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Archive for August, 2011

Flutter-bys

Posted in Etc. on August 29, 2011| Leave a Comment »

It’s August…the 29th exactly…my 320th month-a-versary (see earlier post).  It’s hot out…though cooler today than yesterday.  The grass in our yard crunches because it hasn’t rained in a while.  I’m concerned about child number 4 having football practice this afternoon in such heat…but, I’m a mom and it’s my job to be concerned about such things.  And this afternoon I will go sit outside in the heat while child number 5 has a tennis lesson…but, I’m a mom and it’s my job to sit in the heat when children have such lessons.

Some of my flowers around the yard have withered because of the heat and the fact that I haven’t watered them as regularly…because it’s August and life got crazy in August.

But the Lantana in my front yard is looking good…in spite of the heat…in spite of the lack of water.  And the Lantana in my front yard is smiling so brightly with its yellow flowers that butterflies from all over are coming to visit.

I love butterflies…flutter-bys, as some children call them…and some adults like me.  Watching butterflies is a peaceful thing to do.  Watching butterflies makes me forget how hot it is and all of the things on my to-do list that I have yet to to-do.

We think of butterflies as coming in the spring…and I guess that they do…but there are lots and lots of butterflies that come to our place in August.  As I’ve observed the gathering of butterflies over the last few days…I remembered an August long ago…when child number 2 was in kindergarten and would get out of school at noon and children numbers 3 and child number 4 would ride with me to go pick up their sister from school.

To pass away the driving time, which was only about 10-12 minutes…but sometimes even 10-12 minutes needs passing with preschoolers, child number 3 and I would count butterflies.  There would be bunches of them fluttering around the roadside flowers and bushes.  It was a fun thing to do…a peaceful thing.  Sometimes we would count 100 butterflies…that’s a lot of butterflies…that’s a lot of gentle, peaceful creatures helping us pass away the time of hot August days.

And though I’ve already taken a butterfly-break today…I might take another one…and go sit on my front porch and watch dozens of flutter-bys fluttering by.  It’s such a peaceful thing to do.  You might want to take one too.

 

 

 

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All God’s creatures

Posted in Meditations on August 20, 2011| Leave a Comment »

This morning I aided my husband in rescuing a turtle.  The turtle, a big guy over 12 inches long, was caught in the volleyball net in our front yard, which had blown down during a storm.  Bryan noticed the turtle as he was driving down our driveway.  He called out to me that I would need to help a turtle and then thankfully decided to see to the task himself.  I’m glad he did.

I watched at a distance as my husband bent over the turtle and worked to loosen the net from the turtle’s legs.  What I didn’t realize was that it wasn’t only the turtle’s legs that were caught…the net was also twisted around the turtle’s neck.

Bryan asked me to fetch a pair of scissors.  When I reached Bryan and the struggling turtle, I was surprised by what I saw.  The turtle had foam gathered around his gaping mouth and from the turtle came deep gasping noises…the net was choking him.

Bryan Darling was calmly and carefully untwisting net strings and talking to the turtle.  Without help from the scissors there would have been no way to free the turtle from the snare.

The turtle was gasping for life-giving air and Bryan was working with the scissors.  I was gripped by the scene before me.  This big man bending over a foaming and struggling animal…fighting for life.   The compassion that I saw was overwhelming…this compassion also welled up within me.  We had to save the turtle…it was a life…it mattered.

Finally, Bryan was able to work around the turtle’s legs and head, that would try to disappear into the turtle’s shell, and cut him free from the net.  We carried him to some water so he could drink.  I tried to rinse the foam away from his mouth.  As soon as my husband placed him back on the ground the turtle was off…moving quickly toward the direction of his turtle hole.

The whole scene has stuck with me as I’ve tried to go about the day…the struggle for life and the compassion of a man.  I thought of a verse in the Psalms, actually two verses.  Psalm 103:13-14 says, “As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear Him; for He knows how we are formed, He remembers that we are dust.”

This turtle was not near as important as a child to my husband or to me…still the compassion we felt was so strong…the desire to help overwhelming.  If we can feel so strongly about a creature…how much more must the Heavenly Father, our Creator, feel compassion toward His children when they find themselves ensnared…struggling…gasping for air and desiring life.

 

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encouraging words

Posted in Family and friends on August 18, 2011| 4 Comments »

The last couple of weeks have been crazy with a college graduation, postponed from the spring because the town where my son attends  school was recovering from a deadly spring storm and moving him back to finish his graduate degree;  school  starting for children 3-5, leader training for a Bible study that I participate in, AND child number 2 preparing to leave home for college.

Tomorrow is the big moving day.  We leave early in the morning…child number 2, her daddy and I.  Boxes and luggage await to be loaded into her car and Bryan Darling’s truck as I write this.

I’m thankful that I took a break and checked my email earlier this evening and found a message from my Aunt Barbara.  Her words met my heart right where it is and gave my distracted thoughts a place to rest just for a while and find encouraging sentiments.

Once again she understands where I am and what I am feeling.  Here is a portion of our exchange.

“Dear Donna,

I guess tomorrow will be both a giggly and busy day.  I am tickled to death, as I am sure all of you are, that Amy is moving into the dorm and meeting new people and starting new classes and loving it all. But I’m also thinking that it may be a quiet drive back home. It is weird to me how history repeats itself in a way. (CAUTION ALERT! Here comes another “when-Barbara-was-a-little-girl” story). Mom and dad worked really hard to find a school where I could live on campus. And they moved me and my book case and my bed chair and a couple of stuffed animals – – plus clothes, shoes, and a card table – – into Mynders East about this time of year 53 years ago. I was scared stiff – – afraid that it all was going to be more than I could manage.  It took me a long time to realize that that day took a lot of courage on my parent’s part. And it has occurred to me this week that that same scenario is happening all over again for y’all.  Sorta.  I used to watch you, Donna, with your grandmother and see how complete she looked with you. So many things about you remind me of her – – your reserved nature, your naturalness (though she did love that lipstick and fingernail polish), your faith.

And there’s another weird thing about today. Your mom just called, after I had written that first part above. I think I’ll let her tell you the story. Ask her about the “pocket dictionary.” I really do not want to get completely loopy in my last years, but I am more and more persuaded that there are no accidents.   Just patterns.  Patterns that we pass on from one generation to another, with God’s grace.

Love, Aunt Barbara

And here is my response:
Aunt Barbara,

Your story encouraged me greatly!  We have had a good day…Amy and I running last minute errands and gathering those last few items for dorm life.  I am very excited for her, but cannot fathom leaving her.

We got all of her medication packed this evening and it will be hard for me to not have some control over that…the measuring and reminding.  I probably will still remind her every once in a while via text message.  She does a good job remembering, but still “Amy, did you take your medicine?”  has been a regular part of our nighttime conversations for over two years now.   It feels funny that the 7-day medicine container will not be a part of the kitchen decor now.

I know that she is ready and I am cheering really hard for her.  Just the same…I will need to make sure that there’s a box of Kleenex in the car for the ride home.

much love,

donna

This is where I am tonight.  Early in the morning, I will be travelling with my girl and her daddy…cheering her on as we go.

(author’s note: My Aunt had polio as a child, which paralyzed her right arm completely and she has limited use of her left arm.  She is one of my heroes.  My daughter was diagnosed with epilepsy at the age of 17.  She is also my hero.)

 

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shoulder pads

Posted in Things about me on August 10, 2011| 1 Comment »

I love football…the American kind, with an oval-shaped ball wrapped in leather and players who begin each game in bright uniforms which take on tinges of grass-stain green and mud-brown by the end of the fourth quarter.

I have loved football for as long as I can remember.  I loved it when I was a preschooler and some really cool high-school guys (friends of my family) would allow a little girl like me run around carrying a football in one of their backyard games.

I loved it when my parents took me to watch one of those guys play high-school ball and then when he played in college.

I love watching college ball on TV.  I love watching professional football on TV.  I love watching it in person.  I just love football.

I love best of all to watch my son play football…it’s really cool.  Love it, love it, love it.

My kids do laugh at me sometimes though (well, they laugh at me a lot, but that’s for other stories).  They laugh at me when we’re watching a game and one of the players rises back to his feet after a tough play and he is all disheveled and his shoulder  pads are no longer covered by his jersey and he isn’t even aware of it…but I am very aware of it.

I call out, “Fix your shoulder pad,” to the television screen.  The player usually remains unaware of  his dilemma and often moves on to the huddle and the next play…WITHOUT adjusting the shoulder pad/jersey.

Ok…so maybe I’m a little obsessive/compulsive about this one little thing…but it drives me a bit crazy.  That’s when my kids begin to giggle and snicker.

Because of this pet peeve of mine, my kids began doing something in the last couple of years…just to make fun of me…and drive me a little crazy.  They will each roll up one of the short sleeves on whatever shirts they are wearing…not completely roll up into a cuff…no that is fine…I do that all the time.  No…they just turn up a portion of their shirt sleeves and don’t say a word.  All of them will have turn-up portions of shirt sleeves on their persons and just sit quietly or walk around quietly…until I notice and say loudly, “Fix your shoulder pads!”

If the child is in my reach, I will try to smooth out the partial cuff myself.

They love to torture me in this way.  They think it is funny.

Yesterday, my football-playing son had his team pictures made.  Afterward, I asked him how the picture-taking went.

“It went well,” he said.

And then he mentioned that he had just happened to roll up a part of his jersey for his individual picture.

“NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!” I cried.  “You DIDN’T!”  “You WOULDN’T!”

“But I ordered one of those photo buttons so I can wear it to all of the games,” I told him.

He just grinned.

I never did get the truth of the matter out of him.  I guess I’ll have to wait for the pictures to come in.  And if his shoulder pad needs fixing…well…I will just have to grin and bear it.

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photos

Posted in Family and friends on August 8, 2011| Leave a Comment »

My family took many photos this last weekend.  It was my firstborn son’s graduation from college and we documented the event with lots of pictures.

When you arrive a couple of hours early so you can get a seat, you have a lot of time on your hands.  You read the thick graduation program.  You look for your adult child’s name under the college from which they are earning a degree.  You take pictures of empty stages and large screens that announce that you are at the commencement exercises for the 2011 spring and summer graduates.  You wait.

We took lots of photos during the ceremony…of our son standing and sitting and walking and smiling.  We took pictures of some of the people that he began his college adventure with four years ago…classmates from his high school.  They all finished well.

And we took photos after the ceremony…with his siblings…with his parents.  Photos of him standing…walking…smiling…sweating (it was a hot day!).  We even took a photo of a plaque that bore his name, which hangs on the wall of the college where he left his mark.  We took photos at receptions…photos during the reception…photos leaving the reception.

We are proud parents…we took lots of photos.

But there is one image that I can only carry in my mind’s memory.  I wish I had had my camera.  I wish I had gotten a digital image that I could transfer into a print image and put in a frame and place in my home.  But my camera wasn’t hanging around my neck when my mind’s eye captured this image.

Our three oldest sons had gone ahead of my husband and I and our youngest to breakfast the morning of the graduation.  I knew children 3 and 4 had gone down before us…but for some reason I thought child number 1 was still behind us.  I walked into the hotel’s breakfast area.  It was crowded…with the hotel hosting two different family reunions.  I looked across the large crowded room and a young man caught my eye.  He was handsome and well-dressed with a bright white dress shirt and a crimson tie that went well with his gray slacks.  He was looking back at me…he had a twinkle in his eye.  He smiled and I realized that I knew this young man…this grown-up man.  He belonged to me.  He was the reason that we were there…celebrating his hard work.

I think that a little gasp escaped from my lips when I realized who the man was that met my gaze.  I was so happy to see him (he had arrived later than we had the night before and I had not seen him in two whole days).  Four years of memories of his college years began passing through my mind.  The memories would continue to flow throughout the rest of the day…and I realized that there we were…making new memories.

We finished making our breakfast plates and pouring coffee into cups and sat down side by side.  That will be one of my favorite memories from this past graduation weekend…the image that will linger in my mind…but not in a frame in my home.

 

 

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April 27, 2011

Posted in Etc. on August 5, 2011| Leave a Comment »

I have a series of text messages on my phone from April 27, 2011, around 4:43 in the afternoon.  The messages are from my firstborn, child number 1.  I remember hearing a weather report and thought that maybe I should contact him to see where he was in his college town because the weather was becoming rather stormy.

He let me know that he was safe in the University of Alabama’s Recreation Center, where he works.  In fact, his job that day involved sending tweets…giving weather updates on the approaching storm.

He told me that I could follow him on twitter as he posted updates of what was happening there in Tuscaloosa…so that’s what I did.  I weathered the storm with my son via modern communication devices.  We knew that a tornado had hit the area…we had no idea just how severe a storm it had been…nor of the incredible damage and destruction that had occurred in just a few minutes.

I was on the phone with child number 1 soon after the tornado had passed through the city.  He was heading out of the Rec. when he asked me to hold on a moment.  A man was entering the Rec. center.  He was from a nearby neighborhood.  He was asking my son for help.

“Mom, the guy looked like he had been in a war,” my son told me, as he headed back inside the Recreation Center to see if he could help in any way.  Soon we would begin realizing the horrible toll that the storm had taken.

The University’s Recreation Center would be transformed that afternoon/evening into a shelter for many of the victims of the destructive storm.  The night passed into day and people rallied to help in whatever way they could.  Classes at the University were cancelled as the devastation to the city was beginning to be realized.

The tornado had been an EF5, the rating assigned to tornados with wind speeds of more that 200 mph.  The supercell that produced the tornado lasted 7 hours and 24 minutes, covering around 380 miles.

Many people lost their lives in the path of this storm.  Many lost their homes or workplaces.

The spring semester ended that day.  No more classes would be held.  Graduation would be postponed.

Tomorrow my family will be in Tuscaloosa for commencement.  Those who didn’t walk in their graduation ceremony in May will walk tomorrow.  My son’s diploma already hangs on his bedroom wall here at home, but tomorrow we will celebrate his hard work during the last four years…and we’ll remember those who lost their lives, their homes, their businesses…but not their hope.

 

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Hands

Posted in Meditations on August 4, 2011| Leave a Comment »

The other night child number 3 and I made the most delicious fried apple pies.  It was a culinary success and we celebrated with high-fives.  As I reached upward to slap my hand against his, I was amazed at how small my hand looked…dwarfed in size by his large hand.

Wait a minute…I used to close my fingers around his hand as we walked through a store…or to his Sunday school class at church…or across a street…now my hand looked like that of a child’s compared in size to his.

The hands of people in our lives tell stories…they conjure up memories.

I remember clinging to my father’s hand when my hand was so small that I could wrap all of my fingers around his big index finger.  I remember walking that way,  side by side, holding on to him and knowing that I was with the one who could protect me better than anyone else.

I remember other hands too; my infant sister’s hands that seemed so small compared to my big four-year-old hands;  J.J. Johnson’s hand that I held for the first time back in fourth grade; my momma’s hands that were always busy doing for others, the way they look like my own, except more experienced with all kinds of know-how.

I remember hoping as a young teen that I would have a husband one day who always wanted to hold my hand and I think of the many, many times and situations that Bryan Darling has laced his fingers between mine.  I remember all of my babies’ hands and watching them grow, until all but one of them now have hands bigger than my own.

I remember my grandmother’s hands, long and graceful looking, and the way she held them on her lap, fingers interlocked, pointer fingers extended like making a church steeple in a children’s finger play.  I remember my other grandmother’s hands that could snip a branch off of any tree or plant and get it to re-root and grow on its own.

You remember the hands in your lives too.  Hands that belong to childhood playmates, mothers, fathers, teachers, grandparents, spouses, children, and best friends…we all have memories of hands in our lives.

A devotional quote I read says, “The clinging hand of His (God’s) child makes a desperate situation a delight to Him.”  I think about holding on to my strong father’s hand as a child.  As tightly as I thought that I was holding on to him, I now know something that only growing up would teach me.  I could never have held on to my father’s hand as tightly as he could hold on to mine.  When I have held the hands of my children in certain situations, times when I thought their safety might be at stake, I held on to them in such a way that it would be difficult for their hand to slip from mine.

When I experience times that make me afraid…when I’m faced with seemingly desperate situations, like the devotional quote talked about, fear can easily sweep away rational thoughts until anxiety rules my heart and mind.  That’s when I need to remember that my Father God is right there to hold my hand.  Isaiah 41: 10says, “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God.  I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.”

Verse 13 continues, “For I am the LORD, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, ‘Do not fear; I will help you.’”

And as tightly as I may think that I can hold on to the hand of my Heavenly Father, the truth of the matter is that He is the One holding on to me.  And He can hold on to me in such a way that nothing can remove me from His grasp.

 

 

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“Please, leave your brother alone!”

Posted in Etc. on August 2, 2011| 1 Comment »

“Please, leave your brother alone!” I heard those words coming out of my mouth yesterday morning, as I gathered dirty laundry from a clothes hamper.  Two of my sons were in one of their bedrooms…one was evidently doing something that the other one didn’t like.  One of them kept saying, “Stop it!”

The other brother simply ignored the “Stop it” pleas.  That’s when I called out, “Please, leave your brother alone!”

I was surprised when the words left my mouth.  I was surprised because I realized that I don’t say that phrase as often as I used to say it.  But…as was proven yesterday…situations still arise where those are the only words for a mom to say.

Then I remembered saying similar words a few days ago when we were driving somewhere.  Three of our five children were sitting in the backseat…the middle seat…not the back, back seat of our SUV.  But because they couldn’t sit in the middle seat without me telling them to leave one another alone, I was threatening to send one of them to the furthest back seat.  He looked at me with astonishment as I pronounced the threatened consequences that bothering brothers would bring.

But it’s not just the younger brothers that bother their siblings; even my older children still bother their siblings.  It leaves me wondering if they will have a desire to bother even when they are several decades old.

And then I remembered last night…when I went into child number 2’s bedroom.  She was contentedly busy working on something on her computer.  I decided that it was a good time to tickle her.  She glared at me and said, “Stop it!”

I tickled her again.

Yes…there will probably always be a time in my family’s life when I’m saying something like, “Please, leave your brother alone!”  I guess it’s in their genes to bother.

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Goobers

Posted in Etc. on August 1, 2011| Leave a Comment »

I have a friend who used to describe herself as a “goober” when she did something awkward or silly that embarrassed her.  She would call me up and say something like, “I’m a goober.”  And I would reassure her that she wasn’t and then listen to her “being a goober” story.  Usually the story made me laugh.

Lately, I find myself being a “goober” more and more.  Like week before last when child number 2 and I had an appointment in town.  We received some good news during the appointment so we were very happy…downright giddy…as we walked to the elevator and then got into the elevator and stood talking in the elevator in happy tones with smiles and a little laughter.  The elevator doors closed and then opened a few minutes later.   A couple stepped into the elevator as child number 2 and I stepped off the elevator only to realize that we were on the same floor where we had had our appointment.

As we quickly stepped back into the elevator…both of us thinking out loud…wondering how we were still on the third floor of the building…we both realized at about the same time that when we had entered the elevator, we had never pressed the button instructing the elevator to deliver us to the first floor of the building.  This made us laugh…and the couple now standing in the elevator with us watched us…smiling politely…holding their tongues about how silly they thought we were until we parted ways.

After finally reaching the first floor and getting off the elevator and exiting the building, child number 2 and I continued to giggle…even as we had trouble remembering where we had parked the car…and even as we were almost mowed down by a speeding Hoverchair zipping through the parking lot.

Yes…we felt like “goobers” but we really didn’t care…it was funny…we celebrated our “gooberness” by going to get smoothies.  Child number 2 tweeted about it and told me I should write a blog about it because is was “epic.”

I didn’t really think of the incident as “epic.”  Funny…yes.  Silly…yes.  But “epic”…no…not “epic” material.

But this past weekend…this past weekend our “gooberness” reached “epic” proportions.  This past weekend child number 2, and her parents, of which I’m the mom, went to a new student orientation at the college she will be attending in the fall.

The orientation dates have been on the calendar that hangs in our kitchen for two months.  The orientation dates had been marked on my phone calendar for two months.  Orientation for transfer students was to take place on July 29th.  The date had been cemented in my psyche for weeks.

And that’s why we found it a little odd that child number 2 had received an invitation the week before we were to attend orientation on July 29th, to a meeting about the school’s honor program on the evening of July 28th…the day before orientation began (at least it was the day before in our minds…remember that date cemented in my psyche?).

We arrived at the dining hall, where the meeting was to take place in a room off to the side, about the time the meeting was to begin.  We entered the main doors and were very surprised at the number of people there.  “Wow, this is a pretty big turnout for this meeting,” I surmised, still not realizing our mistake.

As we stood there, the three of us, watching college age kids stand in a buffet line, spooning food onto plates…we continued to wonder what was going on.  We wondered why there were information tables lined up around the dining hall with people milling about talking to the folks manning the tables.

My husband asked an official-looking man what was going on.  Bryan Darling happened to find just the right person to ask…the man was the Dean of Students.  As we talked to this very kind man, we realized that we had arrived for the first meeting of orientation 9 hours late.  The two-day orientation had begun on that Thursday morning.  We had had it very firmly planted in our minds that orientation was to begin on a Friday morning, the next morning, but no, it had begun on that Thursday morning.  We were very simply a day late.

The Dean of Students quickly went into action, gathering his student life staff, introducing them all to us as we stood there feeling foolish…feeling like “epic goobers.”  We made the choice to just begin fresh the next morning.  They gave us packets of information to carry to our hotel with us.

When we arrived the next day, we were greeted by name again and again.  A series of appointments had been scheduled for us to catch us up on everything we had missed because WE WERE A DAY LATE!  Child number 2 went with her orientation group for the last session of the 2-day orientation.  We had staff person after staff person checking with us throughout the day to make sure we were having a good experience.  We had a couple of personal tours of the campus.  The entire staff seemed to know who the Browns were…and they didn’t refer to us as “goobers” even once.

All in all it went great!  And except that we felt awkward and silly for having arrived at the wrong time on the wrong day, it was an awesome experience.  It confirmed in a way that couldn’t have happened had we arrived on time on the right day, that it is the perfect place for our child number 2.

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