Here's Hoping

"In order to create, we have to stand in the space between what we see and what we hope for." - Julie Burstein, 4 Lessons in Creativity

Hope is a tricky thing.

When I was waiting for Mike to fall in love with me, I remember a sermon about Hannah, the mother of Samuel. One time when she prayed, Eli the priest saw her and thought she was drunk. He said, "How long are you going to stay drunk? Put away your wine."

"Not so, my lord," Hannah replied. "I am a woman who is deeply troubled. I have not been drinking wine or beer; I was pouring out my soul to the Lord." (1 Samuel 1:14-15)

I was also a woman who was deeply troubled. I had fallen in love with Mike, but month after month had gone by with no sign of reciprocation. When I heard Hannah's story, I realized that hope is the hardest place to be. It's like sitting on a fence. If your hope is fulfilled, you can come down on one side of the fence, and if you give up hope, you can come down on the other. But living in hope is a precarious balance.

I am thinking of hope and longing now as I look to my post-graduate future. I am a stay-at-home mom right now, but I long to be involved in ministry, in the leadership and shaping of a church. However, the two roles seem mutually exclusive. I like spending time with my baby boy, and I don't want to relinquish him to daycare. Ministry is a demanding 24-7 job that doesn't have space for nursing a baby every four hours, establishing a daily eating and sleeping routine, and being flexible to change that routine every few months for a growing baby.

Yet I long to be part of a community of Christians where we are trying to understand what it means to be the church in our space and time. I long to learn about the Bible alongside others. I want to work with Mike to involve people in ministry and help them do more than they ever thought possible. I want to see God transform and heal broken lives.

Julie Burstein's words struck me. I lived in the space between what I saw and what I hoped for when I was in love with Mike, and it was heartbreaking. She classifies that space as "loss." That's what I felt then and it is what I am feeling now. Then it was the loss of love; now it is the loss of my dreams for my post-graduation life. However, she also identifies loss as a necessary component of creativity. Out of the struggle to see both what is and what could be comes art. Not just the art we see in museums, but the art of creating anything new and original.

My blog may reflect some angst, but I have hope that the angst I feel now will result in a work of art in the years to come as I find creative and original ways to engage in ministry. One of the benefits of getting older is being able to look back on a variety of circumstances in which God has worked creatively and miraculously in my life when all I felt was loss. This may be another season of loss, hope, and art.

I can't put this little guy in daycare!

In Which I Am Angry Again

"Asking for help is a lot harder than giving it." - What to Expect: Pregnancy and Parenting Every Step of the Way

On Sunday, I got mad again. My pastor said the following in his sermon:

"It's really striking how often today the Holy Spirit is calling people to quit things especially when you find so few 'quit' verses in the Bible! And yet, God's program in America appears to be that he wants his people to take lots of time off, to quit serving folks once they have a child, to quit extending themselves. That usually means taking a year, two years, three years--taking a decade."

He also said:

"Are you a person who can be counted on by others, that when you say you're going to do something, it's money in the bank?"

What? You don't know me! Are you judging me? Are you telling me that I'm putting words in God's mouth? Are you labeling me a quitter without even giving me a chance to defend myself?

Because the thing is, I am trying really hard not to quit. But how can we keep volunteering for things and then backing out at the last minute--when our baby gets sick or just decides he doesn't like the nursery, when my husband loses the ability to hear due to an ear infection, or when the baby suddenly decides he needs to go to bed an hour earlier? Our word isn't very much like money in the bank unless that bank is a piggy with structural damage!

So what? We have to choose between being quitters or being unreliable?

As I was ranting and raving to my husband about pastors and sermons and quitters and blah, blah, blah, I told him that all I really wanted was a place where I can volunteer in a role that actually matches my gifts and that has some flexibility.

Suddenly, all my frustration landed on a single point. I want to be part of a community where people serve according to their gifts, their availability, their passions, their calling, etc. Not everyone is an eye. Not everyone is a nose. Some people work part-time or stay home. Others work seventy hours a week. Some people have babies, and some people want babies. Some people have grandkids who they spend a lot of time with, and some people desperately miss their grandkids who live far away. Some people love meeting new people, and some people love completing tasks. People are unique and not simply interchangeable.

Sometimes I feel like Charlie Chaplin.

Our church appears very polished every week. In a church our size, it's easy to think that the whole thing is a big machine and all the volunteers are perfectly machined cogs. My life with a husband and kid with ongoing health issues (relatively minor but still inconvenient) doesn't seem to quite be the right shape to fit the machine.

As much as I may want to blame my church for its machine-like appearance, however, it was the daily newsletter from WhatToExpect.com that stopped me in my tracks. A healthy community is made up of people who are willing to ask for help, and as the newsletter writer so astutely observed, it is easier to give help than to ask for it. I don't want to admit that I can't do something or that something is hard for me. I don't want people to think I'm unreliable.

The reality is that every cog is a little oddly-shaped. Every person has some quirk or difficulty they bring to their job. Every person who plays an instrument, hands me a bulletin, watches my kid in the nursery, and even just sits in the congregation is just as fragile as I am, one germ or crisis away from failing in their role.

Maybe my response to this sermon should not be to defend my ironclad reasons for quitting but to realize that I may need to ask for help sometimes, and that's okay. Maybe I need to take a step back and realize that when I only do things that I am totally confident will succeed, I miss out on a chance to demonstrate vulnerability and to receive help. As long as no one ever fails, failure seems terrifying, or at the very least potentially embarrassing. But if I want to be part of a community where it's okay to fail, maybe I need to start by being willing to fail myself.

This baby isn't afraid of failing! He's having the time of his life failing at crawling!

Dreaming of Puzzles

"Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least." - Goethe,
quoted by Stephen Covey in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Habit 3 (of the 7) is "Put first things first." To be honest, I read Stephen Covey's book quite a few years ago, so I don't remember every detail, but one principle that has stuck with me is this chart:

Covey describes a few scenarios based on this chart. Some people spend their time doing what is urgent, but not important: responding immediately to every request made of them without regard for their significance in the big picture. Others spend their lives alternating between the important/urgent quadrant and the not important/not urgent quadrant. They are constantly putting out fires, solving big problems, responding to emergencies--until they crash. Then they stare at their computer mindlessly until another big problem comes along.

A highly effective person spends their time in the important/not urgent quadrant. According to Covey, most of the big problems and crises start in that quadrant but don't get attention early enough to prevent them from escalating. When your spouse starts yelling at you for not spending enough time with the family, the problem is urgent. The way to fix this is not to clear your schedule for the evening and then wait until your spouse gets angry again. Instead, make spending time with your family a priority so your spouse doesn't have to yell.

That example highlights another aspect of Covey's philosophy. Too often we feel forced to choose between two alternatives, neither of which are what we want. As the quotation by Goethe above suggests, it is up to us to decide what matters most and pursue that. Maybe if you spend more time with your family, your boss will be angry that you are neglecting your job. You feel stuck between an angry boss and an angry spouse. The answer is not to try to figure out how to appease both parties. Rather, it is up to you to decide what you want and to pursue that. Covey says that you are always saying "no" to things in your life. If it's not to the urgent things, demanding your immediate attention, then it is probably to the more fundamentally important things that are easier to let slide.

Stephen Covey tells the story of a mall that was descending into bankruptcy after business after business pulled out. A businessman purchased the mall, and rather than dealing with the impending financial disaster, he began walking around talking to store owners. As he built relationships with them, things began to turn around. The store owners felt heard and valued. The owner made good decisions for the mall based on the store owners' suggestions. By focusing on the important work of building relationships, rather than the urgent financial crisis, he was able to prevent financial ruin.

Source: Google Images

I decided to write on this topic because I had a dream last night that I was trying to climb carpet stairs while wearing rollerblades. I was thinking this morning about how my dreams sometimes reveal to me things that I'm worried about or are bigger problems in my life than I realized. (Apparently I have some residual anxiety about rollerblading.) A few years ago, I was really stressed at work. I had a dream that I was walking around my job, and every time someone wanted me to do something, they handed me a puzzle piece. My cupped hands began to overflow with puzzle pieces. I sat down at my desk and looked at the puzzle pieces overflowing my hands, and I felt completely overwhelmed. As I looked at them, I realized that mixed in with the pieces that represented tasks was a map of the United States. By taking the time to complete that puzzle, I could remove the unimportant pieces and focus on what mattered. So I began building the puzzle. I woke up somewhere around Iowa. (I don't think my subconscious had a very good map of the United States to work with.) From that point on, I began to take ownership of my priorities, doing what I felt was most important and would make me most effective at doing my job, rather than rushing around from one person's demands to the next.

Sometimes the most important thing to do is not the most obvious. It might not be the most urgent, and there may be people who are disappointed by your choice of how to spend your time. But by spending your time pursuing what is important and not being drawn into the trap of constantly responding to the urgent, you can avoid burnout, live according to your own priorities and values, and achieve bigger goals.

I often apply this principle with Amos. Sometimes I have a lot of things that I want to get done in a day. But by spending time with Amos when he is awake and happy, not only do I get to enjoy having a super cute baby (a good priority by itself), but I also end up with a happier baby who is less fussy while he is awake and takes better naps when it's time to sleep. Taking the time to interact with him and play with him may be hard when there are dishes in the sink, laundry in baskets, and an unwritten blog, but it results in a happier baby and a happier mommy.

Sometimes it is hard for me to identify my priorities and keep them in front of me, especially during this season of relative inactivity. The image that comes to my mind is that of a boat at sea on a completely calm day. The sails hang limp, and the boat doesn't move. Time well spent on those days can make the ship more capable of withstanding future storms. I hope that this time as a stay at home mom can help me learn to spend my time wisely and effectively so that when I am surrounded by more urgent concerns, I will have the presence of mind to remember what is important and make that my focus.

This is the face of a baby with a highly effective mom.

Heroes and Saints

"There is a significant difference between the kind of story that is told about heroes and the kind of story that is told about saints. The hero always makes a decisive intervention at a moment when things are looking like they could all go badly wrong. The hero steps up and makes everything turn out right. In other words, the hero is always the center of the story. By contrast, the saint is not necessarily a crucial character. The saint may be almost invisible, easily missed, quickly forgotten. The hero's story is always about the hero. The saint is always at the periphery of a story that is really about God." - Samuel Wells

My pastor is in the midst of a seventy-two week series on Judges. Our church is not for wimps! (He also makes us memorize scripture every week as a congregation, but that's another story.)

As I've been reading the book of Judges for the past four and a half months (yes four and a half months...and we just finished Chapter 10 this past week), I have been struck by the minor characters. Most people have heard of Gideon, Deborah, and Sampson. But those are only a few of the saviors of Israel. Some of the others are judges mentioned by name: Othniel, Shamgar, Tola, and Jair, for example. Some are even more obscure, such as Jael who killed the commander of an enemy army by hammering a tent peg through his head. Some are not even named.

Judges 9 tells the story of Abimelek, one of the sons of Gideon. He murdered his seventy brothers and became the leader of the town of Shechem. When a man named Gaal earned the confidence of the people of Shechem to stand against Abimelek,  Abimelek massacred not only Gaal and his army but the entire city of Shechem by burning down the tower in which they had taken refuge. (It seems crazy to kill every person in the city you lead, but Abimelek seemed a little crazy.)

Abimelek then moved on to the town of Thebez, for no apparent reason. The citizens of Thebez also took refuge in a tower. But this time the fire plan did not work out so well. As he approached the tower to set fire to it, a woman dropped a millstone on his head and cracked his skull (Judges 9:53).

Oh, the drama!

I can just imagine the people of Thebez all rushing into the tower in a panic and then running around inside saying, "Ah! Abimelek! He's going to kill us! We're all going to die. Ah! Ack!" Meanwhile this woman looks out the window at this crazy man running towards them, eyes the millstone, and then lets it fly. Suddenly all the people hear the crash and look at each other for a split second before they rush past the woman to look out the window. They look down just in time to see Abimelek ask his armor-bearer to finish him off so it can't be said that he was killed by a woman.

In the meantime, the woman has probably gathered her things and headed back downstairs to return to her life. That is probably why her name isn't recorded in the biblical account. She seems like someone who just quietly got things done.

I've given a lot of thought to what it means to be successful: as a Christian, in ministry, on behalf of the kingdom of God. And while there are a few Gideons in the world, a lot of times they end up with crazy kids who go on killing sprees. (Maybe that isn't super common, but there are some crazy preacher's kids.) What are more common, though, are anonymous people who accomplish God's purposes through spontaneous acts in the moment that just seem like the right thing to do.

I don't know who this is, but she seems saintly.

That woman was probably a hero in Thebez, but the writer of Judges doesn't even give her name because as Samuel Wells observed, hero stories are about the hero, but saint stories are about God. Verse 53 reads, "Thus God repaid the wickedness that Abimelek had done..." This is a story about God's justice enacted against a wicked man, not a story about an awesome woman.

The world and even the church pressures its leaders to be famous, to be successful, to be impressive. We spend a lot of time in my denomination tossing around names--who knows whom, who worked with whom, who studied under whom. But the story of the saints is one of anonymity. It is not about who knows whom, but about who knows God. Making it into God's story by the name of "a woman" is a great place for a saint to be.

Beating the Air

"I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air." - Paul

Every time I go to my gym, I think about what is true of my gym that I wish were also true of my church.

Unity of focus

Image source: www.kettlebell.net

A variety of my people come to my gym. They are all ages and in all different stages of life. I talked to a lady yesterday who was coming to a different class because her kids just started school. I worked with a lady today who looked to be in her late fifties. There are "meatheads" and chubby guys. There are natural athletes and people who trip over their feet. Some people come straight after work still wearing ties and dress shoes. Others come from the fire station or their landscaping company. But when we get ready to start a workout, we're all the same. A little bit excited, a little bit nervous. Trying to do better this time than last.

The way my gym is set up, we all do the same workout, which means that all of these people walk in different and walk out the same. We're all wiped out. We all feel like we did something impossible today, and we will do something impossible again tomorrow. We have all chosen to pursue this, and that unites us. Differences fade away as the sweat starts to run.

Comraderie
I'm relatively new, so I don't know all of the terminology and movements yet. I also struggle to keep going through a whole workout. Sometimes I feel like everyone else is strong and confident. But then someone shows me how to do something or tells me to keep up the hard work. Because as one person told me, "We've all been there."

Everyone knows what it is to look around at a room full of strangers and wonder if all of these people think you're a huge wimp--if they even see you at all. Everyone knows what it is to look at the workout and have no idea what that combination of words means. Everyone knows what it is to think that you can't possibly do this.

What a new person doesn't realize is that all the strange faces looking back at them love this gym and want them to love it too. They want that person to feel welcome and comfortable. They want to help, encourage, and support them until they are confident and strong and can pass their expertise on to another new person.

Language
The language my gym uses is a bit esoteric. Acronyms like AMRAP, WOD, and PR are tossed around without definition. Cleans, jerks, thrusters, and snatches are a regular part of workouts. The words aren't meant to exclude people. They are just shortcuts. Because most people don't have preconceived ideas about their meaning, the gym gets to define them. When someone in my gym uses these words, I know exactly what they're saying because I've encountered them firsthand. We don't tell stories about doing a clean from two years ago; we do cleans together today.

Participatory
The gym owner is a great coach. As we work, he is constantly scanning the room looking for someone who could use some tips about their form, some words of encouragement, or some challenge to work harder. The coach doesn't stand in front of the room and do the workout for us while we all watch. The coach puts us to work, and we walk away feeling stronger and smarter. We've overcome a difficult physical challenge and learned how to more effectively face that challenge next time.

The Church
I wish the church was more like this. I wish that new people were welcomed and encouraged. I wish that words were experienced and defined, not tossed around without consideration for newcomers. I wish that we all changed clothes when we walked in the door in a way that broke down barriers between different people. I wish that everyone got to participate.

Remember these t-shirts from the 90s?

The crazy thing about my gym is that people pay a good amount of money to go there and get beat up. I had ibuprofen with my breakfast this morning. Churches, on the other hand, can't get people to come for free.

I wish I knew more about what Paul had in mind when he compared himself to an athlete. I love the feeling of meeting a difficult challenge head on. I love knowing that every ache and pain I feel is making me stronger and healthier. I think Christianity should be challenging. It should include meeting and overcoming obstacles, resulting in
a sense of strength and preparation for the next obstacle.

Maybe it's just because we attend a large church, but what I feel like instead is that most of the people in our congregation spend Sunday mornings watching someone else work out, hearing about their accomplishments and victories.

I am not the first one to see similarities between being an athlete and being a Christian. However, I wonder if the church has lost the focus that Paul had. How many Christians are running aimlessly? How many Christians go to church on Sunday because that's what you do on Sunday? How many Christians have a long list of rights and wrongs that protect them from dealing with the complexities of life? How many Christians live in a comfortable bubble that pushes out ambiguity? How many Christians are beating the air?

All Shall Be Well

"A good theologian...is a person who is close to people, who has a creative imagination and the gift of listening, who shows a commitment to hard work, who accepts the risk of making a mistake, who is a person of self-renewal: a person dedicated to overcoming routine and considering theology as an ongoing task and a responsibility rather than a job to be done." - Clemens Sedmak

  
Church
I almost quit my church yesterday. I know. Typical, right? Another young adult leaving the church.

Image source: www.snagajob.com

The thing is, I've really tried. I lead a small group. We welcome new people whenever they visit. I introduce myself to people I don't know every week. I even served as an intern on staff for eight months. I write sermon discussion questions for sermon-based small groups. I've played keyboard and bass on the worship team. I've been on the prayer team. I've greeted people at the welcome desk. I've registered kids for Bible School.

And that's just at this church. That doesn't even take into account my previous church experience. I've served on a church board. I've preached. I've taught every level of Sunday School class. I've led Bible studies. I've even led the music for children's church (and I can't sing!)

In short, I've done it all. And my husband's list is even longer and more impressive.

But on Sunday mornings, we get up and go to church. We sit in our seats and listen to a sermon and some music. No one talks to us. I look around the room and see some familiar faces, but none who know my name. Our pastor preaches about how powerfully God spoke to him at a recent conference. He said that he was feeling lost, like just another face in the crowd when in the midst of three thousand people, someone said, "I have a message for people here from Kansas."

I understood what he felt like. Invisible. Unknown. Alone in a sea of people. But no one had something to say to me. My baby was sick, so we retrieved him from the nursery and took him home. I left as alone as I came.

My pastor and his wife were supposed to have lunch with us, but they had to cancel at the last minute. We've been trying to schedule a time to have a meal with them since March, but they are pretty busy.

My pastor also said, "Young adults, you have been given the privilege of standing on the shoulders of those who came before you. Pursue relationships with mentors. Listen to the wisdom of your elders."

I don't think that we are the first who have found our elders too busy with the work of church to make time to build enough of a relationship with us to impact our lives in a meaningful way.

I am thirty now. I'm tired of waiting. I have experience. I have a master's degree. I even have some positions of leadership and influence in the church. But none of those are enough for us to have someone to talk to on Sunday morning. And they are definitely not enough for us to help shape the vision of the church.

Motherhood

Image source: goodreads.com

I have just begun reading Clemens Sedmak's book, Doing Local Theology: A Guide for Artisans of a New Humanity. His primary premise is that theology should be done locally, by the people and for the people. Theology is not something that scholars sit around and think up. It is also not something that has to be re-invented every few years. The best theology comes from a combination of learning how to serve God in one's context while also listening to the wisest teachers from our day and the past.

My previous post about "the new domesticity" reflected the daily frustration I feel in not being able to be part of something where I feel I can contribute productively. I long to think and talk and write about things that matter, for people who can benefit from my contribution.

In a conversation with my husband, one of my professors acknowledged the validity of this frustration. He said that raising a child is important, but so is doing theology. When my husband told me that, I was overcome by emotion. Finally, someone admitted that devoting all my time to raising a child might not be enough.

Theology
"Our deepest wound is that we do not want to be healed."

Sedmak goes on to quote Erich Fromm's theory that we do not want to be liberated because we fear responsibility.

While I think this is a life-changing idea, I realized this weekend that I don't want to be liberated because I fear not being given responsibility. As long as I spend my energy on self-pity, I don't have to wonder what else I should be doing.

Sedmak's words made me wonder, what should I be pursuing? What is my local theology?

I might as well be a sixteen-year-old boy.

I realized that there are lots of people who live as outsiders. Outside the workforce. Outside the church. Outside traditional roles in society. Outside any sort of power structure. Maybe my location for doing theology is on the outside.

I'm still tempted to quit my church, but maybe being on the outside isn't such a bad place to be.

"We all have our cross to carry. We do theology because people suffer. Doing theology is a way to attend to the wounds of our time. ... We all do theology as wounded healers, as people in need of healing and comfort, and as people who can share the life-giving strength of our wounds."

My theology tells me that I can't quit my church any more than I can quit being a mother. But what I can do is theology. I can make meaning for myself and others. I can walk alongside my mom friends as we try to make sense of our lives apart from the roles that used to define us. I can walk with my young adult friends as we try to find places to serve meaningfully in churches dictated by fifty-year-olds. I can walk alongside women with giftings and callings to ministry who find church leaders less than enthusiastic about their leadership.

And I can hope, along with Julian of Norwich, that "all shall be well, that all manner of things shall be well."

The New Domesticity

"You can call it a movement or you can say, 'I've got way too much free time on my hands.'" - Stephen Colbert to Emily Matchar, author of Homeward Bound: Why Women Are Embracing the New Domesticity

My thoughts aren't fully formed on this topic because I am very much in the throes of the "new domesticity" and not an objective researcher as I assume author Emily Matchar to be, but I couldn't let Stephen Colbert's interview go by completely without comment.

Emily makes an interesting point. Women are choosing to stay home and engage in a variety of more traditional domestic practices for a wide range of reasons. She cites tree-hugging hippies in the Portlandia
genre who pickle everything to Mormon housewives in Utah who are selling homemade scarves on Etsy, all dropping out of more traditional careers to pursue domestic life.

There is an incredible urban farm in Kansas City, which also hosts a weekly farm market called Badseed Market. The face of the farm, Brooke Salvaggio, is an inspiration to me. She sends out a weekly newsletter, writes articles for local publications, sits on panel discussions about local food and other topics, hosts frequent classes, and has a two-year-old--in addition to being a full-time farmer. She is wonderfully passionate about vegetables and enthusiastic about sharing her passion with everyone she can.

So I know these women exist--the women who are wholeheartedly embracing a "new domesticity." However, I find myself identifying much more with Stephen Colbert's comment. I halfheartedly garden, have not found the courage to attempt canning, cook when I feel like it and buy pizza the rest of the time, and still haven't figured out how to thread the sewing machine. We don't have any plans to start raising chickens. I haven't found any craft-based source of income.

I have a few mom friends, and I think most of them are similar. Daycare isn't really an attractive option for our kids. It's expensive and not always of very good quality. We miss working, but we're happy to have kids and be able to take care of them. What we don't have, though, is any overarching philosophy that has led us to withdraw from more traditional careers. We aren't homesteaders or farmers. We don't sit and knit all day. We mostly just try to keep from going crazy while we're stuck at home with kids all day every day. What we have is a lot of time on our hands.

I have no idea what conclusions Emily Matchar comes to in her book. I do wonder, though, if we have lost our way a bit.

Many developing countries raise their children in communities and multi-family households, not behind their fences and closed doors. The French have an extensive government-funded childcare program, in which a majority of French children participate. I don't know how other cultures raise their children, but in the women who find themselves in the midst of the "new domesticity," I hear an underlying plea for something different than the 2.5 kid, white-picket fence families that Americans have pursued for so long.

The thing is, we don't really need to can. Again, as Stephen Colbert pointed out, food in cans is just about the cheapest thing you can buy. My husband recently sewed a laundry bag for me. It cost more to buy the pieces than the completed laundry bags in the store (which, unfortunately, were not very washable). My garden is producing more tomatoes than I know what to do with while I have a jar of salsa sitting in the refrigerator.

My feeling is that the skills, creativity, innovation, and passion of a significant number of women are being wasted in an economy where children are something of an inconvenience that only un-ambitious women pursue, employees are a commodity being bought and sold rather than raised up, and passion about vegetables makes a business meeting really awkward. Staying at home with children is a convenient way to quietly withdraw from a culture where one doesn't quite fit in.

Maybe I'm unique in feeling this way, but most of the stay-at-home moms I know are smart, talented, educated, passionate, and generally people I would want on my team. They are also often lonely, uncertain, and isolated.

In my wildest dreams, organizations work towards a goal of producing something of value and quality to better people's lives. They employ talented people who can help achieve that goal. People work together to help each other participate in the organizations they feel most passionate about by trading childcare, transportation, or even housing. Maybe someone's organization of choice is a local food canning company or maybe it's an insurance company that wants to provide excellent insurance coverage and customer service. Maybe it's a school in an un-accredited school district or a community house providing food and other resources to those in need. Regardless, I wish the talents and passions of those who have dropped out of the work force could be used in a way that benefits everyone.

I should probably move to Portland.

Fixed Points in Time

"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's actually more like a big ball of wibbly, wobbly, time-y wimey stuff." - Dr. Who

I was talking to a friend last night who informed me that Dr. Who had resolved her angst about making big decisions in life. According to Dr. Who (according to her), there are fixed points in time that don't change. Instead of seeing time as a linear progression from one decision to the next, she understands that some things are just meant to be. She shared the story of how she came to her position as a linguistics professor in an obscure Mayan language. It all started when she picked a language class that happened to work with her schedule. When she heard the professor start speaking in Kaqchikel on that first day, she knew that her life had changed.

Because she picked a class that fit her schedule.

Another friend shared her story. As she was walking to the office to hand in her student teaching application, she passed a friend in the hallway and asked her what school she should request. Her friend suggested her own alma mater, so she wrote that on the form. She's now in her seventh year as a teacher at that school and can't imagine working at any other school.

Because she listened to a passing friend in the hallway.

I tried to think of a moment in my life like that, and all I could think of was the day I pulled into Kansas City and Mike was there to give me the keys to the house in which I would be staying. I was afraid my friends would think I was lame if my story of destiny was about a guy. But as the night went on, I realized it was bigger than that.

When I decided to go to seminary, I was going for an education with the expectation that I would only be in Kansas City for a few years before moving on to a more permanent assignment. I connected with a roommate through a mutual friend, and we chose a house at the suggestion of an admissions employee.

It was that house that changed my destiny.

First look at the house (and my future husband)

Turning thirty has made me reflective, and I realized last night that I could not ask for more. I am married to the man of my dreams. I have a beautiful baby boy. I graduated with honors from a masters program. I've gotten to know some really incredible people and get to spend the occasional evening talking about destiny with people who are old enough to actually have some perspective on what that means. I even still get to play ultimate frisbee every week.

These two guys are pretty awesome.

All of those things are in my life now because I happened to move into a house. A house where I met my husband when he gave me the keys. A house where I found a community that supported and encouraged me through grad school. A house where the IT guy invited me to a church that, though now closed, has been the source of some of my closest friends in Kansas City. A house filled with other students who made every gathering a party.

Five of the original eight--does this look like a party or what?

We were celebrating my friend's birthday last night, and she said that she doesn't always do something for her birthday, but she is in a really good place this year and wanted to celebrate that with some of the friends who have helped make that happen. Her gratitude reminded me of my gratitude for the friends who have come into my life over the past few years. I don't know how things would have been different had I not chosen to live in that house, but as Dr. Who so wisely suggested (via my friend), maybe we don't need to worry so much about making the exact right decision in every situation. Maybe some things are just meant to be.

All these babies are part of my life now too!

The Affair with the Water Department

"'That is sufficient, sir. I have heard of you. Go to the First Auditor of the Treasury.'

I did so. He sent me to the Second Auditor. The Second Auditor sent me to the Third, and the Third sent me to the First comptroller of the Corn-Beef Division. This began to look business. He examined his books and all his loose papers, but found no minute of the beef contract. I went to the Second Comptroller of the Corn-Beef Division. He examined his books and his loose papers, but with no success. I was encouraged. During that week I got as far as the Sixth Comptroller in that division; the next week I got through the Claims Department; the third week I began and completed the Mislaid Contracts Department, and got a foothold in the Dead Reckoning Department.

..." - Mark Twain, The Facts in the Great Beef Contract

On the evening of June 21, 2013, Mike and I observed the arrival of a Utilities Locating Services employee at our house. He parked in front and walked immediately to the backyard, where he began spray painting our grass, trees and flowers. He painted green arrows, blue boxes, and orange lines. After he departed, we went out to inspect his diagram.

"The sewer company is going to dig up our yard again" was all Mike had to say about that.

Last year the sewer department replaced ten feet of pipe that had collapsed and the employee overseeing the repair observed that the next segment of pipe would probably collapse soon. He hoped to stay long enough to replace the next segment too but was called to another job.

Apparently the predicted collapse had occurred.

On the morning of June 22, 2013 a crew from the sewer department parked their trucks in front of our house and walked around to the back yard to prepare their attack on the offending sewer pipe. They looked at the green arrows and the orange line. They stood around the blue rectangle.

Mike remembered that first attempts from last year's crew had yielded no pipe and that they had been forced to take down the fence in our back yard and dig there. He informed the sewer department crew of this history, but of course they had no authority to deviate from the green arrows, orange lines, and blue rectangle.

We left home to run some errands and returned to find the entire crew standing around a giant hole, looking somewhat discouraged. They had missed the pipe. The blue rectangle had led them astray.

That afternoon we left for St. Louis with promises from the head of the crew that their work would be finished by the end of the day and that our yard would be back to its previous state of healthy green grass by Monday morning.

When we got home Sunday evening, we found a large hole, covered with sheets of plywood, surrounded by cones and caution tape. Next to the hole was an equally large pile of dirt and a backhoe.

No one came on Monday, but some crews work Tuesday through Friday, so we waited.

No one came on Tuesday.

On Wednesday, June 26, 2013, Mike called the water department to ask about the plans for the hole in our back yard. They informed him that they were unaware of a hole and promised they would send an inspector to verify our complaint.

No one came on Thursday or Friday.

On Monday, July 1, 2013, Mike received a call from the water department asking if we live at 5200 Broadmoor Street. He informed them that we do not live at 5200 Broadmoor Street. The employee informed Mike that the aforementioned backhoe was at 5200 Broadmoor Street, and that since we did not live at 5200 Broadmoor Street, there could not possibly be a backhoe in our backyard. Mike informed him that there was, in fact, a backhoe in our back yard. The employee responded, sounding rather irritated, that he would have to send another inspector to our location to verify the presence of the backhoe.

On Wednesday, July 3, 2013, we left home again for a few weeks. The hole, pile of dirt, cones (labeled KCWW: Kansas City Water Works), and backhoe were still in our back yard. At 11:30am, Mike received an update to his open case with the city water department. It read, "Informed homeowner that there is no backhoe in his back yard. Case closed."

Mike promptly called the water department to reopen his case. The receptionist looked at his case and let him know that there was definitely not a backhoe in our back yard. Since this did not satisfy Mike, she informed him that if he would like to reopen his case, they would need to send an inspector to the site. She asked if he lived at 5200 Broadmoor Street. She said there was a note on his case that the backhoe he claimed was in our back yard was actually at 5200 Broadmoor Street. She suggested that it might be helpful to change our address.

Mike once again described the hole, pile of dirt, cones, and backhoe, including the id number and gave her our address. She promised to send an inspector.

"He took [my papers], and for a long time he ransacked his odds and ends. Finally he found the Northwest Passage, as I regarded it--he found the long-lost record of that beef contract--he found the rock upon which so many of my ancestors had split before they ever got to it. I was deeply moved. And yet I rejoiced--for I had survived."

On July 10, 2013, one of our neighbors called to report the arrival of a crew from the sewer department in our back yard.

We returned home on July 14, 2013. Our grass was gone. Our tree was mangled. Our retaining wall was put back together in a way that resulted in an extra brick. But the hole, the cones, the pile of dirt, and the backhoe were all gone.

We don't know if they ever fixed or even found the collapsed sewer pipe, but at least we weren't forced to sell a city-owned backhoe on Craig's List. And we survived.

"We do things by routine here. You have followed the routine and found out what you wanted to know. It is the best way. It is the only way. It is very regular, and very slow, but it is very certain."

I think someone at the Kansas City Water Department has been reading Mark Twain.

A Long Obedience

"The essential thing 'in heaven and earth' is ... that there should be a long obedience in the same direction; there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living." - Friedrich Nietzsche (quoted by Eugene Peterson)

The last couple days have been long run kinds of days.  The baby did not take his naps on Monday, which left me totally exhausted and frazzled. I went to bed at 8:15. It's not like he's all that demanding when he's awake, but I need those little breaks! Yesterday was better, just really busy.  I know that I'm supposed to be "enjoying every minute" while I have a baby, but some days seem less like a walk in the park and more like a hike up a mountain.

If you've ever done a tough hike, you know how you get to a point where you see nothing, you feel nothing, you think nothing--you just put one foot in front of the next, hoping that something will happen, whether it is reaching the peak or just falling over.

Some days are easy. Other days are a marathon. You just keep putting one foot in front of the next. It's nice to look at the bigger questions in life like purpose and meaning, but I suspect that not a few mountain climbers have thought at some point, "Why did I want to do this?" On the long, tedious journey, purpose and meaning often fade away in the face of sore feet, burning muscles, blisters, exhaustion, and hunger.

One of the best books on leadership I have read is called Leading at the Edge: Leadership Lessons from the Extraordinary Saga of Shackleton's Antarctic Expedition, written by Dennis Perkins. The author's "leadership lessons" were pretty good, but the part that will never leave me was the story of Ernest Shackleton.

His attempt to cross Antarctica in 1914 met with disaster when his ship was crushed in the ice. I cannot imagine the feeling of sitting at the bottom of the world watching the only thing that could possibly get you home slowly crack and then sink into the water as the ice closed around it.

His crew camped out on ice floes for the next six months. Again, I cannot imagine spending six months camped on ice, seeing nothing but various shades of white, gray, and black.

You can read the whole story of Shackleton's voyage in Perkins' book or on Wikipedia. I don't want to spoil the ending because Shackleton met with impossible obstacles at every stage of the journey, and the way he moved forward is riveting.

Shackleton's leadership throughout the ordeal was incredible. He never lost focus of what he wanted to accomplish. He never resorted to self-preservation at the expense of his crew. In fact, at one point, he gave his gloves to a crew member, which resulted in the loss of some of his fingers to frostbite. He never gave up. He sat on that piece of ice in the middle of the most brutal part of the ocean in the world and kept planning and hoping and moving forward.

My day without a baby nap pales in comparison to the endless days Shackleton and his crew spent sitting on a frozen bit of the Atlantic Ocean. If they can survive with purpose and hope, so can I. After all, it is a long obedience in the same direction that makes life worth living, even though it might not seem very exciting or fun sometimes.

Contemplating the journey

Parenthood Is Complicated

"I lay in bed and looked at the painting on the hotel-room wall. It was a print of a detailed and lifelike painting of a smiling clown's head, made out of vegetables. It was a painting of the sort that you do not intend to look at and that, alas, you never forget. Some tasteless fate presses it upon you; it becomes part of the complex interior junk you carry with you wherever you go." - Annie Dillard, The Eclipse

According to Anne Lamott, when you sit down to write, all your neuroses pull up chairs and gather round. I like that idea. I like it because it implies that although your neuroses are you, they are also somehow not you. It also implies that your neuroses can be easily quantified and identified.

I don't think that is quite what Anne Lamott meant when she wrote it, but stay with me.

My husband and I watched all of the first four seasons of the television show Parenthood in a few months this past year. We loved the show. The characters are likeable and easy to relate to; the difficulties they face are complex but not impossible; the soundtrack is an eclectic blend of great music. Sounds like a great show, right?

But after we watched it for a while, I began to notice a disconnect between the show and my life.

Unlike Anne Lamott's neuroses and unlike the insightful characters on Parenthood, I cannot always identify the "complex interior junk" I carry with me. I can't always remember that the reason I don't like cabbage is because it was the skull of some creepy clown painting in a hotel room. (I really don't like cabbage, but I don't think that's why.)

And more importantly, I can't always figure out that my irrational response to my husband's actions is because of the traumatic break-up I experienced in junior high. Nor am I able to realize that my husband's irrational response to my actions is because of some traumatic event in his past. It could be because of any of the thousands of pieces of life that are stuck with us.

I read somewhere that people who watch shows like CSI expect cops to dust for fingerprints, put tape on the floor, and declare a crime scene on every call. They want to see crimes solved now! The huge number of detective shows on television draw us in by the lure of truth. We eagerly anticipate when the good guys will get to the bottom of things and nail the bad guys. But in real life, a lot of bad guys get away. Or even if they do get caught, the truth remains elusive, and the mystery of "what really happened on the night of ___" is never solved.

Likewise, shows like House appeal to the same desire for truth. We think that if we can only find that one doctor who can think outside the box and consider the most unlikely of possibilities, whatever disease we have will be cured once and for all. If one doctor can't figure it out, maybe the next can. We just need someone who can get to the bottom of this!

Shows like Parenthood do the same for our emotional lives. Why was Kristina so upset when her sixteen-year-old daughter was dating a 20-year-old recovering alcoholic? Maybe because, as her husband pointed out, her own mother got married young and suffered through a terrible marriage. See how nicely he wrapped that up!

Why can't my husband help me get to the bottom of my feelings? Why can't my brother listen to me talk for a few minutes and then remind me of that time when we were young when I did the same thing? Why can't I suddenly remember the exact time and place when my opinion on some subject was irrevocably changed?

Sometimes we do get to know. Sometimes we catch the criminal. Sometimes we cure the disease. Sometimes we understand what made us feel this way.

And sometimes even if we don't ever get to the bottom of things, everything turns out all right anyway.

But more often than not, we figure out a little bit of the truth and do what we can with that, hoping for the best.

I will probably keep watching Parenthood, but I do wonder how much discontentment is created by the disconnect between the world of television where everything is nicely wrapped up within thirty minutes to an hour and real life where some things only make sense after years and others remain a mystery forever.

Cousins (and other awesome people)

We have finally returned from our wonderful family vacation. We were able to see lots of friends and family, but it is good to be home again!

Here are some highlights from our trip.

We went to fireworks with the Odon Church of the Nazarene, where Amos reconnected with the little girl who is one day older than him. She wanted to touch him, but he wasn't too sure about that!

Amos and Everlee

Sondra took some time to do a photoshoot with her new background. She did such an amazing job, and we are so lucky to have such great pictures of little Amos. Here is one of my favorites:

Photo by Sondra Laughlin

We made the trip up to see Mike's parents and sister and her family. Amos LOVED his little cousins, and they loved him. They kept walking around saying, "Baby Amos! Baby Amos!" It was like a dream come true for little Amos. He loves other babies and he loves attention, so babies that pay attention to him are awesome. Here are a couple pictures of Amos and the little cousins.

Amos and Isaac

Amos and Maggie sitting on Grandma's lap

We also got to stop and see little Charity on the way home. She is ten months old. I think Amos went into withdrawal when we got back on Monday and there weren't any babies to play with!

It was really good to see our families, and the time away from Kansas City made a nice break from our routine, but I'm happy to be home again!

And now, let the blogging, recommence!

(And also the laundry and cooking and weeding the garden and other home-type activities.)

Chicken

"Why is it that carrots, a simple root that you can just pull from the ground, cost more than a box of Twinkies, this incredible combination of food science and technology that has forty ingredients?” – Michael Pollan

“What we eat and how we eat it reflect whether or not we think we need to abide with others at all. When we thoughtlessly eat commodities alone and on the run, there is no time or place for abiding. But when we eat with a commitment to the strengthening of the ecological and social memberships that make food possible, then it becomes possible for eating to be an act of abiding with another.” – Norman Wirzba

 

In his book, Food & Faith: A Theology of Eating, Norman Wirzba does an excellent job of relating our theology to our consumption of plants and animals as food. He makes a lot of great points, but at the heart is the idea that our decisions about eating matter.

Now that the baby has begun eating solids, I've been thinking a lot about how I want our family to view food and eating. I've come up with a few things that are important to me.

1. Good food takes time.

I don't know very much about the Slow Food movement, but based on thirty seconds of internet research, I see that it was started to oppose the opening of a McDonald's in Rome. It is described as an alternative to fast food (makes sense). 

What I do know is that the best meals start in the garden or at the butcher shop or farmer's market. They begin with real ingredients grown and harvested by real people, sold by real people, and prepared by real people (that last real person is usually me).

Side note: my best season of cooking happened when I lived in a house with three other people and a few regular visitors. We often had a team of four or five cooking dinner together. If I could find a way to make it happen, I would cook every meal with a team. Good food doesn't take as much time when more people are working together to prepare it.

Garden tomatoes about to become soup

Not only should food take time to prepare, it also takes time to eat. You don't scarf down food as quickly as possible if you spent hours tending a garden to grow it; you savor it, appreciating the sweet juiciness of fresh tomatoes and the crisp, earthy taste of lettuce. Someone invested a lot of time into all the food we eat, and all meals should be savored as though we grew the food ourselves.

2. Good food doesn't have to be expensive. 

Everyone wants organic food these days, but a lot of people are put off by the price. Some produce is almost double the price of conventionally grown produce. However, according to the Leopold Center for Agriculture (via this website), the average carrot travels 1,838 miles from farm to table. Growing up in rural Indiana, some of the produce I ate traveled approximately 100 feet from my mom's garden to the table. Or less than ten miles, from a produce stand to my house. 

Unfortunately, much of it also traveled as far as the average carrot. According to Barbara Kingsolver, in her excellent book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, the United States exports as many potatoes as it imports every year. So the farms around me in Indiana were sending their food to Japan while the grocery stores were buying their food from Chile.

Rather than spending a lot of money on organic food that is produced halfway around the world, I think our money should be spent on local food that should be cheaper because of the much lower production costs. If this food is produced organically, all the better, although I have been disappointed to learn more about the strict criteria and expensive process used to classify food as organic that my own garden probably doesn't meet.

On the other hand...

3. Good food isn't cheap.

At the other end of the spectrum are the bargain hunters. If milk from a local dairy comes in a glass bottle that requires a two dollar deposit at the time of purchase, then they will buy the cheaply packaged milk from two states away. If locally grown strawberries are twice the price of strawberries from California, then they will choose to save a few dollars and accept a dramatic reduction in quality.

Multi-colored lettuce growing in the garden

Americans spend a smaller percentage of their income on food than any other country in the world. My husband and I have made the choice to eat less meat but to buy higher quality meat. We also try to buy local produce as often as we can. In general, I am trying to retrain my thinking on how to make good spending decisions when it comes to food. Living on a budget means we can't just buy the highest quality of everything we want. Rather than sacrificing quality, I am trying to learn to make other sacrifices like buying less food, not buying food out of season, and making more things myself.

We have also chosen to eat out only a few times a month so that when we do eat out, we can choose higher quality restaurants over deceptively cheap fast food.

4. Don't throw stuff away.

Americans throw away 40 percent of their food. I have to admit, I enjoy cleaning out the refrigerator. Unlike other parts of the house, I have never agonized over whether that moldy piece of meat has sentimental value, whether my grandchildren might want to reminisce over the time their grandparents had steak for dinner back in 2013, or whether my husband will come home to find that I have accidentally thrown away a family heirloom. 

When my husband and I were newlyweds, however, cleaning out the refrigerator became heartbreaking. I bought things thinking he would eat them. He bought things thinking I would eat them. For a few months, it seemed like we were throwing away more than we were eating! I realized how easy it is to make impulse purchases and then casually toss them in the garbage when they have exceeded their shelf life. We are a lot more conscientious now, and I want our son to grow up recognizing the value of food, the gift that it is, the great lengths it took for it to arrive in our kitchen, and our responsibility as stewards to care for what we have.

Chicken

In Dorothy Day's autobiography, The Long Loneliness, (an excellent book not at all about food), she wrote that her daughter attended a school focused on practical knowledge. One of her classes taught her how to prepare the cheaper cuts of meat. That caught me off guard. Dorothy Day was born in 1897. I assumed that it was only recently that people had to take classes to learn about things that it seems like all of our grandparents knew. I realized that if Dorothy Day had to intentionally educate her daughter on food preparation, there was no shame for me to acknowledge my ignorance and start learning too.

My proudest accomplishment so far is learning to cook a whole chicken. Here is my recipe from Jamie Oliver's website:

1 chicken

carrots

celery

1 onion

dried rosemary

1 bay leaf

a few peppercorns

salt

a few cloves of garlic

1. Put the chicken in a large pot and cover with water. Add the vegetables and spices.

2. Bring it to a boil and then simmer for an hour and twenty minutes.

3. Eat, add to recipes, let cool and shred to use later.

The broth can be poured through a strainer and frozen for later use.

Chicken and broth in the freezer, ready to go!

I want our son to see his parents making intentional, responsible choices about the food we eat everyday. I want him to avoid the epidemic that is leading to obese children with nutrient deficiencies because their diets contain so many sweets and so few nutrient-rich foods. I want mealtimes to be enjoyable for our family. I think we are off to a good start, but we can do a lot more!

Sweet potatoes are yummy!