Warning Words

It was a gorgeous grizzly. And I’m sure the Facebook photo I saw of it didn’t even do it due justice. The person posting the image said she had watched it from the safety of her car as it wandered around the restrooms near Dunraven Pass in Yellowstone National Park.

The same couldn’t apparently be said for other watchers, however. People were placing their children in front of the bear in order to get a great photo. “I couldn’t believe it,” the poster exclaimed. “We actually called for help because we were afraid someone was going to get hurt. Luckily the rangers showed up and the bear was more interested in what was under the rocks!” Good thing, I’d say!

Bears, both grizzlies and the black variety, are quick. And dangerous—especially when they have young. Yellowstone certainly warns people about the them, and other potential dangers in the park. The rule is visitors must stay 100 yards away from bears and wolves and 25 yards from all other wildlife (I will confess to unwittingly violating this rule one summer as I and my camera were mesmerized by a full-racked elk taking a meandering look-see through my picnic area; I meandered right along with this big fellow and I do realize he could have done me damage; I won’t do it again; I will heed the warnings in the future; at least I hope I will).

We think warnings are good, especially for other people. “The past speaks to us in a thousand voices, warning and comforting, animating and stirring to action,” said Felix Adler. Except when it doesn’t. Aldous Huxley countered: “that men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history.”

We often don’t know what warnings to heed. Coffee is bad for us. Coffee is good for us. Avoid fat in the diet. No, shun carbs. Sometimes it seems there’s always a new warning out about something that turns out to contradict itself the very next day.

Good to know God’s warnings to us in His Word don’t change and are always for our good. "Be very careful then how you live, not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord's will is." (Eph. 5:15-17). Oh, and steer clear of bears!

 

As Labor Day weekend approaches and many folks plan to “celebrate” with one last camping trip of the season, I offer the following essay, written several years ago. I still stand by every crabby word I wrote!

Chronicles of a Crabby Camper

In the cartoon strip “Dilbert,” by Scott Adams, Dilbert says to his dog, “Hey, Dogbert – you want to go camping this weekend?” Dogbert replies (and this shows what a smart talking dog he is!), “Why don’t we just sleep in the garage, eat bugs and not take showers.” Dilbert tries vainly to convince his canine companion. “That is completely different from camping, for reasons which will come to me.” Dogbert deadpans, “Because we might not get lost?”

Dogbert?  My sentiments exactly!

Now, the idea – in principle – of camping and experiencing the wilderness is wonderful. Psalm 9 tells us that “the heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament shows his handiwork. “In Genesis we read that “in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth…and God saw that it was good.” And it is good. How exhilarating it is to stand and gaze across a broad vista of snow-capped purple mountains, the wide valleys sweeping down to meet bubbling streams. How peaceful to watch gentle waves lap the lake’s shoreline, the whispering breeze rustling through the swaying trees.

Yes. And how annoying, those creepy crawlies inching up your leg. And how bothersome, those buzzing winged things circling ‘round your head.

For camping is nothing if it isn’t bugs. Grasshoppers and mosquitoes and beetles and mosquitoes. Gnats and mosquitoes and flies. Mosquitoes and ants…and mosquitoes. God must have been in an extremely creative and expansive mood when he was thinking up the insect kingdom. There are zillions and zillions of these irritating little pests – and they will all be at your campsite. They want your food…and they want your blood.

Camping is also dirt. Sandy dirt, muddy dirt, gritty dirt, greasy dirt. It blows in the air. It squishes under your feet. It permanently attaches itself to your children and all the belongings they’ve managed to drag along with them on this “adventure.”

To remove this dirt, you will traipse to moldy washrooms usually located at least a half mile or more away from your campsite. Once there, you use a toilet that may or may not work and which has seen 50,000 others of the great unwashed use it between possible contacts with the Tydee-Bowl Man. You shower in a stall that is in the midst of hosting the Olympics of Athlete’s Foot Fungus and brush your teeth in a sink so scummy you pray, pray your child manages to hang on to the toothbrush and, oh please, not…drop…it…in…the…scuz. The very best part of all this is that you get to wait in line for the pleasure of this activity. (This is all, of course, assuming there actually are (flushing) toilets, showers that expel at least a dribble of water (preferably warm) and sinks that drain – but that’s another story just too pathetic to tell.)

Back at your campsite, you prepare for a meal. (Notice, girlfriends, that I said you. A camping “vacation” is a primarily a male vacation. It’s been my experience that females get to cook and clean up outdoors just as they do indoors, at home. Only there’s no running water, no electric stove or anything else that even resembles a modern convenience.) You get to fetch your water from a spigot on down the road and lug it back as most of it sloshes out along the way. If you are really fortunate, you have a propane camp stove with two whole burners, one of which might even light. If it’s not too blustery it’s possible you might manage to heat up your delicious beans and franks just before the thunder and lightning begins and the torrential downpour drenches everything in sight.

Of course, all that water does serve a purpose. It helps wash off the hundreds of multicolored glops from your picnic table – which looks as if every North American avian has claimed it for its very own potty.

As a child, my parents thought that tent camping would provide some inexpensive family togetherness. What it actually provided was expensive family wetness. One morning we woke up floating in rain-soaked sleeping bags, along with sopping wet everything else, and promptly purchased an off-the-ground pop-up camper.

The tent lesson of my youth must have been lost on me when, years later, my supposedly loving husband talked me into acquiring a tent of our very own – when I was 7 ½ months pregnant. Ahh, that first tent-owning July weekend: fly-swatting, profuse sweating, chasing after a four year old, changing the diapers of a 1 ½ year old and trying vainly to find a not-rocky spot to rest my weary, frazzled head, along with my very expectant belly.

Years later, while on “vacation” in still another, albeit larger, canvas home-away-from-home (I guess I am not a quick learner), sleeping with my family proved to be a complete exercise in futility – for me. They all dozed along just fine, and most of the time on top of me. Their snoring caused our campsite to be declared a noise pollution hazard zone. Then, the air in the pillow portion of my air mattress escaped (and, mind you, I certainly do not blame it for doing so) and I awoke in the early dawn of the damp cold unable to stand erect, complete with a stiff neck that was to last for two solid weeks. A happy camper I was not. To this day I have a sideways memory of Yosemite National Park.

No, I believe the only true “happy campers” were Adam and Eve, and that was before the Fall. Look what happened after that: Those pesky Egyptians shooed the Israelites away from their dandy campsite beside the sea, after which all they did was cry, cry, cry in the wilderness. Elijah’s outdoor experience was no great shakes, either. On Queen Jezebel’s #1 most wanted list, he arrived at his chosen spot under a lovely juniper tree and promptly asked God to just let him die. There was also that great camper John the Baptist, him with his clothes of camel hair, leather girdles and locust and wild honey diet. How many times do you suppose he was stung while trying to evade those wild bees?

So, I must say that though I do cherish the nature that God created, I just basically want it in its place and me in mine. And, as a general rule, its place belongs outside and me not tent camping in it. Getting “back to nature” is fine, but when we’re done would you please get me back to the Hampton Inn?

Praising from the Pits

Everyone’s had one. A day that’s bright and beautiful everywhere except in your spirit. A day when the sun shines gloriously upon everyone except on you. You’re pitifully in the “pits.” What to do?

Sometimes we attempt to eat our way out of the “gloomies.” Doritos. Donuts. Dumb.

Sometimes we think shopping will cheer us up.  New purse. New pants. Pricey.

And then sometimes we just do nothing but sulk, sulk, sulk. Silly.

Maybe a little praise is in order.

Charles Wesley wrote, “Jesus! The name that charms our fears, that bids our sorrows cease; ‘tis music in the sinners ears, ‘tis life and health, and peace.” Thomas Kelly agreed: “Praise the Savior, ye who know Him! Who can tell how much we owe Him? Gladly let us render to Him all we are and have.”

After all, the Bible repeatedly commands us to be people of praise: “Shout joyfully to God, all the earth; sing the glory of His name; make His praise glorious …” (Psalm 66:1-2); “Sing praises to the LORD, who dwells in Zion; declare among the peoples His deeds …” (Psalm 9:11); “Sing praise to the LORD, you His godly ones, and give thanks to His holy name ... “ (Psalm 30:4).

One Sunday, on the back of a bulletin, I read that “a heart full of thanksgiving to Christ for all He is and has done will result in expressions of praise.” (Paul J. Twist) The little article also mention a verse in the Psalms where the psalmist praised God seven times a day for His righteous laws (119:164). It got me to thinking—did I praise God seven times a day for anything? What if I determined to change this and purposefully looked for things to praise God for every single day? To praise Him for anything...and everything...since everything I have is all from Him? And for things I’d never offered up for praise...ever?

For loving me in spite of me.

For being with me through a night of delicious, welcome slumber.

For comforting me when the slumber doesn’t come.

For the charming grin on a little boy’s sweet face, the glittering twinkle in his eye.

For the comforts of home.

For the gift of words.

For the honor of being a wife, a mother, a Nana.

For...wait, that’s seven already. But I’m not done. There’s...and… and...yup, you get it. Praise! ☺

 

 

 

 

A Lane Called Memory

This afternoon I had lunch with a good friend from high school. We hadn’t had the opportunity to sit down and chat for way too many years and the reconnection was delightful. She had been kind enough to attend my father’s memorial visitation a couple weeks ago, and seeing her there had prompted the lunch date, which prompted the walk I took afterward – a walk down a lane called memory.

A parent’s passing will do that to you – that memory walking business. Though it was late afternoon by the time I left the restaurant (high school girls have been known to be chatty, and grown – even long grown, ones – are often no less so!) but the sun was shiny and the sky was blue, so I headed back in time.

Past the assisted living facility where Dad spent his last years and days. He was cared for there by caring folks, and we are grateful for that; he sometimes would make his way to the Dairy Queen around the corner. That wasn’t there when I was a kid. Next the Pizza Hut that was, but it isn’t a Pizza Hut any longer.

The Henry Ave. Bridge across the river that took me to the west side wasn’t there, either. This one was brand-spanking new and I think it might have a new name, too. Up the hill on Olympian – when I was just about to start learning to drive I just knew I would never make it up that “mountain” in the wintertime. Why, I was positive I would slide right back down and cause a wreck. “You won’t,” my Dad comforted as we braved it for the first time. I didn’t.

The hospital on the right, where all the kids were born in the 50’s, is now an apartment building. The hospital hill is still there, though, and I’ll bet the kids still go sledding on it every winter. Doesn’t quite look as intimidating as I remember it, though. But I imagine a person could still manage to sprain her ankle on it and have to wait a really, really l-o-n-g, really really f-f-frozen, really really p-p-painful time for her dad to come pick her up (didn’t have cell phones then and I wouldn’t have been allowed one anyway – Dad had gotten by without one and so could I!).

Young swimmers were having a big ol’ time in the “Big Pool” but it’s a different big pool. Money was tight for my parents “back then” but they managed to come up with the funds for each of us to have a season pass every summer. We actually had to walk the 85 hotter-than-hot, blazing  blocks to the pool whenever we went, too. Well, maybe it wasn’t 85. Maybe just 5 or so. (!!) But there were a LOT of steps to get down, and we also had to walk back UP them! I’m not at all sure I’d allow my unaccompanied youngsters that long trek today, but it was a different time.

The corner grocery where we were sent for a last minute loaf of bread or treated to 10 cent taffy apples is a daycare now, but the house we moved into in 1957 still stands – and looks pretty good, too. Mom’s roses are gone, the color’s changed and a garage has been added (no – everyone did not have a house for their car back then; our driveway wasn’t even paved). That’s a neighborhood where almost each  dwelling housed 4 or 5 kids, had just 3 small bedrooms and only one bath (Dad rigged up a trick-or-treater-counter and each Halloween would record over 350 scary beggars!). Coming from a teeny, cramped trailer, I remember how thrilled my father was to provide that brand new, post-war home for his family.

The huge-for-its-time grocery store where we shopped is now a Family Dollar, but I’m thinking that store just built a “huge-er” one farther on down the road, ‘cause the bag they put my sweet corn in at the farmstand had the name of the store on it. Oh, and it was a different farmer. I told the “new guy” that my parents would never buy sweet corn there unless it was 3 dozen/$1.00. He just laughed and charged me $4 for 1 dozen. I hope it’s good!

In 1968 Dad moved his family into another brand new house, this one with 4 bedrooms (sorry boys, you still had to share, but my sister and I had our own rooms. Girls rule!). Sad to say, it no longer has much curb appeal, is a little rough around the edges and I think it misses my dad. We do too, house – we do, too.

They say you can’t go home again. Maybe that’s true, but you can take an hour and visit where it used to be. Bye, Daddy. Thanks for the memories.

HE'S THERE!

Truth is the torch that gleams through the fog without dispelling it.  - -Claude Adrien Helvetius

They were there. We knew they were there. But if our own eyes were to be believed, they were definitely not.

My husband loves to visit them, those four presidents up on that South Dakota Mount Rushmore. I believe even he has lost count of how many times we’ve made the trek out from Rapid City to call on George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt.

Traveling from the west on a fine summer sunny evening, all appeared set for a grand viewing of Gutzon Borglum’s carved masterpiece. But as we approached, things got darker and foggy fears  began to intrude. This had never happened before! Winding our way past  some frolicking domestic bison and a small herd of tiny deer gamboling playfully in the ditch, we started to think this presidential peek might just be a big fat bust, pun intended. Our four former heads of state were hidden, our view totally obscured, as in  “you’re not seeing the monument today, guys!”

Thick fog had completely obliterated our view of Mt. Rushmore. We know for a fact it was there—had some of our history’s most famous personages taken a tumble down the mountainside, it surely would have been classified as a breaking news story.

 Truth was, our eyes could not be believed. We could not see what was right there in front of us, much like what happens sometimes when we are in the midst of a great difficulty in our lives, a personal tragedy or a devastating illness.

At times like those we need to forget what our eyes see or don’t see and remember what God has said in the past: "This is my command—be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the LORD your God is with you wherever you go."  (Joshua 1:9) The never-changing truth is that even though trouble might obscure our perception of peace for a while, the Lord is always there, loving and caring for us even though we might forget and think perhaps He’s left us. “For He Himself has said, ‘I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you.’" (Hebrews 13:5c)

Fog might restrict visibility for a time, but fog is no match for the gleaming torches of our spiritual eyes! The Lord is there!

 

 

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LIBERTY!

A delicate “little lady,” she is not. From her heel to the top of her head she measures 111 feet, 6 inches, weighs 225 tons and her waistline is a whopping 35 feet around. A face-to-face meeting with her in New York Harbor would be startling, as she sports a 17’3” visage from chin to cranium! Her index finger is 8 feet long, tipped by a 13 inch fingernail. At her feet lie the broken shackles of oppression and tyranny.

Lady Liberty, as she is often called (formal name: “Liberty Enlightening the World”), cuts quite an imposing figure. A gift from the people of France to celebrate the centennial of the American Declaration of Independence, the copper and steel statue was designed by French sculptor Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi and dedicated by President Grover Cleveland in October 1886 (the French were just a little late, as they intended to have it ready by July, ten years earlier). 

When the idea for the statue was proposed the deal was that France would cover the cost of the statue itself ($250,000) and the U.S. would take care of the base and pedestal ($280,000). Newspapers around the country called it a “local, New York project” and scoffed at the idea until publisher Joseph Pulitzer got behind the effort and encouraged benefit balls, theatrical productions and donations from schoolchildren around the country. Emma Lazarus’ poetic words inscribed on the statue’s pedestal were part of a fundraiser: "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door." 

Sadly, this symbol of freedom was closed to the public after the 9/11/01 terror attacks. But fortunately the pedestal and lower observation decks reopened in 2004 and visitors were finally re-admitted to the rest of it in 2009. This “enduring icon of freedom” was once again open for business. 

The cross of Jesus Christ is the ultimate “enduring icon of freedom” and will never be closed. It is always open to all. While it, too, is the object of scoffers, it stands tall as the symbol by which all may be granted true freedom in this life and that to come. Luke 4:18 records Jesus reciting words from Isaiah as He proclaimed, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” True, lasting liberty!

Happy Father's Day

As we approach Father’s Day 2013, I am distinctly, most poignantly aware that this holiday will most likely be the last I mark while my Dad is on this earth. At 89, feeble, and in hospice care, he will surprise us all if he’s still with us on August 6, his 90^th birthday. As he has often told my sister, he is ready to not be. Weariness has overtaken him.

Because I am who I am, and maybe because of him who raised me, I have made some preparations for this leave-taking. I tend to not like leaving things to the last minute if I can help it. Arrangements are set with the funeral home and even pre-paid. I am grateful that Dad was willing to do this when my mother passed. It makes things much easier for those of us who remain. I have constructed a preliminary service bulletin, pending, of course, the input of my siblings. I have made a first-time attempt at a video retrospective of my father’s life. And this is sadly interesting to me: Dad was born in August 1923 and I have never seen a baby photo or a young child photo of him. Not ever.

I don’t know if his remaining siblings are in possession of such a photo, but I do know neither my siblings or I have one. Perhaps they are lost or never existed. My Dad had a somewhat difficult childhood, growing up on a poor northern Minnesota farm with a cold, reluctant farmer for a dad and an overworked mother of 8, pretty much charged with raising her brood on her own. There are two photos of the home Dad lived in as a boy, with his father and mother and a couple aunts & uncles out front, but Dad wasn’t around yet when these were taken.

I first see Dad as a smiling almost high school graduate. Hard to look at that boy I never knew and see the elderly guy I’m acquainted with now!  He’s then pictured with his siblings, minus the brother who died in a plane crash (one that severely injured my dad as well).  There’s a proud Army-Air Force military man and then another grinning guy, this time with his beautiful bride.  I see him tenderly holding his first-born, a precious look on his face that tells me I was very much wanted.  As were my two brothers and one sister who followed. The little house on Johnson Street – 3 bedrooms, 1 bath – 4 kids! Nobody on HGTV’s “House Hunters” would consider such a thing today, but he was proud to be able to provide it! The new house on Garfield Ave, with the Chevy (in which I took my driver’s test) parked out front (no power steering!- I was sure I’d never manage to parallel park that “boat” in my driver’s test, but I did!). Dad gets progressively older in the photos that follow, as do we all. His kids grow up, they marry, have kids of their own. And their kids have kids! I adore the photos of “The Bobs” – my father, my husband and my oldest grandson. My Dad liked that, too.

My father loved my mother. He loved his children. He loved his grands and his great-grands. I don’t think he ever quite saw himself as an old man, his wife gone on to her reward, and him living out his last days in assisted living. None of us ever do. We are all babes, running around the playground. And then we blink and all the cares of school and jobs and child-raising and life-living are over. For my father, in between his youth and old age was a life made up of honor and perseverance and hard work and wisdom and teaching (with a little bit of humor and dog-loving thrown in!). I am grateful for and have benefitted from every last bit of it.

Thank you, Dad. Happy Father’s Day! I love you, Barb

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.” Exodus 20:12