the way to my heart

I know. I've already posted about daffodils once. But then I drove past some mini daffodils...and I love mini daffodils. So I have to post about them again.

When I was in high school, my friend Sarah had a pot of mini daffodils delivered to me in my algebra II class. It was probably the most delightful and unexpected surprise I'd ever received.

So I had to pull over and take a picture of some mini daffodils.

The minis.

But then I realized that we're past the "Oh look! Daffodils are blooming!" stage of spring, and now they're everywhere, and if I pulled over to take a picture every time I passed pretty daffodils, I would be in a constant state of hazard lights.

While riding by bike the other day (side note: He's so happy to see the sky and feel the air on his cylindrical metal frame), I passed several yards with an abundance of daffodils. Forests of them. Gobs. Heaps. Piles! Of little yellow faces nodding in the breeze. And I thought, "If a few of them were missing, no one would ever notice." If I came out at night, no one would catch me. I'd done it before. Successfully, I might add.

And then if I had them in my possession, smiling at me like sunlight in my vase, I wouldn't feel the need to take so many pictures of them.

"We have those flowers in our yard," my boss told me this morning. (I, of course, interpreted "those flowers" to mean daffodils.) I told him about my plan to steal some from one of the neighborhoods near me, at night, wearing a ski mask and rolling around on the ground like stealthy criminals do (hopefully remembering to have removed the scissors from my pocket prior to said stealthy rolling). He told me I could pick theirs.

Come on. Of course I could never do that. I can't steal warmth from people I never want to feel the cold.

He said they had all-yellow ones, and, his favorite, white and yellow ones. I asked if he'd ever seen the orange ones, because they look angry. Every time I pass a cluster of them I feel like they're yelling at me. "My favorite," I said, "are the ones that are all frilly. They look like bunches of lace."

This afternoon my boss walked in with scissors in one hand and a clump of frilly yellow daffodils in the other.

The frillies.

It was like my heart turned to liquid joy and ran through my veins and oozed out my pores with sparks of delight. (It's not as messy as it sounds.)

I think it's that they make me feel so loved, and that's a pretty priceless gift.

They're sitting on my desk in a water pitcher, smelling sweetly of earthy syrup and making me feel like life is simple and good. Crazy how a flower can make me so happy. But these do, and have, and will continue to, forever, and ever, amen.

I just love daffodils, and the people who surprise me with them. :)

based on a true story

Friday, while working some of the often-times mundane tasks of behind-the-scenes church, I suddenly, as though struck with a peppermint wand by the Peppermint Fairy floating with wings of red and white stripes, wanted a peppermint milkshake. It was as strong as the feeling of wanting to live, wanting to breathe, wanting to love someone other than yourself.

So I did the logical thing. I called Chick-fil-A, Baskin Robbins, and Steak & Shake, but all of them replied with, "Peppermint is only during the holidays."

What an awful thing to say. Why would this be? Why would you put such limitations on flavor? Would anybody ever say, "I'm sorry, you can only breathe in April"? "We apologize, but you can only only love before the sun sets"?

And I knew that grocery stores hardly ever sold peppermint. At least, Wal-Mart never did. At least, the Wal-Mart in Wisconsin never did. Only Piggly Wiggly, which Wisconsites call so caressingly, "The Pig."

So I swallowed my Pigless, peppermintless, Kentucky fate and shed a tear, which, unbeknownst to me, the Peppermint Fairy caught in her magical bottle, to do magical things with that I knew not of.

Saturday I went to Kroger, settling like we so often do for the things in life that don't quite measure up to what will make us truly happy. Maybe some Breyer's mint chocolate chip will give me peace of appetite, I thought. And I walked up and down the glass doors of ice cream and wondered which brand of mint was worth it, when suddenly I gasped. Literally gasped. And every part of me froze and melted at the same time.

She'd done it. The Peppermint Fairy had done it, I just knew it. She took my tear in her magic bottle and made it pink and made it fluffy, with specks and chips of candy cane. It was peppermint ice cream, and it was there for the taking by those who knew that Christmas wasn't the only one who loved it.

I love it, too.

3-bowls worth.

Thanks, Peppermint Fairy.

my father's daughter

My dad made me take sips of his coffee while I was growing up, even though I hated it, because he didn't want to be the only person in the family who drank coffee. Now I love it and he doesn't have to drink alone. I think that was the start of his training me to be like him.

He also taught me to play the guitar.
Me: "Dad, I don't always understand what you're trying to tell me."
Dad: "I said augmented, not diminished, stupid."

Any form of ridiculousness I have comes from him.
Mom: "Are the neighbors who took you in when you were locked out, are their names Peggy and Phil?"
Me, remembering being locked out and walking to the neighbor's in my socks: "Yes."
Mom: "They seem nice."
Me, remembering introducing myself and asking them to use their phone and phonebook in my socks: "They are."
Dad: "They have nice grass."

That's not to say we don't have our differences.

For example, he's not always as affectionate as I am.
My thought processes: "Dad, please adjust your comfort level so that I can be as close to you as I possibly can because in my mind I am still small enough to fit in your recliner with you and I want to always be really really close to you."
His thought processes: "I am happy to be in the same room with you; I do not need you to be breathing so close to my face."
My thought processes: "All right, I will sit over here [and try not to feel hurt that you don't want me really really close to you], but some part of me still needs to be touching you so that I can still feel connected to you in some way."
His thought processes: "Your fingers are so cold I can feel them through my shirt sleeve."
My thought processes: "This is nice, isn't it?"

But he's taught me a lot - about excellence, and hanging pictures straight, and how to love Jesus, and loving people, and using duct tape.

My mom told me that one year when we were kids, she wasn't sure how they were going to afford our Christmas presents. Then she found out that all summer my dad had been collecting things from garage sales and cleaning them up to give to us as presents. I treasure that story as a vivid display of my dad's thoughtfulness, provision, and love. I hope I continue to grow to be more like him in the years to come.

1998

2010

How do you show love to those you love?

gone, but not forgotten

It's autumn.

This means that it is time for Zachary to start producing tubs of mello creme pumpkins. Except for that I can't find them anywhere anymore. Last year I wrote that I was going to on a candy pumpkin hunt. This year I figured I'd save the gas and write to Zachary themselves.

Wal-Mart has stopped selling your mello creme candy pumpkins, and I don't know what to do. I've looked other places, but I still can't find them. I've tried Brach's, but they don't even compare. I love the creamy honey texture of Zachary candy pumpkins, and I look for them every fall, but I can't find them. Please help. I'm contemplating driving the 4 hours up to Frankfort, IN, just to buy them. Watching football is not the same without a tub of candy pumpkins on my lap. I'm not saying I need them, but I do really, really desire them. Thanks.

 I was hoping they'd offer to send me a free tub because of my profuse gushing of my love for them. Instead, they emailed me this response:

Heather,

Thank you for your interest in Zachary Confections!  I'm so sorry you're having difficulty finding our product.  We do however have some options for you.  Currently you can find the mello crème pumpkins online at George Howe and the link is below.

http://www.georgehowe.com/fall-candy/

I will keep searching and if I find any in your area I will let you know!

Have a great day!

Beth Randall
Zachary Confections

In which case, with shipping, it would cost me $9 for an 18-oz bag. At Wal-Mart, they were $1.88. So I'm putting out an alert.

Have You Seen Me?

I am an creamy mixture of honey and sugar shaped like a pumpkin. If you have information as to my whereabouts, please alert your local pumpkin connoisseur [that'd be ME] immediately. Also, do not mistaken me for Brach's, or you will never be trusted again.

I miss you.

come on skinny love, what happened here?

I feel I need to confess:  I haven't read a book in its entirety since October. And before that, it was July.

I'm so ashamed.

I feel like something in my mind has broken. Somehow the words my eyes take in never make it all the way to my brain, but get lost along the way. Something about the wiring, I think. So my brain gets bored and starts to play outside while my eyes desperately plead, "We're losing him! Focus!"

But no matter how hard I furrow my brow or how many times I reread the same paragraph, my mind is already frolicking through the grass squealing "Weeeeee!" while my eyes turn to jelly in their sockets.

This is not a pretty thing.

Last night I watched a teenage girl read a book unwaveringly through the entire church service. The preaching wasn't there, her arguing sisters next to her weren't there, and the only time she looked up was, I'm pretty sure, when she felt me watching her. I of course looked away very quickly and nodded at the pastor as if I'd been listening the whole time. Ah yes, grace. Grace and Jesus. Jesus is gracious. Preach it brother man. Amen.

But I wondered, what happened to me? I used to be that girl. I used to come back from Christmas breaks and answer the questions of what I'd done by listing off how many books I'd read. I used to make the world disappear and come back to reality smelling like pages and ink. I used to read.

What. happened. to. me.

So today when I took my parents to O'Hare, I decided I was going to stop in Milwaukee on my way back and kneel at the altar of Barnes & Noble until my heart was right with the printed word. Shed the tears of repentance on the green carpet of forgiveness. You dig it? Oh Book Land, take me back.

But when I got there, I didn't even know where to go. Fiction? Nonfiction? Journals?

I went to the bathroom. Like a bride who steps up to the long aisle runner of the sanctuary and then veers off to fix her veil in the lobby mirror. There's nothing wrong with her veil. She's just a coward.

When I walked into the bathroom, a tiny girl with thin blond curls stood against the wall, looking worried. She held her hands, coated in soap suds, in front of her, like a surgeon freshly-scrubbed and ready to take an unexploded grenade out of a North Korean soldier. (I take most my facts about doctor life and behavior from episodes of M*A*S*H.) Her mother stood next to the sink with the water running. She was pregnant and clean-looking, like she shopped in the maternity section at GAP. She glanced at me briefly when I walked in, then looked back at her daughter.

"Is it the water?" She asked. I gathered she was trying to figure out why her daughter, who looked like her name was Daisy or Phoebe or something else dainty and fragile, was having a breakdown. "Do you want a towel? Can you tell me what's wrong?"

I went into a stall as she patiently asked more questions. The little girl continued to answer her mother with absent whimpers, like she couldn't remember why she was crying and had already begun to think of other things, but still needed to be upset because she'd already started to be. If she couldn't explain what was going on inside, the only option was to keep up appearances on the outside.

I get you, Daisy.

I walked around Barnes & Noble four times, then walked out the door feeling as though the store and I were strangers, when once we dwelt together in familiar communion. I left like a dried sponge where once I soaked my parched mind.

Good news is that the world is ending on May 21 (according to the people on the street corner with a big sign saying "JUDGMENT DAY"), so I won't have to worry about finding the little lost fibers of brain that have detached themselves from their cranial epicenter. Come back, little fellas. I miss feeling whole.

operation: fly north

Spring keeps knocking on my door.

"Listen, Spring," I tell it, "I have nothing against you. You have a lot of things going for you. But I just don't love you...like that. Please stop coming."

But it doesn't listen.

It's already gotten inside the minds of the community. Boys playing basketball in their driveways. Girls riding their bikes down the street. Mothers yelling out their doors for their children to find their shoes and come inside for dinner.

They have no resistance!

And I don't know how much longer I can hold out.

Kroger is selling lilies and hyacinths and lilacs and, I would still be okay, but then I saw them.

The daffodils.

Spring is so sneaky! Blast its yellow-petaled tactics, like drops of sweet, syruppy sunlight, smiling, laughing, bobbing their heads under a bright blue sky...so happy....

There's only one option for me: I have to flee.

I tell people it's because I can't find a job (which I can't), or because I'm hoping to go to grad school this fall anyway (which I am), but the real reason I am packing up all of my things and moving back to Wisconsin is because, well,

Winter is still there.

Winter and I have had a very long love affair that goes through months of turmoil every year. People often shake their fists at the wintry sky and ask, "Why must you snow?" But, you see, Winter and I, we understand one another. I understand why it must snow. And, in the same way, it understands why I want it to snow. But we can't explain it to you. You wouldn't understand.

I wonder if it knows how much I'm struggling right now.

And I have to hurry, because now tulips are beginning to grow right outside my front door.

Spring.

Curse you and your cheerfulness.

my funny valentine

Wisconsin, I think it's time I told you.

I love you.

I know we haven't known each other that long.

I know we aren't always the same.

I know that sometimes the novelty of this feeling wears off,
and we can't remember how exactly it felt in the beginning,
and all that's left is this vague, shadowy idea of what we thought it was going to be,
but isn't.
And our eyes grow dull to one another.
And all we see is the bitterness and the dryness and the cracking skin.

But that won't happen with us.

I know this because I miss you when I'm not with you.
And I think about you, even when I'm in other parts of the world,
and I only want to be here,
with you.

So wrap me in your rosy pink arms when the setting sun reflects off the silos.
Capture me with puffs of breath that disappear over white fields.
Send me snowflakes through the air like storms of lacy love letters.
Sing me the echoing song of frozen trees popping in the wind.
Leave me deep red kisses on my cheeks from the unabashed breezes. 
Write me poems the color of the sky when it looks like ice in the mornings.

Promise me you won't forget me when my footprints melt away.

Because, Wisconsin, I love you.

And if you give me a chance, I think we could be great friends for a long time.

And I've felt like this for a while, but I didn't know how to tell you.

So I just did.

And now I feel better.

love

Maybe you’ve seen it in the aisle at the grocery store, or in the hallway at church: An angry parent grabbing a disobedient child by his arm and yanking him to the side, getting really close to his face as she disciplines in a low growl. The child is either looking over to the side (which warrants a minute shake from the parent to get his attention) or his face is beginning to contort into an upset, pre-sound cry. I’ve seen it. In fact, this past week I wanted to be that parent. I had so many disobedient 4-year-olds that I want to grab them by the arms, yank them to the side, shake them up, and growl at them to listen to me. Stop disobeying me. You little annoying child.

I realized recently that that’s how I’ve been viewing God. I incessantly choose other things over Him. People. Movies. Books. The outdoors. The internet. And I unknowingly have avoided His Word because I was pretty sure the moment I sat down to it He would grab me by the arms, pull me to the side, and, facing me at eye-level, discipline me. I avoided His Word because I was just not ready to go through the rigmarole yet. As soon as I was prepared to look off to the side as God gave me the lecture of my disobedience, I would come back to Him. I wanted our relationship to be like it once had, but I didn’t want to go through the lecture in order to get the relationship back. And so I have avoided Him entirely.

But this summer I realized that God doesn’t want me back through discipline. The way He wants to restore our relationship is not through telling me how I’ve disobeyed Him. He wants to restore our relationship through wooing me, pursuing me, and alluring me.

This is a foreign concept to me. Most of the past few years I have spent trying to prove to others I am worthy to be loved. Most of my relationships I spend pursuing. Hey. Hey you over there. I’m funny. I’m pretty. I’m talented. See? I’m worth it.

And that’s probably why it’s so hard for me to accept that God wants to do the pursuing. He wants me. He says, “Hey. Hey you over there. See me? I love you. You’re beautiful. I want you. You’re worth it.” In sunsets, in mountains, in rivers, in raindrops, and in His love letters to us, He says,

“I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness. (Jeremiah 31:3) Since you are precious and honored in my sight, and because I love you, I will give men in exchange for you, and people in exchange for your life. (Isaiah 43:4) I demonstrate my own love for you in this: Long before you were beautiful, I sent Jesus to die for you. (Romans 5:8) Because I want you back.”

Our response:

O my God, because Your love is better than life, my lips will glorify You. (Psalm 63:3)

there once was love

I've rediscovered some loves. Not of Double Stuf Oreos, which I have consumed 8 of while sitting here at my computer. Not of a clean bathroom, which I daydream about every time I shower in my flipflops and try to roll up my pant legs when I put them on so they don't dip in the puddles of sand on the bathroom floor. Not even of those days when sweat isn't dripping off my face and making my thighs stick together when I walk. I never lost or forgot those loves, so I don't need to rediscover them. Here are some loves I have rediscovered, though, and it's like seeing my husband return from a long trip, having forgotten how handsome he was and how much I missed his smell:

+ Creation. Not true: I have never forgotten how much I love God's creation. But I had forgotten how much I love being completely engulfed and consumed by it morning through night. Last week was Backcountry Camp, and amidst the rivers, woods, rainy nights, and campfires, I found myself being filled with beauty like an empty balloon filled with helium, until all it can do is soar into the sky and pop for lack of a better release. Sometimes I forget not only how much God's love is revealed through His creation, but also that I am His created one, as well. It's so easy to look at a perfectly pure river and not wonder why God delights in His creation, but He delights in us as His creation, too, and our voices give Him even more pleasure than the voices of the perfectly pure river.

+ Writing. To save myself from soaring into the sky and popping, I've rediscovered why I write. After years of creative writing classes and assignments, I was pretty sure I'd lost whatever desire to write I'd had when I entered into college. Both my journal pages and my mind grew blank of creativity. But I realized as I sat on a damp rock beneath a waterfall why I write. I don't write because I should or because I'm required to. I write because I want to capture, I want to preserve, I want to remember. I write because I have to, or else my mind and heart will become so full that I either pop, or I spring several leaks and everything seeps out without any record of it. I'd forgotten what it was like to need writing, like needing food or sleep. Writing is a reaction to me. What would the trees do if they couldn't rustle when the wind blew?

+ Reading. Four literature classes and two history classes last semester had me convinced that I was done reading, unless menus at PF Chang and Olive Garden counted. But all summer I've played ball, I've gone swimming, I've hiked, I've climbed, I've jet-skied and tubed and paint-balled...but I haven't gotten completely lost in a lecture or a chapter so that minutes pass and I forget to stop thinking. I miss this. Thanks to miss Laura's blog, I'm now reading A Separate Peace. I love words, and I'd forgotten this until I was surrounded by a lack of them.

me and Bali in the middle of the Youghiogheny River in Ohiopyle, Pennsylvania.

consider the ravens

It's almost impossible to answer people when they ask me, "How was your spring break?" If I answer truthfully, "Incredible," they automatically assume I had a blast somewhere on a beach or a big city or something. "I'm so glad you had fun!" they usually say. Oh...that just doesn't cut it.

One of my professors, who knew my state of being before spring break, asked me genuinely, "How was your break?" I answered, "Great. Unexpectedly great."

I learned a lot of things this past week. I learned that the Lord provides often what you don't even realize you need. Two weeks ago I had wanted nothing but to go home. How was I supposed to give to my teammates and the people of Atlanta when I felt I didn't even have enough to keep myself running? But when I voiced this to one of my team leaders, she said some very simple words that completely dictated the results of my week: "The Lord knows what you need."

Wow. Isn't that silly? I seem to only remember all the times I passionately tell the Lord, "I want to serve You," and forget all the times He tells me, "I will be with you."

This week was an incredible time of giving and receiving, being exhausted and being filled. As hard as the Salvation Army floors were, as early & cold as Atlanta mornings often came, as old as peanut butter and jelly sandwiches got, and as emotionally trying, stretching, and draining the days and nights so often were, I was not ready to be done. I don't know where the Lord is taking me, but if it includes as much true, genuine, and unexpected joy as I experienced this past week - even amidst, and often because of, the hardships - I cannot wait to go.

I love these people.

"Your Father knows what you need before you ask Him." - Matthew 6:8

self-centered love

Shouldn't it be an oxy-moron?

I have read this passage from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Life Together multiple times over the past few months. But every time I read it I see further just how imperfect my love is, how I love out of my own broken cisterns, and how I love selfishly.

There is...a "merely emotional" love of neighbor. Such love is capable of making the most unheard-of sacrifices. Often it far surpasses the genuine love of Christ in fervent devotion and visible results. It speaks the Christian language with overwhelming and stirring eloquence. But it is what the apostle Paul is speaking of when he says: "If I give all I possess to the poor, and surrender my body to the flames" (1 Cor. 13:3)--in other words, if I combine the utmost deeds of love with the utmost of devotion--"but do not have love (that is, the love of Christ), I would be nothing" (1 Cor. 13:2). Self-centered love loves the other for the sake of itself; spiritual love loves the other for the sake of Christ. That is why self-centered love seeks direct contact with other persons. It loves them, not as free persons, but as those whom it binds to itself. It wants to do everything it can to win and conquer; it puts pressure on the other person. It desires to be irresistible, to dominate. Self-centered love does not think much of truth. It makes the truth relative, since nothing, not even the truth, must come between it and the person loved. Emotional, self-centered love desires other persons, their company. It wants them to return its love, but it does not serve them. On the contrary, it continues to desire even when it seems to be serving....Christ stands between me and others. I do not know in advance what love of others means on the basis of the general idea of love that grows out of my emotional desires. All this may instead be hatred and worst kind of selfishness in the yes of Christ. Only Christ in his Word tells me what love is. Contrary to all my own opinions and convictions, Jesus Christ will tell me what love for my brothers and sisters really looks like. Therefore, spiritual love is bound to the word of Jesus Christ alone. Where Christ tells me to maintain community for the sake of love, I desire to maintain it. Where the truth of Christ orders me to dissolve a community for the sake of love, I will dissolve it, despite all the protests of my self-centered love. Because spiritual love does not desire but rather serves, it loves an enemy as a brother or sister. It originates neither in the brother or sister nor in the enemy, but in Christ and his word. Self-centered, emotional love can never comprehend spiritual love, for spiritual love is from above. It is something completely strange, new, and incomprehensible to all earthly love.

How much I fall short!

Lord, forgive me for my self-centered love, and teach me Your love, which is so contrary to my human nature and the emotional love of this world.