Signs We Wish We'd Made (& A Great Way to Go Deeper this Year)

Sandy summer shoes scuffed behind me. A hallway-away a locker clanged shut and echoed across tiled floors. On the right a faculty bathroom was available and I slipped in, closing the door behind me. I stared at the signs and then laughed, thankful for its warnings.

And isn't that the truth? In addition to wanting to successfully secure some privacy in a bustling public hallway, can you relate to this warning in other areas of your life? "This doesn't work." "Use this."

Those tape scrawls have stuck in my head since, making me laugh and shake my head. Because I can think of so many times when I wish I had had those messages taped into my life too. "This doesn't work, Jen." This will cause you heartache, or unnecessary stress. "This doesn't work, Jen. Use this instead."

We are counting summer's days and trying to savor every moment. You too? Recently my husband, son and I drove to an outdoor concert in St. Paul, Minnesota. In the days leading up to that night, I had raved to my eleven-year old son how much fun we would have and what a treat it would be to unzip our red picnic backpack and lay out a feast on a blanket. Hours before leaving, however, we couldn't find the special backpack anywhere. Daniel and I upended closets and emptied every shelf we could think of. I had vague memories of loaning it out to someone, but couldn't remember who, and suddenly my blonde-haired Daniel wasn't the only disappointed one. When I couldn't find the green blanket either, I started to unravel.

And while I know this says volumes about my closet-organizing skills, it also says more about my heart. Why was I letting minor details of a backpack and blanket upend the joy of this special family evening? God grinned and whispered calm and gentle grace to my heart.

I stepped over the piles of overturned blankets and sleeping bags (those became the next day's challenge and victory!) and stepped into peace. Joy isn't bound by possessions, but by being God's.

We carried our picnic in plastic and cloth bags, and it tasted just as good. Folding chairs and a fuzzy brown blanket completed our supplies and we hopped in the car, headed to the city skyline and a night away together.

In a few weeks, I start my third year of teaching Village School of the Bible's Cover to Cover Bible survey class. Registration is happening now. If you'd like to jump into studying the Bible with me this year, I'd love to have you join us. We'll read the whole Bible in a year, have great group discussions, and build a close community of people who are being transformed by God's word day by day. (Feel free to watch Steve's story of his encounters in this class.)

If you, like me, need reminders some days of "This doesn't work. Use this," you are safe and welcome here. For those reading from emails or blogs, I'd love to have you comment here and tell me what God has been teaching you lately.

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Our Bold Dares

It's audacious and daring actually. What is it about this bold act that says it'll ever work?

We push fingers into dark soil, scooping out vaults. Then with brazen hands we press small brown bulbs into the earth and claim they'll rise again.

Burying them, covering them, we smooth the ground and walk away, with nary a trace of them left.

It feels like a swindlers trick, a money scam, and yet every few years I peruse bags, choose colors, and plop money down.

On a sunny day this month, I kneeled onto damp green grass. Red leaves swirled and dropped. Yellow maple trees shivered and shook in the breeze. Autumn afternoon sun scattered brilliantly across a shocking blue sky. And the beauty caught me. I stopped and snapped photos.

It relaxes me, this time of plunging hands into earth, smelling the loam and dirt. I scooped and filled, scooped and filled. Planting bulbs in October reminded me of my Dad's death, the one year anniversary of it came and went October 27th.

While heaven's hello is still far off, I know the results of pressing violet, fuchsia, and yellow tulip bulbs into the ground, along with tall bobbing purple alium heads. I've seen them. Can't deny them. I look forward to seeing them each year, and have been bowled over by the gorgeous beauty that springs from them.

Bold, brave, audacious flowers erupt each year from dark empty-looking dirt. I've seen it. I know it to be true.

And so I peruse bags, choose colors, and pick up my dusty trowel. It looks different at the end. The splendorous results are nothing like the simple bulbs I handle now, and I know it to be true. Life will come. This is not the end.

Several days later, my husband and I clear off the kitchen table, and plop heavy pumpkins on it. Six squat orange squash await faces. I pile knives and carving tools around them, and scatter empty bowls around for the seeds and pumpkin pieces that'll follow.

"Mom, when are they here?" Daniel asks impatiently, popping his head in the door.

"Soon, buddy! Want to climb a tree?"

He dashes out, eager for his big brother, sister-in-law, and sister to arrive.

For hours into the night, six of us smiled giddy at our pumpkins, imagining their faces, picturing who they would be. We carved and cut, deliberated and decorated. Deep dish pizza slices dripped juices and oil onto small plates. Tangy lime papaya cubes glistened as we popped them in our mouths.

Pumpkin seeds waited and dried, spread across metal trays. Sometimes the good things are now, sometimes we have to wait.

But the bold dares? The audacious hopes? They seem less daring as the evidence piles up, as each year's experiences and gifts stack before me.

Our God's gifts are constant, tender, daily as the sun. His presence is there. He walks beside us. Some gifts are now. Some gifts we await.

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What Marbles and Ice Slip Significant into our Lives Tonight

"Every year I take one out," he says.

He describes a glass jar of marbles that hulks on a corner of his desk. He is professional, efficient, an accomplished businessman, and his words have stuck in my brain ever since.

"I set up the jar, estimated how many years an average person lives, and now every January, I take one marble out."

Photo credit: Flickr user Sally, Creative Commons, cc license

Marbles catch the light and diminish slowly in the jar on his desk, and his meaning sinks in.

"I wanted to remember how fast life flies by and to make sure to live fully."

His exact words are fuzzy to me now, but the image still reverberates.

Weeks, months, years trickle through our fingers and leave only memories. Our children's heads race closer to our foreheads and then flash by. Ankles flash pink skin cold in winter growth spurts, and I peek into my garage for the purple plastic bin of Daniel's next size clothes. Morgan brings home a brand new college identity card, grinning cheeky at her row of color-coordinated gel pens and bulging pack of binders.

We carve calendar dates for two graduations this spring, and both John and Morgan step into their last semesters. They each organize their rooms and start packing. Morgan dreams of college dorm-room decor and spies out small sets of kitchenware. John boxes up childhood mementos, making room for another carton of wedding supplies, and brainstorms apartments for the summer.

And your children too, are stretching taller by the week, their shoes and jeans shrinking by the month, and how do you slow down time?

Our marbles diminish so subtly, so silently, that I look and am surprised to do the math and see where I am today. You too?

Our words matter. Our minutes are priceless. As cells stretch, divide, and stretch again, the loved ones in our life grow taller, older, and seasons flash by. 

Snow melts here in Minnesota today. Last week's arctic chill now slips grated snow through my black metal patio table, shredding ice into stalactites below.

I crunch out to my compost bin this afternoon before supper, scowling at the rabbit tracks, and trying to halt their entry into my yard. I'm comfortable without a winter jacket and the snow crunches and melts underfoot.

The cold had seemed so impenetrable and now snow shrinks by the hour. Tomorrow and Thursday are supposed to be warm as well.

And the snow disappears from my deck.

"Mom, will you play a game with me?" Daniel asks, his tousled hair still standing up in the back despite each day's water.

"Sure, bud. Let's play."

Throughout the night, I sneak down to hug my two oldest kids who are cramming homework.

"I love you so much." The words fall naturally as I reach up to hug them, leaning my head against their chins.

Take a marble with me, my friends. The snow has melted even more since supper and I don't want to miss a moment.

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When You Find Yourself Red-Faced and Hot at the Woodfire

In between sticky smores, sandy swimsuits, and splashes in the crisp Mississippi River headwaters, it washed off: the weight of everyday life. Hamburger hobo stews wrapped in tin foil oozed steaming carrot and potato juices. We smelled of wood fires and mosquito repellent.

Hiking through bogs on wooden boardwalks, slapping mosquitoes, hypothesizing which "leaves of three" to avoid, we explored an Old Timer's cabin, whose round planks stacked four or five broad  pine trunks tall. Piling twelve-cousins onto a stool, the dusty sweaty kids laughed and made faces at the camera. I snapped furiously, trying to capture each smile and smirk.

After the 1930s cabin, half of us took a new winding curved route back to our cars. The path narrowed quickly, filled with slippery boulders and wet dirt in the shade, and crossed by garishly-twisted and snapped trees, felled in the storm a week earlier. Giant red and white pine trees trailed the ground, their splintered white insides gaping and exposed.

"This seems much longer than a mile," we panted, "Is it two?" We wondered if we had gotten lost on alternate hike paths. Eight year old Daniel and his short-legged five year old cousin huffed and panted alongside us, their small legs trekking a longer trail in proportion to us.

"You can do it! We're getting closer," I cheered them on. Swooped up into his dad's arms, my nephew laughed and gurgled as he bounced on his dad's shoulders. My brother-in-law put foot in front of the other and plodded on, his son's legs sticking out from his left shoulder, arms extended on the right.

Four adults and two children, we hiked in hot sunshine, passed ferns, carnivorous pitcher plants, and towering pines. A blue lake sheened in the heat just out of reach through the trees, and then we were at the end. In the parking lot, our small group grinned wearily, gulped cold water from a metal park spigot, and rejoined our extended family.

The week passed in beautiful rhythms. Loons warbled in the night, raccoons rustled and grunted as we lay in sleeping bags nearby,  and we tip-toed shy feet to bathroom breaks in the night, hoping to avoid bears. Early mornings brought hot coffee, scuffed muddy knees, and boy snacks by the dozen.

And somewhere in between the bonding and the kissing over the board games, words sliced fast. The fights are never about anything important, are they, these husband and wife disagreements? There were two ideas of how to cook chicken shish-kebabs, and multiple ways of expressing it. We bombed that. He said, she said, and then both of us were red-faced and hot at the wood fire.

Later in a patch of grass off to the side, we offered quiet apologies, explanations, defensive hurt feelings and hopes, but angry words splashed warm again. Walking away to wind down, we finished supper, speaking civilly to each other, but knowing that more effort was needed.

Behind a zippered tent, I prayed with my eight year old and pulled his sleeping bag and blankets high. "I love you, bud," I murmured close to his soft forehead, breathing in his scent and kissing him. We talked for a few minutes more and then I pulled out my Bible and scooted to a far corner of the tent to read silently nearby as he started to fall asleep.

My bookmark saved where I had left off, and I resumed reading with a shake of my head. "Very funny, God."

"Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the word of God dwell in you richly... (Colossians 3:15,16a)."

I could feel my heart softening and my breathing deepening. Unzipping the tent and slipping out, Mark and I found each other and talked, faces closer, apologizing, choosing soft tones, and starting over each time. We grinned and kissed again.

And I love that about marriage. Sometime it's like addictive smores over a woodfire and other times it's like a muggy hike through the woods that feels longer than you expected. At those times, our God can swoop down, whisk us up, and carry us until we get our second wind.


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Of Fish, and Friends, and Fresh-Cut Grass: Freezing Summer Fast

Can you hear it?

Burring and whirring hums drone a scratchy constant as our backyard neighbor mows. The sound and fragrance are comforting and peaceful, one of summer's iconic pleasures. Tracing the contours of his yard, my neighbor's lawnmower rumbles and roars, releasing the sweet green scent of sliced grass. My sprinkler arcs languidly across the back yard, soaking gardens and flower beds, staining the soil and mulch a rich ebony.

Photo Credit: Flickr User Pearl Pirie, Creative Commons, cc license

On the couch, my green backpack still carries two towels, a dilapidated pair of black and white swim goggles, and Daniel's folded brown camouflage swim trunks. They smell like chlorine from last week's swim class, and we look forward to tonight's session. Crumpled kids' papers from last week's church Vacation Bible School program line his room, I know too.

"Summer is a-third over," Mark teased me this weekend, arcing an eyebrow at me.

"No, don't say that! It's just three weeks in," I said, revising and constructing my perspective.

In a season that flies by, I'm trying to freeze time, savor every moment, and live fully present.

At a graduation party this last Sunday, we sprawled on lush grass in groups, balanced bratwursts on our laps, and branched into conversations with the people around us. That Thursday morning in the hallway outside a church sanctuary where one hundred-seventy children and volunteers performed hand motions to lively worship songs, I curled up knees and leaned my head close to hear her.

"Jennifer, you have to meet Tonya," they had said, and now here we were.

Bending close to hear and reminisce, we talked about towns in West Africa, and the beauty and strength of the Liberian people, and of the atrocities of the Liberian civil war. An hour flew by, and then we exchanged business cards and hugs in the parking lot outside.

At home today, crimson cherries mound in a glass ramekin and Daniel samples a new snack: water-packed sardines.

"Mmm, I love it!"

We pause to examine a tiny fish spinal cord under the microscope, and summer marches on.

Hi friend, what has your first third of the summer been like so far? 

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Of Parties, Time Capsules, and Choosing Your Trajectory

The party was tonight. It was the Dougan Leap Year Doughnut Party.

Peering into the doughnut case this afternoon, we nabbed two glazed ones, two white frosted sprinkled ones, and one filled with raspberry jelly. On the way home, Morgan and I laughed and talked, with me purposefully reigning in my own expectations.

Photo: Christine Rondeau, Creative Commons, cc license

Upstairs around the dining room table, the five of us clambered into chairs. Two plastic cases of strawberries and blueberries sprawled open invitingly, and the five doughnuts gleamed beneath a translucent panel in the cardboard box.

Cracking jokes and tossing berries into our mouths, we stopped to pray, and then we began. Two slim paper envelopes held our attention, and I slid my finger under the seals, drawing out multiple sheets of paper.

"Morgan, here's yours from 2008. John, yours."

"Look at how small our writing was then!"

"I only wrote three lines!" another exclaimed. "Here's a drawing I did," she pointed, laughing.

"Who wants to read theirs first?" I asked.

One by one, we took turns reading our handwriting from eight years ago. In childish print, we heard echos of their younger voices pour off the page.

"Here are your 2012 letters," I said, handing across folded handwritten sheets of paper. "For Morgan only" one of them read in green ink pen. They reached out eagerly, unfolding longer notes written from themselves just four years earlier, and silence dropped in the dining room. Daniel shuffled uneasily.

"Where's mine?" he asked.

"You were only three years old then, but here is a photo of you from then," I replied, unwrapping the accompanying photos, creased from four years in an envelope.

I confess I've been looking forward to this day for years and months! Unwrapping paper, we got to unwrap our lives from eight and four years ago. In time capsule format, we peeked back into who we were four years ago, seeing how we've changed and how we've stayed the same. 

Taking turns, my kids read their letters aloud, their younger selves asking their older selves questions about what life is like now, casting imaginative questions from the past. "Do you have your own car? Are you living in your own house?" a twelve year old John asked his twenty year old self, and we laughed at what a third year college student's life really looks like.

And then my favorite part began: a reflective silence fell as everybody grabbed pens and sheets of paper. Writing from 2016, they talked to their 2020 self, presenting life from this angle and wondering about life four years in the future.

Scribbling messy black words across blue lined paper, I wrote my own letter, summing up the last four years, and speculating about the next four. And it couldn't fail to hit me. My choices now affect who I am then, and my mood turned more introspective as I continued to write. 

Who are you now? Who do you want to be in 2020? And those answers start your trajectories... 


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Under Your Pile of Hats, I See It

Sitting side by side at the kitchen table, we are surrounded by slivers of blue, green, and black construction paper.

Photo of Neptune and moon Triton, NASA Solar System Exploration, Creative Commons cc license

"Here, this will be the volcano," I say, taping a grey three-dimensional cone onto a round blue sphere. "This is the ice lava. Wow, a volcano that erupts liquid nitrogen that freezes anything it touches! Can you imagine?!" and I act it out to Daniel as we attach tiny blue strips of paper to the inside of the volcano. "What a cool God!"

My seven year old grins at me, eyes wide, his haircut growing out in spiky tufts. He swings his legs excitedly under the table and picks up more paper.

"Mom, can we do some more?" he asks, his small red and black scissors poised in mid-cut.

Pausing for a moment, I waver. Because in the throes of efficiency, I had already switched hats. My Homework-Helper Mom hat was already off, my hand raised to don the Lunch-Coralling hat. Next up was Bill-Paying Mom, and Dish-Washing Mom. Homework-Helping-Mom was due again soon when 11th-grade Morgan and I would study Algebra 2.

(Don't ask about Dusting Hat. She hasn't been seen in weeks. Laundry-Folding-Mom works Saturdays, after Mark and the kids bring up toppling baskets of clean laundry. Who am I kidding? Laundry-Folding Mom just needs to tackle the growing mound of clean clothes that have been on the side couch all week, occasionally carried away and hidden in the bedroom when guests show up.)

My hats and To-Do lists are already lined up in my mind when Daniel asks it: "Mom, can we do this some more?"

Splashy colored paper, two scissors, and several glue sticks line the cherrywood kitchen table. South-facing window sunlight warms the dining room. Five flower buds swell slowly on the new green orchid branch.

"Sure, bud. That sounds nice," I say, sitting back down again. I pick up a scissors and start cutting.

"Did you know that Neptune has at least 27 moons? This icy-volcano is on the moon called Triton. Isn't God amazing?"

We pass glue sticks in silence and cut into green, blue, and red paper, the sunshine spreading warmth across my shoulders.

Our Creator God who invents ice-forming volcanic lava wears the hats of Creator, Father, Sustainer, Provider, Encourager, Savior, and Rescuer-King. In striking strength and beauty, he dons them all effortlessly.

I know you have a stack of hats, my friend. I see moms and dads who swipe on and off hats that read Provider, Meal-Maker, Child-Chauffeur, Band-Aid-Applier, Bedtime-Enforcer, Drink-Getting,  Bill-Paying, Present-Wrapper, and Homework-Helping mom or dad.

God leans in and pulls you into a deep hug. He sees you and delights in you. You are loved. You are enough in Him, and you are held and sustained by Him. Merry Christmas! We celebrate our Rescuing King wrapped in baby clothes.

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How To Hold Summer Long

"Have you checked yours yet, Mom?" he asks from downstairs, laughing as I am struck temporarily deaf by the dishwasher's hums below me and do not reply.

"Oh! I thought you were talking to Dad," I bumble and grin. "Yes, I walk out each morning and eat the reddest tomatoes!" I exclaim. "I'll have more today," and my delight and glee is evident.

John is searching for his socks, gathering items for his work day, and talking about tomatoes. Golf ball-size red ones, nubby-naveled yellow pear tomatoes, and ruby grape-sized cherry tomatoes mound and glimmer crimson from a plastic bowl in his hands.

We each have portions in the four garden beds where Derby and Early Contender bush beans stand in tight rows, dangling long velcro green beans in the shade of their leaves. Zuchinni leaves furrow in wide elephant ears and orange flowers trumpet new growth beneath. Nasturtiums peel out in pinks, yellows, and corals, while gladiola flowers stretch upwards, knobby buds hinting. Pea pod plants curl in withered browns and creams, announcing summer's end.

In between the high school class roster, the first grade book-ordering, and an offer to help college boy buy textbooks online, summer glows a dull red. Tangled day-lilies mass and jumble in the flower bed, and the first purple aster opened last night, winking eyes at a single crimson maple leaf in a verdant tree. And the summer can slip away from us so silently.

I brew cold water ice tea in a scuffed Tupperware pitcher this morning, while water boils to pour over Bulgar wheat for a fresh tomato and mint tabbouleh salad. Two kinds of mint herbs teem and wrinkle vibrant flavor from a container pot beside the purple cone-flowers, and how does summer pass so quickly? I snip, wash, and twist the leaves to release oils, and dunk them full into the sweet southern tea.

We're staying local this vacation week, looking for creative ways to make memories and cherish family moments. Tuesday, we licked salty popcorn off our fingertips in a dark movie matinee, watching our seven year old giggle at yellow cartoon minions. That evening when our eldest got off work, we poured out mini crepes for supper, and then poured all five of us into the car for an ice cream outing.

Twenty minutes away at a legendary St. Paul ice creamery, we sidled and stood on one foot, faces pressed against the cool glass window, trying to decide between salted caramel, maple nut praline, Superman blue, and cotton candy. The creamery's smallest size still towered high, scoops of ice cream spilling out and over until the employees simply up-ended each cup into a wide brimmed plastic bowl. We sat, sticky-fingered on a sticky pink- and blue-dripped table outside Snelling Avenue as city cars slid by.

"Don't lick the table!" three of us cried out in slow-motion too late, as my youngest followed his rainbow-colored ice cream to the picnic table top.

By eight-fifteen that night, we were full. Sweetness still in the creases of our lips, on our tongues, and rolling out in satisfied groans from us, we leaned back in the car seats and loosened our seatbelts slightly. Sunshine slanted long and low across the city streets, the whirring highway, and the curving suburban lanes home.

Summer tastes like hot tomatoes, green bean earthiness, and salted caramel ice cream on my lips. August mounts, climbs, and spirals up the numbers, ticking to the end, as hot green days linger. Have you checked yours yet? These days that pass in sun-dripped light.

What Blocks You from Living Full and Regret-Free

"Should we tell them what the meat is?" she asked me and I could hear the smile in her voice over the phone.

"No, let's wait until later in the meal," I decided. "They'll be more open to it."

The next day we scavenged chairs from all corners of my house and seated seven of us around the scratched cherry wood kitchen table. We prayed, then took turns scooping steaming rice onto our plates. Mom reached for our dishes and carefully ladled a savory meat sauce over the rice, pressing her spoon lower into the pot for more gravy. Garlic and herbs slow-cooked the meat into fall-off-the-bone tenderness, and we asked for seconds, extracting occasional tiny bones from our food.

"It's good!" my husband and kids agreed. "What is it?" Knowing my family, they were open to any news.

"Squirrel. Dad has five of them in the freezer," Mom said, and my family nodded their heads in little surprise.

"Those squirrels stole almost every apple off my tree," Dad said. "I'm down to just one apple left.  I've killed seven squirrels so far," he said, adjusting to a more comfortable position in the chair and smoothing out his napkin.

 I saw my parents again this weekend, my mom cutting my dad's hair. Him with a towel around his shoulders, silvery hair combed straight above his ears and my mom leaning in.

"Don't move," she warned, stretching the blades wide.

I leaned back against their cushioned kitchen chairs, watching them. Outside curved glass windows, my parents' backyard was a haven of landscaped flowers, ferns, and birds at the feeder. An occasional squirrel raced across the fence near the apple tree bobbing in the breeze, its lone apple bundled in a guarded plastic bag.

Finished with Dad's haircut, Mom wiped up slivers of glinting hair from the table and carefully folded the towel off Dad's shoulders, trapping loose hairs inside.

"Let's eat that apple now!" she decided suddenly. "Let's not wait until frost. Dad should eat his apple now..." she trailed off, and we finished the sentence in our minds.

I swallowed back misting tears and grabbed my video camera.

"...This is the first apple from our tree," my mom stated, giving the date and more information. My video-record light blinked red until she ended, and the wind blew sun-tossed leaves across the yard. Autumn's reds and yellows rained on us, then danced across the lawn. 

And I know you have this too... moments that need to be captured and savored, moments that need to be frozen in time. Because whether you have parents who are ill, kindergartners stepping freshly off the yellow bus each day, or taller loved ones walking into the front entryway each night with their briefcases, purses, or heavy backpacks, we all have moments that are slipping away. 

And our challenge? Our mission is to embrace them, to see them, and to fully step in. Step away from whatever you're working on and look deeply into the eyes of the ones you're with. See them, lean in to inhale their scent, and hug them tightly. Fully present in each moment, I want to look up from facebook, put aside my To Do list, and forget the busy. I want to savor and seize each moment.

Is there anyone you need to call? Any conversations you need to have? Someone you need to pause and truly see? Because the truth is, we all have the same moments, the same chances, the same twenty-four hours. And I don't want any regrets.

Say what needs to be said, my friends. Stop and savor life, and the ones around you. Live life fully, deeply, and in the splendored colors of fall. Don't wait.

Crimson and yellow climb up the trees around me, ricocheting off the blue sky. September's heat burns brilliantly, while autumn slips in quiet.

You, With Your Foot in Two Worlds

 "So are you ready to let me go yet?" he asks, grinning with a soft cheekiness as he sits on the cement steps of his home.

Photo: Justin Spencer, Creative Commons, cc license

"No! I'm proposing surgery and insurance, and things like that," I reply, throwing back a glance at him, and rounding to my side of the car. "I love you, Dad," I say, slipping a silver key into my golden Saturn. Looking back for one last wave, I freeze the image of him in my mind, and pull away from the curb, racing home to put my six year old to bed.

I drive numbly, mechanically, replaying the sentence in my mind and counting the days until his next appointment.

A giant chalk white moon stands sentinel over the twilight sky. Full, ample, perfectly round, it hangs heavy in a blue-grey city evening. Tall apartment highrises, depression-era flour mills, and green-shuttered glass factories crouch on a Minneapolis city skyline. Trees chase the moon and, behind me, explosions of violet and tangerine encompass the sinking sun. Fiery orange and reds glare against green highway signs, obliterating mile markers and exits on the highway.

My dad has just returned from helping his uncle out of the hospital and back into a memory care unit. He helped Uncle Al settle back into the room, slide out of the wheelchair, and eat sliced peaches and a pumpkin pie cobbler. Together they maneuvered the remote control buttons of Al's new reclining chair before my dad left for home. Half an hour later, my uncle calls my dad, having forgotten about the day.

"Can I come see you tonight?" I had asked my dad, three hours ago. He agreed, and I hurried to throw a supper together for my family before racing out the door.

"Kah, kah," I knock in African fashion at their house. At the door, I see my mom's sandals and smile. "It makes me miss her to see her shoes," I yell out to my dad. She's gone temporarily, and we miss her already.

I slide a plastic carton of cherry tomatoes across the kitchen table, and slice up a crimson purple plum for us to share. He's already laid two plates, and set out tea cups. We drink green tea with roasted brown rice, and catch up from the week. All too soon, the hour is past and I need to race home to put my son to bed.

He says it then, the sentence that has lodged in my throat, in my mind, since. The sentence I have already been whispering to myself and to my husband in the dark of night. "Am I ready to lose my dad already?" NO.

And I know that you face this situation too, many of you. With a foot in both worlds, you care for older relatives and younger ones. You care for ailing grandparents, or older parents, and children of all ages. I hear you talk of it over coffee, at conferences, online, or through prayer chain emails.

I have watched my parents stand with feet planted in two worlds too, helping older and younger relatives and friends around them. And tonight I feel my own feet sliding tentatively wider, tip-toeing uncertainly into that larger world, and words fall short.

I followed that moon on the drive home, that impossibly large milk-white moon. Clarity and closeness etched its surface in stark relief, with edges and craters, and dark holes falling into a moon dry sea. In front of me was the moon, my car trailing an evening highway, curving into quiet darkness. Behind me orange, crimson, violet, and gray exploded across the night sky, curling crispy cirrus clouds up.

One lone trail of black smoke carved a jet stream through gold light, tracing an airplane's flight straight down. An erratic route for an airplane, it seemed, and I swerved slightly in my lane, craning my head backwards, pondering its downward trajectory. A police car shot by, sirens blaring, and the car in front of me forced my eyes to the road before me.

The mysterious black plume of smoke flamed white and gold in the sunset, and my road curved away.

The First Time I Ever Prayed THAT Before Vacation

His long toes and foot stretched out slowly from the backseat of the car to settle on my armrest.

"Is this okay, Mom?" John asked. Reflected in my sun-visor, his broad shoulders spilled past his third of the backseat, brushing against my daughter's. His leg slid up to the front seat's armrest, flexing out stiffness.

"No problem, John." I kissed the top of his foot.

The five of us bounced across the western half of the United States in our blue Oldsmobile on an eleven-day road trip to see relatives in Washington state. We passed crumbling wooden barns whose caving in was silent and imperceptible. Grasses and trees grew tangled through vacant windows and floorboards and, in a blink, the scene was gone. Wind turbines stood tall on hilltops, capturing the air around them in precise, non-hurried arms. Silver oil rigs bent low, faces to the soil, bobbing and drinking greedily. My daughter snapped photographs out the window of North Dakota's green foothills and up its winding caramel and navy-colored badlands. Placards boasted "the world's largest buffalo" and red and green rivers snaked among the bison.

Montana's disproportionate horizon screamed for attention. In a rancher's world with rattlesnakes and miles of brown sandy land between towns, the sky took center stage. Five-sixths of the world was sky, a massive blue ocean of air where wispy cirrus clouds curled and sketched before hiding away behind stony ranges. Clumped white cumulus clouds came next, throwing grey shadows onto the land around us. The highway carved through and over, around and under. My daughter snapped and clicked the camera feature of her dad's phone.

"Isn't there a silent option for the camera?" wondered my son, as his sister leaned across all angles of the car to capture the beauty she saw.

In Idaho and Washington, my six year old noticed his ears. "There's something wrong with my ears," he said.

"Oh, that's called popping. It's because we're driving up the mountains. Pretend you are swallowing food, or drink lots of water. It will help," I advised, swiveling to look over my left shoulder at him.

"Daniel, isn't God cool to make mountains? Wow, he's a good artist." We nodded together, my six year old and I, and the phrase appeared often in his meal and bedtime prayers that week. He thanked God for mountains and oceans, memories of splashing waves soon his most poignant.

Wet fog and mist clung to the bottom of ever-growing mountains, and we swallowed and gasped at the beauty.

We arrived eventually, of course, at my aunt and uncle's home, pulling into their yellow dirt driveway and crunching pebbles with our tires. Fresh peaches grew from their tree in the backyard, and the Yakima sun poured desert heat onto us as we hugged and exclaimed, getting re-acquainted again. The wooden screen door clapped shut behind us as we lugged suitcases and backpacks into the cool interior, and our voices disappeared inside.

And the prayer I uttered before leaving on this trip? The prayer I whispered on winding roads, and after late-nights... God, please make us delightful to each other and a delight to be around. Help us be kind, patient, and humble. Help us reflect you, your love filling us and coming out from us. 

Our Artist God coated mountains in greens, tans, and silvery blues, directed ocean tides, and granted that small prayer too. We pulled into our Minnesota driveway, eleven days later, after sixteen- and twelve-hour days of driving, still liking each other and thankful for the trip.

Hello, friends. I have missed you, and this time here with you. Thank you for your patience as I have been packing boxes, preparing for a move, and racing across country on a road-trip. 

How has your August been going? What adventures or savored moments are you collecting and holding onto carefully? Have you ever prayed any odd prayers before trips? 

What Is It For You?

This post is part of the Atlas Girl Blog Tour which I am delighted to be a part of along with hundreds of other bloggers. To learn more and join us, CLICK HERE.

It still does it to me, the smell of popcorn. It reminds me of home.

Home wasn't a zip code, a particular house, or the number of years in a place for me. Those changed and there were many.

Rural American bullfrogs bellowed from the cowponds, and I climbed high into a green apple tree. Corn fields rippled for miles, tall honey-colored grasses swayed, and lawn mowers droned sleepy in the distance.

In another setting, mango trees swayed high above our cement block house, while tropical rains hammered and crashed on our metal zinc roofs in a way that still leaves me nostalgic. Rice bubbled over coal pot fires, and neighbors chopped sugar cane stalks, throwing a chunk to the monkey pet nearby.

You know it too. That smell, sight, or sound that reminds you of home. Because no matter what state or country we were in, my mom and dad made it home with a few simple touches. Scrounging up batteries or electricity, they slipped in some family-favorite musicians and suddenly music slid through the house. Familiar refrains from Bruce Cockburn, Kansas, Pink Floyd, Phil Keaggy, and Michael Card peeked around corners, explored new houses, and traipsed over our luggage to each of our family of five. Instantly, our shoulders relaxed and we stretched out our legs.

Mom popped popcorn, shaking kernels at the bottom of any large pot she found, fiercely holding down the lid, as corn rattled in the oil and exploded. She shook her hips and torso in an attempt to give every kernel a chance at the heat and oil; we watched my dad watch her and smile or steal up for a kiss.

And suddenly, we were home.

 My blogging friend, Emily T. Wierenga, award-winning journalist and author of 4 books, has released her first memoir, Atlas Girl: Finding Home in the Last Place I Thought to Look. I was honored to read a sneak preview of the first two chapters before it was released, and now I am scarfing down my newly-arrived full-length copy of the book, and enjoying it. You can grab a copy here. All proceeds go to Lulu Tree in Africa. #Atlasgirl

Making Spring Break Work for Every Family, on Every Budget

Photo courtesy of Hasitha Tudagalle, Creative Commons, cc license

From downstairs come the happy hum of voices and the tinkle of Legos being fingered and raked through. My college-age son is home on spring break and my younger two children are thrilled to see him. In between frequent outings with friends, he is nonetheless being intentional about time with his siblings. John and five year old Daniel build Lego castles, line up archery figurine battles, and talk long over red, blue, and yellow plastic bricks.

My high school daughter plans homework sessions around her big brother's work schedule, choosing to take her spring break this week too while he is home. They go on an ice cream date, talk for hours downstairs, and shriek with laughter far into the night.

Today we lingered in the kitchen and dining room, my man-son hopping up to sit on the counter, sprawling huge across my cupboards as I sipped coffee and turned pages in my Bible. At the table, my lanky daughter spread out her art pads and pencils, holding up a white eraser to show her little brother. Daniel pulled out his watercolor paints and some scratch paper, while I rounded up water in a plastic bowl. I clicked on Vivaldi's Summer, and we stopped to stare out the deck window at the melting snow, the blue sky, and a swooping black bird that perched on a pine across the yard. Time slowed, and we breathed in deeply. Rest and calm sank into us, and our shoulders dropped comfortably. Chairs scraped, and violins crescendo-ed as conversation resumed.

My husband and I are enjoying this day off work today too, and are savoring this time as a family. In between various side tasks, we stop to cuddle, closing our eyes, and leaning in for a long hug. Later on this week, there are plans for family games, some computer network gaming, and other casual pursuits. And for my husband and I, life resumes its normal work and carpool schedule tomorrow.

But in between, our family is planning to savor each moment together. Whether it is just curling up on the couch to watch a mystery together, or learning how to cook a new Asian noodle dinner, or playing eight rounds of Uno, we plan to slow the clock, to breathe in deeply, and let that rest and calm sink in.

Spring breaks don't need to be expensive or long. While summery beaches are always appealing to me, some years a break from school and normal life can be crafted just as simply by choosing to intentionally slow down one's pace. What speaks calm to you? What brings family togetherness? Choosing to sleep in late, to linger over coffee, and to lean into family moments can bring long-term renewal and peace on any budget. Plus they can be savored much more than just one week a year!

What does a relaxing day at home look like for you? (I love hearing from you. Those in email can click here to join the conversation.)

What Sports Cars and Physics Can Teach Our Families

Photo credit: Maciek, Creative Commons, cc

Sizzling Latino music rumbas through a sunny south-facing living room. Creamy light bounces dazzlingly off white sculpted snow drifts outside to dribble across red pillows and dented couch cushions inside. Wind-carved ledges hang off the roof, drape the deck, and swoop grandly through our yard. Swing-set chains disappear unexpectedly into snow drifts, the seats hidden below.

Photo credit: Carl Wycoff, Creative Commons, cc

My teen age daughter swipes long side bangs off her face, clipping them back, as we calculate physics at the table. Acceleration is calculated by subtracting the initial velocity from the final velocity, divided by time. We lean closer to read the problem about a sports car that speeds from zero to 60 miles an hour in 3 seconds, and I notice how tall she is, my lanky daughter. Fifteen years old looks good on her. We groan despondently at the subject, but grudgingly fill in the equation. Velocity flies by going east for the sports car, and into the future for this woman beside me.

How do you nurture and build memories with your kids on a daily basis? In between dishes, laundry, and physics problems, we sculpt our days at blinding speeds. Dentist trips, part-time jobs, and family activities carve swaths through our weeks, and I don't want it to erode away.

We laughed as we punched numbers in the calculator about initial and final velocity, my daughter and I. It wasn't the math-filled science. We found humor in odd places, and giggled together. Stopping to hug between subjects, we grabbed her notebooks and sprawled across my bed to read her math lecture together. All too soon, the talk of fully simplifying algebraic fractions trailed off, and she disappeared downstairs.

Walking back into the main rooms, a To-Do list spirals long in my mind, toys scatter my floor, and dirty dishes lean hazardously on my counter.

"Mom, play Uno with me?" my petite five year old asks softly. Shiny red Spiderman decals curl off his shirt. Tiny shoulders wait expectantly.

Snow spirals glitteringly away out the window behind him, as the wind swipes more of it. An afternoon sun slants shadows long across my carpet, climbing further up the red pillows.

He waits still, eyeing the black cards on the floor.

"Sure, bud, let's play some Uno."

And the snow drifts high on my deck, resisting the wind.

Martians Home for Dinner

Photo courtesy of NASA

Vivaldi traipses scales in violins and lutes tonight while a deep white frost encases the glass on our front door.

Record-breaking arctic windchills blast the Midwest, and Minnesotans everywhere huddle indoors today, after jump-starting frozen autos and avoiding the wind. Car dashboards blink temperatures in the negative, and tv news anchors compare our weather to the conditions on Mars.

Bursting through the doors earlier with bulging grocery bags, my husband and I dodged hungry kids, and handed them fruit and vegetable starters, in between fierce hugs. "I missed you!" I exclaimed. They grabbed vibrant red strawberries, a croissant, and some pearly mushrooms.

Rinsing red lettuce leaves, I drained them in a colander, while slicing open buttery croissants. Turkey slices there made a sandwich, and I tossed tomatoes, sliced mushrooms, and shredded carrots onto the torn lettuce for a salad.

After having been gone for much of the day at work and then the grocery store, I see that the dirty dishes still stack high, so we are creative with finding clean plates. Conversation flows easily, quickly, as we catch up on the day.

"How was your school today?" I asked my daughter, kissing her head. We laughed and talked, while my sons disappeared to play games together downstairs.

Some days pass too quickly, and time with our kids is fleeting, huh? Today is one of those days, so excuse me, please? I'm going to pour myself another glass of mango-carrot juice and spend some time with my children. First, my eldest and I are going to search for discount used college books online, and then my two eldest kids and I are going to curl up on the couch to watch a show together.

How do you like to slow down your day and enjoy loved ones? What do you think you'll do tonight? I love hearing from you, friends. 

Transforming Homework Sessions into Home Memories

Wind chimes clang in the ten degree weather, and students everywhere unload textbooks and notebooks across kitchen tables, or toss heavy backpacks onto worn couches.

Artist Hilda Robinson, "Studying at the Table"

What transforms homework sessions into home memories? 

It's the x-factor, that unknown variable that finagles its way into each afternoon. Whether its mixed formulas in Algebra or seismology from Physical Science, there is always a potential for life to be shaken right up, huh?

Class homework seems to be an afterschool event in most families. How do we create happy family environments and memories while flipping pages, erasing problems gone wrong, and keeping everyone on task?

Cutting into gooey caramel-chocolate cupcakes, my teen daughter and I wrote out algebra problems side-by-side on the sunny kitchen table today. I sipped hot coffee and we looked together at the problems she had misunderstood earlier.

"Oh, I see it. I know what I did wrong," she exclaimed, circling a forgotten negative sign. We moved on to other problems, cracking jokes, getting drinks of water, and talking with others in the room.

After one too many interruptions, I became agitated and brusquely brought us back on track. "Okay, let's focus now," I said, sterner than I needed to.

"Mom, we're fine. It's okay. I'm working," assured Morgan.

I paused and remembered. Laughter, calm, and intentionality make the difference. We both visibly relaxed, sinking deeper into our chairs in the sunlight, working quietly on math problems together. Quiet saxophone music played from a corner of the kitchen.

Later Daniel and I read books together, noticing rhyming sounds, commenting on watercolor illustrations, and learning about bats and shadows. We made paper cut outs for shadows, and cast long pictures across the living room floor, before ducking into the bathroom with a flashlight too. Shadow bats, cats, and snowmen wavered in the light, dancing in his hands.

"See how any shadow picture needs the light?" I taught Daniel. "Without light there is no shadow. Where is the light source to make this shadow?"  

Those phrases suddenly seemed much deeper than simple preschool science. To cast a picture, there is always a light. There is always a light. Where is the light source? Without the light there is no image.

Hmm, I snapped off the red flashlight, and headed back to the kitchen. Peaceful saxophone music still played, Morgan gathered up her heavy science books, and I sought out children's videos about bats.

(Also linking up with Emily at Imperfect Prose.)

How Do You Live Without Regrets?

 "Jen, do whatever it takes to rearrange your schedule and make it happen. It may well be your last chance."

The email finds me late one night, as insomnia stalks me. Curled up in the corner near an outlet, I'm reading emails after midnight. Blue light from the ipad casts a blinding glow across my corner, throwing shadows into the sleeping house.

She's right, of course, my sister. It's been four years since I've seen my grandma, and she was just transferred to a retirement home.

The next morning, I made my case to my husband; he kindly agreed, and we set in motion the long line of phone calls, cancellations, and work schedule changes. Six days later, I kissed my family goodbye, grabbed my backpack and drove to my parents' home for the carpooling road trip to Florida.

In two long days of driving, we passed corn fields, farmlands, barren strips with windmills, and bobbing carpets of pink cosmos blossoms. State lines ushered in rising temperatures, cotton fields, pecan orchards, and finally, sloping palm trees.

 My grandma is 86 years old, and has raised six strong, hard-working children who love their families. Children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren span the country, while our matriarch sits quietly on a black fold-up walker in her new center's tropical backyard. Air plants coiled sinewy vines beside Spanish moss and draped off trees, while tiny lizards skittered nearby. I watched my parents and aunts and uncles swap stories and share family news with my grandma, and I lapsed quiet, the stories washing over me.

The days passed quickly, coffee cups filled and refilled, and we gathered for one of Grandma's favorite meals: liver and onions. Later at a picnic in the park, and around family tables, I was thrilled to spend time with my cousins and their families, my aunts and uncles, and to get to know them more.

We wandered at the sponge docks, poked into shell shops, and marveled at this town that boasts its identity as a Little Greece, second only in size to actual Greece for its Greek population numbers. Throaty dark-haired gals shouted out bargain deals of gyros and baklava, and we headed into one of the bistros for a hearty Mediterranean meal.

All too soon, it was time to leave. We packed up the car, carefully placed in our bags of shells, and headed cross-country to the midwest. The temperatures fell with each state, and we added layers as we drove. By Minnesota, we raced the brooding snowstorm home, beating it by a few hours.

The next morning's snowfall blanketed yellow leaves, masked my footsteps, and washed away my time in Florida like waves on the sand.

Pinks and yellows strata the horizon tonight, as the sun sinks low. Meat sizzles and sears behind me, and dishes clatter.

Is there anyone you need to call or go see? My sister's right. Do whatever it takes to arrange your schedule to make it happen.

Because, me? I almost missed it. When this trip was first offered to me on short notice, I turned it down twice, not thinking I could pull off a week's notice of cancellations and schedule changes. I almost missed it, would have missed this chance to reconnect with relatives, to meet new ones and to hug and see my grandma. My sister's right. 

Anyone you need to call? Pick up the phone, or grab a pen and paper, and don't let this day pass without saying the words you would want them to hear...

(Found this helpful or encouraging? Please feel free to forward, or share, this article on to anyone.)