Books, Bedlam, and A Lively Hope
One year this weekend...
I married my best friend.A few quick wedding memories:
'Twas the night before the wedding, and the bride's mother's house was alive,
with worry and anguish...
because the bride's foundation garments to be worn under her dress
had never arrived! (An emergency trip to a bridal shop was made, which was expensive and inconvenient as the shop only carried one type of bridal slip: an enormous hoop-skirt type thing! Many alterations were made. Mostly by hacking away at the slip with scissors.)
We had a small wedding of about twenty people, all immediate family relations, except for our Minister and his wife. It was a compromise between my husband's wish for a more traditional wedding and my wish to elope.
We did not hire a professional photographer for pictures during the wedding, but instead met at a studio before the wedding for a studio sitting. It turned out to be a smart idea.
We spotted a yard sale on the way to church and stopped to make a purchase!
There were no flowers at our wedding other than my bouquet of peach roses and a rose on my husband's lapel. It was quite plain. An Aunt surprised us by bring bubble liquid for everyone so they could blow bubbles at us as we left the church.
My husband wore a neck tie (a traditional no-no among Mennonites) for the second time in his life. Later I saw he had printed instructions on how to tie it. It struck me as cute.
Our "reception" was at a nice restaurant nearby, and the food was excellent. We ordered right off of the menu, and the staff went out of their way to throw in some unexpected extras.
One Aunt kept asking our Minister if my husband would have to grow a beard now that we were married.
We actually had two cakes- one was a smaller, gluten-free cake made for a family member with celiac disease. The "anniversary cake" was boxed up and given to us to take home. Completely unaware of the tradition where you save a piece to eat on your first anniversary, my new husband took the little cake into work two days later to share with his co-workers, to thank them for the pre-wedding party they had thrown him. My initial reaction of horror evolved into laughter...eventually.
And after the celebration, we went back to moving our belongings into our house!
Knock Knock...
Yesterday morning we had some Jehovah's Witnesses stop by to proselytize. It is a bit of a scene, since whenever strangers come on the property the dogs start barking to alert us, and then I find myself in the position of having to physically restrain them at the door, and to make matters worse, my husband had just arrived home not too long before and was sleeping. Needless to say, I like to keep commotion at a minimum so as not to wake my husband after a twelve hour night shift at the hospital. Anyway, the JW's were polite but insistent, and I always mistakenly think that once I state my denomination/church affiliation that they will understand and leave, but there always seems to be follow-up questions to that even, and it makes me wonder:
Where is the "do not call list" for home visits?
I may be wrong, but is it not even more intrusive for someone to drive on to your property, park in your drive way, and knock on your door unannounced than for them to call your telephone?
There you are, in person, you might not be yet dressed for visitors, you might have animals or children that run to meet whomever is on your front step, and you might not be able to blatantly ignore someone at the front door if it is obvious that your family is home! Whereas, when the phone rings, you can easily let it go to voice mail.
Anyway, after wishing our visitors a good day, I couldn't help but feels almost sorry for these two women who got stuck going door-to-door in our Mennonite neighborhood. Of course, there are some Methodists on our road, too. And those who aren't Christian are...Jewish Orthodox! So, good luck. While I care greatly about spreading Jesus' message, you'll more likely find me planting a seed rather than showing up at your door with a hoe and trowel expecting to put in your garden.
And perhaps a national "do not visit" registry is not the answer, considering that we have been on the "do not call" registry since day one and now receive more calls asking for charitable donations than we ever thought possible. The funny thing is, the organizations that we do support rarely call us- it's all of the ones we have never heard of before. We get most of these calls on Sundays, and always around supper time, to boot.
Of Quirks and Quirkiness
Amy Jo wonders if she is quirky or just plain not normal. Who am I to judge? Here are some of my quirks:It drives me nuts when people who know us drive by our house on the somewhat busy road out front and days or weeks later, report to us whether they saw us outside at the time they drove by, and what we were doing at that moment. "Hey, I saw you last Wednesday afternoon in your driveway. You were taking something out of your trunk." (They can beep and wave, though. That's fine.)
When we go on vacation, it really makes my day if we have breakfast at Cracker Barrel. I even bring a special map along of all the Cracker Barrels in the United States.
If I make something new for dinner and my husband doesn't mention how good or tasty it is, I am not above soliciting compliments from him on my cooking.
I love the smell of swimming pool chemicals, and if a store has a section for pool supplies I will walk through it just for the smell.
Despite my upbringing and beliefs as a pacifist, I will unabashedly wage a full-scale war on the moles that have eaten my tulip bulbs.
If I don't get the bathroom cleaned on Saturday, I consider my entire weekend a waste, and complain that I didn't "get a single thing done" on that weekend.
I pray in unlikely places. I've probably prayed for you while driving, taking a shower, or while waiting in the doctor's office.
I have a rare form of dyslexia that makes processing numbers very difficult for me, as well as telling right from left, following how to do something in a specific order, and measuring. I can't remember numbers in their correct order, and do not even read them correctly half the time. Having failed numerous basic math courses in a wide variety of schools, not a single teacher noticed until my second-to-last year of college. The quirks that result from this disability are endless.
A day of unplanned nonsense
This was going to be another day of planned sewing, but my plans were thwarted by a brief snow storm that has left the roads up near my mother's house icy. At first, this seemed like a terrible thing, since having time to sew is both a necessity and a luxury. When I "make time" for it, you can believe it is as important as a birthday party. It's an event! Besides, if I couldn't go somewhere and sew today, what else could I do around here that would not wake up my husband?Well, my husband arrived home this morning later than usual because of road conditions, and then we had planned to pick up one of our vehicles from the repair shop. When we came back from that errand, he asked me if I wanted to go look at exterior doors with him so we could pick out a new back door. It seemed best to do it today since the shop's hours are limited tomorrow. By the time we conquered the door-a-thon, my husband had another appointment he needed to keep, and we still needed to call about service for the appliances. So as it turned out, the day has been anything but the unproductive mess I thought it was going to be.
And I did call for service on both the stove and the dryer, and someone is coming out Monday! Hurrah!
There seem to be quite a few people who fret how technology has "complicated" things, and has made things harder or more difficult. But having grown up with limited technology, I really enjoy much of what it has to offer. We never had a clothes dryer when I was a child. Sometimes, I would tag along with a friend whose mother had one and would use those perfumed fabric sheets, which I found mystifying. Anyway, they didn't seem to have the worries we did about frozen clothing that never dried and the neighbor's dog who would jump the fence, snatch our items off of the line, and drag them through dirt so they would be rewashed.
I had heard of dishwashers, but we surely never had one, and I never even saw one up close until well into my twenties when I house-sat for a well-to-do couple who owned conveniences that seemed incredibly glamorous at the time, but were probably quite mainstream for the upper income brackets. The lady showed me how to operate the dishwasher and I must have ran it (needlessly) three times that day because it was such a novelty. When my mother moved into a house that had one installed, I convinced her it was worth using, and instructed my forty-something year old mother on how to run a dishwasher. Guess what she can't live without now?
While we will never be the family that runs out to buy the newest and latest that technology has to offer, once you've lived without, you can appreciate "living with".
I won't even get into that one place we lived that only had an outhouse...
Thank You....
...to all of you who have extended your condolences to our family during the past several days. It has been a very busy time, but not all of it bad. We really enjoyed all of the family get-togethers that have taken place because of the funeral, and the opportunities to meet or get reacquainted with family members who are not local. Someone recently said to me that they wonder if one of the reasons God allows our loved ones to suffer an extended illness is so that it will be easier to let them go when it is time. I wonder, too.And now, back to regular posting.
Seeking room to breathe
There is a saying around our house which I squawk a little too off-handedly when things get frustrating during our home improvement efforts. The saying is "Let the next owners worry about it!"It makes me feel better to say it because it reminds me that for all of our efforts, we one day hope to sell this home, turn a modest profit, and move on. But move on to where, is always a question mark. It may be another ten years before we are realistically able and ready for our next home. Places that may seem like perfect locations today may not look the same in another decade.
Many people in our part of the country have started to migrate south and west-ward, in search of a less expensive standard of living than the northeast can provide. Yet, it is really not the cost of living here that is my biggest challenge, but something else. It's the population density. The traffic, the crowded stores, the constant development, the feeling of people on top of people.
"How come every time you go the store it takes so long to park and every place seems so crowded?" a friend in another state asked, during a phone call.
"Because it is so crowded, because there are no parking spaces, and because you might have to go to four different stores to find one thing because all of the shelves are empty!" I told her.
I joke with my husband that they could literally build multi-story Targets here, that is, an entire Super Target on top of a Target with maybe a supplemental Target on the third floor, and the shelves would still be empty. (I just use Target as an example, they could do this with any mega-store and it would be successful).
Another side-effect of the exploding population is an increase in pollution. I have been an allergy-sufferer for most of my life, but they seem to improve greatly the minute we cross the border into Ohio. Much of the mid-west is a respite for my itchy sinuses and teary eyes. I couldn't believe it when, on our wedding trip, we met a man in Nebraska complaining about his allergies and how awful he found them to be in that state. I practically pulled up a chair to give my testimony on just how much of an improvement Nebraska was for air quality.
I have to wonder if this is just a case of longing for the good old days, or whether I have some real concerns. To an extent, it reminds me of how people talk about the Lancaster county area. It usually starts when someone makes the observation that is has changed so much, has become so commercial, has so many new housing developments and shopping centers, as they remember how spacious it looked like thirty years ago. Then the next person says that they remember how it looked fifty years ago with even less development and that's when the county was really nice. And then finally you'll have someone chime in that things really started to change there around seventy years ago when they brought in the tourism, etc. etc. (and nothing has been the same since.)
Am I just reacting to a natural progression, or dreaming of a greener lawn?
Leaping into the new year (pun intended)
Did you ever hear the old wives' tale that what you do on New Year's day will be what you will be doing for the rest of the year?I'm ashamed to feel so superstitious, and truly, I am not. There are so many superstitions that I can easily dismiss, and indeed, express surprise when people believe them, so this one should just as easily be dispelled. But there is always a little voice lurking in my head throughout the first day of the year repeating this nonsense that fills me with neuroses and worry. If Scrappy has an accident on the carpet today, does that mean we won't be able to solve her training issues this year? And if I clean up the mess, does that mean I'll be cleaning up after the dogs everyday for the next twelve months? Should I clean anything at all? Or will that mean this year will be filled with the drudgery of housework, and little else?
How ridiculous! We know too well that our destinies aren't tied to a set of tasks we choose to accomplish on a particular day.
And here it comes again. The fear that if I don't sew anything today, then nothing will get sewn for the next twelve months. And yet, the Bible has so much to say about about fear, as we are consistently told that we needn't. Still, fear cannot always be ignored as we need it to both challenge and protect us. Fear is often the warning light on the dashboard of life, or it is merely an apparition we conjure in our own minds, giving us something to rise against. In this regard, fear moves us forward. We feel the fear, and then take the risks. How many wonderful things have happened because you confronted your fear, and did what was necessary?
Today, I will rid my heart and mind of the fear of this silly superstition. Even as we go out to dinner tonight, which was my suggestion, so I won't spend the rest of the year in the kitchen.
Giving thanks for a year well-lived
Many "bloggers" seem to be posting wish lists of things they hope to accomplish in 2008. It's admirable to have the confidence to publicly announce your goals, but you won't see any of that here. My goals and wish lists are perpetual and on-going from week to week and month to month. You could say I decided on my "resolutions" sometime back in the 1980's and those same goals have either been evolving, achieved, dismissed, or replaced ever since, in one continuous marathon of moving forward. One could figure that the middle of March is about a good a time as any to start something new, so why limit yourself to the first day of January?What I do enjoy this time of year is the post-Christmas return to the "quiet rhythms of daily life", which I think is a phrase I read somewhere, but can't recall what book it came from. But I like routine, I like schedule, I value the monotony of day to day life. Yet, in our home, there is also a constant feeling of renewal and a feeling of new goals being set that replace completed projects. And that too, takes the form of ongoing resolutions.
We lived for nearly six months this past year without a stove, as my husband had to install gas service before we could use the one we purchased. When he finally hooked up that stove and I could cook, well, now that was a "new year"! More fulfilling than a thousand new year's resolutions brought to successful completion, my kitchen (still very much a construction zone) was full of the familiar sights, sounds, and smells of pies I hadn't baked in ages, meals I always wanted to try, and culinary skills rediscovered.
Each time new windows were installed, a bulb was planted in barren soil, a new pet was taken in, each time a new unforeseen blessing unfolded it was as if we were experiencing the completion of a resolution we never even knew we had made. We set some goals and made some plans along the way, but so much of it was in God's hands that we could hardly take credit for all of the tasks we managed to successfully complete in 2007. Chances are, you can look back on your life this past year and come up with a list of wonderful things that came to fruition, also.
And that is why when it comes to the new year, I can only wonder what the Lord has resolved for us in 2008?
(Disclaimer: This does not mean there won't be any list-making. I am such a list-maker that I use an online tool to manage my multiple lists, and if my husband dares ask what he should work on next, I could rattle off a list in the order of importance.)
A Timeless Christmas
Yes, it was a wonderful Christmas, and it went by too fast.Many people associate the child-like wonder of Christmas with children anxious to receive gifts, but I am convinced it is something else entirely that captivates children during this season and it is, simply, their freedom from the yolk of time. Children have little concept of deadlines and other time constraints, they just go with the flow. They don't have the adult responsibility of making sure we get to Aunt Sadie's by ten, or budgeting time closely on Christmas Eve morning so that the perfect English Trifle you worked hard on has time to chill, or adding up how many scarce hours we will be able to spend with loved ones who just flew in for a few days. No, for children, Christmas is tradition, it is love, and it cannot be measured by a clock.
I came to this conclusion while meting out tiny moments over the past few days devoted to this task or that one, seeing this relative or the other, and trying to figure out why Christmas feels so differently when you are an adult. When recalling my own memories of Christmas past, they all run together in a blur of carols, worship, candles, and treats...whether they happened on Christmas Eve, or three days later. There was no rush or detailed schedule of events, other than getting to church. If anything, it felt like forever before Christmas Day would arrive! There was the beauty of simple traditions and the wonder of a Savior born so long ago. Christmas was happening, and it was timeless.
Or at least it was for this little girl, who is all grown up now and spent way too much time on Christmas Eve making delicious food, fretting at the clock, and really just looking forward to this Christmas morning, the first she and her husband would share together as husband and wife.
Now that was a moment meant to be timeless.
On Homemaking, Working Out, and Time
Perhaps I should start taking my own advice regarding weeding out the desk regularly, after spending five minutes the other day routing through a drawer after a greeting card that I just knew was in there...and instead finding a 2008 pocket calender which I almost bought at the store last week. What a waste of money that would have been!Another thing that makes getting rid of clutter so important is that clutter not only wastes money, but also wastes time. If there is one thing I would like to find a way to hoard, it is just that- time!
There is just never enough time to get to all of my lofty plans. Partially, this is due to the fact that I work outside the home, but I strongly suspect that even if we were not childless and I no longer worked outside the home, there would still be a shortage of time in many areas. After all, I hear so many mothers lament their forsaken to-do lists that I have to believe that children or not, time is an issue with all women who take homemaking seriously. Even single Sisters who are just beginning to walk their womanly paths can quickly drown in schooling, visiting, caring for siblings or aged family members, and of course, church obligations. For myself, it can get so critical that I silently become disgruntled when the cashier at the grocery store bags items in a way that I think will cause me to waste time! (Well, it would be nice to have all the frozen items in the same bags so I can make one stop at the freezer while unloading groceries.) It can just feel that desperate sometimes.
It is true, working outside the home while trying to maintain your home is difficult. Some days it prompts tears, anger, and frustration. You may think that in a situation like this, the home will be the one to suffer the short end of the stick, and in many cases that may be true. But personally, for me, it is always the job that comes second. Because it is just that important that my husband have a homemade meal, that our clothes are clean, pressed, and in good condition, that the floors are clean, the bathroom scrubbed, and that our home is pleasing enough for us to want to be there.
Frankly, compared to the woman in Proverbs 31, my tasks seem minimal. Have you seen all that she would do? Not only was she to take care of the needs of her family, but I am thoroughly convinced that she was to be a business woman, as well. She was to be buying land (31:16) and making, selling and delivering products to merchants (31:24).
There may come a time when my husband and I will be blessed with a child, and then my days of working out will come to an end. Until then, there is much to do, much to see, and most importantly, much to give. Let us pray we can accept it when our schedules change to conform to His will, in His time.
The mice are afoot...er, a-claw!
Our home is fast becoming a hostel for mice. They are coming in from the fields looking for food and warmth, crawling under the stove, scurrying across the kitchen floor, and hiding in our "housewares" room where we keep our beloved belongings. It is not too much of a surprise that this is the case, but it feels like a new infestation after the cold weather moves in and cures us of the previous one, which was house flies.It's easy to partially blame the obvious holes in floors and walls for the problem, as our renovations have made the house less than weather-tight, and more than vulnerable. And I even feel particularly fortunate that there has been
I am easily amused by their shy, secretive nature. Once, in our bathroom, a mouse crawled out from a demolished area of the wall and upon hearing me gasp, ran back into the wall as easily startled by me as I was of him! Another time, a mouse watched me reading in bed, and when I turned my head to discover him, he quickly jumped and disappeared.
Still, they appall me.
It is never me who actively checks the mouse traps, as I am too afraid of what I'll find! No, my husband is the one who is sent to check on their status, and he is also in charge of disposal. I only handled a sprung trap once, and that was after one of our dogs sniffed it out and brought it out in the open. Even then, I only flung it on the front step for my husband to see and discard. He actually takes delight in examining the mouse, showing it to the dogs, and smiling at my squeamishness. Like an eleven-year-old boy would.
We have been catching about one a day, but we have only had one trap. We are going to put out more and it worries me to think how the count may go up once we have several traps set.
A free gift you can give...
Christmas arrives whether we are ready or not, during what may be a pleasant time in your life, or a time of rain. With that in mind, would you join me in lifting up in prayer Carrie at How I Love Thee during this difficult time? It has been a privilege to share this sister's burdens as she and her courageous family struggle at home. Carrie is a warm and wonderful wife and mother, creative, smart, and she still takes time to share her walk with Jesus with others. I know she has inspired many readers to deepen their walk with the Lord. Now, please help encourage her as she is caught in the storm. Your prayers would be the perfect Christmas gift for her family.He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength. Isaiah 40:29
And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:7
Our first Christmas
Here at the library, I have just put up our seasonal display of Christmas books. It's my favorite book display to do! All year long those Christmas books taunt me from the stacks: "Don't you wish it was December already?"It's an easy display. To find books for it, I can simply walk up and down the aisles looking for Christmas themed stories, which are easily identified by their festive book jackets. And these books are so popular I will have to replenish the entire display at least once a day!
More than one friend has pointed out that this is the first Christmas for my husband and I in our new home. They wondered what decorating plans we have, what new traditions might manifest? As you might expect, decorating isn't something we are terribly concerned with considering the bare-bones state of our house. Also, we have two rowdy indoor dogs that I suspect will take no prisoners when festive objects go on display. As for traditions, our main tradition seems to be getting engaged, since it was just a little over a year ago we did that. It's hard to believe that it was only a year ago that took place, followed by a whirlwind year of house buying, wedding dress sewing, wedding, post-wedding trip, dog adoptions, and so many other things, too. The Lord blessed us so greatly this past year, it was actually hard to accept.
Growing up, it's not the planned annual traditions we did that really bring back memories of our Christmases. It was those things that simply seemed to happen year after year, that we had no control over, that became our traditions.
Every year, my Grandmother's friend from Germany would send us a Christmas package filled with wonderful Swiss chocolates. This was long before they were available in stores here, as they are now. Oh how I loved that chocolate! And wrapped in the same package were gifts for us- strange and comical gifts, usually clothing, always in hilariously small or enormous sizes, and in loud, mismatched patterns and colors. We would have a good laugh about the odd choices, and then dutifully write the thank you note.
Anyway, the family Christmas letter reported on in a former post is in the final editing stages. So maybe that's a tradition.
Finding glory in the simple
When we bought our home last Spring, I thought the fields around us could never look prettier than they did then, with all of the greenery and a few wild flowers in bloom. Then, Summer arrived and the corn stalks grew tall, and I thought, "No, this is the prettiest it could ever look." And then on Thanksgiving morning I was standing out back looking at the eastern section of the field, and once again couldn't believe how pretty all the Autumn colors are, especially the gold. Will I ever be able to choose?
I recently learned of an interesting project that took place in the 1950's called "This, I Believe." Prominent people were asked to write a brief essay on their beliefs, which was then read aloud, broadcast, and ultimately bound into a book along with other essays. The project was so popular, educators used it as a writing assignment in their classes and contests were held for best essay. But what I found particularly interesting was that people wanted to hear essays from average, every day people like themselves, not the famous people who were being sought out. The format was changed, and regular "unknowns" were searched out to write essays on their beliefs. One woman, a homemaker from North Carolina, wrote a lovely ode entitled Doing the Simple Tasks. She wrote: Distant tasks may seem more glamorous and more alluring, but our only chance I think, of bringing in the Kingdom of God, is to work at the thing at hand.
This, I believe.
Encouragement for Homemakers
A wonderful friend from church gave me this postcard when she heard I was reading Ella May Miller's Happy Homemaking! A Christian Look at Everyday Problems. Mrs. Miller was one of two women who sought to start a ministry encouraging homemakers, and they did something radical to get their messages out: They broadcast them on the radio.
As Mennonite women.
In the 1950's.
Trust me, it was radical.
My friend must have held on to this postcard for many, many years. The book simply contains the transcripts of Mrs. Miller's messages on her radio show Heart to Heart. She covered everything from mental health, to issues with your mother in law. Helpful, practical, and Biblical, the messages from Heart to Heart are still relevant. There is one entitled "The Whip of Hurry" which could have been written today! It laments the fast-paced lifestyle that often robs us of enjoying life. "Too many days are scheduled to the minute." How true! Let us slow down. Let us be still before the Lord.
The Christmas Letter
Do you enjoy receiving Christmas letters?
Please don’t be offended by this post if you write and send out a Christmas letter on behalf of your family. After all, we’ll be sending one out, too.
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