Heard Ya; loud and clear

This post is going to take a little back story
Here it is:
the baby daughter once took her chances with roommate assignment for on-campus housing. Previously she had roomed with fellow members of her college tennis team. When she decided to transfer to the college where her then boyfriend was attending and where she knew no one else, the automatic selection thing was her only option.
The roommate she was assigned was, then, a stranger. But not for long. The two bonded so quickly and so firmly that people would later wonder that they had not known each other for the whole of their lives. The family of one became like family to the other.
Once, when they showed up at the hospital to wait the birth of  a new family member, they entertained those gathered by supplying the endings to family stories they had heard so often that they knew them by heart.
When it came time for one of them to leave for residency training after medical school, they were inconsolable.  One of them reckoned their state to be not unlike a divorce, so long had they lived together and so much had they shared.
Just a few weeks after one of them moving out of the apartment they shared all through graduate school one of them moved across the state and the other just across town, a soul crushing blow came to one and thus the other.
There were many calls and Facetime chats, emails, snap chats, and texts in the days that followed the big move but none caused them to feel the distance between them like an early morning call regarding the death of one of their mothers.
The one stayed on the phone with the other trying to keep her calm until family could reach her at the intern site where she was working.
The other then headed as hard and fast as she could to her grieving friend. The experiences they'd shared previously had done little to prepare them for this rough road.  So sad was the one she could scarcely see light. The days were dark and stormy and the other was determined to find some thing, anything, that would help her friend survive the loss that seemed want to do her in.
Then, there it was. A rainbow. A beautiful double rainbow. The little pearl white bug there to the right of the photo is what they were riding in when the bow appeared in the sky.
That rainbow was just one of several that appeared in the sky that week. Together, the former roommates/forever friends gloried in each one, as did various friends and family members they shared their excitement in the middle of grievous loss and pain with.
When I heard the story, I came to an immediate belief and understanding that the Hand of God Himself painting those rainbows. His Hand also put those two together: first in a college apartment and now in life.
For me, there's just no other explanation.
As far as the rainbow, my first thought is the one I used for the title of this post. I heard His Voice in this story, just as I see His Hand; and that most clearly.
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Counting redbuds

 The grandbaby's first dance competition of the season was this weekend. The Hub and I drove up to watch what was one of the best group of dancers/dancers I've seen. That includes, of course, the grandbaby and her group, but there were lots of others. These little chicks danced their hearts out. We brought her home with us as her sister still had dances to dance in the upper age divisions. She was tired and a bit cranky. The closer we got to home the worse it got.  I did with her, finally, what I once did with my own children, started a game of I Spy. The redbuds are just starting to fade. I wish their blooming season was longer. This year it seemed particularly short, somehow.  There were just glimpses of their once rich color through the wooded areas we passed along the road. We began counting them and soon we were home. A warm bath, some comfy pajamas and a movie to be watched from my bed fixed what out game had begun to cure. Those are some of my favorite things. They act like a balm on my fatigue and ill humor. And for one small time each year, so do the redbuds...
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These little beauties

This is the formal program portrait of five little girls who as a group are known as the "minis." They are dancers.  If the number of awards they brought home last weekend is any indication (and I say it is) they are very good dancers. (Notice I didn't make that proclamation on my own because I know full well I have a bias where they are concerned.) They are sweet and spunky. They squabble sometimes amongst themselves yet they are fiercely loyal to each other when push comes to shove. They have spent long hours in the studio through the fall and winter months getting ready for this new season. I am expecting great things from them this season and in life. Maybe having such strong expectations of first and second graders seems odd, but I have seen their character. I have seen their tenacity when they were exhausted. I have seen their determination when they were sore and frustrated from time, not just in the dance studio, but also in the gym, where they worked to perfect extra skills required to achieve excellence. I am persuaded that these traits parlay quite often into life skills that will serve them and this world we live in well. How glorious to be an observer of this process. note: credit for the group photo belongs to the also beautiful and talented C.R. Berry.
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My pretty baby

My baby is pretty and sweet and very smart. She is also a very good friend.
I know I cannot be objective where she is concerned so I will tell you this story and see if you don't agree.
About this time last week we learned that her the mother of her longtime friend and roommate had died very suddenly. My baby gets in her little pearl white vw bug and heads out immediately in the direction of her best good friend. She kept her on the phone until family reached her and then called her dad and I to let us know where she was and why.
When we attended the memorial service on Friday, here is what we were told by various members of the family and others close to them.

My baby:
helped with the funeral arrangements, including the program.
she helped select burial clothing, the casket and flowers to rest on it.
she accompanied family to the cemetery where a plot was selected.
she wrote the eulogy.
she fielded calls.
she sat up with, and laughed with and cried with her friend and the rest of the family.

On Saturday, even as I begged her to come home and crash and let us baby her until she was rested.
She declined and instead drove better than two hours back to an event at her school. She even got dressed up for the event, since it was formal and quite important.
The picture below is what she sent me as she was leaving to attend.



I am not quite sure how she pulled it off, given what the days previous had demanded of her. Another friend who is also a classmate texted me a copy of the program for the evening.  My baby got more awards, or so I am told, than any other single attendee. I've always been proud of her. She has been a constant source of joy to her dad and me. I am very proud of her academic accomplishments, which are many. But at this moment, I am overwhelmed with pride at her depth of her care and concern for others and with her ability to demonstrate that while taking care of her own business.
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I love number 17

This is number 17 for the Shockers softball team. Isn't she adorable?!
I blogged last year about how she chose her team number based on a line from a favorite song she once did a recital dance to.
She's kept the number and she's kept at softball. Despite her dance and gymnastics schedule. Despite the demands of team practice and the obligatory self practice, she has stayed with it.
Last weekend was her first dance competition and this weekend is her first softball tournament. She has the energy for both and to my surprise the skill.
The girl is well rounded and for that I am thankful.
I love number 17.
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Nicknames

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When they placed you in my arms...

My cousin, Eva, is counting down the days until she becomes a grandmother.

There are many things I want to tell her about my own experience.

After all, this is the person who taught me the words to a goodly number of Beatles songs. She taught me to make gum paper wrapper chains and that eating lime sherbet while watching "Dark Shadows" made the whole experience less scary.



She is my lifelong pen pal. I wore her hand me downs and followed her lead.

Grandmother hood is one of the few things I actually experienced first.



So here is the problem. I can't teach or explain this.

This cousin of mine is a teacher by profession and I expect a very excellent one. I love the written and spoken word, yet I am without words to describe this particular things.

My first and only grandbaby is seven now but I recall very vividly the first time I heard her cry. I recall the first time I held her in my arms.  It was just like a quote I've often seen Pinned and RePinned on Pinterest. She slipped into my heart, in fact, in ways I cannot describe.

Her other grandmother, whose own first grandchild was eight at the time, told me that "something happened" in her heart the first time she saw her grandbaby's face. At the time of the telling, just weeks before I experienced exactly that, I could not get my mind wrapped around grandmotherhood being a whole different experience than anything I had felt before. It is. I just can't describe it.

What I can tell my cousin, is that having a grandbaby is one of the few things in my life that has lived up to the hype. It's every bit as wonderful as I was told it would be; maybe more so.

I can also tell her that it just keeps getting better. At least for me, the new has never worn off. My heart (and sometimes my eyes) still well up at the sight of her. I find myself staring at her as she sleeps when she spends the night at our house. Just the thought of her floods my mind with joy.

That's the best I can do to describe what is about to happen to this cousin of mine.

I am hoping she will suceed where I have not and that she will be able to tell me all about it.



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Necks and the lack thereof

The picture above is a screen shot I took of my baby sister originally posted on Facebook by my mother. I use it here to illustrate that she has a very long and elegant neck. Out other sister, likewise has a head that sits very regally atop a neck that is long and well, elegant.
My head sits right on top of my shoulders.
I don't consider myself particularly given to envy.
Especially where they are concerned, the more they have and do, the happier I am. Except with this neck thing.
Mother also has a long and elegant neck. I blame her.
I am pretty sure they pulled me before I was ripe and that has got to somehow be her fault.
Even if it's not, I am blaming her.
She and both her other children are also tall, but I can let that go. I think.
If I stretch to the fullest degree possible, I am almost five feet tall. I've learned to live with that.
Here's the rub with regard to the neck thing (pun intended):
my middle sister, Karen the Good went to the doctor because she was having some issues with her neck. There she learned, after xrays were ordered and read, that she has an extra vertebrae.
Whatttttttttttttttttt?
That vertebrae is mine. It has to be. I have no neck and she has extra neck? Really?
She says if it's my vertebrae she got it is because I left it behind.
Didn't I say they pulled me before I was ripe?
Mother has some explaining to do.....


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Epiphany in the dentist's chair

I have never liked going to the dentist.
Not ever.
I put off going as long as I can.
If I can avoid it altogether, I usually do.
It is not just because I have had bad experiences (though I have) and because I've had more than my fair chair (I really think I have.) Rather I think that being in the dentist chair is generally something I have found unpleasant that I can actually avoid.
I avoid things sometimes.
Actually, truthfully, I avoid some things as often as I can.
Namely I avoid:

The things I fear.
The subject of my phobias.
Those which lead to crisis.

You are free to put dentistry in any and all of the above categories. I know I do.
So there's the back story.
Fast forward now to a recent Friday when it was no longer possible to put a trip to the dentist off any longer. My pain was greater than my fears and cowardice. I had been up all night fighting all of them.

Perhaps that is what made me susceptible to what happened there in that dentist's chair.
Here's how it happened:

The dentist's assistant asked me if I wanted "laughing gas."
"Will it make me happy?" I asked, for at that moment nothing much was funny.
"It might make you laugh. I does sometimes," she said.
Hence the name, then. I had previously heard it referred to as nitrus(sp).
They begin hooking me up to the that and all the other apparati found there in close proximity.

The nice assistant explains further as she prepares me for work on tooth 31 (I heard them say that.)
Sometimes people really do laugh. We get tickled because sometimes women will tell our dentists how pretty their eyes are." All three of the dentists in the clinic are  handsome, she tells me.

I try to relax, secretly hoping I don't laugh so as to dislodge the apparatus covering my face or snort so as to embarass myself. In a moment, I know they'll be pulling out the big drill that vibrates my whole head (and upper body.)
"Deep breaths," they tell me.
"Sometimes people actually fall asleep," the tech tells me.
Fat chance of that happening, I think... yet if I had, would I close down and create some (un)natural disaster.
I try running through my brain those things on my "to do" list.
I find myself listening to the music playing in the cubile where I lay defenseless, vunerable and more than a little freaked out.
The songs are familiar. I sing along in my head.
The dentist tells the tech that when he has had "laughing gas" he felt like he was flying.
"I believe I can fly", I say to myself (and maybe out loud.)
I have been listening to T.D. Jakes' "Instinct series in my car. I try to focus on butterflies and cocoons.
There is chatter in the space around me. Something about someone having to work on their child's birthday and how torturous that is. I hear words and numbers. I hear that the dental staff prays together, for each other and for their patients.
"Amen," I say in my heart.

Maybe that's when it happened. This thing I really can't explain. The peace that washed over me. Maybe it was the KLOVE radio playing or the calming words of the dentist and his assistant. Maybe it was because I have been  listening to sermons in my car.
Certainly it is not because I have no woes. It is not that I suddenly liked being in the dentist's chair, after all these years of fear and dread.
I remember telling the tech that her mother loves her. I do know her mother but not all that well. and I'm sure her mother loves her, but I'm still not sure what would make me say that.
Maybe it was the laughing gas aka nitrus.
Or maybe, there in the noise and chaos, the things I've been sowing into my spirit began to germinate.
I had my eyes squinched shut so as not to see the dental instruments on the mental tray. I avoided eye contact with both sets of eyes above me for reasons mentioned above.
But there in the dark, I saw the light.
I did not have an out of body experience and I did not fly.
But I did find peace and tranquility I have experienced before only at the beach or in the mountains or a church somewhere.

This is not a paid advertisement. If you ask me who my dentist is, I will gladly tell you. The whole office, in my experience, is professional, competent and very patient oriented. This is about them only in part. It is about me only in small part.
What this is really about, and what I hope you read here, is that by exposing myself and by being exposed, to the things of God, I was able to sense His presence, there with me, in a situation I have always found difficult.

While I am not anxious to return to the dentist, I am not dreading it the way I have for at least a half century. And I am convicted to continue to feed on His Word and to seek His Face.
I know I will be thankful that I have.
There will be difficulties ahead. Jesus promised that.
He also promised to be with us,
He keeps His promises. He is faithful.
That's what this is about.




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Our little leprechaun

The youngest of my handsome and talented nephews turned one yesterday.
We had a hoopty doo big party for him Saturday.
I was able to swing by and get a birthday kiss from him on my way to the dentist on the first anniversary of his natal day.
I like nephews.
Soon I need to do a nephew blog post about my nephews, but this one is just about him.
He has the sweetest personality. He smiles almost all the time.
The year since he was born has flown by.
There was a little trouble when he was born. When I learned of it I made a flying trip to the hospital with a pot a shamrocks, a St. Patrick's Day teddy bear and my baby daughter who is a universal blood donor.
For there to be trouble at a birth is something we are especially sensitive to in my family. We've had that before. God is faithful even in those tough times. Maybe especially then.
We love our babies. We naturally want them to be well.
This little guy was very sick, again, very recently, when he came down with flu so severely that he had to be hospitalized. All three kiddos in this little family had the flu but it hit the baby like a ton of bricks. He was quarantined and lifeless.
He has bounced back, albeit slowly. He had to re-learn steadiness on his feet, though he has been walking since he was seven months old.
He is running again, now. Chasing behind and trying to catch up to an older brother and sister.
We like to celebrate in my family.
We especially like to celebrate birthdays.
Especially first birthdays.
and wholeness. and wellness. and happiness.
That's what was going on Saturday at my sister's house and yesterday at her office.
It is what is going on today, here in my office. And in my heart.



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Books of me

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Salon time

I realltI really need to get my nails done," the Grandbaby said. I had offered her a reward for the big girl chapter book reading she has been doing. Where reading is concerned, I will go to great lengths to offer encouragement.
This we traveled to our favorite nail salon where the Grandbaby revealed that she knew exactly what she wanted and why. I overheard this as she chatted with the shop owner who was working on those previous little nails.
Ivey, so you know chevron, she asked. And yes, Ivey knew chevron. So a chevron pattern was painted upon those precious little nails. Then it was Ivey's sister Jan's turn. There was some consultation. It seemed the grandbaby wanted something spelled on her toe nails. D-A-N-C-E.
"For the big sister, little sister" event, scheduled for the next day at the dance studio.
The older dancers and the younger ones are paired together, apparently, for the new season, to offer encouragement and support and maybe to help with hair and makeup and costume changes. This is what I gathered from the conversation I overheard between the Grandbaby and her finger and toe nail artists/technicians.
I didn't try to get additional information. It was enough for me that she's been reading so much of late.


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Reader

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Serial

The first message came to my sister, who is way more technologically astute than I. She is also a more avid reader and follower of the media coverage of trials, etc. Let's make that "A" on the word "Avid" capitol. Thus, the message came to her. It came from my baby daughter. It said: "Whatever you are doing, right now, stop and listen to "Serial." My sister is currently in the throes (together with our other sister) of helping her husband set up a business. She is also very involved with her own three small grandchildren. Her children, a son and a son-in-law, work in the business. They are busy. She can't just stop what she's doing. This is what I explained to my daughter who is also very busy but stopped everything recently to listen to the Podcast and all the episodes presented to date. When I went to help her move recently, she insisted I do the same. There was a lot of driving around between her old residence and her new one and then back home again. I followed my husband, who was driving a UHaul truck and listened to the second half of its inaugural episode. The first half I listened to trapped in the back seat with my daughter who help me captive as we moved boxes, playing the first half of that episode as we drove between her old digs and her new one. By the time she released me, she had a captive audience. I'd gotten the message and I was hooked. I listened to the whole rest of the series the same week. Now I am left awaiting the second season fairly breathlessly. Do you get the message?

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I have fun friends

We took the picture just above these words at lunch recently when it just happened to work out that we could all go at the same time. I am in the middle. The fellow to my right is a concert pianist, the brother to one of our best girlfriends and one of the wittiest people I know.
The blonde (natural and un) to my left is just fun. All the time. In every place. Almost no matter what.
Have you figured out already that they can make even a weekday lunch an adventure?
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