Home from Sacred Road for almost two weeks, and just now getting a chance to look around and see where I've been, where I'm at. Our last night on the Rez was almost an all-nighter, with a special dinner, a singing and sharing time, a video of all our adventures through the summer, cards and gifts exchanged, and then, finally, hugs and tears. Us girls drove home and packed after the party, and then I slept for about an hour and a half before getting up to drive home, early so I could get Scott to the airport for his flight. Scott and Kyle were good companions over the mountains, and it felt lonely when I dropped them off at the airport, sudden goodbye to the summer's consuming whirlwind.
That very night we delved into party mode here at home, apparently making up for all the family gatherings I missed over the summer. Birthdays, anniversaries, out of town guests (my Berlin family!), work days at our house and the Dillow's, Annie's baptism. So good to see everyone and just spend time with family.
Yesterday Mom and I cleaned the house together and then I had some time to answer e-mails, go through things at my desk, tackle a stack of mending and ironing. And to realize where I am. It's tempting to call it "in between," but I know that there is no time unmarked by God's purpose or unused by Him. I might describe it as waiting, but while I am waiting, most certainly He is working. It's a quiet place, a thoughtful place, a free place. And as always, it's a place permeated by the presence of God. A friend said, sweetly, that she hoped God would show me what He wanted me to do next. I smiled and thanked her, and said I had no doubt about His leadership. If there is a weak link in the chain, it is me. Hopefully I will follow, but most certainly, He will lead.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Monday, August 1, 2011
Gifts
Blue sky, golden sunrise over green fields.
Birthday waffles for breakfast with blueberries, peaches, whipped cream, and sprinkles.
Calls, texts, e-mails, and cards coming in all day from friends all over the world.
Cool job in the lawn this morning filling up water balloons with Joshua while the girls baked my birthday cake inside.
Greeting the Schmitts, friends from home who stopped by to drop off their daughter Marina at the Granberry's for a few days.
Mary sending Joshua to get tacos from a little Mexican store in Harrah for a special lunch treat -- so tasty!
Making suds and laughing with the kids at Totus during craft time today as we created felted soap.
Hugs.
Connie's excitement about my birthday: whisking me out of my chair at dinner and dancing me up to the front so everyone could sing to me, crowning me with her princess headdress, carrying my card around "secretly" all day ("I need everybody but Julie to sign this!!"), proudly presenting me with her hand-decorated card ("Happy Birthday love Julie rocks!"), giving me a tight birthday squeeze. "I love you so much, Julie!"
Cake made by Molly, decorated by Katie, enough to celebrate with the whole team.
Working together with my friends: scrubbing ovens and back steps, loading and unloading vehicles with kid's club and meal supplies, chopping vegetables for pasta salad, peeling potatoes, washing dishes.
Coaster made by Thelma this morning, given to me tonight.
Evening call from the team in Warm Springs complete with a rousing rendition of the birthday song.
Beautiful potholders, a gift from Mary.
People to love and be loved by. "I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you." Love each other, that your joy may be complete.
Birthday waffles for breakfast with blueberries, peaches, whipped cream, and sprinkles.
Calls, texts, e-mails, and cards coming in all day from friends all over the world.
Cool job in the lawn this morning filling up water balloons with Joshua while the girls baked my birthday cake inside.
Greeting the Schmitts, friends from home who stopped by to drop off their daughter Marina at the Granberry's for a few days.
Mary sending Joshua to get tacos from a little Mexican store in Harrah for a special lunch treat -- so tasty!
Making suds and laughing with the kids at Totus during craft time today as we created felted soap.
Hugs.
Connie's excitement about my birthday: whisking me out of my chair at dinner and dancing me up to the front so everyone could sing to me, crowning me with her princess headdress, carrying my card around "secretly" all day ("I need everybody but Julie to sign this!!"), proudly presenting me with her hand-decorated card ("Happy Birthday love Julie rocks!"), giving me a tight birthday squeeze. "I love you so much, Julie!"
Cake made by Molly, decorated by Katie, enough to celebrate with the whole team.
Working together with my friends: scrubbing ovens and back steps, loading and unloading vehicles with kid's club and meal supplies, chopping vegetables for pasta salad, peeling potatoes, washing dishes.
Coaster made by Thelma this morning, given to me tonight.
Evening call from the team in Warm Springs complete with a rousing rendition of the birthday song.
Beautiful potholders, a gift from Mary.
People to love and be loved by. "I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you." Love each other, that your joy may be complete.
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Let the Little Children Come
At Kid's Club in Warm Springs this week . . .
Waurica, shy and not as easy to connect with but so delighted when you take the time to get to know her
Andrew, who often wears this puzzled, disturbed expression even when you are engaging with him, but the sun comes out when his sparky grin appears
Haley, one of the jump rope queens
Playing tag -- the team members run and the kids reach out from their arms to do the tagging. Tree is base!
Celena, quiet 5-year-old who loves rainbows and colors perfect pictures
Kaiwin, spunky little guy who puts on his charming smile and makes up stories about all the cool things he's done so I will be impressed at his daring and skill
Destiny
Ashlynn, who loves to laugh and play
Jasper, the clown
Dairius, hurting little boy who warmed up during the week to love and positive attention
Kelly, who tapped me on the back one afternoon and sat beside me on the pavement to show me his cool transformer and talk to me for 15 or 20 minutes about all its features
Carry me?
Monday, July 11, 2011
Birthday Bash
Ann Marie frying okra
Shrimp & Grits, asparagus in the background. Steak, potatoes, salad, bread, and cake not pictured!
Marisol's nephews careening around the race track
Uncle Dave receiving his birthday hat -- 58!
Digging into the steak
She loves it!
Marisol
Let me help you with that!
My job
"So what do you do when you're not here for the summer?" It's a natural question, especially when they find out I'm not in school. I try to scrounge up something that answers the world's definition of Doing Something. I tell them I was a nanny in Germany before this, and a baker in Seattle before that. I tell them I don't know what I'll be doing at the other end of the summer.
What if I simply said, what if I truly believed that who I am is a follower of Jesus? What if that was where I found my truest identity? This morning I felt chastised along with the Galatians when Paul said, "You foolish Galatians! Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law or by believing what you heard?" It's not about observing the law, doing my duties, being productive, getting the job done. A life well lived is a life of believing, a life of receiving.
Instead I try to please others, to do a job well for my own credit, and to validate my existence, my being right here right now, by the works of my hands.
But the works of my hands will fall like the tower of Babel; they will burn like wood, hay, and stubble; they will crash when the rains come down and the streams rise up. At the final summing up, they will amount to nothing.
What will remain? Love, and I am not capable of love on my own. Like an infant who is not held and loved from birth, if I do not receive love from my Father I will suffer from spiritual attachment disorder, from failure to thrive. My job is pretty simple: look to the Father. Receive love from Him. Go deep in intimate relationship with Him. This is where heart transformation happens, where love comes from.
There was a little girl at kid's club in Warm Springs this past week who made me feel my inadequacy. Her name was Clarissa, and she asked me as we blew bubbles together where David and Kat were. I remembered David and Kat; they were team members from the first week. "Well, they had to go home," I told her. Her face fell right away, but she asked me a few more questions and as my answers sunk in she became increasingly depressed. "Are you sure they aren't going to be here this week? But Kat was my best friend. They aren't coming back?"
We puttered around the various crafts together, but her apathy increased. I read her a couple of books, and she put up with listening to the stories but her heart wasn't in it. She didn't want to head around back for story time, but I cajoled her to join us on the grass and she sat with me on the outskirts of the group, leaning against me, resigned, wearily eating her teddy grahams and sucking her Capri Sun.
When we waved goodbye, said "See you later!" at the end of the afternoon, I wondered if we were doing any good at all. Are we just torturing these children, already living lives of hellos and goodbyes, of fair weather friends and guardians? We come each day and leave after a couple of hours; the teams come for a week and then go home; the interns keep returning throughout the summer but at the end we all disappear and they don't see any of us for another year.
What am I doing here, I wondered? I come, the virtuous missionary with my packet of love and good deeds to pass out for my eleven weeks here. I am not entering into their pain, their lives, their community. While my need for Jesus is not one whit different than theirs, my actions seem to say that I think I have something to offer them.
And then I thought of that great missionary Jesus, and how he came. He didn't move in next door, setting up a store of heavenly goods to parcel out to passersby. He moved in WITH us; he moved into a human womb, took up the all the constraints and trials and dilemmas we struggle with. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.
I have not done that. I have held myself aloof, not wanting to enter into the suffering and dirt of the human condition. I, who am of this race, will not stoop as He has done for me?
I do have a long term career goal: to be transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory. It starts with gazing long and steady at his face, all day, every day.
What if I simply said, what if I truly believed that who I am is a follower of Jesus? What if that was where I found my truest identity? This morning I felt chastised along with the Galatians when Paul said, "You foolish Galatians! Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law or by believing what you heard?" It's not about observing the law, doing my duties, being productive, getting the job done. A life well lived is a life of believing, a life of receiving.
Instead I try to please others, to do a job well for my own credit, and to validate my existence, my being right here right now, by the works of my hands.
But the works of my hands will fall like the tower of Babel; they will burn like wood, hay, and stubble; they will crash when the rains come down and the streams rise up. At the final summing up, they will amount to nothing.
What will remain? Love, and I am not capable of love on my own. Like an infant who is not held and loved from birth, if I do not receive love from my Father I will suffer from spiritual attachment disorder, from failure to thrive. My job is pretty simple: look to the Father. Receive love from Him. Go deep in intimate relationship with Him. This is where heart transformation happens, where love comes from.
There was a little girl at kid's club in Warm Springs this past week who made me feel my inadequacy. Her name was Clarissa, and she asked me as we blew bubbles together where David and Kat were. I remembered David and Kat; they were team members from the first week. "Well, they had to go home," I told her. Her face fell right away, but she asked me a few more questions and as my answers sunk in she became increasingly depressed. "Are you sure they aren't going to be here this week? But Kat was my best friend. They aren't coming back?"
We puttered around the various crafts together, but her apathy increased. I read her a couple of books, and she put up with listening to the stories but her heart wasn't in it. She didn't want to head around back for story time, but I cajoled her to join us on the grass and she sat with me on the outskirts of the group, leaning against me, resigned, wearily eating her teddy grahams and sucking her Capri Sun.
When we waved goodbye, said "See you later!" at the end of the afternoon, I wondered if we were doing any good at all. Are we just torturing these children, already living lives of hellos and goodbyes, of fair weather friends and guardians? We come each day and leave after a couple of hours; the teams come for a week and then go home; the interns keep returning throughout the summer but at the end we all disappear and they don't see any of us for another year.
What am I doing here, I wondered? I come, the virtuous missionary with my packet of love and good deeds to pass out for my eleven weeks here. I am not entering into their pain, their lives, their community. While my need for Jesus is not one whit different than theirs, my actions seem to say that I think I have something to offer them.
And then I thought of that great missionary Jesus, and how he came. He didn't move in next door, setting up a store of heavenly goods to parcel out to passersby. He moved in WITH us; he moved into a human womb, took up the all the constraints and trials and dilemmas we struggle with. The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.
I have not done that. I have held myself aloof, not wanting to enter into the suffering and dirt of the human condition. I, who am of this race, will not stoop as He has done for me?
I do have a long term career goal: to be transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory. It starts with gazing long and steady at his face, all day, every day.
Sunday, June 26, 2011
For Real
On the second day of the week, Kalani was surprised when I recognized her at Kid's Club. "How do you know my name?" she asked.
By the end of the week she recognized me too, tapping me on the shoulder as she walked by the craft area, a vinyl tablecloth spread over dusty clumps of grass. "Hey, can I make one?" she asked. She sat down to work on her bookmark, diligently searching to find the letters of her name on the foam sticker sheets. She knew "K" was the first one, but wasn't sure what came next. "Maybe an 'a'?" I suggested. She pulled off a capital "Q." I said, "I don't think that one is in your name."
"My mom said it has a circle and a tail," she said. I smiled, and we finally finished spelling her name: KQLQNI.
She wandered off but came back when it was time for snack and story. I was cleaning up the craft area. "Can I sit on your lap?" she asked. So I hurried to put away the craft items and we joined the rest of the kids sitting in dusty rows in front of Joshua. The team passed out snacks to all the kids while Kalani asked me name questions: what my mom's name was, what her last name was, what my last name was, what my second name was. Then Joshua started on the story. He reviewed the story from the day before, and then his actors, some of the kids, joined him to act out the story of the day: Jesus welcoming the little children. "I was in the story once," Kalani told me.
"What were you?" I asked.
"An angel."
"What did you say?" I asked.
"There were thousands of angels," she answered.
"Oh, it must have been the story of an important baby being born!" I told her.
We fell silent, listening to Joshua and his crew, but Kalani started her questions again in the middle of the story. "What's your mom's name?" I whispered to her that right now was time to listen to Joshua and hear the story. "I'm listening," she said. "I know what the story is about. He's talking about Jesus, who did bubbles with the kids and played with them. He loved the kids. My mom told me that Jesus loves grown ups."
I said, my cheek against her warm shoulder, my arms wrapping around her, "He loves kids too, a lot."
"For real or for fake?" she asked.
"For real. He really loves kids."
Joshua finished the story and we had a few more minutes to play. Kalani wanted to get on my back. She's only five, but she's a big girl and carrying her all over the field was a good workout! It was time to go, and Kalani asked me if I could walk her home, "to the brown house." Joshua said she could ride in the Suburban with us, so when we were all loaded up she climbed up into the front seat with me and we drove down the block to her brown house, where she hopped down and disappeared inside. See you later, Kalani. Don't forget, Jesus loves kids, for real.
By the end of the week she recognized me too, tapping me on the shoulder as she walked by the craft area, a vinyl tablecloth spread over dusty clumps of grass. "Hey, can I make one?" she asked. She sat down to work on her bookmark, diligently searching to find the letters of her name on the foam sticker sheets. She knew "K" was the first one, but wasn't sure what came next. "Maybe an 'a'?" I suggested. She pulled off a capital "Q." I said, "I don't think that one is in your name."
"My mom said it has a circle and a tail," she said. I smiled, and we finally finished spelling her name: KQLQNI.
She wandered off but came back when it was time for snack and story. I was cleaning up the craft area. "Can I sit on your lap?" she asked. So I hurried to put away the craft items and we joined the rest of the kids sitting in dusty rows in front of Joshua. The team passed out snacks to all the kids while Kalani asked me name questions: what my mom's name was, what her last name was, what my last name was, what my second name was. Then Joshua started on the story. He reviewed the story from the day before, and then his actors, some of the kids, joined him to act out the story of the day: Jesus welcoming the little children. "I was in the story once," Kalani told me.
"What were you?" I asked.
"An angel."
"What did you say?" I asked.
"There were thousands of angels," she answered.
"Oh, it must have been the story of an important baby being born!" I told her.
We fell silent, listening to Joshua and his crew, but Kalani started her questions again in the middle of the story. "What's your mom's name?" I whispered to her that right now was time to listen to Joshua and hear the story. "I'm listening," she said. "I know what the story is about. He's talking about Jesus, who did bubbles with the kids and played with them. He loved the kids. My mom told me that Jesus loves grown ups."
I said, my cheek against her warm shoulder, my arms wrapping around her, "He loves kids too, a lot."
"For real or for fake?" she asked.
"For real. He really loves kids."
Joshua finished the story and we had a few more minutes to play. Kalani wanted to get on my back. She's only five, but she's a big girl and carrying her all over the field was a good workout! It was time to go, and Kalani asked me if I could walk her home, "to the brown house." Joshua said she could ride in the Suburban with us, so when we were all loaded up she climbed up into the front seat with me and we drove down the block to her brown house, where she hopped down and disappeared inside. See you later, Kalani. Don't forget, Jesus loves kids, for real.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Winnie
She was squirrely last night at Bible study. I was in the kitchen for the first part of the evening, before and during the meal, but I heard she was sitting by a friend and they were making little bits of trouble together. When we separated for adult Bible study, youth group, and kid's story and craft time, she was in the group I was helping with. She sat across the table from me, grabbed two markers, and began scribbling wildly on her paper without looking at what she was doing. Then she glanced down to see where the paper ended, moved her markers off the paper, and grinned at me as she kept scribbling on the table. When I reminded her of a rule I'm sure she was aware of (no coloring on the table) and enforced the rule by taking the markers away, she threw down her marker caps, slithered under the table, and began an underground escape. Stephen intercepted her, brought her back, sat with her till it was story time. Molly and I were kept busy trying to seat the other three girls in our group: Marie and Lorinda wanted to sit next to each other so they could chat and conspire, and little M.J. was squirmy and fussy. The girls wouldn't stay seated for more than about 60 seconds before jumping up to try to find a new seat, and they were making no effort to be quiet. Joshua was making great efforts to let his voice be heard above the roar, and we were fighting to make him successful. Then Winnie reappeared from somewhere and climbed into my lap. She sat there for the whole story, not always quiet but responsive to my reminders, not obviously paying attention but who knows what was sinking in? Joshua and the flannelgraph board told us the story of Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt, and we went back to our tables. Winnie stayed on my lap, and I traced her hand, splayed on the table, with my finger as we waited for the other girls to gather and for Molly to pull the coloring sheets back out. I started coloring her scribbled-on picture. She was fascinated, and kept pointing out the next thing I should color, choosing markers for me to use. By the time the burning bush sand craft came out, she was a different girl than the one who had brazenly colored on the table earlier. She stayed in my lap, and worked diligently to squeeze glue, spread it with a paint brush, spoon on sand, and tilt the paper so the excess slid back into the bowl. Marie and Lorinda, though older, were more careless and silly, but Winnie was quiet and made every effort to keep the sand in the right place and complete her picture. When the bus pulled up outside the longhouse windows, she obediently put things away and we tucked her pictures into a paper sack for her to take home. And she slipped out, onto the bus, into the night.
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