all teary eyed

I passed a guy singing (and dancing) at the top of his lungs at a bus stop today. Thoroughly enjoyable. He may be the most uninhibited person I've ever seen...

Enjoyed dinner last night with a fun family and have now nominated their kids for entry into the "cutest kids in the world" club - so Makenna and Tracen, you have two new friends named Autumn and Taylor. Height of cuteness may have been when 2 yr. old Autumn put her tiny fists out for a little fist bump, shortly after 4 yr old Taylor gave all of us a big hug and kiss on the cheek.

And speaking of cuteness, that brings me to the title of this blog... There are brief moments and situations that make tears come suddenly...and not like really crying tears, just eyes almost overflowing type tears. These unexpected moments have been brought on by certain notes sung by sopranos, or incredible chords in lush symphonies when I'm playing and I'm surrounded by such intensity of sound, or by confessions of belief in God from people, or by innocence in kids. At Christmas the kids choir sang in big church and my eyes filled as they sang... I think maybe it is beauty that brings these tears. I'm not really sure...but it's good. Any of you ever experience those sudden tears? Hope so.

sad news

We had to put my (our) dog to sleep today : (.

Poor little Jesse was so full of cancer...but we had such a hard time letting him go. We had him for the last 15 years. Long time, especially for a big-ish dog like a german shepherd.

I am sad.

moments of irony

So I've joined the Jewish Community Center (a gym) here and yesterday I was struck by how funny life can be. As I was running around the track at the JCC, wearing an old mission trip shirt (the one with the California license plate) that has a verse from Hebrews on it, and listening to Bad Religion (they sing at the pace I run, works out well), I just had to laugh. None of that goes together...Jewish community center, new testament verse, band that...well, their name says it all. So as I ran, my mind wandered all over the place (when the track is only a 16th of a mile long and I lost count at about lap 5...you just give up counting and run for awhile) and irony kept striking...like how 8th grade was the worst year of all time, and now that's what I teach for most of the day...and how I, miss conservative goody-two-shoes, really enjoy some crazy music that maybe I shouldn't enjoy (like bad religion)...and how I really thought that I didn't want to get married until I was oldish (ie 28) and then changed my mind completely and thought I would get married like 2 years ago and now find myself very very single, but pretty ok with that again...and how I always think I'm a little jealous of those girls who always have a date, but then I go on a date (2 actually, wow) and realize that dating is not fun, just mostly awkward and nervewracking...and I could keep going on and on, but I won't. You know, I don't even know that these things really are exactly irony, but they strike me as funny, and I like them. I guess that I enjoy the contradictory parts of life...the parts you don't expect and which don't go according to "plan" (I must admit that I tend to throw a fit when my plans don't go like I wanted them too)...and you know, all this just goes to remind me that my glass is half-full again...yay! These ironic things were in fact making me chuckle as I ran...and you know that had to just be so weird for the people on the treadmills and bikes that I kept unintentionally making eye-contact with everytime I passed them...hey look, there's that girl that's run around the track like 30 times and she keeps smiling this really weird smile, wonder what's wrong with her...yeah, weird. Oh well, who cares, I do not go to the gym to look cool anyway. so there! ha ha : ) I hope you are enjoying life friends, truly I do! I hope I'm not the only one laughing while she runs too...come on, you know you want to look like a total weirdo too!

I am great (fantastic actually) and everybody likes me

There was a statement in an article on parenting in today's newspaper that really stood out…something to the effect of "current research has shown a strong correlation between high self-esteem and anti-social behavior…therefore what we need is a lowering of self-esteem…." Hmmm, interesting. Seems that what my generation was fed (your high self-esteem is the key to a happy, successful, and significant life) seems to have been wrong, imagine that. From the Christian point of view, that seems to be obvious…but now apparently the world is agreeing. Perhaps we aren't really worth all that high self-esteem that we thought we were. Not to say that people don't have wonderful qualities, useful, unique, even outstanding…but regardless of our talents, skills, etc., the view shouldn't be on ourselves. The aim isn't whether our self-esteem is elevated or not. And that's just based on the thought that we earn our self-esteem…and I should probably add the important detail that my generation was taught that your self-esteem is completely outside your abilities. For example, in 8th grade we had to present a portfolio of work that we'd done throughout middle school to a small group of our parents, teachers, and friends. We were instructed to put anything we were proud of in our little portfolio bag for presentation…and I distinctly remember a teacher telling us "even if a report has a grade of an F, if you're proud of it, stick it in there!" What?!? Proud of an F?! Seriously? Oh yes, seriously. Ok, so I thought the self-esteem movement was idiotic then (as a know-it-all 13 yr old) and it would appear that general society is agreeing with me now (yay for me! Just kidding, guess that would be a rather ironic statement in this particular post).
So what's my point? Well, friends, tonight I heard a speaker at a worship service talk about how we are absolutely incapable of saving ourselves…and once we have been rescued, we are still absolutely incapable of earning or paying back that rescue (Eph. 2:1-10). Why? Because we aren't enough…we are too far gone…we are prisoners of depravity, unable to free ourselves, ever. And because we don't deserve the glory of a freedom ability…When God rescues because of "the riches of his love", when he bestows his incredible mercy and grace upon us, when he sets us Free (with a capital F), he alone gets the glory. Which is as it should be…really, he's the only one who actually has a right to "self-esteem"…because he's perfect. He is what we should be. And I'm not saying that we ought to just think poorly of ourselves, "woe is me, I am so rotten", especially if he's saved us (because we're on the way then, he's in the midst of changing us) - I think CS Lewis had it right when he said that humility, practically speaking, isn't thinking badly about yourself, but rather just not really thinking of yourself at all. So as God changes us, and as we find ourselves working, it's not for our own merit. We work because God has changed our hearts…so it's never us that are owed glory from others or from ourselves. Hard words, I don't really know how to live like I think I ought to…but keeping the end in mind seems to be a start for me. In my mind's eye, I have this picture of a runner…running to the end. This picture isn't original of course, but I think I really identify with Paul referring to us as runners in a race because I like to run. I love it in fact, despite the tough battle in the middle of a run to just finish. There's something about running that makes me think of flying. Maybe I'm crazy (probably) since I know very few other people who actually enjoy running, but truly there's freedom in the movement for me. So why bring up running in the middle of a self-esteem soapbox? For me to finish a run, I have to see the end…not that the end is actually in sight, but I know it's coming eventually…so I just have to keep going. In that mind's eye picture, it's just the same…I find myself running on a mountain path, full of roots and rocks and uneven places (yes, Hind's Feet on High Places is my favorite book and I get my pictures from there)…and sometimes I run with endurance, sort of on that runner's high that allows you to just keep going without feeling like you're dying. Sometimes I want to stop and I find myself sitting on the ground, too tired to keep going. Sometimes, rarely though, I sprint…and that's the closest to flying that I come. You know when you see the finish line nearing and you run as hard as you can…heart pumping like crazy, lungs ready to burst, legs going faster than you feel like you can control, eyes focused on the finish, arms reaching, reaching, reaching for that finish line…ah, feels so good for a moment. And then the moment ends and you are completely out of breath, head beating with your rushing blood, legs like jello…but you made it to the finish and that's what matters. And the exhilaration that comes is so incredible, the realization that your legs did what you didn't quite know whether you could do. The difference between that and the runner in my heart is that my legs can't take me to the finish, and the exhilaration is completely due to the fact that God made my legs run to the end…and not only is he the fuel behind the sprint, he's the very reason for the sprint…it wasn't me at all. Sure I put my heart into it, I am going for the end with everything I've got, but my heart wouldn't go if he didn't cause it to. If he didn't rescue it and breathe life into it, and if he didn't put the desire for freedom in me, I wouldn't go.
I guess that I write this because I've been thinking about it a lot lately…thinking about how miraculously I feel like I've come alive again. How God has removed the crushing weight on my shoulders…the world is in color again and my heart is singing…and it's not because of anything that I did or didn't do, but because I've been rescued by the great love of my heart. So I guess I feel like I'm sprinting lately…and it's wonderful. A friend of mine told me last year about his struggle with timing, feeling like he sprints everything and sprinting doesn't seem to be the way to go about life. At the time, I thought he was right, because I wasn't sprinting then, and I don't even like to sprint (forgot to mention above that when I talk about sprinting the end of a run, I mean like the last 25 feet…because I am so not a sprinter). But I think I was wrong…there is merit in sprinting sometimes. I think that running with endurance is truly the best pace…and that's what it'll take to make it to the end…but maybe God has us run with everything we've got from time to time, so that we are reminded of the joy and the freedom that he's planted in us. We're reminded that the end is the focus, not the immediate situation, when we sprint because we can't sprint for very long. We're reminded that we can't do it too (no matter how good our self-esteem is!), that God must be our reason and our fuel. And maybe because sprinting is almost flying…and in the end, well, flying is Freedom.

Check out Baby Jesus' Hat!

This is from a little nativity that my mom brought back from Peru. Note the llama and the hats...they are fan-freakin-tastic! Who knew that little Baby Jesus was outfitted in a supafly snow hat?

Happy 2007 friends! I hope that your year has started well. I must say, I'm really REALLY happy that it's a new year. On Sunday I woke up thinking that I was so glad that 2006 was over because it stunk big-time (very positive thoughts, eh)...but then I started to look at pictures from the year and realized that something pretty amazing happened in 2006. Somehow, without realizing that it was happening, my smile became real again. Sounds ridiculous maybe...but most of you probably know that my smile was broken in 2005. Too much heartache made the joy in me hide away...and 2006 started in a continuation of the awfulness of 2005. In pictures from a trip to cloudcroft with Em and Graham, my smile isn't real at all. My mouth is turned up, but the screaming on the inside is written all over the outside. That trip was early in the year...January I think. In Africa, my smile starts to be genuine again...it's not a big smile, but it's real. Over the year, my smile becomes bigger and bigger - by the end, there are pictures of me laughing in which all of me is laughing...my mouth, my eyes, my body language says JOY again. Wow, how could I have missed that God was fixing my smile all along? I don't know...but I do know that my God is incredible and despite all the hard junk of the year, I can't cease to thank him for fixing my smile, and telling my heart that he loves me over and over and over again. And thanks to all of you for loving me too!

And now, on a funny note, just thought I'd share what I just witnessed...I'm currently sitting on a couch in my favorite Satellite (coffee shop) and it's pretty busy today. All the snow has meant major increases in coffee shop patrons, so it's often hard to find a chair. I got lucky with a seat on a couch(!) today. I'm across from another couch which has been taken up with 3 people for the last hour or so. They just got up to go and a pretty young looking couple (high schoolish) came in to take their spots. Apparently they'd been eyein' this couch for awhile as the guy said "Ah ha, now it's ours!" as he came in for the kill...and by "Ah ha, now it's ours", I mean that this guy said in the best action movie narrator voice "Ah HA, No-ow it's OURS" and proceeded to scurry in with his cute girlfriend. Ok, maybe it's not as funny in the telling...but it cracked me up...and if that didn't make you laugh, maybe the mental picture of me flailing around on the snow today will. I walked to the post office and nearly ate it as I crossed the street. I stepped where I thought was just snow, only to discover that the snow covered ice that made me slide a good foot or so, wildly waving my arms around in an attempt not to fall. Made me laugh out loud, which is always good, especially when somebody else is walking by, trying not to laugh at me falling down. Alas, too bad you're all not here enjoying the snow and the funny high school kids with me! : )

Aagh!

Ok, first, anybody like sea food? But really, a picture like this just BEGS the question "Why doesn't anyone want to marry me???"










Ok, and now SNOW! We got 13 inches...a new record for Albuquerque!! Whoohoo!!!