The Season of Breaking Through (Gather the Good)

"Emmanuel has come to us. The Christ is born, Hallelujah! Our God made low to raise us up. Emmanuel, has come to us." ---God Made Low

Next Sunday is the start of Advent, December 1st. Whether you are religious or not, the Christmas season comes hard and heavy, at least in most parts of the Western World. We get bombarded with tinsel, gift wrapping, and Bing Crosby for at least twenty-five days straight. I think we all end up feeling rather Charlie Brown about it, that Christmas is too commercial, and can't we all just sing around a sad little tree in the spirit of love and friendship? Nope. We know we can't. Expectations and pressure and the burden of perfect, magical memories weight heavy. It's a lot.

To be quite honest, some years I feel Christmas, and some years I don't. This year, I've been feeling a decent amount of anxiety about it. I feel overwhelmed by the burden of expectations and wish lists. I'm tired and don't have any idea how to muster up the wherewithal to pull it off. I know I am not alone.

"As He sleeps upon the hay He holds the moon and stars in place. Though born an infant He remains the sovereign God of endless days."--God Made Low

We sang a brand new (to me) Christmas song this past week at church. There was something about hearing a totally new song on such a familiar subject that was able to chip away a bit of the rock formation around my heart. In that moment of clarity, in the respite from the weariness, I understood that this is the season of breaking through.

Breakthroughs are amazing things. Sometimes the breakthroughs seem small to us grown people, like the light bulb that finally went off for my son that unlocked the world of reading, or when my daughter figured out potty training. We did these things so long ago that we forget the independence and sense of pride that came with them. Some breakthroughs impact the world--like when Edison finally got his light bulb right. And some breakthroughs happen in inches and degrees and in the mundane everyday moments, like when I choose patience over anger, gratitude over entitlement, grace over bitterness.

"You didn't want Heaven without us, so, Jesus, you brought Heaven down..."--What a Beautiful Name

And for Christians,  Christmas is when we stop to remember the moment when Christ broke through. His breakthrough was like none other in all of history or mankind. He broke through the wall of darkness that separated the created from the Creator, the beloved from the lover, the children from their Father. His break through demanded the attention of all heaven and hell, even though most of the Earthlings slept right through it.

I don't really care if it's historically accurate to celebrate this moment in late December. I don't really care about Saturnalia and pagan roots. It's interesting conversation, but it's not exactly the point. The point is that Jesus came, he saw, he conquered (and he did it a lot better than Caesar), and it's worth remembering, it's worth celebrating. I realize that the victory came at Calvary, but without Bethlehem, we have no way to the cross. To rend the veil in the temple, a breach first had to be made into our world at all.

"For all our sins one day He'll die to make us sons of God on high. Let every heart prepare Him room. The promises have all come true."--God Made Low

Since I was in middle school, I read a book almost every year called The Birth by Gene Edwards. It's a short little book, probably a novella actually. And it's told from the perspective of Michael and Gabriel, the archangels. In this book, Michael actually has to bust a hole in an iron or steel wall that has come to separate Earth from Heaven so that Gabriel can get through to Mary. I don't know if that's a Biblically accurate idea or not, but it's a powerful one anyway. There had to be a literal breakthrough on the part of Heaven to penetrate the palpable darkness of sin and evil coating the entire world. And not just a message came through. Emmanuel. God with us. Jesus.

So. It's late November. Thanksgiving is just a few days away. We decorated our tree and my Amazon shopping cart is full. Christmas steadily approaches. The question is: will this be a season of breakthrough in my own heart? Will the coating of weariness, uncertainty, frustration be busted open in this season of light? God, I hope so, I pray so. Let it be so. Let the trappings and burdens fall away. They're not real. They don't matter in the end. What matters is the breakthrough. I know I need one this year. And I'm pretty sure I'm not alone.

I'll be sharing some of my favorite Christmas music, books, recipes, and so on here on the blog over the next weeks and days. It's a deliberate choice on my part to share beautiful things when I would rather just skip it and sleep. I had a realization the other day that beauty ingested but not shared will only ferment and rot inside. So, I'll be sharing and I hope it blesses you, and helps you find some light in a frazzled season.

"God rest ye, merry gentlemen, let nothing you dismay. Remember Christ our Savior was born on Christmas Day to save us all from Satan's pow'r when we were gone astray. O' tidings of comfort and joy, comfort and joy. O' tidings of comfort and joy!" --God Rest Ye Merry Gentlmen

Gather the Good: Despite the Darkness

"Wintergreen, can't outshine your radiance. Wintergreen, or undermine your salience. Wintergreen, I love you more than anything--despite the darkness of some of these days." 

Every now and then a song comes to me that I need. Ballads from Broadway musicals, giddy love songs from pop sensations, powerful proclamations of God's goodness from Christian artists, and honest, hopeful songs from Celtic-styled folk bands. Each song very much needed to speak something specific to me. It is played ad nauseum in its season. And each one remains in a permanent playlist in that whatever-it-is that makes me me. The soul, the heart, both perhaps. In that whatever-it-is there's a special playlist of songs that have shaped and carried me. Whenever I hear them I am reminded of another place, another time, another me, and often, some important truth I still need. 

This summer another song was added to that list. It came by way of music that has already been looping for a year or more. That made both musical experiences richer and better. Like when one book mentions another so you read it, and you end up loving them both to dog-eared pieces. 

I've mentioned before the music of We

Banjo 3, so I won't fangirl about that now. But without WB3, I wouldn't have found The East Pointers. Though, to be fair, my best friend Marybeth found them first. She listened to WB3 on my recommendation, just casually, and then The East Pointers popped up on a Spotify playlist for her. I remember her telling me she found this great Canadian band, but full disclosure, I didn't listen to them right away. What can I say? Sometimes I don't know what's good for me. So many months wasted. Then again, maybe I discovered their music when I needed it most. 

In August, Marybeth and I got tickets for the Dublin Irish Festival so we could see We Banjo 3. Marybeth also noticed that The East Pointers were scheduled to be there. Because we had an entire day deliciously to ourselves to do whatever we wanted, we made plans to see both bands twice. So, before we went I finally started listening to TEP. Before long, their recent single release "Wintergreen" was looping on my Spotify regularly. The more I listened to it, the clearer it became that I needed that song. I still need it. I've listened to it almost every day since the end of July, usually more than once. 

It's a song about having worth, beauty, and meaning despite dark days. Depression is a defining element of my personal narrative. It's not my favorite part of my story. I like the bits better where I make delectable chocolate chip cookies and serve them up in dainty cups of herbal tea for my kiddos. Or when I'm all gussied up and made up and hair done up for a rare date night with my handsome husband. Those parts look nice. They feel nice. The dark parts that sometimes rage, and often, lurk in the background of an otherwise good day, do not feel nice. It can also feel like mental health issues downgrade my worth, beauty, and meaning. I start to feel like that dark shadow of a person instead of a whole person. So, whether I like it or not, depression is a defining part of my life's story.

So, when I find something brave enough to face that kind of thing head-on and come out hopeful about it, I embrace it. Embrace might not be strong enough of a word. I take it in until it's part of me, so when the dark days surface, hope is at the ready.  "Wintergreen" is one of those songs. And I just have to share this quote, taken from The East Pointers website, by their banjoist Koady Chaisson. 

“I was diagnosed bipolar about five years ago and there was so much darkness, so many extreme highs and extreme lows,” Koady says. “It’s actually a song I kind of wish I could have heard then; a vote of confidence from the perspective of someone who loves you regardless of which end of that spectrum you’re at.”

I immediately felt I had found a kindred spirit in someone who was open and honest about their mental health. Which is incredibly fitting since Koady and his cousin Tim Chaisson (fiddler and lead singer) are from Prince Edward Island, same as the enduring and endearing Anne Shirley. I admire the bravery, boldness, and hopefulness The East Pointers infuse into their music.

Last Friday, October 25, the full album Yours to Break was finally released. I say finally because I
had a countdown widget on my phone. It was highly anticipated. By me, anyway. But judging by their social media, I'm not alone. These guys have a worldwide audience and for good reason. Their music is flawlessly executed, a little experimental, incredibly fun, and deeply soulful.

Chestnut Ridge Metropark 

There are two other songs on the new album that I must mention when I'm talking about gathering good things. I mean, the whole thing is good, but in this particular vein of hope and light and feeling alive, two songs stand out to me. The instrumental 'Light Bright' which is immediately followed by 'If You're Still In, I'm In' if you listen to the album in order (which I recommend, it has awesome flow). Since 'Light Bright' is an instrumental I can't share lyrics (duh), but I will tell you that Tim's soaring fiddle, if I close my eyes, makes me feel exactly like a bird. Light and free, soaring above the landscape, catching the wind, and nothing is weighing me down. When depression wants to pin me down, this is exactly the kind of feeling I need.

Now, I'm going to close this post with lyrics from 'If You're Still In, I'm In'. But before I do that, I want to give you a challenge. No, it's not necessarily to listen to The East Pointers. I realize that indie folk music isn't actually everyone's cup of tea. Although it should be.  Go for a drive. Listen to your favorite music. Music that makes you feel. I won't even tell you it has to make you feel happy. Sometimes we need to feel sad (good golly, have I listened to me some sad tunes in certain seasons). Just music that makes you feel something. And look around at the beauty of this autumn. The leaves are starting to fall rapidly, and there are rainy days ahead, so there's no time like the present. Take the long drive home, find a scenic route, go off the usual path, and notice what there is to see. I did this on Friday and between the new tunes and the incredible show of autumn leaves, I felt thoroughly stuffed with beauty. And with beauty, hope. With hope, life. Isn't it awesome how that works?

"We can settle in on a high warm wind. No good comes from hanging back to see what happens. With hearts like heroes, and wings like doves, we can fly away break through the clouds above. Come again, bright days, come again, come again. When you're good to go, I'm following. If you're still in, I'm in." 

Gather the Good: Book Girl

Growing up I was an avid reader. A total bookworm. An absolute geek for books. I read every American Girl book, every volume of The Baby-Sitters Club, as much of Sweet Valley High as I could get my hands on, and I adored the works of Marguerite Henry (books + horses = yes, please!). I took advanced classes in high school and majored in literature in college. I did a lot of reading, to say the least.

Then I sorta just...stopped. Between kids and married life and housekeeping and volunteering at church, there didn't seem to be time. And with social media and TV being such an easy way to unwind, my once beloved books stayed on a dusty shelf. This fact always bothered me. How could such a prolific reader become someone who reads one or two books a year? And more so, how could I ever find my way back?

In the fall of 2018, I started listening to Sally Clarkson's podcast. Her daughter Sarah was launching her newest book, Book Girl. And the timing was kismet. As I listened to Sarah and Sally talk about what it meant to be a book girl, I felt so strongly that I wanted that to be me again. I got a good deal on the eBook and devoured this lovely book. Sarah writes so beautifully, having read pages and pages of deeply beautiful books herself. Each chapter has a theme and then a book list chock full of recommendations. As I poured over the pages, I was reminded of old dear friends like Anne Shirley. I was introduced to many new authors, like Elizabeth Goudge. And I was assured of the actual brilliance of some authors I've never really attempted, like JRR Tolkien. But perhaps most importantly, Sarah gives loads of tips for working in a bit of reading every day. And she shares some compelling reasons for why it matters. The brain thrives on reading in a way it cannot with social media and screens. We grow as people as we read, in empathy, imagination, and understanding. Reading is a magical, powerful pastime.

I read Book Girl in maybe November of 2018. I don't remember precisely but I think it was November because in December I took off reading. I'll tell you all about those reads closer to December. Anyway, I took Sarah's advice and kept a book handy for easy reading. I also downloaded a couple through the library app on my phone. And once I had the taste of it again, I couldn't stop.

As of now, in October of 2019, I've read 50 books. The main secret to my success is that I basically abandoned television for a while. Instead of unwinding with an episode or two of my favorite shows, I picked up a book instead. I also tried to read a chapter every morning during breakfast. I started out reading a chapter of nonfiction in the morning and a chapter of fiction in the evening. That didn't last too long because the fiction was riveting and took over. Thank you, Tedd Dekker. It really didn't take long for that passion for reading to return and for my own book lists to fill up with completed volumes.

So. Are you a book girl? Did you use to be one and seem to have lost the time? Have you never been bookish but would like to be? Start with this book!

And if you're a parent who would like to raise bookish children, check out Sarah's book Caught Up in a Story. In this treasure trove, Sarah goes through the various stages of a story and childhood development. At each stage, she offers a detailed book list with stories to foster imagination and character. I discovered some fantastic books that my son and I both love through this book. Miss Rumphius, Roxaboxen, and Brambly Hedge are now classics in our family. And I have lists of books to read with my kids as they grow that will continue to nurture their imaginations and give them a rich inner life.

Aren't books just the best things??!

Gathering the Good in a Fallow Year

 2019 has been an unusual year for me, personally and writingly. (Hey, Shakespeare made up words and everyone was okay with it). I've felt that this has been somewhat of a fallow year for me. A year of letting the fields go dormant and seeing what wild things grow, what nutrients need restored, and what can bloom in rest. I've picked away at writing here and there, but I've not made significant progress in anything. And that's okay. Believe me--it's taken a lot of work for me to get to the point where I can say that it is okay. When you self-identify as a writer and you stop writing, it's kind of an existential crisis.

Now, however, I want to start blogging again, because in this year I have discovered and cultivated so many beautiful things that bring me joy or catharsis or meaning. I've gobbled up fascinating books and practically brainwashed my family with music on repeat and brewed life-changing cups of tea and even sat awhile in passive entertainment with movies and shows. Off and on, I've thought to myself: I should blog about this! Book lists! Beauty! All the things! But then the words slip off of my fingers, like rings that need sized to fit, and I do not write.

Full disclosure: I'm a little nervous declaring some big return to writing or blogging or whatever. As if it matters terribly much to anyone other than me. But I have one of those personalities that craves all the things and has grand intentions, but then runs off to watch clouds change shape or to pick up another book full of someone else's words. In other words: I'm a creative with ADD.

And yet...it's a wonderful little phrase, isn't it? And yet....There's possibility in it that despite how things are, there may be something else. Ahem, anyway. And yet, I plan to share here some of the very beautiful things I have loved this year. Movies, shows, novels, picture books, non-fiction books, tea blends, music, bands, podcasts....I'm going to gather up this goodness and leave it for you here. So should you ever find yourself in need of something beautiful, or a simple joy, you can find some suggestions. After all, so many of the things I have enjoyed this year came on the recommendation of others. Isn't the internet a marvelous place that way? People I've never met in real life have led me to fountains of loveliness, and perhaps, I can leave a well for others.

One of the most important lessons I have learned in this fallow year is that beauty matters. Oh, it can feel like a waste of time, or that no one in all the world cares, but that simply isn't so. God himself revels in beauty. Look around at this colorful world! Outside my window right now is a tree turning the most remarkable shade of golden yellow. On Sunday I marveled with my children and my nieces at the bright pink of flamingos. And my son and my daughter and myself all have uniquely different shades of green eyes...my daughter's are so dark that the green can only be seen in the right light, my son's are rimmed with gold, and mine are bright like a polished emerald. And who among us has never cried at the intense beauty of a song? Who has never laid aside a book feeling full and satisfied, almost as if it was a feast? Beauty nourishes us! It moves us along and sustains us. And in the darkest times, or in years of existential crisis, beauty gives us purpose.

So, I think it's time that I share this treasure trove I've gathered. In fact, the tag for each of these posts will be: Gather the Good. It's the name of a We Banjo 3 album and I fell in love with the name on contact. And if you somehow still don't know who We Banjo 3 is, I suggest you go back and read this post. Then, hop on Spotify or wherever you listen to music, and listen to the Haven album. Or the song 'Happiness'. You can't go wrong. Trust me.

I will also try to do some stories on Instagram and Facebook with brief snippets of what I'm loving and some goodness for your day. And here on the blog I can provide links where you can buy, download, subscribe, listen, or otherwise enjoy it for yourself.

And please, always feel free to share with me any books, movies, songs, or anything else that has been a particular source of beauty or meaning for you. Or a simple pleasure, like brewing a cup of tea, or I don't know, sketching a wildflower. I'm always on the hunt for more good things to gather.

Who They Really Were: A Journey

I never imagined I would make a serious attempt at writing historical fiction. When I was in early high school, I started a manuscript of a story set in the 1840s but that's because I was working at a living history museum and thought I knew everything. I think I still have it in a bright purple envelope, but I refuse to go looking. Reading it, I'm sure, would we incredibly cringe-worthy.

*shudder*

You see, despite the fact that I have a real love for history, and even minored in history in college, I'm really not much a historian. I get bored too easily by non-fiction to read much of it. It often seems like a lot of dry detail packaged with a nice cover. So I figured I would never write historical fiction because I would never know enough about any given period to write about it well. And when I started working on The Sayen Falls Series in 2014, I made a solemn commitment to myself that I would not write any story if I couldn't tell it well, tell it truthfully, tell it with the honor it deserves. That's why I made certain creative choices with my characters and not others.

But there's one story I've always wanted to tell. A true story. The story of two people I love very much and who loved me very much. My grandparents--Milford and Betty Buterbaugh. I mean, I've thought about this since I was probably seventeen years old. That's half my life at this moment in time. I was just never sure how to go about it. Screenplay? Novel? I don't write historical fiction. Guess this won't work.

Then last year it hit me to construct a story that's told largely through the paperwork of a life, the mementos and souvenirs, the scrapbooks and photo albums, the stuff and clutter. So I decided this was my vehicle. This is how I would finally be able to tell their story. And then I was hit with a new unexpected problem. 

I didn't really know them.

We were very close. They absolutely doted on me and I couldn't have adored them more. The thing

is--I knew them as my grandparents. Kind, generous, old people who told interesting stories about days gone by....but they weren't like the young people in the photos, the young woman who scribbled over the faces of his ex-girlfriends in the yearbook, the young couple who eloped and had to hide it. I've always known that they eloped. BOTH sets of my grandparents did, in fact. (And my dad's parents have an incredible story as well that I know even less about and will perhaps be another quest someday). But since I've always known it, it didn't really seem that surprising. Until I stopped and thought about it, and tried to figure out how my "never do a wrong thing" grandmother ran away to marry my grandfather. That made me scratch my head. That made me realize: my grandparents were real people. They were more than my grandparents. They were young once and in love. They took risks. They were newlyweds and first-time parents and struggled to make ends meet. They had a whole story and it must be fascinating. 

Yet, when I sat down to piece together the narrative there were huge cavernous gaps. A major reason for this is that by the time I was born in 1984, Grammy was 63 and PapPap was 71. I didn't really have grown-up question to ask them until she was in her late 80s and he was in his 90s. By then, my grandmother's memory had started to fade. Plus, I still didn't really know the right questions to ask. "What was life like during the depression?" is a stupidly open-ended question that always yielded vague answers. 

Thankfully, some of the gaps can be filled in partly by my mom (who had the smarts to ask them detailed questions AND write down answers), or my aunt and uncle. But some things...no one knows. My grandparents were deeply private people and had no problem telling us "that's none of your business" if we asked something a little too intimate. This is not my default setting--I'm an open book type--so I'm especially perplexed by this. So, even if I had asked some of the questions then that I have now, I might not have gotten answers. Although, maybe I'd be pushy enough now to really ask because I desperately would like to know what kinds of things they fought about when they were first married, was she scared the first time she was pregnant, how did she know mom things without the internet? 

Anyway...I digress a bit. As usual. 

Now, faced with this mystery, I feel challenged to discover them for who they really were. I want to know who the young Milford and Betty were. How did that sweet 18 year old fall in love and run away with the quiet 26 year old who drove his car too fast? So I'm researching. I have a stack of non-fiction books on my side table that's very high. I'm combing through the precious few documents I have that they wrote and saved, and I'm hoping to get more from those who have them so I can piece together the story.

Which brings me back to writing historical fiction. Yes, I do intend to make a book out of this. BUT for several reasons it will be fiction. The most important reason is that because my grandparents were private, I think it would be disrespectful to them to not fictionalize it in some ways, change their names, etc. And the second important reason is, I simply cannot know the whole and complete and true story. It's impossible. So I have to take some creative license, make educated guesses, and fill it in as I go. (Hence the mile high stack of books). Milford and Betty are the inspiration, but truly at this point in time, only God knows what's going to come of this. I'm just setting out to discover not only their story, but the story God wants me to tell. Basically, all I have so far are names and a very sketchy outline. (Van and Ivy, if you're wondering. Aren't those great names??)

I decided the other day--whilst sitting in my closet staring at my great-great-aunt and uncle's wedding registry from 1913--that I should chronicle this in my blog. Most posts will not be this long, I just wanted to lay out the back story before I jump in. The fact is every question leads to another one and another one. I've been rapid fire texting my mom and googling things and making lists out the wazoo to even make the semblance of a narrative right now. And I think this journey is in some ways just as interesting as anything I will write coming out of it.

It's not that I'm so interesting or that I think anyone on this planet (other than my mom) will be interested in me figuring out minutiae like how long my great-great grandparents were married before my great-great aunt and uncle got married (why is that interesting even to me? Because they were two sisters that married two brothers but there seems to be a big gap between the two weddings....). It's that I think there are lots of people out there like me who one day realized that those who went before us were real people and we want to know what they were really like. And by sharing my own journey to know my grandparents, maybe other people will be inspired to dig in and see what they can find too. There are things we can yet learn from those who came before us.

The Bible tells us that human life is fleeting. We're all here today and gone tomorrow. But we leave traces of ourselves behind and it tells a story. And those stories matter.

The Inheritance of Cathedral Work

As I write, it is one day since most of Notre Dame has burned. The reports are slightly conflicting as to how much was truly destroyed, "ravaged" by flames as the eye witnesses describe. But in any case, it's a breathtaking loss. It feels surreal. This magnificent, larger than life structure, full of grandeur, designed to lift the eye to the light and bend the knee to the holy has been standing for eight or nine hundred years.

I've been learning about cathedrals just as a matter of happenstance lately. Many of the podcasters and bloggers I follow have been writing and speaking about them. Most of the oldest, tallest, grandest cathedrals took generations to complete. One generation would begin the work, another would finish it. Perhaps three or four generations separated the beginning and the end, but the work was singular--to construct a beautiful gathering place to reflect on the majesty of God, to lift songs to the risen Savior, to quicken the imagination for the perfect city God is building for us. 

My modern American brain struggles with the idea of starting a work that I will never see completed. We build churches in a matter of months. We routinely tear down sanctuaries and start over to build bigger, better. We seem to make our churches ever darker--not lighter. Paint the walls black, use filtered lights, fog machines. Our ancestors would think we were nuts. In a time before man-made light, they craved light. Stained windows cast a holy glow over a place to open up the mind for contemplation. I wonder what our obsession with dark and fog says about our cravings. Maybe it's because we live in a world so full of stimulus, that we have to darken our worship areas in order to focus. I don't know. I digress.

So today I've been thinking about building cathedrals. It's a lost art. Communities just don't do it anymore. We don't quarry the rock and fell the forests and hire the artisans to labor for two-hundred years to build a place where our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren will worship. We don't weep on the same altar where our parents and grandparents did. And that's okay really. The Holy Spirit is just as sacred and potent and strong in Saint Paul's Cathedral as in a hovel in Africa or a secret church in China. Some would argue, the earnest artistry has been overshadowed by pageantry and the Spirit has been hushed. Perhaps so in some of these grand once-sacred places.

Still, there seems to be a message in this. For me, anyway. A directive finally uncovered. I'm in a strange, quiet season where words don't flow and writing hurts. I've been reading and reading and reading. And listening to podcasts and soaking up whatever I can to wring meaning out of it. I'm hungry for answers to deep questions, questions that I've maybe carried with me my entire life but are finally bursting forth to be answered. As if someone had planted tiny little apple seeds in my soul when I was a baby, and now it's time for them to grow into a tree and bear fruit.

As I pondered cathedrals and generations laboring together, knowing one would start and another would finish, I felt some sort of deep truth blossom. Isn't this exactly what my grandmother did in her own quiet way? The woman never carried a chisel to carve a stone, she never worked with glass to reflect the light, but she labored in love for Christ. She served in her local church for decades, and at her funeral person after person after person after person stood to tell the story of how she loved like Jesus and their lives were changed through her. She loved us, her kin, her family with humble devotion. She taught her kids right from wrong and the promises of God. She loved my brother and me, her grandchildren, whole-heartedly but with wisdom. I just said to my husband last night that when I'm tempted to complain about my kitchen (I cook on a hot plate, y'all, because I don't have a stove actually in my kitchen) I ask myself what my grandmother would do and I know she would do her work cheerfully. I try. I try to carry on as she would. She started a cathedral work; I've inherited the labor and I want my contribution to be as lovely in the eyes of God as hers.

It will look different. I tried to be her for a while, but that doesn't work. We were created differently. I'm working with different spiritual gifts, different personality quirks, different talents. My generation is also remarkably different than hers--she grew up in The Great Depression and had her oldest children during World War 2. I'm in that displaced generation between Generation X and Millenials, where we remember library card catalogs but also had to be told Wikipedia isn't a legit source for research papers.

However, our striving is the same. My grandmother spent her life laboring for the Kingdom of Heaven. There's no cathedral I can point to and boast that she set this stone, she crafted that window, she hand-carved that gargoyle. But I am a living, breathing example of one who was changed by her work and her example. And I labor for the same Kingdom. The fruit will be in the people around me. My children, my someday grandchildren, my friends, my community....the people I may never meet who read the words I write. My words are like seeds blown into the wind. I don't know how far they may float or onto what kind of soil they may land, but God may bring fruition through them. I pray for this. I pray that my contribution to the cathedral pleases Him. And I pray that though I get tired and weary, I never give up.

I have to imagine that at least some of the workers in the cathedral had to wonder if spending their lives creating something they would never see finished really made sense. Certainly, in our modern world we would say it was stupendously inefficient and a waste of  life. We crave production, end results, and mass quantities of them if possible. Thankfully the laborers of the cathedrals didn't quit when they couldn't see the end. And thankfully those who have labored on invisible cathedrals of the heart and soul didn't give up when they couldn't see the end either. They kept the faith, they finished their work, and passed the mantle to us.

I was almost done with this post and my kids came in. The writing bubble has burst. The words are just gone. As suddenly as they came to me, they're now gone. So I can't really "finish" this the way I would like to. I like to wrap up with something neat and tidy, poignant if I can manage it, quotable if I'm really on a roll. But. After ten minutes or so I've trying to manufacture something that's good and it just feels like a tangent or like I'm changing the point or I'm just plain rambling, I've realized something: this whole post is about doing work that can't be finished. I'm a writer with two noisy kids. My labor in their lives is perhaps the greatest work I'll never do, so sometimes I have to set aside the writing. I don't truly know what my legacy of words will look like, but I know what I want my legacy of love to look like. So. I'm leaving this blog post more or less unfinished to go do the work that will last. And I'll leave you with this simple thought: What are you working on that will last? What will out-live you?

And since words escape me and I find myself lacking the poignant, I leave you with a poem that has given me much food for thought in the last six or nine months. Just read it slowly, line by line, and consider how you live today and the cathedrals you build for tomorrow.

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

By: Wendell Berry 

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,

vacation with pay. Want more

of everything ready-made. Be afraid

to know your neighbors and to die.

And you will have a window in your head.

Not even your future will be a mystery

any more. Your mind will be punched in a card

and shut away in a little drawer.

When they want you to buy something

they will call you. When they want you

to die for profit they will let you know.

So, friends, every day do something

that won’t compute. Love the Lord.

Love the world. Work for nothing.

Take all that you have and be poor.

Love someone who does not deserve it.

Denounce the government and embrace

the flag. Hope to live in that free

republic for which it stands.

Give your approval to all you cannot

understand. Praise ignorance, for what man

has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.

Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.

Say that your main crop is the forest

that you did not plant,

that you will not live to harvest.

Say that the leaves are harvested

when they have rotted into the mold.

Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus

that will build under the trees

every thousand years.

Listen to carrion – put your ear

close, and hear the faint chattering

of the songs that are to come.

Expect the end of the world. Laugh.

Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful

though you have considered all the facts.

So long as women do not go cheap

for power, please women more than men.

Ask yourself: Will this satisfy

a woman satisfied to bear a child?

Will this disturb the sleep

of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.

Lie down in the shade. Rest your head

in her lap. Swear allegiance

to what is nighest your thoughts.

As soon as the generals and the politicos

can predict the motions of your mind,

lose it. Leave it as a sign

to mark the false trail, the way

you didn’t go. Be like the fox

who makes more tracks than necessary,

some in the wrong direction.

Practice resurrection.

Sparrows, Rams on the Mountain, and Me

When my daughter was born she screamed for the first forty-five minutes of her life. She wasn't crying. She was screaming. She was irate. Inconsolably angry at being brought into this cold, strange world. And she was hungry. I mean, she was eleven pounds, eight ounces at birth. The girl probably really wanted some chocolate chip cookies and a glass of cold milk. It was her favorite in utero and it's her favorite now at three years old. But it's not exactly protocol to give newborns cookies and milk, however much they scream. Instead, we tried to get my baby to nurse. By "we" I mean I had a whole team working with me and trouble-shooting and trotting out every trick they had up their sleeves. When the lactation consultant--who was so kind and cheerful and positive and wonderful--declared that my daughter was a "tough case" I knew I was in for trouble.

You see, I have two children (most of you already know this, but I will write for those of you who perhaps don't know me in real life). My daughter is my youngest. I have a son three and a half years older. And he never did get the hang of nursing. Oh, we tried. And the guilt I had when I stopped trying and started using formula instead was intense. Deeply intense. And very much exacerbated by my undiagnosed post-partum depression and the mommy wars. You know, those passive aggressive comments made on social media that cut to the quick and everyone bloody well knows it. Those mommy wars.

So when my sweet screaming girl came along, I had been determined that I would breastfeed her longer than my son. If memory serves (which it doesn't because I've been sleep-deprived for almost seven years), I made it about ten weeks with my son and my goal with my daughter was eleven. I wanted just one more week. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Back to the hospital....Collectively, the experts and my husband and me agreed that we would try to get my daughter to latch for ten minutes and if she was still hopping angry, we'd stop and give her a bottle. We didn't want her to start associating feeding, or worse yet, me, with anger and frustration. The plan was to pump as much as possible but if girlfriend needed a little formula, that was okay too. Really hard for my pride in the mommy wars, but okay.

I so clearly remember sitting alone with her in my quiet little hospital room and feeling deeply worried. I had all this emotional baggage from "failing" with my son. I had hoped she would be easy. Nothing about this was going right and we hadn't even left the hospital. Then--all of a sudden, as they say--I felt in my spirit a message from the Lord. He assured me that he looks after birds and makes sure they get enough to eat each day, and that my dear sweet girl was worth more to him than any bird. He would make sure she'd thrive too. One way or another, I wasn't in this alone. I wasn't responsible for making sure she was okay. I mean, I wasn't free to neglect her, but the parts that were out of my control were in His control. He saw me. He saw my daughter. And we were going to be okay.

Naturally, I looked up the scripture passages about sparrows and the lyrics to the song "His Eye is on the Sparrow". I started singing it to her to soothe her. I found a rendition by The Newsboys that I think freaks my mother (Hi, Mom!) out a little bit, but it worked like magic to settle my fussy newborn. I learned all the words to that song. I memorized them in the first week or so of her little life. It became my anthem, even when it didn't work to calm her down.

There were some nights when she just wouldn't stop crying. It didn't matter how hard I tried, how much milk I offered, if I swaddled her or not, if I rocked her or not, if I sang or not. It didn't matter to her if I sang, but I kept singing because it mattered to me. I distinctly remember standing in her nursery, so bleary-eyed from no sleep, and teary-eyed because I was just so wrecked by the crying infant and singing over and over again...

"And I sing because I'm happy, I sing because I'm free for His eye is on the sparrow and I know He watches me."

Singing about happiness with tears streaming down your face makes an indelible impression on your spirit. I was clinging to that promise. I grabbed hold of it hard and I didn't let go.

Eventually, my daughter got a grip on her emotions and settled into a pretty wonderful baby. I also eventually gave up nursing her (I believe I made it eleven weeks and one day.) About the same time she became rather pleasant, PPD hit me hard. Anxiety. Never had it before. Not like that anyway. Which I talked about in the post 'Kindness Carries the Light'. Fluctuating hormones, and weeks of high-stress and very little sleep did me in. Still, I had the promise that God was watching.

And not just watching, lest you think this God of mine is a passive one who merely observes from on high and occasionally remarks to other celestial beings about the tiny humans on that blue and green ball. That is not my God. My God is deeply personal and intentional and deliberate and kind. God moves. His plans are, in fact, set in motion before my need even arises. He knows what I need now and what I will need next week and what I'll need in three years or thirty or whatever. Being omniscient gives you that kind of high-level clearance. And being omnipotent gives Him the clearance to also do something.

You don't always see it. Or, I don't anyway. I probably shouldn't speak for you. Maybe you're more observant than I am. But I don't usually see the provision before it's smacked me in the face and announced it's arrived. I don't see the ram climbing up the hill as I trudge up with my sacrifice. When Abraham and Isaac went up the mountain so Abraham could sacrifice his beloved son, he didn't notice or know about the ram coming up that would take Isaac's place. But God did. God made sure that ram was coming. Lately, I like to trace the steps backwards in this biblical narratives that we know so well that we take the details for granted. God knew that ram was needed the day it was born. That ram had a purpose and God got it up the hill for Abraham on just the right day. The ram wasn't a week early and missed it, it wasn't a day late and a dollar short. The timing was perfect. The provision came in the moment of crisis.

Friends. I'm going to be honest with you. 2019 has been a moment of crisis for my family. All three months of it. My husband has a heart condition; it's genetic and he's known about it for over twenty years. It's been well-managed and monitored for those two decades. This January he had an episode that landed him in the hospital for five days while they poked and prodded and scanned him, then hemmed and hawed and read results. The good news is after a minor surgery where he got a new internal defibrillator with some additional features and some new medicines, he's stable and good to go. He can live his normal life and he's fine! Except his employer won't let him come back to work for a year. We don't understand it. The doctors don't understand it. No one I have talked to understands it. And mountains of paperwork has been printed and faxed and copied and mailed and messed up by people not us....and hours and hours of phone calls have been made to fix what's messed up and find out what's needed and to determine what our immediate future holds. It's been stressful.

Yet. My God is watching. El-Roi. The God who sees me. This name was given to Yahweh by the Egyptian slave Hagar, a woman mistreated and hurt and desperate. She was sure she was alone in the wilderness and unable to provide for her son when God spoke to her. He gave her a promise and he provided for her and her son.

I've loved the story of Hagar ever since college when I first intimately understood that my God is one who sees me. Then today, oh, today was a hard day of listening to my husband's half of phone calls and feeling like I can't fix anything and trying to keep the kids and the dog quiet and no one was having it. I was so done. I was just so exhausted deep inside. I used up all my soul energy frowning and fretting and freaking out but swallowing it up whole so the kids wouldn't start to worry. Anyone else ever been there? Anyway. I finally got shoes and socks on the wild ones and we headed out the door to pick up some things we needed. As I stepped into the garage, it hit me--all of a sudden:

"His eye is on the sparrow and I know He watches me."

It was almost audible. I'm surprised my kids didn't' say, "who said that?" I dialed up the playlist I made for my daughter when she was a newborn, I haven't listened to it in two years at least. The first song on it is "His Eye is on the Sparrow" by The Newsboys. Ordinarily, my children have very strong opinions about what we listen to in the car. If it's not The Greatest Showman, Mary Poppins Returns, or Charlie Brown Christmas they're not having it. Today we listened to "His Eye is on the Sparrow", "A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes" (the Lily James version, so lovely), "Blackbird" (yes, by the Beatles. My son asked to turn it up), "Forever Young" (sung by Alfie Boe. Look. It. Up. Get tissues first), and "Your Grace Finds Me." They fussed a little with the last one but I had it cranked pretty loud at that point. *Shrug* I was worshiping the Lord.

I wish I could tell you that we got home from the store and my husband ran out to greet us shouting that all our problems are over and we struck oil in the backyard...or found gold under the shed....or someone just gave us a check that would cover the whole year....or some other bananas thing. He didn't. But he was smiling. And we had a nice dinner and then he played with my son while my daughter and I did the dishes. Okay, I did the dishes. She played in the sink but it makes her so ridiculously happy to do it that I no longer mind the water slopped on the floor or the fact that she's technically in my way. We were together. We've been together more in 2019 than we've ever been since the kids came along. And happier. We have our moments--all families and couples do. It can't always been sunshine.  But we're contented together. We play games and build with Legos and do puzzles and draw pictures and tell stories and read books and watch movies and play with the dog. There's so much to do just here in our home. The little home we complain about because the kitchen needs remodeled and we wish it sat on five acres. Yet this home is full of good things, and "every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like the shifting shadows." (James 1:17 NIV)

James wrote that in his contribution to the New Testament. James was a brother of Jesus. I wonder if he was among the brothers that first thought Jesus was mad and tried to bring him home to just be quiet and stop embarrassing the family. In their defense, maybe it was bad for business. Reputation is everything for a family business. But James came around. We don't know how exactly, but clearly he came to believe in his big brother. And I'm glad he did. James also wrote "consider if pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance....Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him."

In my life, I have faced trials of many kind. The other evening I started thinking through the last several years of my life and the list of trials was staggering (I had a legitimate reason for pondering this, it wasn't self-pity, I promise! It may perhaps be another post sometime this year). I don't know that I've always persevered well. I'm not much for perseverance typically. I'm more of a sit in the dirt and whine type. And yet. I'm here. And I've learned so much about the Lord it is also staggering. I know I haven't considered it pure joy. At no point today did I start naming and claiming 'pure joy' about our circumstances. Yet, in the moment when I heard the Good Shepherd speak to me, I experienced peace and joy. I was able to worship Him with a lump in my throat and kids in the backseat because I know that His eye is on the sparrow and He also watches me. I don't know that have that 'crown of life' yet, but I know that if I get handed any crowns or treasures when I arrive in Paradise that I'm headed straight to throne room to set it at the feet of Jesus. I have much thanks to give for all the rams on the mountain, all the provision in the wilderness, and all the reassurances that my family and I are worth more than many sparrows. Really, I owe Him everything.

Kindness Carries the Light

The last few days have been utterly exhausting but God has been in each moment, boldly revealing himself. In family. In friends. In quiet moments. And sometimes in banjos.

Yes, banjos. Let me explain.

Three years ago my childhood best friend, Holly, happened to be watching a morning news program when an Irish band came on to play a couple songs and promote their summer tour. Knowing me and my love for anything Irish, she texted me the name of the band and told me to look them up.

I. Fell. In. Love.

David Howley, Martin Howley, Enda Scahill, and Fergal Scahill

The band is We Banjo 3 and their genre is 'celtgrass' which is

an amazing marriage of American bluegrass with traditional Irish folk music. Two sets of brothers, Martin and David Howley, and Enda and Fergal Scahill, make up this incredible quartet of unparalleled talent and awesomeness.

Last year, in 2018, Holly and I went to see them in concert at the GAR Hall in Peninsula. The GAR Hall was constructed during the Civil War, and as it houses many artifacts from the era, it retains all of its historic charm. It's an intimate little hall that was packed with people--most of whom had seen the band before. Holly and I had no idea what we were in for. A Scottish band, Talisk, opened for them and blew the lid off the old hall. Then We Banjo 3 absolutely blew us away with their talent, passion, storytelling, and kindness. We left that night (in a snow storm) committed to We Banjo 3 for life.

At that concert, they played a couple new songs from the album they went on to release in the summer of 2018. Songs about depression and hope and family and love. Songs that stuck with me for a long time. And when that album dropped, I played it on a loop for weeks. My kids know the words to every song, and I'm good with that. The messages on the Haven album are everything I need to hear and want my kids to internalize. I don't think I've ever heard an album as honest and hopeful as this one. It's a curious blend in this modern age of cynicism and, well, ugly. But it's what we so desperately need. Honest words that life isn't always easy and mental health is a messy business sometimes, yet tempered with the insistent message of hope and light. I've talked before about my obsession with light. At least four songs on Haven talk about light. No wonder this is my jam.

Mental health is a hard thing to talk about. At the risk of this backfiring on me....I've wrestled with depression off and on for over a decade. Probably closer to two decades, though it it wasn't diagnosed until 2008. After my son was born in 2012, I experienced post partum depression which made me afraid that someone was going to take him away from me if I made a mistake, and that anyone but me would be better at raising him. It took about six or eight weeks for that to pass. When my daughter was born in 2016, PPD actually presented as anxiety. I'd never experienced anxiety like that before. I couldn't explain how I felt to anyone. I just knew I wasn't me, and I wasn't right. And talking about it felt impossibly hard at times. This took six to eight months before I got my feet under me again. Over the years, I've endured some dark days and nights that keep me ever yearning for the light. 

The hard things are the things we need to talk about. Or write music about. Or write novels about. My Sayen Falls Series features many characters wrestling with mental health issues for a wide variety of reasons. Most notably are my main characters; Blythe Elwood who is prone to depression and Gracen Hall who battles anxiety daily. As the story progresses into future books, I'll explore other facets of mental health like trauma and PTSD. But there will always be a thread of light and hope to follow. I want to be brave enough to write about the hard things--to write boldly about hard things as Hemingway instructed--and also brave enough to claw for the light.

The first time I listened to the Haven album in its entirety, I was almost in shock. My characters could've written these songs. 'War of Love' is Jesse Beckwith in a three-minute-and-twenty-nine-second song. I mean, it's eerie. And 'Pack It Up' could easily be played by Silas Elwood at an open-mic at The Yellow Bowl. The title song 'Haven' is so fitting for Blythe and for Gracen that I'm starting to wonder if the banjo boys hacked my laptop.

"Lay down your weapons, lay down with me. We will stare at the stars and think what life could be. Island of memories we'll leave them where they lie. Can we make the choice for love and joy? The moon lights a path we can travel down. River runs wild with what has gone before. Cast aside for new and more and more and more and more and more and more. Let me be your haven. Let me be your light. Sail with me across the ocean deep. And find a place for love and joy."

I was supposed to attend the We Banjo 3 concert in Peninsula this past weekend. Then we had a medical emergency. Everything planned was immediately canceled and I shifted all my attention to my husband.

Holly still went to the concert. She sent me some pictures, and told me that Martin compared Peninsula to Narnia or Hogwarts because no one has ever heard of it and you can't find it unless you know about it. I mean, he's not wrong. In fact, I think he's spot-on. 

Then, after the show she sought out David. She told him how our plans were derailed and my husband was in the hospital. The next thing I knew I was on the phone with him. It wasn't riveting conversation on my end because I was rather astonished. (I gave the play by play to my husband and he said it sounded like when he'd call girls in 7th grade. Again, he's not wrong. Pretty spot-on). 

And yet that brief conversation carried the light. Kindness always carries the light, and often small actions can carry more than we'd ever expect. This perhaps is the underlying message in Haven, and it is without a doubt an underlying message of Sayen Falls.

My family has been blessed with so many acts of kindness over the last few days. Our family and friends have been invaluable. I told my mom that I can tell so many people are praying because I can practically see it dripping down the walls. We are saturated in love right now. Even a wee bit of banjo love. And we're all back home under one roof! As I write this, everyone is sleeping soundly except me. As usual and as it should be. I'm heading off to dreamland soon myself. I will likely dream of kindness because I'm just so in awe of the Lord's mercies and the actions of kind souls. 

If We Banjo 3 plays a show anywhere even remotely near you--go. Even if you think celtgrass is not your thing. It will become your thing. It will be fun and entertaining, and it will be hopeful. And if you get to talk to the boys, they will be friendly and kind. And if you can manage to not be tongue-tied like me, they'll even listen to your stories.

And if you can't get to a show, download the album, grab a couple friends, and share your stories. Build community, find your tribe, make connections. As the boys in the band say, "we all need more kindness in this world....we all need more banjos in this world." And trust me, when something comes up and knocks your feet out from under you, having a real community to catch your fall is priceless.