Saturday, April 21, 2007

My Podcast MUST HAVEs

I love a good radio show. Do you?

NPR, baby!

Thanks to Podcasts I can download the latest This American Life and Studio 360 and listen to them when I have time to take a long walk.

Friday, April 20, 2007

Supporting the "Shameless"

I love the courage and honesty this woman has.

The Illusive Stride

I did a lot of running in my youth. I've had my splits timed more than I'd like to remember. I was never really good at running, but it was what I did all through High School. I ran long distance so I loved those times (and they weren't very often come to think of it) when I hit my stride. I define 'hitting your stride' as being able to hit your time goals and feeling great while doing it.

I walk these days. My body is really not designed to run but it is definitely made to walk. As I walked around the lake the other day I felt like I was just hitting my stride right after I had finished approximately 2 miles. I felt great! The sun was shining, my baby was not crying, and I was a mama about to finish her 3 mile walk around the lake.

Walking is also a great way to get some thinking done. "What does it mean to 'hit my stride' in other areas of my life?" I wondered during my walk.

Lately, 'stride' has been hard to come by in my life. Before I know it the circumstances have changed and I have to speed up or slow down and I'm 'off my stride'. Pregnancy is a great teacher when it comes to learning how to live a stride-less life.

Marriage can also be a great, discombobulating life force, something that often throws me off when I think I've hit my stride. In the last few weeks my husband and I seem to be running in circles. These are not ordinary - mutually exclusive circles - these circles require us to run into the other person, who is running in the opposite direction. Funny thing is, we can't even see the other person until we've collided. And we seem to do it over - and over - and over again. We've been the most ungraceful ever in our married life, as far as I can tell.

We found out a couple of weeks ago that my husband did not get the job he was seeking in our former home town. And unfortunately we never really dealt with what it meant to lose this opportunity. We never really morned the loss of an opportunity to move back home.

I had already make plans about how I was going to spend my time with all the free child care that we would have available to us back home. I was planning to have our extended family gather for Sunday supper at our house. I was planning on going back to school. I was planning on watching my nephew regularly so my sister could work child free a couple hours a week. I was praying about how God would use me in the church where my husband and I met. And I was excited about all these things. But, I had gotten ahead of myself and God. My husband had not been offered the job yet.

It was about a week after we found out that my husband didn't get that job that we collided. Since we missed the step of processing this loss there was alot of emotion that seemed to come out of no where. Mostly it took the form of anger - that stern unmoving kind of anger. Really only a couple of days ago did we finally break through the muddle of anger and frustration and finally get to a little understand and grace.

Maybe this is a preview of things to come...maybe God is preparing us for great changes...I don't really know. What I do know is that next time a disappointment of this magnitude comes along I hope we can allow eachother the space and grace to morn.

Wednesday, April 4, 2007

Lenten Lessons

As I was walking today I realized that this Sunday is Easter Sunday. Maybe realized isn't the right word. Maybe it's more like a leap in my soul at the understanding that on Sunday many of us will be celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

I grew up in the Catholic tradition and have participated in Lent almost all my life. As a child, it was not eating meat on Friday or trying to abstain from something or trying to add new disciplines to our lives that were different from the norm. One of my mom's best ideas was what we called 'lenten letters'. All of us (even my parents) would sit down every Sunday of Lent and write a letter to someone we loved, usually an out of town family member.

I've experienced varying degrees of feeling connected to lenten tide and Easter. Sometimes Easter Sunday is this feast for my soul after fasting for 40 days, but the last couple of years have been very uneventful. It is always my desire to participate fully but often times I get distracted and Easter arrives and seems no different than 'ordinary time'.

The last 2 years have been really tough. Life is tough, in general, for all of us. But since we moved to Seattle we have dealt with some fairly huge things. God's been faithful through all of it. One of the hardest things about this time is not having a feeling of being called to people here in Seattle. I'm sure it's our ability to hear the calling that was impaired. At first we needed to learn some things in the absence of community. But it seems that the time for this is over and we are compelled to stop just dipping our toes in and to jump head first into relationship building.

It's been a 'lenten season' the last two years on an emotional and spiritual level. It has brought us closer to each other and closer to God.

Today I realized that I'm ready for Easter this year. I'm ready to break through the death part (I still have to get through Good Friday) and really submit to celebrating the resurrection.

Picture This

An overweight, baby laden women in ill fitting sweatpants with dirt stained knees from gardened the previous day. She is radiating joy as she takes in the sun, brisk air, and vigorous walk around a lake where some of the most beautiful, serious and well dressed Seattlites exercise.