Encouragement

A friend shared this verse via Facebook today,

Come and let us return to Jehovah;
For He has torn us, but He will heal us,
And He has stricken us, but He will bind us up.

Hosea 6:1

My very first thought when I read it, was AHA! I knew it! HE has torn us. HE has stricken us.

But then I read again. And my heart softened (cue miraculous music).

But He will heal us.
But He will bind us up.

[sigh] It has been quite the doozie of a week. Twice this week I collapsed onto the couch and fell asleep. This is something I never do. But this week really did me in. And to be honest, this past year has really done me in. This past two years. Okay, nearly this past decade. I am tired. I am torn. I am stricken. I am wallowy. (I made that word up.) For years I have been descending deeper into this abyss of self-pity, desperate for rescue, yet each day more confidently assured there was no hope of rescue for me. And I remain ever stubborn, hardened, unturned, unyielding, unwilling to return.

And here on this day, the culmination of a week of being pressed beyond my limits, this verse. From a friend who has endured her own week (and more) of affliction and has need of its comforting as much or more than I. And not only that, but also on this day, this friend entered in to my life to meet another of my needs, most graciously and sweetly.

Does she know that her coming was God's coming? That her presence was God's presence? That her comfort was God's comfort?

That is not all of the comfort of today, but it is all I can bear to share. And Hosea 6:3:

Therefore let us know, let us pursue knowing Jehovah:
His going forth is as sure as the dawn,
And He will come to us as the rain,
As the latter rain which waters the earth.

Family Night

At our beloved local library. (Since we had about 20+ books that were due -- TODAY. And nothing makes me want to kick myself more than owing the local public library money for all of my free books.)

One of my favorite sights of the day:Like we aren't busy enough with the onset of school, here's our latest stack serving its dual purpose of holding down the hearth. (Notice one of the titles is Deadly Perils and How to Avoid Them. I just noticed that one. Yes, my 11-year-old son picked it out.)
So, I mentioned in my last post that I was starting Anne of Green Gables. How did I not read this book as a youngster?? Love it! I continue to be surprised each time the storytelling causes an involuntary smile to break forth on my face. In fact, the other day I was so enrapt in the book I actually ran into an old guy on campus (old guy = distinguished professor who works in my building), a collision which sent my beautiful Italian bookmark flying across the floor (recovered, unharmed.) I told you this would happen some day. Thankfully, I didn't hurt Dr. So-and-so, nobody fell down and only a few scattered people were witnesses - if they noticed, they pretended not to. To be fair (to me), he did stop very abruptly and change direction right in front of me. In the future, I'll be watching out for this guy.

The Red Pony

I just finished reading The Red Pony, by John Steinbeck. It was a very satisfying little book. I would love to recommend it to my son, but I have learned that the surest way to disinterest him in something (i.e. a book) is for me to suggest it to him. [sigh]

Any strategies out there to combat this phenomenon?

I eagerly await your wisdom. In the meantime, I will share with you a little quote. It is short. It may not strike you the way it struck me. That's okay. I think its poignancy is somewhat lost out of context. But anyway.... Just picture a 10-year-old boy growing up on a ranch in northern California around the 1930s. The boy has been given a responsibility and a promise and is setting off to complete his task with a sense of earnestness and importance.

The warm morning sun shone on Jody's back so sweetly that he was forced to take a serious stiff-legged hop now and then in spite of his maturity.

That's all. Just felt like sharing a tiny tidbit. Now it is on to Anne of Green Gables.

Sewing Camp

Have you heard of such a thing? Well, I hadn't. But thanks to our friend, Jennifer (thank you, thank you!), now I have. And not only have I heard of it, but thanks again to wonderful Jennifer, my daughter was a happy attendee in the camp last week. For those of you who have a little girl (or boy, because why can't a boy want to sew?) who's itching to get creative with a sewing machine, just visit Austin School of Fashion Design to find out all of the camp info. As I understand it, they also have classes during the school year and even classes for adults (like me) who own a sewing machine but haven't the foggiest idea what to do with it (me) and who may be currently using their sewing machine table as a TV stand (yeah, me).

Back to my awesome girl, though. Over the course of the week she made a hat, a purse, a shoulder bag, an apron, and at least 11 little pouches. Here's a picture of her wearing most of her handiwork.

And the cute little purse with a hand-sewn button.

And the many, many pouches. Very pleased with herself, she is.

True to her generous nature, she made gifts of the many pouches to family members - I was the recipient of the chic red and black paw print pouch, which is the perfect size for my cell phone.

And this is the girl in action. No hesitation, no fear. Speedy Gonzalez, they call her.

The following project was not a part of sewing camp per se, but was more the inspiration. Jennifer has been spending some quality time with our daughter over the last couple of months and they have been working on a very special project together. This project was finished on the final day of sewing camp, providing a wonderful consummation to the week. The project was a special bag in which to carry a very special doll, Julie. Julie is the much cherished American Girl doll received for Emma's 8th birthday and Julie needed a mode of transport. Now she has it.

Stitching of the names and little dog (hard to see) done by Emma.

Jennifer and Emma (and all her stuff!)

Summer Reading List (Completed)

Since I can't muster up enough brain power to string together words into an amalgamation of coherent and/or witty sentences, I give you my summer reading list. A list of the books my nose has been buried in while walking up and down campus this summer, making you nervous for my safety, if you saw me, wondering when I was going to finally trip, fall down, possible break something and most assuredly embarrass myself. (And by "summer" I'm counting all the books I've read since May, since that will make me feel more accomplished even though it is essentially cheating.)

• The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas.
• NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children, by Po Bronson.
• Wintersmith, by Terry Pratchett.
• The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood.
• Islands in the Stream: A Novel, by Ernest Hemingway. My first time reading Hemingway. Loved his style and will be adding more of his works to my list.
• The Lucky One, by Nicholas Sparks. You probably shouldn't follow up a Hemingway novel with something like this - it makes you feel like a literary snob. (No offense intended toward Mr. Sparks. I certainly couldn't write a novel. And anyway, I read it while on vacation at the beach, which it was perfectly suited for.)
• The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde.
• Fantastic Mr. Fox, by Roald Dahl.
• Tuck Everlasting, by Natalie Babbitt.
  
• Girl with a Pearl Earring, by Tracy Chevalier.
• Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson.
• Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut. This book has been on my to-read list for a while. I really didn't expect to like it and meant to slog my way through it so I could finally just check the darn thing off my list. I was surprised that I was continually drawn to it and found myself sneaking away time to read it. I found the following passage absurdly beautiful:

Billy looked at the clock on the gas stove. He had an hour to kill before the saucer came. He went into the living room, swinging the bottle like a dinner bell, turned on the television. He came slightly unstuck in time, saw the late movie backwards, then forwards again. It was a movie about American bombers in the Second World War and the gallant men who flew them. Seen backwards by Billy, the story went like this:

American planes, full of holes and wounded men and corpses took off backwards from an airfield in England. Over France, a few German fighter planes flew at them backwards, sucked bullets and shell fragments from some of the planes and crewmen. They did the same for wrecked American bombers on the ground, and those planes flew up backwards to join the formation.

The formation flew backwards over a German city that was in flames. The bombers opened their bomb bay doors, exerted a miraculous magnetism which shrunk the fires, gathered them into cylindrical steel containers, and lifted the containers into the bellies of the planes. The containers were stored neatly in racks. The Germans below had miraculous devices of their own, which were long steel tubes. They used them to suck more fragments from the crewmen and planes. But there were still a few wounded Americans, though, and some of the bombers were in bad repair. Over France, though, German fighters came up again, made everything and everybody as good as new.

When the bombers got back to their base, the steel cylinders were taken from the racks and shipped back to the United States of America, where factories were operating night and day, dismantling the cylinders, separating the dangerous contents into minerals. Touchingly, it was mainly women who did this work. The minerals were then shipped to specialists in remote areas. It was their business to put them into the ground, to hide them cleverly, so they would never hurt anybody ever again.

Here kitty, kitty .... Kitty?

It was so peaceful this morning. No caterwauling at 5:30am. 6:00am. 6:30am. Ahhh.

But I didn't notice the silence. I was sleeping.

I vaguely noticed when I entered the kitchen that the old man cat was not hot on my heels demanding his morning meat paste. Vaguely. I did have a fleeting thought that he must be lying dead somewhere in the house if he wasn't out pestering us (what else could keep him from his meat paste?) Eh. Whatever - the cat's moods cannot be accounted for and I needed to get to work.

I made my breakfast and prepared to leave. I finally heard a distant sound of meowing. Weird, I thought, why is he crying in the back of the house if he wants to be fed? Why doesn't the stupid oaf come to the kitchen instead of trying to wake everyone up? Again, eh. Not my problem. He knows where to come if he wants to be fed.

Almost ready to leave, I hear the meowing again, but this time I perceive the direction from which it emanates. I walk to the door that leads into the garage, unbolt it, and open it. Well, wouldn't you know it - in darts the kitty, wide-eyed, whining, a little dingy, and ravenously hungry (no surprise there).

Huh. That's weird. What is the cat doing in the garage? I do remember bolting the door the night before. I do not remember a fuzzy hulk of a cat breezing past me into the garage to explore its myriad wonders. I bet he felt pretty smug about his stealthiness until he heard the bolt click and the lights went out.

Now, we didn't lock him in the garage all night on purpose. Honest. Sure, sometimes we call him names. Stupid. Whiny. Oaf. Fatty. Dolty McDolterson ... but we really do love him. Honest. Poor little (and I use the term loosely) guy. Stuck in the stuffy, dusty, dark garage all night. No vittles. No prospect of waking up the people with his offensive odors and sounds. We felt bad. Honest. That said, you can be sure we got a good chuckle this morning over his plight.

I am baffled he was able to get into the garage without me noticing, but man, oh man, was it quiet and peaceful this morning!

You can see he's none the worse for wear (picture taken at 4:00pm today).
Um, does he still look mad?