Ode to Technology

I'm back!

After one (long) week without the internet, we now return to our regularly-scheduled (almost) daily blogging.  Whew.  It was a long week.  At one point toward the end, I said to a couple of friends, "You know, it's not so bad not to have the internet.  We just have a lot of questions that can't be answered."  It was a joke, but, as with all jokes, there was a grain of truth in it.

In that week, my husband and I learned a lot about ourselves:
* My husband discovered that he is addicted to an online game.  He can't let anyone pass him, so he had to check in every day, even to the point of using all of the data on his iPhone plan.
* We're even more grateful for our iPhones, or we would have been completely cut off.  Which would have been awful.
* Apparently I can't research anything without Wikipedia and IMDB.
* I also can't pay my bills or check my bank account without the internet.
* If I couldn't text, I'm also not sure I could have stayed connected with any of my friends.
* Strangely, it is extremely difficult to communicate with my new internet provider without some access to the internet.  Which I didn't yet have.

That really got me thinking.  How did two people who grew up without email addresses, internet research, or online banking and had to play board games or Minesweeper, wait for a bank statement to arrive in the mail, and dial 5-3-0-S-H-O-W for movie times end up here?  And why can't we fend for ourselves?  I had two people offer to let me go to their house to use their internet, and I very nearly went to ask my neighbor for his password so I could use his wireless.  It's rather like getting a calculator or cash register and then having to think hard about how to make change for a dollar.

Really, though, we're a society that depends on technology for almost everything.  The scale that weighs me in at the gym uses a computer.  The van that I drive around cannot function if the computer goes down.  I rely on weather.com and yp.com to answer questions that a phone call, check of the daily (HA!) newspaper, or flip through the phone book used to answer.  I track my weight gain and loss with my computer, work from home via remote access to my desk computer, arrange babysitters and double dates via email and texting, check restaurant menus and movie times on my phone . . . the list goes on and on. 

Technology can be such a gift.  And when it's taken away, it's hard to remember how life used to be before we had it.  In fact, when I look at my goals, there is really only one that I can accomplish without technology: daily Bible reading.  And it's the only one I'm going to meet this month.

Please Excuse Me If You've Heard This One

This morning in my Bible reading, I (re)read the story of the quadraplegic man whose friends bring him to Jesus.  Today's time through was in Luke, which is the more familiar text to me.  It's a story that I've heard many times in my life, and I even used to know a song about it (now lost somewhere between here and Vacation Bible School at Hamlin Reformed Church, I think).  Yet, it's one of my favorite stories in the Bible.

Eleven years ago I was in the middle of a rough year.  To call it a rough year is actually quite the understatement.  I know I've shared this, but I had several family funerals, illnesses and funerals for family friends, and my husband and I separated.  Through all this, I found it increasingly hard to get to Jesus on my own.  I just didn't think I had the strength to do it.  I would try, but I just felt so weary.  A dear friend of mine said, "Beka, we'll carry you there."

Exactly.  My friends would carry me.  And they did.  Just like the quadraplegic man with his four friends who carried him to Jesus and let nothing--even a climb on top of a house and the thatch roof--stand in the way of them setting him at the feet of the Savior.  My friends did that for me.  It was their pleasure, they said.  They did it because they loved me, they said.  They did it because it was an honor to them to bring me to the One who could heal my heart.

Fast forward through April and part of May and to a phone call from a friend.  She called to tell me that the twin brother of my dear friend's husband had died.  I was stunned.  Our mutual friend was stunned.  My dear friend was stunned.  Immediately I phoned her.  When she answered, she told me that she didn't know what to say or what to do.  Without thinking, I said, "It's really not so bad.  You just lie there."  And then we carried her.  It was our pleasure.  We did it because we loved her.  We did it because it was an honor to bring her to the One who could heal her heart.

Through the past 11 years, she's carried me again, and I've carried her.  Together we've carried other friends, and I know that we will continue to do that.  It always comes back around.  And it's always an honor. 

Surely it seems difficult to climb onto that mat and just lie still.  The quadraplegic man had it made--he couldn't move.  Too often we try to get up, because we just don't feel right just lying there.  But that's our job.  For that season, we have to just lie there, and it really isn't so bad.  For other seasons, we get to carry.  But if we never trust anyone to carry us, will they trust us to carry them?

Which side of the mat do you find yourself on right now?  Are you carrying someone?  Then you know the honor that is there.  Are you lying on the mat, being carried?  Then you know the love that is there.  This is family.  We're friends.  We do it because we love each other.  And because we know that there is no one else who can heal our hearts.

The Twelfth Sabbath

Oh, God, our help in ages past
Our hope for years to come
Our shelter from the stormy blast
And our eternal home.

Under the shadow of Thy throne
Thy saints have dwelt secure
Sufficient is Thine arm alone
And our defense is sure.

Before the hills in order stood
Or earth received her frame
From everlasting Thou art God
To endless years the same.

A thousand ages in Thy sight
Are like an evening gone
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the rising son.

Oh, God, our help in ages past
Our hope for years to cmoe
Be Thou our guard while life shall last
And our eternal Home.

"Oh God Our Help in Ages Past," Isaac Watts

Why Do We Want to Go to Church?

Overheard at the dinner table tonight:

Addie: "Why do we want to go to church tomorrow?"
Ellie: "Because it's Sunday."
Addie: "But why do we want to go to church tomorrow?"
Ellie: "That's what we do on Sundays."
Addie: "But why do we want to go to church tomorrow?"
Meg: "Because we want to praise God."

Amen, and amen, Meg.  Because we want to praise God.  Why do we want to go to church tomorrow?  Because we want to praise God.  It ended the conversation at our dinner table, certainly.  But it also answers a question that our pastor asked us last Sunday:

Why are you here this morning?

So many of us struggled to find the church answer--or even admit our honest answer.  Leave it to Meg to get to the heart:

Because we want to praise God.

Things I Think I Think #35-48

In lighter news:

35. I have discovered that I have a serious passion for those sounds that carry great meaning without ever uttering a word.  You know them when you hear them.  If you don't, just ask Julie Schalk.

36. There is very little that calms me down more than driving down country roads with the windows open on blue-sky spring days.

37. I love March Madness in spite of the fact that I watch almost no college basketball during the rest of the year.

38. I get totally grossed out talking about teeth issues.  I can't imagine being a dentist and putting my hands in those dirty mouths.  (Sorry, Russ!)

39. At the same time--or maybe because of that--I hope to die at an old age with all of my current teeth.

40. My subscription to Entertainment Weekly resulted in a free subscription to Us Weekly.  When it (Us Weekly)  arrives in the mail each week, I drop everything to read it cover to cover.  When there's a double issue, I get a bit sad knowing next week won't have that gem in my mailbox.

41. I LOVE tacky "B" horror films on Chiller and SyFy.  That love of poor acting and excessive drama is probably what fuels my addiction to Days of Our Lives.

42. I have a friend who often shares with me what she and another friend did when they were younger, and I giggle inside because I have also done or would happily have done most of them too.  Or maybe I'd still do them.

43. Because we moved around so much when I was growing up, I don't have a best friend--or even a consistent one--who has known me through all the different stages of my life.  It makes me want that for my kids.

44. Every time the blowing wind takes my breath away I remember standing at my bedroom window in South Dakota and feeling that for the first time.  It amazes me that a feeling can still be so vivid after 26 years.

45. When I think about "home," I first think about my husband and my girls; then I think about my pillow and my bed; then I think about South Dakota.

46. I really believe I saw the tooth fairy when I was young.  I'm just not sure how that worked now that I'm an adult. 

47. Dirt and bugs are the number one things I don't like about camping and the only things I don't like about spring.

48. If I got to eat a couple of scoops of ice cream every day for the rest of my life, I wouldn't tire of it.  Even if I only got vanilla.

Quit Playing Games With Our Kids

{Steps onto soap box.}

An email came across my desk at work last week.  It noted $20 million in funds for the Victims of Child Abuse Act that had been excluded from the FY13 budget as proposed by President Obama.  For the first time since 1994, there was to be no funding for the National Children's Alliance, which means a cut in program support for every accredited children's advocacy center in the country (including the Children's Assessment Center, which is my day job) and virtually no funds allocated for emerging centers in counties where they don't yet exist.  Then, on Monday evening, another email came through.  This one stated that the FY13 budget further proposes to reallocate $365 million in funds from the Victims of Crime Act, which would mean cuts to--and possible elimination of--services for crime victims all across the country.  In Kent County alone that means a number of cuts to children: victim witness programs, domestic violence shelters, and the Center's counseling and victim advocacy services.  The real kicker is that the funds are paid through criminal fines and penalties and don't affect the size of the federal budget at all.  It is proposed that they will be used to pay for other line items in the budget outside of true crime victim services.

As we talked about it internally and formulated our response, our pleas to Representative Amash and Senators Stabenow (who has signed on to save the Victims of Child Abuse Act funds at least) and Levin, and our rallying cries to our donors, one thing kept coming up. 

"You know this is just a game, right?  It's political gamesmanship.  It's an election year.  Nobody is really going to cut our child victims of crimes out of the budget this year--but they will use them to get other earmarks they want."

I know this is likely.  I know it has been proposed before (by Bush, so let's not get too self righteous, friends), and there were no cuts.  But I also know that if we lost all of our funds from these two sources, that would mean eliminating our counseling and our victim advocacy and limiting our forensic interviews.  It would mean hacking out a third of our budget.  It's too big of a risk to take.

So I spent most of Tuesday formulating all of our responses and rallying everyone I know.  Every other email on the NCA listserv has been updates on who signed on and who didn't.  We've had conversations about face-to-face meetings with our representative and whether it is more likely that our senators will read a letter or an email.  We've also talked about whether we should combine the issues into one email or leave them separate and just send two responses to each person.  We should have been spending that time on our kids.  On raising new money.  On making new donor contacts.  On completing paperwork from another interview with a child who had been sexually abused.  But instead we spent hours on this--and have continued to spend hours more--because we can't take the risk that this is just gamesmanship.

Ridiculous.  Appalling.  Quit using our kids as pawns in a game that they don't care about.  They just want help.  They want the bad guys to be locked up.  They want to sleep safely at night.  They want their nightmares to go away.  They want to laugh and play like children should.

If you want to help, please do the following:
* Send your representative a letter asking him or her to sign the House Dear Colleague letter sponsored by Rep. Danny Davis (D-7th) of IL to fund the Victims of Child Abuse Act at $20 million for FY13.

* Send your senators a letter asking them to sign the Dear Colleague letter sponsored by Sen. Kerry (MA-D) and Sen. Baucus (MT-D) in support of funding the Victims of Child Abuse Act at $20 million for FY13.

* Send your representative and senators a letter asking them NOT to use money for victims of crime as a revenue base for its FY13 budget by asking for a $1 billion VOCA cap in FY13. Because the Crime Victims Fund comes entirely from criminal fines and other penalties—not taxpayer dollars—this cap DOES NOT ADD to the national debt or deficit.

{Thanks you for your time, and steps down from soap box.}

The Eleventh Sabbath

{NOTE: I once listened to this song on the radio as I drove through a lightning storm in the otherwise pitch black night.  As the flashes of lightning shocked my eyes every time it flashed, I realized that was like catching a glimpse of God's glory.  To have seen His entire glory would have been to be blinded by His power.}

I caught a glimpse of Your splendor
In the corner of my eye
The most beautiful thing I've ever seen
And it was like a flash of lightning
Reflected off the sky
And I know I'll never be the same

Show me Your glory
Send down Your presence
I want to see Your face
Show me Your glory
Majesty shines about You
I can't go on without You, Lord

When I climb down the mountain
And get back to my life
I won't settle for ordinary things
I'm gonna follow You forever
And for all of my days
I won't rest 'til I see You again

Show me Your glory
Show me Your glory
I can't live without You

"Show Me Your Glory," Mark D. Lee, Samuel Tai Anderson, Bradley B. C. Avery, David Carr, Johnny Mac Powell, Marc Byrd

Quotes Worth Remembering

From The Night Circus:

I find I think of myself not as a writer so much as someone who provides a gateway, a tangential route for readers to reach the circus.  To visit the circus again, if only in their minds, when they are unable to attend it physically.  I relay it through printed words on crumpled newsprint, words that they can read again and again, returning to the circus whenever they wish, regardless of time of day or physical location.  Transporting them at will.

When put that way, it sounds rather like magic, doesn't it?

- Friedrick Thiessen, 1898

{page 369}

"It is important," the man in the grey suit interrupts.  "Someone needs to tell those tales.  When the battles are fought and won and lost, when the pirates find their treasures and the dragons eat their foes for breakfast with a nice cup of Lapsang souchong, someone needs to tell their bits of overlapping narrative.  There's magic in that.  It's in the listener, and for each and every ear it will be different, and it will affect them in ways they can never predict.  From the mundane to the profound.  You may tell a tale that takes up residence in someone's soul, becomes their blood and self and purpose.  That tale will move them and drive them and who knows what they might do because of it, because of your words.  That is your role, your gift.  Your sister may be able to see the future, but you your self can shape it, boy.  Do not forget that."  He takes another sip of his wine.  "There are many kinds of magic, after all."

{page 381}

"Why haven't you asked me how I do my tricks?" Celia asks, once they have reached the point where she is certain he is not simply being polite about the matter.

Frederick considers the question thoroughly before he responds.

"Because I do not wish to know," he says.  "I prefer to remain unenlightened, to better appreciate the dark."

{page 183}

Book Six

The Night Circus
Erin Morgenstern

What a delightfully, charming book!  I'm a total sucker for magic and mystery, and this book was full of both.  Morgenstern cleverly lays the book out in narrative sections, describing the night circus, and sections from two different time periods.  At first it was confusing, but once I started to get to know the story and the characters in each time period, it was easy to follow.  And when the stories came together, Morgenstern's quick transitions between different days instead of years added to the suspense.

The premise of The Night Circus is that two magicians--illusionists, really, who have learned to truly manipulate reality rather than use slight-of-hand techniques--have chosen students who have been eternally bound to participate in a challenge to determine which is the better illusionist.  It would actually be more accurate to say "determine which is the better teacher," because it truly is all about the elder illusionists.  Celia and Marco are kept in the dark about their opponents and the true conclusion of the challenge, and that makes the book even more engaging.  The imagination needed to create this story and this world is a gift--and made it especially fun to read.  Morgenstern's careful attention to detail in this imaginary world of the night circus made it easy to recreate in my head and made me wish for a red scarf of my own. 

My only true complaint is that I could not read the book quickly because I wanted to relish every word.

A Tender Day

I've been a bit tender ever since I opened the letter this afternoon.  It was a normal day, and it was a normal letter.  We often get letters from the principal over the listserv, so I started to open it without really thinking.  But then the subject caught me off guard this time: "Death of a Student."  I thought it was an accident--a high school student or someone from one of the other schools.  I figured it would hurt as I thought about it, but I never dreamed it would hit me this hard.

A 7th grader at a local middle school passed away yesterday.  He committed suicide.  He went to the same elementary where my oldest daughter is a student.  If we stay in West Michigan, then in a few years she'll be at that same middle school--with most of the same kids she started school with in Kindergarten.

I don't know why this young man, this baby really, decided to end his life.  I pray that some day his parents get answers and find hope again.  As I think about what happened, though, my heart breaks--for him, for his parents, for his friends, for his classmates, for his teachers, for my daughter.

Middle school sucks.  There's no way around it.  It's so, so hard being a teenager.  But it gets better.  It sounds trite, or perhaps it just sounds like I'm stealing it from something different, something that this might not have been.  All I know is that it's true.  And when I walked in my daughter's classroom to read to her class this afternoon, I was tender.  I looked at their little faces and wondered what middle school holds for them.  They have a little better than five years before they get there, and so much can happen in that time.  But all the same, I wonder.  These are Ellie's classmates.  They're beautiful children learning to read and be friends and eat from all of the food groups.  And I love them.

So this is a tender day.  May God wrap His arms of peace around this young man's parents and his teachers and his friends and his classmates.  May God protect those kids, those babies, from themselves and from the only choice that can't be fixed.  And may God help all of us know what to say, how to help, what to see, how to be tender.

God, I love those kids.  The big ones and the little ones . . . please keep them safe tonight.

Finding Us Faithful

There is a large dumpster in the driveway of a house a block or so away from my house.  It's a house that I walk by or drive by multiple times each day.  There's a gold van in the driveway that announces who its owner voted for in a past presidential election.  It used to drive by my house several times a week, and when I was outside of my house, the driver would honk his welcome--and I would nearly jump out of my skin.  That won't be happening anymore, because the owner of the house, of the van, is gone.  He has arrived in his eternal Home, greeted by his Savior and his beloved bride who preceded him Home by 2 1/2 years.  The man has probably been a member at my church longer than I have been alive, and in many ways he embodied our church.

When I got the email last week that John had passed peacefully, tears immediately filled my eyes.  I thought of the joyous welcome he received and what a gift it was for him to look around him and see that he was Home.  I described John to a friend who is new at our church, and I said, "You'd know him if you saw him--or rather, if you heard him."  John was mostly deaf, and he compensated for it by talking loudly.  It didn't really matter how loudly you talked back, because he didn't really leave too much time for you to speak.  That's probably because he couldn't hear you anyway.  Still, John was an amazing and welcoming man.  He was one of the first people to welcome my husband and me to church, nearly seven years ago, and I continued to see him be that welcoming, Sunday after Sunday.  John was love.  John was a gift.  And John was faithful.  Heaven got just a bit louder at his arrival, and our church got just a bit quieter.

Since we started attending Fourth Reformed almost seven years ago, we have been to several funerals for longtime members of the church.  Jerry was the first, and when the memorial service is held on April 1, John will be the most recent.  As I was thinking about John, I was struck by Whose he was as much as who he was.  John had two loves: his Savior and his beloved Jane.  There were things he really enjoyed--hunting, getting away from the city in his rustic cabin, talking politics, his children and grandchildren--but he absolutely and completely loved God and Jane. 

Some day they will all be gone, all the saints who have built our churches and who have been the sources of our wisdom, our examples.  Some day they will all have reached their final rest, and we will be the saints who are left.  We'll be the ones who stand as an example of what it means to love God and to love others, to give up our lives for our spouses, to work with integrity, to welcome.  It will be up to us.  May those who come behind us find us even half as faithful as we find those who have gone before us.

The Tenth Sabbath

Just as I am, without one plea
But that Thy blood was shed for me
And that Thou bidst me come to Thee
Oh Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Just as I am, and waiting not
To rid my soul of one dark blot
To Thee whose blood can cleanse each spot
Oh Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Just as I am, though tossed about
With many a conflict, many a doubt
Fightings and fears within, without
Oh Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind
Sight, riches, healing of the mind
Yea, all I need in Thee to find
Oh Lamb of God, I come, I come.

Just as I am, Thou wilt receive
Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve
Because Thy promise I believe
Oh Lamb of God, I come, I come.

"Just As I Am, Without One Plea," Charlotte Elliott

OCD Much?

Our youngest daughter has a problem.  I'm not sure it's an actual problem or would warrant an official diagnosis, but she fixates like no one I've ever met.  Now it must be said (because otherwise my husband will say it for me), that I'm a fixater, too.  If I'm lying in bed thinking about doing something the next day and some random item I'll need for the project is missing in my mind, I absolutely have to get out of bed to find it.  That moment.  It can't wait until morning, or I won't sleep.  So perhaps she comes by it naturally.

Every two year old goes through the "Why?" phase.  Addie seems stuck there.  No answer satisfies her "why," nor will any answer make it go away.  And, to make it all worse, she doesn't forget her curiosity.  So, we have a two year old who wonders why about almost everything she sees, and then she fixates on it.  For the next three days.

You think I'm exaggerating.  Last week Monday, we were picking Meg up from preschool.  On our way out the door, we started talking to our friend Kari, who was there to pick her daughter Maddie up from school.  Unfortunately for Maddie's little sister, Molly, we continued our conversation after Maddie had opened the door of their Jeep, and the wind caught Molly's balloon, lifting it out of the Jeep and sending it soaring into the sky.  Maddie was traumatized about what she'd done, Molly was devastated to see her balloon floating into the sky, Meg was grieving for all of the balloons she's lost to the clouds, and Addie was fixated.

As we drove home from school that day, Addie must have asked "Why?" two dozen times.  Finally I got tired of the question and could no longer ignore her insistance.  So, taking the advice of another parent I'd chatted with recently, I launched into a full and detailed explanation.  The plan was that this would confuse her so much that she'd be distracted from her question and would stop asking.  It went something like this:

"Well, you see, that balloon was filled with helium, and helium is one of the lightest gasses in the world.  It's on the periodic table before oxygen, and the air is mostly filled with oxygen.  When the balloon was in the car, it stuck tightly to the ceiling because it was so light, but it wasn't strong enough to go through the ceiling, so the balloon was safe.  When Maddie opened the door of the Jeep, the balloon, filled with super light gas, wanted nothing more than to fly into the sky, because it is lighter than all the oxygen in the sky.  Because it's so windy today, the wind caught the balloon and pulled it out from under the ceiling and into the air.  The helium was too light to stay down and instead it floated up into the sky and just went up and up and up.  It's sad, but that's what happens to balloons filled with helium when they are set free in the sky."

There was the much longed-for and planned silence.  Then, the two-year-old voice behind me said, "Why?"  Super, I thought.  What do I do with this? 

Before I could answer, the four-year-old voice in the far back of the van said, "Do you suppose it just keeps floating all the way up to heaven?  Do you suppose all of the balloons we lose are there?  And maybe the ones we write on for Baby Zion?  There in heaven, with God and Jesus and Nana and Papa and Grandpa Meyer and Baby Zion?"

Then Addie asked, "Meg, do you think we'll see them again when we get to heaven, too?"

"I hope so," came the seasoned, big-sister response.  "I hope so."

There was a long silence after that in the car.  As the tears filled my eyes from thinking about all that we have lost waiting for us in heaven where we will gain eternity, that wise four-year-old voice piped up again: "When do you suppose Jesus will come back for us, Mommy?  Because it seems to be taking a long time, and I really want to play with my balloons again."

Some things you just can't make up.

You can't make this up either: on Wednesday, when we drove Meg to school again, Addie said, "Mom?  Why Molly's balloon fly into sky?"  Maybe she just wanted to be reminded about heaven.

When You Don't Believe in You

I don't think you have time to waste not writing because you are afraid you won't be good at it.

DearWriterFriend sent me this Anne Lamott quote the other day.  And then a few minutes later she accused me of not believing in myself.  It would hurt if it weren't true.  (No, it wouldn't, because she loves me, but it certainly is true.)

I called her simply because it IS true.  I had just come from a meeting that might result in some contract grant writing for me, and they asked me to submit some writing samples--pieces I'm proud of.  Naturally, I panicked.  I kept up my confident "I'm a professional writer" face while I was still in the building.  As soon as I shook their hands and walked out of the building, my confident expression was replaced by "Holy crap, they're going to figure out I'm no good" eyes welling and throat closing off.  So I did the only logical thing.  I called DearWriterFriend. 

For the last ten years, DearWriterFriend has been believing in me when I don't believe in me.  She said all of the good friend things, encouraged me, told me that of course I was going to submit the writing samples, and called me a writer.  After she was done laughing hysterically at me, of course.  And then, within a few hours, she emailed me a link to a writing contest and told me I was doing that, too.

And that's what true friends are.  That is how you know your friends.  They're the ones who believe in you when you don't believe in you.  They're the ones who tell you what you need to do in order to meet your dreams, and they're the ones who make sure you do it.  Naturally, they're also the ones who laugh hysterically at you when you say, "What if I'm not really any good?" because they know you are good.  Because other people believe you are good.  Because maybe, just maybe, you really are.

At least until you're pretty sure everyone is about to expose you as a fraud.  Then they'll answer the phone and do it all over again.

Two are better than one,
because they have a good return for their labor:
If either of them falls down,
one can help the other up.
But pity anyone who falls
and has no one to help them up.

Ecclesiastes 4:9-10