart and took back His glory. Because even those loving relationships are truly nothing without God.

I thought that "home" would be the theme, if you will, of my semester, because I was moving back to my parent's house. I prepared myself and my heart against creating grudges, or bitterness against this place and my parents. I had no idea, what God really had in store for me, and the exciting thing is, there will  be even more. And because God is becoming more so than ever, my home, and my confidence, I know I am ready, because "I" am a "we".

(See coinciding post here)

Emotional Purpose

A little applicable music

I just sent a text message to a friend who I am in the process of, I guess you'd call it pranking. The message, written in reply to his repeated asking for me to reveal what was going on, read, in essence, "I'd rather tell you what's going on, but it will be more fun for you if I don't. Personally I wish the frustrating part was over."

Then it struck me what a weird parallel that was to my life, right now.

It has become increasingly apparent to me that I may have some unsettled issues. Most of them revolving around my inability to accept, process or all together deal with emotion. I have uncontrollably sobbed more in these past few months than most of life combined. I have been coming to terms with the fact that I have emotion. This may sound odd, but let me explain.

When I was younger I was overly emotional and people used to tell me how sensitive I was. I hated it, and I was happy when I grew up and seemed to have less emotion to deal with, but now it appears that I had the same amount of emotion, it has just been perpetually stuffed. I grew up unconsciously training myself to simply not abide crazy feelings. I have heard often that emotion should not rule us, no one told me that that did not mean that it has no place in my existence, because that is how I have been living.

God has spent the past three months slowly revealing my inabilities as twelve or so years of unattended emotion has been coming to the surface, often at terribly inconvenient times.  I have learned to brush my teeth, get dressed, drive, eat, dance, and all around live while copious amounts of water run down my face and my breath gets stopped halfway up and sent back before it is released. He is graciously working with me on it, but the reality is, no matter how good the results may be, the process hurts.

I know that God is working this for the good. I could not handle adulthood, future marriage and parenting, or even ministry, with so little ability to accept or process my own emotion, let alone all the people's around me.  I know that God is teaching me, because I've already seen it. I also know that it will take me a while a to learn, because that is the only way it will stick with me.

The text message I wrote struck a chord because it seems as if God has spoken a paraphrase of that text message to me countless times, as I curl in a ball and feel like my heart is breaking into a million pieces; instead of dealing with pranks and frustration like the one I sent, God's message sounds more like, "I know this hurts, but it will better if you go through it. I wish it could be over."

I know this because in the midst of it all, I have peace at the core of my soul. I know I am where I am supposed to be. I know that God is compassionately walking with me through the fire, so I can emerge on the side, stronger in my faith and ability to serve. Furthermore, I have the gift of a physical representation of God's love in my parents, who will sit and listen, and pray and hug, and make dinner when I am doubled over in the kitchen because, for some reason I cannot explain, the decision between burrito and quesadilla inspires tears.

So when I feel an inexplicable wave of emotion, I will first tell myself to accept it. And when I am not sure how to deal with it, I will pray and ask God. And when I am not sure how to pray, I will just lay it out before Him and wait. And while I wait, I will be thankful for the life that He has given me and His willingness to teach me.

(See coinciding post here)

"Keep the earth below my feet/ from my sweat my blood runs weak/

let me learn from where I have been/ 

Keep my eyes to serve/ my hands to learn."