Listen, be strong, take courage

The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet – Frederick Buechner

After a summer packed with memory-making family gatherings, autumn is calling me to something new.

The ordeal of cancer has improved my hearing – I now listen more intuitively to God’s still small voice. This summer two thoughts came to mind that almost sound contradictory, but I accepted them as holy nudges: “Don’t try to do too much” and, in a dream, “Do a new thing.”

This Type A lady doesn’t want to give up doing anything, but living with cancer requires it. As I reluctantly ease my grip, God replaces my plans with something new, showing me again His ways are trustworthy.

In May I sent this message to my pastors: “I regretfully withdraw from (some committees). I’m trusting God to lead me in what I’m to do with my time and energy … Something on my heart is organizing a support gathering for people with cancer who need encouraged and a reason to hope.”

Pastor Kathy messaged me, “This is definitely something I would like to work on with you!” 

We met together and laid our plans before God. The result is the group, COURAGE & Cancer. It begins tomorrow, 3 pm at Grace UMC Church, and is open to everyone living with cancer.

Our inspiration is Joshua 1:9, Be strong and Courageous, which happens to hang on my kitchen wall. Early in my cancer journey someone anonymously gave me a painting of a bright cardinal and that phrase.

Ever notice we’re told to take courage when there’s something risky coming, like a hurricane? Courage is like a strong hand helping us batten down the hatches. Who, after all, needs courage to walk through sunny fields of daffodils?

New ventures come with risk. If you look at my cardinal painting, this strong fellow looks a bit battered himself! Topping my list in beginning a group is my concern I won’t be able to remain faithful to this calling.

Sweet Jesus, the greater risk is missing opportunities by not trusting my tomorrows to You.

When I raised the idea of supporting people living with cancer I discovered Pastor Kathy went through training with Cancer Centers of America, three years ago. She had prayed ever since for partners to lead a group with her. Coincidence???

I was also surprised by my senior pastor’s affirmation: “I believe firmly God is calling you to this and I have no doubt that you will have a huge impact on the healing of others as a bi-product of the healing that God is bringing to your body. I fully endorse your splendid idea . . .God Bless! Pastor Bill.”

It’s time I stop being startled at the way God orchestrates everything for good. My part is to be still and listen, then step out in faith and love the people who cross my path.

Here are some verses from the first chapter of Joshua. Try meditating upon God’s instructions and be blessed by whatever He has prepared for you:

“No one will be able to stand against you as long as you live. For I will be with you as I was with Moses. I will not fail you or abandon you.

 “Be strong and courageous, for you are the one who will lead these people to possess all the land I swore to their ancestors I would give them.

“Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the instructions Moses gave you. Do not deviate from them, turning either to the right or to the left. Then you will be successful in everything you do.

“Study this Book of Instruction continually. Meditate on it day and night so you will be sure to obey everything written in it. Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do.

This is my command—be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:5-9, NLT, italics mine)

That key phrase echoes through the story of God’s people and through my own. I have deep gladness living bravely as God’s broken, beloved daughter. He is especially with me though, when I’m not brave at all, when I cower in the shadows.

Only because His Spirit hovers over my victories, mountains and valleys can I possibly be there to encourage others who hunger for a hug or a word to lift their spirits.

If I were to create a creed it might begin like this:

• God is my Source of strength and courage. (With God, all things are possible.)
• Jesus will never fail or abandon me. (What peace this brings!)
• The Spirit is within me wherever I go. (I’m never alone.)

Listen. Be strong. Take courage, my friends.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

Colorado Million Dollar Highway photo: Brett Woodard

Peace like a River~Fly fishing the Little J

The Juniata River streamed through my childhood summers like a steady, reliable friend. I canoed it with Girl Scouts, boated it with family and more recently viewed it on wintry train rides meandering south where it joins the Susquehanna.

I’ve stood on the Little J’s banks while my hubby pulled trout from its pools, content with my role as photographer. I never suspected that someday I’d be the one wearing waders and fishing boots, casting for rainbows in its clear waters.

Then again, I never suspected I’d get cancer.

I spent last weekend in the hamlet of Spruce Creek, a guest of Casting for Recovery with 13 other breast cancer warriors, all of us randomly selected to take part in a fly fishing adventure held at HomeWaters Fishing Club.

CfR, with its compassionate leaders and generous supporters, believes women with BC deserve –free of charge and free of the stress of treatments, home and workplace–a few peaceful days in a beautiful natural setting.

When we first met as a group everyone was asked to give a word to describe herself, beginning with our first initial. When it was my turn, “Juniata Jan” flowed out of my mouth. That wasn’t the only surprise of the weekend.

“Jeep Jill,” the only guest other than myself living with advanced cancer, is pragmatic about her future. She depends upon support groups as a life line and is fervent about efforts to increase funding for all kinds of cancer research. Everyone agreed BC has greater visibility than most types of the disease, which are equally devastating.

I was uncertain I’d fit in with a group of fisherwomen, assuming everybody was more coordinated than I’ve ever been. I still recall my stomach rippling with anxiety when I was reprimanded for my paddling style at canoe camp.

With trepidation, I approached a field to practice casting Saturday morning, expecting to fling my line wildly or make other awkward mistakes. I vaguely wondered why I’d accepted CfR’s invitation without considering embarrassing consequences. As I cast –I’m a lefty– our instructor Briget said I did a good job controlling my line. I glanced around to make sure she was speaking to me!

The following day we were each provided a private fishing guide to stand by our side in the river. Early on, I felt a sudden, exhilarating tug.

Oh boy! This is it!

“Fish on!” someone called.

There was magic in those words.

“Fish on!”

Juniata Jan caught the first fish that morning. I grinned to my hat brim as I lifted a lively brown trout out of the net and then released it to swim another day.

Thigh deep in water with my trusty guide, hours later I hooked a bigger rainbow.

“Fish on!” someone again cried, as they had every time a woman’s rod bent under the weight of a trout.

“Big ones are harder to land,” my guide consoled me when mine got away. “Feeling that tug, knowing you’ve made a good cast in the right spot is really what it’s all about.”

I now have two flies–miniature hooks decked with tiny feathers and shiny beads—evidence I accomplished something I thought was beyond my skill set.

It makes me ask, “When else have I assumed I wasn’t good enough to do?”

And that raises the question, “What is success?”

For me, it’s being at peace about what I’m doing, trusting I’m in the right place at the right time, aligned with God’s intentions for me in that moment.

For sure, success is measured by more than the fish we catch. Briget, a founder of this event, said she fly-fished a year before netting anything. “A day of fishing with no fish is better than a day with no fishing,” she said, laughing.

We gathered before breakfast on Sunday for stream-side reflections. I was asked to read a meditation I’d learned as a scout song 60-some years earlier:

Peace I ask of thee o river,

peace, peace, peace.

When I learn to live serenely,

cares will cease.

From the hills I gather courage,

visions of the days to be,

Strength to lead and faith to follow,

all is given unto me.

Peace I ask of thee o river,

peace, peace, peace. (traditional folk song)

The Source of all Courage speaks to those seeking refuge from dire circumstances: Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river… (Isaiah 66:2, English Standard Version of the Bible).

An old songs says, “I’ve got peace like a river in my soul.” I’m wading through rough waters at this unforeseen bend in life’s river, grateful I’m moving more serenely than through past torrents. I left my Casting for Recovery weekend happy that, while cancer steals much, peace was my prize catch.

All will be well.

This event is sponsored by Casting for Recovery of Western Pennsylvania, https://www.facebook.com/CfRWPA/ held at the beautiful HomeWaters Fishing Club: https://www.homewatersclub.com/fishing/

Texting Thru Recovery/ Indiana Gazette /Copyright © Jan Woodard 2019

Slack tide: Best time for Chincoteague Pony Swim

This week I’m revisiting a post from a few years back, when I thought I had moved beyond cancer, forever… still of a lot of living to do, this side of an advanced cancer diagnosis!

The mystique of a childhood classic, the pull of the sea, the stark beauty of wild horses…when we reached the waters of Chincoteague Island for the 92nd annual Pony Swim a few weeks back you could taste excitement in the humid salt air.

Hours earlier I slipped out of bed before the alarm rang for the 80-mile jaunt on dark silent roads. I didn’t know how much we (my twin, her hubby and I) would see, but I was up for the adventure.

The fame of the pony swim spread with the 1946 publication of Marguerite Henry’s Misty of Chincoteague. To refresh my memory, the day before our trek I curled up with a 1947 paperback edition borrowed from Indiana Free Library.

The swim draws thousands of visitors to the Virginia coastal village the last Wednesday of every July. This year wranglers guided some 200 feral ponies -actually small horses- across the quarter-mile channel from their home on Assateague Island to Chincoteague.

There’s nothing quite like it in all the world, the announcer said over a loud speaker that morning, and no where else she would rather be. The whole thing had a friendly, small town kind of feel.

After the swim the ponies paraded to a shady corral on carnival grounds. A day later many were sold at auction, especially young colts. Funds support the local fire company and veterinary care for the herd. The sale also prevents a pony population explosion on Assateague.

The little horses most likely arrived hundreds of years ago after a Spanish ship wrecked, which would mean ancestors of today’s herd completed the very first pony swim to dry land.

We stood with a wide-awake crowd as shadows turned to dawn and light spread across the bay. Luckily, we were next to a dock at the front of Memorial Park for the main event, although not as close to the swim as those standing in the muddy marsh far down the island.

Most in the park viewed the swim on a big screen but after I adjusted my monocular (half the weight of binoculars), I was able to watch the saltwater cowboys driving ponies into and across the water, a half-mile away.

The time of the pony swim is determined by slack tide, the best time to navigate the channel. This year that occurred at an unusually early hour, before 7 AM and sizzling heat set in. After their brief five-minute swim the ponies rested for about half an hour.

That gave families with strollers and folks in our generation with folding chairs time to wander over to Main Street for the parade. Soon the ponies trotted by, the youngest keeping pace with the mares and stallions, so close I could feel their breath.

Organizers plan the swim’s time for the safety of the animals, not the convenience of the crowds. They understand the importance of both slack tide and rest.

Slack tide was a new term for me.

It occurs when outgoing seawater -ebb tide- slows and stops momentarily before switching directions. Thefishingline.com says, “There is a window of time between high and low tides where the tide ‘rests.’”

Recovery from cancer takes periods of daily stillness, too.

So why do I think I can cyclone through my day without pauses, without rest… without consequences?

I’ve found the way to tame my eagerness to move beyond this stage is by following the lead of Psalm 46:10.

I’ve quoted it before and have yet to plum its depths: “Be still and know that I am God.”

God isn’t saying, “Be constantly busy and you’ll know Me better” or “Dash around like a panicked stallion and you’ll find peace.”

Be still . . .

Rest is God’s idea.

The Creator of wild creatures and still waters built rest into the universe.

I saw it in a baby’s sleepy pink face, snuggled against his daddy’s shoulder that early morning in Chincoteague, oblivious to ponies sprinting by.

I see it in the pattern of the seasons.

In a farmer’s fallow fields.

In slack tide.

A quiet pause is a good way to start the day before we’re off to the races.

And a near perfect way to close the gate at day’s end.

Near to the heart of God.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette 8.12.17

 © Column & pony photos Jan Woodard 2019. Mural Photo by Jim Emanuel

Comments by Readers:

CANDY S.: What a wonderful article Jan. I could smell the ocean and feel the excitement of the ponies as they swam then paraded through Chincoteague! We’ve visited there several times and knew about the swim but never felt the excitement as in your beautiful words today. God bless!

MARLENE M.: What an exciting morning you had! Hope to see it myself someday.

BETTY S. Thanks for another interesting article . I had never heard of “slack time ” either . I loved the analogy . Thanks for the reminder .

DIANA B.: Once again you nailed it. I was transported to standing by your side, breathing in the clean salt air. What am experience! Bucket list worthy. “) Thank you for sharing dear friend.

JIM P.: Thank you Jan. I love this post! Be Blessed.

BETTY R.: I loved visiting this event vicariously through your post, Jan. Half a lifetime ago, we used to camp at Assateague. The first time, a pony walked through our campsite and I quite indignantly said, “Oh, we can’t take our pets here but they can bring their horse?” I knew nothing about the ponies event. At least I experienced that one. 😉

COURAGE & Cancer: group welcomes those walking thru cancer

The August sun sizzled as my sister and I entered the cool grounds of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in downtown Lewes, Delaware. We were drawn by shade-loving burgundy coleus, leafy trees and–primarily–the labyrinth.

This congregation traces its history back to the early colonial days of 1681. Grave markers that are clustered near the church, the earliest dated 1707, dominate the grounds.

I once walked the labyrinth here with my grandson. Josiah, then five, reached the center and plopped down contently, legs crossed in a traditional position of contemplation without even knowing it.

A sign says it is “A Path of Peace for all.” A church brochure website adds, “There is no right or wrong way to walk the Labyrinth. With only one path in, take it and you will arrive at the center. You may want to take a deep breath and focus on an intention as you walk.”

I’ve been attracted to labyrinths since I walked one on a retreat a dozen years ago with friends. Why? And what does this have to do with living my faith or helping people through the havoc of cancer?

Well, I’m usually in a recliner for my reflective time. A labyrinth gets me on my feet, sends extra oxygen to my brain and heart, quiets pesky inner chatter and invites me to follow where other seekers have walked and prayed. This is an invisible chain of pilgrims going back to the first church labyrinth in AD 324 in Rome, designed to encourage unbelievers to ponder the holy mysteries of newly sanctioned Christianity.

Like life, a labyrinth isn’t about reaching a goal as much as it’s a story of small steps taken along the way.

I first walked St. Peter’s pathway before my initial bout with cancer. Now I see it with different eyes. St. Peter’s church website says a labyrinth is a metaphor for a spiritual journey. That’s me, on a spiritual journey, whether I want to be or not.

I’m grateful this is a labyrinth, not a maze. A maze is confusing. I can imagine my heart racing if I tried to find my way through one. A labyrinth does just the opposite. No one gets lost in a labyrinth. It’s a clearly defined path that leads somewhere, to a center, providing sacred moments of contemplation.

St. Peter’s is as humble as they come, stones guiding walkers along a worn, grassy path. One down the road in Rehoboth at Epworth United Methodist Church is made of glistening white seashells, appropriate for a beach town. I was inspired to write this blog while walking it, last Sunday after worship.

There’s one more circular path I’ve visited near Lewes, at Lavender Fields, as fragrant as it sounds. I was feeling a bit fragile, in the middle of chemotherapy treatments back then, as I am now.

Many others are, as well. Or have completed chemo and perhaps radiation and are wondering, “What now?”

Some friends and I are beginning a support group we’re calling COURAGE and Cancer. We want to walk with people traveling through this devastating disease. Cancer can seem like an endless maze; we’d like to make it more like a labyrinth, a path delineated by hope.

Guiding the group are Pastor Kathy Mihoerck of Grace Church; Sue Majoris, a retired RN who initiated the nurse navigator program at IRMC’s Women’s Center that has helped hundreds of women through breast cancer; Natalie Glaser, cancer survivor and author of “Don’t Call Me Brave, I Was Not Alone;” Ray Reinbold, a retired teacher recovering from traumatic cancer surgeries; and myself, living with metastatic breast cancer.

I was surprised how honestly I could share my deepest concerns with these good people. We’ve prayed, talked, planned and believe others are looking for this kind of support.

“People in support groups have better outcomes, make new friends, find new purpose,” Sue says, encouraging the hesitant to come.

Our first gathering will be Sunday, September 8, 3—4:30 pm in the Grace United Methodist Church Welcome Center.

This is an inclusive group, all are welcome. If you’re interested, please call 724.463.8535 and give your name and email address to the secretary. Just showing up is okay, too!

We know fighting cancer is exhausting. Please be assured this will be a confidential group where you can safely say what is on your heart, or say nothing at all.

Maybe you’re reading this and feel no one understands what you’re going through. If so, please come. We may not have all the answers, but we promise to listen and be there for you.

Cancer demands courage. We can find it, together.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

Lukewarm? No thanks!

My church prayer team is planning a series of discussions to help people feel more comfortable approaching God in prayer. They asked me to talk about praying God’s Word.

I’d love to, I said. It’s my favorite way to pray.

Really? Then why do I put off opening my Bible and entering into its Story?

Because I’d rather check Facebook first? Rather write about the Bible than take time to dwell there?

Or, maybe, because I’m overwhelmed with all life throws at me. A lot of people feel like that.

I heard a speaker say he resolved the temptation to put off daily meditations by withholding his first cup of coffee in the morning until after he delved into the Word.

Good advice (for me, it’s a cuppa tea).

Jesus taught new believers, “If you keep and obey My Word, then you are My followers for sure. You will know the truth and the truth will make you free.” (John 8:31-32, New Life Version)

John Wesley’s commentary on the Gospel of John says “The truth will set you free” is written on our hearts by God’s Spirit to free us from guilt, sin, misery and Satan.

When I put off drinking in the Word day after day, my faith becomes tepid. Tepid is rarely good. It’s easy to slowly spiral into depression and miss the joy of knowing there’s more to life than guilt, sin, Satan . . .and cancer.

I suspect I’ll always wrestle with questions about faith, yet truth for me is best defined in relationship with this person called Jesus. Every time I open my Bible it helps me follow and know Him better. It helps me know myself, neighbors and this fractured world better, too.

The 1914 edition of The Fourfold Gospel says, “Discipleship is an abiding condition –a life, not an act.”

Jesus said, “If you keep. . .My Word.” Keep means abide. Continue. Remain. Keeping in the Word is the ongoing process of staying and persisting no matter what, finding myself at home in my Keeper, and Him in me.

After school as a child I rushed through a glassed-in vestibule, eager to be home. Mother said the vestibule protected the door from winds that blew across College Heights. Friends and strangers rang the doorbell and waited for us to open the door. I ran right in, a part of the family.

Praying my Father’s Word back to Him says I belong the family, to One who flings the doors wide open and satisfies my thirst with the cool refreshment of His presence.

I saw the stone arched Roman aqueduct at Caesarea on pilgrimage in Israel. A scrawl in my old study Bible notes that Laodicea used aqueducts to carry water from hot and cold springs into the city. By the time it reached the people it was lukewarm, good for neither drinking nor bathing.

To these church-going folk, Revelations says: “I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other! But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth!” (Rev. 3:16-17 NLT)

Wesley’s commentary says it this way: “I know your works, mindset and behavior, though you don’t. You’re neither cold -an utter stranger to the things of God –nor are you hot. We should be like boiling water! Penetrated and heated by the fire of love…If you were cold, without any thought of religion, there would be more hope of your recovery!” (paraphrased)

Lukewarm. Apathetic. No thanks!

Change my heart, oh God!

JD Walt wrote that early believers “interpreted their lives, as a community and as individuals, through the story revealed in Scripture. . .They lived out of a memory much larger then their own life and times” (Seedbed Daily Text, 6-26-19).

Now more than ever, I pray for American communities to be held together by a Story and a Storyteller larger than ourselves.

It grieves me that our culture, so entranced with well-told drama, has lost a sense of being part of the best Story of all.

Please Lord, hold me accountable for living out my part of Your Story, and doing it well.

I read a meditation just now that took me to Revelation 3. It concludes with an image of Jesus waiting to be invited inside, calling out to His friends:

“Hey, guys, it’s Me, standing in this vestibule! If you hear me and open the door, I’ll come in and we’ll have burgers together.” (Rev. 3:20, my paraphrase)

Come in, Lord!

Help me listen for Your voice, closer than my own breath, when I feel overwhelmed. Abiding in the Word is a good place to begin.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

Photo: Aqueduct at Caesarea by the sea, with Mary Lou Lazear, 1999

A time for wheelbarrows

My husband surprised me with a wheelbarrow today.

Me, the one with gray hair, trifocals and a walking stick.

Not that I’m counting, but it says a lot about a marriage when a guy gives his wife of forty-nine years, seven months and one day a pushcart for yard work.

“You bought me a wheelbarrow?” I said. “Why?”

“You said you wanted one… and it was $39.00.”

“Oh. Yeah. I did.”

Jim doesn’t need a wheelbarrow. He uses a metal cart he welded together to haul stuff around the yard, pulled by a tractor. I don’t do tractors. But I do weed flower beds and hate asking him to clean up after me.

He rode his cycle earlier to Walmart. Bright clearance stickers on the last few wheelbarrows of the season caught his eye; he asked them to hold one until he returned with a car.

I pictured a shiny red one to replace our old rusty wheelbarrow. (It was in this point in the story that Jim began grinning as I read a draft to him. He suddenly understood my wheelbarrow-of-choice didn’t match his intended purchase.)

“Do you want to go with me to pick it up?” he asked.

In my universe, this qualifies as a date. The night before we watched lightning bugs at Yellow Creek and an evening earlier we attempted unsuccessfully to catch goldfish for our water garden from a friend’s pond. Three dates in a row!

As we rode down the hill I spotted a gray plastic tote that looked like a garbage can on wheels in a neighbor’s yard.

“Is it plastic?” I asked. I never considered a plastic wheelbarrow, but isn’t everything made of plastic these days?

“Yes.”

I was disappointed. I like red metal wheelbarrows, with wooden handles. Like Grandpa, Daddy and we used to have.

When I was beginning to take writing seriously I attended a poetry workshop. The instructor read us a poem I’ve never forgotten called, “The Red Wheelbarrow.”

It’s simplicity, imagery and brevity appealed to me. That poem has forever informed my writing style. If my writing sometimes appears to be clipped, blame William Carlos Williams and the poem he published in 1923:

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens.

Williams taught me the power of imagery. I felt like I was looking out a window at the wheelbarrow, the white chickens, could hear and sniff the rain. I was there in that moment with him, entering into the scene he painted.

Thus, I like red wheelbarrows.

When we reached the store I was happy to see my new wheelbarrow didn’t look like a garbage can on big wheels. It’s black, heavy-duty molded plastic with bright yellow handles and comfortable black hand grips that won’t give me splinters.

I like it. If I happen to be pushing it down the road at night –”Why?” I’m sure my children will ask– those bright yellow handles will glow in the light of oncoming traffic, warning drivers that Grandma is out and about with her wheelbarrow.

Jim listened as I read and said with a chuckle, “So you aren’t considering this your (golden) anniversary gift?”

Actually, I consider every day I’m alive a gift.

Every laugh a bonus.

Every sunset pure gold.

It says a lot about a guy’s perspective that he gives his wife a wheelbarrow simply because she asked for one (even if it was on clearance).

It says he has faith his best friend will be pushing it up and down hills for summers to come, knowing better than anyone she lives with the daily unpredictability of advanced cancer.

Did you hear about a fellow named Blondin who pushed a wheelbarrow on a tightrope over Niagara Falls in the 1800s? As the story goes, when he reached the middle he took out a stove, fried an egg, ate it and continued on his way.

Visiting Niagara again is on my bucket list, but minus a wheelbarrow.

To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.

A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, a time to pluck, and a time to toss pluckings in a wheelbarrow. 

There’s a time to weep and a time to laugh . . . and always and forever, a time to say, Thank You, Lord!

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

Blueberries, politics & letting go of perfectionism

On this perfect summer day – low humidity, bright sun –I had a choice. Do I spend the afternoon with my blueberries, ready for picking, or listen to Robert Mueller’s testimony before Congress?

Hearing the opening statements, it wasn’t a hard choice.

I was ready to condemn the President when I heard the Democratic opener and to defend him following the Republican response. Obviously, I’m easily swayed by a good argument. But seriously, would hearing more have added to either my IQ or sense of calm?

Deciding I didn’t want to waste an ideal summer afternoon, I switched off Lester Holt, stepped into the backyard and gingerly crawled through a small screened doorway into our netted patch.

Meanwhile, millions of Americans watched senators interrogate Mr. Mueller, who seemed like a tired, honorable man. After hours of questioning, I imagined him muttering under his breath, “I volunteered for this? I could be picking berries somewhere outside the beltway right now!”

Berry by berry, my mind drifted into calmer waters. I recalled gathering blueberries on July afternoons with Mother and Grandma Wesp on our annual walk around Lake Kittatinny in rural northern New Jersey. My grandparents rented the same log cabin there for close to 40 years.

Wild berries grew on untended bushes on the back side of the lake. They were small and tart. When Grandma served the fruit of our labor on cereal with creamy milk the morning after our hike I consumed mine cheerfully, part of the Great Berry Picking Adventure.

This summer I posted pics on Facebook of our abundant harvest of mulberries, raspberries, wild blackberries and blueberries. A classmate said his grandparents tried to convince him as a child that berries were sweeter if picked early in the morning, a whimsical way to get kids out the door.

Earlier this month a couple sisters of my generation looked surprised when I told them I’d had fun in the berry patch that morning. “It wasn’t fun when Dad told us to not come home until we filled a five-gallon bucket!” one said, her sister nodding.

I realized again that I’ve had an easy life.

The most significant job I had as a kid was completing my homework each night, which I did diligently. There was never a question if it were done, with one exception. The night the shaggy-haired Beatles first appeared on the Ed Sullivan show my dad switched off the TV on the pretext I hadn’t finished my homework.

I was in tenth grade, almost 16, and wise enough to know Daddy wasn’t worried if my English assignment would be completed; he was uptight over these British invaders and the explosion of Beatlemania across America. I still have my Beatles albums, by the way.

I now have the job of picking fruit, except on hot humid days when chemo and outdoor activity join forces to cause light-headedness and nausea.

I’m working on not being bothered about imperfect berries. I try to select shiny, dark blue ones but inevitably red ones are in my basket, too. They haven’t fully ripened yet and tend toward the sour side. My father-in-law taught me that when I first began picking berries in the family’s backyard.

Ever since, if I suspect someone is peeking at my picking I bury the red ones, ashamed of my inability to discriminate ripe and unripe fruit. I’m not a perfectionist about much, but I’d like to be considered an accomplished berry picker.

During the weekend in June that I spent at Bethany Retreat Center we talked about letting go of perfectionism. None of us are perfect at anything so it’s time to stop asking self-destructive questions like, “What will they think?”

Speaker Anne Kertz Kernion suggested we chose to re-wire our brains and strive for self-acceptance, instead. The key is believing in our worthiness as God’s beloved children.

If He accepts me with all my messes, can’t I do the same?

I’d like to see schools, churches and scouts teach kids basic skills of self-kindness, every bit as vital as other types of self-protection. We cling too willingly to the common human experience of feeling bad about ourselves. Jesus spoke indirectly about this when He said, “Love thy neighbor as thyself.”

Self-compassionate people are less stressed, happier, better able to accept their own weaknesses and not fall apart when they receive critical feedback from others.

There is peace in the assurance that God loves me unconditionally. That’s how I love my kids, their spouses and our grandchildren. I’m freezing some of my less-than-perfect blueberries now, hoping they will enjoy warm berry syrup on their dad’s waffles when Christmastime rolls around.

I know I will.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

‘Don’t squander one bit of this marvelous life’

Like a continental divide, my life flowed between Before and After.

Before college, writing, marriage, babies, grandchildren. Before glasses. Before Young Life. Before Jim. Before was always framed by a potential happily-ever-after, even when threads of chaos, uncertainty, disappointment and worry fringed the borders of change.

When we’re talking about before and after metastatic breast cancer, the conversation changes tone.

Finding that hard speck in my breast that resulted in a mastectomy three years ago was traumatic and life-changing. Those aggressively treating me conveyed a pervasive element of hope.

They thought they succeeded. I did, too. I honestly didn’t think about cancer, except for taking daily medication to thwart its return.

Now I’m receiving more treatments and completed palliative radiation. It reduced tumors that caused a fracture, with the unspoken understanding that radiation isn’t likely to change the trajectory of the disease.

When I worked in long term healthcare I heard nurses speak of residents with “mets to the bone” (or lungs or brain) – meaning cancer that originated in one part of the body migrated elsewhere. Those patients weren’t expected to live.

But there’s more to my story than survival rates. For one thing, I keep hearing hope-generating stories, like a phone call just now from a family friend whose husband lived 40 years longer than expected. How’s that for a biblical number!

The peace that’s mine may be why folks tell me I look good; peace that comes from God’s indwelling Spirit. No doubt if I lost my inner calm, I’d no longer receive those encouraging comments.

My peace comes from the sustaining friendship of the Trinity, from having a seat at the Divine table, not in the sweet by and by, but in the here and Now.

Peace also comes from knowing Now is the best part of my story.

Now is where I live, it’s my local address. Living Now is pivotal to the totality of my health. It’s why I spontaneously told my hubby the other day, “I love my life!”

At this moment I’m seated on our deck at a glass table with my laptop open, sheltered from steady rain splattering inches from my bare feet, resting on another padded chair. The heavy greenness of mid-summer soaks deep into my inner being. Slipping out of chronological time, I find myself in a karios moment.

Karios is Greek for an appointed time that is in sync with God’s grace-filled purposes. St. Paul wrote, “… please don’t squander one bit of this marvelous life God has given us… now is the right time to listen, the day to be helped.” (2 Corinthians 6:1-2 Message Bible)

Unlike linear order, karios moments are always in the Now.

As if on cue, thunder vibrates the air.

Air. Since learning about a tiny lesion on my right lung, I’m more conscious of breathing.

It’s why I went to Bethany Retreat Center, where presenter Anne Kertz Kernion said breathing is the primary activity connecting us physically to mindful inner peace. It has a rainbow of spiritual dimensions.

In. Out. Deceptively simple.

God’s breath, His Pneuma –His Spirit –fills my lungs, expanding my diaphragm and my destiny.

Thomas Merton wrote in Thoughts on Solitude, “Every moment of existence is a grace, every breath is a gift.” If I concentrate on what may come next or mull over past griefs, I miss the gift of this breath.

At my seventh birthday party, every little girl gave me bubble bath. Ever since, the words “birthday gift” take me back to sitting on our green wool living room carpet, opening glass bottle after bottle of bath powder, all of which made me sneeze. Although I said thank you, I didn’t feel thankful on the inside! Now every breath is a gift, bringing fresh meaning to the word.

When I’m aware of this breath, of the life-giving energy in it, I’m experiencing Now.

I was already reading Walden when Anne mentioned Thoreau on our retreat – as if God was preparing me for new ways to view creation, myself, His goodness. Thoreau said something I’m pondering: “Affecting the quality of the day is the highest of arts.”

Let that soak in, like rain. The earth doesn’t understand showers, yet accepts them without question.

When Jim’s hand brushes mine, it affects the quality of my day.

When I pluck fading zinnias so new buds will flourish, it affects the quality of earth.

When we’re awestruck by fireflies and distant galaxies, praises ripple throughout the universe and angels do high-fives in heavenly agreement.

When I live in the gift of Now, I’m saying Yes to God.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

Icon: (Rublev’s “Trinity” – LegacyIcons, Etsy)

Time to pay attention

At the national birthday party in Washington, DC on July 4th the president spoke of Americans who’ve changed the world with positive contributions and praised the millions who’ve served in the military. I was surprised how much I learned that evening.

It made me think of Col. Walt Kealey, a former Indiana Junior High principal who served in Desert Storm and held yearly programs honoring veterans. I realized, sitting in that darkened auditorium, that my family served in every war from the American Revolution through Viet Nam. Not all of them came home.

During the Vietnamese war there were frequent stories in the Gazette of local people who paid the ultimate sacrifice – you can find their names engraved on a wall in downtown Indiana. Gazette editor Carl Kologie said it was heart-breaking, interviewing their families. I struggled reading those articles and often skipped over them. If that was your loved one, forgive me.

On the Fourth, I enjoyed fireworks from the comfort of our deck, treasuring the memory of our youngest on my lap as we watched them together during her growing-up years. That led my thoughts to less fortunate kids I know little about. Topping the list are children of immigrants, some confined in overcrowded detention centers that reek of urine and lack adequate food.

Would I rather not know?

I also haven’t closely followed the unprecedented challenges border agents and border communities face due to what appears to be an unstoppable flood of humanity. It’s easy to criticize them from my easy chair.

It all seems overwhelming . . . but America is rooted in faith.

“The Battle Hymn of the Republic” was played in D.C. on July 4th, including this verse: “In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me. As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free, While God is marching on.”

The challenge of that hymn rings on, as if God is saying don’t shrink from what makes me uncomfortable. It means not turning the page or the channel when I’d rather skip ugly news.

While I’m not called to take on every burden in the world, I can do more.

At least I can pay attention.

Last summer I marched for children separated from their families but heat and chemo don’t mix, so I stayed home yesterday while friends protested some horrendous living conditions of children still isolated from parents.

If we all can make a difference, what’s my part? For one thing, I’m re-posting why I joined other marches from a column last July headlined, “I marched for the children:”

I marched because God’s Word commands that I stand up for the oppressed.

I marched against a policy that traumatizes children.

I marched to say we need family-centered ways to respond to people who cross the border illegally. Let’s begin by defining them by their personhood instead of treating immigrant like a dirty word.

I marched for the shipload of Jews who sought asylum during Hitler’s reign and were denied entrance to America, the land of the free and the brave.

I marched because I believe the tablet at the Statue of Liberty is still America’s most noble response to people seeking a better life: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free. . .”

I marched because I didn’t join protesters in the 60s who demonstrated for civil rights and have always regretted it.

I marched because of the Good Samaritan story. Lutheran pastor Stephen Bond messaged that when we see someone lying by the side of the road who is beaten down by life’s hardships, the question is not what will happen to me if I help, but what will happen to them if I don’t.

I marched because God holds us accountable for what happens to the “least of these.” Jesus, a refugee child, fled to Egypt with his parents.

I marched for the Christ Child, who teaches us deep humility.

Americans have the privilege and right to protest government policies, even when we don’t have all the answers. I’ve also marched on Washington DC and Harrisburg on behalf of unborn children. How then, can I not protest the living conditions of children in detention centers and remain true to God and myself?

The prophet Micah wrote, “What does the Lord require of you but to love justice, do mercy and walk humbly with your God?”

Justice. Mercy. Humility.

If we begin by striving for humility–not greatness–answers will begin to unfold.

It won’t be easy. It will be costly. But this is America. Fifty summers ago we landed men on the moon.

God shed His grace on thee.

All will be well.

Texting Thru Recovery/Indiana Gazette

Photos: Brett Woodard