Five minute Friday – rhythm

4 Comments

Posted on June 21, 2013

Winnie the Pooh meets strange heart rhythms, don’t recommend it.

The normal, forgettable rhythms of my heart changed one night when I was about 10 years old.

Prior to that, I only knew that my heart was beating because I was still alive. Suddenly it was like having a bowl of jello inside my body. Btw, I hate jello.

After a stirring 5th grade performance as Winnie the Pooh (hold the applause) I came home and my heart began beating wildly. The pages in my library book began pulsating to the rhythm of my thumping chest. I was weak and afraid.

I really had little control over when my heart would beat strangely and then suddenly go back to normal.

It required several visits to the emergency room throughout my adulthood. Only when I was pregnant with my oldest son would I learn that I had SVT, a non-fatal but super annoying heart condition that plagued me until I had a cardiac ablation two years ago.

I was DONE with having unpredictable heart problems. Like many things in life, you know how much you can handle and then make necessary changes to fix “rhythms.”

Me just before I had my cardiac ablation

At times my heart could beat like a hummingbird, up to 220 beats per minute.

I very much enjoy participating in this weekly writing assignment. You might like it too!

So what comes to mind when you think of the word “rhythm”? Check out what other people are writing about this word! It’s pretty cool!

Five minute Friday – fall

14 Comments

Posted on June 7, 2013

I want things to be nice but never perfect.

When I have company over, there is temptation.

If I want things to be perfect, I fall into pride.

If the night didn’t gel as I had hoped, like, let’s say, the Hubs got on my nerves the entire evening (true story) I fall into despair.

It’s when I give the occasion to the Lord that I see the greatest rewards.

When the birthday party, dinner company, gathering of friends is marinated in prayer, that’s when everyone has the sweetest fellowship.

I once had a family member come over for dinner with his family.

They do not know Jesus and before they arrived, I prayed for us to have a special night together.

Strangely enough, as I asked the Lord what to serve this family, I sensed God said “barbecue chicken.”

I realize this might sound like a really stupid prayer and even more so, a really weird answer. You talk to God about food? He talks to you about barbecue chicken? Come on.

My answer is I talk to God about everything and occasionally chicken is part of our conversation. Jesus is my friend and he is intimately involved in my life, so yes poultry is even an open topic for us. Don’t you talk to your best friend about everything?

So this isn’t a usual main dish for me to cook but I listened to His voice and guess what? Barbecue chicken was this person’s favorite meal! I had no idea!

Time and time again, these things have happened to me where God confirms that He was with me the entire time. Falling into his arms, relinquishing the moments into His will keeps me focused on the right thing, serving Jesus by serving others.

Five Minute Friday is a gathering of super cool people who all write for five minutes about one word. If you’re up for the challenge, join us!

Five minute Friday – imagine

5 Comments

Posted on May 31, 2013

Do you ever wonder

or imagine

what life would have been like?

If you had married another person?

Had children of a different gender?

Lived elsewhere?

Grown up in ways that you never knew?

Have you ever mused –

What if you had played a sport?

Continued to play an instrument?

Really pursued that gift or calling?

I do not regret my life in the slightest but sometimes I imagine. Having a daughter. Being Italian. Playing the flute. Writing a book. Living in Europe. Being rich. Stuff like that.

While taking a walk with the Hubs the other day, I started imagining life differently. He’s a good Hubs and listens because he knows I don’t want to be with anyone else but him living this life.

And you know what?

I always come up with

I like my life with my Hubs and three olive shoots.

There are many aspects of the past I would prefer to bypass

But I see God’s hand

How He ordered my days – three sons, North Carolina, Jesus follower who loves kale

And I can’t imagine being anyone else.

What do you imagine?

(Check out this fun writing prompt each Friday! It’s a highlight of my week and I love reading the other posts people write about the same word!)

Five minute Friday – view

14 Comments

Posted on May 24, 2013

Straight hair, glasses, this was the re-take picture sophomore year!

Gulp.

Etched into my memory is the stunningly gorgeous popular girl who looked into the mirror in the high school bathroom and let out a disgusted, “UGH! as she peered into the glass.

I was standing beside her.

Contact lenses, perm, junior year and still on that struggle bus!

If that girl was ugly, what did that mean about me? If she let out a mighty gulp, what should my response be for the creature that was looking back at me?

Pimples, fake perm, flat-chested, family problems, low on the social scale, I didn’t have a chance.

My view of myself is very negative though many people might find that hard to believe. They think that a sassy, pink-haired women would like what she sees but they are wrong.

I’m still the woman who looks in the mirror with disgust

Sometimes horror

I get in trouble with the men in my family when I inform them about my level of hideousness. They yell at me when I try to convince them that I am especially yucky. Somehow they do not see all the imperfections that make me at times even feel like I need to apologize for being out in public.

Reconciling God’s view of me with what I see, how I feel, making sense of life’s ugliness appears to be a painful, lifelong process. Ugh.

I’m not expecting you to try to convince me of my inner beauty, my physical at- tractiveness, that’s not the purpose of this post.

I wouldn’t believe you anyway.

I’m just being honest and I suspect I’m not alone. God has a lot of work to do and his view of me is what should really matter.

Ok, so that was immensely painful. “Thank you Five minute Friday“?

Five minute Friday – song

8 Comments

Posted on May 17, 2013

This boy when he sings, makes my heart smile.

I know my family has found the sweet spot in the day when my orange-hair, freckle face 16-year-old starts to sing.

You will not hear him on an album. His ministry-minded middle is in the Moody Men’s Choir and he sings with wild abandon. He sings almost too much. I love it, don’t get me wrong but there’s a sharp contract between the two.

Isaac, though, most of his songs are silly and they are less frequent. These songs can be of the suburban white-boy rap quality busting bad rhymes about important things like how much he hates swiss chard

or cleaning the marble kitchen island

You know, deeply emotional things…NOT

Quite a few are about me being his mom.

Oh these make me giggle

But more importantly they tell me something very important.

He feels safe.

When I sing, it means I am allowing you to hear my voice. You have been permitted to hear my non-musical melodies. I have deemed you safe. When I am off-pitch or goof up a word, if you are hearing my song, you have been given a gift not necessarily in the form of sound but in the form of security.

Writing for five minutes is a treasure. Do it! Click here for deets!

When people sing in this family, it brings more than music to my ears. It brings healing.

Question: When someone in your family sings, what does that mean to your heart?

Five minute Friday – brave

22 Comments

Posted on May 3, 2013

Why just typing about the subject of bravery is well, brave.

My heartbeat is increasing with each.word.placed.

An idea has been swirling in my head for a while now and I’m afraid. I scarcely allow myself to ponder this and now I’m nearing the moment of revealing it to you.

A sample of the things I used this week. I feel happy in the kitchen.

What if my idea succeeds? What if it’s a total failure? What’s my motivation? Do I have the physical, financial, emotional resources needed to make it work?

Speaking to over 50,000 teenagers about saving sex for marriage was brave. Sharing incredibly personal stories about my past was something I asked the Lord to help me with every time I did it and that was for nearly eight years.

But now the Lord is placing, (I think) an idea which scares me as much as the first time I entered a high school classroom full of very skeptical kids.

My dining room

I’m thinking about opening my home to encourage women with cooking and hospitality. Not as a money making idea, not to sell any kitchen gadgets or products, but just to encourage women in the art of domesticity. This is something so very close to my essence as a wife, mother and homemaker.

I think about this idea when I am chopping red cabbage or stirring up a homemade salad dressing in the kitchen. When I’m roasting poblano peppers or making a pretty table setting for my family, I feel this urge to open my home and show others how to do it. I’m so not an expert which is why I’m afraid to try.

When I think about going forward, I bravely ask God, “Is this what you want me to do?” It’s sad that I don’t know any of my neighbors, what if they reject me? So many questions and doubts but yet an eagerness and an unction to try.

Writing for five minutes is a treasure. Do it!

Should I do it? What is the brave thing you are contemplating?

Check out this word party. This might be the brave thing you need to do!

Five minute Friday – friend

9 Comments

Posted on April 26, 2013

When someone chooses to call me her “friend,” I have to catch my breath. Did she just call me a friend? It blesses one of the most tender places in my heart.

It’s like a badge of honor to move from being someone a person just “knows” to being elevated to friendship status and I’m not talking about getting friended on facebook. If I am introduced to someone, I admit I pay close attention to how they refer to me.

I know someone who competes with others on the amount of facebook friends she has. It is massively annoying. That’s not friendship.

Recently in casual conversation, I discovered a new friend of mine was having a colonoscopy three days before I was going to have mine. We have shared some personal things in the short time we’ve gotten to know each other. It meant a lot that she shared intimate details with me about the procedure.

Writing for five minutes is a treasure. Do it!

To enter that private place with someone and feel safe, to laugh and be encouraged, I received a gift AND a colonoscopy. One (the person) was better than the other (the procedure) but they went well together in a weird sort of way.

I received a text from this woman at 6:30 in the morning the day of my procedure. She was checking on me. I would have assumed she was asleep but early in the morning, she reached out.

Do you have any idea what a sweet comfort it was to ask her the most indelicate questions and feel totally safe? I’m praising God for the many people who call me their friend.

Join us for a writing adventure, click here for the deets.

Five Minute Friday – broken

8 Comments

Posted on March 29, 2013

The women’s Bible study on Psalms finished on Wednesday. A group of broken and redeemed women coming together each week has a tendency to make one feel whole again. The presence of the Lord was upon our time together. It became a healing and learning time for me.

The last assignment in our Bible study was to create our own Psalm. Here’s mine and I thought this worked with today’s theme “broken.” You will probably notice the element of brokenness in my words.

Cindy’s Psalm

Stunning are your ways, O God!

When I was covered with shame, plunging headlong into the mire

Whelmed with falsity and pride

Your loving-kindness scooped me up

I opened the Book of Life

And this ugly, benighted woman became beautiful in your sight

Suppliant I became

Scribe I have become

Servant I shall forever be

Rendered helpless apart from your spirit

Because of you, I AM

Blessed through Jesus Christ

Chosen before the fullness of time, incomprehensible though it may be

Free from the bond of deception and death

Stunning are your ways, O God!

I tell ya, I go to bed on Thursday, knowing tomorrow’s gonna be Five Minute Friday – that’s pretty cool! Join us and see what it’s all about!

Five minute Friday – remember

10 Comments

Posted on March 22, 2013

This picture hangs in my dining room. So many memories.

As I returned the phone call, a warning was necessary for my husband. “I’m going to cry.”

The voice on the other end asked the triggering question.

“How’s your grandma?” she kindly inquired.

I had only seconds to consider a polite answer. The grief which has whelmed me came surfacing back though truth told, it’s never far behind.

“We lost her 19 months ago. I’m so sorry you didn’t know. It was quick, we only knew she had brain cancer for about a week. I’m so sorry to tell you that. She loved you. You were a good friend.” I choke back the tears, I’m in the hallway of the hotel. I’m in Fort Benning visiting my Soldier on a brief pass from Ranger School. My stomach lurches within, it’s shocking how hearing from my grandma’s old friend makes me remember this woman I loved so much. I remember that I haven’t forgotten that I miss her.

After returning home, a card arrived in the mail. It was from my grandma’s friend. It was a sympathy card. Like the phone call, this card was a surprise.

I so appreciated getting this card, what a thoughtful expression and kindness.

But it was a blessed affirmation. She remembered ME. More importantly, she remembered my grandma and the friendship they shared. She remembered the sadness displayed in our phone conversation even though I reassured her she had done NOTHING wrong. I’m glad she called though it was painful. She missed her too.

Check this out and write for your sanity, that’s my personal experience!

Writing for five minutes can be a blessed experience even if you cry. Trust me, I know!