Throughout my entire life Jesus has been my friend. I cannot recall one solitary day in my childhood of thinking Jesus was not for me, not loving me, or not compassionate towards me. Combine that faith in Jesus with a giant creative heap of imagination and you have a version of little Rebecca who was absolutely brokenhearted by passion plays and Good Friday services. Little Rebecca grew into adult Rebecca, but my spirit was just as crushed at such services. I still haven’t seen the Passion of the Christ movie for the same reason I choose not to watch movies with excessive violence towards enslaved Black Americans. I don’t need that in my noggin. My heart is wrenched by such scenes.
I struggle every single year with what we Christians call Holy Week. I don’t like to be forced into imagining the torture of my friend and Savior Jesus. Every year I have an internal–sometimes external–argument where I tell my pretend audience that “you can’t make me repeat all of this again.” You. cannot. make. me. And just to be real clear: we’re all pretending! I mean, this already happened and now we live with a Risen Savior at the right hand of God the Father. I’ve skipped Good Friday services in order to not give in to the deeply sad feelings. Sometimes I simply do not want to cry anymore.
This year we attended a Tenebrae Service and while I did indeed cry, I also felt grateful for the physicality of the memories of Christ’s death. We used our senses to experience dark and light, to listen to mournful music, to witness the Light of Life exiting the building. And I felt camaraderie with my Savior in the depths of despair that life holds. This deep sadness? He knew it. These heartbreaking betrayals? He was there, too. My friend Jesus, the perfect man, knew the same suffering that I know, that my friends know.
Of course the story doesn’t end there. Praise God, THE STORY DOES NOT END THERE. With freedom and perfect abandon we Christians worship a Jesus who did NOT stay dead. He was the Messiah–is the Messiah, the great deliverer–and death couldn’t hold him down. He is the perfect sacrifice and scripture says he died and rose again with our names on his heart and with our sins on his shoulders. His perfect and sinless self for my broken and sinful self. Amen.
All of this believing and remembering (and even present-day pretending during Holy Week) takes faith; I will not say otherwise. I couldn’t buy into it without that leap of faith. I’m here, existing with a faith that ebbs and flows but is always present nonetheless. I’m here, with outstretched hands, receiving daily mercies and grace that come from a Father in heaven who loves me and knows me. I’m here, rejoicing in what I don’t see but what I know deep in my heart until I see our Triune God face to face in glory.
Picture this: excited students on their final day of school before holiday break. They’re hopped up on sugar cookies and dreams of no school for days on end. Popcorn! Movie! Apple cider! Gift exchange! Perler beads (Lord help us all)! Decorate your own sugar cookie! It’s all happening. The time has come for the day to end; the students begin stacking chairs, throwing away trash, breaking down tables, grabbing their things. They head for the exits and then…? A mere table bump turns into a broken-down-table cascade with an APPLE CIDER AVALANCHE. Screams! Panic! Teacher’s gonna teacher, so I grab the Clorox wipes and a giant roll of paper towels and issue orders in a calm voice. Only–as it turns out–the cider avalanche chose to flow downhill onto the finger-sized DIVOTS on the backs of all the tables. Who even knew those divots were there? And what do they even do?? Student who table bumped is extremely embarrassed and keeps muttering the words “failure” under his breath while I pollyanna the situation and encourage my students that “We can do it!” and “No worries!” and “It’s fine!” even though I feel certain there is now apple cider fermenting on spaces previously unknown to man. I have sweat beading in places the sun don’t shine but it’s an interesting finale to an epic semester. We made it. We did it! I finish vacuuming the room, pack up my precious student gifts, head home, take a shower, and Jeremy orders a pizza.
Fast forward 18 hours and picture this: I’m enjoying my first holiday morning by finishing a book on the couch when concerned noises start coming out of my husband in the kitchen. Sink something. Disposal not working. A sweet smell and a powdery residue. Eventually me and my fingers go to check out the situation and I discover that SOMEONE did SOMETHING with wax in the sink and while it smells quite lovely kitchen productions have now come to a screeching halt. This needs management. Put the kettle on, Ma, we need boiling water stat. I use a ⅓ measuring cup to portion out the waxy water that my fingers and a slotted spoon can no longer grab. A pile of paper towels, two tea kettles-full, a gallon and a half of wax-filled water, and distant memories of my calm morning later and the disposal is open but my mind is clogged by WHY IN THE WORLD WOULD SOMEONE DO THIS? Someone is at school and cannot answer for herself. I have less patience with this Someone than the Someone at school yesterday, so it’s probably good the Someone isn’t here.
Ack.
Life is messy.
Learning to be gentle around apple cider is messy.
Figuring out that wax should never go down a sink drain is messy.
Raising children is messy.
People are messy.
I am messy.
There’s no easy fix to messes, but patience, time, and a whole lot of paper towels can cure a number of ills. I don’t know what messes you’re cleaning up this week but you got this, friend. Deep breaths. You’re not alone.
On Sunday, September 17, we said our final goodbyes to our much-beloved baby-old-man dog Shiloh. He was 14 years and 7 months old.
Every year that we marked with him was a year I felt really blessed that he was still around. The dogs in my childhood all came to early and tragic deaths and I had sworn I’d never get a dog again because it was so painful to lose them. I remember crying into my pillow yeeeeeears after these dogs had crossed the rainbow bridge. Tears have never been hard for me to find. Alas, I grew up, got married, and then had a little girl who very badly wanted a puppy. She got one just before her 5th birthday and that was it. I was head over heels for a dog again.
Shiloh’s doggie life paired well with family life, and even now as I go back into my blog archives I can see that he was exactly the same dog through all the years. He always loved to shred tissues. He always wanted to be nearby us, a part of our pack. He loved eating all human food—including veggies, with the exception of undressed lettuce—and was never a snuggly dog. Livia marveled at a few photos of him cuddling with her on the floor of our first home and I assured her that I was very good at snapping photos quickly. He loved his kennel. He loved routine. He understood the pecking order in the house which gave him something of a respectful worship for Jeremy, a loving protective nature toward me, and a sibling relationship to Livia. With me he was equal parts sassy and adorable, and it didn’t help that I found much of his sassiness to be hilarious. I am a far cry from an efficient dog trainer. But with Jeremy’s affinity for structure our Shi was potty trained quickly and was an all-around terrific dog. His enthusiasm for greeting people at the front door was only tempered by hearing loss as he aged. He still surprised us with a few zoomies in these last years. Oh, and he loved to lick. He was a licker. Himself. Others. Obsessed. Kissed the back of Judy Schlarb’s teeth after bible study one day, and one time enjoyed slurping my mouth out when I was laughing so hard I accidentally shut my eyes. That’s not a mistake I made twice.
This week has been the strangest week as we begin to adjust to life without our furry buddy. The tap-tap from his claws has gone silent. No little face appears in my doorway after the guys come over for D&D or Magic. There’s no heavy breathing coming around my side of the bed to see what crumbs have been dropped by the type 1 diabetic mom. No snuffling through the piles in Liv’s room, no nesting on her bed, no staring with rapt attention at the gecko. The morning shift of potty-treat-meds has been traded in for a quiet cup of coffee and time to sit. The evening shift of potty-kennel-treats is no longer necessary. The expenses of an old pup—medicines, dry and wet food, extra vet visits—have been replaced with grief take-out and grief coffees this week. The doorbell draws no barks and no front door scramble. It is quiet uptown… in a canine type of way.
Shiloh ultimately succumbed to congestive heart failure. He lived about 15 months after the condition was diagnosed, which is fairly average I believe. I opted to medicate his little body for all of that time, but his coughing grew worse at the end of last week and his rapid and shallow breathing Sunday morning was not sustainable. I could not ask for more time with him. He had lived so well and so lovingly for so many days. There was truly nothing more to do and enjoy with Shi—we enjoyed each other so fully every day that choosing euthanasia was our final act of kindness for this furry boy who had shared his entire life with us. The emergency vet office here in Lincoln was extremely professional from my explorative phone call around noon to the moment we walked out of their clinic around three hours later. I have been afraid of having to put a pet down for my entire 45 years and in the oddest way possible it felt like a relief to have survived the weight of that event. The vet was incredible. Our boy was so very tired. He very gently and quietly experienced a final rest.
He was the best and I loved him more than words can express.
Shiloh, we love you, bud. I will miss your perfect furry face forever.
Thank you, God, for giving us this precious bit of fluff that brought so much joy and rhythm, hilarity and light to our days. We are grateful. We are sad, but we are grateful, too.
“There’s an opening for a church secretary. Do that!”
“Maybe you should get your counseling degree.”
These are all questions and thoughts I’ve fielded in the past 10 years, so I thought I’d record a few of my thoughts on what I bring to vocational church ministry as a woman.
(Note: this explanation is for those who interpret scripture as limiting preaching and elder roles to men. In short, for those I’ve gone to church with my whole life. Other interpretations open up preaching and eldership to women–and I can understand those viewpoints as well. I’m simply addressing the former perspective in this post.)
I once asked a PCA pastor friend if he thought women could be lower-case P pastors. His response was: of course! What does it mean to pastor someone? What does it mean to be a shepherd? Personally I love the concept of being a shepherdess. It means you teach. You exhort. You encourage. You facilitate. You read, study, and absorb the word of God to better understand it and you take it to people. You create opportunities for learning and for growing. You help build souls. You enter into lives and grieve with others, serve others, connect others, feed and water them.
Preachers preach. And some only preach. In the context of complementarian churches, only men are invited to preach. I’m not arguing with this (at least in this blog post). In complementarian churches, only men are invited to sit on elder boards. And I’m not arguing with this either (at least not in this blog post). Everything else is open to women. Even in complementarian churches.
I already do shepherding tasks. I’ve received training, both in professional contexts and in my denomination’s seminary–and I am eager to work with and for the institutional church. And I want to get paid for it.
That last tidbit is hard for some of my loved ones to swallow. “If you really loved the church why wouldn’t you work for free?”
Ready for this? Because that is unfair. It’s unjust to expect women to work for free when they are gifted, skilled, tested, and have bills to pay.
Women are free to be veterinarians and we know they run fantastic practices. For pay. Women are bankers. Educators. Surgeons. Zookeepers. Women are encouraged to run for office. You vote for them. Women are welcomed into seminary. They are trained. They can get MDivs even in conservative places. But somehow folks want to draw the line at paying a woman to work in a ministry context? No. That is not right.
So, back to “what would you do?”
I’d provide counseling from a pastoral perspective. I’d teach the bible to anyone I’d be allowed to teach. I’d build and develop programs aimed at discipling believers. I’d improve communication between staff and congregants. I’d want to shepherd the sheep the Lord has given us. In short, I would pastor. In this context, I would not preach.
Know what my first real job was when I turned 16? I worked in the church office and I learned from the incredible pastors, elders, deacons, teachers, and youth group leaders that God surrounded me with.
I went to our denominational youth leadership camp for years. (They were training ministry leaders. But now, as a women in her 40’s I’m confused about what opportunities they were actually training us for!)
I began to lead youth group as soon as I graduated from it and it was my absolute JOY to love my middle school girls.
In fact, I adored them so much that I graduated with my bachelors of science in education for middle grades. All the while that I was in college I was focused on ministry as well. An upperclassmen female commended me for speaking up in our youth ministry class as “girls usually don’t speak.” I’ll never forget how surprised I felt that she saw me as brave for raising my hand and asking questions. (This speaks very poorly of how women often feel within our denomination.)
I graduated and immediately went back to working in the church office again. This time, though I continued to provide support at the front desk, I also had the opportunity to receive pay as Children’s Ministry Coordinator. I spent a few years volunteering as co-chair of the Nursery Committee just as we were getting ready to build a brand new nursery. I continued with my youth ministry work for free. And even after the church hired a man to do youth ministry, I worked for free. I finally realized that I was still doing his job and then I exited the program quickly, my sense of inequality only beginning to be developed.
Even after I made the my choice to become at a stay-at-home mom, I worked again administrating the start of a church plant. I got paid for 5 hours a week and sometimes worked twenty. I only stepped away from that position in frustration when it was clear I wasn’t part of the ministry team the way I wanted to be.
My denomination can be a boys club. Scratch that. It *is* a boys club. Much like the old golf courses for men only, the rooms where decisions happen in my denomination is almost always exclusively male.
Elders meetings are for men.
Presbytery meetings are for men. (I’ve both been told “why would you want to come?!” and “you can come sit by me” by pastors when I’ve asked about these regional meetings.)
The country-wide meeting of my denomination is attended by female ministry workers and wives, but you can only vote if you are a man.
See where I’m going with this? We have largely male-dominated spaces because only men can preach and only men can be elders. But guess what? It’s not only men that are called to ministry.
In the spaces I’m in, women have to be invited by a man. Ministry jobs are few and far between, but the doors to that work are opened by men. The job descriptions must be written by men, voted on by men (elders), and then approved by those same men. Women cannot walk into paid ministry work here without an express invitation.
I’ve recently been studying Galatians with a small group of women and I’m more convinced than ever that I have been set free to follow Christ. If I quit following his call on my life–out of fear or out of exhaustion–then I am willingly walking behind prison bars again: It is for freedom that you have been set free!… There is neither Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, male or female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
I am going to minister to others. The Lord has heard my cries, my desires, my hopes. He made me and established his purposes within me to serve him and shepherd his people. I’d love to serve him in a church context, but the best thing is to see what doors he wants to open for me. I’ve been set free–beautifully so–and I will follow my Savior where he leads.
I’m actively posting graduation pictures of my one and only beloved (begotten?) daughter and I have near-constant flashes of school drop-offs in my head. The most challenging ones were in middle school.
So here is my gratitude list for those who helped us through every era and every episode of childrearing.
To those who heard me at my absolute worst, ie, when my middle schooler refused to get out of the car and go to school. Or when she refused to stand up (on E Street, at amusement parks, at the zoo–look, it happened a lot) I was HOT. I said things. Unpretty, ungracious things. You heard me and responded with love and guess what? WE DID IT. We survived. No, scratch that… WE THRIVED.
To those who came and took my kid to school on some mornings. Okay, that was Dad. Thank you, Dad. You and mom and grandma and grandpa deserve so much more than mere words but that’s all I’ve got at present.
To those who literally put my kid in a bathtub and bathed her. YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE. May your mansions in heaven be filled with every kind of delicious baked good and coffee that never runs out.
To those who hugged my kid and loved her. To those who hugged me and loved me.
To those who took my credit and insurance cards, those who scheduled appointments, those who dealt with canceled appointments and the rare completely-forgot–about-it appointments. Bless you. But even more to those who walked into counseling offices and counseled us, to those who walked into medical offices and gave high fives and cheered her on. You deserve all the stars in the sky for your care for us.
To those who taught. Oh, our dear teachers. Some of you were only okay but some of you were the most stellar people on planet earth. To those who gave tough love. To those who bandaged knees and gave tylenol and provided kotex. To those who listened and reasoned and still persevered and taught new things. I see you and I am you and we needed you at every single turn for the past however many years it took to earn a high school diploma. Some of you have been around that IEP table with us for years and I thank you for your longevity and ability to really see my girl.
To those who simply received this fabulous kid and believed in her from day one. To those who saw her light and didn’t demand she become someone else. To those who encouraged her writing and sculpting and drawing and horseback riding and love of every single animal on God’s green earth. Thank you for the opportunities you’ve given her to grow.
To the aunts and uncles who cheered her on. Biological, adopted, and honorary.
Memories are drifting in and out of my mind while I get ready to host a party to celebrate this moment. You are all a part of our journey and I’m grateful times a thousand for you.
…where two of our foster children came back to us. Our little boys brought a baby brother this time and—in that weird way dreams go—they required a lot of care, as in, all of them were babies with really bad diapers. I was weary in parenting them but also very happy and I remember exclaiming to Jeremy how wonderful it was that I didn’t have a job yet so I could be free to care for them.
I woke up and felt crushed. Crushed with the fact that carrying children in your heart once means you carry them there always. These little boys are my question marks. I’ve tried to figure out where they are and if they’re being cared for, but every avenue pursued for information has been a dead end. I also felt vulnerable, as though Freud himself was examining my dreams and floated out two very big and confusing life issues all in one relatively brief moment of REM.
My life now doesn’t look the way I intended it to. This is quite a theme for me, and sometimes the pain of it will seemingly come out of nowhere and smack me in the face, just like the dream did from last night. As I get older and meet more people, I’m keenly aware that not everyone knows my story. What is obvious about us Tredways is that we have one child. And good grief, sometimes that really kills me. What’s not so obvious is that we said a thousand yeses prior to our four years in foster care and all throughout our time welcoming children in our home. We said yes to adopting children two years before Livia arrived and we haven’t ever closed that door really. We said yes to biological children from the time Livia was one. We loved our peanut baby who is now in heaven, and I went through multiple surgeries and drugs to conceive, all with a no as the final answer. And then we rolled the dice big time and started caring for other people’s children through foster care. We knew reunification was the goal and always cheered on the parents whose lives we were privileged to join for a time. Meanwhile we said yes; yes to all the phone calls for more placements and yes to the children needing a permanent home.
When you say YES all those times and the answer is always NO, you feel confident that God is speaking.
I care too much about what others think. This is a lifelong struggle of mine. But I don’t mind saying out loud that God closed the door to more children.
And then I dreamed again of our little boys.
Oh, this life. It doesn’t always make sense, right? It doesn’t make sense that you could want something very badly and just not get it. It doesn’t make sense how grief works—both in our situation and in your lives, too—and how you might feel fine one moment and feel whammied the next. It doesn’t make sense that the future doesn’t seem crystal clear and that we might have seasons of feeling goal-less and aimless. As much as we fill up our schedules and find ways to be productive and necessary, at the end of the day, what are we doing with ourselves? Where do we find comfort and rest?
I cling to God’s promises in the Bible. I’m completely aware that many of you may not find hope there, but I do. My faith is weak, my vision is poor, my memory is forgetful, and even my dreams sometimes punch me in the gut, but I have faith in a God who is sovereign and who loves me very much. This world has all kinds of trouble, but He is good and He is faithful from the beginning of time to the end.
I believe in God and love him with my whole heart.
That may be a weird thing to say because God is pretty mysterious and also he’s pretty big and so what does it mean to be one small person in this universe and declare that I love the One who made it?
I’ve been mindful of the seasons, of the church calendar to be specific, as I teach my 4th-8th graders a bible lesson each week. Connecting new material to old material is the way we learn, so I refer back to concepts we’ve already learned or holidays that are already in their lives, and lately we’ve been looking forward a little bit. Jesus was born into a people, born for a specific task, born to continue the story God began with humanity, and born to redeem. We’re now beyond the Easter story and working through WHAT IT ALL MEANS.
Working through WHAT IT ALL MEANS is the work of a lifetime. Truly, I’m working through WHAT IT ALL MEANS at age 44 and I’ll continue working through WHAT IT ALL MEANS until I meet Jesus face to face.
I believe the bible is true.
I believe God really does love me and I learn more about how He does that all the time.
I believe Jesus was God—is God—and that he died in order to redeem us from our sins. He balances the scales of justice cosmically and ultimately.
And I believe that the Spirit of God dwells in me now. He dwells in those who believe in him, giving us insight and correction, hope and purpose to live out our days.
This week has been a doozy. May brings with it wonderful occasions that leave me breathless on a normal year, but this year it’s all I can do to doggie paddle in order to keep my head above water. It’s the end of the school year—for me as a teacher and my kid as a junior. (JUNIOR. Lord have mercy.) It’s Livia’s EIGHTEENTH birthday tomorrow and, no, I have not absorbed what that signifies. It encompasses everything from “how did these years go so fast?” to “in Nebraska you’re a minor until age 19” to “what should she wear for her senior pictures” to “I’m so incredibly proud of her” and everything in between. It’s Mother’s Day. And maybe it’s still Infertility Awareness Week? And it’s Birthmother’s Day and boy oh boy do we miss and think of Livia’s first family with the biggest love in our hearts right now. Lots. of. feelings. It’s also graduation week for dear ones who have worked hard for their advance degrees and we are so proud of them. It’s Teacher Appreciation Week and we had an IEP meeting and, wow, do I love these people who love my kid day in and day out. I also love my students in ways that keeps my mind and heart both tremendously busy and tremendously full.
And in the middle of all the celebrations, there is hardship.
Long-loved friends are dying and that seems impossible. There’s pain and suffering and being too far away to physically help those you love. There are loved ones ailing. In hospitals fighting for their lives and awaiting surgeries with fear and trepidation. The country is torn over women’s rights and women’s health issues and the ever-pressing question of whose life is worth more? Why do we even have to decide whose life is worth more? They are ALL worthy of love and attention and good care and respect. But who wins? Truly, no one wins. Not before Roe v Wade and not after. Not if abortion is a federal issue or a state issue. Women have always been on the crap end of healthcare and that game continues on. No winners, just a lot of losing.
Lord God, what do we make of all of this? How can May usher in so much joy and so much heartache all at once?
From one small person in the expanse of an entire universe I do not know. But God, you are huge and you are great. You created every creature, you know the number of hairs on my head, you clothe the lilies in the field, you know the number of stars in the sky. The pain is not too much for you to handle, too great for you to understand. The celebrations are not so small as to escape your notice. You see it all and you care for us in the midst of it all.
Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!
If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.
If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night,”
even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you.
A few years ago a life coach observed that I was beating my head against a brick wall. She knew I wanted to fly.
Up until that point I hadn’t considered it really, but I came to acknowledge that I felt like I was living in a straitjacket, that all my options were wrapped up and, boy, did I really want to stretch. What would it feel like to be set free? What would it feel like to exercise my abilities and to move beyond the boundaries that felt stifling?
Around the time I met with this wonderful life coach I wrote the following in my journal about what the word “thrive” meant to me:
to be excited, somewhere to channel the excitement
to blossom, to flower, to spread arms wide and run toward the light
to be uniquely used
to feel alive, vibrant, meant to be, purposeful
to be DELIGHTED & DELIGHTFUL & DELIGHTED IN
For years my prayers had begged God for some pretty specific things. I suffered greatly in spirit, going over my giftings with a fine toothed comb, reviewing my resume to see if I was falsely understanding who God had made me to be. My girlfriends, bless their hearts, heard my woes for many years and I am certain I exhausted them. My husband supported my pursuits, heard all the hardness and sadness in my heart, and in turns affirmed me, held me while I cried, challenged my thinking, and then set me back on my feet. And through it all, I turned the the One who made me and we talked. We talked a lot.
In this instance, my internal struggles made it very easy to say yes when an opportunity finally came my way. The yes was so immediate that I forced myself to take a breath and then consult with both my 17-year-old daughter and my husband. And then a whole bunch of other circumstances came into play—and I haven’t wrapped my head around all of that yet. Being in one position—a life-giving position—yielded to another position and now I find myself at the end of a school year preparing to say goodbye, for a season, to my students.
I graduated in 2001 with a Bachelors of Science in Education and a teaching degree in Missouri and here I am in 2022 planning out my final weeks of academia for my middle school students. To say I did not see this coming is an understatement, but all I can do for the moment is to turn back to that concept of thriving and how utterly freeing it is to abandon that straitjacket that hindered me.
I am trusted in my position in the classroom. Appointed to it, seen worthy of it, entrusted with it.
I am released to be my very best self. In this space I’m encouraged to be creative, to teach, to shepherd, to encourage, to raise up these precious young people into their futures.
I have autonomy here. There is always accountability and structure, which is so important, but also autonomy.
I work within a team of godly and wise people to bring excellence to all we do.
I’m compensated fairly for my hard work and for my resume.
I still find it tremendously sad that the place where I felt most restricted and bound against being fully myself was in the church. I don’t think it has to be that way by any means, but it’s the reality for many women with leadership skills.
For now I praise God for the good gift of work, for my incredible co-teachers, and for the students I spend time with each week. They engage my mind and spirit, they challenge me, and in our classroom I am free to exercise my gifts in a thousand fulfilling ways.
Yesterday had some rough moments for sure. Rough moments in my classrooms turned into rough patches in my heart, which then turned into rough mom and wife vibes in my home, which flowed right into rough self-talk and feelings of inevitable future doom.
That rolling stone certainly gathered moss of a terrible kind. I’m still dealing with the effects of it in the daylight today, trying hard to separate truth from fears, reality from pessimism.
Despite the weight of some ick, I had four bright shiny points in my day that a little voice keeps telling me to write down. So here I go.
One. I find myself in a work position where I get to rub shoulders with someone I love very much but haven’t seen a lot in recent years. The girls who lived next door to me on South 8th—the Grand girls—are family. We did a lot of life together in those years! So yesterday when Joie and I got down to our deepest selves in a 30 Second Dance Party? Well, it connected a lot of dots and brought a lot of joy. The memory of it will always make me deeply happy. (I highly recommend teacher dancing before school to remind yourself you’re not just who these young kids think you are.)
Two. A student brought me my favorite candy and my heart exploded. In that moment I had zero idea how he knew that I loved Neccos (turns out his teacher mama told him) and all the heart emojis were floating around me in joy. Suffice to say that zero of my students had ever tasted a Necco, so later, when I broke them out and shared them it was a sweet moment. Mega warm fuzzies still.
Three. I love Lynn Locklear more than I even like most people. We’ve got a rapport that comes with years of working alongside each other in the Zion Church office, and yes, perhaps I’m using the word “working” a little loosely. Lynn says her productivity massively increased after I left, but I’d like to believe the positivity we generated in that space made all our conversations and laughter completely worth it. So while I was emailing Lynn—something that doesn’t happen that often anymore—I actually ran into her at the checkout counter of a bookstore. Total goodness.
And four. Word games are my jam. I love books. I love words. I could study etymology the rest of my life and be a happy camper. So last night as I was telling my family about an urgent GI situation mid school commute that day, we laughed ourselves silly about how I bought snacks at a gas station in order to justify my run to their restroom. “Post doo-doo Dew dues” was what we came up with and it is still making me giggle. So absurd, but how worth it to have a moment of laughing hard with my favorite people.
Laughter scares the blues away. Joy scatters the ugliness and lets the sunshine through. Counting our blessings just makes good sense.
A 5:00am wakeup time—becoming more common in the past few years—had me picking wallpaper images for my phone. This shot captures SO MUCH JOY for me. You know I’m serious because I wrote that in caps. Livia and I… mmm… invited ourselves along on my parents’ 50th anniversary trip to Sanibel Island last October and the location was absolutely dreamy. The water was just cool enough and the views were incredible. I found myself feeling more centered and at peace than I had been in a long time. My dad is walking in the background there, I’m admiring the world around me, and Liv, always the first to the sensory table in preschool, is shelling. Of course. We still bear loads of shells from the Gulf, months later, in frozen Nebraska.
I love my home. And I love to get away, especially to the ocean, and then I love to come home again.
