Our Separate Shells

We sat under a tent by the ocean. I read by lantern light while she listened. I in my oyster bed, mom in her argonauta. Each in different shells of life, we connect with the wisdom offered in this tiny book written nearly 60 years ago. Lindbergh takes us through the phases of our life's relationships. I get a glimpse of the future in her life; she can remember the past through mine.

I want to expound on what I've read. But I before I do, take a look at this portion. It reminds me of recent nights on the beach reading and talking with my mom. It calls me to pay attention to the need in me to relax.

page 94..."Evening is the time for conversation. Morning is for mental work, I feel, the habit of school-days persisting in me. Afternoon is for physical tasks, the out-of-doors jobs. But evening is for sharing, for communication. Is it the uninterrupted dark expanse of the night after the bright segmented day that frees us to each other?

Communication - but not for too long. Because good communication is stimulating like black coffee, and just as hard to sleep after. Before we sleep we go out again into the night. We walk up the beach under the stars. And we when tire of walking, we lie flat on the sand under a bowl of stars. We feel stretched, expanded to take in their compass. They pour into us until we are filled with the stars, up to the brim.

This is what one thirsts for, I realize, after the smallness of the day, of work, of details, of intimacy - even of communication, one thirsts for the magnitude and universality of a night full of stars, pouring into one like a fresh tide. "

This selection touches on something I recently read by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay. She was talking about how, as mothers, we need to focus on winding down in the evening hours, facilitating an environment in which our family can relax at the end of the day. She acknowledges how difficult this can be, especially for a mother who is with her children at home all day. Yet endless busyness will inevitably lead to the fragmentation of our souls. So what do we do? I have a couple of ideas I want to try and see how the mood in my home might change. Retreat is something Lindbergh stresses. I'll share more in my next post.

Gift from the Sea

I have been at the beach two weeks and have felt nothing creative. I haven't studied, sewn, or written a thing. And I haven't wanted to. I am not wearing make-up or cleaning, and of all the shoes I brought, I have only worn the flip-flops. Yesterday as a damselfly landed on my beach blanket, I was inspired. I picked up a book I have been saving to read at the beach. I read it with emotion. The very thing I had written in my poem was expressed in the foreword of Anne Morrow Lindbergh's book. Do you know of this woman? Her life was fascinating. I have a few more insights I want to share from her book. But for now, read chapter one here. It is what I feel.

THE BEACH:
The beach is not the place to work, to read, write or think. I should have remembered that from other years. Too warm, too damp, too soft for any real mental discipline or sharp flights of spirit. One never learns. Hopefully one carries down the faded straw bag, lumpy with books, clean paper, long over-due unanswered letters, freshly sharpened pencils, lists and good intentions. The books remain unread, the pencils break their points and the pads rest smooth and unblemished as the cloudless sky. No reading, no writing, no thoughts even - at least, not at first.

At first, the tired body takes over completely. As on shipboard, one descends into a deck-chair apathy. One is forced against one's mind, against all tidy resolutions, back into the primeval rhythms of the sea shore. Rollers on the beach, wind in the pines, the slow flapping of herons across sand dunes, drown out the hectic rhythms of city and suburb, time tables and schedules. One falls under their spell, relaxes, stretches out prone. One becomes, in fact, like the element on which one lies, flattened by the sea; bare, open, empty as the beach, erased by today's tides of all yesterday's scribblings.

And then, some morning in the second week, the mind wakes, comes to life again. Not in a city sense -no - but beach-wise. It begins to drift, to play, to turn over in gentle careless rolls like those lazy waves on the beach. One never knows what chance treasures these easy unconscious rollers may toss up, on the smooth white sand of the conscious mind; what perfectly rounded stone, what rare shell from the ocean floor. Perhaps a channeled whelk, a moon shell or even an argonaut.

But it must not be sough for - heaven forbid - dug for. No, no dredging of the sea bottom here. That would defeat one's purpose. The sea does not reward those who are too anxious, too greedy, or too impatient. To dig for treasures shows not only impatience and greed, but lack of faith. Patience, patience, patience, is what the sea teaches. Patience and faith. One should lie empty, open, choiceless as a beach - waiting for a gift from the sea.

The Secret Life of Farm

I want a farm so bad. It's all I can think about some days. I'm not looking for a working farm. I want a city girl farm....garden, chickens, a tractor I can manage and a horse. The slam of the screen door is what I long for...and the crow of a rooster instead of the robotic sound of my iphone in the a.m.
The desire has grown stronger since the kids pray for a farm every day. Last week Jett said, "Why can't we move to the house with the barn now?" Because God has to give it to us, I said. Jett's next question was, "Is He painting it or something?" Something like that, I told him.

Last night I finished The Secret Life of Bees. I realized why I can't stop thinking of a farm...this book is about that slow, simple life. For three weeks, I have read this book in my free time. My mind was landing on the simple life. My heart wants to follow suit.

Fun with Books

Amy has something fun posted today. I love reading and I know lots of you do. She shares a great resource for keeping up with what you have read/what you want to read. Check out Good Reads. When looking for a good book, this would be a great way to see suggestions on what friends are reading.

So here is the idea Amy shared for something different for today:

Grab the nearest book.
* open the book to page 56.
* find the fifth sentence.
* post the text of the next two to five sentences in your blog along with these instructions.
* don't dig for your favorite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST.

The closest book to me right now is Time Management: Leadership Skills for Women by Debbie Lloyd. Nowadays you can't find this book ANYWHERE! But it is the most helpful book on this topic I have ever read. I recently took it off the shelf because I need a little inspiration. So let's see what is on page 56...

If you struggle with procrastination, you are not alone. How often have we echoed the Apostle Paul’s apparent self-reproach as he wrote to the Romans, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do” (Romans 7:15). We cannot easily transform the bad habits of procrastination that took years to acquire. But by thoughtful analysis of the reasons for our postponing we can alter our attitude toward the problem. And changed attitudes become a springboard for modified behavior. We procrastinators with good intentions would do well to adhere to the challenge of Paul in another letter: “On with it, then, and finish the job! Be as eager to finish it as you were to plan it.” 2 Corinthians 8:11

Ugh! I love starting projects. I love getting just far enough to see that my idea works. Then I am ready for something new. Guess it's a good thing I didn't look at marriage that way!

Rees Howells Intercessor

Some books are better read when you're desperate. For me, this is one such book. I feel I have just taken a course on intercessory prayer. To be in the throes of following Divine direction, yet not having the needed resources is a personal test of faith. It is as if a veil is blocking me from seeing what is around the next corner. Though that veil hinders my vision it is serving to strengthen my faith. By no means am I facing what Mr. Howells faced. Yet being immersed in his testimony of the Holy Spirit is somehow holding me above my own sea of human emotion and showing me how to abide in what God has said. I am learning that when God is silent, his presence has to be enough. Can I be sustained by that? Can I hold on, unwaivering, to what he has spoken to me until he chooses to lift the veil?

The Power of a Book

The Shack was so good that I want to read it again. Danny read it over the weekend and loved it. I have only read one other book that so wrecked me. A Mother's Ordeal by Steven Mosher. It is a true story about forced abortion in China. Loving a daughter from China whom I know could have easily been aborted, this book touched a nerve with me.

But the thing about The Shack is that it will touch a nerve with everybody! You can't read this book and not be affected by it's message. The best part to me is that this guy has never written a book in his life! I continue to be caught up in what The Shack made so clear...that God's objective is a relationship with me. That concept has made me more emotional since reading this book. Wait! Is it possible that I could be any MORE emotional??

Now I am reading Rees Howells Intercessor. This is a great book. Not as gripping as the last read, but very timely in my life. I am learning some things about abiding. It seems one book builds on another. The message of this one is taking me a step closer to understanding/accepting that God's ways are so different from my own.

The Shack

Wow! I just finished reading The Shack by William Young. You have to read this book. I promise you have never read anything so consuming, revealing, painful, beautiful. A friend gave it to me Saturday and I have not put it down since! Seriously, I was cooking dinner and reading at the same time! Click the link and read a preview. But order two copies because you will want to immediately put a copy in someone else's hand!

I am sure I will be expounding on what is in my heart over the next few days. I just have to let this sink in. As I was reaching the end of the book, I wanted to be alone to finish it. Actually, I read most of the book hidden away where I would not be interrupted. I think every chapter brought me to tears. But most were good tears. I have never looked at humanity or myself through God's eyes like this. I found myself reading outloud more than once. This book indeed leads to a path of discovery!
Eugene Peterson is on to something when he says "This book has the potential to do for our generation what John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress did for his. It's that good!"

Good Read

I finished Madame Bovary this week. Great book. But what a wretched woman! I have gone back to reading about Amy Carmichael. What contrast! Though one is fictional, these two women provide something to ponder. Madame Bovary spends her life overlooking the happiness right under her nose to pursue a euphoria that doesn't even exist. How interesting to pick up Amy Carmichael's biography and see the sheer joy she possessed by choosing not to love the things of this world. I am really looking forward to reading more of her story. It is compelling to me that we often choose the self-serving path of Madame Bovary when both history and fiction show us how futile it is. What a sad fact that Carmichael stands in such minority!

When I grow uP

I was just telling a friend that I love reading Ernest Hemingway because his style captures me with just a few lines. Writing like that truly is a gift. My dream is to write when I grow up. Danny always says quit dreaming about it and do it. I guess I fear that I don't know enough about any ONE thing to write about it. But blogging is easy! I can write a little about a lot of things. And you are my guinea pigs!!

Writing out stuff always brings me to an awareness of who I am. Hemingway says when you are blocked, write one sentence that you know is true. When your writing trails off and gets stale, go back to that one true statement and start again. I think I will try that! I want to write with the eloquence of Ernest Hemingway, the style of Pearl S. Buck, and the wisdom of Elisabeth Elliot.

What do you want to be when you grow up?