let it snow...

Well, okay, I'm not saying snow should pile up in April, but it sure gave Pittsburghers something else to talk about today.

Especially after the past coupla days: 3 police officers killed on Saturday, a house invasion in East Liberty on Monday, a wife shoots a ex-husband on Monday, oh, and there was the guy that drove into the Subaru dealership. Literally.

Calling all angels??

So, yes, I'm glad we had something else to talk about today. And I'm glad the Penguins WON! Woo hoo!

I'm in and out and around (it's called vackay) !!

To bed so I can wake at the crack of dawn...later I'll tell you about egg decorating and the day SL thought her vackay was a goner b/c of jury duty.

Keep smiling...

My sister's phone: inanimate object? NOT!

My sister's phone, much like the watch in the movie Stranger than Fiction, decides to call me every once in a while. It's done this one other time, and all I heard was jostle jostle and when I called back I got voice mail. I was freaked out and called my mom. Sis just called me but I couldn't hear her! I imagined her trapped somewhere without cell coverage. It was around the time when that guy got out of prison because he twittered one word. When my phone rang this morning, because of the snow, I thought the only person that would be calling me this early would be someone from the library saying that the library was closed, which would be ridiculous, a) because it's not that much snow and we never close, and b) because I don't work until 1 pm, so everything will be clear by then that isn't clear now.

So I called my sister and she thought, who would be calling me? The only person that calls me while I'm waiting for the bus is Mom, and she wouldn't have anything to say to me, I just saw her last night. She picked up, and I told her, "Your phone called me." She was puzzled. "It's supposed to be locked..."
"Well," I said, "It's done this once before." Which is when she said, maybe it's like the watch in the movie Stranger than Fiction. Yes, my sister's phone calls me. I have a stalker. It likes to call me and go jostle jostle. But we had a nice chat. She was freezing, standing at the bus stop.
"Guess how many layers I have on?" she asked me.
"Five!"
"Three. It's so cold today, it's 32."
"Nice try. Yesterday it was 11 here."
"Ouch. I better bring lots of layers for the weekend."
"Yep, cuz it's going to be cold."
So I told her about my newest fun thing--making sure the sidewalk in front of my house is clear. When I get home after work, I sweep the snow and then salt the walk. It takes me about ten minutes. While talking to my mom last night, I said, maybe it's because it's the only thing I can do in about ten minutes that doesn't have a second part. When I do dishes, there are always more, somewhere in my apartment, on a desk, under a coffee table. When I do laundry, I do one load at a time. But the walk, it's done and that's it! Of course, we got another inch or two overnight, so I'll have to go sweep and salt it, but it will be a lot less work than if I hadn't swept and salted it last night.

Somehow we got onto the topic of the inauguration, because of port-a-potties. There's one at the Metro now. "Yeah, that's the thing about Tuesday. It would be so cold that I'd be wearing five layers, and think about it. Five layers and a port-a-potty? No thank you!" She said, "I have friends that are going and they're like, why aren't you going? And I say, 'You must not read the newspaper.'" I would be one of those crazy people, because this election meant more to me than any election ever has, but my sister with her talk of port-a-potties and throngs of people changed my mind over Christmas break.

We chatted some more, until she was about to go into the station at the Metro. "I'm going to lose you." So we'll talk again, later.

False Evidence Appearing Real

I was fascinated to learn this morning while I watched CNN that Osama Bin Laden's tapes inspire his followers. (He has a new tape out.) I remember when I was in Mary Kay, I listened to tapes for inspiration: Rena Tarbet, Zig Ziglar, and Susan Jeffers, who wrote the book Feel the fear and do it anyway. My Mary Kay days are long behind me but I still remember how I listened to those tapes while cooking, driving, whatever. I wonder if my love for audio books began with listening to those tapes, over a decade ago.

So as I started writing this post, about fear, and its false faces, its masks, I refer to some quotes I've culled from an email I opened this afternoon.

I experiment with online devotionals. Some have gone away, some change their style...some get political. The one I like right now is Transformation Garden. In the devotional for January 6, labeled "Handling the future with faith or futility," Dorothy Valcarcel has compiled a group of hymns, quotes, and poems that point that we have a choice, and our choice has to do with how much trust we put in our Savior. I have pretty much lifted all the quotes herein from that devotional, in an effort to encourage myself and hopefully you, dear reader. If you want to receive Dorothy's devotional, you can subscribe by clicking on this link.

Now, I know, dear reader, that you may not trust God or want to. But these quotes do have a wisdom that I hope translates without sounding namby-pamby.

I like this one, from Dorothy Hughes: "Nobody can take away your future. Nobody can take away something you don't have yet." (italics mine.)

I so often forget that the future is this fluid occurrence that hasn't happened yet. My novel-writer's mind has every detail laid out. The story of my life is laid out in my mind: it is so detailed, layered with meaning, that it has me convinced, until it doesn't happen and my confidence crashes once again. I hope this year that I can be more accepting of each moment as it happens, even while I plan for the future that I don't count on a specific outcome.

I recently watched the movie Prince Caspian. It amazed me, the thousands of years of time travel that occurred as the British children were once again taken to the mythical land of Narnia. Here is C.S. Lewis, the author of the Narnia books, talking about the futility of grasping for the future:

"The next moment is as much beyond our grasp, and as much in God's care, as that a hundred years away. Care for the next minute is just as foolish as care for a day in the next thousand years. In neither can we do anything, in both God is doing everything."

Now, dear reader, this next poem could either make you smile and nod or want to throw up. It is not my desire to illicit the second response, I promise, but I really like it, and I do cling to the encouragement it offers. It's by John Greenleaf Whittier, the Quaker poet.

I know not what the future hath
Of marvel or surprise,
Assured alone that life and death
His mercy underlies.

And if my heart and flesh are weak
To bear an untried pain,
The bruised reed He will not break,
But strengthen and sustain.

No offering of my own I have,
Nor works my faith to prove;
I can but give the gifts He gave,
And plead His love for love.

And so beside the silent sea
I wait the muffled oar,
No harm from Him can come to me
On ocean or on shore.

I know not where His islands lift
Their fronded palms in air;
I only know I cannot drift
Beyond His love and care."

That last bit reminds me of Psalm 139:7-12, where the psalmist writes that there is nowhere he can go where God is not also:

7Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence?
8If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.
9If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;
10Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.
11If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me; even the night shall be light about me.
12Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.

Well, the light is gone now. I will be driving home soon. But first, dinner. Because one thing I do know, without a shadow of doubt: if it's snowy and I'm hungry and I have to drive, it is better to EAT FIRST.