Easter High!

My main goal this week has been to do whatever it takes to prolong the high I felt on Easter morning. It was the culmination of a very emotional Holy Week all of which provided for me the entire journey of Christ's love and sacrifice for us. This week, the flowers have been brighter, the sun more sun-shinier and the voices of those around me have a certain richness to them. The experience of Easter morning worship is the ultimate renewal...way more meaningful than the marking of the new year and all the promises we make during that time. The real newness comes when we are smack dab in the middle of a celebration that throws joy in your face and demands you pay attention to the love and grace God has for us.
Of course for me the best way to keep this reality in my face is to be outdoors and be 'in' God's creation...remembering again that I am a creation of God just like these amazing tulips. They are glorious aren't they? And we are glorious in God's sight.

Feeling Blue!

When the dark days come, we need to remember that even if a secret sabotuer - depression - is at work temporarily derailing our progress (or so it seems), each day offers us a gift if we will only look for it. Sometimes we're sad for a very apparent reason - a overwhelming loss, for example, or worries over money or health. Other time we don't know why we feel so bad, which makes us feel even worse. It could be for a million different reasons - an appalling lack of appreciation (by ourselves and by others), exhaustion, the weather, hormones, the advent of the flu, or simply part of the process of personal transformation. It's on days like these that you can barely get yourself dressed and out the door. You look like hell and couldn't care less. You can't remember if you took a shower yesterday or when the last time was you washed your hair. Life seems bleak, not bright with promise. It's taking more work than you expected to discover who you really are, and now you're no longer sure you even want to find out.
What should you do? You have two choices: One is simply to give in, stop resisting. You've got the blues, so sing them baby! But before you do ask for grace. Then have a good cry. Use an entire box of Puffs and make an impressive pile of them on the coffee table as you use them up.
The alternative is to shift gears. Ask for grace. Put the kettle on for a nice cup of tea. Eat some comfort food...you need the happy inducing serotonin kick. But don't eat it in front of the fridge. Sit down and savor your treat. Wash your face, put on lip gloss and your newest jammies. Brush your teeth, turn out the light, thank God for the day and go to sleep.
Whichever route you take, the day will be over within 24 hours and you might feel better. If you don't feel better, love yourself enough to call for help. Get your doctor on the phone and talk and take action.

My Rating as a Wife!

Earlier this week, my very clever husband thought it would be amusing to inform me that this week he is holding my review and will be assessing my performance as the wife. Wow! ...this could go very badly! I haven't even been trying to impress him all that much and I'm just not sure I'm ready for this review. I mean, give a sister some notice!
So to continue with this fun little excercise I ask Alvaro at the end of each day how I'm doing. He always says, "On a scale of 1 to 10...." and then he gives me the verdict for the day. One evening, I had achieved an 11 (I have no idea why...I was just sitting on the couch doing my cross stitch drinking some tea in my pj's...apparently this gains huge pointage!) Then another day, he announced that I had dipped to a staggering 4.5! What?!? What brought this on you ask? I guess it was because I was stepping on the back of his flip flop with each step he took...yeah I guess that is pretty annoying so I'll accept the 4.5
But the thing is it didn't take long at all for me to shoot right back up to 9 or a 10. Either he has a major issue with short term memory or he just doesn't hold on to grievances. In all seriousness, I can't remember a time when he ever really remembered a slight I caused or a hurt I imposed.
Just today (four days into this fake and funny review process) I was completely struck by how it is the perfect picture of how I always experience God's love and acceptance. I believe that God wastes no time at all in telling me when I've not lived up to my potential of being a caring and loving person. But then it's over and I feel the complete and non-judgemental love that I always felt. There is no list of grievances stacking up against me. This is where my freedom lies. In being a cherished child of God.

When People are MEAN!

Multiple Choice Question:
When people are mean your response should be:
a) cuss
b) shake your head in disbelief that someone's mama did such a bad job
c) later think of all the stuff you 'could have' said
d) look at them like they have two heads (and a couple of horns)
e) shame them with a sarcastic "Wow, really?"
f) get so mad that you cry but you don't want them to see you so turn around and walk off
g) tell everyone else how mean they are therefore making yourself a rotten person
h) none of that stuff!
I have a way of dealing with this. I have to practice a little more but it's quite simple really. Are you ready??? "It's not about you" Okay, so you can get your feelings hurt cuz no one likes to encounter mean people; it doesn't feel good. But it should only take you a couple of minutes to realize that you didn't make them mean. Mean people are either mean as a character flaw or they're just having a really bad day and they tend to take it out on other people. Either way, what can you do to control that??? Control what you can control which is your reaction to mean people. Today I encountered a mean person on the highway...incredibly mean. And it wasn't just toward me...for as long as I could see this person speeding away from me he was cutting people off, putting people's lives in danger and generally only thinking of himself. I thought about what might have happened to him today that life was so difficult. Maybe he's having marital issues. Maybe he's grieving for a child. Maybe he's just mean. No matter what it is, I can only pray that tomorrow is a better day for him (and for those of us on the road). The next time you feel offended, try a bit of compassion instead of the automatic offense and anger. It's not always easy because God gave us the emotion of anger. But maybe we can all figure out when is the best time to utilize the emotions rather than just let them shoot out like rubber bands.

It's my birthday, I'll be a crank if I want to!

My birthday is in the summer so I'm not talking about my birthday today. I'm talking about my husband birthday which was on Friday. When it's my birthday, it's my birthday all month and I love to get cards and for people to remember that it's my birthday. This photo is of me (stirring my coffee with a mondo sized spoon) and my mother-in-law at Buca de Beppo. My cute husband has a different vision for his birthday...for no one but me to mention it and then to have a nice quiet night on the couch without a bunch of people making him eat a cake he may not like and then stay up all night doing the pleasantries that you have to perform when people are trying to celebrate you. When we first started dating I thought to myself, "Wow, how selfish" Here people are trying to celebrate you and you're being a big ol' crank! It only took me about 5 years to finally figure this out. It's HIS birthday, why can't he celebrate it the way he wants? With a cringe, I also figured out that the party thing was really for me anyway. I love to do birthdays and so apparently I thought I would put that on him!

So anyway, the cute husband is not a crank after all. He just wants to have the kind of birthday he wants to have. And I have finally gotten it through my dense skull that the loving thing to do is not to force a party on the man but to honor his wishes and have a quiet little day with a private little dinner out...don't even think about telling the waiter to bring a desert with a candle in it cuz', good Lord no, they might sing!

Out of Town Guests

Have you ever had out of town guests for more than a week? On February 7th, my husband and I received his parents into our home and they have to return home on Sunday the 24th. My new niece Gabriela was baptized on the 9th and everyone came for the celebration. We've had guests from Colombia, Guatemala and Los Angeles. As wonderful as family is, I laughed today when I realized that my husband called me at work today to just have a conversation. We put so much into being hospitable that I think we've lost sight of ourselves. This is my first blog entry since they arrived...the routine is officially shot!
I used to think it would be horrible to say anything less than perfect about family but I know now that since we're all family I can say I feel cramped if I feel cramped. I can long for the moment that my husband and I can lay on the couch and watch CNN for hours on end on a Saturday while he naps.
I adore my parents-in-law and they know I'm doing my best in conducting myself in Spanish. When I get home on Sunday after church, I will be thinking, speaking and even blinking in English...oh glorious day :)

Ash Wednesday & the Lenten Season

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday. The day that marks the beginning of the Lenten Season. At 7:30 p.m. I will get the ashes on my forehead which will be the external sign of the internal reality that I am striving toward humility in God's midst. The forty days on the Lenten calendar are representative of the time that Christ spent in the desert being tempted by the devil. The culmination of these forty days is the celebration of the week of Easter that starts on Palm Sunday and ends on Holy Saturday, the day before Easter. During the forty days of Lent, through Holy Saturday, it was tradition for Christians to observe a fast—not completely abstaining from eating and drinking, but limiting the kinds of food and drink as well as the number of meals.
The tradition of fasting dates back to the early Middle Ages, when examples of acceptable foods were fish, bread, and fowl, and when the consumption of alcohol was for the most part banned during the fast. Nowadays, people who choose to observe the fast are much less restricted in their choice of foods, and fasting is mostly about being modest and showing humility and restraint in one’s eating habits. For some this means giving up chocolate (agh horrors!) or meat or coffee or what ever you should really eat less of anyway...really more of a resolution than a sacrifice. Giving up something for Lent isn't a get-skinny-in-time-for-Spring-Break thing...it's a concentration on Christ's journey and a very private mental communion with God. I have friends who always ask what I'm giving up for Lent...just like they ask me about my New Year's resolutions. I always lie and say I haven't given anything up or that I haven't decided. For me, it's a very private thing...somehow just not for conversation.

However you decide to concentrate on this time make it meaningful. It may not be giving anything up at all. It may be a Lenten book study (click here to see the one offered at FUMC Dallas) or intense moments of prayer in a private place. Make it a time to explore your relationship with God and ask some really tough questions of yourself. Am I putting my faith into action by serving others? Am I being quiet and really listening to God's answers to my concerns? Am I really working to make those changes in myself that I've been wanting to change? Let these next 40 days be pure communion with God.