Saying Goodbye

After five amazing years, we are leaving Atlas. And leaving anywhere, for me, has never been easy. It's painful. For the past five years, those have been our kids. For the past five years, we have loved them quite literally as our own. We've laughed at them until things snorted out of our noses and we've cried when their moron boyfriends broke their hearts and we've... well, they've just been the center of our world. So how do you say goodbye to that?

On the other hand, it's always been strange to me how "goodbyes" can sometimes actually cement a relationship. Tonight, sitting at El Charrito with our Atlas kids "for the last time", I was reminded of that. Suddenly every moment became precious. Suddenly we were all taking the time to say "I love you", and hug, and plan more time to be together. I was reminded that God has piled blessing upon blessing on me by allowing me to live five years of my life with those kids. I would not trade one single moment. They have changed me for the better, and because of them, I will never be the same again.

A couple of days ago, a kid (who is now an adult) from our very first youth ministry job passed a sign that reminded him of us, so he called up. He's home from college and wants to get together. And it hit me that our family is SO BIG. And getting bigger. When we begin our new work at Killen on Sunday, it will grow even more. It's just overwhelming. We are pressed-down, shaken-together, pouring-over kind of blessed. I can't wait to have my whole enormous family together one day when we all finally make it home.

The life of a youth ministry family is crazy. It's unpredictable and emotional and frustrating and heartwrenching and stressful and wild. And you have to stay out really late at night. It's not for everyone. But it is for us, and I am so very thankful that it is.

People Who REALLY Annoy Me

Not trying to be negative or anything, but really... some people just get on my nerves. Here is a partial list (reserving the right, of course, to add to it at any time):

1. "Customer Service" people who refuse to give Customers Service. Last week my car died in the parking lot at McDonald's. (Sad thing was, I wasn't even eating there... long story.) Anywho, Nicole and her mom happened to be just across the street at the mall, but we soon realized that none of us had any jumper cables. So in we go to ask the MickeyD's workers if they might be willing to share. We ask the cashier on duty, who, by the way, was not busy in any form of the word. She turns and screams at all the other workers, each of whom mumble a halfhearted "no, don't got any" in their turn. So the lady turns back to me and says, "I've got some in my trunk." At this point I'm wondering why she felt the need to yelp at the others when she had some all along, but hey, a favor's a favor, right. "Great," we say. Unfortunately, she wasn't done. "Yeah, I've got some in my trunk, but I can't go out and get them, sorry." Seriously? The other customers look at each other in disbelief. We all look at each other in disbelief. We look at her in disbelief. She gives a sort of apologetic smile and turns back to her oh-so-important-guarding-of-the-counter. Now, I used to work at McDonald's. I realize there are rules. I also realize that, in quasi-emergency type situations, the rules are made to be broken. "I'm sorry, sir, but I can't come around the counter to Heimlich that french fry out of your throat. There are rules, you know..." Geez.

2. People who embarrass themselves (and others) with completely irrational statements. Examples are numerous as the sands on the seashore, but I'll go with this one... I have seen one too many facebook statuses in the past couple of days blaming President Obama for the tragedy at Fort Hood. Seriously, people? You don't have to like his politics, you don't have to like anything about him, but really... to imply (or state outright) that he had anything whatever to do with that horror story is absurd. The guy was a Muslim. True. a) Obama is not a Muslim. b) As I told the kids in my class last week, you have to be really careful when throwing out blanket assumptions. "Christians" have bombed many an abortion clinic, but that doesn't mean that those radicals are representative of Christianity as a whole. Let's learn from the plight of Japanese Americans in World War II, and not overreach. Be angry at the individual who committed the crime, and not an entire race of people. Don't let prejudice take root in your heart. Nothing good comes of that.

3. Scrooges who don't like Christmas. This one is thrown in just for good measure... Santa Claus is coming to town, folks, so you might as well enjoy it!

Getting good at rejection

I have never been all that great at rejection. Perfection, I like. Rejection, not so much. If I can't do something perfectly, I'd just as soon not do it at all. I've done pretty well over all with my anti-rejection philosophy, but I've known for some time that once I finished this book, the ensuing agent-search-and-rejection process would be rough and painful.

I've done better than I thought - not even one meltdown crying spell to date - but I have to say, it's quite the learning experience. In school, if you work hard enough, you get an A. In agent hunting, you're entirely at the whim of that particular agent's time constraints, personal preferences, and whether or not her snotty nosed kid put her in a bad mood that morning. It's completely uncontrollable... and I DO NOT LIKE uncontrollable. You just have to do your best work and keep putting it out there again... and again... and again.

Today I got my fourth rejection. To date: One form rejection, the kind where they don't even bother to write your name at the top. One "this isn't for me". One "this work has merit, but isn't for me right now". And one "you are talented, and this is quite a commercial concept, but after much thought I've decided not to go with it".

ARRGH. And then there's the fact that it takes literally months to receive most replies.

I'm not discouraged (yet), and I realize that this is part of the process. "Paying your dues", they call it. Wow. I thought I was paying my dues when I spent three years of my life throwing pencils at the computer screen. But I know I can't give up; I've worked too hard for that. I'll just keep paying those dues. And hope that one day they return the favor.

It's never too late (until it is)...

Well, I am officially a horrible blogger. Drat. I promised myself that, once I started, I would not get so busy with other things that I wouldn't take the time to do it. But then - what with a difficult graduate class, several retreats, workshop, and a multitude of other life-i-ties - I did exactly that.

So... I guess I'll just have to start over now. And now is a very good time to start over. I've had lots to think about lately.

I found out today that my best friend and roommate from college has been very, very sick. In fact, she still is. That in itself has been difficult enough. But aside from the sickness itself, what has made it even more difficult for me is the fact that I know that I have not been the friend to her that I should have been.

We were inseparable in college. Our apartment was classic... the refrigerator was held up by pizza boxes, the air conditioner was held in the window by duct tape, the bathroom door was so warped that it wouldn't shut, and the roaches outnumbered us 200 to 1. And we had the time of our lives. It would take me through Friday to tell half the stories I would love to share here, but the bottom line is that we loved each other dearly.

And we still do. I still know that she would be there in a second if I needed her. And I believe that she still knows the same about me. But, as life and distance tends to do, we have let the past ten years or so allow us to grow gradually apart, until most of my thoughts about her are about how things were instead of how things are. I've thought about that many, many times, and I always resolve to change it. And I never do.

But today, when I talked to her about all the difficulty she's had lately, it made me realize with crushing force just what a powerful influence she has been in my life. She – and, very possibly, I – will never know exactly how much she has meant to me. But I do know this: I'm so grateful to God for the time that I have had with her, and I don't want to take her for granted ever again. I'm glad I still have time to enjoy my friend. I know that not everyone is so blessed.

A Thank You - 13 Years Too Late

A few minutes ago, my husband texted me to let me know that my (hardcover, embossed, beautiful) copy of Thoreau's Walden had come in from Paperback Swap. (I must digress here to say this: If you are not a member of Paperback Swap, you should be. It could literally be the best thing to be invented since sliced bread. You post your unwanted books, and swap them, free, for millions of other books posted by other members! A-maz-ing.) Anyhow, Walden reminded me of the very first English class I ever took at UNA... the class that began my lifelong love affair with literature.

My teacher's name was Rita Galbreath, and the class was Honors English A. We spent the entire semester studying Walden and Resistance To Civil Government (neither of which, I'm sorry to say, I had ever heard of). I had never read anything like Thoreau, and Ms. Galbreath was one of those teachers who made the words leap off the page. I can still remember the feeling of wonder I felt listening to her explain the difficult passages. It's a cliche, I know, but in that one class, Ms. Galbreath and Thoreau – together – opened up a whole new world to me.

Ms. Galbreath left UNA after that one semester. I never saw her again and I have no idea where she is now. But for what it's worth, I want to thank her. She did me a great service, and I will always be grateful. 

As a tribute to her, here are a few of my favorite Thoreau quotes:

"To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake."

"It is an interesting question how far men would retain their relative rank if they were divested of their clothes."

"I cannot for an instant recognize that political organization as my government which is the slave's government also."

"Is there not a sort of blood shed when the conscience is wounded? Through this wound a man's real manhood and immortality flow out, and he bleeds to an everlasting death. I see this blood flowing now."

"Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, thought and speculation at a standstill."

Poor Lion...

I couldn't resist a picture of this....

Right, Off You Go: A successful Quest!

We did it!

Last night Nicole and I enjoyed a great evening at the UNA outdoor concert with Andy Davis... and as promised, here is our photo with him!

No starstruck PR professionals this time...

Lessons the Lord has whacked me over the head with, #5,287,452

Honesty time. A while back, a couple of the students at HCU (where I work) came by the PR office (more specifically where I work) to let us know that they were planning a "Student Gospel Meeting" on campus, and to ask if we would be willing to help them with advertising and such like. Outwardly I smiled and said we'd be glad to, while inwardly I groaned and made that "tsk tsk" noise... until they walked out of the office, at which point I groaned and made the tisking noise out loud. There were a million reasons why I, in all my PR wisdom, knew that this was a silly idea. For one, it's hard enough to get anyone to come to a gospel meeting anymore, even at their own congregations. So who's going to come to one without congregational backing? For another, the people who will feel obligated to come - those of us who work for the university - have heard more than our share of sermons. Working as we do for a non-profit, religious organization, we are overworked and overstressed... and this is just another addition to our workload. For another, it's the week of the biggest fundraising event of our year, so we'll be much too busy... And etc., ad nauseam. These were my internal observations.

Fast forward to this afternoon. I had been in Birmingham all day for a doctor's appointment where I had been poked, prodded, and stuck... tried to play catch up for the graduate class that I missed due to said doctor's appointment... and haggled with a book distributor that has made preparations for the big event this weekend a nightmare. I really did not want to go to this "student gospel meeting". Only my guilty conscience caused me to shove myself off the couch and make the trek to Florence. But like so many other things, I arrived to find that the Lord had a lesson ready and waiting for me... it just wasn't hanging on a string above my love seat. I had to go out to get it.

This time, the lesson was this... this meeting was something these students needed to do. As ministry students, they needed an opportunity to learn how to organize an event... to introduce a speaker... to mail out flyers... to lead singing, and prayers, and all those things that they don't always get to do at their home churches. They needed to learn, on their own, what things work and what things don't. They needed to make their own mistakes, and adjust, and to succeed. It reminded me so much of... myself.

All of a sudden, sitting there watching them as they sang and introduced and preached, I remembered myself, not too long ago, at the Christian Student Center at UNA. The girls and I wanted to have a ladies' day. We didn't have congregational support. We didn't know how to do - well, pretty much anything. But we wanted to try, and so Danny, the campus minister, let us try. He didn't tell us we couldn't, or that it was a bad idea, or that no one would come, or that we needed to do our schedule this-or-that way. I think he knew that some lessons we would have to learn for ourselves.

And we did. We learned that if you schedule a ladies' day from nine to three, only your mothers will stay the whole time. We learned that the PR advertising techniques you used in class for businesses wouldn't work with little old ladies from churches. We learned that you never, EVER try to make a million gallons of chicken salad, from scratch, the night before, or you will all be crying in the floor of the industrial-sized kitchen at 4 a.m. But all those things made us better, and stronger, and more capable. 

I should have been so much more supportive. I should have been proud that, out of all the projects they could have chosen to undertake, they chose to teach the gospel. Especially in the light of the sad news of the closing of Magnolia Bible College, I should have been glad that we have so many students who are eager and willing to preach. I should have been better. Our students - and I am so proud to call them our students - will be better, stronger, and more capable for having organized this week.

And one more thing... I realized, too, that I, one of the chiefest of sinners, can never hear more than my fair share of good preaching. But the great thing about God is that He keeps giving us room to grow, and lessons to learn. I'm so grateful for the chance to learn this one, and next time I will be better.

War and Peace: Check!

Yesterday was a very good day. After an entire summer devoted exclusively to its reading, I finally finished War and Peace! "Why?" I can already hear the masses asking... well, you tell me. There are a few reasons. For one, even Charlie Brown characters reference W&P when they want to tell you what another book is not. "It's not like it's War and Peace or anything," people will say, and everyone nods like they understand what that means, even though they undoubtedly do not. So, I figured that if a book is good enough to be the litmus test by which every other book is undermined, then I should read said litmus test. Secondly, I read Anna Karenina a couple of years ago, almost by chance (chance here meaning that it was in the clearance bin at Books-A-Million, and anything in the clearance bin at Books-A-Million is sure to find its way into my car, house, and then stack-of-books-to-read-someday pile). And I LOVED it. I was blown away by Tolstoy's ability to make every part of life so very... real. And third, I, evidently because I enjoy torturing myself, am attempting to read the greatest 100 novels of all time. There is some disagreement as to whether W&P should be on that list, but I figured I better read it just in case.

I won't lie. There are parts that are tedious, and you have to trudge through them like a muddy Russian battlefield, as it were. I don't understand very much about war strategies, and which army should go where at what time, and to be honest, I don't care about it either. But every tedious explanation was more than made up for by the sections that were... absolutely... and... utterly... brilliant. Tolstoy has a way of creating clarity in a character that I have never seen in  another author. It's like every other person who has ever put pen to paper is writing their account of what they're seeing through a veil, and he is the only living (or dead, as the case may be) soul who can walk behind that veil and write the truth. Even as the characters are saying things that they believe to be true, he will show you by the slightest detail why they are lying, even to themselves. He will show you yourself, complete with all your fallacies and foibles, and basically make you see what a silly person you really are. And it's never obvious. They don't scream at you to notice them. It's like mining for... universal truth. Okay. That might be a little excessive. But you get the point. 

Which is, I genuinely feel like I am a better person for having read it, and I'm very glad I did. That being said, I fully intend for the next book I read to be something completely free of thought... Bridges of Madison County, maybe. Or even better, I just got a free copy of James Patterson's Swimsuit. Maybe that would do quite nicely.

WHAT is your quest? A pic with Andy Davis, that's what.

I love it when you find something out there that makes you wonder where it's been all your life. Recently my friend Holly introduced me to the musical genius that is Andy Davis. She sent me a video and told me that she knew I was going to love him, and the first time I played it I realized that she was more than right. And then... I found this. (Sigh.) He is very good. He is also going to be at UNA very soon, and I am going to do my best to pass myself off as a college freshman and participate in the wonderfulness that will follow.

One of the most exciting parts of this opportunity is the chance to redeem myself from my moment of star-struckedness a few months ago at the Joshua Radin concert. The short version is this: Nicole and I went to Nashville to meet Holly and Gina for an evening with the great Joshua Radin. He was better than good. He was amazing, I nearly wet my pants, and I screamed and giggled like a schoolgirl the entire time. I think Holly may have even flung her bespectacled self at the stage when he sang, "Lisa Loeb glasses, I'd sure like to ask you to stay". Fast forward to the end of the concert. There we are, three public relations professionals and a public schoolteacher standing outside the Exit/In chattering and saying goodbyes, when who should come walking toward us on the sidewalk - alone and in a toboggan, no less - but Joshua himself. He even slowed down and looked right at us when he walked by, clearly expecting us to ask for an autograph, a picture, something. What do three PR professionals and a public schoolteacher do in a situation like this? Stand frozen with our mouths open, paralyzed with utter disbelief, that's what. He walked within three feet of me, and I just stood there like I was Mr. Tumnus or Kalijah or something.

So, where the picture of me and Joshua should be, there's just a sad spot on my wall. But... I have another shot, theoretically, with Andy Davis, and I plan to make the most of it. Stay tuned for updates on my quest to get a pic with Andy...

In the meantime, enjoy this little jewel:

WEI

For about a week now, I have been working my way into the shallow end of my newest project... World English Institute. WEI is an online program that teaches English using passages from the Bible. For those of you who know the LST program, WEI is like LST online. I had been praying for some time that God would send me some way to reach out beyond the borders of the small and saturated area in which I live. When we made the decision not to carry out our plans for a move to Brazil, my desire for outreach to the world was not diminished. I just honestly didn't know what to do or how to do it. I heard about WEI through the illustrious Perry "Maywood Shorts" Taylor, and felt at once that it would be something I would feel at home doing. And I have to say that the program is set up better and more effectively than I dared to dream. When a student takes a test online, the English/static questions are automatically graded, complete with an explanation of the correct answer. The teacher then makes any comments he or she desires and makes remarks on the discussion questions. This is where your effective outreach lies - basic conversation based on what the students have read in Scripture. The other positive is that it does the monotonous work for you, leaving you free to spend your time interacting with your student. The nine students I have so far have been from places I could never go, even if I wanted, and other places I dream of going - places like Libya, Palestine, Egypt, and Brazil, just to name a few. The lessons are beautifully done, not cheesy, and they're modern (not 1950s leftovers). I'm so grateful for this chance to share with others, and so happy that people out there have the vision to use a tool like the internet in such a powerful way.

If you want to check it out, the website is www.worldenglishinstitute.org. There's not a lot out there for the teachers (intentionally), so if you're interested let me know and I can get you in touch with the appropriate person.

Girl, thirty-one

Today we went to see "Julie and Julia" with my parents. It was a good movie; not anything over the top, not anything extraordinary. Just a girl with a dream, living life the best way she knows how. She was a girl a lot like me. No less than three times during the movie, I got poked in the ribs, patted on the knee, or pointed at, all because the things she was saying were things that I say, or the things she was wishing were things that I wish.

Here's the premise of the story. Girl, thirty years old, with a husband and a cat, has half finished novel and an awareness that her life at thirty is not at all as she planned it. She was supposed to be a published author. She was supposed to be successful. She was not supposed to be living above a pizzeria. 

Meanwhile, here's my story. Girl, thirty-one years old, with a husband (the cat kicked the bucket), has finished novel and an awareness that her life at thirty-one... well, you get the picture. 

It was a neat thing to see how the things in her life came together. She found her emotional center with the help of a Julia Child cookbook, a kitchen roughly the size of a telephone booth, and a blog. In my case, I can say with absolute certainty that Julia Child will have no part of my future. I have no interest in steaming a live lobster, deboning a duck, or making a jello mold out of the meat juice from a cow's hoof. (Blech.) But that's all right, because the point is still the same. You just keep doing what you're doing, you don't give up, and you try new things, because amazing things can and do happen every day. Sometimes they happen in big ways, and sometimes in small ones, but they happen.

And even if they don't, at least I don't live in a 900 square foot apartment above a pizzeria in Queens. There's always that.

Honesty is the best policy

I'm a big fan of University of North Alabama football, and I'm a big fan of grammar. Unfortunately, the two don't always mix. Below is one of my favorite grammatical atrocities from last year:

This time, I'm sticking with my gut

Published: Thursday, October 23, 2008 at 3:30 a.m.
Last Modified: Wednesday, October 22, 2008 at 11:08 p.m.

Take it from me: always go with your gut instinct.

Click to enlarge

I learned that the hard way last week. In this very column, I pointed out that UNA, despite playing like national title contenders all season, was due for a letdown at Delta State. I held that opinion for three weeks, but changed my mind at the last minute and went with the Lions.

That was dumb.

UNA did just what I expected. It went into Mississippi and looked like a team that had played three games in 13 days. Delta State won, and I found myself slamming my head into my desk at an alarming rate.

I felt just as strongly that UNA would rebound and destroy defending national champion Valdosta State at home. This time, I'm stinking with my instincts.

I've got to give it to him. At least he's honest.

The Definition of "Aspiring"

I have noticed something lately. As some of you may know, I recently finished a project over three years in the making – a young adult fiction novel that sucked up most of the free time in my late twenties. Only my closest friends and family even knew that I was working on it until a few months ago. Now people are finding out about my book, and asking me about it, and for some inexplicable reason I find myself answering them apologetically. "I didn't know you were a writer," they'll say, or, "You never told me you're an author!" "Well, we'll see," I respond. (Insert sheepish smile here) Or better yet, I correct them: "Oh, not yet. I'm just an aspiring author." But a while back my mother gave me a box of papers and various whatnots from my childhood, and in the box was the very first book I ever wrote. It was made from construction paper and crayons, and titled The Mystery of the Red Rose Burglar or something equally edgy. Still, I was, after all, the author of the story. In middle school I authored diaries, in high school articles for the local paper, in college poetry and music, and now books. So what right does my 31-year-old self have to diminish my sundry earlier selves by insinuating that all they have written has not been "authored", just because it hasn't been published? Why do I have to have an "aspiring" label stuck to my back? Some of my writing has been poor, no doubt. Heck, maybe it is all poor. Don't expect The Mystery of the Red Rose Burglar to appear at your local Barnes and Noble anytime soon. But it's mine all the same, and in just as real a way as the book that was three years in the making. So are the songs that were written in the back of a van on a college trip. So are the poems I wrote curled up on the window ledge in my dorm room, with rain on the pane and tears on my face. All of them are a part of me. 

I don't know why we are so afraid to acknowledge any part of ourselves that is not considered successful, at least in the traditional sense of the word. Who we are is not determined by whether or not the forces that be acknowledge us. 

So from now on, I'm going to try not to apologize for who I am. 

I am an author.

And so it begins...

You can only look at the screen for so long, wishing something would appear there, before you realize that you might as well just start and be done with it. I'm not positive why the task of "the first post" seems so daunting, but daunting it is. What if I sound too bookish? Not bookish enough? What if this new "hobby" has absolutely no inherent value? What if (perish the thought) there's a misspelled word in the VERY FIRST POST? All melodramatic and yet actual fears.

So, why throw my hat in the blogging ring anyway? Well, hmm. I think that, at least partially, the reasons will reveal themselves as time goes by. While I'm waiting for them, though, I can't help but think of a scene from my favorite movie of all time - You've Got Mail. (Sue me.) Joni Mitchell is singing about wishing she had a river she could skate away on, and Meg Ryan is hanging twinkle lights and popsicle ornaments from a little Charlie Brown tree and reminiscing about her mother and her valuable-but-small life. "So much of what I see reminds me of something I read in a book, when shouldn't it be the other way around?" I still think about that question, and I still am not sure of the answer. In any case, she finishes out by saying, "I don't really want an answer. I just want to send this cosmic question out into the void. So, goodnight, dear void."

I suppose that that is what this blog will be for me. A place to throw out the things my overactive brain wonders. A place to share my somewhat unthought thoughts about the books I'm reading and the people I'm meeting and the places I want my life to take me. (It will likely also be a place to share the quite large collection of "grammatical atrocities" currently shoved into a manila folder in my office desk, but that hardly seems fitting here.) Maybe, somewhere in the void, someone will be interested in what I have to say. Maybe not. Either way is okay. Like Meg says, I don't really want an answer. Just sending it out there is enough.

So, goodnight, dear void.