Epiphanies and Uncertainties

Phoenix is always a strange place to be around this time of year. Some trees are dropping their leaves. Perhaps it finally grew cold enough at the end of December to inspire them to shed the glory of last year. Still, with this weather it is nearly always a good day in winter to go to the park. Why, I just recently enjoyed a hot afternoon hike with my children beneath the January sun!

Did you know the Christmas season ended for us Catholics yesterday with the The Baptism of Our Lord? I was going to get a few more carols strummed on my guitar last evening and ended up looking at photo albums instead. The pictures of our little children playing in this house and yard that we no longer own made me wistful. Our family is experiencing a time of transition and uncertainty.

I have so many emotions lately! That is always true with me, I'm afraid, though I am trying harder not to be led by my feelings and not to let them spill forth from my mouth - that is my perpetual resolution for self-improvement, and I don't need a fresh year to remind me of it.

Aside from emotions I had many small revelations and minor disappointments this past Christmas season. This last Sunday was the feast of the Epiphany commemorating the visit of the Three Wise Men and the revelation of the Messiah to the Gentiles. Epiphany is a great feast and an important one to me. I love the story of the wise men. I am grateful to be a Gentile who has seen the light. But this last feast day found me not altogether happy with every change that has occurred in our family life these past months nor entirely without fear when I try to plan for our future. Where will our own star lead us?

On a more frivolous note, because I am currently employed in retail and often work weekends, I was unable to have friends over or prepare all the usual yeast breads, cakes, and gingerbread camel cookies that I typically do, and I may have even cried about it - mostly because I just really wanted some homemade bread to stuff in my face while spending time with people I love!

On the way home from work that evening I found Rosca de Reyes at Walmart to serve my family for the special occasion, and I played We Three Kings and O Holy Night on my guitar at the dinner table. It was still a celebration, just not the one I hoped to have. Yet, my oldest son Berto made sugar camel cookies all by himself for the family, for me. He also, with Papa's help, made the cookies for Santa this year, and can you imagine how proud these efforts made me? They were very good cookies, too.

Beyond the revelation that my son may enjoy baking like me, I had other important epiphanies this past December.

While preparing one morning to read at church for the fourth Sunday of Advent, I read the Gospel passage where Gabriel visits Zechariah and greets him thus:

Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall name him John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord.

Zechariah later responds:

How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years.

Then Gabriel replies:

I am Gabriel, who stand before God. I was sent to speak to you and to announce this good news. But now you will be speechless and unable to talk until the day these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled at their proper time.

Never before had I been so fascinated with this passage! Often have I overlooked it in favor of that greater announcement that Gabriel makes to a young woman named Mary, but several things struck me quite powerfully this time. Why, oh why, did Zechariah question the answer to his prayer, no doubt a prayer that he made fervently and doggedly for years in hope of God's reply? Could it be that by the time Gabriel visited Zechariah, Zechariah had long since given up on this prayer, on uttering his pleas, and resigned himself to God's silence or a definitive "no" from the Most High? Why else argue with an angel, God's messenger? For Gabriel specifically said, "your prayer has been heard"?

I don't know the answer, but I find the whole thing very, very interesting, and as someone who has sometimes felt like God's 11th hour baby - haven't we all? - when it comes to prayer life, it bolsters my faith - and also encourages me not to argue with God's messengers when they come at their proper time.

The other small revelation I had came from a conversation I had with my friend Dana. We were speaking about the suffering we see in the world, and she brought up that old saying, "God doesn't give you more than you can handle". Dana added something like this: "But he gives you right up to that limit." 

I told her I felt the saying was trite and added, " Sometimes I see people, and I think they have more than they can handle."

Later in the car - again on the way to or from work - I was thinking about my own response and feeling a little appalled by my own cynicism. My speech was not hopeful or encouraging, probably because my family was having a rough few days - mostly my fault, I must say. In the car it occurred to me that, yes, perhaps that old saying did need a bit of editing but it was not to be discarded like stale dessert, for if one just adds a few more words, I think it makes sense to me:

God doesn't give you more than you can handle [with His grace].

Three times I begged the Lord about this, that it might leave me, but he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness." I will rather boast most gladly of my weaknesses, in order that the power of Christ may dwell with me.  2 Corinthians 12:8-9

Unanswered and Grateful

Gratitude can be found in unlikely places:

One can feel it while sitting in a chapel and listening to a fellow volunteer explain the Gospel parable to children, hoping to gain new insight, too.

One can experience it while watching bees hum around a honeysuckle bush that produced more reddish-orange blooms in a week than it has in a year.

One might find it in the simple yet challenging endeavor of winding pliable Eucalyptus branches around and through each other to form a wild wreath, however strange and ill-proportioned it may appear to visitors on your door.

Ironically, it can also be found in a change of circumstances that, on the surface, seems bad and unsettling.

And it can certainly be found, just like that classic Garth Brooks' song claims, in unanswered prayers.

Throughout this past summer and fall I thought the thing I really wanted was a new home for my family. I prayed diligently for God to guide us to the house that best suited us in the right location - not too far from work, church, schools and friends.

I walked into place after place and got discouraged. Often I didn't understand why I couldn't like a house. They were nice, but they elicited nothing from me save ambivalence. I kept praying, and - at last! - we encountered a house that felt immediately like home to me. I was so excited that I trembled as I texted my husband. It had the perfect rooms for our children, the ideal spaces to entertain friends and family. Unfortunately, it wasn't in the best location for schooling. We hesitated, and someone else made an offer while we were debating and sorting out the details.

Then another house, completely different from the first one we loved, came on the picture a few weeks later. It felt more like home than the first, seemed a better fit. As we quickly made our offer, however, other offers were coming in, and another family was blessed with that home.

So we toured more homes that made me feel uninspired, including one quirky one in a nice neighborhood in the right location that we didn't make an offer on because I was indifferent to its charms. Boy, was I being difficult!

Yet now I am grateful for the indecisiveness that resulted from my perplexing feelings.

Two days after Halloween we received some news that altered our circumstances; it could logically be perceived as an upsetting and unsettling change in our fortunes.

No longer could we continue to shop for houses. We needed to adjust.

My first emotions about this news were surprise and sadness at the conclusion of a long, important, and mostly fulfilling episode in our family's life. The news wasn't a complete shock, but it was of such a nature to make one take a step back to evaluate the future.

As for the house hunting? I was glad it was over! I was relieved!

It is always surprisingly refreshing to receive a slap in the face that reminds you of what's truly important to you in life. The larger, nicer home? Not so important to me it turns out. All that anxiety, all that discouragement for nothing. My faith is tried by silly things. Family, love, health and security - those really matter. Home is truly where the heart is. God didn't answer our persistent pleas, but now I understand why. Thank God for unanswered prayers. I cannot imagine the stress my family would feel at this juncture if we had gotten that big home we desired, that I desired for my family.

There was another feeling, too, that rushed in upon the heels of surprise, sorrow, and relief.

It was excitement. Perhaps a slightly inappropriate emotion to feel at the time, I definitely felt it. If the river suddenly changes course, one must anticipate adventure.

This change has come in Autumn, not the most auspicious time of year in which to face a drastic change in circumstances, but we have desired this kind of change for a while. It just came about in a more urgent way than expected, but I am resolutely - may God help me not to waiver - anticipating growth and opportunity to spring forth.

Lastly, though it is entirely secondary to more important considerations for my man and our kids, a most welcome opportunity for me followed the cease and desist of home shopping.

I got to write again.

I realized as I cried with joy the first day I earnestly played with words - not just spinning sentences in my head but actually putting paragraphs and ideas down - that no beautiful home could make me as happy as writing can, particularly writing on my book.

As I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving, these are the things for which I am personally grateful: unanswered prayers; another Thanksgiving and Christmas spent in the only home my kids remember; brave, new horizons, diverse opportunities, and wide open possibilities; and a chance to renew the pursuit of my passion.

May we all be blessed with a well-timed slap in the face occasionally in order to realize what we really value! And may we learn to, not just embrace, but squeeze the life out of change.

Preach to the choir

I met a prayer prophet.

At least that's what I called her, a new friend who is the mother of my son's soccer friend.

She was telling me at soccer practice how grateful she was that while having her family in town from Colombia these past few months, there had been very few misunderstandings and hurt feelings. Occasionally, disagreements had arisen, but she credited prayer in preventing them from getting overblown and causing lasting tension.

She got teary-eyed as she told me that she and her mother are spending as much of their remaining time together as possible, enjoying all they can. 

Then she confided that her mom had seriously misunderstood the meaning behind her words once. They had an argument, and my new friend told her mother to please go, pray and ask the Holy Spirit for guidance, and if after prayer she still wanted to be mad, she could be.

"Do you think I would bring you all this way to my home just to make you suffer?" she asked her mom.

The situation was soon rectified.

"I think everything works out right with prayer," my friend told me. "Just prayer, prayer, prayer in everything."

On that evening that was something I needed to hear. Honestly, I feel God gave my friend the opportunity to tell me that precisely, to be a prayer prophet for me. And it wasn't a topic I had even suggested, but it led to a message I recognized.

I pray; I throw up thoughts to God sporadically throughout the day. Thank you. Thank you! Come with your mercy. Protect my family. Bless this person, Father. Help me! Forgive me. Guide me. Hold my hand.

So my friend was preaching to the choir, really. But this choir member was struggling anew with an old problem and had become weary of praying about it, had forgotten the grace and power of prayer. 

I think preaching to the choir is too often slammed as a resounding gong that does nothing, stirs no one and imparts no aid in the fight to be better human beings.

But is the choir perfect? Is their harmony so sublime already that improvement is impossible?

Preaching to the choir is still preaching, and if done with God's help, is effective and stirring and energizing. Because sometimes the choir has fallen asleep. Or the back row is gossiping while the front row is self-righteously pretending not to listen. Sometimes every single last person in that choir is bent over their phone playing a game, wasting time and effort on distractions and cheap rewards. Sometimes the choir is sulking because they don't get to sing the hymns they like today. Or they're singing mechanically, because they have been doing it for so long, they forgot why they loved to sing and glorify in the first place.

Preaching to the choir is very necessary sometimes, I think, and I have been thinking about it a great deal lately, because I have lately had people preach to me and have been truly very grateful. May no one ever say that Hillary is past the point of accepting and welcoming and reflecting on others' preaching!

After all, we live in community to share wisdom with each other, to share joy, love and hope and to say, "Soldier on! I'm coming, too." Or the never obsolete words: "You're not alone. I've struggled. But now I'm here to help carry you forward with my encouragement."

The choir needs encouragement, too. The choir needs each other and needs a good preacher (not always the same person from moment to moment). The choir needs, every so often, one member to stand up on a dreary day and belt out Amazing Grace with such beauty and truth that everyone is fortified and renewed, 

Praying

I used to hear about people who spent their whole lives in one small community, on one tiny parcel of the earth, working and praying, praying, their days away in mostly silence.

And I thought, What good is that?

How on earth can you help this world if you are cloistered with like-minded people? How is that working for the common good to hide yourself and your talents away?

I'm a little wiser now, and though I do not at all believe this is the only way to serve the way of truth, hope, love and life, I now believe it is one excellent way.

I don't think for one moment that I am the only one who has underestimated the power of prayer. Of silence. Of contemplation. But because I am naturally a restless person who detests sitting for too long, perhaps I have been more prone to underestimate it. My prayer reminds me of my son Berto"s gesture when the priest asks us to lift up our hearts, and we pronounce at Mass, "We lift them up to the Lord," and we all raise our hands palm up. For a while it was like Berto was tossing God a football with how quickly he threw up his hands and then dropped them: "Here! Catch my heart, God!" It made me smile. So, too, my prayer. I toss God footballs several times a day, prayers for that homeless man or my sick relative or of my desperate need for some spiritual buttresses to be erected posthaste. And I believe with all my heart that God catches those erratic balls, because my words are fervent. Well, most of the time.

I cannot imagine, however, really getting down deep with God in prayer. For an hour or more, for hours each day in and out of Mass. And, yet, I think how marvelous would be the results of such efforts, because prayer is, as my parish priest said recently, our act of being in the presence of God. Even if we nod off while doing it, it is our endeavor to walk and sit in his presence, to hold his hand, and to accept some real nourishment. What might we learn about ourselves if we made that decision more often, if we were very still and knew that he was God?

So I no longer think shallowly about contemplative lives. If I am honest with you, I think a community of nuns or monks praying for this world is doing a great deal more for us than all the words of politicians could ever do. I even think now - and this is shocking to me - that a community in God's presence by the exertion of their own free will on a routine basis, asking for his grace and love and guidance to be poured out upon us, can move more mountains than many actions.

But then we see the connectivity, don't we? For some of us life in a small community praying is our service to mankind, and for some of us the work in this fractured world to be God's physical instruments of peace is ours. The two ignite each other in faith, and God weaves us together, helping us bear good fruit.

photo by Daniel Hylton

Today I said a rosary for France. It is a very Catholic thing to do, I know, but something I rarely do. I only meditate in this way when I am rocked by some great tragedy and realize that I need to really pray deeply, to do something more than usual to let my Heavenly Father know that I care and want to help and that we all need a heaping helping of faith, hope and love from His table.

I say rosaries when I am aching for others.

So I am praying. I know many of you are praying. And we know prayer is more than general good vibes. Prayer is standing in the presence of our loving Father with all our might.


"I want to be only a poor friar who prays...Pray, hope and don't worry. Worry is useless. God is merciful and will hear your prayer...Prayer is the best weapon we have; it is the key to God's heart. You must speak to Jesus not only with your lips, but with your heart. In fact on certain occasions you should only speak to Him with your heart." - Padre Pio

"Everyone of us needs half an hour of prayer each day, except when we are busy - then we need an hour." - St. Frances de Sales

"For me, prayer is an aspiration of the heart, it is a simple glance directed to heaven, it is a cry of gratitude and love in the midst of trial as well as joy..." - St. Therese of Lisieux


Then he told them a parable about the necessity for them to pray always without becoming weary. He said, There was a judge in a certain town who neither feared God nor respected any human being. And a widow in that town used to come to him and say, 'Render a just decision for me against my adversary.' For a long time the judge was unwilling, but eventually he thought, 'While it is true that I neither fear God nor respect any human being, because this widow keeps bothering me I shall deliver a just decision for her lest she finally come and strike me.' " The Lord said, "Pay attention to what the dishonest judge says. Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who call out to him day and night? Will he be slow to answer them? I tell you, he will see that justice is done speedily. But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" Luke 18:1-8

Walking with Dogs, Angels

I see people walking their dogs on my drive home from taking the kids to school, and I think, How can they do that? Aren't they scared?"

Yet walking is my preferred form of exercise. I used to love to walk my dog, though I was always nervous when large dogs barked and lunged at gates as we passed.

Then one day while passing a house, a pit bull or boxer mix ran out and attacked our dog, Taz. Danny, my little boy, was with us on his scooter. I yelled at him to ignore the dog and to stay away, and he cried as he watched the big dog grab our terrier by the neck and shake him in its mouth twice, maybe three times. I thought Taz was going to be killed, and that my little son would have that terrible memory of watching his pet being throttled to death. The lady who ran after the big dog did not know how to control it and did very little except to squirt water from a bottle onto its muscalur neck. Then she asked me to pick up my own dog. I am ashamed to say that I didn't want to, terrified that her animal would turn on me. When I finally grabbed Taz, the larger dog stalked us, eyes concentrated on my poor furry friend. I told Danny to go ahead of us, to keep his distance, but at one point, as the other animal still trailed us, I looked around, rotating, and cried aloud, "Where can we go? Where can we go?"

I was not very brave, and later I agonized over how well I protected Danny by merely telling him to stay away from Taz and me and the other dog. I also wondered why, in situations where I find myself controlled by fear, I do not cry out silently to God for guidance. For I have asked him for guidance in other situations, and often his answer has been instantaneous.

However, with my wail of, Where can we go?,  there came an answer. Two good Samaritans, male neighbors of the woman, showed up. One had a garden rake or broom in his hand, and he used it to keep the dog away from us. Then he brusquely told the woman to grab the dog by his collar. As she did so I wondered why neither of us had thought of that. I wondered for no more than a moment, though, because I was busy telling Danny to go quickly on the scooter to stay ahead of me as we made our retreat. Sobbing, I did turn my head as we went, and threw several garbled thank yous back at those gentlemen.

Our dog survived that attack, and as I bathed him that morning, I did not even find the blood and lacerations I was fully expecting. I can only think that his long hair and collar offered protection. I was a bit of a mess as I told my husband of the events and later a close friend on the phone.

We never ventured down that street again. Trying to walk my dog after that, I kept a golf club close at my side, but the excursions became successively shorter and closer to home. I was terrified of another incident and became even more fearful for my children's safety, something with which I already struggle a great deal. Several homes in the neighborhood have large dogs who are kept confined much of the time, making them aggressive I suspect.

Nevertheless, our dog still desires walks, and he would prefer it if we actually journeyed more than a few yards each way down our street.

One Sunday I caved in when my kids begged to take Taz on a walk. My husband opted out; walks bore him. I wanted him to come, because fear holds little sway with him, but I comforted myself that Berto, my big twelve-year-old boy, had more than triple my courage in hairy situations.

The loop around the block went alright until we got down the main drag and saw a little black dog running free. Our Taz goes spastic in the presence of cats or other dogs, so I picked him up in order to avoid even the smallest fight. As we rounded the corner onto our street, we no longer saw the other critter, but I still nervously scanned the road as I cradled Taz in my arms. Then just as we passed a home with an open gate, a pit bull charged out at us.

Fear grabs me by the neck in such cases, making my eyes bulge as everything seems to happen simultaneously at lightning speed and agonizingly slow. Foolish woman, I had been walking too fast in my anxiety and was ahead of all my children, though not much. I turned and saw the animal brush past my kids, and I thought clearly, He is going to bite one of my children!

Out of the corner of my eye I saw someone off to the left on a bike, someone we had not seen on the street when we turned. The dog charged the person and then without any perceivable cause abruptly turned tail and ran back inside the gate.

I was already telling my children to come NOW! Ella took off on her scooter. Daniel was fumbling with his, so I told him to leave it; we would come back, and I grabbed his little wrist in a vice grip and trotted with him toward the house. Ana followed us close behind, and Berto grabbed the scooter and brought up our rear, holding the metal toy at the ready.

The dog never came back out. Daniel rebelled against my propulsion.

"You're hurting me, Mama!" he cried. I hadn't meant to, but I was desperate not to let my littlest one be in another scary situation.

As for the biker, our friend, he came slowly behind us, an empty baby trailer attached to his bike. Realizing his pace and that he was basically securing our escape, I turned and said breathlessly, "Thank you for being braver than I am."

He responded by saying he was glad he was there.

Ella said, "That was a pit bull, wasn't it?"

He nodded. "It doesn't help the perceptions people have about them, huh?"

We were at our house, and he paused at the sidewalk by our property and said, "My buddy lives there. I need to tell him about that." He pulled out his cellphone and gazed at it for a moment. I thanked him again, and then the kids, Taz and I went inside and started spilling the story to Matthew. I pulled back the curtain as I told him of the man, but he was already gone. Again, as always, I agonized aloud over how quickly I had reacted, how I could have better protected my kids. Gratefully, I turned to Berto and thanked him for keeping a cool head and bringing up the rear, protecting his siblings. I scolded Matthew for not coming with us. He responded that I needed to let it go; we were safe, and there was no use in beating the subject to death.

Late that night I lay awake in bed thinking about the strangeness of the morning's encounter: how we didn't notice the bicyclist on the street until after we saw the dog ---(Did he come from the other direction? Where did he come from?)---; how neither the pit bull nor Taz made any noise at each other; how the pit bull inexplicably ran back inside the fence after confronting the man on the bike; how I never heard the bicyclist shout anything at that muscular animal to frighten it; how the dog never ventured back out as we walked the remaining several yards down the street even though the gate stood gaping, and we were a noisy, anxious bunch; and how the man followed us with his empty baby trailer to our home and paused as we went in.

I also reflected on how my prayers for my children had changed since our car accident a few years ago. I felt at the time that their angels kept them completely free from harm, and that changed my prayers. I began not simply to pray to God for his protection over my kids' each day but to pray more specifically that their angels would walk with, watch over, and guard them.

Was that man one of those guardian angels? Laugh if you like. My husband looked as if he thought it wasn't a sound idea when I confided in him the next morning....and yet after the man supposedly called his "buddy", the yard gate still remained open that whole day.

Yes, I know. He probably wasn't a supernatural being, but I think of him often with gratitude, because I do not doubt one bit that, angel or no, his presence at that moment on a Sunday morning made a big difference for my family.


Some time ago a priest asked me to compose a personal prayer for peace, because he rightly discerned, I think, that I am often restless, passionate, and fearful - controlled by my emotions. I liked his idea, so I built one from several Scripture passages that had spoken to me reassuringly. This was that prayer, and I pray it or some form of it often when my emotions hold too great a sway over me or my fears nag me with a plague of ugly pictures:

Where sin increased Grace overflowed all the more

Lord Jesus, give me your peace

Let not my heart be troubled

Neither let it be afraid

But send the Holy Spirit

To give me courage

In every circumstance

Amen

Offering It Up for Dad

On that day, as evening drew on, he said to them, "Let us cross to the other side." Leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat just as he was. And other boats were with him. A violent squall came up and waves were breaking over the boat, so that it was already filling up. Jesus was in the stern, asleep on a cushion. They woke him and said to him, "Teacher do you not care that we are perishing?" He woke up, rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, "Quiet! Be still!" The wind ceased and there was great calm. Then he asked them, "Why are you terrified? Do you not yet have faith?" They were filled with great awe and said to one another, "Who then is this whom even wind and sea obey?"

Mark 4:35-41 (NAB)

What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?

No, in all these things we conquer overwhelmingly through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:35, 37-39 (NAB)



I have been very worried about my dad. In March he had a terrible fall - just from standing up too suddenly after crouching on the floor to watch his grandson play. When he regained consciousness and the paramedics were called, it was obvious he had broken both his jaw and nose, broken teeth and had bitten his bottom lip nearly off. He was a little disoriented and probably suffered a concussion, but he refused to go to the hospital - just like that time in Tennessee when he was bitten by a copperhead on the foot.

Since then, it seems like it has been one thing after another for Dad - all while trying to finish the last book in his Kelven's Riddle series. He was ill in May with a serious ear infection. When he came to visit our family in early June, he had a lingering headache from his fall and then got terrible nausea and a fever from some kind of virus. He became sick with a bad cold during our trip to San Saba, Texas for my sister Annie's wedding, and just this past month during a visit with his family in Idaho, that headache grew and exploded until he endured a miserable flight home and then didn't get in to see a doctor until more than three days later. Now he is suffering from an acute bacterial infection of the head and neck.

My sister Vinca, who saw how sick Papa was in Idaho and has been very troubled, called to give me an update yesterday, for which I am so grateful. I didn't know how ill he was. Dad's immune system has been wrecked by all the assaults on it, so he can't see anybody, on doctor's orders, but Mom for two-three months at least. Talking on the phone is excruciating for him, because his ears are in terrible pain.

I can't physically do anything to help, can't even talk to him to gain reassurance for my own selfish comfort. It is my lot to worry. Yet I can't just fret and agonize and do nothing at all.

Yesterday, I offered it up in prayers. I offered it up. My worry is nothing compared to the suffering of my dad these several months, but if anyone can use all this anxiety, this sorrow, this regret and this love I feel to help Dad, it is Jesus.

I'm not expressing this well at all. I had never encountered the idea of offering it up before a few years ago, but I like it. I like to think that if I give something to Jesus Christ - no matter how little - to use to help heal someone I dearly, dearly love, that he won't turn me down, that he'll let me help in this small way, uniting myself with His love for that person, with His love for Dad.

Pray for my dad, Daniel, please if you would. God bless you, friends, and thank you.

A Friendly Answer

God hears prayers. I was reminded of that.

He may not always answer. As I told friends recently after seeing the movie Contagion, I feel sometimes as if I'm pounding on a cold stone door three feet thick, that the mail's not running, no messages are getting through, and the gate is barred behind me as I leave the grounds dejectedly....but he hears. I've had answers given before, one of them hand-delivered with a crystal-clear rebuke. So I leave my request parceled on the doorstep, tape a sign to the door, come back and rattle the doorknob occasionally, call out a resounding Hello! that echoes back to me in a thousand different tones of perplexity, frustration, reverence and inquiry. Then I shuffle down the path to keep my neglected patience company, peering over my shoulder in hopes of catching a glimpse of God.

My dear friend Camille's move to a different state last week reminded me of answers given. In saying goodbyes, her husband mentioned how fortunate it was that we had all met in the social hall of our church one Sunday seven years ago.

"I was praying very hard for friends then," I replied passionately.

That is absolutely true, though perhaps pathetic. When I met Camille, I had no friends in this dusty town to talk to. I was raising two fresh whippersnappers; I needed support, fellow women to converse with about my experiences, to share advice, laughter, tears.

Of course, God helps those who help themselves, so when I saw my opportunity, I pounced on it. Literally and not gracefully, I'm embarrassed to say. I saw Camille, elegantly-dressed and with a kind, friendly face, and I heard her mention to an older couple that she sang in a touring opera company. The words had barely escaped and the couple had hardly a chance to acknowledge them when I sprang toward her like a lonely Jack-in-the-box. With wide-eyed desperation, I exclaimed lamely but passionately, "I love opera!"

Another person would have given me a short response, a false smile and turned away, but Camille, though a little startled, chatted with me and gave me a card with her cell phone number, telling me we could get coffee sometime.

It would be a long while before we got that coffee, but we began to greet each other with a smile and pleasantries whenever we met. A few months later, after a Mom's Group I had started in our parish began to blossom (and bless me with the friendship of several lovely, intelligent women), I saw Camille walking out of church as we were waiting to baptize our little girl. She was pregnant. I congratulated her warmly.

"Did you ever start that Mom's Group?" she asked eagerly.

The rest of the story is history, as they say. Since that first Mom's Group meeting to which she brought her infant son and for seven years now we have watched each other's children grow. We have shared faith, tea, countless pastries (we both have a compulsive baking disorder, though hers often yields mind-numbingly yummy results), and time with friends. We have talked about sleep deprivation, nursing, beautiful moments of parental bliss, mommy regrets, history, our personal artistic endeavors, and, of course, God. I could always talk long to my friend about God, and in doing so feel that she truly was a friend given to me through faith. Camille and I became such good friends these past several years, and however it may sound to an outsider, I believe we were both in the social hall that day because God knew we could.

Now that we no longer live close, I find myself unusually grateful for a world that is riddled with cellphones and bubble-gummy social media.

And even though today she's a thousand plus miles to the northwest, even though I've recently felt as if I were prowling outside God's gate in the dark waiting for some guidance, I can reflect with gratitiude on the friendship I was given and remember through it the prayers that are answered.

Go pray in the field, and be persistent

I am currently reading Anne of Green Gables to my two oldest, and in the book Anne confesses to her new adoptive mother that she does not say nightly prayers, essentially because God gave her red hair "on purpose", and she resents it. But Anne also points out that if she were to pray, she would go into a field alone or a forest somewhere and look up, up, up....and let the prayer come to her.

This brought back a childhood memory, or, rather, a string of them. I told my children that in Tennessee, I did use to go into the cornfield or near the edge of the woods to pray in the evening before bedtime. It was usually summer and during twilight when the whippoorwills' calls pierced the fog about the hills and woods. As I stood in the uneven soil of the field or dropped to my knees and began Our Father, I felt closer to God than I would have if shut up inside.

There were also evenings when I'd sit in an old lawn chair by Freddy's grave just below my bedroom window, the light spilling across my lap. Freddy, you see, was a big floppy-eared black rabbit whom I loved very much. He died too young - even for a rabbit, but I sat by his grave often, twirling my favorite walking stick in my hands. And in sitting by Freddy's grave in prayer, I felt closer to the One who had made my dear little friend.

After sharing this with them, we were led into a discussion of the importance of persistent prayer - not only as a means of asking and receiving, but as a way of seeking your Creator often and being humble before him.

"And it's very important to thank God for your blessings," I added. "Because in doing so, you'll become more aware of just how truly blessed you are. Do you know what I say in many of my prayers?"

"Amen?"

"Well, yes...but, no, I say 'thank you, Father, for all we are blessed and provided with'."

I didn't add that I always thanked Him for their Papa and for each of them, too.

"I know; I know," said Berto, his eyes growing wide and lighting up. "I've heard you say that at dinner."

"Mama, do I pray enough?" asked Ana, her eyes growing misty.

Well, dang, I wasn't trying to make it a chore, a burden or a schooling in guilt. I was trying to convey the strength you get when consistently seeking your Father.

"Yes, Ana. We pray together at church, don't we? And during the school year, we say Our Father on the way to school each morning. Look, God simply wants to hear from you, so it can be as simple as saying at bedtime, "Father, I love you and thank you for my friends and family and toys and home. Amen.' Just remember to talk to Him often, and to ask for His guidance when you're older."


Proverbs 8:17 I love them that love me; and those that seek me early shall find me

Psalms 27: 8 When you said, Seek you my face; my heart said unto you, Thy face, Lord, will I seek.

Dad Steps on one and Mom Beheads another (anniversary repost of the week)

While pulling weeds with my eldest girl in the yard this morning I was reminded of a summer in my childhood when my siblings and I were supposed to be helping our lovely mother in the vegetable garden. We were lazin' about, of course, and while we were thus engaged, Mama encountered something that gave her a real fright. But, of course, that story cannot be told without setting down first the very scary incident of Dad's encounter with a similar cold-blooded creature.

This was a story I always wanted to tell, and I think I did it justice.


I will embrace this summer, destined to be terrible like any Arizona summer, by indulging in summer memories from the past. Those that are foremost in my mind at the moment involve, of all things, snakes.

My brother Nate and I used to sneak up on the garden variety to touch their slippery skins until they ejected their forked tongues at us. Our brave lab Reuben attacked even the venomous kind, rattlesnakes and copperheads, with vigor in the cornfield and woods - barking, circling and lunging. Twice he was bitten, and he would forever have the bare patches of fur as proof of battle.

The scariest encounter happened early one summer. We kids were swimming in the creek in the afternoon. There was a massive old tree which bent its limbs over the water. From one sturdy limb Dad had hung an old barge rope. When we weren't taking turns using it to launch ourselves into the water, we were having dog paddle races in the gentle current or adding rocks to the dam we'd built to deepen our swimming hole.

My parents came home early that day. We saw the car cross the culvert, barreling toward home. This was the first unusual incident, for Mom and Dad often stopped the car at the creek, especially if we kids were there, and they'd lie down in the shallows to cool off after a hot sweaty day in the woods.

We kids abandoned the cool water, jumping the spring as we followed the creek path before climbing to the road and dripping a trail down the dirt lane. As we rounded the corner by the mailbox, we were surprised to see our parents still by the car. And Dad was in the passenger seat. This was a new alarm; Mom never drove. That and the fact that Dad's face was a shade we'd never seen before as he leaned his head against the open car door told us something was very wrong. We all four ran to his side, our words and our limbs becoming tangled. He responded to this onslaught by asking us weakly to back up and give him space.

It was Mom who said in a strained voice, "Your dad was bitten by a copperhead."

The inevitable questions erupted from us in panic. "Is Dad going to die? Why isn't Dad at the hospital?"

Mom's big brown eyes were alarming in size, the rest of her face pinched by stress. Dad finally cut through the tears and mounting fear by saying in a firm if weakened voice, "I'm not going to die. Help me inside the house."

Once inside Dad cut the boot off his foot. There was nothing else to do; the foot was swollen to twice its size. We kids watched in anxious fascination as Dad laboriously pushed the sock down, his face tight with pain. When he finally collapsed against the couch, sweating from the effort, the foot was revealed to us: mottled with various shades of red and blue that had spread up his leg.

It was my brother Nate who spotted the fang marks. "Look!" he cried, pointing to the top of the foot. "I found where it got you, Dad!"

We all bent over the two tiny white marks.

"That's it, alright," said Dad. "Now someone turn down that air conditioner. I'm burning up."

That night I woke up to the sound of someone being sick in the bathroom. We kids straggled out to the living room where we found Dad sweating and miserable by the air conditioner. Mom was urging him to drink a tall glass of water, her cure for everything.

"Kids, go back to bed. There's nothing you can do," said Dad in a low voice.

But we didn't, because we didn't fully trust Dad's assurances that he wasn't going to die. He was shaking and sweating badly; we had to keep watch over him.

For two grueling days my dad suffered from recurring fever and vomiting induced by the venom. On the third morning he got ready for work despite Mom's objections. It took quite a lot of duck tape to secure his work boot to his swollen foot that morning. Every day he had to rewrap the shoe as he prepared for the woods, but he recovered as he said he would.

We learned the story by and by. As I have said my parents worked in the woods for a living. While they hunted for valuable roots to dig, Dad always walked ahead of our mother. This time he stepped over a large decaying log, breaking his own rule about looking before proceeding. The prick on his foot was virtually instantaneous. Luckily, Dad recognized the copperhead pattern on the snake's back as it slithered away, but the burning heat that surged through his foot quickly spread up his leg even as he stood in a nearby creek to gain relief from the painful sensation.

Dad knew copperheads are rarely fatal, so he resisted Mom's urgent demands that they go straight to a hospital. But we prayed, too, and prayer is powerful.

****************************

Dad's experience explains the enormity of my mother's reaction to her own confrontation with a slithering reptile. The image of Dad stepping over the log and saying, "Honey, I think I just got bit," and his subsequent misery were no doubt still fresh as Mom knelt in our family garden later that summer, tending the bean plants and unaware that she had company.

I feel some guilt in the telling of this episode, for I remember our dad adjuring my siblings and I to help her before he left to work a neighbor's farm.

We kids were being particularly unproductive, listening to music and rocking on the couch or the floor in a general state of ennui when Mom burst open our front door and said, "Oh, s--t! There's a copperhead in the garden!"

All four of us froze in horror, not because of the presence of a snake in the garden, but because of the word which had escaped our virtuous mother's lips. It was Vinca who finally stuttered, "Wha-waa-what did you say?"

Mom omitted the word and cut straight to the point before adding in wide-eyed frenzy, "I need something...anything! I've got to kill it!"

It was very unfortunate that Mom spotted the rifle on the living room shelf. She ran out of the house with it and the ammunition before we could prevent her. Nate was close on her heels, however, urging her to let him shoot it (he was a good shot and had actually handled it before).

"Stand back, all of you!" she ordered.

After promptly doing so, we kids watched as our mother blasted not only the bean plants, but the corn and tomatoes as well. Upon inspection, the snake was found to be unscathed.

Having depleted the sparse ammunition, Mom yelled desperately, "Get me rocks! Bring me rocks! I need something to throw at it!"

My sister Annie dragged an enormous rock from the flower bed wall, laughing and winking at me and Nate as she lugged it between her legs. Our mother, still powered by adrenaline, lifted the considerable weight over her head and hurled it like She-Woman in the general direction of the bean plants.

But the snake, not surprisingly, survived the bombardment of stones, though it had lost much of its cover. Our flattened garden was a sad testimony to the presence of the iniquitous reptile that had, despite the assault, hardly moved from its original position. Mom decided the time had come for close combat. She marched to the side of the house, grabbed the hoe propped there and returned to the very place where she had first discovered the copperhead while kneeling in its proximity. She then did what she should have done at the first by quickly and precisely chopping off its head.

By the time Dad returned home that evening, our mother was her usual calm and ladylike self, and we kids were impatient to relate the story of our adventure. We met him at the car, and Mom stood behind us with folded arms as we all spoke at once. Somewhere in the telling, one of us burst out with, "And Mama said a bad word. She said the s-word!"

"I did not," Mom spoke firmly.

"But, Mom, you did!" said Nate. "When you came in the house."

"I would never say that word." Her voice was very quiet, and her large eyes were narrowed. We didn't dare argue with her.

At least not until she went back into the house. Then we all turned to Dad and began whispering, "She said it, Daddy. She really did."

Dad was skinning the miscreant snake in the driveway. He looked up, and his pale green eyes were bright with amusement when he said, "I believe you. But it's our secret, okay? Don't make your Mama angry."

It's strange that our mother's use of a bad word should capture our imaginations more than the image of her firing a rifle into the bean plants. I can only say it is a testament to her beautiful manners, and I need not add, I have never heard her say it since.

A Joyful Admonition and An Answer

I have had a prayer answered in a definite way as an adult, despite my lack of confidence in myself and in God's desire to answer. But it was before I knew God would answer my urgent request that a revelation, a communication, came.

I was pregnant with my first daughter. I was praying for her to come safely into the world, yes, but I was also praying that my husband and I would have a safe place to leave our toddler son while I gave birth. We were newly settled in a city where we had no family nearby. Our neighbor, whom we had gotten to know over a few months, grudgingly agreed to watch our son while we were at the hospital, but she had vacation plans during the first part of the month in which our daughter was due. My husband asked his mother if she could cover the week our neighbor would be gone. My parents said they could come just around my due date.

A woman, unfortunately, does not have a sixth sense about the day and hour she will give birth. I was nervous. First, because I did not want to leave our son with our neighbor who seemed so reluctant to watch him and who also did not seem to care about his nut allergies, and second but most relevant: our son, while very attached to me and his Papa, was extremely anxious, fearful really, around almost everyone else (as I said, we had no special people who lived near us then - no family or friends to whom he became accustomed). I desperately wanted one of his grandparents, someone who loved our son, to watch over him.

The particular prayer I was reciting night after night over my son while he slept was becoming more desperate, even angry, as my due date approached. I was losing confidence that God would heed my request. Because of this, my thoughts began to plague me, and I mean that quite literally; I am obsessive-compulsive, and it grows considerably worse when I am worried or weary. I was both exhausted and anxious when I attempted to pray over my little boy one night. I had to begin again and again - my OCD raging, pernicious thoughts riddling my mind. Finally, I gave up in despair. I deserted my sleeping child and went and wallowed in my misery on my own bed, pressing my hands into my forehead and tossing this way and that, as if my physical resistance to the mental turmoil could rid me of cluttered thoughts and distressed feelings.

Quite suddenly, a rush of utter silence, and I heard Someone say stridently, "Stop this! Get up and go pray over your son."

It was a rebuke, a chastisement, but I sat up with a jolt of pure, electrified joy. And I obeyed immediately. Still I was given no respite; unwanted thoughts clattered and banged around with annoying persistence as I finished my prayer over my resting child, but I did what my Heavenly Father had told me to do, rejoicing that He had spoken so clearly to me for the first time in my life.

A short while later, He would answer my urgent plea.

***************     ****************



The circumstances surrounding our children's births are variable. At least this is predictable. I was eight months pregnant with Berto, our firstborn, when Matthew and I were crawling through the mountains of Arizona in a U-haul, on the way to our new home. There were no family or friends waiting for us where we were headed, and this lack of special people made it hard when our baby arrived. The fierce love I felt for my son was a shock, so overwhelming that I simply stared in awe at the red, crying creature they laid on my stomach, forgetting to even wrap my arms around him in greeting. Yet there was no one to celebrate the arrival of our first child with Matthew and me. It was lonely.

I feared that loneliness while I was down on my knees each night almost two years later, asking for our daughter to arrive when I knew there would be someone to care for Berto.

My mother-in-law came to stay in town a couple weeks before my due date on Matthew's request. I believe she had the strategy of walking the baby out of me early, because the day after her arrival we spent navigating the nearest monster mall - not shopping, just walking. Our efforts were rewarded; I began having wrenching lower back pain on top of the nagging sciatica I was already experiencing. This is labor pain, I thought. But I didn't go into labor.

It was that evening while praying that I knew for a certainty that my parents wouldn't be coming around my due date. The next day, my own mother confirmed this. My grandmother needed an operation; all my parents resources were occupied with helping her. So my prayer shifted, became more specific. My new request was that my daughter Ana would be born in the following four days, the remainder of Barbara's stay.

The week stretched out, and my hopes wore thin. Barbara, my mother-in-law, got to see a side of me she may have suspected existed but had never been privy to. On Thursday of that week, Berto had blood drawn for allergy testing. I held him, looking into his streaming toddler eyes while a blond-haired nurse attempted to draw vials of blood from his arm. Before she had finished, the chosen vein dried up.

"I'll have to try again," she said stoically.

"How many do you need?" I asked in panic.

"Three," she said bluntly, holding up one partially filled vial.

So, there, in front of my mother-in-law and that no-nonsense pediatric nurse, I had a come apart, an episode of hysterics, complete with sobbing, hyperventilation, and involuntary shaking. I was told that I should leave while they tried to draw blood without my "help", but I refused to abandon my son. So I called Matthew who left work to come supervise the blood-letting, and forthwith I was permanently blacklisted among the nurses at our pediatrician's office. With that blond-haired nurse in particular, I could never again make eye contact without acute discomfort.

Truly, it wasn't a surprise that after such an episode, I woke up at 4:30am the next morning with contractions. I shook Matthew awake, but while waiting for them to grow, I dropped back asleep and was not roused again.

On Friday, over a spaghetti dinner, a series of slight sensations washed over my abdomen like gently lapping waves. There was no pain there, however; all discomfort was concentrated in my back and legs. Acceptance had come, and I was tired of anticipating something that would not come when I desired it. Barbara was leaving the next day. Matthew and I both thanked her for coming, for supporting us by being there. She left, planning to head out early the next morning, and I went to bed.

And then God answered my prayer - in the eleventh hour, and in His way.

I awoke Saturday morning a little after 5am, and the pains were unmistakable. I told Matthew to wait on calling his mother (she probably wouldn't be up yet, I figured) as I began a frenzy of last minute activity around the house in the lapses between contractions, starting laundry, loading dishes, brushing my teeth, packing snacks for the hospital. At 6:30 am when the intense pain prevented me from concentrating on anything else, Matthew called his mom.

She was already on the road out of town. With my labor progressing rapidly, we had to wait for her to turn around.

An hour later, Matthew and I were headed for the hospital, his sporty little car's sun visor clenched in my teeth - the protruding metal from its frame a testament to the strength of a laboring woman. Matthew tried to protest my pain-management tactics, but I gave him a wild look, and the words died on his lips even as his eyes continued to plead for mercy to be shown to his beloved vehicle.

I arrived at the hospital dilated the full 10 centimeters, knowing that my son was safe in his Grandma's care. They wheeled me into delivery as I begged for last-minute intervention, Can't you start an epidural, pleeaaase?, and I got to experience natural childbirth for the first time in all its excruciating glory.

After Ana's delivery at 8:44am, I repeated the L&D nurse's words in amazement to my husband.

"We have a daughter," I said to Matthew in wonder as a rush of feel-good hormones washed over my body, uninhibited by the lingering effects of an epidural.

And there was no loneliness, for Barbara and our little Berto came to the hospital later that day to greet our precious, healthy Analisa and welcome her to the family.

*********** ***********

All these years later I still reflect with wonder on the fact that God spoke to me (He has not done so again in such a direct way since that day). For my Creator I had become like the widow who importuned the fearless judge in the parable told by Christ. It was a time in my life when I was seeking my Father's attention continually, asking Him to fulfill a need, and He did fulfill it. He blessed us with Barbara's presence. I am forever grateful for His faithfulness.

I know firsthand the power of persistent prayer.


Luke 18:1-5

And he spake a parable to them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;

Saying, there was judge which feared not God, neither regarded man:

And there was a widow in that city; and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary.

And he would not for awhile: but afterward he said within himself, Though I fear not God, nor regard man:

Yet because this widow troubles me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.

Twisters and Monsoons (revised version)

Monsoon storms have rolled through our desert valley since Thursday. (I don't understand why they are called monsoons, since I live nowhere near an ocean or sea, but they are continually acknowledged as such by meteorologists, and so...there you go.)

They were forecasted for this whole week. As the cloud cover and humidity built up, so did my anticipation, and with each day that I saw no rain, I became more and more virulent as I talked to the clouds. And my children became concerned that Mama thought she could have a conversation with the sky.

Just when I had given up on the ability of these clouds to deposit moisture in the desert, the wind began to whip our eucalyptus trees around and drove the rain with such force that it slanted through our main air-conditioning vent and drenched the hall carpet.

By early Friday morning it was a calmer drizzle as my children and I enjoyed it from the patio. I sat in a chair with the baby, watching the birds line the branches of our African Sumac tree. My older three were happy to stand and collect the rain in buckets as it streamed from the roof, because to them rain is almost as wondrous as snow. To me it is a good friend too little seen nowadays.

In Tennessee rain was expected, but there was always the possibility that a storm system could bring tornadoes with the rain in spring and summer. True, we did not technically live in Tornado Alley, but I recall hearing tornado watches come on the television quite often, and we had a few warnings.

As soon as the television began its irritating warning beep, Dad listened intently for the message. When our county was included, he quickly abandoned his chair for the porch. I joined him there a few times. As I stood beside him in my cowboy boots, he would gaze at the sky with such intensity it was as if he expected to receive a secret communication from it, one which I hoped to interpret by carefully watching his face.

A couple times when I was small the television went static while the tornado warning was trailing across its screen. Dad did not hesitate at that point; we were told to grab a stuffed animal and blanket and head for the basement. We would navigate the narrow, rickety stairs and wait for the storm to pass in that musty cellar lit by its one feeble bulb. As we squeezed our teddy bears, we tried not to think about the spiders and various other creepy-crawlies that would not take kindly to our intrusion.

But during one of the scariest incidents of my childhood, we were not at home and therefore had no basement to scurry to.

Mom and Dad worked in the woods, rolling wreaths and digging valuable roots for a living. On this particular summer day, we kids had gone with them to explore a new stretch of wilderness while they worked. Mom and Dad quit early; there was a bad storm brewing.

We kids were hustled into the car. Dad had the radio on soon after we left the woods. The winds picked up, and the sky deepened to an unusual hue of slate blue. As we turned down Spann Road, the last leg to home, Dad was watching the sky, glancing in the car's side and rear mirror more and more frantically as the car's speed increased. I knew he was no longer examining the possibilities; he was searching for the reality of what we could hear building from that strangely-colored sky.

Because a noise which was more than that of a gale had grown out of the storm as Dad sped along the rutted dirt road. I didn't see the twister, though I remember turning in terror to look out the back window as the roar of it amplified. Suddenly, Dad swerved off the road and braked violently by a decrepit barn near the fence line.

"We won't outrun it," he said. Then he turned. "Kids get down on the floor and start praying."

Annie, Nate and I huddled down quickly. Vinca held Mom and Dad's hands in the front seat. We three in the backseat were praying aloud; one often does when desperate, I suppose. As I prayed I longed to be in the front seat with my parents. I thought about climbing the seat, because if I had to die, I wanted at least to be with Mommy and Daddy when it happened.

But in the midst of our supplications, the strange growling suddenly died. The tornado was gone, sucked back up into the clouds that began to lose their angry color shortly thereafter. The twister must have been of the fickle kind that touches ground for a few miles on a lonely piece of earth, thankfully leaving little indication of its passage before vanishing like smoke. In the eerie calm that followed, Dad started the engine, we kids climbed back onto the bench seats in that old car, and we drove the last couple miles home in silence. When I looked back I saw nothing but the rain falling on the fields, stands of trees and fence line behind. The barn which had witnessed our terror stood indifferent and untouched.

I can't help finding tornadoes fascinating because of their power. Perhaps that is because I am removed from their reality here in the Southwest where they are practically nonexistent. It has been a long time since I stood on a porch and gazed with my Daddy at the threat of an angry southern sky.