I Need a Vacation

When I am weary and feeling in need of a vacation I do not have time to take, I take out the memories of particularly good ones already taken. The last month or so has been a bit taxing and revisiting this tale was just the remedy I needed to pick myself up and move on to the next thing on the list.

Several years ago, Tav and I were stealing a couple weeks in Montana, which is our favorite escape from our lives. Two whole weeks just for us. The only rule we have for our stolen trips (the ones we really can’t afford to take, but simply can’t afford not to) is that we do what we do together and that we consciously celebrate life and God’s presence in it. This particular trip, we spent a lot of time on the road, checking out places we’d never been as well as revisiting old favorites. We drove through Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons to Jackson Wyoming. There is a little Episcopal Chapel just as you cross from Yellowstone into the Tetons. The back of the altar is all glass. To look around the altar cross and see the mountains behind is truly an astounding moment. It’s like hearing God say, “Look what I did for you. Feast on my land with your eyes and you will know Me.” It’s one of the most personally spiritual places I’ve ever been. Now we always plan a stop there to sit a while and every time we feel completely uplifted and one with each other and with God when we leave.

We spent the next couple nights in Jackson, not to be confused with Jackson Hole. Jackson is the old town.  Jackson Hole is the very modern made to look old ski area. We got up the next morning and hiked and explored the area. Came back and did a bit of spa action, had an early dinner and watched the stars. The next morning we headed back through the parks, but for the first time on any of our visits the Cody pass was open. A whole new park adventure for us. We drove. We stopped. We gawked.  We picnicked.

I needed a break from the car. We saw a sign announcing a 2.5 mile hike to Looking Glass Lake. A good omen. A hike and water. Perfect. Tav agreed to stop and we tied on our hiking shoes. 2.5 miles is a short jaunt for us. We took nothing with us assuming we’d be back at the car in less than an hour. We saw an older couple returning from their hike, spoke to them and they said the walk was pleasant and not strenuous. Plus, they didn’t look worn out. Again, perfect. Off we went. It was a beautiful hike. A nice path to follow and lightly wooded. Cool breeze blowing. Perfect woodsy smell – clean vegetation unspoiled by man. Good-bye fanny fatigue. Well we walked and we walked. Where is this lake we asked ourselves? By this time we had clearly walked at least two miles. Uh-oh.  We must have taken the wrong path somewhere.  But we hike a lot and Tav has a good sense of direction.  We knew which direction to head in to get back to road. We had no water, no compass, no bear bells, and no cell phone. Stupid rookie mistakes when hiking where there are wild animals. Still we knew we weren’t too far from the road. OK – we voted to continue and see where life led us. 

Not fifty yards up the path we saw scat from a very large animal. Lots of scat from very large animals?? However we did not know what kind of large animals. I took the car keys out of my pocket and started jingling them. We also started singing silly songs. Surely any animal worth its salt would be running away from us.  Reassured, we continued on our path. We climbed over felled logs over swiftly running creeks. Tav has an excellently embarrassing picture of me scampering across looking like I am scared to death. Which he knew I was.  I am totally uncoordinated and actually turn green when looking down from on high. After crossing this particular creek, we started downhill which was a good sign and the path seemed to be heading directly to the road. 

We rounded the curve and we were face to butt with a buffalo. He was less than 5 feet in front of us. We had a swift vision of the signs posted throughout the park.  “Do not approach the animals”. Tav turned around and I was gone.  Twenty-five feet above him standing in a big pile of deadfall. Neither of us knew I could move that fast. Tav climbed up with me. We could see the beast just standing on the path nibbling buffalo delicacies from the abundant greenery. We waited, we pondered. We saw the buffalo move just a foot or so off the path and decided to make a dash for it.

Neither of us has moved that fast since. We could hear road traffic and ran straight for it, thinking that where there was one buffalo, there was bound to be another. We left the path and scooted across what we thought was grass. No such luck. A bog. Up to our ankles in sucking, stinky muck. We finally got to the road and could see our car about 50 yards up the road. We laughed until we couldn’t breathe over our own stupidity. And thanked God for getting us out of there in one piece. We had been hiking for over 3 hours. The only damage was our shoes.  Mine were absolutely black and slimy. We bagged them up and changed back into sandals and continued our ride. So longer saddle sore, but with a new tale to tell.  I did finally get my shoes mostly clean and wore them several more years.  Tav called them the Tatonga poop shoes until I retired them. We’ve also never hiked without the appropriate supplies again – not even for a 2.5 mile walk.

Is there a wonderful outdoors story in your past that still makes you laugh?  The mental pictures I come up with every time I revisit this one still make me giggle. But I'm now ready to tackle the next sixteen items on my to-do list!

I Need A Candidate!

Michelle Bachmann asked attendees at a speech she gave to sing happy birthday to Elvis. Not only was it not his birthday, it was the anniversary of his death.  Mitt Romney wants to make $10,000.00 bets when the rest of the country can’t even imagine having an extra $10,000.00 lying around with which to make frivolous bets. Newt Gingrich is becoming scarier by the minute. Ron Paul’s family needs to take him in hand and protect him from himself. I’m not even going to talk about the others. Really.

I need a candidate. I am a democrat and a feminist to boot, albeit a conservative-leaning one. Politically, there are literally millions like me in this country. We all need a candidate. Fast. With idealistic high hopes and visions of a healing time for our country, I voted for Obama. Granted, he inherited a colossal mess. But I am so disappointed. I am seeing the direct opposite of his campaign promises. He was going to be the candidate who worked for everybody – regardless of their political party.  He seems to be stubbornly sticking to a party line while claiming that he will compromise – if everybody else agrees to do it his way. It’s just not working.

Our political system is broken. Is it Obama’s fault? No, not entirely. The Republicans seem to have decided (also stubbornly) that no matter what the subject matter, they want the opposite of the Democrats. Period. It’s like a grade-school playground war.  But the consequences for our country go far beyond a three-day suspension from school. Our country is broken. Everyone is looking for someone else to blame. But the fact remains that we are broken; financially, emotionally, spiritually broken. We lack the proactive, positive leadership that brought our country out of similar situations in years past. We need a leader who can re-ignite the patriotism that has been such a bulwark of American life. I really thought Obama could do it.  I was wrong.

I believe that our constitution and our budget are moral documents and that our Senators and Representatives seem to have lost either their understanding of their responsibility to those moral documents or their morals altogether. I need a candidate. I need a morally upright person who gets social justice.  One who understands our moral responsibility to those less fortunate. Ideally, I think I need a faith-filled business person who has experience in the real world with real people and understands our country’s moral responsibility to support the small business owners and entrepreneurs who are the backbone of our economy rather than pandering to big corporations. I know I’m asking for a lot, but please, God, send us a candidate.  We are so lost.

I’m open to suggestions for a solution.  Just hurry up.

The Reason for the Season

I just got back from a flying visit to hug my sister-in-law. Life has been kind of hard for that part of our family in the last couple of months and she just plain needed a hug. Or, more accurately, I needed to give her one or six. It was a one night, less than 24 hours trip. Round trip – it was about seven hours of driving. It included my most unwelcome dogs (one of whom is 15, both of whom are sort of large) . I really needed to deliver some hugs. I didn’t have a dog sitter. She was gracious. What can I say? Sisters-in-law are among God’s most special gifts – especially when their husbands share a really quirky gene-pool. 

As we were leaving this morning, her parting words resonated with my soul. “This year we will really be celebrating the true meaning of Christmas.” Her comment spoke to the lack of time before Christmas to simply “get it done”. This year the bundle of gifts for family, baked goods for friends, and that perfect something for a co-worker probably just won’t get done. Circumstances are simply eating the time.  But what I heard resonated on a whole different level.

“The true meaning of Christmas.”  The commercialism-free, holy celebration of the birth of Jesus.  When the chips are down, that is where we turn for comfort.  But sometimes we tend to forget that need when we are riding on top of the world.  We get carried away with the gift-giving and the mania that tends to accompany the season.  We lose our heartfelt thankfulness.  We ride through the season on a wave of superficiality. 

Today I am thankful for family.  For the fantastic times.  For the not so fantastic times and the way both kinds of times tend to draw us closer.  I am especially grateful to a sister-in-law who reminded me of the true meaning of the season, helped me let go of the seasonal madness and made me think about those words all day.

Anybody else need that kind of reminder?

New Traditions

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving. All of our children, their spouses, fiancé’s and our grand gifts were in attendance at Camp. Way too much food, a great deal of laughter, a lot of football, a bit of hunting and fishing for the guys, a bit of shopping for the girls and the antics of a two and a four year-old made for a boisterous good time. There was a little nostalgia for holidays past. This was my first holiday away from my parents – ever. I am so fortunate to still have both of my parents; it really was quite difficult for me to miss sharing even one special occasion with them.

Also, our son-in-law-to-be was celebrating without his family for the first time. I am sure it was hard for him, even though he was gentleman enough not to let me see it. All of us understand with our minds that the passing of time brings with it necessary changes to long-held traditions. But our hearts stage a grand rebellion and we want to cling to what is familiar and what has always made us happy. Change needs to sneak up on you, and catch you by surprise so that you are suddenly flooded with the realization that the change has already happened, and that you are so grateful that it was just fine after all. 

Best new tradition:  Everybody went to the Christmas tree farm and chose a NC mountain-grown tree to take back to Eastern NC for Christmas. Santa was definitely on-site to insure that all wishes went straight into his ear and therefore his memory. After all, Santa forgets nothing. 

Next best new tradition:  The arrival of the Elf on the Shelf named (by the grand gifts) Fred. The children found Fred in various dioramas throughout the house each morning after much planning, staging and giggling by the resident elves. The idea being that Fred flew to the North Pole to update Santa on everyone’s behavior and then flew home to have an adventure of his own each night. He had a date with Tinkerbell. He wore pink pajamas and had a sleepover with a baby doll. He ate popcorn while hanging upside down in the popper. He got stuck in a birdhouse. He even went fishing in the toilet tank.

   

We also got the giggles sending personalized video messages from Santa to each other. Highly recommended website for the entertainment of all elves and the amazement of all young children:  Portable North Pole (portablenorthpole.tv).  Fill in the blanks and Santa will send your child (or grown-up friend or significant other) an email directed very specifically to them. 

Did anybody else start a new tradition this Thanksgiving?

Walking off Thanksgiving

I’ve been thinking about “Ernie” lately. When the kids were growing up, I drove them everywhere. To and from school, to after-school activities and field trips, to weekend sporting events, overnights, etc.  You name it, I was the driver. First of all, I was more than a bit paranoid about who they rode with.

And secondly, I learned early on that kids in the two backseats of a big old Suburban forget that there is an adult driving the car. Suddenly you became invisible and totally deaf. You just weren’t in the car. It was fabulous – one of my best mom tricks. Because once they forgot you were there and as long as you didn’t open your mouth, they started talking. About everything under the sun. Boys, girls, boys and girls together, teachers, principals and coaches, sex, alcohol, and drugs. Good ways to get around your parents’ rules and curfews – what worked on what parents. Who snuck out on Saturday night. You know – the good stuff. The more kids in the car, the better. I was the best informed mom in town. It also helped that I might have been the only mom in the neighborhood who provided “travel snacks” and was always good for a trip to the Donut Shop. Much to my husband’s dismay these goodies were always eaten in the car.  Many kids, much food and a moving car make for quite a mess over time. I didn’t care then and I still don’t clean cars. Just ask him!!

Travel with them long enough, keep your mouth shut long enough, and they eventually start talking about real life, grown-up stuff. “We need to cheer Mary up. Her Mom just got diagnosed with breast cancer. I’ll call her tonight. You ask her to spend the night on Friday.” “Sam got cut from the baseball team. Want to go with him to try out for American Legion ball so we can still play together?” “We’re doing Samaritan’s Purse stuff at EYC Sunday, want to come?” “If you had to vote in this election who would you vote for? Really? Tell me why.” And so on. Issue after issue would come up and sometimes the conversations would pick up again on the next carpool trip. That’s how I found out about “Ernie”.

Riding through the neighborhood one hot, hot summer day on our way to the pool, one of the girls pointed out a young black man, maybe in his late twenties, walking down the side of the road with way too many clothes on for such a hot day. She commented that she had noticed him walking around the neighborhood a lot and wondered where he was going. The consensus of the group was that he must be walking to and from work.

A couple days later, as we headed to an evening baseball game, we spotted the young man walking again, only in the other direction. The kids again contemplated where he had been and where he was going. This happened over and over for many weeks. Come fall, the kids had named him “Ernie” and we discovered that his path was pretty consistent. After winning a fall soccer game, I took the group to a fast food spot for a celebratory dinner. There was “Ernie” working in the kitchen. We found “Ernie” working in several fast food spots over the next year or so. The kids got so they noticed when he was missing from his regular route and wondered if he was sick or had moved away. Then several days later, “Ernie” would be back where we expected to see him and all was well again. 

Riding home one afternoon, we spotted “Ernie” trudging down the road in the pouring rain with no raincoat and no umbrella. He was drenched. The kid noise took on a new rumble, and soon, my daughter’s voice rose above the usual cacophony. “Mom, we all have umbrellas in this car. Is one of Dad’s raincoats in here somewhere?” I replied, “You have got to be kidding, Dad thinks this car is a dumpster. Do you really think he’d leave anything he cared about in here?” “Well, then just turn around and go offer “Ernie” a ride or give him an umbrella.” As my mind clicked, “Yes, thanks be to God, she did listen!” I turned the car around. We stopped beside “Ernie”. I got out of the car, introduced myself and offered him a ride. He appeared to be really frightened, like a child who had done something wrong and knew he was in trouble. As I spoke to him, I realized that he probably fell somewhere on the autism spectrum. As he sort of cowered and refused the offer of a ride, I handed him an umbrella that one of the kids proffered through the window. He tried to give it back. I told him that the children in the car wanted him to have it. That it would hurt their feelings if he refused. He nodded and took the umbrella.  As I climbed inside the car, the children expressed their upset that “Ernie” had to keep walking in the rain. I tried to explain that “Ernie” had some communication difficulties and that he was trying to follow the rules, much as they had “stranger rules” to follow. That it was hard for him to take the umbrella.  They seemed to understand that – although there was a bit of conversation about the fact that they didn’t know “grown-ups” had stranger rules, too. This thought sort of disturbed them even as it comforted them.

Years passed. The kids grew up, went to college, got jobs, got advanced degrees, got married and had children. Twenty-five years later, the girls and I were pushing a stroller full of my first granddaughter as we walked off Thanksgiving lunch, when they spotted “Ernie” on the same beaten path. They were amazed that he was still around. I commented, “Well, you are still around, aren’t you?” They asked, “Is he really still marching the same path every day?” “Yes,” I replied. “His world has changed little even though your lives have moved to different places his is sort of stuck in time.” “That’s not such a bad thing,” they said simultaneously. “They were really happy days.” This mother’s heart soared.

I actually saw "Ernie" today marching on the same path.  His hair is gray now and he walks a bit slower, but he seems to be his same old self.  It was strangely comforting.

Can you capture a moment in time when you did a mental break dance because your children proved to you that they really did “get” it?  

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is really my favorite holiday. Get together with friends and family, eat, drink and give thanks. What's not to like? Perhaps just the thought of too many people in a too-small place is your challenge. Perhaps timing the cooking of 16 different dishes at four different temperatures for 16 different amounts of time in one oven is just too much to contemplate. Or maybe Aunt Sarah's and Great Aunt Mary's annual "Who made the best pie contest" has gotten as old as they have. Then there are the toddlers with picky appetites whose nap times must be worked around. Or there may be that gluten-intolerant, nut or shellfish allergic, vegetarian whose food issues must be dealt with.

And there is always, always happy noise echoing off of every wall and shouts of chaotic bedlam that come with multi-generational family life. You could be trying to cope with family circumstances that are challenging or filled with grief. You might be alone. But for me, this holiday is worth every ounce of it. Every hour in the kitchen, every hour cleaning the house, every hour airing bedrooms long unused, every sound and every smell. (Even the year we carved the turkey on a cutting board that had been sprayed accidentally with bitter orange spray I’d been using to train a puppy not to chew everything in the house.) Because getting together with friends and family to eat, drink and give thanks is my favorite thing to do.

It's my opportunity to make sure that at least once a year I very intentionally say thank you to my friends for choosing to walk this life with me. To say thank you to my family because even though they really didn't get to choose me, they did choose to love me and share their daily lives with me. To celebrate births, engagements, marriages, firsts and lasts. To commiserate with the sad or lonely and to grieve with the grieving. To say thank you to God for the fullness of my life. And to say thank you for His presence here. What are you thankful for this Thanksgiving?

Thanksgiving Menu 2011

Roast Turkey with Gaga's bread stuffing
Tav's Grilled Turkey, chopped with bbq sauce
Honey Baked Ham
Gluten free stuffing
Vegetarian stuffing
Turkey Gravy - gluten free
Mushroom Gravy - vegetarian
Green beans (cut on the bias for Gramps)
Mashed Potatoes
Fresh Sauerkraut (we are of German descent)
Vegetable Stuffed Butternut Squash - Vegetarian Entree
Aunt Ella's Baked Apples and Cranberries with Oatmeal Brown Sugar Topping (no nuts, no gluten)
Cranberry Sauce (jellied, straight out of the can and lots of it)
Sister Shubert's rolls
Gluten free rolls
Chocolate Pie - nut free/gluten free
Pecan Pie
Ice cream & whipped cream ( the real thing is gluten free)

I hope your Thanksgiving is a joy-filled celebration.