A Joy-Seeker Reads the News!

       The newspaper of my city is getting smaller and smaller. I am not talking about the number of pages, though that may be true, too. The cost has remained the same, though less paper is being used.  People are getting their news from other sources and for good reason.  The internet is faster and you can pick and choose articles from a variety of sources.

      Our paper comes to our home on Thursday through Sunday. When we get our paper, sometimes it sits on the driveway even for a few days before someone bothers to pick it up.  Is it that we are apathetic about the world events or too busy to make it a priority?  

       The newspaper is not a bad newspaper, but a bad news paper.  The head lines of the days are on the front paper, followed by the most news worthy articles in the Section A.  None of them are about international trends or news that offers any hope.  The following sections headline bad news in the city, state, world of sports, world or business and world of entertainment.   Very little focus is on anything is productive or positive.  It is best to skim and scan, for sanity’s sake.

      The local city news section focuses on every perverted event that people in our general vicinity have participated in.  It talks about abuse of children, heinous murders, tortures and every sick, sick activity possible.  I can barely stomach the headlines, let alone want to read the detailed articles.  It is the same for the parts of the arts and entertainment section, specializing in sordid details about lives of our depraved celebrities.  I used to love both of those sections.

      The section that tells us what our television has in store for its followers for the week is another adventure in depression.  Researchers say that avid television watchers are more depressed than others. Is it any wonder?  We now have a hundred or more channel instead of 3 or 4 and there is still nothing of value to watch.   

      The Sunday paper is a little thicker and includes the travel section.  This has become my favorite, because you have “got to have a dream”.  The arts and entertainment on Sunday includes articles about upcoming cultural events in town, movies and new books, so I usually look at those parts, and only those parts.  I love the idea of going places and doing interesting things, even if it does not happen as often as I would like. It is always great to hear about new reads, too.

      I always look for jobs and property auctions in the paper.  I always know someone who needs a job and I think about finding some great property for nothing. Looking in these sections may be sheer habit at this point in my life.

     Then, there are the advertisements and coupons.  Honestly, I would be a lot more content and a lot wealthier, if I did not look to see what other people are buying “on sale” that I did not have.  The best thing for me to with these ads, as well as the most of the newspaper, is to take it straight to the recycle bin without passing “Go!”

      There is one part of the newspaper that is truly the best for joy-seekers, however.  It is a reflection of modern life that wallows in humor, sarcasm and subtlety.  You cannot skim it as you do with other parts of the newspaper.  You have to give it your full attention and take a hearty bite, not a nibble.  This part is not for tasters, sippers or cautious partakers.  Joy-seekers, this is your only consistent hope for the modern “hard copy” newspaper.  It is the only part where you are sure to find a belly full of joy and laughter, or, at least, smiles and a clearing of the brain.  There’s sure to be something that helps you laugh at yourself or remind you of a situation you can relate to.   As a joy-seeker, I applaud and appreciate the cartoonists of America, who brighten the days of so many with their cleverness and creativity. 

      Years ago, someone, who only read the comics in the newspaper, was considered low brow and uneducated. It was something that was mocked!  Someone who only read the comics was scorned and found himself the subject of jokes!  When I was a young person, I did not read comics too often,  because I did not think the comics were that worthwhile.  Now, I see how balancing the comics are!  Part of finding joy is learning to laugh at oneself.  Sometimes that is the best we can do!

Gold in my Backyard

      A friend recently asked me why I had not blogged in such a long time.  Someone actually noticed!  I was surprised.  Here are the reasons for my negligence:  end of school year busyness, family issues, critical life decision-making and a too-full plate in many, many ways.  Have I been too other-wise focused to see the joy in life?

      The friend that started blogging before I did decided to end her blog after a year of blogging.  She had decided in her blog to make an adventure of discovering the city she lived in after nearly thirty years of hating it.   She wanted to find the beauty and the joy in Cleveland, of all places.  Her beautifully composed blog explored this topic of finding adventure in your own backyard.  She summed up the lessons she had learned and ended her blog by literally saying, “Bye”.

      My blogging topic, on the other hand, is never ending.  Finding joy in life is a life-long journey.  Friend, I thank you for asking, because it reminded me to regain this focus. There are so many things concerning joy to write about. I want to share an experience concerning joy in my own backyard.

      I was picking up two girls at the Columbus airport for church camp. One girl arrived an hour before the other.  After getting some lunch, we had time to kill until the second plane arrived. 

      Columbus tourism is alive and well at the airport.  You can buy just about anything with the word Columbus, Ohio, Buckeyes or Ohio State printed on it. Some items are tasteful, even lovely and some are just tacky and useless.

      I saw the most amazing postcard at one of these airport shops.  It actually dropped my jaw.  It was a photo of a beautiful field of radiant, golden sunflowers that I had longed to see for many years; that I had even looked for in Normandy and Tuscany and did not find.  I had only imagined the beauty of such a sight after reading the novel, The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. Yet, here was this postcard with the word OHIO on it. The postcard on said the picture was taken in Central Ohio. Yes, it was taken in my own backyard!  Sometimes we do not have to travel very far to find joy, the joy we are looking or longing for.  The postcard even had glitter on it: something gold with glitter!!!

Onion or Oak and What I Carry

        The saying in my high school yearbook said, “Life is like an onion. You peel away each layer and sometimes you cry.”  I thought it was a beautiful, meaty statement about life when I was 17.

         I look at life differently now. The onion metaphor does not seem to work for me any more.  As I get older, I do not think as often of peeling away something on a regular basis to get to the end: an end, which is an empty nothing, like the inside of an onion. It seems somewhat pessimistic. Though perhaps, I missed something in my understanding of this onion.

         I think of my life as more like an oak tree that each year gains a growth ring.  In good years there is a lot of growth added to the trunk and in other years the growth is smaller.  The growth we gain each year is the character we build and what we do with our lives to help us become stronger and align ourselves more to God’s plan for His people.

        The title of the book, The Things They Carried, is an interesting title to a book that is not as good as the title.  It makes me think of what we carry with us through life and what that says about our character.  It makes me think of what we would carry out of a burning house or what we would pick if we could only keep a few of our possessions.  It makes me think of ladies’ purses and what they value enough to take with them everywhere.

       Then, it causes me to think of invisible things that I carry with me from year to year and what those things say about me.  Is life a peeling away like an onion or building of layers like an oak?  Maybe it is both.

      What thoughts, ideas, habits and qualities do we carry with us from year to year?  Peel away the bad, the unnecessary, and the sin and build the layers of strength, character and sense of purpose.  Whichever the case, as it goes with peeling away, so it does with strengthening and character building: sometimes we cry. 

       I revised my two page resume last night.  I peeled away the unnecessary, the padding and I just went for the truly most important highlights of my career.  My resume is now, at over 30 years of teaching, smaller than it was at two years’ experience.  Does that mean that I have not done much lately or does it mean that I am finally able to see what is important? I hope it means the latter. Yet, I wonder: is my life more than a little piece of paper that speaks of my career?  What is worth carrying and what is not?

      What really mean something are the intangible qualities that I hope I have that no one can peel away, pare away or take away.  The intangible qualities that will show my Maker that I have grown in the ways that are important are what I am interested in keeping and transporting on life’s exciting journey.  I hope that the things that I carry are things like love, joy and peace.

Gardening Quotes for April

Gardening Quotes 

Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant. ~Robert Louis Stevenson

I think this is what hooks one to gardening: it is the closest one can come to being present at creation. ~Phyllis Theroux

Hope never dies within a true gardener’s heart. ~author unknown

The man who has planted a garden feels he has done something for the good of the whole world. ~Charles Dudley Warner

Hoe while it is spring, and enjoy the best anticipations. It is not much matter if things do not turn out well. ~Charles Dudley Warner

However many years she lived, Mary always felt that 'she should never forget that first morning when her garden began to grow'.”
― Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden

“The greatest fine art of the future will be the making of a comfortable living from a small piece of land.”
― Abraham Lincoln

“My garden is my most beautiful masterpiece”
― Claude Monet

Run for Joy

       In the 60’s before running or jogging was in vogue, my dad intentionally parked over a mile from his downtown office.  Did he do it to save money?  Did he do it because he could not find a parking spot up close?  Maybe not…   Wearing a crisp suit, a white shirt, tie and hat on his head, with briefcase in hand he ran to work.  Running was his expression of an exuberant joyful attitude that identified this man.  Running is not just an action, but it is also a form of self expression.

       Running expresses an attitude.  “Immediately, when they saw Him, all the people were greatly amazed, and running to Him, greeted Him.” Mark 9:15 “Now as He was going out on the road, one came running, knelt before Him, and asked Him, ‘Good Teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?’" Mark 10:17   “So they went out quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to bring His disciples word.”  Matthew 28:8 “Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it.” 1 Corinthians 9:24

       I love to watch children run.  It expresses enthusiasm that cannot be expressed in any other way.  Ask a child to come to do something special and the child will run.  Ask a child to do a chore and the child will walk or worse.  At school, we spend a lot of time teaching children to walk instead of running, leaping or bouncing.  I wish we could let them run.

       When I fell off a ladder six years ago, running became nearly impossible for me to do. I learned to walk quickly, but not run.  Lately, I have been practicing in the basement, because running is something I miss.  On a beautiful day, I imagine running and feeling the fresh air in my lungs and the sunshine on my face.  Running is better than walking to me.  Walking is good, but running is better.

      There is one thing better than running, however.

       “Now as the ark of the Now as the ark of the Lord came into the City of David …King David leaping and whirling before the Lord…”  2 Samuel 6: 16

            

       “Now Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour. And a certain man lame from his mother's womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms of them that entered into the temple; who seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple asked an alms. And Peter, fastening his eyes upon him with John, said, Look on us. And he gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something of them.  Then Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk. And he took him by the right hand, and lifted him up: and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength.  And he leaping up stood, and walked, and entered with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God.”  Acts 3:1-8

Prayer in Public Schools

            No prayer in public schools!  I think of it when I am in the urban public school where I teach and someone asks me to pray.  I think of it when I send up a silent prayer in a moment of need!  I pray that God would help the people I work with, the parents, students and me.  I want to have love for others at all times and the wisdom to know what to do in the many difficult situations I encounter daily: I ask for this in prayer.  I think of it when I see a fellow teacher bow her head before eating her lunch.   No prayer in public schools?

            I remember when I was a child and prayer was allowed in public schools.   I remember when no one would think of eating a bite of lunch without our lunchtime prayer.  Even a snack was not to be consumed without prayer.   (Of course, many families had the same practices at home.)

            In December 2012 (so you know I am not reminiscing back too far), I went into a fourth grade class where the students were having a small party before the commencement of the Christmas holiday.  I helped the teacher arrange the food for the children. 

            It was nothing like the parties you would see in a suburban school with all kinds of colorful goodies arrayed on a bulging smorgasbord table. Instead, all of the desks were arranged in a close circle and the teacher had a small place mat on each desk.  There was a small cup with about a fourth of a cup of a fruit smoothie, a plate with about a half cup of popcorn, one Hershey Kiss,and a small wrapped candy cane on the place mat.

            There was such an air of excitement as the teacher invited the 20 students to take a seat and then begin eating.  One fourth grade girl said, “ No!”  She told the students that they could not eat before thanking the Lord Jesus for their food. Spontaneously, they all locked hands and raised their hands above their shoulders and began to pray in unison: “Lord Jesus, we thank you for this food! God is great, God is good and so we thank him for this food…”  They continued a very long version of this old prayer. At the end, they shouted: “Amen!!!” They all seemed to know this prayer and if any did not, they said it anyway as though they did!  Needless to say the other teacher and I were speechless.  I muttered something like that was very nice as I wiped the tears.

            Society has done a lot to squelch prayer and its practice in the past 50 years.  On many levels, it has succeeded.  However, as long as there is need, gratitude and a human longing for God there will be prayer, not just in foxholes and trenches, but in homes, churches, stores, factories, parks, wilderness areas and, yes, even public schools!

                       

Another Snow Day

        Another snow day…(a holiday from teaching and learning at school due to difficult weather)  Since we just had one recently, I was not quite as excited this time.  I was determined to get some things done and enjoy some time outdoors in the snow.

        Most of my plans to be outdoors went awry.  I planned to spend the day sledding with some children from church (Plan A), but my husband was worried about the watery mess.  Even though we had a lot of snow, it was the watery kind that felt like an ice-water-filled sponge when you squeezed it.  I succumbed to his wishes and went for Plan B, which was to help him shovel the driveway.  He got out there and did the job while I was busy with another chore. He did not tell me and did not wait for me. (I guess he did not realize that I really wanted to help.) Thus, “snow day” was having little meaning for me.  I was stuck inside. 

        Visiting a sick friend in the hospital was what I planned for the afternoon.  She was so sick that I could only stay a few minutes and kept falling asleep when I tried to talk to her.  I decided to leave. I had hoped to spend the afternoon with her. Even though it was not an outdoor plan, it did not go as I hoped either.

        However, the walk to and from the car to the hospital and a short walk in an old neighborhood provided just the experience that I craved.  My boots were keeping my feet dry as I sloshed through the snow.  The cold snow, now water, that had melted, chilled my feet as I walked but my socks and feet were dry.  The wet, moist air made me wake up and pay attention to my surroundings.  It was a beautiful mid-afternoon in March and I was walking, not inside a school building or around the house; but outside and breathing fresh, clean air!  That chilly, tingly feeling that makes you realize that you are happy to be alive came over me!  Kicking wet snow can be a hoot!