College Road Trip

Brooke and I celebrated spring break with a girls' getaway. For a couple of years now she has known just where she'd like to go to college. Now that she has almost completed her junior year, we decided to take SNU up on its invitation to visit the campus, meet some professors, and sit in on some classes.

On Monday we detoured a few miles out of the way to spend a few hours with Samantha, who had just earned privileges to leave base in a bus or a taxi. It was so good to see her looking strong and confident and as beautiful as ever.

It was while we were visiting in the mall that I was first hit with a sense of nostalgia. I remembered this place from thirty years before. It was where I did my "serious" shopping when I took my first teaching job.

On Tuesday morning we drove through the town where I had lived and worked for eight years. Intersections and areas of town I used to know like the back of my hand had changed so much they were barely recognizable. A few buildings had changed hands, some were gone, but most were simply dwarfed by new retail establishments that had crowded around them.

The place closest to my heart was the block that held the Christian school and the church where I spent so much of those years. The school had celebrated its twenty-fifth anniversary while I lived there, but has been closed for a number of years. It was sad to see it empty and to remember the life it once held. All the windows were boarded up, closed tightly to the light and to the community. Unless one is looking for it as I was, there's barely a hint that a couple of mobile homes used to sit over in the corner of the campus. That anyone ever lived there once upon a time.

I hadn't made plans to see anyone, but I did run into a couple of people I knew. I found myself studying their faces, trying to recognize features of the people I remembered. In all the ways that matter, they were the same. I told Brooke stories about people and places from my past as we made the final leg of our trip. She even acted interested. (Smile!)

We stopped for lunch at Grandy's across from the SNU campus before heading to our appointment. There was a dear little lady who must have been close to eighty years old refilling glasses of sweet tea in the dining room. I told Brooke she must have been a pastor's wife who didn't save enough for retirement and who sent her children to SNU!

The campus was beautiful, almost idyllic, and Jennifer, the admissions officer, gave us the VIP tour. I loved watching Brooke interact with the faculty and staff. She seemed so poised and grown-up. Still, I can't imagine letting her go off on her own as my parents allowed me to do when I was just a few months older than she is now. More than ever it seems so important to make the most of every day she has left at home.

On Wednesday my old friend Norma was able to break away from her family and join us for some girlfriend time. For four of my eight years in Oklahoma, she and I had been housemates. It had been way too long since we'd been in touch with one another, but she is the kind of friend that you can always pick up the relationship exactly where you left off. It was so good to laugh with her again. We spent the day just catching up. Our conversation was peppered with "What ever happened to...?" and "Do you ever hear from ...?" The belly laughs usually came after "Do you remember..." and were often followed by one of us saying, "I had forgotten all about that!" Between the two of us, we reconstructed enough nonsense to convince Brooke we were totally crazy.

"Doesn't it seem," we asked each other, "that we should still be in our thirties, or maybe even our twenties?"

Where have all the years gone? Who would have known they'd pass so quickly?

"Sunrise, sunset. Sunrise, sunset.
Swifty fly the days.
Seedlings turn overnight to sunflowers,
Blossoming even as we gaze.
Sunrise, sunset. Sunrise, sunset.
Swiftly fly the years.
One season following another,
Laden with happiness and tears."

A Belated Thank You

It was the night before Easter, 1975. In all the years since then, I have never experienced anything more difficult than what our family was going through on that day. I thought I might never smile again, much less celebrate anything. Not even Easter.

When I reflect on that painful time, one redemptive memory always surfaces. My sister-in-law Carol said to me, “We’ve got to do something for the kids for Easter. We’ve got to go to the store and get something for Easter baskets.”

It seemed surreal to do something as ordinary as getting in the car, driving to the drugstore, and looking through the picked-over merchandise to try to find chocolate bunnies for Deborah, Tom, and Julie. My heart wasn’t in it. Neither was Carol’s, but she was much wiser than I was.

She knew that life goes on in the midst of tragedy. She knew that sometimes you must put your feelings aside and just keep going. She knew that the simple traditions surrounding our holy days can help keep us focused on what is real and true. With her hopeful perspective and her mother's heart, she helped me face the future.

Carol has a gift for celebrating life. She knows "how to keep Christmas well." Also Thanksgiving, Easter, birthdays, and any other occasion that she can turn into a celebration.

She is a homemaker. A true HOME maker. She has always made her home a restful and joyful place for her family and guests. Every meal she serves turns into a time of refreshment, not just because she is an excellent cook, but also because everyone wants to linger around the table to have their souls and spirits nourished.

She is a beautiful and remarkable lady, and I am blessed to call her family.

On this Easter my heart goes out to her as she is fighting the battle of her life against cancer. I remember the courage she has always shown in adversity, and I pray that she will stay strong for this ordeal.

And I want to say thank you. Thanks for all she has taught me, especially for the lessons of that long-ago Easter weekend.

A Morality Tale in Three Movies

Last week marked the beginning of the LEAP test, our state’s performance assessment. It is a high stakes test that the students I teach must pass to advance to the next grade. The pressure to prepare has been intense, so the administration decided that a school-wide movie would be a great way to relax and boost morale the day before testing began. Nothing heavy, just something fun. The choice was Madagascar 2.

We teachers took shifts to supervise the kids, so I wasn’t in the gym for the entire movie. Maybe if I had been there from beginning to end I may have seen more of a point, but for me it was mostly silly and often crude. The reason I even mention it is because of a disturbing trend I’m noticing in children’s movies. For years now, we’ve tolerated sexual innuendo in kids’ entertainment, but in more recent movies another line is increasingly being crossed into the realm of deviant sexuality. In this movie, for example, a male lemur dresses in drag and suggests that he is attractive to another male, a penguin romances a bobble-head doll, and a giraffe marries a hippopotamus. Their “courageous” outside-the-box relationship is greatly celebrated. Even in the most pointless and un-educational of movies, you have to wonder about a hidden agenda.

In my own classroom as each day’s testing was over we watched bits of A Series of Unfortunate Events. I wanted to lure my students into reading the books which, "dear reader," spoof a literary style of two hundred years ago. When Brooke first brought Lemony Snicket home as a fourth-grader, she was deeply shocked that I found him hilarious. To her, the plight of destitute orphans left to the care of inept adults while being pursued by an evil villain was extremely tragic. My students loved the movie, probably for the same reason that I loved reading fairy tales as a little girl. In these stories the line between good and evil is unmistakably clear, and good triumphs in spite of all odds.

On Friday night the kids and I watched TheBoy in Striped Pajamas, a riveting and disturbing story set in WWII Germany. The horrors of the Nazi regime, as seen through the eyes of two children, seem even more terrible because of their trust and innocence. It is not an easy movie to watch, but one of the most unforgettable I’ve ever seen, rich in symbolism and timeless truth. I highly recommend it.

Today begins Passion week, and I want to mark out some special time to think about all it means. But today I think of what John Eldredge says in Epic: “What if all the great stories that have ever moved you are telling you something about the true Story into which you were born?” And quoting Frederick Buechner: We live in a world “where goodness is pitted against evil, love against hate, order against chaos, in a great struggle where often it is hard to be sure who belongs to which side….Yet…it is a world where the battle goes ultimately to the good…It not only happened once upon a time but has kept on happening ever since and is happening still.” YES!

One of the best places I found for movie reviews is pluggedinonline. If you haven't been using it, you might want to check it out.

Home Alone

I’m home. Alone. For the first time in I-don’t-know-when.

I’ve slept in. Read a book. Read the newspaper - and it was actually in order. (Around our house, the sports section is usually on top, courtesy of Brayden.) I can really enjoy a certain amount of solitude.

The phone has rung once. Otherwise it’s been quiet. I can hear the birds outside the window and the hum of the washing machine. That’s about it. No cabinet doors banging. Nobody coming in or going out. No TV. No kids’ music. Nobody needing anything from mom. No arguing….No laughing.

I’m already lonesome.

Just last Saturday there were eight of us here. In addition to our usual four were Blake, Brad, Michelle, and little Tyler, here for a short while before saying another long goodbye.

A few years ago when all the kids were home, I stood at the kitchen sink watching them walk down the road, then walking back again. I wanted a picture of the memory to hang on that wall, another “window” to look through as I wished all the family back together. Little Austin was with Grandpa and Grandma when the shot was taken, and Michelle and Tyler were not yet part of the family. Otherwise everyone is there, all looking about the same except for Brayden who has almost caught up to his older brothers in height.

There are miles to go and missions to fulfill before they’ll be home again. Last week, Brad, Michelle, and Tyler began to get settled in Peru. Thank God for the internet which makes it possible to get frequent updates on their lives.

Brent has already been serving off the coast of Africa for a couple of months. Back in Virginia, Christina and Austin mark the days with emails, rare phone calls, and a jar of chocolate kisses. One kiss each night from Daddy. When the jar is empty, Daddy comes home.

Blake is preparing for deployment to the Middle East. His service to his country has involved an additional sacrifice during the past six weeks as his best friend and lovely wife, Sam, has embarked on a military career of her own as a nurse with the Air National Guard. Going through something as hard as basic training is, well, hard. But when someone you love more than your own life is going through it, the toll is doubly painful, especially since communications have been, and will continue to be, so limited.

I miss them all. I even miss Brooke and Brayden who are just a hundred miles away and due back tomorrow. I can’t wait for all of us to be together once again.

As I sit in quiet reflection, my heavenly Father has been speaking to me in His still, small voice. “Child, aren’t you a little far from home yourself?’

It’s true. I’ve traveled a path of busyness, carrying suitcases of earthly cares and never-ending tasks that have seemed so important. I think I’ll put them down and spend a little time in my Father’s house. Rest a while, and get refreshed for whatever lies around the next bend in the road.

My Amazing Aunt Frankie

Since the age of ten, I haven’t had a grandparent in my life,but that gap has been more than filled by my Aunt Frankie, my daddy’s older sister. Last week at the age of ninety-nine, she underwent surgery for cancer and came through with flying colors. Her prognosis continues to be good.

I spent the weekend with her and marveled again at her courageous spirit and the incredible filing system that is her memory. Although she is beginning to repeat many of her stories and needing to be reminded of more current events, she can pull names and events to the surface with amazing clarity.

I don’t know many ninety-nine-year-olds, but I don’t imagine there are too many who read the daily newspaper or weekly news magazines. Perhaps one secret of Aunt Frankie’s longevity is her motivation to stay connected to people and events.

Her name is actually Ida Frances, but Frankie stuck and it fits. You won’t meet anyone more “frank.” Of course, at her age she’s probably earned the right to say whatever she likes, but her frankness is nothing new. My mother was so known in the family for her tact that her grandchildren created a new verb: “MawMawing it” in our family dictionary means to practice the ultimate discretion in avoiding saying anything controversial or unpleasant. Aunt Frankie doesn’t need a verb - or an adjective. Her name suffices.

She’s the kind of friend that the Proverbs writer must have had in mind when he speaks of iron sharpening iron. There probably were some feathers ruffled in the past ninety-nine years as the result of Aunt Frankie’s direct style of communication.

She used to love to discuss differences in doctrine with her Baptist friends. These discussions were not for the faint of heart. What was invigorating to Aunt Frankie could be intimidating to anyone else. Now those differences don’t matter as much, although she did tell me that her surgeon was a "good Baptist boy."

Aunt Frankie never read romance novels or watched soap operas. She prefers real life – and doesn’t mind asking questions or voicing speculations. She loves to recount our “love stories,” in front of us. The actual facts may be fairly straight, but the “spin” she gives the story can be unsettling. In the retelling, there are “details” that never happened except in her own mind. It’s amusing if it’s someone else’s story. Embarrassing if it’s yours!

Thankfully, I learned fairly early to look past her words and straight to her heart, which is unfailingly generous and compassionate. And Aunt Frankie has actually become less blunt with age. Usually there’s at least one comment on my appearance whenever I see her. If she doesn’t say anything at all, I know she is holding her tongue. Lately her line has been, “I found a picture from your bridal shower, and you were so thin!” I know exactly what she means.

It took me awhile to learn to appreciate her. She called me her “golden girl” when I was little because she loved to see me wearing browns and yellows, colors I hated. I could always expect an “ugly dress” under the Christmas tree from Aunt Frankie. My mother was always grateful – I hope enough for both of us.

When she stayed overnight, she had to share a bed with me. She had the audacity to report to me each morning how much I had kicked her during the night. It usually made me feel either guilty, embarrassed, or mad. Staying at her house was an entirely different matter. After a long day of riding my cousins' bicycles or horses, I loved going to sleep in her airy bedrooms and hearing the night sounds of the country through the open windows. And when she would take me to campmeetin' for a week, it was a child's paradise.

During my teens, Aunt Frankie expressed an interest in my friends, my clothes, my music, my reading – my life – that I resented. I didn’t think it was any of her business. I didn’t realize that her concern led to fervent prayers. Only Heaven will reveal how different my life might have been without her prayers for our family and me.

During times of crisis in our family, we turned to Aunt Frankie. She always came. And stayed as long as she was needed. And I learned to love her more and more.

Nowadays her interest in me and my family is a balm. I look forward to hearing the phone ring and finding that she’s on the line. There’s an art to conversing with her, especially by phone. It involves yelling and rephrasing sentences on my part because of her hearing problem. Trying to understand what she is saying is also difficult because her voice sounds something like a very bad cell phone connection, cutting in and out. And sometimes there is a bad cell phone connection, cutting in and out.

She asks about each of us, remembering details from the conversation before. Sometimes we don’t quite get what the other is trying to say, and she gives up with a little laugh and changes the subject. We say “I love you,” and hang up. I’m so thankful I can look forward to those conversations for a while longer.

Dreams for our Children, Part 2

Eighteen years ago when I became a wife, I also became a stepmother to four boys who were instantly sons of my heart if not my flesh. I walked into that role with my eyes wide open, but nothing could have prepared me for what lay ahead. I’m glad I made that commitment – both to Steve and to his sons.

The past couple of days have been spent with Brad, Michelle, and baby Tyler in Florida. What a precious little grandson! On our first meeting, he came to me with the trust of one who has always been held in gentle, loving arms, and within minutes he was snuggled close, asleep on my shoulder. Nothing else in the world could feel as sweet.

While we were there, we enjoyed Brad’s thirtieth birthday. The time we get to spend together is rare since we live more than 2,000 miles apart. “Rare” as in “precious.”

One lesson I’ve had to learn is that there can be nothing possessive about a stepmother’s love. You give as much as can be accepted without strings attached and without expectations, and you receive what can be returned – hopefully with gratitude and understanding. You comprehend better than most the analogy of happiness being like a butterfly which can never be grasped, but which may alight on an open, patient palm. The lesson doesn’t come easy, and sometimes has to be re-taught.

Still, on this first day of a new year, I have an easier task than many others who love Brad, Michelle, and Tyler, for they are preparing to answer a call to serve with the Extreme Nazarene organization in Peru ( http://www.extremenazarene.org/images/peru/index.htm ). Several miracles will need to happen in the coming weeks, including selling their home and automobiles and raising financial support for their three-year term.

Steve and I have prayed that God will open or close doors as He sees best. Having lost one son, “losing” another to the mission field for three years is a sacrifice for Steve, but also a joy. All of us have feelings of caution and concern, especially Brad’s brothers.

How much harder would it be for me if I had a lifetime of memories with Brad? If we lived close enough to be a part of their family’s daily lives? If I had watched little Tyler being born, and memorized each phase of his growth thus far? If we worshipped together each week and observed cherished traditions for every holiday?

That's where Michelle's family is tonight. And yet, they too pray that God's will be done. If our situation comes to mind, would you join us?

Christmas Potpourri

I hope you’ve had a beautiful Christmas. For me, it has come in bits and pieces this year: quiet moments of reflection in the midst of our busyness.

It came - as it always does for me- in the music. The carols played in my classroom throughout the days of December, and I don’t think my students will ever forget learning “A Song of Peace” for we all felt God’s Presence among us during that lesson!

There were the times of Advent worship at church, always so thought-provoking and meaningful. Each Sunday was a gift. And the special traditions of our church body, especially the annual Christmas supper, were times of warmth and joy.

Christmas Eve candlelight services have been a long-standing tradition for our family whenever possible. This year, we attended two services on Christmas Eve.

One was a homegoing service. When we got the news that Becky Dzieken had lost her battle with cancer just a few days before Christmas, my first thought was, “What a tragic loss for her family. And why now?” But as I reflected on the radiance of Becky’s life, I was reminded of John 1: “In Him was Life, and that Life was the Light of men.” I’ve never known anyone who reflected that Light any more clearly or transparently than Becky did. Besides her gift for communicating joy and faith, Becky was blessed with an incredible voice, and her memorial service closed with her own rendition of “Cornerstone.” It felt like Christmas.

Later that evening, we attended a simple, unhurried service in town. In the quietness and darkness of that candlelit sanctuary, the message and meaning of Christmas settled into our spirits. For us four busy Hunts, Christmas had come.

On Christmas Day, as we talked to family scattered across the country, someone must have asked Brooke if she had had a good Christmas. All I heard was her reply: “Yes, and it’s not over!” All the packages had been unwrapped. Christmas dinner was done. But Brooke was still having Christmas.

So was I. I still am. And I hope that you are too.