Looking back over the last year...
How can so many changes happen in one year's time?
Let's see--
*Finding out I was pregnant. At 41.
*Being so sick every second of every day for nine months.
*Being so tired that all I wanted to do was sleep.
*Amanda graduating from high school.
*Amanda moving away to college.
*Having a baby. At 42.
*Sleep deprivation!
*Keeping up with four kids. Yes, even the fledgling still needs me.
*Moving from the town to the country.

a choice. It really is. We can choose to be happy or we can choose to be miserable. I tell this to Georgie and Maddie all the time. They wake up on the wrong side of the bed on every school morning unless there is something "special" planned that day. The smallest "special" thing will put them in a good mood. Maybe it's a birthday party for a classmate, or a field trip, but to them it's a reason to choose to be happy. All other mornings they are plum miserable. A while back I started something with them to help them understand that they choose their own happiness. I raise my hand and I say "I choose to be happy" like it's a fun game; or I'll smile really big and say that I am choosing to smile because I am happy. It used to work. It's not working anymore and I'm not sure why. Maybe they have finally seen right through it but I think they have learned, as so many others in this world, that there is some sort of enjoyment in choosing to be miserable. It takes effort to be happy. It takes effort to smile. I've always heard that it takes effort to frown too but I know that it is much easier to frown sometimes than it is to smile. But I do know that once you choose to smile and you choose to be happy, then the happiness follows. There needs to be the effort there sometimes to getcha goin' but afterward it just falls into place.

I also have come to realize that being in a miserable state of mind is a "priority problem". It's usually because people have lost their focus on "what matters most". I find it interesting that my innocent girls are even capable of losing this concept of what matters most, but living in this world, it's no wonder. So I have to help them get back on track often. Sometimes it works but other times there just isn't the time to do it. Like on school mornings. We are concerned with time constraints--getting up on time and getting ready on time and there are always those unknown issues that come up especially with children that have special needs. It's to be expected sometimes that the special needs will require special treatment. That's of course understandable. But what I refuse to accept is that a person who has special needs should be expected to be miserable all of the time. Does this make sense? I know that at times they are pitied and they at times even want to be told "I'm sorry". "I'm sorry that you have Tourette's. I'm sorry that your tics are really bothering you"--or whatever it is that is bothering them at the time. So, it is understandable that they are miserable at times because of physical or emotional ailments that are beyond their control but at the same time they can find some happiness somewhere. I suppose that is in a way my job, as their mom, to help them find some joy. I have learned that they are very capable of believing in heaven. Some of their, and my, happiest moments are when we talk about heaven. I can't tell them exactly what it is going to be like but I can tell them that they won't have their "syndrome" in heaven. They won't hurt in heaven. They won't cry in heaven. In heaven they will always be joyful because they will be with God and Jesus and the angels and all the saints. For them, heaven is something to put their hopes.

And that's the priority problem resolved with the rest of the world too. Where do they rest their hopes? On a paycheck? On paying off a bill? On getting rich? On falling in love and getting married and having a family? In traveling the world? In discovering something new and wonderful, becoming famous? All of those things can be taken away from us. None of those things are promised to us. But heaven is promised. And it is something to look forward to.

But I think what happens to people who have this hope in heaven at one point in time, is that they begin to doubt whether it will ever happen, or they begin to think of it as something that will take place a long, long time from "now". "What about now?" they want to know. So they begin to get caught up in the "now" and they begin to lose sight on "heaven". It's something in the future to think about. It's put up on a shelf with the fine china and only taken down for special occasions but years pass by and those special occasions never happen so the fine china stays up on the shelf getting dusty.

We need to dust off that hope of heaven, just as we dust off our fine china. We need to utilize that hope in our lives daily.

Remember the Bryan Adams song "Everything I do...I do it for you"?

That can be the motto of the person with the hope in heaven. Everything that is done in this physical life is done for the Lord. Taking care of our physical needs is done for the Lord because when we have healthy bodies we can serve Him better. When we help others, we are doing it for the Lord's glory. When we stand up to the lion's of injustice, we are doing it for the Lord. When we go to work and earn a living, we are doing it for the Lord--we are taking care of our family's needs, we are helping others, we are being examples at our workplace. Everything we do....

The wisest man who ever lived once wrote that the whole duty of man is to "Fear God and to keep His commandments". That pretty much sums it up. Is there happiness in this? You better believe it! There is happiness in this because we have been promised something beyond our wildest imaginings. We have been promised an inheritance that is more glorious than anything we are capable of understanding with our finite minds and our physically limited sight. And that is where our truest happiness rests...in this promise and in this hope.

Of heaven. :)

Happiness is...looking forward to heaven. :)

The end.

It all started as a joke.
Last year for my 40th birthday, I wanted to do something memorable. I wanted to be someplace magnificent and to be able to mark that day in my memory.
The Grand Canyon was the perfect place. I stood on the edge of the canyon and watched the sunrise and listened to a group of college students sing "Amazing Grace" as the sun came up--"bright, shining as the sun..."
This year, for my 41st birthday, I was again asked where I wanted to go for my birthday and out of the blue I answered to Robert Frost's Farm in Derry, New Hampshire.
It wasn't exactly "out of the blue". I was taking a college class on Robert Frost's poetry and my instructor had mentioned the place so it was fresh in my mind. I really did want to see where he lived when he wrote some of his poetry like "The Road Not Taken" and "Tree at my Window". So I was given two round trip tickets to Boston and told to "plan the rest". That was my birthday present and I had a lot of fun planning the itinerary.
First we drove from Boston to Amherst and spent the night and got up early and went to visit cousin Emily's home. Emily Dickinson lived with her family her entire life. She never married and she rarely left her home. Cousin Emily wrote almost 1800 poems in her lifetime (that we know of). She wrote letters every day and at one time had as many as a hundred correspondents.
I love her poetry, especially the ones that are untouched by editors. She rarely used punctuation but preferred the dash. She did not title her poems. At first she was so careful with her poetry and would bind them into little books, sewing the edges and keeping them neatly in a box. But later, during her frenzied writing years, she stashed them everywhere, writing on the backs of envelopes, and scraps of paper. Some of her poetry was written in her letters to others. I loved touring "The Homestead" (Emily's home) and "The Evergreens" (Emily's brother Austin's home next door) but I really loved walking through the gardens. It's autumn now so the flowers are all spent and leaves are covering most of the garden but I walked on those same path stones and viewed the house from the bottom of the hill, just as Emily had done all those years ago.

When is the time to give up on our dreams
those dreams as a child
that we whispered to ourselves
not daring to tell
--others.

Some of them fall by the wayside
when life and commitments get in the way.
Others are extinguished
when hurtful words are said
--by teachers
--or parents
or friends in disguise.

Some are lost in the busy-ness of the day
when our hours are spent
from morning to night
without a chance
to even remember
--let alone breathe.

Others are forgotten
as we grow
and take on new interests
--new dreams
to dream.

Where do they go
these fallen,
lost and forgotten,
childish dreams
of a childhood?

Do they ever truly
leave us?
Or are they
...there
lingering...
waiting...
for their time
...to come.

I wonder....

love,
jane ;)

They say it took two hundred million years to make...
rocks rubbed down by a ribbon of river...
each layer revealing a different time period.
They say the canyon has a story to tell--
a story older than time.
I agree, that there is a story here,
but I don't see how a tiny ribbon of river could create something so vast and awesome,
or how it took millions of years when time was not even in existence but for thousands.
No, this was not created by a tiny river of water.
This was by the hand of the Creator.
What I found interesting about the Grand Canyon:
they have these circle plates along the rim trail marking the age of the rocks below--
some said 100 million; others 200 million.
At this same canyon, they have God's word posted on beautiful plates at remarkable lookout points.
Verses from the Psalms,
words written by a shepherd to his heavenly Father,
words remarking on the glorious creation of God.
It is very contradictory, this canyon.
Some of the rock formations are named after Biblical names and places; others named after foreign gods and temples.
We cannot serve two masters.
They say more than 5 million people visit the canyon every year.
How many of them know God?
How many of them try to make sense of this huge expanse of scenery with their own finite wisdom?
Sunday morning, my 40th birthday, we went to Mather's Point to watch the sun rise.
We were both quiet and a little distraught. We had wanted to find a church nearby to worship but they were all so very far away.
As we walked closer to the canyon, we heard the sound of beautiful voices lifted in a familiar hymn.
People had gathered at this point to sing praises to the Creator.
It was the most beautiful sound to hear God's name proclaimed out across the canyon.
We made our way through the crowd, through people smiling, some with tears in their eyes, others with skeptical looks or even anger;
we made our way and joined in song.
As the sun's rays lit up the sky over the distant cliffs, we were singing: "when we've been there ten-thousand years, bright shining as the sun..."
It is a day I will not soon forget.
love,
jane