Category Archives: Random

Fighting in Marriage

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I was Stumbling around and came across these rules for fighting fair in marriage.

Because of my background, very little on this topic is ever new to me, I’ve been around the material so long it begins to all sound familiar (in the same way that few sermons are very new to me).

I think you music types get this feeling when you’re familiar with a composer.

Anyway, I wanted to highlight it, because I thought the article was well done, and because one thought was wholly new to me:

5. If your spouse says you do, then it’s true
When confronted with an issue, your first response may be to hide behind statements such as, “No I don’t” or “You’re just exaggerating.” When your mate states that you’re doing something irritating, trust him or her. Consciously choose to look past your defensive walls and ask your spouse, “Why does this bother you?” Then listen to what is being said. Try to see his or her point of view, and be willing to change for the good of your marriage.

Just something new for me to think about.

Indirect Attack

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In the movie Amazing Grace, after years of “frontal” attacks failed, the opponents of the slave trade decided to dog-leg an attack.

By imposing a restriction that would put the pinch on slave ships, the law made it hard to continue in the current system, even while it remained legal.

I have not been able to determine the veracity of that segment (though it was very good storytelling), but have wondered if the Pro-Life supporters have ever looked for or found a similar sideways attack.

The law seeking to make the murder of a pregnant woman a double-homicide is the closest I can think of (as no “average American” could object to the emotional appeal of the law).

However, it was strongly opposed by the abortion supporters who recognized the assault it was on their “values.”

(The chief of those values being the inconsequence of the “by-product of pregnancy.”)

~ ~ ~

A suggestion I have (though part of me hopes it’s out-dated) is to begin making surprise-inspections of all clinics that perform any sort of in-room surgical procedure, to verify each is in compliance with the codes of cleanliness and sterility expected of surgical sites.

This would, by the specific wording of the bill, include abortion-providers.

Years ago I remember hearing pro-lifers (and abortion survivors) lament that there was no oversight to abortion clinics, and a claim was out there that veterinarians had more regulation and oversight than abortionists did.

There have also been some serious allegations of post-abortion deaths directly linked to improperly cleaned surfaces and/or equipment.

Even if things have cleaned up since then (and without oversight, how do we know?), instituting equivalent governmental oversight would continue to chip away at the sacred, all-knowing, infallible sanctity of “Choice,” and those revered suppliers of choice.

Something that could only help the fight for the unborn.

As such, I’m sure this too would be recognized for the attack it is.

But, as with Laci and Connor’s Law that acknowledges two victims when a pregnant woman is killed, my hope and prayer is that the basic sense of such requirements would help it withstand the attacks against what it represents.

The Washington Post had an excellent quote from President Bush.

“Today’s decision affirms that the Constitution does not stand in the way of the people’s representatives enacting laws reflecting the compassion and humanity of America.”

I have never dwelt much on what Bush says, but that line just thrilled me.

Yes, humanity is woefully fallible, but nearly all the good work God has done since creation has been accomplished through the will, minds and hands of we who are created in His image.

The New Abortion Ban

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What everyone (involved) hope/feared has begun coming true.

For the first time since 1973 a limitation on abortion has been upheld by the “new” Supreme Court.

~ ~ ~

The largest (legal) objection to the ban on partial-birth abortion seems to be that there is no exception allowed for the woman’s health.

The supreme court concluded, as did the people who framed the law, that there are other methods of abortion that may guard a woman’s health if this became an issue.

I am one of those (in case there was any question) who believes the only exception for an abortion ban should be the threatened life of the mother.

The whole idea that abortion was illegal before the 1973 Supreme Court ruling is a misperception.

Coat hangers are propaganda.

There were health exceptions to the abortion ban before 1973, and “thoughtful” providers could code a woman at health-risk for something as survivable as emotional angst or fear, for which there are options besides abortion.

I now expect “the life of the mother” to be interpreted equally broadly, and so have no fear that a woman could actually die from lack-of-abortion in America.

Should I offer advice “publicly?”

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I just popped back over to a forum I haven’t visited in a long time and ended up leaving a huge (for a message board) post of advice to a gal asking for info for a virgin bride.

The stuff I told her I have written at least twice before via e-mail to different people (didn’t save either time, *grumblegrumble* so I’ve had to rewrite it every time.)

Now I’m thinking about putting it here so when it (inevitably) comes up again, I won’t have to rewrite it, I’d just point to it.

At first I thought I’d be too embarrassed to do any such thing, but then, imagining I don’t have many readers (and most of those in the demographic I talk to about this stuff anyway), I figured the benefits would be worth the risks (hey, I’ve got a good spam filter).

Now, I don’t have a counter and I don’t know how many people actually stop by here regularly, so I’d be swayed by just a couple comments, but:

Who thinks I should put my “advice column” on my blog for linking to in the future?

(And, if I put it up, expect a lot of posts in a short amount of time to push it off the bottom.)

;o)

This could start a whole new “advice” category… hmmm….

Know Your Child

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Here is a good example of why you need to know your kid.

I found Wiley and the Hairy Man at the library and snagged it because I liked a telling I’d heard once, and wanted to look at the story.

Melody (2 1/2) got a hold of it, and because I didn’t want it to be too terrible too talk about (she might have already looked at the pictures) I decided reluctantly to read it to my girls.

Melody *latched* on to it. She wanted to hear it again and again.

If you’ve never heard of it, it’s about a boy who avoids getting captured by the Hairy Man (a wicked-looking snatcher) by using his wits and following his mother’s advice.

You may guess already these are themes I like my children to absorb.

In addition, the Hairy Man is twice gotten rid of by the arrival of Wiley’s hound dogs. And Melody and I will nod together that everybody is afraid of something– even scary somebodies.

One evening I had just finished telling someone why I choose to read that story to my kids when my mother, skimming the book said, “That’s a pretty creepy thing in there. That one ought to go back [to the library].”

I don’t think I contradict my mom that much (we agree on so much to begin with), but to this opinion I just said, “No, I have my uses for it,” and felt a sudden thrill at knowing both my own purposes and my daughter well enough to be confident I was making the right decision.

Practice as Service

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Writing to this blog does take time that could be spent on other, theoretically, productive things, and I have occasionally returned to the question of whether maintaining this site, basically for my own entertainment, it worth that time.

With all my commitments and desires and interests, everything I do continually comes back under scrutiny.

I look at things over and over again, determining why they’re in my life, and whether they are performing their intended function (it’s really easy to throw away magazines in this mood).

Several times this week I’ve used the analogy of a musician practicing scales, when I try to explain my writing, or why I write.

In themselves scales are not particularly beautiful music, and doing them isn’t even for anyone but the musician. But it is those daily exercises that provide the necessary familiarity with the instrument that enables him/her to be an accomplished musician.

My writing may, as I say, be solely for my own entertainment, but everything I do is honing my craft, and preparing me for my next piece.

I no longer question if this writing has value, because I am convinced it does.

Doubtless it was hours and days of David’s “diddly-dorking around” with a sling and stones that prepared him first for the lion and the bear, and ultimately for Goliath.

Practice is a form of faithful service.

It assumes that there is something worth preparing for (a word in season, for example), and rises to that call.

A Plea to Leave the Stories Alone

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Someone gave my kids a 3-pack of cheap paperback picture books for Christmas last year.

I have nothing against paperback books in general, and I’m not trying to say this person was cheap. I mean the quality of the books and the content itself was cheap.

Maybe the best way to say it is that these are the types of children’s books that are easy to write (ouch.) or, maybe worse, the type of book that’s only worth reading (or listening to) when very young.

I like what C.S. Lewis says in a number of different ways, and that, essentially, is that a children’s book only worth reading as a child is not really worth reading at all.

One of these books was a softened version of Hansel and Gretel. There were a number of changes made to make it more child-friendly, and what good I felt the original story could communicate was removed altogether.

The wicked step-mother and the hunger were entirely removed. The children were not abandoned by an endlessly (emotionally) battered father, but were simply lost. Hansel was not resourceful and protective of himself and his sister, merely curious or careless, letting the crumbs fall– and foolish too, imagining they would be there in the morning. (The original, you remember, had him using stones at first.)

When we got to the the witch was where my husband began to object. He has different ideas than me (our kids get a double wammy) of what wrecks a children’s story– traditional or otherwise.

Gretel knew the old woman was a witch because she made the children work ever so hard, carrying water and firewood. Whenever Jay was compelled to read the story (because we kept forgetting to make it disappear) he changed the wording to say the children were very good to help such an old woman with her heavy chores.

In the end, again, it isn’t the children’s cleverness or resourcefulness that “saves” them, but luck and the witch’s own clumsiness. And they find treasure somewhere as the house burns down around them and they bring it out with them. (Jay’s retelling always had the father scolding the children for not leaving the burning building at once).

I don’t even remember the original story having treasure at the end.

~ ~ ~

I like retellings, Just not when they change the essence of the story.

I like “age appropriate” versions of traditional tales. My 4-year-old doesn’t need to know yet that Snow White’s stepmother, the queen, wanted to eat her liver and lungs. It is enough that she wanted her dead.

My 2-year-old doesn’t need to know that a woman is being accused of eating her own children. That will not add anything to the story for her.

The stories were originally entertainment for adults, and it is only natural that some things should be softened or omitted when they are used as entertainment for children. But that doesn’t mean they should be changed to be “safe” by “modern” standards.

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Doing What We Really Want to Do (part 3)

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(Actually writing this down is a little embarrassing. It seems painfully obvious once it’s in print, but here ya go):

My final conclusion: I was right the first time (The second time too– but that wasn’t where I raised the question).

Barring other hardships, we really do do what we want to do. But, if you don’t get something done, that doesn’t have to mean it’s not at all important to you, or that you don’t care about it; it primarily means that you care about something else more.

~ ~ ~

This train of thought started with I’m Stuck, which I wrote after a Sunday School teachers’ meeting where I was fixated the idea that because I don’t do better/more preparation I must not want to. It made me feel that I must either be very undisciplined or simply not value my role of teaching the little children.

Neither of which I felt was quite accurate or fair.

In Getting Un-stuck, I shared a sort of “holding pattern” God led me to while my plane of thought (Oooo– I’m upgrading! Hmm, Or down? Anyway…) circled around to queue up for another attempt at a coherent landing.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Yesterday I sat down and made a list in one of those SAT, go-with-your-first- instinct sort of ways. Up to this point I think I was putting things into two categories (this is where the trouble in Stuck came from, I believe):

  1. Want to/important to me– I do.
  2. Not important to me/don’t want to do/not interested– I don’t do.

I felt an embarrassing sense that what was important or unimportant to me could be ascertained merely by looking at what I did and didn’t do.

And now I think that is only partially true.

Yesterday I suddenly had three categories (which, technically, was four categories, since I didn’t list anything from the above #2).

I began creating a more finely articulated hierarchy of priorities. Everything on the list was important to me, or I wouldn’t have put it there.

Sunday school came in at tier 3, which was utterly appropriate, even when I came back to think on it more.

  • Tier 1 had to do with our nuclear family, God, and my callings/ability.
  • Tier 2 was those things I’m primary responsible for and/or want to do. They make my daily life more rich and peaceful.
  • Tier 3 was where my periphery interests sit, and the things I do simply because they need to be done.

Jay asked, “So you really put teaching Sunday school lower than doing housework?”

“Well, yes,” I said (having my epiphany). “Home is supposed to come before outside ministry. Putting Sunday school in tier three didn’t lower teaching as much as it raised (emphasized) that housework sits at Tier 2.”

That was one of those needed-to-write-down-to-understand things.

I seem to have a lot of those… But at least I’ve got the mechanism down.

Friends

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The second half of my freshman year in college I had one of my most unique friendships, unlike anything before or since.

We were all the same age, and at the same level in our schooling, but beside that (and our faith in Jesus) we seemed to have little in common. We had different body-types, personalities, hobbies and majors.

I can’t remember now how we came to spend so much time together. It was bad for my Biorhythms (I learned with these friends to stay out late) and my Biology 106 grade, but good in every other way.

While staying up late we talked about what we’d read in our Bibles, discussing the scriptures and sharing thoughts about life and growing up. All that sorting out of life that begins snowballing in college? We hacked away at it in student housing, late into the night.

I still lived at home. I got my first curfew.

We all become like what we spend time with. This is why aspiring writers are told to spend time with good books.

I couldn’t understand was why my mom felt so reserved about this relationship when I knew it was doing so many neat things for me.

I admired the openhearted generosity and creativity of the one friend. I aspired to the intellectual honesty and self-discipline of the other. Both of them modeled a healthy disinterest in what others thought of them, something I struggled with. And I learned new (healthier) eating habits.

When I finally tried to explain it to my mother, I described the three of us us as colors: I was red, she was white, he was black; as different as we could be and still complementary and complete.

“But that’s the problem,” my mother said. “You’re so complete you don’t need anyone. What will you do if someone else comes along? There’s no room for anyone else.”

She might have been concerned that I wouldn’t feel a need to date while my intellectual and emotional needs were being so thoroughly met in a platonic relationship (I’ll have to ask her someday).

The statement got me thinking for the first time about how exclusive friendships are supposed to be.

I was so excited to finally have “best” friends, “in” jokes, and crazy shared memories, I was not thinking past us.

(In our own defense we did include a fourth person, and more, several times in our adventures– one a story for another time– but the question still stood.)

That friendship “broke-up” within a year, due to travel and shifts in interests and life-foci.

For a long time I missed what we shared more than I missed the individuals themselves (we still saw each other around). The camaraderie was gone. I mourned its passing and seeing once-intimate friends dissolve into mere acquaintances.

My mother, once again my only confidant, listened to me articulate my disappointment. It had a lot to do with time invested and memories grown, and how it seemed I as the only one they mattered to any more.

“You are going to love being married,” Mom said. “You have a best-friend to share everything with– build memories with– and they never go away.”

And she was right.

Congratulations, Lance Mackey!

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I know this isn’t anything like a sports blog, but this is so neat I wanted to share. My husband and I are ridiculously proud of Mackey’s achievement, considering we don’t actually know him personally.

Lance Mackey has become the first “double crown” winner in distance sled dog racing, winning both the Quest and the Iditarod in the same year. Some said it couldn’t be done, that there wasn’t enough time between races for the dogs to recover adequately.

One newspaper article quoted Mackey saying that he really didn’t push his dogs very hard on the Quest, that it was more of a training run for the Iditarod.

Twelve days after winning the 1,000-mile Yukon Quest in record time, he reharnessed 13 out of those 16 winning dogs and plunged into the 1,100-mile Iditarod. (He finished with a smaller team, and said eight of those nine dogs were in the Quest).

To cap it all, he is the third member of his family to win the Iditarod, third under bib 13, and the third to win on his 6th attempt.

After a battle with cancer.

The Fairbanks paper called him “Lance Dog-strong” today.

It’s probably as silly as being proud of watching your favorite team win the Super-Bowl in an under-dog, Disney way (it’s the folks on the team who did all the work, after all) but we are excited with him for his victory.

Congratulations, Lance Mackey! We are very proud of your achievement. (And if you decide you want a local co-author for your sure-to-be-coming book deal, well, I could probably help you out– my husband’s a big fan )