Competition Nation

At church this morning I heard the couple sitting behind me tell another couple it was their 29^th anniversary today.  I turned to congratulate them.  They always sit behind me and we share the sign of peace but hadn’t spoken otherwise.  This is my opportunity, I thought.   The other couple announced they had celebrated their 52^nd anniversary.  I shared that my neighbor was married 65 years.   Afterwards I got to thinking.   Should we just have let them enjoy the glow of their 29 years without sharing other stories with them?   It’s so natural to do so, but was it appropriate?   When does sharing cross that line into competition?

Of course, it is part of our culture to compete.  We compete about everything.  Mommy wars.  Daddy wars.  Grandma wars.  Couple time.  Work.  Cars. Homes.  Interest rates on our investment or savings accounts.  Mortgage rates on our homes.  Who has the smartest child/grandchild?  Whose child has the most activities and excels at them?   What school does the child go to?   Who had the most vacations? Which ones sounded the most exotic on the retell? Who has the best dog or cat?  Who saw the latest movie?  Who read the latest best selling book?  Who tried the new restaurant?  Who shops at more exclusive stores?  Who is the busiest?  Who is the most productive? Who was married the longest?  Who was widowed the longest?  Who works out the most?  Who is the sickest?  Who has the most ailments?  Who attends church more frequently?   It never ends.  And we have all been guilty of it at times to one degree or another.  When does sharing cross that line?

And there is the untold hurtfulness that this behavior can wrought.   The long-term damage to relationships and the eventual alienation it will bring.  A truly competitive person will pitch that zinger at just the right moment in a conversation.   ‘Well this works for you but for me…[fill in the blank as to topic].    ‘This car is so cute but…’  or  ‘I don’t like [blank] but other people do.”   As a relatively new widow, I have even been the recipient of a few conversational lobs of  ‘we’ve been married [blank] years.’   At random, they had to work it into the conversation although marriage or relationships wasn’t being discussed.  It seems that a competitive nature can’t contain itself.  Even when that particular competitive field has been definitively closed to my participation.   

As the comments start flying across conversational streams, I’m always left wondering – why can’t they just express happiness for you and share in your contentment?  Why say anything else at all?  I think people forget the kindergarten basic that everyone gets a turn to be the center of attention.  And for a competitive soul – the fact that you aren’t competing with them makes no difference.    They are still instinctively determined to ‘win this one.’  I tend to grow leery when I am in conversation and someone uses the word ‘but.’

At the heart of all of this stems some good intentions.  People want a good life.  They want the best for their children.  The need to prove it to others is the crux of the issue.  So, I propose that all of the good things are possible without the national game of competition.  Many people have naturally stepped back from the precipice this competitiveness brings.  It is a free fall into an empty and endless battle to still be seen as ‘the one in the know.’  And when you are sitting at the end of your life-  will any of this make a significant difference to you?  I can assure you that it will not.  Your concern will be if your loved ones will be okay after you’re gone.  Your one disappointment will be that you won’t have more time with your loved ones.  

And of course from a Christian perspective, it truly is pointless- for there is room in heaven for every one.   No competition.   No sign up sheets.  No getting ahead in line for a better view.   No early placement needed.  God has already chosen the perfect place for you.  It’s done.  You just have to accept this gift.   And does anything else really matter?   So you see, competition really is a pointless past time.  Just something to ponder.  Maybe our nation can change.   One conversation at a time.

Irrepressible Hope

I just watched The Great Gatsby.  I remember reading the book in college.  Great film rendition.  About the carelessness of people.  The callous carelessness.  And the irrepressible hope of one man.  Clinging to his dream.  Not able to accept that the dream had already ended long ago.  The death scene got to me.  I sobbed during the credits thinking of my lost love.

And I am now left to ponder:  what do you do with your innate irrepressible hope once the dream is gone?  How do you harness it as you move forward?  How can it be redirected into a new dream?  And how long will it take before you are able to focus on a new dream?  Will you know it when you see it?  So many questions lodged in the simple words of an author in a novel written long ago. 

I look around.  I reflect upon my life and all I’ve done.  I’ve already accomplished so many of the things I wished to in the realm of education, career and travel.  I was blessed with a grand romance and abiding love in my husband.  I’ve had interesting adventures great and small.  I’ve enjoyed the companionship of family and friends.  I have loved and been well loved in return.   I have no regrets.   I have indulged in many creative pursuits over the years.  It is an interesting place to be, this stage of life.   I have many more years behind me than before me.   The future is a blank canvas.   Yet, I have no desire to rush to fill it.  Most unusual for me.   I am content to wait upon God.  I trust that the guidance will come when the time is right.  And that the small part my life plays in the gorgeous tapestry He is creating will be as it should.

As I journey forward, I shall have to be on the lookout.  Looking for clues.  Evaluating hints.  What will the new dreams be?  A person with irrepressible hope needs something to look forward to.  My last dream standing is early retirement.  I’m sure others will come to me in time.  But for today, I so understand how Gatsby could cling to his dream against all odds.  He instinctively understood the unbearable nature of the pain its loss would bring.

Dawn’s Early Light

I awaken before I need to rise.  Squinting at the bedside clock.  The clock that is so high-tech I find it difficult to operate.  My husband’s clock.  I can go back to sleep for another 45 minutes or just get up.  Tossing back the covers.  The decision’s made.

Gosh, it’s dark out.   I put on the lights and dress in my exercise clothes.  Fumbling with the remote to start the exercise dvd.  Realization slowly settles in.  This is not the remote for the dvd player.   I dutifully start the routine.  Just listen to the directions and keep moving.  Before I realize it the half hour is done.  Still a bit bleary-eyed, I head to the kitchen.

The silence of my home is deafening.  Water boiling away in the electric kettle seems unusually loud.   Email is quickly scanned while waiting for the tea to steep.  Morning prayer time and bible reading is engrossing.  The last half of cup grows cool.

That kettle again makes its loud boiling noises as I contemplate the beauty of the early morning light.  The subtle light before the sun comes up over the horizon.  The sudden piercing rays through the window once the sun appears.  Holding the warm mug of tea in my hands as I stand at the window.  The steam wafts up to my face as I slowly sip.  Aaaah, ‘Nectar of the Gods’.  That’s what I would answer every time my husband asked why I drank so much tea. 

I contemplate my day.  Work looms large in my mind.  A colleague asked how I was doing yesterday.  We hadn’t spoken in months.  And he really cared to hear my response.  We were working together when I was diagnosed with cancer.  His daughter had cancer as a teen so he could relate a bit.  He was very kind during my husband’s illness and as I dealt with his death.  Our work together is done and our paths will not likely cross again. 

I think perhaps he is one of the rare people God has placed in my path to help me on my journey.  Here for a fleeting time to bring some bit of kindness.   A blessing.  The beauty of that rising sun and the risen Son join together in a moment of peace.   I smile softly as I realize that tossing back those covers was a good decision today.

Loaves and Fishes

In my house the freezer is prime real estate.   During my husband’s illness we moved from a townhouse style home to a one-floor condo.  Its spacious and well-designed floor plan captured my heart.  But there was no room for the small chest freezer that had been the mainstay of my kitchen creations for years.  I would make a batch of this or a pot of that and freeze our future meals and nest them safe and sound in our basement.  I actually made my own broths and kept them at the ready for future culinary sessions.

And so, since the big move, the bottom freezer in the new GE Profile unit has been a challenge.  I may have developed a complicated relationship with this freezer.  It’s become both a game – a large 3D puzzle- and a source of great irritation-  a ‘freezer volcano.’  It would erupt with various items whenever I was looking for something.  I would dig through layers of cartons and packages looking for broccoli.  Inevitably I would give up and eat the spinach I found.  Oh look, I knew I had blueberries in here.  Then I had to take a few minutes to fit everything back into the giant drawer at the bottom.   I confess to at times making food choices based upon the desire to not hunt in the freezer.

The months after my husband died my sister-in-law brought over endless bags of small containers of frozen meals for me.  What a Godsend!  Otherwise, I would have spent those early months eating cereal or toast for dinner each night.  We would joke as I would try to wedge them into the freezer.  I literally would say “okay, Jesus.  It’s loaves and fishes in reverse.  I need you to make room for this in the freezer.”  As the months went on, this kept working.  It really was quite miraculous.  Whenever someone visited, or I went shopping, I would end up saying – how am I going to get this into the already full freezer?  Then I would say ‘loaves and fishes, my Jesus’.  And it fit.  I began imagining a ‘build-out’ of my freezer located in heaven where it was all being stored.  

Then as the year continued to unfold, after those lovely ‘meals on wheels’ from my sister-in-law had all been eaten, I went through the inevitable ‘microwave a Lean Cuisine’ phase of widowhood.  The shape of the freezer made that difficult and the space wasn’t being used well.  Then there would be the bread or rolls I’d purchase that were too many in a package for me to eat.  The bits and pieces like turkey hot dogs leftover from that holiday weekend or that extra sliced baked chicken breast.  So I would toss them in the freezer.  Sigh.  It was always full.  Never any room to buy things I would spy on a good sale.

My sister gave me some great tips and I recently dug in.  I’ve been eating out of my freezer pantry for a few weeks. 

I now have organized it by containing the smaller bags of fruits and veggies into little plastic bins in a top drawer.  

I have a shelf reserved for proteins – meat and fish.  And I’m proud to say that when I recently saw a spiral ham on special for about $7 [instead of $28] I grabbed it.   I took the time to slice and dice the ham into baggies and placed those into a sealed container on my protein shelf.  I had the room!!  Let the freezer games begin.

The bottom ‘pit’ now has two plastic bins so I can at least remove one and search it if need be.  But the real goal is to eventually have space to store a few home-cooked meals.  With the bins I could store soups, stews, casseroles in plastic bags and lay them into the bin to save space as my sister suggested.  Or use the cute new Ball freezer jars a dear cousin recommended. 

Of course, the other problem is that any time you make a pot of something it is about ten to twelve servings.  I learned to cook by watching my Mom and Gram in the kitchen.  It was family meals – not a meal for a widow.  I’ll have to learn to cut the recipe in half.  Then freeze half.  It’s a system that may work.  And if not – ‘loaves and fishes, my Jesus.  Loaves and fishes.’

River of Joy

The other day I saw a beautiful sunrise.  A special winter one full of soft muted color.  It reminded me of the conversation I had with my cousin the morning after my husband passed away.  It was early morning and we were watching the sunrise from the dining room window.   I remember how beautiful the colors were.  Much like this past week.   It's amazing how our memories are connected to our senses.

She kindly told me her theory about the river of joy running throughout life.   This river is running parallel to us all our lives.  Even in the midst of great sorrow or anger we can choose to tap into that river of joy.  It's there for us whenever we want to reach for it.

And I have clung to those words this past year.  How comforting to reach for a river of joy when all else is lost.  If even for a mere moment.   We can pass back and forth between tears and laughter if we only just allow the fluidity of our thoughts and emotions to be as they are.   It means we can't edit ourselves as we so often do.

I wonder today if this river of joy is not connected to our souls.  The lifeline for our eternal selves.   A way for us to experience life today as transcendental beings.   A mere hint of what is yet to come.

Reverse: Not My Strong Suit

I pulled my small SUV into my assigned garage parking space and carefully lined up the car so I centered the car in the spot.   As the past year has taught me it makes the reversing out of the parking space so much easier.  The interesting thing is that the more experience I’ve gained maneuvering my car between the neighbor’s SUV and the wall and large support post is that reversing the car is less intimidating.   I don’t think about it anymore.  Not like the early days after the move when Robert taught me how to pull in and out with ease.  I joked with him that the spot was so difficult for me that the second time I hit something I was getting a smaller vehicle.  After all, reverse had never been my strong suit.

I began wondering if my not liking to reverse has been limited to the world of driving?  I don’t like to read the same book twice.  Not even a book that I truly treasured as a favorite.   I don’t see the point in traveling to the same distant vacation destination more than once – haven’t you already seen everything?  There are so many new places to visit.  On a menu I am always scanning the choices looking for something new to try.   Perhaps I have a natural ability to be forward focused? 

But is being perpetually forward focused necessarily a good thing?  In its own way it may be as limiting as dwelling on the past.  You could get lost in the endless possibilities of ‘what’s next?’  The older I am the more I understand that more choices do not lead to happiness.  I can’t help but believe that being fully present in the current moment is an even better state of mind.

It brings to mind a scene from the movie ‘Star Trek: Insurrection’ in which Captain Picard learns how to capture and slow down the perfect moment.   It is something that practitioners of meditation know well.   Now, how to continuously achieve that coveted state is something to ponder.   It sounds a bit lofty, this new goal.   It may take a while to get there.   No better time to start than right now.     This very moment. 

The Mask You Wear

I ran an errand on the way home from church today.   I wanted to organize the contents of my freezer  into plastic bins of some sort.  My sister told me that you can't beat the plastic containers at Dollar Tree because so inexpensive that if it cracks you won't care.   I happily approached the register with my new little bins in hand.   They were stacked together by type of bin as I placed them on the counter.  The cashier sighed heavily.  I politely asked if she would like me to separate them and she said no.

 I asked how she was and she ignored me.  Hmmm, I thought.   I asked if she liked football at all or if she was looking forward to the game.  She said she was cheering for Denver Broncos in the Superbowl because they had beat the Patriots.  I gently teased her 'hey, them's fighting words here in New England'.   Her response was a bit hostile 'I don't care.  I hate the Patriots'.  I just nodded my head and was wondering if I would ever shop at this store again.

But something made me look at her necklace.  And then I was prompted to look again.  She had a cross on a chain hanging in front of a ring.   So,  I told her that I really liked her cross.  She looked up startled and said 'WHAT?'   I gently repeated myself.  She got all teary eyed and told me it was her mother's and so was the ring.  She had recently lost her mom.  I told her that was such a wonderful thing to do keeping them close to her heart.  She thanked me for noticing them and for telling her.  I told her I'd lost my husband last year.  She lost her mom's brother just two weeks ago.  She questioned why all the folks carrying guns into schools and malls are allowed to live but good people are taken early.  I just nodded my head.  We exchanged a glance of understanding.  She smiled at me and wished me a good day.  I saw a different woman when she did.  I saw her true self.  I realized that all that anger was her mask.  A mask over the pain still so close to the surface.

On the drive home I felt gratitude that I'd been persistent.  This interaction probably took all of two minutes.   The homily today had been on the presentation of Jesus at the temple for a blessing and how each of us has the ability to bless others every day.  Perhaps I did that today.  I know that those few moments with that woman blessed me.  It led me to question what masks we all wear.

I recalled a book group meeting a couple months back.  The book we discussed was "The Art of Hearing Heartbeats."  One of the characters had chosen a difficult life path by marrying a man who admittedly did not love her.   She spent decades trying to change his feelings and ended up an angry and bitter person.  One woman in the book group expressed the view that that character had a right to be bitter.  I expressed the view that the character choose to be bitter.  If she had been more accepting and forgiving perhaps she could have been happier.  I said that I thought you could choose to be joyful even when enduring sorrowful events.  In subsequent discussion the woman in the book group shared that she was in the midst of caring for a very ill husband.  I came to suspect that she was projecting her own feelings onto the character.  She was developing a mask of anger.

And so I challenge you:  what mask will you wear?  As life unfolds and the decades begin to accumulate:  will it be a mask of anger?  or a mask of contentment?

Farewell NCIS, I Knew Ye Well

You may already be wondering what NCIS could possibly have to do with my widowhood.  Well, as with most interesting things in life there is a bit of a story behind the story.   When my husband passed away last January I had to wait until May to schedule the burial.  It was a difficult time and my mom came to stay with me the week after the service.  

Mom has watched NCIS faithfully for the past ten plus years.  She watched a few episodes with me that week on one of those NCIS Marathons on USA Network.  The character development was so fantastic and upon her advice I started watching old episodes on those marathon days.  Apparently there had been a huge NCIS phenomenon this past decade and I missed the whole thing.  Late in the summer I was reading a book by Debbie Macomber about a widow rebuilding her life when I ran across a reference to NCIS.  An elderly neighbor of the main character had to run home to catch Mark Harmon on a marathon day.  All roads led to NCIS.

As the months went by I actually came to love the show and all the quirky characters-  Gibbs, Abbey, Ducky, McGee, DiNozzo and Zeva.  Those were dark days for me and it gave me something new to focus upon -  something unrelated to my husband.  By last fall I was so 'caught up' on the show that I began watching each new episode on Tuesday night on CBS.  Until this week that is.  

On Tuesday a video was posted to YouTube in which Michael Weatherly - actor on NCIS- portrays Jesus in a pro-abortion skit with Sarah Silverman.  Now we live in a free country.  While  I do not support abortion,  I would never judge someone who does nor treat them with blatant disrespect.   If only Sarah and Michael had thought about common courtesy, respect and appropriate behavior before filming this video.  Or before posting it to YouTube.  Really, they had to go there.  They used foul language and mocked Christ.  It was a deeply offensive portrayal.  It went beyond expressing an  opinion.   It crossed a line.  A line between acceptable behavior and unacceptable behavior.  A line that we as a society have allowed to move beyond boundaries once considered forbidden.    Billions of Christians know that Jesus Christ is God.    What were they thinking?

I know what I am thinking.  I recall a homily my parish priest shared with us at church a few months ago.  He discussed the early days of the church when Christians were martyred.  They were dragged out of their homes and convicted of being a follower of Christ based on evidence or testimony by someone else.  Then they were tortured and executed.  2,000 years later this still happens in some areas of our world.  In the US we are blessed with religious freedom.  And sometimes we take that freedom for granted.  At the end of this sermon he asked us to consider our homes.  If a stranger were to visit your home, is there enough evidence there to 'convict you' as a Christian?  And I thought yes, there is - I have crosses on several walls and I actually have bible verse on a wall in the entryway.

Today I am processing the concept of what 'home' means in this age of social media.  Is not my Facebook wall, Twitter feed and blog space also my home?  And so I am sharing how offended I am by this YouTube video.  I am offended that so many days after it was posted that YouTube still has it online.  I am offended that CBS has not offered an apology for the actions of an actor under contract with that network.    And so I sent feedback directly to both CBS and YouTube prior to drafting this blog post.

I urge all Christians to express an opinion when something like this happens.  I believe that if we did vocalize our outrage then offensive moments like this would happen less often.   Why are we allowing our Christianity to be marginalized?   And so today I choose to stand up for Christ.   Farewell NCIS, I knew ye well.