I spy with my little eye ...

I like to “people-watch”. Not in a creepy voyeuristic way, but in an observant “noticing those around me” kind of way. I’m curious about the people I see riding the bus, walking downtown, out and about shopping, or at my kids’ sporting events. I wonder who they are and what their story is.

A number of weeks ago I was waiting for the bus downtown and an older woman passed by and I literally did a double-take because this woman looked exactly like Mrs. Doubtfire! From the hair to the polyester dress, I thought she was the spitting image of the movie character! I wonder who she really is? If she wore pants and a shirt instead of the dress, would she look like Robin Williams? I keep hoping I’ll see her again.

I see mothers on the bus in the morning with their young children, and I wonder what kind of jobs they work at and just how early they must need to get up in the morning to drop their little one off at daycare. In the early afternoons I see older ladies on the bus that look like they got dressed up to get their hair done or to go shopping downtown (somehow I always presume at The Bay). Some of these women are quite elegant in their older age and I wonder what they were like when they were younger.

I see all types of different people and I hope a smile or a kind word or gesture might make a difference in their day.

I spy with my little eye, people all around me. I wonder what other people-watchers see when they see me?

Thank you, God.

I recently discovered a website and facebook page for SCD Lifestyle (link in the side bar), “SCD” being Specific Carbohydrate Diet. As someone with celiac disease, I found the link to be helpful and actually discovered some new information about celiac disease. One of the proprietors of this web site is also celiac, so he has a helpful perspective on diet, supplements and celiac health.

Through their facebook page, they offered tips for alleviating stress. I figured I would subscribe because who doesn’t have stress they want to have eased! The first email tip was meditation (aka breathing exercises). Easy enough.

Today’s tip for the day involved a 3 step process, the last step of which I can’t clearly remember. The second step had an impact on me (which is probably why I can’t recall the third and final step). The tip was to exercise gratitude; essentially to spend 3 minutes making a list of all the things that I am grateful for, whether relationships, possessions or experiences and recall the positive emotion tied to those relationships, possessions or experiences.

Too often I find myself praying in “asking” mode, asking God for help and healing and for this or that, instead of thanking God for all He has done for me. I have been blessed and I am grateful.

Thank you, God.

True or False?

“Liar, liar, pants on fire.” Wouldn’t it be something if when someone told a lie, their pants actually lit on fire. A visible sign, like Pinocchio’s nose growing, would be quite helpful in order to disseminate what is truth, and what is not. Unfortunately that just doesn’t happen. Maybe it’s a good thing it doesn’t, because I suspect there would be a lot of politicians walking around town with trousers afire or noses even Cyrano couldn’t compete with.

The truth is a precious commodity. That’s why I use it so sparingly. (Mark Twain)

So how do we know what is true from all the things we hear and read? We are able to access this amazing tool called “the Internet” where a wealth of information is available to us. We can read varying points of view from news organizations and bloggers who each believe they are speaking truth, but in the spectrum of truth, are miles apart.

I know that the items or articles I read online, the news and television shows I watch, the books I read, and even the music I choose to listen to, do influence what I think and believe. The saying goes, “You are what you eat”, but perhaps it can also be said that “You are what you read or hear”. I was going to phrase that as “You are what you expose yourself to”, but speaking of exposing yourself and pants on fire in the same post might be open to misinterpretation.

So how can I know what is true from all the things that I hear and read?

Philippians 4:8 (The Message)
Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse.

To Hope or Not to Hope?

To hope, or not to hope? That is the question. (My apologies to William Shakespeare.) I wrote a recent blog post about “Hope and Change”, and after it was posted, I asked my husband Eric for his feedback. His one comment was, “What if you have hope and no change happens?” Eric has been fighting major depression all of his adult life, so I would say his life experience with depression is one of tentative hope, without having experienced the full healing change he is hoping for.

I made a vow to Eric on our wedding day to walk with him in sickness and in health, whether poor or rich, and in laughter and weeping, so we are yoked together in this fight. I can’t always understand the emotional trauma he lives with on a daily basis, but I can understand that it is a daily battle and I can commit to walking through it with him as best as I am able.

Depression, by its nature, makes “hoping” difficult. There is no magic pill to take to make it go away (and stay away), and the human will is not strong enough to power through it every day for years on end. You can’t just tell a depressed person to “snap out of it!”

I believe God yoked us together so that I could have hope for him. Early on in our marriage, I struggled with how to live with a depressed husband, and I prayed often with the Psalmist David:

Psalm 13 (paraphrased)

1 O LORD, how long will you forget Eric? Forever?
How long will you look the other way?
2 How long must Eric struggle with anguish in his soul,
with sorrow in his heart every day?
How long will his enemy, depression, have the upper hand?

3 Turn and answer Eric, O LORD my God!
Restore the sparkle to his eyes, or I will die.
4 Don’t let his enemies gloat, saying, “We have defeated him!”
Don’t let them rejoice at his downfall.

5 But I trust in your unfailing love.
I will rejoice because you have rescued me.
6 I will sing to the LORD
because he is good to me.

Eric may find it difficult at times to proclaim Psalm 13:5-6 and to trust that God is good to him. I choose to hope and trust in God's unfailing love, and I will sing to the LORD because he is good to us!

To hope, or not to hope? That is the question. My answer is to hope.

Chocolate

I love chocolate. I’m not sure “Chocoholics Anonymous” exists, but even if it does, I’m not signing up for the support group any time soon! I don’t drink (much) and I don’t smoke, so my one vice would have to be chocolate.

The 12-step chocoholics program: Never be more than 12 steps away from chocolate! (Terry Moore)

I heard an interesting news item this morning:

“The higher a country's chocolate consumption, the more Nobel laureates it spawns per capita, according to findings released today in the New England Journal of Medicine. And guess who leads the pack? The Swiss, of course, closely followed by the Swedes and the Danes.”

The Swiss are the big winners and take the cake, presuming of course it’s chocolate cake, or at least contains chocolate or is covered in it.

Need there be any more validation for the consumption of chocolate? Not that I’m in the running for a Nobel prize, but if it’s good for those smart people, it must be good for me!

I was diagnosed with Celiac Disease 14 years ago when I was pregnant with my youngest son, Zackery. Although I wasn’t symptomatic at the time and wanted to deny the diagnosis, I chose to start living with the gluten-free diet. It was a difficult transition learning what I could and couldn’t eat, especially being pregnant, but my go-to comfort food was milk chocolate, because I knew without a doubt that it was gluten-free.

Last night I baked a batch of Banana Chip Muffins for the boys, and generally I don’t need to even refer to my recipe since I’ve made them so often. I’m not sure what I was thinking (and clearly was not thinking), because instead of adding a ½ cup of chocolate chips, I added 2 cups! The muffins looked a little different, but the boys said they still tasted OK. I confessed to the boys that I had screwed up the recipe and added too many chocolate chips and their response was, “And the problem with that is …?” Clearly these are my sons.

My favourite fridge magnet saying:

I could give up chocolate, but I’m no quitter.

Hope and Change

Note: This has absolutely nothing to do with President Obama!

Hope. It’s vital to our emotional and spiritual well-being. We hope for situations or circumstances to change; we hope for physical and emotional healing; we hope for personal and financial success. As a Christ-follower, I have a hope that I have an eternal home with my Saviour.

Hope is a noun, but it is also a verb. We have hope (noun) and a belief that our circumstances or situation can change. We hope (verb) for change to happen.

About a month ago, I was at the dentist with my youngest son, Zackery. Zackery had 4 teeth extracted (over 2 appointments) and the dentist was preparing to put in a spacer to ensure the new teeth would have enough space to come in where they’re supposed to. The dentist noticed that Zackery’s teeth had moved since the first two extractions and there wasn’t enough room between two teeth for him to insert the spacer. My heart kind of fell when the dentist suggested he put in a rubber spacer to move the teeth apart and then we would have to come back for a third appointment. I appreciate that our dentist is also a Christian and he often prays for his patients when he’s working on them. He prayed for Zackery and specifically that those two teeth would move a little bit, and Zackery agreed to wait in the chair for another half hour. After the dentist prayed, he and I talked about hope, and the definition of faith given in Hebrews 11:1: “Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.” We hoped and prayed that the teeth would move in that half hour. We had faith that our God was big enough to make that happen!

We hoped, prayed, and change happened! The teeth had moved enough in that half hour and the dentist was able to insert the spacer and a third appointment was avoided.

This past spring, my aunt was diagnosed with Stage 3 esophageal cancer. She underwent rigorous chemo and radiation treatment for 28 straight days and had to have a feeding tube put in for about 2 months. She went for a check-up this past week and has been declared cancer free. We hoped, prayed, and change happened.

Around the same time as I heard the news about my aunt, my sister-in-law learned that she had breast cancer. A lumpectomy was not enough and recently had a mastectomy in order to try and remove all of the cancer cells. We heard today that she is cancer free. We hoped, prayed, and change happened.

I have another friend who has just finished radiation treatment for ovarian cancer. We are hoping and praying for change for her as well.

God is good. He is the author of hope and change.

Psalm 62:5-8
5 Let all that I am wait quietly before God,
for my hope is in him.
6 He alone is my rock and my salvation,
my fortress where I will not be shaken.
7 My victory and honor come from God alone.
He is my refuge, a rock where no enemy can reach me.
8 O my people, trust in him at all times.
Pour out your heart to him,
for God is our refuge.