Real Visions

It's funny how twenty years later I still reach to the back of the toilet to flush.  Somehow, the toilet in the bathroom attached to my childhood bedroom was installed with the flusher on the back.  It tricked a lot of guests.

My parents have redone the bathroom, and probably ten years ago they put in a new toilet with the flusher in front.  But still, in the middle of the night or in the bright of the day, I relearned during my visit to Washington last week to reach for the front.

Home is like that--ingraining into our minds patterns, behaviors, and memories.

It was a joyous visit this spring.  For indeed spring has come there, the daffodils beginning to fade, the tulips in full glory, and the lilacs just starting to flower, their delicious fragrance still withheld.

Four of my kids and I visited family and friends in Washington.  Brian was in Peru and Conner stayed in Williston to attend school and thereby not have to retake his classes.

We happened to come when three of my dearest friends were moving or have recently changed up their new country homes. The space, acreage, and promise of new things, right at the dawn of spring brought much joy to our lives.

While we were there we had a couple hours of downtime, and I asked the kids which old haunt they'd most like to visit.  They chose Daffodil Hill and our old house.  I was reticent to visit our old neighborhood, fearing the lure of the street would cause us to look up old neighbors and put us behind in our time commitments.

Daffodil Hill a few years back

They insisted and so I caved, with the caveat that there was no getting out allowed.  We paused at the old place, turned around at the dead end where Dean had posted signs saying No Parking and Please Pick Up After Your Dog.

Next to the signs were the grapevines we'd transplanted and my dad taught me how to prune.  No one's pruned them since I had three years ago and their wild look choked my heart.

How many children from the neighborhood had paused in the early fall heat to try a grape, first when they were unripe and then again when full of sugar?  Will they still produce with such lack of care?

The hedge and the apple trees were equally as bad, unruly and shouting for attention.  Instead of the blue corduroy curtains hanging in the far bedroom there were gaudy brown taffeta panels.

The last thing I noticed was the pick up truck parked atop our sidewalk we created to enter through the side door instead of the front.  In such a small home, it was a wonderful addition so that the main entry did not get bombarded by constant use from the seven of us.  The front door was reserved for our many guests coming in and out.

Because of the pick up truck I could not see the roses I'd transplanted, carefully tended, and tried to fight aphids from every summer.

We drove off, eager for the next visit to my sister's, and the old house was forgotten.

Later, days later, I conjured up the image of the pick up truck again.  If it was on top of the sidewalk, then it was also on top of the five lilac bushes I'd planted.

My vision was for large, fragrant lilac bushes to flourish in the full sun, providing a bit of privacy to us from the park next door and beauty for others.  I was going to put a hidden bench there as the lilacs got bigger.

Four of those lilac bushes were picked out personally--one by each child (Tim being a baby and not caring much)--at the Hulda Klager Lilac Gardens up in Woodland.  We'd visit the gardens every spring, sometimes with friends and sometimes by ourselves, and smell the hundreds of varieties of lilacs cultivated and offered for our enjoyment.

The sale at the gardens was buy three, get one free.  Each child besides baby Tim picked their favorite.  I used a little of our tax return money for the purchase and took them home.  We made little stones with each child's handprint to put next to their lilac.  I planted them alternating--dark purple, light purple, dark purple, light purple.

Then I transplanted the other lilac in our yard.  The one some people brought us shortly after we'd moved in, telling me lilacs love lots of water and shade.

I stuck it in the shadiest spot and poor Bill next door walked over to faithfully water it every day while we were on vacation.  It hadn't grown much.

Lilacs actually thrive in sun.  Tim's lilac was much happier next to the others.

Now they are squashed by an old pick up and my vision will never be more than that...a vision.

That's okay, though painful.  There are lots of visions in that yard that are there because they. actually. happened.  Memories of little toddlers running about, planting gardens together, watching things grow, chasing squirrels, playing basketball and football and tag.

Times of getting stir crazy and being "Rain Runners."  Sometimes a child or two would run around the house fifty times and come in drenched.  Times playing capture the flag or sitting in the middle of the street watching the fireworks with neighbors. Those are the visions I will hold on to.

I'm thankful the lilacs are squashed and the plants untended.  It confirms the truth: it's not my house.

My beloved friends are making new homes right now.  They will have visions of what things will look like in the future. They will propose projects and improvements.  Some will come to pass and others will not.

Greater than all these, I have a vision for them, for me, for you.  A vision of our children and teens being raised in righteousness.  A vision of hearts revived with the truth that God loves them and their response is a life given over to His leading.

I can hear their adult selves sharing stories with their children from their childhoods.  I can see them pointing to the sky and telling them this was not all an accident.  I sense them whispering words of hope and wisdom and love into hearts yet unborn...a hushed truth that they are forgiven and accepted because of Jesus.

I pray over their places but even more so, their lives--for the visions that they look back upon, the memories that really do take place, that they will be able to say "the boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; surely I have a delightful inheritance."

Would You Rather....

Lying down next to her, talking before bed, she asks me a "would-you-rather" question.  "Mom, would you rather break your leg or eat candy for the rest of your life?"

The answer seems pretty easy.  I explain to her how eating candy for the rest of my life would make me more miserable than breaking my leg and being in pain for just a little while.  She adds okay, fruits and vegetables, too, not just candy.  Still....

I think, though, what kind of a leg break?   Clean, quick, cast and then six weeks later good as new?  Or would it be a shatter, multiple surgeries, isolation in my bed healing for two years, pain in my leg from then on?  Would it financially devastate us?

Maybe candy would be better.

I ask my cousin, and she wants to know how much longer she's going to live.

We don't always get to choose.  Even if we do, we cannot really know the implications or full scale of the choice.  Those things we think we can evade happen.  Maybe it's raising children alone, something you never thought would happen to you.  Health struggles.  Relational pain.  Accidents.  Unemployment.  Financial strain.

This past weekend I took all the snow pants, boots, and heavy coats out of the closet and put them in a bin in the basement.  As I washed and folded and stuffed, I felt the struggle, near trauma, of my first winter in North Dakota.  It hasn't been easy for me.  I'm not a cold weather girl.  Definitely not a subzero for months kind of person.  Definitely not.

Also there's the heart-healing.  The tearing away of my life as I knew it has been painful.  There were many nights, especially the first few months, where I would cry myself to sleep, picturing my little nephews' faces and feeling jipped that I don't get to be a part of their everyday lives anymore.

Or going on walks by myself, a lack of good friends or good conversation to stimulate and inspire me.  Podcasts have become my companion.

I miss our family rhythm, our friendly, involved neighbors, our outings and fresh produce and good deals.  Maybe I find too much joy in a bargain.

I close the winter bin, trying to snap the lid.  The scabs from all that tearing are still there.  They are healing.  Some things can't be rushed, though.  I have to submit to the healing process.

I guess in a way, I've chosen the leg break.  I didn't know what I was getting in to, but I believed that it was best.  Saying yes to Jesus is always, always best.


"Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides.  You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors.  So don't try to get out of anything prematurely.  Let it do its work so you become mature and developed, not deficient in any way." James 1, The Message

Angelic Choirs

Veteran's Day, November 11, comes around every year.  Every year since I can remember I've celebrated my cousin's birthday.

Stopping through Spokane on the trek to North Dakota

My sophomore year of college, the George Fox Concert Choir, which I was a part of, had an amazing director.  He loved to arrange music.  He taught us this wonderfully fun and beautiful rendition of happy birthday.  I made a phone call to my cousin that November 11, surrounded by the choir and we all sang to her.  It was angelically magical.

This year finds me in North Dakota, her in Spokane, both of us so busy with five kids, pastorates, projects, time differences, and basic chaos that we can't even squeeze in a chat.

Nine out of ten...Timmy's missing

I did, however, manage to reach her voicemail.. I grabbed the four kids running about the house and asked them to sing happy birthday.  It was really bad.  Timmy attempted opera, and if you've ever heard him sing, you'll know that she probably could have heard it from here to Spokane even without the phone.

Noelle rapped, she's into stamping her foot really hard on the floor and head banging to everything.  Raleigh and Dawson did their part to add to the silliness, and of course I had to jump in, too.  I wish I had it recorded so I could embed it for you.  Sorry.  Just believe me that it was really bad and really loud.  My little cherubs still have opportunity for improvement.

It is a picture, though.  For all of my life I've been built into by many gifted, loving people.  Now I'm in a new place with a community of strong believers but much more opportunity to share what I've learned from others than I've ever had before.

I'm having to lean harder and harder into Jesus.  Trusting that He'll use me and help me turn the cacophony of wild birthday songs in my life into angelic choirs.

Look at those trees...sigh.....cousins playing one last time in Spokane before we moved.

Writing the Truth

"If she tried to write him anything definite about her work, she immediately scratched it out as being only partially true, or not true at all.  Nothing that she could say about her studies seemed unqualifiedly true, once she put it down on paper."
from Song of the Lark by Willa Cather

This is exactly how I feel about writing right now.  For instance, I was going to tell you how discouraging it was that I could not find a gallon of milk in this town for under $4.00.  Since then, I've found it twice at $3.98.  Who knows when I'll find it for $3.95 or even lower???

So I will update you on what I believe to be unqualifiedly true, though I may be wrong, for being new means a large learning curve.  I told some men at church on Sunday that I keep thinking I'll be back in Vancouver soon.

When I look at the orange mums on my kitchen window I picture the thick, lacquered kitchen ledge in Vancouver.  When I look out the living room window, I can almost truly see the VanNostern's place.

And when I pull in the drive here and push a button for a garage door to open, I can fully visualize pulling into our drive, no garage opener, but a lovely Magnolia, two gray cats, and a flowering welcome sign.

I can hear Skylar knock on the door and say "Can Conner and them come out and play?" and see the park next door...feel my eyes straining to see who's out there now.  I can see Earline's smile at church and feel Diana's hug.  It is strange when past reality feels truer than the present.

I miss things, too, for we'd found a rhythm of days and weeks, months and seasons.  Right now I am pining away for fresh boquets of dahlias.  Brian used to go to the U-Cut dahlia farm near the church and bring some home to me every week or so in the fall. This year I found a pot of mums at Walmart for $3.99 and called it good.

We'd pick blackberries at our beautiful, secret spot.  Brian would put them in the fridge and ask if it was enough for a cobbler.  Or was it a pie?  Crisp?  I would make one and it would always be different from what he'd ask for.  But it would be good!

I'm having a little gathering this weekend for the people who built this parsonage we are living in.  I find it absolutely remarkable that they were able to work together to accomplish such a project.  I can't wait to hear the stories of God's provision.

In this town, it is almost essential that employers provide housing or subsidize housing for their employees.  The housing market is expensive and it is difficult to find a place to live at all.  So the people of the church decided to build a parsonage on some of the church's property.

It is now our dwelling, a new place to create new rhythms.

As I attempt to embrace these new days, new times, new places, new people, I wonder what rhythms and memories will embed themselves.  I take a picture at the little Minot zoo, the children in front of the zebras.  Will I take a picture here with them next year?

Or will my memory treasure counting vultures on the cell tower across from the local grocery?

Questions for the Prairie Lady on My Wall

Dear South Dakota Prairie Woman,

I look at you often and wonder what you are thinking.

I see you gathering beauty and teaching your children to as well.

That makes me want to know you, and to be like you.  

How do you gather beauty in a foreign, near desolate land?  

Are you thinking about the coming winter?

Wondering where your husband is?

Taking stock of the land and how best to use it?  What needs to be done first?

You look confident, like the lady of Proverbs,"When it snows, she has no fear for her household; for all of them are clothed in scarlet."

Are you thinking of God's provision, confident of his care for you and your family?

Are you a pilgrim, making a place of springs the Valley of Baca?

Or is it just a strange cloud in the distance, the possibility of a tornado?

I can tell you have a heart.

Are you missing your home and family?

Do you wonder how they are?

Or are you looking to the future, at those who will come after you?

Could you be looking north?

Knowing that even years and years later, women would journey to your land, seeking to make a home there.

Did you know one would be me?

Thank you for your courage; it helps me have courage, too.

From another woman on her way to make a home in North Dakota.