Since I was, oh, about 18 my mother has not celebrated Christmas. No tree, no festive music, no stockings hung by the chimney with care. In fact, you can’t even find her fireplace anymore with all the boxes and what-not piled in front of it. I wouldn’t call my mother a Grinch. She just, well, she’s just not a big fan of Christmas. She’s not making lists of people she hates (alphabetically) or prank-calling the townspeople or anything. She would rather be left alone, which would be fine except this small little detail: I’m her daughter and I kinda love Christmas. It’s my thing.
A couple of years ago I forced my mother (by means that are best left secret) to cook Christmas breakfast, which she was happy to do. And I’m happy to report it is something she’s done every year since. It’s nothing fancy: eggs, gravy, biscuits, sausage, bacon, and muffins. Pretty yummy stuff.
Now, normally Christmas morning goes a little like this: Lauren and I get up, she opens her gifts, we throw on jackets and head to Mom’s for breakfast. We hang out there all day, being lazy and drinking coffee. Well, I drink coffee and am lazy. Come to think of it, so is Mom. This is the only meal that is both served in proper dishes and eaten at the kitchen table (the rest of the meals are left in pots and pans on the stove and eaten from atop T.V. trays in the living room). So while Pansy, that’s my mother, isn’t one to put on the dog for a guest, this simple act of requiring that we eat around the same table, at the same time, is the only thing she does that remotely resembles a sense of reverence for the holiday.
This might be the best place to insert a bit of more recent back story. My mother is unofficially retired. How’s that possible? The woman accumulated enough sick days and paid time off that she’s on state payroll until the day after the end of the world, that's how. Anyhow, Mom decided that she needed a pistol, what with her retiring and all, and that made sense to me (not really). But her logic was simple, “I’ve always wanted a pistol and I feel safer, now that I’m retired, having one around the house.” Because coming home at 5:00 to an dark, empty house was perfectly acceptable, but staying in a well-lit house with the doors locked is just not something retired people should do lest they are armed to the hilt with a weapon that would make Clint Eastwood drool and hollow point shells to match. Yes, my mother of retirement age, is now the proud owner of a 357 or .357 or however you type out the type of gun one owns. I think you get my point.
Back to Christmas Breakfast 2010…
My friend, Matt, is not married and has no children. Often his in-town relatives are traveling on Christmas, so I invited him to come enjoy a home-cooked, country breakfast with me and mine. He has known my mother for years and has commented (many times) that nothing she could do would surprise him.
You should have seen the look on his face when Mom pulled out her WMD and began passing it around the table for my older and younger brothers to examine.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
For a dead guy, you've gotta a tight grip...
I was young and easily impressed by a sly smile. Had I only known then what I do now: sly smiles usually hide something. Granted sometimes that something isn’t a bad something, but in this case, it wasn’t a good something either. In this case, that sly smile hid the face of the man I would see long after he disappeared. That sly smile hid the right hook that would come nearly 13 years after I’d forgotten his middle name, or the warmth of his touch, or the taste of his kiss.
Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present Lauren’s father, Jamie McHone. He and I met when I was foolish enough to still believe that love (apart from any other factor) is enough to change a person. (Let me share something with all you 20-somethings who don’t yet know: Love is not enough to make a man or woman, for that matter, change. Not by itself. There has to be something else – another factor.) My father tried to warn me; nothing doing but for me to jump on in to a relationship with this guy and give it and him my all. It ended horribly. I was heart-broken and pregnant. Jamie moved on. Rapidly. Not long after he moved on, he shot himself.
Please forgive my unvarnished, unsentimental retelling of this love affair. I am a romantic. I wish this story were filled with long, slow kisses and dancing in the rain. I would give my pinky toe on my right foot – the more important of the feet, as you know – for this to have been a romance to rival any other in the history of romance. However, in order to have a romance, you have to be with someone worth romancing and apparently Jamie didn’t think he was. And sadly, neither did I. So I was content with his hand-me-down affection so long as I had the hope of a brighter future. And hope I did. Even after his funeral, I still daydreamed about the man he could have been. After a while, that became exhausting and keeping up with it all became pointless. Eventually, I conceded to the truth: Even if Jamie had lived, there was nothing to guarantee that anything would change. So I thought I let it go.
Until today when I experienced what can only be likened to being punched in the stomach while watching your parents make out naked while your grandmother sacrifices a kitten to a dead clown but then brings you fresh, soft chocolate chip cookies after. There was hurt, shock, loss of the ability to breath, and finally warmth.
I was hurt to realize that I’ve ended relationships and picked people apart not because of something they’d done, but because something they did was so similar to something Jamie had done. It was almost as though I could sense the hurt and embarrassment and feeling of betrayal that would inevitably follow those actions and I would rather hurt a little by my preemptive strike than a lot by ignoring it.
I was shocked because I hadn’t realized that Jamie still had such a tight grip on my happiness. I knew that I probably had issues with abandonment but I never thought about those coming from him. Or that they may not be abandonment issues at all. They may instead be self-preservation issues: I don’t ever want anyone to make a fool of me again. Cause that’s what Jamie did. He’d made a fool of me. I trusted him with my love, money, car, body and soul and he burned me. I chose him over my family and he threw me out like a ragdoll. He wanted only the light, fluffy parts of me. And when I refused to be only light and fluffy and things got real, he ran. Fast. So fast, in fact, that he didn’t completely end things with me first. Yeah, that sucked.
So there I was, sitting on my therapist’s couch, tears rolling down my face, while I tried to find the words to say what I was thinking, not to mention the breath with which to say it.
“I…I…Every…I…Every time…has…been…I…can’t…” Finally I blurted out, “Every time I’ve sabotaged a relationship has been because of something Jamie did.”
Perhaps not exactly, but very close. For example, I dated a guy who drank. Now Jamie never drank but he did smoke weed. Jamie never hurt me, but he tried to control me, which may very well be where I developed my control issues and my fierce sense of independence, who knows. What impressed me more than all that was the awareness that I suddenly, in a moment, had reason to hope again. Warmth spread from my face, down my spine, into my arms and hands, and further down into my back. I felt energy cracking through my skin and breaking down walls that I never even knew existed. Oh, I knew I had walls, to be sure. I just had never thought they were made of Jamie bricks and held together by years of unsaid things.
Ask anyone with issues if they enjoy having them. The person who says yes is lying to you. We all want to be as near to perfect – or at least a better version of ourselves – as we can get. Realizing that Jamie still had a hold on me made it so much easier to understand how to begin the improvement process. So crazy as it sounds, I think tonight I will write him a letter. I will forgive him (and myself) for the foolishness of our youth. I will share my dreams with him. I will give him permission to observe from afar the progression of Lauren’s life (and mine). I will not assume that he looks on me with loving regret. I will not assume anything. I will not give him a voice at all. I will pretend that he is listening to me and the sound of brick walls crumbling as a new Wendy steps out from the rubble.
I hope she likes Mexican food.
Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present Lauren’s father, Jamie McHone. He and I met when I was foolish enough to still believe that love (apart from any other factor) is enough to change a person. (Let me share something with all you 20-somethings who don’t yet know: Love is not enough to make a man or woman, for that matter, change. Not by itself. There has to be something else – another factor.) My father tried to warn me; nothing doing but for me to jump on in to a relationship with this guy and give it and him my all. It ended horribly. I was heart-broken and pregnant. Jamie moved on. Rapidly. Not long after he moved on, he shot himself.
Please forgive my unvarnished, unsentimental retelling of this love affair. I am a romantic. I wish this story were filled with long, slow kisses and dancing in the rain. I would give my pinky toe on my right foot – the more important of the feet, as you know – for this to have been a romance to rival any other in the history of romance. However, in order to have a romance, you have to be with someone worth romancing and apparently Jamie didn’t think he was. And sadly, neither did I. So I was content with his hand-me-down affection so long as I had the hope of a brighter future. And hope I did. Even after his funeral, I still daydreamed about the man he could have been. After a while, that became exhausting and keeping up with it all became pointless. Eventually, I conceded to the truth: Even if Jamie had lived, there was nothing to guarantee that anything would change. So I thought I let it go.
Until today when I experienced what can only be likened to being punched in the stomach while watching your parents make out naked while your grandmother sacrifices a kitten to a dead clown but then brings you fresh, soft chocolate chip cookies after. There was hurt, shock, loss of the ability to breath, and finally warmth.
I was hurt to realize that I’ve ended relationships and picked people apart not because of something they’d done, but because something they did was so similar to something Jamie had done. It was almost as though I could sense the hurt and embarrassment and feeling of betrayal that would inevitably follow those actions and I would rather hurt a little by my preemptive strike than a lot by ignoring it.
I was shocked because I hadn’t realized that Jamie still had such a tight grip on my happiness. I knew that I probably had issues with abandonment but I never thought about those coming from him. Or that they may not be abandonment issues at all. They may instead be self-preservation issues: I don’t ever want anyone to make a fool of me again. Cause that’s what Jamie did. He’d made a fool of me. I trusted him with my love, money, car, body and soul and he burned me. I chose him over my family and he threw me out like a ragdoll. He wanted only the light, fluffy parts of me. And when I refused to be only light and fluffy and things got real, he ran. Fast. So fast, in fact, that he didn’t completely end things with me first. Yeah, that sucked.
So there I was, sitting on my therapist’s couch, tears rolling down my face, while I tried to find the words to say what I was thinking, not to mention the breath with which to say it.
“I…I…Every…I…Every time…has…been…I…can’t…” Finally I blurted out, “Every time I’ve sabotaged a relationship has been because of something Jamie did.”
Perhaps not exactly, but very close. For example, I dated a guy who drank. Now Jamie never drank but he did smoke weed. Jamie never hurt me, but he tried to control me, which may very well be where I developed my control issues and my fierce sense of independence, who knows. What impressed me more than all that was the awareness that I suddenly, in a moment, had reason to hope again. Warmth spread from my face, down my spine, into my arms and hands, and further down into my back. I felt energy cracking through my skin and breaking down walls that I never even knew existed. Oh, I knew I had walls, to be sure. I just had never thought they were made of Jamie bricks and held together by years of unsaid things.
Ask anyone with issues if they enjoy having them. The person who says yes is lying to you. We all want to be as near to perfect – or at least a better version of ourselves – as we can get. Realizing that Jamie still had a hold on me made it so much easier to understand how to begin the improvement process. So crazy as it sounds, I think tonight I will write him a letter. I will forgive him (and myself) for the foolishness of our youth. I will share my dreams with him. I will give him permission to observe from afar the progression of Lauren’s life (and mine). I will not assume that he looks on me with loving regret. I will not assume anything. I will not give him a voice at all. I will pretend that he is listening to me and the sound of brick walls crumbling as a new Wendy steps out from the rubble.
I hope she likes Mexican food.
Miracles, Blessings, and other God-thing so forth and so ons Part Deux
I work for a development company in Spring Hill. One of my many assignments, and probably the most consistent one, is to be a leasing agent for the apartment complex where our office is located. Some days are stressful and I wonder why I can’t just walk out the front door and never look back. Some days are terrible because of the odd situations my tenants put themselves in and then ask me to fix and I wonder why God won’t release me from this assignment. Some days, however, are like today. They are days where I am reminded that God still has lessons I need to learn, people I need to help, and stories I need to hear.
I won’t tell you her name, though I doubt she’d mind. I will say that she has become one of my favorite people. Not just on the complex, but in general. When she comes into the office and I ask how she’s doing, her reply is consistent and cheerful: “I’m blessed and highly favored.” She used to come to the fitness center (right next to my office) to work out in the mornings. She’d listen to her mp3 player and sing worship songs. Then, after a while, she began to pray. Not loud and if she knew that I could hear her, she’d have stopped. I always enjoyed those times because I felt the presence of God when she sang and prayed. It honestly did more for me than it probably did for her. So sweet and tender that I nearly felt I was intruding.
She came in today and said something that challenged me. “I would rather err on the side of following God and messing up than to be disobedient and do nothing. At least Peter got out of the boat. Those other jokers just sat there. And Peter walked on water, too. Til he started listening to them.”
Her commentary made me think about this charge that I have been given and what it might look like for me to be obedient (being…uh…not 18 and going back to school full-time) and I gotta say, I have no idea. I don’t know what’s going to happen next. I only know that at least I’m out of the boat, right? I mean, that’s a start.
I won’t tell you her name, though I doubt she’d mind. I will say that she has become one of my favorite people. Not just on the complex, but in general. When she comes into the office and I ask how she’s doing, her reply is consistent and cheerful: “I’m blessed and highly favored.” She used to come to the fitness center (right next to my office) to work out in the mornings. She’d listen to her mp3 player and sing worship songs. Then, after a while, she began to pray. Not loud and if she knew that I could hear her, she’d have stopped. I always enjoyed those times because I felt the presence of God when she sang and prayed. It honestly did more for me than it probably did for her. So sweet and tender that I nearly felt I was intruding.
She came in today and said something that challenged me. “I would rather err on the side of following God and messing up than to be disobedient and do nothing. At least Peter got out of the boat. Those other jokers just sat there. And Peter walked on water, too. Til he started listening to them.”
Her commentary made me think about this charge that I have been given and what it might look like for me to be obedient (being…uh…not 18 and going back to school full-time) and I gotta say, I have no idea. I don’t know what’s going to happen next. I only know that at least I’m out of the boat, right? I mean, that’s a start.
My Miracles, Blessings, and otherwise God-thing Note (Part I)
So I've given up on blogging. For now. Maybe forever, who knows. But I am starting a journey and I decided that keeping a written record of God's provisions might come in handy. There have been several leading up to this point - things too numerous to recall right off hand. But today, that changes (I hope). Through all of this, I will learn to trust God in a way that I don't know I ever have before and I'm super excited about this journey.
For those of you who don' t know/haven't heard, I'm back in school on a full-time basis. The company that I work for is being ah-may-zing and they are working with me to complete this dream; a God-thing, no doubt. This fall, I start Middle Tennessee State University where I will pursue my B.S. and eventually be a middle school math (yeah, I said math. TOTAL GOD-THING) teacher.
Since April, I've been getting these annoying emails from the Financial Aid Department saying that I've not completed information they need to approve my grants and loans (yes I have, I even have copies) and I've called countless times about it. Evey time I call, I'm told not to worry that it will show up soon, all the while, I continue to get at least 2 emails per month. Now, ya'll know me and you know that I'm nothing if not tenacious when it comes to records and approvals and paperwork. I'll keep on it until it's done. So, every time I got an email, I called and every time I called, I got the same answer.
Guess what came in my email today...
So I decided to email in stead of calling and I typed one of my strongly worded (but still very charming) emails.
~Pause~
I used to work as a volunteer at my church in Decatur. When the copier or the duplicator messed up (often) and I couldn't figure it out (sometimes), I'd go get Pastor Ken. Before he even moved, he'd ask, "Did you pray over it?"
~Play~
I didn't pray over it this time - I was too busy calling the business office about something else. The lovely young lady (my mother's age) was helping me (and by that I mean she was telling me what I wanted to hear) and she was doing such a darn good job that I decided to ask her about the financial aid stuff. She was waiting on me to log into my account so that I could get some bit of info she needed and when I did (not 5 minutes since my email was sent), IT WAS FIXED!
And as a side-note, I'd like to thank all you hard working, tax-paying peoples out there for helping make my dream come true. Please know that my pledge to you is this: I pledge to not screw this up. Thanks for your support!
For those of you who don' t know/haven't heard, I'm back in school on a full-time basis. The company that I work for is being ah-may-zing and they are working with me to complete this dream; a God-thing, no doubt. This fall, I start Middle Tennessee State University where I will pursue my B.S. and eventually be a middle school math (yeah, I said math. TOTAL GOD-THING) teacher.
Since April, I've been getting these annoying emails from the Financial Aid Department saying that I've not completed information they need to approve my grants and loans (yes I have, I even have copies) and I've called countless times about it. Evey time I call, I'm told not to worry that it will show up soon, all the while, I continue to get at least 2 emails per month.
Guess what came in my email today...
So I decided to email in stead of calling and I typed one of my strongly worded (but still very charming) emails.
~Pause~
I used to work as a volunteer at my church in Decatur. When the copier or the duplicator messed up (often) and I couldn't figure it out (sometimes), I'd go get Pastor Ken. Before he even moved, he'd ask, "Did you pray over it?"
~Play~
I didn't pray over it this time - I was too busy calling the business office about something else. The lovely young lady (my mother's age) was helping me (and by that I mean she was telling me what I wanted to hear) and she was doing such a darn good job that I decided to ask her about the financial aid stuff. She was waiting on me to log into my account so that I could get some bit of info she needed and when I did (not 5 minutes since my email was sent), IT WAS FIXED!
And as a side-note, I'd like to thank all you hard working, tax-paying peoples out there for helping make my dream come true. Please know that my pledge to you is this: I pledge to not screw this up. Thanks for your support!
Year-end Thoughts
I have this fun little tradition of silently reviewing the year that has been. This year is different only in that I am doing so earlier than is typical.
This year I’ve watched sunrises on my way to school and been moved to tears by the knowledge that God, who makes the sun rise, also watches over me. I’ve felt His presence as I sat in lectures and let the full realization of just how blessed I truly am settle into my soul. I have smiled at strangers, hugged friends, and kissed the forehead of my sleeping daughter. I have danced close to the edges of my sanity and pushed myself to levels of exhaustion I haven’t known since Lauren was born. I have felt the approval of my dad shine on me like the sun on a spring afternoon, reminding me that he is never far from me. I have read good books, tasted fantastic wine, and kissed handsome men. I have touched history and made it come alive for my daughter. I have said hello and goodbye to amazing people. I have said thank you to several and have received the warming hugs of those who are thankful for me. All in all, 2010 – my 33rd year – was great.
For all that I have done, there is an even more impressive list of things I have not done.
I have not read my Bible every day. I have not displayed the proverbial patience of Job I've heard so much about. I have not exercised every day (honestly, I think I only went to the gym once). I have not taken my cholesterol medication every night. I have not smiled sweetly at the old lady driving with her right blinker on in front of me through the entire parking lot at the grocery store. Incidentally, a right turn would place her square in the customer service area, likely with victims. I have not bought Girl or Boy Scout any things. I have not forwarded emails and text messages about how much Jesus loves veterans and kittens and how little I do if I delete the messages. I have not adopted one of Sara McLachlan’s pitiful animals from those gut-wrenching commercials of hers. I have not wondered where Waldo is because frankly, if he’s not been found after all this time, I’m guessing he doesn’t want to be. I have not exercised restraint when faced with a delicious bottle of wine. I have not thanked a teacher, hugged a chipmunk, punched a Republican, saluted a police officer, nor have I visited anyone in prison. And it should be quite obvious that I have not lost that charming wit for which I am most famous.
All that being said, I want to make this one thing very clear: It is neither what I have done nor what I have not done that really matters in my life. Yes, I have a laundry list of places I want to visit, statues I want to see, and places I want to sit in silence and pray to God. I have a cookbook filled with recipes I want to try and a World Market between me and school that I want to personally finance via my purchases. All of these silly things are important to me and yet none is as important as this very simple yet life-changing, time-splitting, everlasting truth:
"This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn't go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person's failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him" (John 3:16 from The Message).
This is the part where I remember that no matter what, it - life, the purpose, the point, the big picture - has nothing to do with me. I can relax. I can breathe. I can smile knowing that I can't really screw it up much more than it already is, because I'm not in control. So I can go to Italy. I can eat carbs, drink wine, and flirt a little too much. I can dance in my bathroom and sing in my car and love my neighbor - whatever it is, I can just let it be knowing that God, the one who began my faith and only in whom will I ever see it completed, is planning an all-out victory based not on what I do or don't do, but on who He is, what He has done, and the sacrifice He made.
I'll drink to that.
This year I’ve watched sunrises on my way to school and been moved to tears by the knowledge that God, who makes the sun rise, also watches over me. I’ve felt His presence as I sat in lectures and let the full realization of just how blessed I truly am settle into my soul. I have smiled at strangers, hugged friends, and kissed the forehead of my sleeping daughter. I have danced close to the edges of my sanity and pushed myself to levels of exhaustion I haven’t known since Lauren was born. I have felt the approval of my dad shine on me like the sun on a spring afternoon, reminding me that he is never far from me. I have read good books, tasted fantastic wine, and kissed handsome men. I have touched history and made it come alive for my daughter. I have said hello and goodbye to amazing people. I have said thank you to several and have received the warming hugs of those who are thankful for me. All in all, 2010 – my 33rd year – was great.
For all that I have done, there is an even more impressive list of things I have not done.
I have not read my Bible every day. I have not displayed the proverbial patience of Job I've heard so much about. I have not exercised every day (honestly, I think I only went to the gym once). I have not taken my cholesterol medication every night. I have not smiled sweetly at the old lady driving with her right blinker on in front of me through the entire parking lot at the grocery store. Incidentally, a right turn would place her square in the customer service area, likely with victims. I have not bought Girl or Boy Scout any things. I have not forwarded emails and text messages about how much Jesus loves veterans and kittens and how little I do if I delete the messages. I have not adopted one of Sara McLachlan’s pitiful animals from those gut-wrenching commercials of hers. I have not wondered where Waldo is because frankly, if he’s not been found after all this time, I’m guessing he doesn’t want to be. I have not exercised restraint when faced with a delicious bottle of wine. I have not thanked a teacher, hugged a chipmunk, punched a Republican, saluted a police officer, nor have I visited anyone in prison. And it should be quite obvious that I have not lost that charming wit for which I am most famous.
All that being said, I want to make this one thing very clear: It is neither what I have done nor what I have not done that really matters in my life. Yes, I have a laundry list of places I want to visit, statues I want to see, and places I want to sit in silence and pray to God. I have a cookbook filled with recipes I want to try and a World Market between me and school that I want to personally finance via my purchases. All of these silly things are important to me and yet none is as important as this very simple yet life-changing, time-splitting, everlasting truth:
"This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn't go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person's failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him" (John 3:16 from The Message).
This is the part where I remember that no matter what, it - life, the purpose, the point, the big picture - has nothing to do with me. I can relax. I can breathe. I can smile knowing that I can't really screw it up much more than it already is, because I'm not in control. So I can go to Italy. I can eat carbs, drink wine, and flirt a little too much. I can dance in my bathroom and sing in my car and love my neighbor - whatever it is, I can just let it be knowing that God, the one who began my faith and only in whom will I ever see it completed, is planning an all-out victory based not on what I do or don't do, but on who He is, what He has done, and the sacrifice He made.
I'll drink to that.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
