Every now and then something will spark a memory that makes me laugh really hard. I know how lucky I am that I get to say that! And when that laugh comes from way deep down inside, causing me to throw my head back, and then have to catch my breath and immediately phone someone in my family who will "get it," well - that laugh usually involves my Dad! Today was one of those days. My cousin Jo Ann in Nova Scotia used to come to Detroit and stay with me for long, fun visits. Some fun we still enjoy laughing about, and some fun we will never breathe a word about. To anyone. So don't try to make us. Our lips are sealed. Dad loved Jo Ann - he loved her just like one of his own daughters. And Jo Ann loved him too, ever since a very early memory in her childhood when Dad ... View Post
Little Thing #27: Cornerstone Baptist Church
Little Thing #27: My church & my peeps! A racist, conservative, Republican, white bigot. That is what I was called this week. That was not based on anything I’d said, or done, or anything this individual who claims to know me, actually knows. It was simply based on the color of my skin. I’m white by the way. I’m first generation American too. My father served in the US Army, and became a citizen. He loved this country, and he came here legally. Legally. Worked his butt off. Taught me right from wrong. Sent me to school to get an education, because he knew how important that was. He only had a 5th grade education, and he wanted more for me than he had. He taught me to be a strong woman of God, and he taught me right from wrong by the way that he lived his life. I ... View Post
Little Thing #24: Wilson’s Bank
See this little bank? It sat on the window sill of in the tiny little kitchen of the 800-square foot bungalow home I grew up in for as long as I can remember. There were never any pennies in it - just dimes and quarters. Mum saved as many as she could, and that provided some of the gas money we used to drive to and from Nova Scotia each summer. My brother, sister, and I would use a kitchen knife to get the coins out because there was no cork in the bottom. The phone number on it made me chuckle because I can still remember phone numbers beginning with letters, and remembering mine by singing it! "KE3-4053, KE3-4053, KE3-4053, that's my telephone number!" Well that little bank was in Mum's throw-away pile recently, but I just had to have it. So now it's sitting on my ... View Post
Little Thing #23: Hannah, & The Art of Letter Writing
"There must be millions of people all over the world who never get any love letters... I could be their leader." ~Charlie Brown A year ago I took a random, spur-of-the-moment trip and volunteered for a week at Voice of the Martyrs in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. My task for the week? I hand wrote scripture on the bottom of donation receipts with several of the sweetest women I'd ever met for eight hours a day. It was one of my most favorite weeks ever! I have stayed in close contact with a few of the friends I made there, and in particular one little 11-year-old girl named Hannah from England who was volunteering with her family the same week as me. Hannah wanted so badly to have pretty handwriting. So she sat with us for a few hours a day practicing. She was silly and she ... View Post
Little Thing #22: Music & Singing
My friend and I went to the mall today. There was a necklace I've been eyeing there, and a girlfriend of mine works in the store, and texted me this morning making sure I knew it was 40% off today. So I just had to go snag it while it was on sale. We decided after that to grab a Starbucks around the corner. It's 21 degrees today and feels like an actual heatwave compared to the past two days. But 21 is still pretty chilly, and a nice warm cup of coffee sounded too good to pass up. As my friend held the door for me, a young man came literally running out of the store. We just kind of stood there and looked at him, because he was smiling from ear to ear after getting out into the cold, and stopped to turn around and sort of look up. I asked him if he was okay. He looked ... View Post
Just Keep Running…..
I spent ten years in the Army, and not until the last four did I actually enjoy running. My first two years in Panama I hated it. Three miles at a fast pace in 100 degree tropical heat with 100 degree humidity, at 4 o'clock in the morning, up and down horribly steep hills....... I don't think in the two years I was there I ever completed a run with my platoon. I was always lagging behind. I was one of the last to make it home, last to get in the shower, and often had to skip the mess hall just to get to work on time. There was never a morning of leisurely getting ready because there was little time between the time I finished my three miles to the time I had to be in the office. Those of us who ran slower than the expected pace just knew to begin in the rear of the ... View Post
Running the Race
"Many will say they are loyal friends, but who can find one who is truly reliable?" Proverbs 20:6 Someone once told me that when you love someone, you always assume the best about that person. For quite some time, I was convinced they must be right. In fact, I had actually even begun to believe that I really didn't know how to love well. Or maybe at all. But if that were true - that love is always assuming the best about someone, then what reason would there be to want to encourage anyone to run harder after Christ? To dig deeper, to do the hard work of letting God get into every nook and cranny of our hearts? And to actually truly believe we could be a new creation in Christ? Heal from our pasts? That would also mean that my closest and most cherished ... View Post
I Love You More Than An Ironed T-Shirt
I got dressed today, but I'm not exactly sure why. I had 8 a.m. plans, 10 a.m. plans, and then it snowed. And snowed, and snowed, and snowed. I canceled the 8 a.m. plans, canceled the 10 a.m. plans, and commenced to study. And study, and study, and study. I'm so, so, so sick of studying. In the middle of studying, "Suzy Q" called. I snagged her as my friend about eight or so years ago when she was holding the door at a Bible study I was attending. She was so friendly, always remembered my name, always asked about my sons - so I told her one day I was keeping her. And we've been good friends since the day I told her that. Suzy Q loves to play in the snow (I told her she's cray-cray, but she just laughs!) so I was surprised when she took a break from playing in the ... View Post