Hearing Heart Blog

“My A . . .” is what you called yourself as a baby. You’ve always known who you were. Big brother "J" would go left, you would go right. "J" would go right; you would go left, because you knew you were "A . . ."! In the middle of adventures you were the shepherd-brother-hero. You kept an eye on little sister and held her when she cried, you showed little brother how to stick Lego’s together, and you gave "J" some great game ideas – all at the same time. I’m fishing around in my head tonight to find words, and because I’ve been scrutinizing words most of the day – new ones aren’t coming to me easily. (I’m in the middle of a proofing project.) What I would really like is to look into your eyes, again; and try to decide what color they are, again. I’d like to wrap my arm around your neck, and tell you “happy birthday”. I would love to watch you play with your son and adore your wife. Instead I am sitting here late at night trying to pull up some wor

I am allowed to stare at him. I am his mother. I admire the man he is. His was the soft little fuzzy head, my infant son, that I cradled on my arm and caressed with my hand. He doesn’t know how my eyes are adoring his profile, following the line from the top of his forehead to his chin - so familiar to me. I watch him handle his instrument, engrossed in his craft. He is unaware of the power of the love I have for him. Because the emotion is screwing up my face, I have to divert my eyes and distract my thoughts. If I look any longer, I’ll embarrass myself in this public place; but maybe that would be okay. I turn my eyes to my child’s child, dozing on his mother’s shoulder; his fuzzy head hanging limp. How beautiful the pride of motherhood looks on her – who is carrying another child I cannot see. Thank you, Lord, for joy in my motherhood! + + + + + + + + + + + Perched in the choir near my husband and daughter, I could observe my son on his guitar. What a blessed woman I am, to stand an

Simply put, I was made to be a mom. After I married my husband in 1978, I discovered that my history of job descriptions all added up. I was meant to be a mom. Following high school I worked as a dishwasher, child care provider, cook, teachers’ aide, sandwich maker, and building maintenance worker. My free time was spent in Bible study, singing and playing guitar, outdoor adventures and journaling. My faith, which I also call my “self-talk”, said that if God created my body to bear and nurture children, then he must have intended me to be a Mom. Out of respect for his design, I must say that he did a complete work; therefore the next step in my reasoning faith was to say “I can do it, because he designed me to”. Because of his loving creative power, I would see tremendous success, enjoyment, and satisfaction in this. Besides these reasonings, my desire for motherhood was strong (second only to my desire for a godly marriage). Sure enough, when my first child was born – I knew my calli

He is sure that he was told he'd need his crutches only 2-3 days, then he'd be on his feet. Like he says, "that ain't happenin'!" My husband had knee surgery Tuesday, and today he's going a bit stir-crazy (Friday). Apart from the pain and stiffness, his backside is just tired of being sat on! His head is weary with watching videos. Acquaintences who have had arthroscopic surgery have said that it's far easier to recover from, and less painful, than conventional surgeries. Perhaps the medical personnel were just giving him a rosy "best case scenario", so he wouldn't be fretful before the procedure. Maybe he just heard the information differently than I would have, had I been there. I dunno . . . It's just not going the way he had expected.

Frugaltude It means an "attitude of frugality". A strong word, like the word "fortitude". I want to strengthen this quality, so here are my thoughts on it: Being content with little, delaying satisfaction for greater pleasure at a later time. Enjoying simple pleasures in life NOW. Anticipating simple pleasures growing in scope, duration, or value LATER. Like fertile seeds that we've been given or have harvested ourselves; some we eat, some we share, and some we put in the ground to harvest later. The picture I see in my mind is of a woman in Africa scooping up spilled rice in the dirt, to sift out later in the privacy of her home. She works quickly, fingering the individual grains of rice and putting them in her basket. She may be poor, or she may just have frugaltude! Perhaps she can offer some of her recovered rice to a missionary pastor, or invite a hungry friend to a meal to share the gospel with her . . . One aspect of my frugaltude is to avoid going into a