Category: Journals

Faith Baldwin

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God’s plan is never one of monotony. He works through contrasts: the seasons, tropic and arctic regions, seas and rivers, deserts and wastelands. He works to bring about good; to teach compassion. Some have said that God is impersonal, indifferent to suffering. There have been times when I, too, have thought so. There are moments in the life of every man when, unable to explain the Plan satisfactorily to himself, he wonders why is there loss, tragedy, destruction of peoples, the sorrow of the innocent? If we know why, we would have achieved our identification with the Plan itself. Out of fire and flood comes the strength to rebuilt, the impulse to share unselfishly, to comfort and sustain, the great drive to compassion felt by one or many people. Out of loss comes the growing into knowledge that – past the material – there is no real loss. Out of surrender, I believe, a conquering is attained, out of the violence of emotions, the noise of self-pity and distraction, we learn quietude.

Many Windows: Seasons of the Heart

Faith Baldwin

pg 34

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Because {why I do what I do}

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“I have found that it is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folks that keeps the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love.”

~Gandalf, The Hobbit, J.R.R. Tolkien

 

Match struck. Wick touched. The smiles, clink of dishes, delicious smells lingering, dinner is served. The twinkling reflection of candlelight in my loved ones eyes beckons me. The why behind what I do, my because.

A little boy’s hand leading me to our old rocking chair. The Little Train by Lois Lenski clasped in his chubby hand. He smiles through each whistle and toot of the story, even through we’ve ridden this track many times before. This is my because.

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Soft stacks slipping. Fold, stack, fold, stack. Squeals of delight, or rather rolled eyes, a favorite shirt or finally-my-jeans-mom that are freshly clean, ready for new adventures. Feet pounding up stairs, drawers slammed. Tangible everyday deeds keeping the darkness at bay. My because.

Grocery lists, faded recipe cards, old Bible-camp baked oatmeal ingredients, long lines, let me rub my sore feet. Fresh fruit in hand, gulps of cold milk, buttery popcorn piled high. Feasts for family. Kindness and loved stirred, baked, and served.  Because of Love given, I am here to love,…my because.

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Listening, answering, helping. Relationship ruminating. Tears, angry words. I’m sorrys, and I love yous. The sag and relief to their shoulders, the sparkle flaring up in downcast eyes. The because behind all the time and agony spent. It is so very worth it.

I read somewhere “you can only come to the morning through shadows”…these moments, these little things we do, this January road I’m walking is beautiful. Why? Because. Because of the beautiful people served and the life lived together.

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Anne of Green Gables: Chapter 5

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Continuing with our reading…

“I’ve made up my mind to enjoy this drive. It’s been my experience that you can nearly always enjoy things if you make up your mind firmly that you will. Of course, you must make it up firmly.” pg 37

I love this line by Anne as her and Marilla are headed to straighten out the mistake of her not being the boy that they requested. If I took that line to heart in many of my real life situations, I know things would be more peaceful. I added this to my commonplace journal although it should go into a fortitude list of quotes.

Anne asks Marilla about her knowing anyone who’s red hair changes as they grew older. Marilla dashes her hopes. 🙂

This is one of my favorite bits and I say it to my husband all the time, in which he rolls his eyes at me. 😉

“Well, that is another hope gone. My life is a perfect graveyard of buried hopes. That’s a sentence I read in a book once, and I say it over to comfort myself whenever I’m disappointed in anything.” pg 37

I absolutely love naming things and places. Anne and I share that sentiment. Love this part as Anne tries to explain the importance of names to Marilla.

“Well, I don’t know,” Anne looked thoughtful. “I read in a book once that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, but I’ve never been able to believe it. I don’t believe a rose would be as nice if it was called a thistle or a skunk cabbage.” pg 38

This cracked me up!

“I like babies in moderation, but twins three times in succession is too much.” pg 40

Love this…

“Don’t you just love poetry that gives a crinkly feeling up and down your back?” pg 40-41

Anne’s sweet spirit is starting to thaw Marilla…

“Pity was suddenly stirring in her heart for the child. What a starved, unloved life she had had – a life of drudgery and poverty and neglect; for Marilla was shrewd enough to read between the lines of Anne’s history and divine the truth. No wonder she had been so delighted at the prospect of a real home. It was a pity she had to be sent back. What if she, Marilla, should indulge Matthew’s unaccountable whim and let her stay? He was set on it; and the child seemed a nice, teachable little thing.”

“The shore road was ‘woodsy and wild and lonesome.’ On the right hand, scrub first, their spirits quite unbroken by long years of tussle with the gulf winds, grew thickly. On the left were the steep red sandstone cliffs, so near the track in places that a mare of less steadiness that the sorrel might have tried the nerves of the people behind her. Down at the base of the cliffs were heaps of surf-worn rocks or little sandy coves inlaid with pebbles as with oceans jewels; beyond lay the sea, shimmering and blue, and over it soared the gulls, their pinions flashing silvery in the sunlight.” pg42

Sigh. 🙂

Monday Ponderings {January 2nd}

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Reminding myself…

Events moved rapidly in the Mason household, as they always do when the children reach womanhood and manhood. It is the young themselves who welcome the changes. Only the parents reach out impotent hands that would fain hold the little ones back from their journeying. One day all seems shouting and confusion and hurrying of little feet to and fro. Almost the next there is silence and peace – a silence that is stifling, a peace that is painful. It is an age-old tragedy – the Passing of the Children. 

Mother Mason, Bess Streeter Aldrich, 247

Foggy Memories

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I read somewhere once that we write so we won’t forget. I recently joined a memoir writing class at a local library and you know, it has me digging deep into the recesses of my foggy memory for life experiences. It’s hard. Scraps of life jump out to me, childhood games of pretend, forcing my sister to eat grass because we were rabbits. An award ceremony, the cold, hard delight of that basketball trophy gripped in my hand. My grandma’s cigarette-smoke filled home, the soap operas, Smurfs, ice cold milk in old jelly jars, and stale cookies out of her raccoon-shaped cookie jar.

I hear bits of my teacher trying to consul me about my lack of brain function over math. I feel the pain after hitting the wall instead of my brother with my pathetic attempt at a punch. Flashes of my high school and college jobs, the chop suey sold and all the apples and ramen noodles consumed by this broke college student.

Little fragments tinkle and crumble through my hand. But I’m forgetting. My mind is blank in some spots. I remember bits of my wedding, the hot, sticky, humid September air. The kiss from the leathery lips of my husband’s grandfather. I remember smiling so much my lips cracked, the frosting up my nose, my new husband’s hand on my satin-clad waist.

I must keep remembering in ink, so the remembering in life will never be forgotten. I must remember my babies births, that moment when they broke free of my womb and I see their precious face, lips, hands, and toes for the first time. It’s slipping away in a jumble of fog, life, hurt, joys and the simmering soup of time.

I don’t want to forget that first car my dad helped me buy, or the beauty, intrigue, and tension of my first love. The summer camp nights, big group of friends gazing at a sky full of stars. The miles I walked on campuses, Professor Grant’s face from English Lit or a sociology class that turned out fascinating. The Ph.D student from China, who I met and became close with, him cooking Chinese for me and I dubbing him Doc, his laugh echoing and head shaking at my lame attempt with his name. I could go on and on.

I must write to remember, keeping my life moments alive. I have these memories that only I can save from slipping away forever.

 

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Monday Ponderings {December 5th}

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Mother had that peculiar God-given gift of imagination so keen that the printed word became to her a vivid, living reality. It was as though, while her body stayed at home and cared for the children, her spirit had climbed far mountain peaks and sailed into strange harbors…Yes, the warp of Mother’s life had been restricted to keeping the home for Henry and the children. But the woof of the texture had been fashioned from the wind clouds and star drifts of the heavens.

Mother Mason by Bess Streeter Aldrich

pg 84-85

Monday Ponderings…{November 21st}

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It’s strange how that is: everybody wants to change the world, but nobody wants to do the small thing that makes just one person feel loved.

 

The Broken Way: A Daring Path into the Abundant Life

Ann Voskamp

page 74

(Thinking on this quote today, the ouch factor and the thanksgiving of living a life ripe with opportunities to do just this very thing. May I not miss those opportunities!)