See you at the Met

            I just got back from several fun filled days in New York with two of our daughters.  It was such a treat to see Robin since she was unable to visit with the rest of the family this past summer due to a broken leg. Thankfully, she has been progressing very well…until right before Jessie and I showed up, that is.  For our visit, she was back on her crutches but still able to drive and having fun playing host to her older sister and her even older mother.

            When it was time to head back to the city, (for those of us in the Fly-over Zone, “the city” is their affectionate moniker for the Big Apple itself), Robin had decided to treat me to a visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (A.K.A., “the Met”).  As she drove us through the city and past the Met, we observed a formidable line forming outside the front of the building, which did not bode well for our excursion.  After saying goodbye to her sister who was catching an Uber to the airport, I helped Robin negotiate her crutches and get her situated into a wheelchair.  We then proceeded to find a line on the inside of the building to get tickets, but not being sure of which line we needed to be in, I walked ahead a few paces to look around.

            That’s when a professional looking lady with an authoritative lanyard asked if I needed help.  When I showed her my daughter in the wheelchair, she immediately took charge.  We were invited to following,  and were led past everyone else and into the first exhibit.  (Not kidding.) 

            “Now, you two go on in here since this is the exhibit that will take the longest and I’ll bring your tickets to you.”

            And so, we perused about, and I wondered if she really would come find us.  However, within maybe fifteen minutes, the nice lanyard lady did find us, giving us the requisite stickers to wear and paper tickets to pocket should anyone question our authority to be inside. 

            “Thank you so much,” said I, “and where can we pay for these?”

            “Oh, no, those are complimentary tickets,” said the lanyard.

            Dumbfounded.

            Needless to say, it was a wonderful visit.  Not that I wanted my daughter to be in a wheelchair—far from it—but it was obvious we needed something beyond our own capacity and we were certainly not too (stupidly) proud to accept the help.

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 5:8

            I love the accounts of Jesus reaching out to the wounded and disenfranchised people of his society, which in reality included everyone whether they acknowledged it or not.  The Samaritan woman at the well with multiple failed marriages, the untouchable unclean lepers, the paralyzed man at the Pool of Bethesda, Matthew the despised tax-collector and Peter whose courage failed him in Jesus’ time of greatest need.  I love all of these because they are me: broken, failed, and flailing in life’s storms. 

            I can do all I know to do, following all the rules to earn my way in, (like standing in line at the Met), or I can accept with gratitude the One with the authority to get me beyond the obstacles I can’t get past myself.  With a free pass, paid for.  All for the acknowledgment of my brokenness. 

But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.

John 1:12-13

And when He gives me the ticket in, who am I to argue?

New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. All rights reserved.

Inventory

A good friend of mine told me about the local Red Cross blood drive that was happening here in town.  I hadn’t donated blood in a L-O-N-G time, and since someone dear to me in my family had just had a transfusion, it was obviously still in my frontal lobe.  That, plus I was on summer vacation, plus I have one of the rarest blood types (B negative), so no excuses.  Drink some extra water, grab a protein bar, and I’m off.

There’s a family story about my mom back when we were kids.  She had the rarest type of blood, AB negative.  That’s always fun, since if you’re in a car wreck or some such awful thing, and you need a lifesaving transfusion, you might be in a world of hurt. 

Call your folks

There’s a story in the book of Joshua where God holds back the sun so the Hebrews could have more time to fight on and subdue their enemies. 

More time.  Man, I wish.  Of course, most of us would just blow it.  But somewhere in our collective psyche where “deep calls unto deep” is that gnawing feeling that time is something we can’t grasp or control.  A cursory glimpse at even modern entertainment is informative—sci-fi time travel flicks abound, even the humor of “Ground Hog’s Day” maybe-I-can-get-it-right-this-time wistful thinking is not far below the surface for most of us. 

So somewhere thousands of feet over Midwest farmlands, I was in a jet heading home from seeing my parents for a few days at their retirement village.  Dad was recovering from a knee problem across the street from where mom was preparing for their new digs in the apartment complex. 

After sharing my dad’s breakfast table with a 93-year-old WW2 veteran, after hearing of one of their friends who skipped her chemo so she could go hiking in Colorado (“just give me a little extra medicine this time, will ya?”), and after meeting some of the other indomitable souls in their neighborhood, it kind of makes me think twice before complaining about…anything. 

We went to church together that Pentecost Sunday morning huddled around his computer at the foot of his hospital bed watching the live-stream from their Methodist Church with mom and one of their neighbors (a retired world-traveled physician who can now only see peripherally due to a degenerative eye problem—but walks everywhere anyway.)  I’m kicking myself for not providing some grape juice and flat bread for communion.  (“The good Lord knows our hearts, honey.”)

One of my parents’ good friends from W-A-Y back, (meaning my teenage years, okay, no wise-cracks necessary), is now in his 90’s and just returned home to the same complex from visiting family from the west coast.  I am informed he is of the polar-opposite political party than my father, which in this day and age could mean, well, we all know the vitriol that implies.  Evidently, they are both “old school”, which means that they can discuss politics without interference in their relationship. 

Would that we had such maturity these days.

Dad’s the one who taught me to “ask for the moon” but won’t ask for a bag of ice when he bumps his bad ankle on the wheelchair.  When I mention a plan to call for something, it’s “oh, no, don’t bother them…”  So I have dubbed myself “the wicked witch of the West” and I can imagine the nurses in report saying, “she called again.” (One of my main consolations is all the heavy lifting my local siblings do when it needs to be done.  This long distance thing STINKS.)

Dad says that as the light streams through his window in the morning, he gives thanks to the Lord for another day of life.  My folks have a perspective that my culture has largely lost, or missed altogether—gratitude.  Fortitude.  Resilience. 

Gray hair is a crown of glory;
    it is gained by living a godly life.

Now, let’s see, who shall the witch bother today?  

(Call your folks!)

Proverbs 16:31 Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

A timely reminder

Source: A timely reminder From Pied Type

And I quote, “NO!”

Bob and I were incredibly fortunate to spend this past Christmas with our oldest granddaughter and her family at their beautiful new home in Los Angeles.  Let me clarify: our oldest granddaughter is 2-years-old and her family is our oldest child and her husband.  Now, Bob and I have memories of when this precious bundle was born, when she started to walk, and one of my favorite life events is rocking her as she fell asleep in my lap even just this past summer.

That’s when she had just turned two, but even then the storm was beginning to brew.

And this past holiday season, it was the southern California equivalent of a nor’easter.  Of course, being the parents of three children of my own, this comes as no real surprise.  As much as I know her parents love and

“God is more powerful than my stupid”

My husband’s brothers and their childhood friends are an interesting lot.  Nice guys, really, but growing up in the 60’s and 70’s, they made their mark, and thankfully were also prevented from doing so a time or two.

One of the (many) stories that has passed into family lore has to do with Bob’s brother and a friend who were caught as they were trying to set fire to some old newspapers in an alley within a neighbor’s garage.  For “some reason” (thank God for guardian angels), the