slice of life – Page 7

Reflections of a Freelance Writer

I’ve traded my fashionable pumps for scruffy slippers and I couldn’t be more elated about it!

Massive dry cleaning bills & endless hours spent in grueling traffic are a thing of my past. So is that disgracefully unkind woman who passed for my “manager”. No more extensive mileage reports, lost expense receipts, mind-numbing staff meetings. No nagging need to panic that the pager battery is dead…again.

I don’t miss eating lunch in my car. Or skipping lunch altogether. Or skipping dinner altogether. Or skipping both. I’m not longing for the 15 hour work days nor pining away for on-call weekends. I’ve shed no tears over the loss of demanding voice mails, late night calls and hateful text messages from my disgracefully unkind manager.

My child can now fit in my car without first having to clear folders and water bottles and medical brochures and empty Chick-fila bags.

Sure the regular paychecks of a “steady job” were nice. But the boss wasn’t. Did I mention that she was disgracefully unkind?

I will never again have to hear someone on a conference call repeatedly tell dozens of other people to mute their lines if they aren’t speaking. I will never again be compelled to leave my family 2 weeks before Christmas to board a full aircraft with some atrociously out-of-control kid behind me relentlessly kicking my seat for 2 hours while I travel somewhere I don’t want to go for 3 days, to sit in a dark conference room for 8 hours {without benefit of sugar highs} listening to people I don’t want to listen to speaking about the same topics they’ve covered in the past 5 regional training meetings!

After 6 months without an office vending machine, I’m 8 pounds lighter. And I am light years happier. I am a staff of one. I set my own hours. I set my own goals. I answer to myself. And if the boss is ever disgracefully unkind…it’s probably because her feet are cold. In that case I don my pair of scruffy slippers!

p.s. anyone who knows me, knows this goes without saying…YES, I miss my patients and their families. I loved that part of my job and considered it my ministry. It was unfortunate that everything else got to me…especially that disgracefully unkind boss.

Angels and JOY Rides

I’m having one of those weekends where I found myself with a huge internal ache generally curable only by remote seclusion and a box of soft tissue. Deciding on the road to respite that I might find happiness in turning loose 330 horsies under the hood of a cute little sports car, I took myself for a drive in the mountains. Nothing gets the adrenaline pumping quite like the challenge of staying in your own lane, running 60 through a series of 25 mph high altitude curves while listening to Tracy Chapman’s “You’ve got a Fast Car…so remember when we were driving, driving in your car, speed so fast I felt like I was drunk’…”. My sincere apologies to the elderly man driving a whopping 5 mph in his 67 Chevy truck who had an expression of sheer terror as I blew his doors off. I promise there was no alcohol involved.

I don’t normally drive fast. Okay, that’s a lie. It’s the one vice I indulge myself in when on remote back roads and no one else is in the car with me. I call it taking my guardian angel for a JOY Ride. And if anyone turns me in to a state trooper, I’ll vehemently deny this as a piece of fiction.

I have no idea where I was but I came upon a river and turned onto a dirt road that held me side-by-side to raging waters decorated on both banks by golden aspen and celebrated by a host of avid fly fishermen. So beautiful and serene was it, I felt I had stumbled upon a living Fall Foliage poster. I parked the Infinity “leer jet”, grabbed my Bible and headed for a quiet rock by the water’s edge.

Prior to arriving at this place my mind was racing even faster than the V6 engine. A series of unrelated events in the past 4 days had left me feeling as if I had been through a tornado that blew me to places I did not want to go and an earthquake that shook my world. Emerging from those I found a fire had ignited some painful things in my heart that I thought I had dealt with years ago. At a loss for anything to say to God, I prayed a Mercy Me song… “Word of God speak. Would you pour down like rain, washing my eyes to see your majesty…to be still and know that you’re in this place. Please let me stay and rest in your holiness. Word of God speak…I’m finding myself in the midst of You. Beyond the music, beyond the noise. All that I need is to be with You. And in the quiet…hear Your voice…”

When everything else around me ceases to make sense I follow the example of my Jesus who made a practice of getting alone with the Father. Though some are great listeners, friends are for the most part unskilled at offering counsel. And therapy can be expensive. Jesus knew where to turn for the source of his strength and He must have treasured those times of aloneness with God. I used to resist these ventures, telling myself I am too busy to escape for any kind of spiritual respite, trying to “make do” with a quick quiet time or a few minutes in the prayer closet at home. Eventually I learned that these moments of separation…a week, a day, a few hours even…are God’s best opportunity to speak into my soul. Today, He did not disappoint…but then, He never does. While I looked to God, listening for His voice in my tornado and my earthquake and even in the fire, I didn’t hear Him. It was in the quiet by the river as water crashed onto huge boulders that I heard Him whisper and His words were as clear as the sky above me…

“And he said, go forth and stand upon the mount before the Lord. And the Lord passed by, and a great strong wind rent the mountains and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind, an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake, a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire, a still small voice.” I Kings 19:11-12

My heart knows there are no substitutes for purposeful time alone with my Lord, to listen for that still small voice. My soul rejoices every time He speaks. May this Mercy Me video be an encouragement to you that when your engine gets all revved up, refreshing & restoration come when you permit your circumstances to drive you into your own time alone, shift into neutral, cool your jets and allow the Word of God to speak into your journey.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JK_6osCH74&NR=1

In Dry Places

Miles of beach with no ocean, mountains with no trees. Sounds like the worst of both worlds. I mean, I love the mountains and living in the Colorado Rockies I regularly spend time hiking and/or driving admiring the beauty of the mountainous terrain, trees and wildlife. And at least once or twice a year I run away from home to get an “ocean fix” somewhere to listen to crashing waves, gather sea shells and wade into the coolness of the sea. So it was strange to find myself in the Great Sand Dunes Wilderness with nothing but mountains of sand. No waves, no water, not even a single sea shell. No trees, no wildlife, no vegetation. Just sand.

From the parking lot, the dunes don’t appear that challenging. But within the first several steps of walking into deep shifting sand I was struck with the thought that this is not going to be an ordinary hill climb. It was a bit like Michael Jackson’s moonwalk…I knew my feet were moving but they didn’t seem to be taking me forward. I pressed on looking up to the top and calculating that I should reach it within half an hour. That was my first mistake…miscalculating the “cost” of the experience.

Jesus said, “Who among you that does not bear his cross and come after me cannot be my disciple; for which of you intending to build…doesn’t sit down first and count the cost to determine if he has sufficient to finish?” Luke 14:27-28

It didn’t take long to determine that this hike in & out of dunes would be much more strenuous than I originally expected. Shoes full of sand & feeling as if I was navigating with cinder blocks on my feet, there were times when I congratulated myself for going 30 steps without stopping to catch my breath. It didn’t help that I was there at the hottest part of the day. I’ll have to ration my water supply or I’m going to run out, I told myself. Not being able to drink in as much as I wanted was miserable.

I am nothing if not determined and so I continued for a solid hour to what I perceived was the peak. Every so often I would turn to look down the mountain of sand at the poor souls just starting out, appearing the size of gnats, and because I could see how far I’d come already I was encouraged to keep going higher to the finish. I was within a few feet of it when I was hit with the reality of a false pinnacle. The climb had been so steep to this point that the view beyond was obstructed. Only when I reached the “top” did I see that I had gone barely half way through this journey…there was at least another mile ahead of me that I had not expected. My spirit sank and then it rebelled…that’s it. I’m done. No more. I sat down with my half empty bottle of water and a piddly little snack bar that wouldn’t even begin to sooth my hunger pains…I wasn’t planning on being up there through lunch so I failed to bring enough to nourish my body. I told myself the view from here is good enough. I’ve got nothing to prove. I’m not going on any further. I sat down in the hot sand & complained by text message to a friend…

Ever found yourself there? Sitting down in the middle of a half-finished journey, complaining that it’s just too hard to go on? Possessing a sense of smugness as you compare yourself to others not as far along the climb? Experiencing the sensation of going nowhere while the sands of life’s daily challenges keep shifting? Heat pounding you as you struggle to climb out of a pit? Feeling beat up by false peaks of life, where every time you think you’ve conquered some mountain in your path you find a bigger one up ahead? So overwhelmed you’re able to move only short distances at a time before you feel the wind knocked out of you again? Hungering with only a small snack in your spiritual belly because you failed to plan for the long haul? Parched & thirsting without living water to sustain you?

It’s in times of walking through the barren dry places that God speaks…

I give Living Water John 4:10, 14

I am the Bread of Life. John 6: 35, 48

They shall not hunger or thirst neither shall the heat nor sun smite them. For he that has mercy on them shall lead them, even by springs of water shall he guide them. Isaiah 49:10

The refreshment of the Holy Spirit never leaves us. Our place is to hunger & thirst after Christ, to come to the fountain and be filled, to never stop hungering & thirsting after the righteousness of God as we trudge in & out of the valleys & peaks of this thing called life. We can give up when faced with ominous mountains in our path, telling ourselves that this view of God is “good enough”. But what if we miss heaven, the angels, the Hallelujah Chorus? What if we miss Christ altogether? Let me encourage you to read Matthew 25:1-13 and diligently study the parable of the foolish virgins & the wise virgins. Discover for yourself what it means to have a heart of good intentions but still not be prepared for the final part of your journey.

Exhausted, discouraged, hungry & frustrated I wanted the hike to end. I justified why I didn’t need to go on any further. But the words of a friend urged me in reply to my earlier whiney text message…“Quit texting and CLIMB! You can do it, Di !” You can do it! Someone believed in me at my lowest point and that was enough to keep me moving. Three more ridges of false peaks and 95 minutes later I found myself at the pinnacle flat on my back making sand angels and singing the Hallelujah Chorus. I was having a moment. I had finally arrived. A short while later came a second text from my friend… “look behind you at one set of footprints…” The symbolism of Christ carrying me brought me to tears.

It has taken a couple of days to get the sand out of my car and my clothes and my ears! But the exhilaration of reaching the top remains fresh in my spirit. And the message of hope that inspired me is not forgotten.

When you find yourself in the dry desolate places, listen to the voice of hope from your truest Friend, the One who tells you that you do not have to go it alone. He loves you so much that He cannot get you out of His thoughts!

“How precious are your thoughts toward me, oh God. How great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they are more in number than the grains of sand…” Psalm 139: 17-18

In dry places, know that it is He who carries you through the desolation and He who will deliver you from it.

“I am He…I will carry you; I have made you & I will bear the burden. I will carry you and bring you to deliverance.” Isaiah 46: 4