Day 118

I remember 9/11 clearly, even though I wasn't even in my teens yet.  I remember, like so many others do, what I was doing when I heard the news.  I remember watching the news for hours on end, watching the planes hit the buildings again and again, waiting to hear the slightest bit of new information.  I remember the uncertainty, the fear, and watching people pull together.  9/11 was personal on a national level.

I remember a little over a month ago waiting for the call that my grandpa had passed away.  I remember carrying my phone around with me, afraid that I might miss the call when it came.  I remember the suffering I felt for my family who were at his bedside, counting breath by breath, hour by hour, day by day, thinking that every day would be his last, and only feeling the tension mount as he hung on for one more day.  I remember feeling incapable of doing anything because the weight of the situation consumed me and followed me around.  My grandpa's death was personal on a family level.

This past week I have watched as an out-of-control wildfire has burned not only my state, but MY town.  At least two families I know have lost their houses completely, numerous more had to be evacuated, including my in-laws, and the fire reached my church's parking lot but did not make it to the building we are pretty sure.  This past week has been a mixture of the previous two events I mentioned above.  I found myself checking the news sights every couple of hours looking for more updates.  I found myself staying close to my phone in case any news came that way.  At work there is a different feeling in the air: sadness for those who come in and have lost everything and a deeper sense of gratitude from both customers and employees.   Again I felt the uncertainty, the fear, as neighborhoods went up in flames and the fire just kept creeping nearer and nearer.  I've seen people pull together, a tremendous out-pouring of love from the community, and a personal sense of frustration from wanting to help and not knowing where to begin.

The fire is personal on a community level.

When something like this happens lots of emotions and thoughts wash over you.  It's hard to know where to the draw the line between complete absorption and complete denial.  Compassion is needed in great abundance for everyone, because even those of us who have not lost our homes have been impacted.  However, crying for hours on end doesn't really help anything.  One thing that keeps coming back to me is that as Christians, this is just our temporary home.  We are just passing through, and any comfort and beauty that God gives us for our time here is His blessing to us, not a right that we have.  Our earthly home may be in ashes, but our heavenly home can never be touched by any disaster and is waiting for us in radiant glory.

May you find joy in the midst of tragedy.

Day 117

My in-laws are the leaders of a group called Emerge within YWAM, and this weekend Emerge is putting on a business conference for business men and women who are interesting in business as missions.  I helped at this conference the first year they had it, but the last two years I was busy or gone and haven't been around when it has taken place.  I have helped at several events at the YWAM campus in the past, but it has been awhile, and I realized how much I missed it.  I was able to stop by the conference and assist with various projects for about five hours today, and it felt so right, almost like I was coming home. 

May you find joy in doing what you love.

Day 116

Well, I'm back. I know it's been awhile, and I'm sorry.  You don't know how many times I thought to myself, "I need to get back to my blog," and yet I didn't.  Things get easier with time.  When you write a blog everyday, it gets easier to write.  When you don't write a blog everyday, it gets easier not to write; it gets easier to come up with excuses.  My main excuse for not writing for a month is simple: I couldn't.  For part of it I was physically too busy, and for the other part of it I was not mentally and emotionally ready.  Even now, right this minute, it's hard.  I cried when I read my last post about my grandpa, and I'm crying now.  I'm a mental processor, which means it's hard for me to work through things with words.  I think and think and think, and once I've worked through something, then it can come out in words.  To be honest I don't think I quite know why this past month has been hard or even to the extent it's been hard, I just know that it has.  I've seen the signs that something's not quite right, from struggling to do something creative like making cards, to not being able to figure out what to have for dinner-every night.  It's like I've lost part of myself and I don't know where I went.  The good news is that I feel like I'm getting better.  Whatever I lost is coming back, slowly.  Like I said on Day 115, you have to learn how to live again.

This isn't a warm and fuzzy feel-good post, but at least it's honest.  I'm going to try to start writing every day again,  but I'm not making any promises quite yet.  Thank you for sticking with me.

May you find joy when life is hard.

Day 115

This morning I woke up at 5:00 a.m. in Kearney, Nebraska and drove for seven hours to my home in Colorado Springs.  This followed ten hours of driving from the previous day, which was preceded by my grandpa’s funeral and graveside service mere hours before.  The day before that, Monday, was the visitation.  On Saturday, my family and I started at 4:00 in the morning and drove for eighteen hours to my grandpa’s bedside and said our last goodbyes, only about nine hours before he passed away on Sunday morning.   The preceding week was a stressful day by day, hour by hour existence waiting for the phone call that never came that my Grandpa had passed on from this life and was now with Jesus. 

It’s been a hard week and a half.

Emotionally, I’m doing pretty well.  Physically, I’m worn out. 

Grief affects everyone differently, and it shows up unexpectedly.  For me, I did most of my grieving for my grandpa before he passed away.  It took me a couple of days to work through it, and then for the most part I was alright. I still cry sometimes, but my soul is at peace for my grandpa.  The grief that remains is for the people that remain, because I can’t feel sad for my grandpa.  I know he is with Jesus and is experiencing the greatest, happiest, most wonderful existence any creature can have.  He was a faithful follower of Jesus in this life, and he is receiving his reward for his faithfulness.   But for the rest of us, we have to wait for that.  We said goodbye, and we know it’s not forever, but it is long enough to be hard.  We who remain have to live the rest of our time on earth without the man who was a faithful husband, a loving father, a proud grandpa, and a tender great-grandpa.  We mourn because our lives are poorer without the man who made them richer. 

After living in a vacuum for the last two weeks, where everything I did or planned depended on what was happening with my grandpa, it is a little hard to jump back into regular life. Dinner needs to made.  Cars need to be filled up with gas.  I have a job I need to go to.   I can put stuff on the calendar again.  When someone you love dies, you want life to stop for a while to give you time to adjust.  But it doesn’t.  Life continues to spin at a dizzying pace, and just like a merry-go-round, you just have to jump in and hang on. Although it’s hard at the beginning, I think it’s better this way.  If you spend too much time wrapped in your sorrow and loss, it’s easy to become very self-focused and it just becomes harder for you to get back to the new normal.   We all eventually have to learn how to live again. 

I loved my grandpa and I will miss him very much.  But when the day comes that God calls me home, that day will be the beginning of the time where there will be no more sorrow, nor tears, nor death nor pain, because Christ has conquered those things for those who love him.  I live today in the hope that one day there will be no more goodbyes.  All that will be left is an eternity of todays with the ones that I love in the presence of the One who loved us first.

Dedicated to my Grandpa, Al Peterson (1921-2012)

Day 114

Wow.  The last two weeks have been a roller coaster to say the least. I read a saying that described it accurately: "I try to live one day at a time, but sometimes several days happen all at once."  Life has been full and tiring.  I worked some crazy hours last week at the florist for Mother's Day, we bought a car, the Ignite Retreat was last weekend, and in the midst of it all my family found out that my grandfather has been put on hospice care and will soon be with Jesus, which means that I am back on puppy duty while my mom is away.

I want to share about the retreat, but not now.  I think I need a few more days to process everything.  All I will say is that it was the topic was something I needed to hear and apply to my life.

There has been so much going on and yet I don't know what to say.  It's hard waiting for someone you love to die.  It's easier that we've known that it has been coming for a long time, but it is still not easy. My grandpa was a faithful follower of Christ and a great example to his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.  He is deeply loved, and will be greatly missed.

I'm tired, but I'm at peace. God is in control, and even though so many things are up in the air right now, I know that it's going to be alright.  I'm taking it one day at a time.

May you find joy in peace.

Day 113

I had a job interview today.  In times like this, it is always nice when God gives you a clear direction, a one door open and another door closed type of thing.  God gave me a clear direction: the door was strongly, firmly, and rapidly shut.

The interview was going well for the first four minutes.  I felt fairly comfortable and confident while going through work history and what-not.  And then came the question:  Are you available to work on Sundays?  This surprised me, mainly because this company is not opened on Sundays, and that was one of the reason I was excited about this job.  My answer: I don't like to, but I will work Sunday afternoons and evenings if I have to.  It turns out that this company is moving towards being open seven days a week, and that change will probably happen within the next year.  They need someone with availability starting at 10:00am on Sundays.  That person is not me.  Going to church is a huge priority in my life, and I will not change that priority for my job.  After that, the interview was basically over.  I was in and out of there in ten minutes.

Was it disappointing?  Yes it was.  Was it nice to know immediately that this wasn't going anywhere?  Yes it was.  My prayer throughout this whole thing was that God would be glorified in my life no matter the outcome, and I will continue to pray for that.  May God grant my prayer.

May you find joy even when the door is closed.

Day 112

If you have never had the opportunity to drink one of my husband's cappuccinos, than you, my friend, are missing out.  They are absolutely delicious.  Imagine strong espresso mixed with steamed milk and topped with a cloud of foam and drizzled with just the right amount of chocolate, my husband's modus operandi, and what you have is a little taste of heaven.  Ahhh, so good.

Last night we went to go see a movie and got home after 9:00pm.  We were both tired, but I had gotten a great deal on pastry turnovers and wanted to eat them.  My husband suggested cappuccinos, which of course I agreed with, but in the back of my mind was thought of drinking espresso that late and wanting to go to sleep at a reasonable time.  Then my husband had a flash of genius: mini cappuccinos!  We were given a set of espresso mugs from Thailand, which are really small, and he made our cappuccinos in those.  They always say that things taste better in miniature form, and I'm inclined to believe them.  We ate our turnover and drank our mini cappuccinos and then went to bed happy people.

May you find joy in life.