Mama Doe Wisdom

My Mama Doe and Me

Tall, damp grass tangles around my toes, soggy earth perfume fills the air, a red apple falls from the twisted and knotted old tree bordering our rural wilderness. Standing still, her ears twitching this way and that, a mother doe slowly and cautiously leads her two spotted fawns closer to the fallen fruit. Just a few feet behind her, the fawns follow, their white tails wagging and ears twitching, patiently waiting for their mother to give them the "okay." She steps forward and begins to eat, the little ones follow suit coming up on either side of her finding plenty of apples. After a little while watching I turn back towards the house, the sound of my slight movement makes Mama Doe start and look around, she sees me and begins to sniff the air and snort. The fawns look up at her, curious to see why she has stopped grazing. She turns and waits for the fawns to notice, then gracefully bounds back into the woods, the fawns following in their feebler and not yet determined gait.
Events and experiences are more keenly felt and understood, once one has or in my case, will soon be, experienced for oneself. As I approach the new stage of my life, motherhood, I can't help noticing all forms of mothers, children, and families. Time spent with my own mother is seen through a new looking glass, and I wonder at the amazing and beautiful example I've had for a mother. It fills me with questions: will I be as strong and as brave as she, will I have the wisdom, the compassion, and the perseverance that all growing up seemed to be so natural and easy for her. As my mom and I sit and talk over lunch, she tells me, " You're going to be a wonderful mother." Laughing nervously in my doubt, she continues, " I wasn't the perfect mother, and you know I made mistakes, but if you trust in the Lord- He gives you the strength, He gives you the wisdom, and He gives you the courage to wake up everyday with a smile on your face, ready to claim the greatest calling of your life. Being a mother is so much fun!" 
I've watched, learned, and followed my mom, just like the little fawns did this morning. I'm so grateful to know that I've had the best teacher, for she has followed the greatest teacher of them all, Christ. So as I step out in faith, into a field strewn with apples, I take confidence in knowing that my God is greater than any weakness I have and that He will provide whatever it is I need to be the mother He is calling me to be. What a joyful and happy place to be...

Preggie Pops and Snake Pillows

It always amazes me how so many birds begin to sing, just as one is drifting off to sleep. Normally, I love the sound of all my mite infested, feathered, frie...creatures. Although, I used to sleep like I'd climbed Mt. Everest and swam the Channel twice over, so waking up to the smell of delightful coffee brewing,and the chaotic mess of noise coming from my window was merely a gentle nudge to get up and seize the day! Now I find that being just four months pregnant, your joints and back refuse to let you get comfortable. The lovely people who know absolutely everything about be pregnant, midwives they call them, tell me, " One cup of coffee a day." Gah!! Do they know who I am?! Also, I can't sleep on my back anymore, or on my belly and if I sleep on a side- it should be my left. Great! I have an option. Except this is the most uncomfortable, so the night is spent flip flopping like the fat carp that shoved it's way to the top of the pile at Pymatuning Dam for a bunch of stale bread. However, the wonderful world of catering to complaining expectants, have come up with this "Snoogle" as they call it, namely, a pillow that slightly resembles a snake. Properly used this snake pillow allows the prego pop mom to sleep like they would with a Boa constrictor, completely motionless and for Pete's sake on their LEFT side. My inner cheapskate has a hard time paying more than twenty dollars for anything, much less a snake pillow so I came up with this ingenious idea. Using the cute decorative pillow that Husband always throws on the floor (he has a lack of appreciation of the finer things) I place between my knees and sleep peacefully as if on a cloud of cotton. That is until it goes flat, or scooches down to the bottom of the bed, or until Husband yanks at it thinking the blankets are all twisted. All that to say, this morning, the owls, doves, wrens, crows, chickadees, and chipmunks were facing great peril of a pellet gun, that is until I felt the small flutter of a five inch baby inside my belly asking for breakfast of eggs, bacon, waffles with boysenberry syrup, and COFFEE. So glad it's taking after me...

Joy of Life in Christ

"There is nothing that can replace the absence of someone dear to us, and one should not even attempt to do so. One must simply hold out and endure it. At first that sounds very hard, but at the same time it is also a great comfort. For to the extent the emptiness truly remains unfilled one remains connected to the other person through it. It is wrong to say that God fills the emptiness. God in no way fills it but much more leaves it precisely unfilled and thus helps us preserve -- even in pain -- the authentic relationship. Further more, the more beautiful and full the remembrances, the more difficult the separation. But gratitude transforms the torment of memory into silent joy. One bears what was lovely in the past not as a thorn but as a precious gift deep within, a hidden treasure of which one can always be certain."
— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

There's something in the crisp white of the snow and the way it falls ever so gently today, that makes life seem so peaceful, so beautiful. Life is beautiful, what a wondrous gift our Creator gave each of us that are alive. Even greater than life,however, is the death of one who believed in our Creator. The glorious faith that allows that person to move from earthly sorrow, pain, and struggling toil that life often brings, to a place more suited for a child of God. Heaven is a place that we believe in. It's the palace with streets of gold and pearly gates. One will never cry, for there will be nothing to be sorrowful about, no one will hate for only love encompasses everyone there, hearts our free, bodies are perfect not sick or crippled, and the most wonderful thing above all others- is that they are with their Lord and Savior- the man who chose to die to give them this life of perfect beauty. Today a beautiful lady, with cheeks that felt like velvet when you kissed them, and soft hands that held ours tightly when she hugged us "hello," and a stature that was poised and elegant like a Queens, is accepting her crown full of jewels for a job well done here on earth. Praise God for His love and her willingness to accept Him as her Savior. For though I'd barely begun to see into her heart, I'm going to miss her very much for in the little time that I knew her, she showed love, kindness, and a joy that comes from loving God. What joy it is to know that I will see her again someday, ready with her hair just so and all her pins fastened, to show me what Heaven is like. Thank you Grandmother Center for loving us, we will miss you so much!

"The sun does not shine upon this fair earth to meet frowning eyes, depend upon it." Charles Dickens

Thunder claps shake our little house, wind is howling through every cracked window and gap, a flash of lightning scatters shadows all over the walls... You'd think this is a summer storm, but one look out the window tells you much the opposite. Jack frost is clinging stubbornly to the window, a fine, fierce snow is blowing in every direction, and little crystals of ice are pulling every small branch further and further into a frown. Mornings like these, though intimidating for those poor creatures who must journey out, are quite tranquil and comforting for those of us snug in our cozy abodes. It always amazes me at how much we complain about how wretched the winters are in Erie, for every year is very much the same as the last. When it snows in the winter we are shocked because we got "too much," when it's 85 degrees in the summer we are mad because we're too hot, the springs are too long in coming and overly muddy, the falls are a beautiful array of color, but then there are thousands of leaves to rake and mulch so lets complain about that too. Gracious, just writing that makes one feel grouchy! However, this morning as I read from Psalms, the perfect verse for Erie was right there, " The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. " Ps. 19:1-4 What a difference that verse makes, when you remember that everything around us is displaying the glory of our God! That all His creations are living proof that He is God, He has made everything, and it is all GOOD. In fact, it's WONDERFUL, how thankful I am for the beauty that God has shared with us, by making each season different, each with a purpose, and all for us to enjoy. I feel blessed to live where all four seasons are experienced, so bring on the snow, mud, humidity, and leaves, if the wind and trees are clapping their hands to praise their Creator I'm gonna be right there with them...

Rockwell and Me and other Nonsense

My head slowly starts to bop to the music, my fingers begin to tap in rhythm of bongo drums and I fancy myself in some warm sunny place with lots of sand and sun. The crunch of the espresso bean between my teeth wakes me up to reality, and I remember that I'm sitting in a coffee house in the middle of winter, feeling just slightly too warm for the three layers I have on.My husband, Jared, has had classes for two days in Cleveland, looking at it as a mini vacation I immediately said “Yes” to his asking if I'd coming along. However, after spending the first day staring out the windows, drinking cardboard roasted hotel coffee, and spilling more tears than I thought possible watching all the TCM specials with Cary Grant -I decided to brave the intimidating city life for some fresh air. Besides the fact that I had no other choice since check out was at 11 a.m. Walking around the block once was enough fresh air, I was beginning to feel like soon someone was going to start following me- thanks to Alfred Hitchcock deepening my already over reactive imagination. The valets standing outside a ritzy hotel were sure to be fakes, and their smiles were so not legit. I detoured so as not to pass them again, and slipped into the haven of Erie Island Coffee Co. Since I've worked as a coffee barista for almost four years, this place was the closest thing to home and it even had ERIE in it's name. I felt a little like Audrey Hepburn did about Tiffany's, nothing bad could possible happen to anybody here. Still not wanting to look out of place, I ordered quickly, acting like this is what I do everyday. I set up my laptop plug it in, dabble around on the desktop pretending to look for the “super important file” that I’m supposed to get in by such and such a time. Looks like I'm gonna be here all day working on it, that is until Jared gets out of class and saves me from my charade of looking aristocratically important. Just to make it look even more believe-able I pull out my super nerd RayBan glasses and put them on...not for too long though, with contacts in I wouldn't want to spoil the effect by falling off my chair with self induced vertigo. So here I am, sitting, drinking my latte, and listening to coffee house music- which is always a genre of it's own- the same songs played somewhere else never sound like the same song. People watching is pretty good from where I'm sitting, right in the front window- sideways- so I don't have to turn my head to watch ( with my amazing peripheral vision ) plus the reflection of all the angles of the windows allows for extended views of people coming and going. Now before I start to sound creepier than I really am, let me say this, people watching is my profession, a very ill paid one for sure, but that is why I work at a coffee house- so I can people watch and get paid for it. Watching people is a form of art I believe, which is probably why I like Norman Rockwell paintings more than Van Gogh's. You see, Rockwell's paintings you can look at and know exactly what he is portraying, it's life, painted with all the details that make life interesting and fun. He emphasizes the things in life that people remember, and therefore, they hit you in your core because you can relate to almost any of his paintings, for you've been in them yourself. Watching people is for me, kinda like watching a Norman Rockwell painting in motion, making a dull and boring day somewhat exciting and new. Ordinary people become more interesting, their smiles more defined, and their mannerisms more exaggerated. Knowing how to see people as they are yet catching onto their individual personalities can be a great way to get to know people. So many times I have misjudged a person by the way they smile or look at me. It's easy to think the the frowning elderly man is an ogre, and thus all the stories of the dreaded “ old man next door” that will eat you alive if your cat climbs up his tree- begin. Then one day as he's taking his daily stroll down the road, whacking at rolling pop cans with his knotted wood cane, and muttering to himself, he stops before you and says, “ Hey, kid how's it goin'?” Starring speechless at first you awkwardly answer,“ Fine Mr. Smith, how are you?” “ Above ground!” He says, and walks away laughing at the morbid joke that he just made about himself. Suddenly the scary old man next store isn't as scary, he's just a lonely old man with a very dry sense of humor- and what's more is he has his own cat, it's just as old as he is and doesn't climb trees anymore. How does this make getting to know people any easier, you may ask? A.K.A. Is the answer to that question, Also known as, ASK, Know, and Apply, by Asking someone about themselves, and listening with genuine interest, you will Know better how to Apply yourself to establish healthier relationships. *****Blip of changing the current subject**** Big fan of watching people by Ella Fitzgerald, even the snowflakes seem to be floating to the crescendos of her voice, ah, winter isn't so bad*** So, back to the moral of this story, don't just assume that the people you see everyday are the same people you see everyday. If you look close enough, I bet you can find something new about them and make that relationship even better- or worse depending on your motive. So go ahead and try it out, pick someone you know (or think you know really well) and find something new out about them, I bet you'll be surprised at how much better you can get to know them. Now wasn't that enlightening?

Once Upon a Time

Grabbing a mug from the cupboard, I hear the small "clink" of my engagement ring hitting the ceramic- I stop and look at it as it sparkles back at me- and I smile thinking about what it means. Last winter my mom and I had stood in the sunlit kitchen with our mugs looking out across the field of freshly fallen snow, admiring the sparkling beauty of God creative way's of blessing us with what mom coined as "poor girls diamonds." The peacefulness and joy that settled in my heart that morning now comes twinkling back at me from my ring finger, for it will be there forever and what an exciting and beautiful reminder to have all year round!
There is an endless list of romantic stories that we girls have grown up hearing that follow a similar plot- poor, over worked damsel meets Prince Charming, and is rescued just in the nick of time from becoming an old maid. Cinderella working day and night for those nasty step sisters, loses her glass slipper, Prince finds it and searches persistently till he finds the perfect fit. Snow White whistles to pass the time away, is completely oblivious to the jealous and creepy old hag's plan, eats the apple trying to be healthy and save her figure, but ends up having to wait for her slow, but determined Prince to come wake her from her sleep. Dwarfs just don't have what it takes apparently. We hopeless romantics watch these with a box of tissues and some chocolate's wondering if it will ever happen to us....which makes us grab another box of chocolates for most of us doubt that it ever will--or if it does- it won't be as happy or as romantic. So what then? Is it really as exciting as the movies and story books portray? Is the prince as gallant and chivalrous? Does he really have the strength to make it up that steep and treacherous cliff to save fair lady? Will the love they find be perfect and whole? Will it last forever? As these questions run through my head, I keep saying a big, " YES!" You may ask how I know this is true and shake your head at my confidence and say that it is a mere flicker of temporary excitement, that after the newness wears off, will sink into the pile of broken dreams, however, I can tell you why I am so sure- how this amazing blessing has come to be.
Before I was born, someone loved me and though they knew I was going to be born with many faults and make many bad decisions, that I would purposely do things to hurt them and reject them-they decided to leave me a gift that would provide me with happiness for all of my life. God in His infinite mercy, loved me without one ounce of my own love to give back in return, He chose to give me His love, and send His Son to die for my sins against Him- to give me eternal life even though I deserved death. When I was seven I understood the importance of that gift and accepted it, accepting Jesus Christ as God's Son, and asking for forgiveness, was given the perfect peace that passes all understanding. I am confident that Christ's love for me is true and sure, and I'm so thankful for it and praise Him for all his continual graces to me! How then can I doubt that this new gift He has sent, Jared namely, is not something sure and true? "Every good and perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation of shadow of turning." James 1:17 As Jared and I prayed together, as we both sought after Christ together, we were amazed to discover that Christ was giving each of us to the other! So as Jared knelt to ask me for my hand, that I was so nervously sitting on, and told me how much He loved Christ and how much he has come to love me, " Of course I will marry you!" was the only answer I could give- and if Christ's love for us is forever- then so is the love he gives us for others. The pumpkin coach will soon be driving away, and we'll be waving from it together, happy forever in Christ......

After Thanksgiving Resolutions

As I polished off my second piece of thin crust pizza, and gulped the last of the Sprite, my mind was finally at ease. It was finished, the binging was over, after all it was the day after Thanksgiving, and I'd had my fill of leftovers. The Turkey sandwiches, the pumpkin pie with a mountain of whipped cream, and the cheese and crackers were not even appetizing. After working all day, we decided to order pizza for dinner, saving the rest of the turkey for Sunday soup. We sang along with Bing and Blue Eyes Christmas songs on vinyl, decorating the house for Christmas feeling rather jolly. The house looked great and the tinsel was doing a great job glittering and looking glamorous. It was at this moment my glutenous self realized that all this eating was not going to have such a glamorous effect on my figure. Therefore, after that momentous moment of polishing off my perfect pizza crust (pizza hut really does outdo themselves on that thin crust thing), I decided that starting the next day-Saturday-it would be back to eating normal sized portions, at normal hours of the day. Strictly three meals, with plenty of fruits and fiber, eight glasses of water, and "hold" most carbs.
I woke this morning with the motivation level of Napoleon after his successful battle at Waterloo. Wait, that one didn't go so well for him did it? Never mind, at any rate breakfast went pretty well- coffee and a piece of pumpkin pie. Not even a big piece of pie, course I had a sliver more because the piece I cut was rather small, but I was going out to load firewood- surely I'd work it off. After that lunch went well too, small salad and one itsy bit of turkey. Cool, this was going pretty well, ah but alas, it was the calm before the storm. After doing some reading my appetite was pricked, the cheesecake in the frig looked pretty sad all by itself, so down it went. Some house cleaning called and off I went refueled on cheesecake, hmmm...that pumpkin roll it getting dried out, better take care of that too. I stopped, trying to regain some composure, they say when you're craving food you should drink tea, why that is supposed to work I have no idea- but I made some anyway. The only problem is, I'm accustomed to taking crackers with my tea, so a tray of sliced apples, pears, smoked gouda and crackers accompanied me to the study. Not so bad, it's all healthy anyway right? However, after something salty one must have something sweet- pumpkin pie took care of that. Ahh, but we aren't making dinner tonight, better toast a bagel to tide me over for the rest of the night. Bagel and more tea finishes the night off....well maybe the squirt of whipped cream to annoy brother finishes it. ~Big Sigh of Contentment~ Well, maybe my resolutions were a bit manic, maybe N.F. Simpson had something when he said, " I eat food merely to put it out of my mind." We'll try that method tomorrow....