Waiting

I hate to wait. A favorite cliché used by anyone who has ever served in the military is “Hurry up and wait”.  I’m not sure if the cliché originally came from someone in the military but it is hard to imagine thinking of a better example of “Hurry up and wait”. Sorry for those who have not been in the military and are waiting for an explanation or an example. That will have to wait for another time.  

When I set up this blog I set the security settings to ‘Only people I invite’. I don’t care who reads it but I just can’t see it being of much interest to anyone outside of my immediate family. I sent invitations to family members who would like read my posts. I got tired of waiting for a response to my invitation so I changed the settings to ‘Anybody’. I will never get a response from ‘Anybody’, but at least I don’t have to wait.

While I was driving to a FedEx office in Harrisburg to pick up a package I had been waiting for I was thinking that I need to learn to accept waiting better than I have in the past.  When I arrived at FedEx there was only one employee working. She was working on what appeared to be a large print job for a customer but the printer was not cooperating.  She was pushing buttons, opening and closing the paper drawer, removing rolls of paper and then reloading them. After a few minutes she finally asked me if I was here to pick up a package.  I said “Yes I am”.   I felt a glimmer of hope.  In my mind I was sure she would put the previous customer job on hold while she took one minute to give me my package.  No such luck.  After hearing my reply she returned to pushing buttons and loading and unloading rolls of paper. I’m not sure why she asked.  I was beginning to get annoyed. Luckily before I said something harsh to this woman I caught myself and held my tongue. Then I thought to myself “Crap, learning to wait is going to be harder than I thought.”

I’m hardly alone in my distaste for waiting.  In the 1960’s when I was just a child the American Food Distributers introduced a product call ‘TV Dinners’. This novel product was marketed as a way to provide a complete hot meal that could be put directly into the oven and be ready to serve in no more than a mere 45 minutes. You could even eat directly off of the disposable tray.  No more dishes to wash just throw the trays away.

TV dinners never really caught on. I can remember having them on rare occasions. To the best of my memory there were a grand total of 3 different variations of the TV dinner. There were probably a few others but that is all I can remember.  ‘Salisbury Steak’, ‘Fried Chicken’, and ‘Pot Pie’.  Anyone who is old enough to have actually eaten  any of these American delicacies of years gone by would have to admit  that to actually eat the TV dinner one would have to be willing to sacrifice a good deal  of taste in exchange for the convenience.  

Not until the invention of the microwave oven were food distributers able to deliver the convenience that consumers wanted but did not find with TV dinners. As opposed to the 45 minutes TV dinner the consumer only has to wait minutes for a complete meal that even tastes good. Countless inventions and products have been made in our times that eliminated the need to wait.

Of course nothing has eliminated wait time more than the internet.  A product manufactured in California can be bought, shipped and delivered to the consumer in New York in two or three days. If the consumer is willing to spend a couple more dollars it will be there tomorrow.

I bought a Kindle about a year ago. A Kindle is an electronic book capable of holding literally thousands of books on a portable device that weighs only a few ounces.  If I am talking to a friend about a book that sounds pretty good to me I can use the Kindle that is connected to the internet and download the book to my kindle right wherever I happen to be in just a few seconds.

One final example from the internet is email. A letter in an email can be sent and delivered to just about  anywhere in the world to anyone with a computer or any type of smart phone  in a just a few micro seconds, virtually instantaneously from the perspective of the sender. No stamp, no paper, no wait. 

While shopping at a local department store I was looking for stationary. I wanted to write a special note to my wife. I didn’t want to send her an email. I couldn’t find any.  I never actually asked an employee if they had any but it was obvious they did not carry it anymore. I have six teen age daughters living in my house. I thought surely one of them must have stationary. When I got home I told them how I couldn’t find any at the store and asked if I could borrow a couple sheets of stationary from one of them. There was a pause as they looked at me with blank faces until one of them said “What’s stationary”?  “Never mind” I said. Now I know why I couldn’t find any stationary.

This is starting to get long as usual. I’m well aware of what the reader is thinking by now. “I can’t wait until this is over”.  I feel your pain.  I can’t wait until I finish writing this. So with that in mind I am finally ready to come to a conclusion.

I will use two well-known clichés to put an end to all of this waiting. They are “Practice makes perfect” and “Be careful what you pray for”.

Most people would agree that to become good at any task it is of mind or body.  Also they would agree that that in the beginning the practice must be on fairly simple tasks. The simple task is practiced until it is mastered and only then can we begin to work on the more difficult tasks.  I believe that in today’s world we no longer have to wait for most of the simple things. There is no end in sight to man’s passion to eliminate the need to wait. But all these things that we no longer have to wait for were practice to prepare us to wait for much more important things.  There will always be things we have to wait for.  All good things are worth waiting for. Oops, I just let in another cliché. But it is true and mankind will never eliminate the need to wait for things that are good and meaningful.

 “Be careful what you pray for” is usually used in a light hearted or even humorous context. But as we know all clichés are at least based on some truth.  If you ever pray to God asking for him to give you patience, what you most likely will receive is a chance to practice.  Be careful what you pray for.

Thinking Out Loud

What are you supposed to put in a blog anyway? I don’t know the answer to that. Is there a blogger’s etiquette that I should use when I am blogging? If there is and I ever violate it in some way please let me know.

I thoroughly enjoy reading other blogs that uses attractive backgrounds, artistic fonts, and carefully organized pictures that help the reader feel connected to the story that is being told. I’m afraid you will not see much of that in my blog.  You won’t see it very often because I suck at that sort of thing.  If you ever do see one of my posts with those types of things included will be because I asked Jenni to do it for me.

I like to think. Even as I was writing   “I like to think” I began to wonder if somebody asked “What do you mean “you like to think”?  Hmm. I have to think about how I would answer that.

For me the blog is a place for me to think out loud.  Sometimes I am in the middle of a serious personal struggle or grieving personal loss or experience sadness because a love one is pain but most of the time I’m just thinking about stuff.

I have to organize my thoughts before I can write them.  Knowing that there might be people reading besides myself means that I will have to review what I have written for clarity and cohesion. Whenever I skip the review process because I am in a hurry or too tired it will be pretty obvious to the reader when I was being lazy and skipped the review. The extra benefit I get from the review process is that gives me a chance to think about what I was thinking about even more. I told you I like to think. J

 When I am done organizing and clarifying I save my thoughts in the blog post.  . Now that my thoughts have been saved I can quit thinking about the things I was thinking about. But if at some point in the future I decide that I would like to ‘rethink’  those thoughts I know where my thoughts are and I can read over them and think about them.  This is starting to get a little confusing. I wish I could think of a way to make this whole thought a little clearer.

There is a danger to thinking out loud, especially if you write them down and make them available for reading by other people. When you are thinking quietly to yourself you do not have to explain every thought that you have. Neither are you in danger of offended yourself because the thought was misunderstood. If you do have to explain your own thoughts to yourself or find that you are frequently offended by your thoughts you might want to think about what that might mean.

When I am thinking out loud about things that I am passionate about and deeply committed to is when I am dangerous. When I try to express my most passionate thoughts I have a tendency to sound like I am lecturing or even preaching to the reader. Occasionally, at least I hope it does not happen frequently, I will offend someone because of the way I expressed myself.  After reading my post the reader may feel hurt or even angry because they are sure that I am in some way insulting their own beliefs or trying to convert them to my way of thinking.

I feel very bad when that happens. It’s probably why I have stopped blogging in the past and have been afraid to start again.  The last thing I would ever want to do is hurt someone’s feeling or insult them because their values and beliefs are not the same as mine.  If anyone by chance ever feels hurt or insulted in any way because of something that I have posted please consider this an apology in advance. I didn’t mean to offend. I was just thinking out loud.

The Last shall be the First

Jesus tells us in Mathew 19:30 "But many that are first shall be last; and the last shall be first." For me, this has always been a favorite ideal of God's Kingdom. I don't think the attraction to this is strictly Christian. You see over and over again in movies with the 'Reluctant' hero, or the 'Nerdy/Nice' guy gets the bad guys girlfriend (the last shall be first) when she finally sees what a jerk he was and usually of course the bad guy ends humiliated at the end of the movie (… the first shall be last) . The most popular family 'feel good' movies are always about the band of misfits/losers who are led by an inspired leader and lead the team to the championship (BadNews Bears, Mighty Ducks, etc.)

If this is all we mean when we say we believe what Mathew 19:30 says, what makes us any different than most of the world which has the same sense/desire for justice. In the real world the 'nice guy' seldom ends up getting the girl. The band of misfits win no championships and they have to struggle their way through life at the bottom of the social ladder whether it be at high school, the work place or God forbid even at church.

History reveals what usually happens when the 'weak' get their chance at leadership. They end up as bad or worse than the ones they replaced. For example when the Spanish Christians were finally able regain control of Spain from the Moors things were peaceful a while, but before long it turned into one of darkest stains in church history, the 'Spanish Inquisition’. Just the mention of the name brings up images of the unbelievable things mankind is capable of, even in the name of religion. Another one that comes to mind is the Bolsheviks. Truly the common man suffered under the rule of the Tsars, but eventually these people who were 'champions' of the poor and underprivileged evolved in the regimes of Lenin and Stalin. Although seldom talked about like the Holocaust, the numbers murdered and enslaved during the 'Purges' of Stalin may actually dwarf those of the Nazis. According to 'Wikipedia' historians estimate the numbers to be at the low end 3 million and maybe as high as 60 million. Pick your number, either way it's about as ugly as mankind can get it.

This suggests that a lot of our infatuation with the 'Last shall be first' is more about jealousy than it is about understanding 'Gods Kingdom'.
I am certainly no historian and I am completely unqualified to teach anyone about history and it is not the reason I am writing today. What I am interested in more than anything these days is how can I become more like 'Jesus'. In the book of Acts (11:26) it says that the disciples were called 'Christians' first in Antioch. I've been told that 'Christian' simply means 'Little Christs'. Sarcastic or not, the early Christians at the time were apparently emulating the life of Christ well enough to earn the title. What have I been doing in my life that would make people think I am acting like Jesus would?

For as much I thought I was trying to make Mathew 19:30 a theme for my life, I need to confess my failure to recognize and give honor to someone in my life who was surely one of the people that Jesus had in mind when he said this to his disciples. If anybody happens to read this and is a 'C. S. Lewis' fan (I am thinking of at least one that might read this and she'll know I am thinking of her) coincidently I just finished reading the 'Great Divorce' once again this week. Chapter twelve presents an image of what Mathew 19:30 really means. Of course I don't believe it was a coincidence, it was a confirmation that I really need to learn this lesson once and for all.

My mother, Nancy Poe was born into a large family in 1933. It was not a Christian family and even though they didn't label things like they do now, it would certainly be labeled today as 'Dysfunctional'. Father with alcohol problems, her real mother I never really knew or understood but was apparently incapable of taking care of the children in a large family.

No social services to call in those days, so when problems came up the kids were passed from relative to relative or put in an orphanage. My mother was fortunate in that she eventually was placed in home where she was raised buy a fairly stable couple 'James and Hilda Howel'. They were not Christians and Hilda was a somewhat 'stern' woman but she eventually became 'mom' to Nancy. Hilda, was related somehow, but to this day I still can't specifically explain in what way, complicated family trees are just a thing of recent history, it just wasn't talked about as much back then.

Only after I began adopting children and started to learn and live with kids who have the baggage with them of being passed around was I able to see some of my mother’s behaviors that were signs of the same kind of insecurities.

Its pretty hard for me to stay on task, so I need to fast forward and tell you that shortly after my mother got married to my father Dale Beaver (I think about 1952/53) that my Dad's mother told my Mom about Jesus and explained to her how much He loved her exactly the way she was.

It must have stuck with my Mom, for the rest of her life absolutely nothing was more important to her. If you ever met her it wouldn't take more than a few minutes to find about her love affair with Jesus, and she would be telling them that Jesus loved them too. Nothing could stop her from finding a way to bring 'Jesus' into the conversation.

When nobody was around to tell Jesus about, she would think about him. She would pray and read her Bible of course, but I really can’t give you the proper picture of how consumed she was with this. She would have Bibles 'stashed' all over the house so she would always have one near by if she got a few minutes to sit still. Every one of them would have what seemed like every page marked with notes and highlighted passages. After she was gone, we would find notebooks that were stashed as well, and often they would just be filled with her copying versus and favorite passages by hand into the notebook.

My mother was a very simple woman. Even for her time period she seemed quite incapable by the world standards. Not necessarily because of intelligence, but she just had no desire to learn how to do things that would make life 'easier/better'. She never learned to drive and wouldn't even consider it. Simple things like using the washing machine or a microwave oven were a challenge for her.

Even though she was an excellent reader, all her life she was unable or too stubborn to let go of her 'Pennsylvania Dutch' grammar and expressions that were humorous at times, but more often made her look far less intelligent than she really was.

For most of her life my mom struggled with being overweight and even obesity in the last years of her life.

And here begins my confession, as a teenager, no great surprise of course, I became very embarrassed by her when my friends were around. The sad part is for teenagers; their friends don't care in the least about things like that in somebody else's parent. Actually they were usually pretty fond of her, as most people where when they got to know her. I was never embarrassed about being a Christian (probably because I didn't resemble one any how) but I would feel like she was being foolish the way she would talk about Jesus to people like he was sitting right there in the chair next to her.

Sure, I know what most people think, you were a teenager and all kids feel that way about their parents. First of all that doesn't make it right. Second I was supposed to be a Christian. But my biggest sin was that I never really let go of those feelings during my adult life. Sure I loved her and wasn't ashamed to be out in public with her, but I never really let go of the feeling of her looking kind of ‘foolish’, with the combination of her Pennsylvania Dutch grammar, her clumsiness and I thought she was kind of weird the way she would talk about Jesus to people.

What I totally failed to see is what was really happening to the people who were interacting with her. Even folks who had no interest in Jesus and Christianity didn't mind any of things I thought were embarrassing.

You see when my mom would talk to people she always told them the same thing over and over again. She would tell them how wonderful Jesus is and then she would tell them this, and this is what people really like and want to hear, She told them that Jesus really 'Loved' them exactly the way you are. Just about anybody knows that they have lots of faults and have made a lot of mistakes and they desperately need assurance that they won't be rejected.

She would be telling my friends when I brought them to the house how much Jesus loved them. They never once would say anything about her or make fun of her. They always 'felt' good after they talked to my mom.

Adults were exactly the same; they always accepted her sincerity even if they didn't accept the message. She always had this smile on her face when she talked to you that seemed to say 'I really like you!' Jenni and I have often noticed that it seems to be about impossible to find a picture of her with out that simple smile. It's really hard to have a good argument with some one who won't stop smiling at you.

No matter where we lived, somehow mom would make a special connection with one or more neighbors that would become intimate with her. They would share their deepest problems with her and look to her for advice.

It never stopped through out her life. She would constantly be on the phone with people she met at church, or just about anywhere. They would call 'Nancy' whenever they had a problem.

For the life of me I could never understand why in the world somebody would look to my mother as a 'Mentor'. Now it is obvious to me, nobody has the answers to the complicated problems or apparent injustices that we have to tolerate. But nobody expects you to have the answers either. There has only ever been one answer to all of our pains and fears. That is this: "Jesus loves you, He knows about your problem and He will be with you and most of all 'Jesus loves you exactly the way you are!'

Nobody was better at telling people that message than my mom, she didn't just believe it, but ‘knew’ it was true.

My mom died in an automobile accident in 1998. Her funeral service was held at Christ Community Church, which is a pretty large church for this area. It was a good thing it was large too. Hundreds of people came to give ‘honor’ to this simple housewife who couldn’t even drive a car. The Pastor said it might have been the largest turn out for a funeral he had ever seen.

I never got to tell her how sorry I was that I didn't honor her the way she deserved to be honored and how much I only now appreciate what a gift I was given to be raised by somebody who loved Jesus. So this is for you mom and also for Jesus. I am so sorry for what I have done. I love you very much and ask for your forgiveness.

I know exactly what she will say when she reads this too. It will be this:

"That’s alright Danny, Jesus loves you exactly the way you are!"




Danny and his Mommy



David and his Granny



I Forgot!

I've forgotten a lot of things , especially in recent years. But for now I am talking about how I forgot I had this blog started more than one year ago and never got around to writing a single post.  It's time to post.

I've not been very happy the last couple of years for many reasons. To tell the truth I would have to admit that I have been depressed.  In the past I had no idea what that really meant and couldn't possibly imagine it could happen to me. Sure I had bad days like anybody after a couple hours I would get bored with being depressed and move on.

Now I know for someone who is depressed it just isn't that easy. It seems impossible to explain why it is so hard to move on.  I don't like to use drugs for depression, but that doesn’t mean I think it is wrong to use anti-depressants.  For some, maybe even me, it  may be the best option and maybe even the only thing a person can do at times in their life. I would just like a better, more permanent solution for myself.  I'm sure writing can help. 

Perhaps the biggest think I have forgotten is that I forgot who I am, where I come from and even what I believe in.

My mother passed away in an automobile accident in 1998. I was sad of course but it never seemed to bother me as much as it should have.  Seven full years after her death I began to mourn. I remember the day well, but I cannot remember what may have triggered it. I was sitting in front of the computer and I started to think about her. I began to cry. Within a matter of minutes I was wailing like a toddler lost in a crowd and couldn’t find his mommy and daddy. At that time I had not cried since I was a child, at least not that I can remember. Crying comes too easy since I got old. I cry when I hear my daughter sing, I cry at weddings, I cry for children when they are in pain or when they are making decisions that could ruin their lives.

I digress, but that’s a good sign for me, I’ve always been a bit of a master at digression and rambling. Anyhow, after the crying subsided I started to write (typing in ‘Word’ actually). Before I knew it I had written a several page tribute to my mother. I had just started a blog at the time and I was bold enough to post it. I felt I needed to tell somebody how I really felt about my mother and never knew it my whole life.

 I was publishing one or two posts  per week for maybe 5 or six months. But one day when I was angry with myself I permanently deleted every single post from my blog. Lost forever included the one about my mom.  Tonight when I was cleaning up some old email folders I found a copy of the post about my mom. The timing could not be better. I don’t want to live like I have been for the last 3 or four years I am tired of being depressed.  I need to change. I need to remember who I am.

 If you want to know where you come from or why you are what you are taking time to reflect on who your mom was is not a bad place to start. This tribute to my Mother ended up as a revelation to myself about how important she was to me and how much of what I am , what I think and what I feel is because of her.

I want to repost that tribute. The temptation to edit it before posting is strong, but I will not do that. I am sure I could improve grammar here and there, make it a little more interesting, maybe even a little shorter but I will not touch it. If I edit it in any way I am sure any improvements I could make would cost more in what is loss  from the spirit and emotions I was feeling at the time it was written.

One final word, my mother was not a perfect woman by any means. She was full of faults and failures as much as anybody else.  But I think most would agree with me that a tribute is not written as a historical document. It is written to reflect and remember the spirit and how that person changed our lives.

Of course I hope a few people will take the time to read it and it will in some way provide value to them or remind them of what their mothers meant to them, but if not that’s ok. I am posting it for me. I have to. I want to remember who I am.