An Old Ride and New News

I seem to live on a roller coaster.  True, this one's ups and down's are gentler than a few years ago, but the ups and downs have not stopped.  Some things make improvements and things go well for awhile, but there are inevitable slips back on to the cycle.

It is such a predictable cycle that I could write it out.  So predictable.  First this, and then this, and then this.  So predictable that we even begin to tense at the "happy stage".  We know it is coming.  We see him and know.  First happy, then not sleeping as much, then irritability, then the inevitable blow up at something trivial or just the deepening grouchiness, then settles into a silent withdrawenness for a few weeks.  Round and round we go.  Sometimes there is a season of normal that occurs to give us a break before we go back to the no-sleeping and irritability.  We enjoy life in that normal pause - but honestly, that pause is not normal; the roller coaster is.

I've begun to ask myself different questions.  Wondering perhaps if looking for a "solution" may not be even a possibility.  If instead, we ought to turn our attention on how to survive and be whole.  On how the kids and I will manage.  Things like order and routine may help lesson the roller coaster.  Managing and keeping stress away.  Teaching the kids to pause and bring conflict to me later to solve instead of their dad if he is in the irritability or withdrawn part of the coaster ride.  To let me carry their load when possible.  On how to take it less personally, get less emotionally involved, and learn to sit it out.  We do not all have to ride the coaster just because it exists.

The sort of good news of the week is that the planned travel plans have been delayed.  I am not sure why they are delayed or what is going on as we are now on the "silent" part of the coaster ride, but I have been told by others that they are delayed.  I'm thankful.  Dealing with that and all right at the beginning of school was not going to be fun.  I am thankful for the schools my kids are in and the support they get from there.  I had meetings with teachers, principals, and guidance counselors to be prepared for the inevitable stress the travel would cause.  We can push pause on those plans for awhile - maybe a month or two.  We will still need them, and I am thankful for the understanding we have at the schools.

Speaking of schools - I'm applying tomorrow for a small job there.  Being where we are, we just don't raise enough support to survive, so I work outside the home for one or two days a week.  I have been working in an old folk's home, which I love.  But it's rough work.  I was injured twice this last year by an male patient.  He slammed me into a wall and then body checked me.  My hip hit the corner of a bookshelf and bruised.  Now I have bursitis on the hip.  He also dislocated my wrist.  It is an old injury, so it popped back in again, but my wrist which had been stable for seven years is now weak again.  I'm seriously wondering about my ability to keep going at that place and allow healing.  Last week I heard about a position open at the school to assist with a student with serious medical issues.  There is another mother and I who both can not work full time due to our lives, but we can job-share.  We go for an interview tomorrow.  I'm hoping to get the job.  My husband had been telling me and telling me to get in the school and volunteer so we get to know people and are involved and know what is going on.  This may be better.  I'll be there one day a week, and I will get paid for it!  So I am hoping.  We'll see.  My son tells me that during class time, the nurse's aide simply sits and reads and is there if needed.  Hmm... with a small computer and internet, I could actually get work done while working.  Hmm.... prayer letters done, address changes made..... do I dare hope?

Then, if I can get work as a doula, too, perhaps I could quit at the old folks home, or at least take a few months off and allow my hip to heal.

I Hate Fall

Fall is always our busy season.  It is travel season, meeting season, and the start of a new school year all rolled into one.  Added in this year, is that I am training as a doula, and have two births I am assisting with in September, too.  (Not at all stressed about the births - I've been to over 20, but finally decided to get certified.  But they add in some busy-ness.)

I want to write more about the decency thoughts.  I have a story about an amazing MK from Columbia who lived a life of integrity in front of me in such a way that it caused me to think.  I have more to say, and hate to leave the topic here as it could look like I think decency is not important.  If you're new to my blog, just take my word that that's not true, and suspend judgement for a time.

But with busy season and travel season, there is talk on my horizon about travel that is a big step, and I feel like someone just hit the pause button on my world.  I'm not sure how I am responding or what I am thinking.  So it's been hard to blog.  It's hard to think about.  I'm not sure about this step.  No one told me it was coming.  No one told me or warned me it would be this soon.  I feel blindsided by people who knew it for a long time and chose not to tell me, and those same people are asking me to trust them that it will be ok.  I'm finding that hard.

And yet, I know I don't really have an option in it.  I can't really say no.

I'm not sure if I would have said no if I had been asked, either, but I feel betrayed that I wasn't asked about it a long time ago, back when it was only a thought.

I'm also struggling right now from another type of fear.  There is the fear that something could happen, but there is another fear.... during the last crisis, we were abandoned, uncared for.... by our team, by our mission, .... both during and after the crisis.  Even by people who had been our "support people" just weren't there.  Some had reasons that they couldn't be and others just failed miserably.  Now, these same people are asking me to walk through that possibility again.  Yeah.... and if something goes wrong, not only do I have to deal with the crisis, but with being abandoned in it.

I just don't really know if I can go through that again.

It's making me angry.  Grouchy.  I'm not so angry about the risk or the choice - this is the life we went into with our eyes open.  I'm angry because I feel pushed and half deceived by people who already failed my family in a crisis.  Grouchy because I feel so alone right now.  There is no one near me who gets what we are asked to do.  Part of the oddities of the type of cross-cultural marriage that I have is that we live with different scenarios than other workers, and I feel alone.  There is no one to talk to who understands.

I'm also deeply concerned about the effect this will have on my daughter who still has not completely recovered.  In the middle of our handling it, I am going to have to find a way to be extra strong for her.

So I live on pause right now.

One of the things I learned in my doula training is that when I have taken on the responsibility to support a mom for a birth, I need to be there.  If something comes up or some emergency in my family happens, or I am sick, so I can not fulfill my chosen responsibility, I am responsible for arranging a back up doula.  I think as I heard that, a light went on in my head.  This last crisis greatly changed some key relationships in my life.  There is an element of guardedness and disconnect that wasn't there.  I hold myself at a bit of a distance.  I can get close to people, but I don't stay close.  I distrust more.  I pull away faster.  I've tried arguing it my head that "ok, it was a crisis, people couldn't function in the normal way", but it didn't remove that niggling wariness.

They couldn't be there.... but they didn't arrange back up, either.

And telling me to "just get over it" doesn't work either.  One of them tried it recently, and it hurt.  However, another met me with a "I'm really sorry.  We really messed up.  Can you help us learn how to handle this to do better?"  That was a great response, and I felt comforted.... able to put down some pain and go on.

But then came this talk of travel again, and I'm jittery.  I don't like doing this.  I know I have to say yes, and I am saying yes in faith.... but I have faith in a God who sometimes protects us in this life and sometimes chooses to allow evil to happen while saving us in eternity.  I'm in no pollyanna bubble that assumes that only good will happen.  So I say yes because I have no other choice, but it is not a carefree yes.  I don't think God is any less happy with me because my yes knows what a yes can mean and is said in a whisper, not a smile.  And through the pain of knowing what it feels like to be abandoned in a crisis, I hang on to the truth that God did not leave me alone in it.  His people did.  And that hurt.  But He was there.  So while I may be isolating from people because I don't want them to hurt me again, I'm hanging on to God.  He's really all I feel comfortable with trusting at this point.

But that's all I have.  That's all the trust and all the faith I have.

So, if anyone is reading this anymore, hang in with me and remember my family.  It's going to be a rough month ahead, and I'm already feeling isolated.

The Things They Say.... It's in the Cup

We drove recently on a windy road since the highway was blocked.  We had recently been to McDonalds, and thankfully has saved money by buying one extra large drink to share.  At the road got more windy, I heard that ominous sound, "Mooommm, I feel sick!"

Great...  I looked down, and saw the empty cup (thank God for the large size!)  I passed it back to my daughter just in time, and being the neat little girl she is, she was able to um, empty her stomach contents into the cup. 

Now what?  There wasn't room to pull over right away, so I told her to put the lid back on the cup - cut the smell down some, I hoped.  She did.

As I looked for a place to pull over, I heard her quietly talking to herself, and what she said cracked me up.  She was looking down at the buttons on top of the cup that McDonalds uses to identify what type of a drink it is. 

And I heard a quiet, "I guess this would qualify as a diet drink."

Snort!

Moral Purity - Modesty is What We Wear, Right?

I read a blog recently about modesty.  I wasn't too surprised by this blog as I had seen these thoughts elsewhere, but I was surprised still.  Surprised that it is still out there and that women are still buying it hook, line, and sinker.  The blog post included a long checklist for dressing modestly.

I want to approach this carefully so that no one stops listening before they hear what I want to say.  This post will only have part of what I believe, so hang in there before you object.  I believe in modesty.  You may not believe I do by the end of this post, but let me assure you that I do.  But I think there is a lie hidden in posts like the one I read that is damaging to us women.  My husband firmly agrees with me - he's more adamant about it than I am.

The post talked about the typical things - hem length, skirt tightness, neck length, fabric choice, slits pinned shut, attention drawing colors, etc.  Near the end was a point to double check that your purse wasn't making you immodest by the strap lying across your chest and "accentuating your breasts".

Sigh.  I guess if I wore a purse with a strap, and it lies between my breasts and shows that indeed I have two breasts...instead....  instead of what?  An inner-tube wrapped around my chest?  I do have two breasts, as well as two ears, two kidneys, two arms, two eyes, two ovaries, two lungs.... basic biology 101.

I think women have swallowed the lie that they are responsible for the thoughts in men's minds.  With that comes a deep shame for our bodies.... because we believe that if men have a wrong thought, we (our bodies) caused that.... and we caused men to sin.

I used to believe that.  Wouldn't have put it in so many words.  Didn't completely know I believed that since I didn't think through it, but I did.

I've said before that I have lived all over the world in different cultures.  That has given me a unique ability to see different things.  Let me share some of that.

If you carry the "dress decently, and you won't cause men to sin" theology to its extreme, you will get something similar to a religion that completely covers women - so that only the eyes, or at times not even the eyes show.  I've lived in that.  I lived in it for years, and I dressed decently to their standards.  I acted decently, too - eyes down, no smiling, no contact or conversation with men.  You'd think in that situation, men's minds would be completely controlled - nothing causing them to sin.

(To all those working in those cultures, believe me, I can hear your snorts!)

I also lived in an almost opposite culture.  (My parents likely didn't know about this, so don't blame them.... ) but when my mother was sick in bed for several months, I was often cared for by the mother of my best friend in the village.  A wonderful family who took good care of me.  On bath days, she would take me to the river with her daughter.  Many families marched single file to the river.  My friend's mom stripped us down, scrubbed us with rough soap and then a rock to get all the dead skin cells off us, washed our hair and tied it in a knot on the top of our heads, smacked us playfully on our butts and told us to go play while she washed our clothes.  We played all morning in the beautiful sunshine and nothing else while our clothes dried, and then she brushed out our hair and redressed us for the trip home.  We weren't the only naked kids playing in the river.  Several families washed together, men gathered at one end of the river clearing and women at the other, neither troubled at all by the sight (from a slight distance) of naked people of the opposite gender washing.

I have both been wearing nothing but sunshine and been covered from head to toe with only my eyes peeping out.  I have been both only two short years apart (and no great change in body shape between to blame the difference on.)  If the "if we cover, we don't cause men to sin" train of thought was correct, men would have been struggling at the river bathing time and not one man would have taken a second look when I was covered to the eyeballs.

The opposite was true.  No one bothered us, no one stared, no one said anything at the river.  And I spend my whole "covered" life enduring the pinches, comments, and dirty stares of men whose thoughts were not the slightest bit controlled by what I was wearing. 

I felt more decent naked than I felt covered.

Ok, I'm not endorsing nudity, really.  :-)

But I am saying we need to stop and think what we believe.  Anytime we take responsibility for another human's thoughts, we are taking more weight than we were ever asked to carry.  And we ignore truth - that God created man - male and female - and blessed us and called us good.  I - yes, me, my body with two of many things - is good.  I've carried the shame of taking responsibility for men's thoughts long enough.  That is not my weight to carry.

What is mine to carry is my own thoughts.  They are enough to be responsible for.

Watching the Olympics

Like a lot of people, we watched the opening ceremonies of the Olympics yesterday.  This is the first Olympics in eight years that I haven't been traveling, so it was nice to watch.  I'm not sure it was my favorite opening ceremony, but it had a beauty.  I loved hearing all the hymns sung and the children's stories.  Those were prettily done.  And Rowan Atkinson!  You can't help but laugh!

I watched interested, aware of the request by the families of the Israeli athletes killed 40 years ago in the Olympic village for a moment of silence, a memorial of sort.  I was aware that it had been denied explaining it was "inappropriate" to have a memorial on a night like this.

Then we watched the ceremony.  There was a beautiful scene where Emile Sande sang "Abide with Me" and they showed photos floating across the stadium.  (How they did that, I don't know.) They were photos of loved ones that members of the audience had lost in the last years.

Excuse me?

Now, it seems on the news this morning that if you were in the US, you didn't see that part as the US network chose to cut it and show a interview of Michael Phelps.  There is a lot of chatter on the web from people in Britian offended that their memorial - unspoken perhaps, but clear that some of it was at least dedicated to the victims of the terrorist attack of 7/7 - was left out of American broadcasting.  Poor taste, and I am ashamed of them.  Not only was it beautiful and worth seeing, it is insensitive, as the British understand, to cut out a memorial to people brutally murdered.  I hope America apologizes.  It needs to.  As an American, I am sorry we did this.

Let me get this perfectly clear.  I am glad they had a memorial to those killed on 7/7 and to other loved ones members of the audience lost.  Grief and loss are common to all man and has a place even on our happiest days.  Joy and grief walk hand in hand in our lives.  I'm glad they included that section.

But my mind went to the families of the Israeli athletes, to the Israeli team, to those who were told NO.  Your grief does not have a place here.  Where else?  Is this not where they were killed - at the Olymics?  Is this not who they were - part of the Olympic family?

I wonder if the answer would have been different if it had been a team from Chili whose place crashed leaving the Olympic Village?  If it had been a Latvian team who a crazy man gunned down?  All it should have come down to was that a whole team of athletes from a country were murdered by a group of men simply because of who they were.  And they deserved their memorial for that massacre.  It would have been fitting.  They have waited long enough.


It hurts when that memorial is cut out.

I hope that their day will come, and we will remember before we forget.

As We Walk....

My daughter and I walked through the stores today looking for things she needed.  For a few minutes we followed a mom with two boys maybe ages 6 and 8.  They were fussing and she was explaining again and again that if they were good they might get a surprise, but they had to be good the whole time if they were to get a surprise and that they had to be good, if they were bad they wouldn't get a surprise and..... you get the picture.

We walked silently behind them for a few more minutes and then they turned away from us and we continued on.  I looked down at my daughter and said, "Sweetie, when you have kids, just keep it simple.  Just expect good behavior as normal, and don't bribe your kids to be good.  Then when they are good or do something specially nice, reward them, but sometimes give them surprises just because you love them.  But just expect good behavior as the norm, and life will be a lot easier."

We walked farther on, and in the middle of the shopping center was a double wide bench with no back - sort of like a bed, but just a bench.  On it were three toddlers, gently wrestling and quietly laughing with each other.  We stopped to look because they were so cute.  Just then, the mom came by and scolded the toddlers for playing there.  "Hey, stop that, all of you!  Behave!"  They stopped laughing and got down.

We walked on.  As we walked out of earshot, I looked down at my daughter again.  "Sweetie, when you have kids, remember to let them be kids when you can.  There was nothing wrong with where those kids chose to play.  A different place in the store and it may have been a problem, but they chose the place well, and they were playing quietly enough to be respectful to those around them.  Let your kids play when you can."

She may not be old enough to get her facts of life straight, but when an object lesson on parenting is right in front of us, we are going to use it.  I don't know that I was the best parent of little kids.  I'd like a do-over on several things, but we don't get those.  What I can do is train my children now as we walk in the way.

My Daughter's Chatter

It always used to interest me what my daughter would come up with, or even my daughter and my youngest son, when they were just chattering.  Funny imaginations, and funny thoughts.

Today, I took her shopping with me.  We bought some baby clothes for a friend who is due soon.  She was "imagining"....

"Imagine if all the people in the world died, but all the animals lived, and just one baby lived, and imagine that she had already kissed a boy before all the people died, so she had a baby when she grew up, and......"

I just smiled.  I guess we still need to do some teaching on that topic with the younger ones!  In the meantime, be careful about your babies kissing other babies.

Moral Purity - A Question of Rules or ........?

Recently, at a training time, someone led a session on the subject of integrity and moral purity.  We broke into groups and were to discuss a passage and also discuss how we maintain moral purity in our own lives.  Ok.  So they began, and one older lady started off with the typical, "my husband and I decided that we would have these rules......"  You could probably list the rules if you thought about it.  No man ever alone with her at any time - never in a car, never open the door even to a delivery man, no talking to a man in an office except in the hallways, no in-depth conversations with men without her husband there even in a public setting.  Of course, her husband had rules, too.... similar to hers.  Another woman wisely nodded and agreed that if you kept these rules, you would be morally pure and never even need to think about it past that.

Sigh.

I sat there and watched.  A little frustrated.  Two emotions going through my mind - frustration and guilt.  Frustration because it was all external rules.  True, those rules had value and weight to them.  But they still all focused on the external.  What about the heart?  What is going on inside your heart?  Are you even aware of your heart?

Then guilt.  Because I break many of those rules.

Ok, there are locations where those rules are critical.  But even in those places, once or twice I broke them.

Once "over there", I was in a car with a man alone.  I was taking a removed body part to a special pathology lab, and it was in an unfamiliar location, so a friend came along to show me the way.

  (Honestly, developing a romance while transporting body parts just wasn't on my radar.)  

Still, generally, in some locations, we were sticklers about the rules.  It was culturally important and because interacting with other cultures, it is harder to read non-verbals and know where you stand, it becomes even more important.

But we are not "over there" now.  We are here.  But as I listened to her, I worried.

  Am I that wrong?

Another older lady chimed in with how good her rules were.  She told a story about a time when she was alone with another missionary, and he grabbed her and forced a kiss.  Honestly, that is awful, and he should have been confronted by people in authority and stopped!  But does that make what she did wrong?  I don't know that I would even want to say that.  That was an assault, and it was his fault, and his alone.  She can, perhaps, protect herself by never being alone with a man anywhere again.... but, sadly, there are men everywhere, and there will always be the few who will assault women.  Being assaulted is not your fault. It did not happen because she was alone with him.  It happened because he was an abuser.

But I break rules.  I often drive people places.  I am the errand/go-fer person in our office, and it makes sense to send me on airport runs and other things.  My husband can easily nod off on drives - part of his health problems, and I am a better driver.  I've been left alone in my house with different friends when they stay with us.  I've been staying with different other people and been alone for a few hours with another man.  I have checked with my husband about this.  "Look, this happened, or this could mean that could happen.  Are you ok with me being in that situation?"  He smiles.  He trusts me.

This woman continued on with the rules that we shouldn't have any significant relationships with men that are not our fathers, husbands, or sons.

Hmm.  I like a lot of different men.  I'm friends with quite a few.  Some are older than my parents, some are my age; some are closer to my son's age.  As I think back over my life, I smile when I think of the men I have been close to who have influenced my life.  Men who cared about me, and still do.

I don't know if I would be who I am without those friendships.

I volunteered a few years before I was married with a group who prepared and shipped things overseas. Most were older, and I was primarily their muscles.  I lifted the boxes for the ladies and moved things.  There was another man - ok, he was older than my dad, but younger than the women.  He worked with me moving boxes around.  We became good friends.  We talked a lot.  He told me stories of his life, and stories of his wife's life during WWII.  I learned a lot from him.  Lessons about patience, choosing to be grateful, of tender love of others, of serving with joy, of choosing joy after being dealt a life of severe pain.  He listened to me - to my doubts, to my fears, to my small joys and small worries of being a college student, of the news of my wedding, and plans to move to another country.  He helped me hide my car during my wedding so my unique family of engineers wouldn't "rig it up" like they had other cousins.  He teased me about my honeymoon.  We had a close relationship.  Sometimes, he would drive me home from the volunteer center since he lived three blocks from my house.  I only met his wife three times, the last being when they both came to my wedding.  Was our relationship wrong?  No!  But it was close, and we were alone occasionally together. I count his friendship still as a stabilizing, good influence in my life at that time.

I struggled with what this woman said.  I was not at peace all that afternoon and evening.  So instead of settling down to my homework, I played two hard games of ping-pong.... with two men from our team.  (I am an incorrigible sinner.)  That evening, my husband and I talked.  We talked about relationships - ones I have with other men and ones he has with other women.  We set them out to be discussed and questioned in a safe environment.  I asked him what he sees as a man, and does he have any concerns or worries.  I told him what I was aware of as a woman with his relationships.  I told him I was feeling guilty and burdened by this woman's rules which I am breaking.  He just smiled and said he has no doubts about me and most of those rules I "break", I break not only with his express permission, but even at his request.  He's the one who often will say, "Why don't you do that airport run, so you get a chance to talk?"  or say, "Why don't you phone so and so and talk, I'll keep the kids for awhile.  I think you could use a chance just to talk."

What bothered me about this woman's rules is that they were all superficial.  All on the outside.  As if sin is only on the outside.  They might make good guidelines for a youth mission event, but as standards of moral purity, they fell short for me.  Rigid and shallow.  Judgmental in some ways.  As if every relationship with someone of the opposite sex is immoral.  God help us if we have become people who automatically think that just because two coworkers are talking alone outside that there is something wrong.  (It could be something wrong - with the new computer system, and she is just not getting the new layout.)

Now, I fully agree that every relationship with the opposite sex has the  potential to be immoral, and that fact always needs to be held in view.  I am always aware of it, and cautious of it, but not always living in fear of it.  There are a lot of good men out there, and I am proud to be friends with several of them.  I'm thankful, too, as a mother of boys, to have good relationships with different men.  It helps me and it helps my boys see godly men with different personalities and interests that they can model their lives after.

But for me, moral purity has to go deeper than just not being alone with men.  It has to be in my heart, deeper than my actions, even deeper than my thoughts.  It has to start with my needs and my wants and my lacks, and what I chose to do in reaction to those.  It is deeper than whose company I keep because, quite honestly, I can sin in the area of moral purity alone with another girl or in a crowd or all by myself.  It is in where I let my mind go, what I dwell on, what I speak about, and where my heart is.  Sin begins in the heart, and that is where I would rather focus on than a set of rules. 

Also, having lived all around the world, I am aware that the "rules" change so much within culture that trying to navigate rules as a global citizen would be difficult.  I have been both naked as a child in a village on bath day by the river and covered head to toe with only my eyes peeping out out to go shopping - and been totally "decent" in both according to the situation.  Different cultures, different lands, different expectations.  Interestingly, I got more "looks" from men when completely covered than I ever did as a naked child playing by the river.  Proof that sin is in the heart, not in the rules or even the clothes.

So after a good discussion with my husband and two good male friends of mine and two good female friends, I shook off the guilt for not following this lady's rules.  The question then remained for me, "What constitutes good moral purity and how do I address this in my life?"  I still believe that we need to talk about it and think about it, but the answer didn't lie in rules that deprive us of the blessings that God has given us in varied relationships with different people in His family.  The answer may be much harder than a set of rules as I was going to find out.

Tools Sitting in the Shed

I've got a nice shed in my back yard.  My dad built it along with my husband and sons.  We roofed it with the help of a neighbor or two who helped hold struts into place.  It is beautiful - still smells like wood inside.  It has shelves full of winter clothes, roller blades, kid's bike helmets, and balls.  But the front half of it is where we store our garden tools.

The lawnmower sits there.  I need to use it today if the sun comes out enough.  The bags of seed, fertilizer, and other chemicals sit against the wall.  Leaning on one wall is the shovel, rake, leaf rake, and other various tools for yard work.

There they sit.

Enough usefulness in them to keep the yard in good shape.

But they are useless unless they are used.  Strong, good quality, the right tools for the job - but useless unless used.

It is not all in the tools.  It is in actually picking them up and using them.  In getting blisters on your hands from the grip of the tools.  In the soreness of a back at the end of the day.  The satisfaction of a hard job tackled and finished.

I'm going to be sitting in a class next week learning tools.... learning them from a man who is excited about these tools.  Great tools, can do amazing things.  Perhaps the best.

But the man's yard is a disaster.  Weeds grow knee deep with roots down halfway to China.  Grass never cut.  Bushes taking over the flower gardens, never trimmed.  Grass dying since it is never watered.

His tools sit in his shed - never used.

I like tools.  Don't get me wrong, I do.  But I like jobs done - if you don't have the right tool, adapt, learn, adjust, put muscle into it.... but do it.  I'd rather have the basics in tools and a job well done than a well stocked shed and nothing done.  Last week, with mis-matched gloves and an old shovel, I put in my vegetable garden.  I don't have a wheel barrow, so I hauled dirt and compost the old fashioned way - by sheer grit and muscle by the bucket load.  I'm a do-er.  Don't get me wrong - I like tools.  I have a few of my own.... picked up in unusual places, adapted to whatever I am doing at any given time.  But for me the proof is not in the shed, but in the garden.

Scotch-Taped to Constuction Paper; Still Valuable

One of the hardest things about working on a team is people.  Missions is full of interesting people.  Perhaps not normal people.  Odd people.  Awkward people.  People with no people skills.  Determined people.  Pioneering people.  Hard-nosed people.  And among them are a few sweet people.  They keep everyone else from killing each other, I think!

We've got some people on our team.  Tough people to get along with.  People who step on toes but have no awareness that they did.  Even worse, if they were told, instead of reacting with gentleness, they react with anger.  Difficult people.

Last week, inevitably, another conflict with one of these people.  Sadly this is with a person who has not learned to bite his tongue when angry, so he inflicts large scale damage.  It's been a rough week.

The whole things started off with people who didn't respect basic boundaries.  Nothing huge or scary, but really simple basic stuff that a normal-brained person would get, but sadly we seem to have a member of our team who doesn't get normal social graces.  A request in light of his actions set another member of our team off on a jaunt into anger.  That person is the one who fights dirty.  There is no past in his anger.  Everything is in the present, and every past detail is brought up and hurled back at people.  It's tiring.

I was closest to the eruption, so I bore the brunt of it, but I am not alone.  I've watched the hurt in others eyes this week, too, heard the comments, the seething anger underneath.  It's sad.

This is the stuff we don't write home about, right?  We're missionaries, remember?  We're supposed to be good, have it together, and get along.  But I have a suspicion that we are not the only team with people on it - people with their problems.  I just have the ability to write because I am anonymous.

So this week I listened to someone tell me that I do everything wrong, that I am lazy and not keeping up.  (This person knows full well that I am so anemic at the moment that when I stand up, I go dizzy, and if left in silence for more than ten seconds, I will be asleep.  That my long muscles ache, and I feel daily like I've just run a mile.)  I listen to them tell me that I am a bad mother because I don't parent like they do.  Worst of all, I listened to them tell me that I am just damaged because I have lived through sexual abuse.

Eventually, I politely told this person that I am sorry that I am not meeting my obligations in my job and will from now on be there and be doing what I have agreed to do regardless of how I feel.  Then I told this person that I need to be going and since we seem to be only going in circles, I am going to end this conversation here, and I walked away.

I've had a rough week.  I've alternated between being strong and wanting to curl up in the fetal position and cry.  Between calmness and burning anger.  Between exhaustion and tears.  I'm back at 100% running on empty.  (The goal right now with my health is to let me physically crash so the medical system here will take me seriously that there is something wrong.... perhaps this is doing me a favor since I will crash faster running at full steam.)  It just feels so unfair.

And then I am a mother!  I am a good mother!  And I fight like a mother bear when attacked on my children!  I know the accusations are false.  They are so false that they are ludicrous, but they hurt.  People parent differently.  I was accused of not loving my kids....  oh, if I was a swearing type of a person, I would throw in  few choice ones here!  My kids feel loved, safe, secure, and cared for with me.  They have deep meaningful discussions with me when they are alone because they trust me.  They know their mom will tell them the truth and will be there.  I do make them work.  I firmly believe that chores are a part of good raising and will help them be successful as adults.  I do not baby my kids and do everything for them.  It is not a sign of lack of love, but a determined love.  I love them, so I raise them to be capable.  I work with them, and sometimes they enjoy working.  Sometimes they don't, but that is ok.... life, sadly, is not all enjoyable.  But, grrr.... to accuse me of not loving my kids simply because I chose to parent in a different way.  I walked away because the temptation to yell.... throw something... blow up... whatever was too strong.  Those are lies.  (What is that I always tell my kids?  Don't respond to idiots telling lies about you - they are too stupid to listen to you and those that love you won't listen to them.)

The second thing that bothers me is that some people still consider me "damaged goods" because I was sexually abused.  Hmpf.... working in the wrong profession then, I think, if you don't believe in the transforming power of God!  Do I have areas of scars?  Probably.  I wince faster when I see someone's face get that serious, far-away look when some topics are brought up.  I am more sensitive to listen to pain that they may not talk easily about.  I watch children and who hangs out with them and how they act.  Jesus has scars, too.  I will never be the snow-white, beautiful image of innocence - that bland, unaware innocence that never believes evil can happen.  But I will be the one in the trenches fighting for those who hurt.  And if occasionally in that, I feel triggers of my own pain, and I cry, so be it!  I would rather be damaged than a damager - like those who throw words like spears.

All week, I have been thinking, when I have been thinking straight and not crying, about my grandpa.  Not only was my grandpa one of the kindest, gentlest men I have ever met, he loved me.  There is a special place in my heart for him because he had a special place in his heart for me.  I was not "the strong willed child" or "the trouble-maker" to him.  I was loved.  But it was only a few months after I got engaged that one of the side diamonds fell out of my engagement ring.  I was horrified.  My fiance was not in the country, and my ring had broke. My mom gave me a little piece of black construction paper with two shiny things scotch-taped on it.  Seriously, they looked like glass glitter.

My grandpa was always helping people.  He had helped this old neighbor move and clean out his house.  As thanks, after the months of work it took, the old loner had given him this black construction paper with two pieces of "jewels" scotch-taped on.  He told my grandpa they were diamonds and would pay back the debt the man owed him.  My grandpa just smiled and said thank-you.  He passed them on to my mom saying that they are most likely nothing, but could be worth something.  They sat in a box on my mom's dresser for another few years.

When my side diamond fell out, my mom gave me this old paper and told me to ask the jeweler what they were.  Perhaps they were diamonds.  Well, I'll tell you something - jewelers are not usually impressed with stones that come scotch-taped to construction paper!  But I explained the story of the old loner and his gift to my grandpa, and the jeweler agreed to look.

He held them up to a light, squinted through his special glass, and said, "Well, these are definitely NOT diamonds...."  I was just in the middle of saying, "Well, I guess it didn't hurt to ask...", when he said, "wait a sec...." and rubbed the stone with his finger and peered again.  "Hmpf, that was just glue from the tape, not a fault....."  He peered some more, then whistled and muttered, "what do you know!"  They were diamonds - two larger, quite good diamonds.  He set them in my ring, and I've had them in that ring for 16 years - until  last year when one of them got knocked out helping hold my son for 40 stitches.  I miss the diamond, not only because I have no engagement ring to wear (no money now to fix it), but because my grandpa's diamonds and their story are gone.  I guess there is one left, but... not the two.  My grandpa is gone, now, too, and with him the quiet gentle love that he loved me with in his own special way.

I think about those diamonds now.  They were diamonds.  They had value.  How they were treated did not change their value.  They may have been unearthed from a lonely, odd, old man's house, scotch-taped on torn black construction paper, but they were still diamonds.  Valuable.

I try to remind myself of that this week.  I am who I am, not how people treat me.

Sometimes it helps.