These Hands

She holds her head proud
She walks tall
She tilts her chin in defiance
She refuses to talk when she's mad

Today, she walked by me
Eyes blinking
Chin on her chest
Eyes on the floor

I followed
Found her willowy self
Scrunched in the corner
Sobbing into her arms

I sat down beside her
Rubbed her back
"I know it's been hard
You have what it takes"

"I don't care," she spat
"I've tried to change
No one sees
So I'm not going to try"

"Oh, honey," I said
"You can't change yesterday
But you always have a choice
Make a good one"

"No! I don't care
What happens to me
I'm done"
She shrugged off my hand

"But I do care
You're smart
Beautiful and talented
You can do this"

A few minutes after
I left her alone
She emerged
Head up proudly

She put on her shoes
I walked her to school
Told her she made me proud
She walked tall and smiled

This afternoon
Kneading bread dough
I noticed my hands
Stared at them in awe

How does God see fit
To use these hands?

Who needs Walgreens?

We have greens on our wall, too.

Bad joke, I know. I just crack me up sometimes.

Air-drying basil works, but more ingenious is a tip I got from a friend: to dry herbs, spread the leaves on cookie sheets in a hot car for a day. The herbs dry in no time, and your car smells amazing.

I'll have to do that next time. For now, I smile at the sight of herbs drying in my kitchen and laugh at my strange sense of humor.

For real, when you can grow your own herbs and spices, who really DOES need Walgreeens?

Chair Makeover

 Two dining room chairs came home with me from the coolest sale last Friday.
Two for $8 is just my style.
The scratches and worn vinyl were not so much.

After much sanding, paint, and my first attempt at upholstering,

they are much more my style.

The fabric came from Jo-Ann Fabrics.

I kinda sorta really adore it.

I used this paint and absolutely LOVED it.

It's by far the best spray paint I've used.

The Painter's Touch primer is great, too.

Some primers leave little warts; not this brand.

Next on the makeover list is the dresser/secretary I use as the coffee center in the kitchen...

Miraculous

A little over a month ago, I posted this:

I admired a friend's tea rose bush this morning, and she promptly cut a sweet rose for me. I read that honey can be used as an organic rooting hormone, and I hope the article was right. I wounded the bottom of the cutting, smeared it in honey, removed the lower leaves, immersed six inches of the cutting in loose potting soil, and inverted a container over the leafed, exposed end. The Rosebush Project has begun, adding to my family of growy things. :)

After weeks and weeks of checking for new growth, I peeked under the container "greenhouse" last week, and this is what I saw:

The reddish leaves were brand new! I admit I ran into the house and grabbed Bekah, yelling, "Come look! Come look!"

This week, here's what she looks like (the rose cutting, not Bekah):

Miraculous.

A whole new rosebush, from one rose. Pretty soon, she'll be ready to be planted in a flower bed.

It's the simplest joys that run the deepest.

Speaking of joys, one of my girls at work has been very open in her hatred for me. I didn't think it would ever change. Over the past week, it seems to be, almost imperceptibly. Yesterday, she walked by me and hit me with this comet: "I love you, Becky." I recovered my verbal capacity in time to assure her I love her as well. Wow. Sure never thought I'd live to see that day.

Miraculous.

In other adventures of last week, here's one I have no desire to relive:

In the merciful coolness of an evening last week, I began digging a flower bed for my new bird bath. Bekah started mowing the lawn. The flower bed's perimeter was  barely finished when Bekah came running around the corner of the garage. Followed by a swarm of hornets. The hornets were rather upset that Bekah had dared mow their little backyard and stung her with great vim and vigor.

I dropped my shovel. What could I spray on Bekah that would kill the hornets and not kill her? I ran for the Windex and proceeded to empty half the bottle on her while imploring the hornets not to sting me because I'm allergic and really didn't feel in the mood for any kind of medical emergency.

One hornet was not moved by my pleading.

By the time Bekah was insect-free and checking out her battle scars, I felt really... weird.

If I take Benadryl immedately, I usually don't have too dangerous a reaction. Not like when I was Five Years Old and my throat swelled shut or anything.

We didn't have Benadryl.

Both of us sweaty, Bekah and I, covered in Windex and soil, respectively, drove as quickly as legal to Walgreens. Bekah, despite her multiple stings, had to drive because I was staggering like a drunk.

Not to complain about Walgreen's customer service or anything, but I stood at the checkout for a good long time before anyone came to let me pay for the Benadryl.

"Would you like any KitKats, Baby Ruth, or Twix bars today?" the cashier asked, gesturing at the "ON SALE" array on the counter.

"No, thanks. Just the Benadryl," I replied, swaying slightly and trying to swipe my card.

He hadn't totaled the order yet.

"What about Walgreens-brand toothbrushes? Two for fifty cents?"

"No, thanks. Just the Benadryl." Not feeling very coherent at this point and hoping vaguely he didn't think I was drunk, I again tried to swipe my debit card.

He still hadn't totaled the order.

"How about.."

"No, thanks. Just the Benadryl."

Giving me a strange look, he pressed the total button.

I paid, grabbed the Benadryl, and swayed out onto the sidewalk where Bekah was waiting with my water bottle. Like pill poppers, we both immediately took the max dosage. Thank God she isn't allergic to stings, but she had a massive lot of poison going on in her system.

That having happened last week and this being THIS week, obviously we survived. I just don't think I'll ever have the courage to go back to Walgreens.

Miraculous.

Tolkien and the Gospel, or "Adventure"

I think we all reach points in our stories when it seems like we've reached the end. Nothing seems to be turning out the way it should, and we don't see much reason to go on. The problem is, the book isn't over. Somehow, we have to keep living, going from page to page.

It's hard. So hard that you being to understand that you can't do it much longer. Only you don't seem to have much choice.

If only you knew how it all would end, you could live this page. But that's the problem: you don't know. And every page of every day, the words your feet scratch seem to be the same as the page before. You guess the next page will be the same.

I've been there, and I began to understand something: my story isn't my own. I'm a character in a meta narrative, an epic that was begun before the ages. Rather than focusing on whether or not my end will be the one of my choice, I only have to see what my part is on this page. In that realization, I found something: adventure.

J.R.R. Tolkien, master of human story-telling, says it well. It's the scene where Frodo and Sam are nearing Mount Doom in the evil wasteland of Mordor, near the end of their weary quest to destroy the One Ring. But you know this, right? If you don't, I beg you to end your deprivation and read the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

I don’t like anything here at all,’ said Frodo, ‘step or stone, breath or bone. Earth, air and water all seem accursed. But so our path is laid.’


‘Yes, that’s so,’ said Sam. ‘And we shouldn’t be here at all, if we’d known more about it before we started. But I suppose it’s often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of sport, as you might say. But that’s not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have just landed in them usually – their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn’t. And if they had, we shouldn’t know, because they’d been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on – and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same – like old Mr. Bilbo. But those aren’t always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we’ve fallen into?’

‘I wonder,’ said Frodo. ‘But I don’t know. And that’s the way of a real tale. Take any one that you’re fond of. You may know, or guess, what kind of a tale it is, happy-ending or sad-ending, but the people in it don’t know. And you don’t want them to.’

It's true. Life isn't for wimps. That doesn't mean we have to just buck up and deal with things, pretending we don't care or it doesn't hurt. Neither should we have to pretend that because God knows what's going on, this must be His Divine Doing and we shouldn't question. Being characters who only see today, it's not only fine, but necessary, to be honest. To cry as well as laugh, to question as well as believe. Meanwhile, we keep writing. With hope and an abiding sense of excitement. Because we know the Author. And we know that He is weaving together, with threads of Redemption and Mercy, the imperfect parts we all play... and that, somehow, when the Author ends the chapter titled "Time", it will all come out right.

The most admired of lives were lived by those who kept going, not avoiding hardship, because they knew. They were part of something bigger. A grand adventure.

A little table with your coffee?

A birdbath for my back yard. 

That's what I've wanted. 

But, of course, I wanted something less expensive and more creative than the predictable white plastic.

I thought I could use a large planter base for the top, if only I could find a base.

A little table at my favorite coffee shop, Artist's Cup Cafe, caught my eye more than a year ago.

Sure, the gold was a bit ghastly, but its style was adorably French. I was just a bit jealous.

Yesterday, to escape the heat and humidity, Bekah and I went to Artist's Cup for smoothies.

A blended mocha for me, thanks. Some concoctions were just meant to be.

Bekah noticed the little French table siting in a corner. Its ceramic top had been broken.

I know a scavenging opportunity when I see one.

The cafe owner is a sweet lady who always talks to regulars like me and makes the coffee shop feel like a family of sorts, drawn in from the sidewalks by the warmth of human company, art, and (of course) phenomenal coffee.

I could work up enough courage to ask her if I could buy the broken table.

"Just take it! On one condition... don't bring it back." 

Who walks into a coffee shop for a drink and comes out with a free table? 

Obviously.

What can I say? ;)

Back home, I immediately took Miss Too-Golden 

for a visit to The Graveyard. It's behind the shed, where the grass that barely grows there is usually covered by a fine mist of paint.

A coat of spray primer followed by satin-finish ivory spray paint

+

a $6 planter base from Home Depot

=

I'm still debating whether or not to paint the terra-cotta planter base.

 Pretty sweet birdbath for $6, no?

All the more reason to love Artist's Cup Cafe.

As if I needed a reason.

Isaiah

While Bekah and her parents moved her things into the house that is finally not my solitary abode, I entertained Isaiah, her adorable nephew. We washed dishes, made guacamole for supper, and built things with wooden blocks. I haven't had so much fun in a long time. I'd forgotten how everything done with kids is so much... richer, somehow. It's impossible to be completely time-driven, and you're more aware of the simple joys so easy to overlook. Like putting soapsuds on your nose, letting water run through your fingers, squishing avocados with a biscuit mixer, and racing to see if you can complete a replica of Stonehenge before marauding feet gleefully destroy it.

Sometimes life can wear on a person, you know? Sometimes constant prayers still go unanswered, people try to step on you to advance themselves, and innocence, love, and trust seem extinct. Kids remind us of how the world should be. Just by being himself, Isaiah refreshed me... gave me the energy to keep working for a better world.