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Tattoo(s)!

I got a tattoo.

Well, two actually.

I’m not having a third-life crisis, I swear. At least, I don’t think I am.

At this moment in my life, I need to be reminded over and over again that I come from somewhere, that where I come from matters, and that as Someone who Comes from Somewhere I have a responsibility about how I choose to be in the world. And that, for me, is the crux of what it means to be a princess. I know, princess can mean lots of things to lots of people. That’s fine. But I’ve decided to reclaim that title for myself (and for my daughter, to whom I very strongly desire to show some example of a princess besides the not-too-bright Ariels, the entranced Auroras, or the smart-but-abused Belles of the world).

So for the first tattoo I decided that I wanted to be reminded of this idea all the time.

But as important as that concept is to me, I’m not really a “‘Princess’ in a girly font” on my arm kind of person, so I did like my daddy raised me and wrote it in elvish. Qenya (high) elvish, to be exact. The tengwar is mostly the same, but high elvish is based on greek and latin and looks and sounds fancier than Sindarin, which is loosely based on Welsh. Even though my family history is vaguely Welsh (my maiden name is, anyway–apparently “Pharis” meant “gravel-digger”), I chose Qenya because there is no official word for princess in Sindarin. Long story short (Too late!) words are interesting and important to me.

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The tree of Gondor represents a return of hope and a renewing of strength. Gondor was a country that many people had given up on. The time of men was assumed to be drawing to a close; their strength failing. The tree had stood bare in the Court of the Fountain for many years. But when a “rightful and true” king ruled in Gondor the tree, the country, and the people in it were able to flourish again.

“When, finally, Gandalf takes Aragorn up into the mountains and shows him a slender white sapling in the snow, a sense of fulfillment wells in us all. The tree is found; the world is right for now. The first sign that the time is imminent is the Elven-woman Arwen’s gift of a banner with “seven stars and seven stones and one white tree” (1966 ROTK, p.27), sent as Frodo nears Mt. Doom and the last battle approaches. When Frodo’s quest is over and Mordor has been defeated, the last sign that is awaited to indicate the world has been set right is the return of the living White Tree to the courtyard.

The living White Tree is the final symbol of recovery for Gondor, a country that looked at one time as though it were in its last decline. This is significant to Tolkien’s theory on the importance of fantasy in general. Tolkien saw fantasy as a potent form of art that, through the powers of sub-creation and enchantment, could provide readers with the healing gifts of recovery, escape, and consolation. These are all gifts that Tolkien’s trees bear to Middle Earth. As Hans Christian Andersen said, “green is good for the eyes” (1981 Lewis, p.91), so Tolkien might have added: and for the heart.”

If you’d like to read a long-ish and entirely wonderful essay on Tolkien and trees, you can find “Tolkien’s Trees” by Claudia Riiff Finseth here.

I am grabbing hold of hope and strength for myself and for my loved ones. It’s really hard work. And if the craziest thing I do in the process is to get a tattoo (or two!), I can live with that.

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Because some people have already asked, I’ll add here that my very talented cousin, Dan Clay Smith did these. I am so very pleased with his beautiful work and really appreciated being able to trust his very knowledgeable advice about where and how to tattoo so that it will look the best possible now, heal well, and still be what I want in 20 years. If you’re around Harrisburg, PA I highly, highly recommend him.

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Drinking Water

I’m kind of a mess right now. Meaning, talking about my own stuff far too much instead of listening to people I find interesting because my brain is like a car engine revved up to 8,000 rpms all the time kind of mess. Meaning up all night, could easily go skipping down any of a number of destructive paths kind of mess. I’m not saying that to garner sympathy (I have enough of that because I have lots of kind and compassionate people around me), and I certainly don’t have the market cornered on Going Through Stuff. I know a lot of people who have a lot going on. 2014 has been sort of a glass 3/4 empty kind of year so far.

The thing about being a parent is that it doesn’t stop just because I am a mess. People still poop in their diapers, and need to be fed, clothed, washed, and cleaned up after/told to clean up after themselves. And there are a lot of other areas of life in which this holds true to varying degrees. Even the most understanding of workplaces will require one to eventually, you know, be able to function and do work. Sick loved ones are still sick, even if I can’t handle it. And sometimes, the astounding pressure to just GET IT TOGETHER ALREADY is enough to get me through an ER visit. But sometimes it’s not. So what then?

My new spiritual practice is drinking water. As a way to remind myself to stop and allow myself to be replenished in the most basic way I can think of. Because if I am not intentional, I can go days without actually drinking a glass of plain water. It’s like being a Christian without praying to God for peace in times of sorrow. Sure, I can do it; probably even for quite a long time, but why would I want to? What does it prove? It’s not as though God doesn’t know I’m a mess if I don’t pray about it. I am privileged to live in a place where water is readily available whenever I want it, so why should I let myself wither like the houseplants I keep forgetting to water?

Someone’s chemo isn’t working? Stop and drink a glass of water.

Kids are fighting over the same toy AGAIN? Stop and drink a glass of water.

A friend’s baby has to have open heart surgery? Water.

We’re doing a test that will “rule out” Crohn’s disease for the fifth time this year? *sigh* water.

Now, drinking water doesn’t directly help any of these situations the least little bit. Any more than remembering to water my houseplants would keep them from burning in a fire or being smashed to pieces if thrown on the floor. But when the hypothetical fire or smashing feels like it’s hanging over my head (especially if it seems to follow me for any length of time), it’s so easy to overlook the important fundamental ways that I can keep myself from withering away in the meanwhile.

Sometimes I don’t feel any different after I drink a big glass of water. But sometimes I do.

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Attention Cranky Hippie Ladies: you are promoting the wrong kind of feminism.

We attended a beautiful hippie festival this weekend. The Hessler Street Fair has been happening in Cleveland since the 60s and it’s always a great experience to see so much hand-made and lovingly shared craftsmanship from artists of all ages. I bought a clay tea light holder from my friend’s ten year old daughter.
The main attraction for us, these days, is Harmony Park. It’s a smallish, enclosed area where kids can run relatively free and enjoy drumming, dancing, balloon creatures, face-painting, community toys, and lots of other things.
My daughter recently turned six. For her birthday, my mom hand-made her an Elsa Dress. We did insist that she take it off for bed, but when we told her she could wear it to Hessler her entire face lit up. The bottom got a little dirty while we were walking around outside at Hessler, but I haven’t gotten it off of her long enough to wash it (I know, I know…it’s on my list to do later today).
So when I say that she loves Elsa without me telling her to, please believe me.
As my newly minted six year old waited in line to get her face painted, the lady who was taking the money looked her up and down, then said in a somewhat confrontational tone, ” That’ll be twelve dollars. Because the mask she chose takes a long time. Where’s your crown? Aren’t you supposed to be a princess or something??”
E. said nothing in reply, then leaned over to me and whispered, “Mama, I don’t know what she’s talking about.”
“I don’t know either, honey…don’t worry about it.”
Then the lady who was doing the face painting looked over scornfully and said, “Um, NO. If she was really a princess at Hessler, she would be wearing tie dye. Not….THAT.”
I considered leaning into the moment and saying snarkily, “Well, I did have to put her on a diet to get her to fit into the dress, but it was totally worth it because STANDARDS OF BEAUTY.”

I decided against it. I do have some thoughts though.

1. She was accused of being the wrong kind of princess for Hessler. I disagree, as did ostensibly the little boy who followed her around all afternoon calling her “princess” and asking her to send him on quests for her, then bringing her little tributary gifts. I think the general consensus was that she was dressed as a princess. Just because something is culturally recognizable as girly doesn’t mean it has no place at Hessler.

2. She’s six. Can we just let her like what she likes? If little boys (and girls) are allowed to get their faces painted like Captain America, then why can’t little girls (and boys) also like princesses and fairies?

3. If the hand-painted portrait of King Triton we passed on our way out is any indication, there is no official Hessler ban on Disney or their princesses, or conventional fairy tales in general. I feel quite sure those ladies didn’t speak for Hessler as a whole. Just for the record.

4. It is entirely possible for someone to hold ridiculous ideas about what other people’s children Ought To Do or Ought To Like and yet be capable of beautiful, beautiful face painting. I highly recommend the face painting, if not the commentary. Also for the record.

5. This is one main reason why my blog is called Sustainable Princess. Because you know what? Forcing girls to hate princesses (or anything culturally recognizable as girly, as I mentioned above) is not better (or even more possible, really) than forcing girls to like them. And as for the word “princess”, I think it suffers from a bad case of “You keep using that word….” Princess does not have to mean spoiled, selfish, materialistic, man-dependent, etc. Liking Disney does not automatically come with an eating disorder in the teen years. Unless, of course, I refuse to engage the issue in any constructive way and leave it up to culture by default to define for my children what Princess means. Because I think we can all agree that the prevailing groupthink on this issue is kind of broken and inconsistent at best. I’m just not sure that forming a new and similarly inconsistent groupthink is the answer.

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Homemade Mondays: Blackberry Lemonade and Blackberry Lemon martini

Yes, I know. It’s Thursday, not Monday. It’s almost Mother’s Day. Humor me. Plus, this is really good. And it’s fun to have a grown-up version and a kids’ version.

This is meant to be made up in smaller batches, for just a few people. For party lemonade (or just for less work), here is the recipe for lemonade concentrate to keep on hand.

blackberry lemonade

Blackberry Lemon Martini

Ingredients:

1 part lemon juice

3 parts maple syrup

3 parts vodka

a few frozen blackberries, to taste

some ice

some lavender bitters, if you’re feeling extra fancy

Method:

Combine the lemon juice, maple syrup, vodka, blackberries, and some ice in a cocktail shaker (a wide mouth mason jar makes an excellent substitute if you don’t have a shaker). The more blackberries you add, and the longer you shake, the darker it will be. Shake for half a minute or so, then taste a bit to see if you need to add more lemon or maple syrup. Adjust amounts and shake again if necessary, or pour into a fun glass and top with lavender bitters if that’s your thing.

Blackberry Lemonade

Ingredients:

1 part lemon juice

1 part maple syrup

a few frozen blackberries, to taste

some ice

water

 

Method:

Combine the lemon juice, maple syrup, blackberries, and some ice in a cocktail shaker (a wide mouth mason jar makes an excellent substitute if you don’t have a shaker). The more blackberries you add, and the longer you shake, the darker it will be. Shake for half a minute or so, then fill the rest of the way with water. Ready to serve! This also works really well with other berries, mint leaves, etc.

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Homemade Mondays: Lemon Sesame Salad Dressing (and science experiment)

I really like homeschooling lessons that involve food. So for our salad the other night, we mixed up this simple salad dressing together and discussed how the different layers of liquid had different densities, and what emulsions are (I only gave the very basic description that oil and water are not really friends and that when you emulsify them it’s like making them stay together even though they don’t want to–cut me some slack! I don’t have a degree in science. My goal in homeschooling isn’t to be an expert in everything; because who can know all the things? The point is to rouse kids’ curiousity about stuff and then google the answers to their questions with them!).

This was easy, fun, and delicious.

 

Lemon Sesame Salad Dressing and Science Experiment

Ingredients:

1 part lemon juice

1 part honey, agave, maple syrup, sugar, etc.

2 parts sesame oil (you could easily substitute avocado, olive, etc.)

 

Method:

Combine all ingredients in a clear glass bottle. If you have little kids around you (or even if you don’t; whatever) take a minute to notice which liquid is where…the least dense (oil) will be on top, and the most dense (honey) on the bottom! Food is interesting!

Oh, then tightly lid and shake well to combine.

I served this over a romaine salad with sesame seeds and it was yummy.

lemon sesame salad

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The Things I Can

Got some really great advice from an ER nurse this weekend. This is heavily paraphrased, as I was pretty overwhelmed and don’t remember exactly what she said, but she really helped me a lot.

Nurse: Don’t try to do everything at once. Do one thing at a time.

Me: But sometimes there are too many things. Like right now. My husband is on this side of the ER and my friend is bringing my daughter to the kids’ side. I can’t be in charge of both of those things! Who do I go with? I want to be both places.

Nurse: That’s true. A lot of times it does seem like everything comes at you at once. When that happens you just have do something about the thing you can do something about.

Me: I guess you have a lot of experience with having to prioritize stuff like that, in a high stress environment like this.

Nurse: Yes. I’ve never been through AA or anything, but a lot of times I just say the Serenity prayer anyway, because it’s really helpful when you’re overwhelmed.

Me: Yes! That’s really concrete and helps me a lot. I can’t make my husband ok, and right now he’s drugged and sleeping anyway. So I should go get ready to do the best I can for when my bleeding kiddo gets here.

I would also like to add that I mentioned during that conversation that it must be a tricky part of her job to deal with people who are often at their worst and that she was being really kind and clear and helpful when I was certainly not at my best. 

ER nurses and staff in particular and medical professionals in general, I salute you and thank you for that graciousness.

 

serenity prayer

**I found a lot of these graphics online…and mostly they seemed to favor the serenity, wisdom, and courage. Those are good things, but I’m more about verbs than nouns, solution-wise. A personality thing, I suppose.

 

Just for my own running reference:

Some things I can’t control

~whether or not my husband experiences pain

~whether or not my kids experience pain or sickness

~whether my family and friends (or their kids) experience pain or sickness or even death (oh, it hurts my heart to write that)

~whether other people will assume the best or the worst of my intentions and actions

~what other people learn about who God is because of their suffering

 

Some things I can control

~Learning as much as I can to help my family to live well and pain free

~asking for help when I need it, and accepting help when it’s offered

~cutting myself a lot of slack when I am not at my best

~cutting other people a lot of slack when they are not at their best

~assuming the best of other people’s intentions and actions

~letting other people know when I am not at my best; not so they can cut me slack necessarily (though that is nice sometimes), but so they don’t think that whatever social or relational sins I commit are about them

~what I choose to think about God amid (and because of; or at least taking into account) my own struggles and doubts, and those of the people around me

~Doing the dishes (though if 3/4 of my family is injured or in the ER over the weekend I’m gonna go ahead and give myself at least until Tuesday before I even think about it!)

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Two days, both alike in happenstance…

There’s a lot of talk around here these days about positive and negative self-talk. Apparently, what we tell ourselves has an effect on how we feel about our circumstances, our people, and our lives in general. Novel, huh?

Neither of the following depictions are exactly what happened; rather it was something sort of in between. Because no one is just one thing; though I’d like to think I was closer to the positive end most of the day, I am still learning. So I present, for your consideration (and possibly amusement; it’s ok), my day yesterday. Twice.

~~~~~

Woke up, dissheveled, and rushed around to get everyone ready and get out the door. Today we needed to get the family car, because E had her first Homeschool Book Club and it’s too far away to walk to so we decided to drive there. We got J to work, later than I had hoped in my unrealistic fantasies which do not include things like stopping to change diapers and coffee taking 3 minutes to steep in the french press.

Got J to work, then headed to the mall to look for athletic shoes for the girl, because strappy sandals are not good for bike riding, and after several trips to the second hand store we have given up finding them there. Walked around, bored, for half an hour, until 9 a.m., then went to the store we were trying to go to only to find out that it opens at 10. GAH.

Tried to figure out something to do for an hour and a half, then remembered the old golf course across the street from the mall is a park now. No playground equipment or anything though. Hope it doesn’t suck. My car starts making a weird noise that seems associated with the brakes. Ugh. Maybe if I ignore it it’ll go away. But….

Made it to book club a little early (because I’ve come to terms with the fact that there is no ‘on time’ for me; I’m 20 minutes early, or half an hour late). Had a little snack and read some while waiting for the other families to get there. What will it be like? What if everyone thinks I’m crazy and my kids are ridiculous!? More to the point, what if that’s true??

Book club went along just fine.

We played for a while at the library, my kids dawdling and being angry about leaving the library, just like they didn’t want to leave the park, or the mall, or the car, or our house. I got frustrated and said, “we LEAVE PLACES, ok? It’s a thing. If we never left anywhere, we’d never go anywhere. GET USED TO IT.”

We tried out a new lunch place. It was good that they have nondairy stuff we can eat, but my kids didn’t want to sit nicely because WATERFALL and I spilled my drink all over myself trying to pour it into one of my kids’ waterbottles. Because of course I did. “I deserved that.” I said to the waiter who brought me a napkin. I think he said something back, but I was too distracted finding a crayon under the table.

Lunch was good, but I ordered too much. I’m so wasteful like that, even if we did take it with us and ate it later as a car snack. Why aren’t I better at estimating portions served by restaurants I’ve never been to?

We went to a store nearby to look for shoes, now that it was open. It took forever to walk there because kids have to stop and look at every worm on the sidewalk while I try to get them to JUST COME ON already. We have places to be.

After some argument, we finally agreed on some ‘sparkletastic’ purple and white athletic shoes that light up when E stomps her feet. As if she needed another reason to stomp her feet all the time. They are purple, because I vetoed the pinkalicious ones on the grounds that they were ten dollars more. I felt the imaginary eyes of progressives around me standing in judgment of the fact that I didn’t convince her to get the Captain America light up shoes instead, but it just didn’t seem worth the fight. And she did seem pretty excited…

We picked up J and dropped him off at an appointment. Not sure what we were going to do about dinner, because we might need to visit a dear friend in the hospital. TOO MANY PEOPLE I LOVE IN TOO MANY HOSPITALS. I left my wallet in the cart at Costco. I realized it five minutes after driving away with my children and my groceries. I immediately called the store, drove us all back there, looked all around, left my information at the front desk, and called to cancel my debit card right then (because there is a Best Buy next door to the Costco). It was embarrassing and tiring and irritating. And it was 6 p.m. Luckily, our friend was home from the hospital, and another friend offered us dinner. So that was nice. Then I got my wallet back. So I guess the day wasn’t that bad.
~~~~~

Woke up, dissheveled, and rushed around to get everyone ready and get out the door. Today we needed to get the car, because E had her first Homeschool Book Club so we were taking the opportunity to run other errands, too. We got J to work, later than I had hoped in my unrealistic fantasies which do not include things like stopping to change diapers and coffee taking 3 minutes to steep in the french press. maybe later than before we had kids, but all things considered in a fairly timely manner. Good thing he has flex hours, and no early morning meetings.

Got J to work, then headed to the mall to look for athletic shoes for the girl, because while strappy sandals are amazing for cuteness with dresses and things, they are not quite as practical for things like running fast, climbing trees, or bike riding. Walked around, bored, fascinated by turned off mall fountains, the big clock in the center of the mall (we practiced telling time), a decoration on the wall, and various indoor plants we encountered. At 9, we realized the store didn’t open for another hour. GAH. Rather than hang around for that long (we’d seen lots of interest at the mall already), we left and had a snack in the car.

Tried to figure out something to do for an hour and a half, then remembered the old golf course across the street from the mall is a park now. No playground equipment or anything though. Hope it doesn’t suck. There was some really interesting stuff there, like signs with information about Coyotes, and what felt oddly like a suburban archaeological dig site. This is where they used to drive the golf carts! That is where you had to pay to be a member or you couldn’t come and pay to eat at the restaurant! Oooh, this would have been the hole to get the golf ball in, and that’s a SAND TRAP. OMG. My car starts making a weird noise that seems associated with the brakes. Ugh. Maybe if I ignore it it’ll go away. But…. Yay! It did.

Made it to book club a little early (because I’ve come to terms with the fact that there is no ‘on time’ for me; I’m 20 minutes early, or half an hour late. I am who I am). Had a little snack and read some while waiting for the other families to get there. What will it be like? What if everyone thinks I’m crazy and my kids are ridiculous!? More to the point, what if that’s true?? What will the other moms be like? I wonder what kind of homeschooling style they have. Other people are so interesting. And it’s such a relief to hear other people having the same conversations I have hundreds of times a day.

Book club went along just fine. Book club was awesome.

We played for a while at the library, my kids dawdling and being angry about leaving the library, just like they didn’t want to leave the park, or the mall, or the car, or our house. I got frustrated and understand transitions are hard, but we have to find a way to not be fighting about this all the time. I said, “we LEAVE PLACES leave places, ok? It’s a thing. If we never left anywhere, we’d never go anywhere. GET USED TO IT.”

We tried out a new lunch place. It was good that they have nondairy stuff we can eat, but my kids didn’t want to sit nicely because WATERFALL and there was a really cool waterfall near our table. I spilled my drink all over myself trying to pour it into one of my kids’ waterbottles. Because of course I did. “I deserved that.” I said to the waiter who brought me a napkin. I think he said something back, but I was too distracted finding a crayon under the table. “No you didn’t,” he said, smiling at me. Oh. I guess not.

Lunch was good, but I ordered too much. I’m so wasteful like that, even if we did take it with us and ate it later as a car snack. Why aren’t I better at estimating portions served by restaurants I’ve never been to? E ate the leftovers later in the day. That worked out nicely.

We went to a store nearby to look for shoes, now that it was open. It took forever to walk there because kids have to stop and look at every worm on the sidewalk while I try to get them to JUST COME ON already. We have places to be. We rescued a sand-covered worm from certain death on the sidewalk and returned him to a grassy spot where I assume he lives happily to this day. Related: I held a worm today! And then E was brave enough to try it too! We Kikel ladies are shockingly stereotypical in our silly fear of bugs sometimes. But not today!

After some argument lively discussion, we finally agreed on some ‘sparkletastic’ purple and white athletic shoes that light up when E stomps her feet. As if she needed another reason to stomp her feet all the time. They are purple, because I vetoed the pinkalicious ones on the grounds that they were ten dollars more. I felt the imaginary eyes of progressives around me standing in judgment of the fact that I didn’t convince her to get the Captain America light up shoes instead, but it just didn’t seem worth the fight. And she did seem pretty excited…

E: Mama, I NEEEEED them!

K: Um, try again.

E: Mama, I really WAAANNT them!

K: That, I can respect. They have the features I wanted in a shoe (see above re: running, climbing, biking, price point), and the features she wanted in a shoe (see above re: sparkletastic). I like when it works out like that sometimes. She doesn’t need those shoes to be happy, but it’s really ok for her to enjoy them.

I left my wallet in the cart at Costco. I realized it five minutes after driving away with my children and my groceries. I immediately called the store, drove us all back there, looked all around, left my information at the front desk, and called to cancel my debit card right then (because there is a Best Buy next door to the Costco) and antics ensued. It was embarrassing and tiring and irritating. *Sigh* At least I know where I left it, and canceled my debit card right away. That’s a pain, but it’s not the end of the world, and the magnetic strip didn’t work right anyway, so now I’ll have a working card in 4-7 business days.
We picked up J from his appointment, then found out that our friend is home from the hospital (yay!). Then I looked at my phone and saw that another friend had made a big pot of soup and had texted wanting us to come eat it at her house with her family. We did this (the soup was very delicious!!), and were presented with half of a homemade vegan chocolate layer cake to take home with us. Let me say that again. VEGAN. CHOCOLATE. LAYER. CAKE.
Then we arrived home and ten minutes later a man walking his dog in our neighborhood knocked on our door and handed me my wallet, which he had found in the Costco parking lot five minutes after I dropped it then decided to return to me himself when he investigated and found out that we live a street away from each other. His name is Mike, he has a cool friendly dog, and he was very kind.

All in all, it was a good day. I love my neighborhood, I love my friends, I love my patient husband and children.

~~~~~

 

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Failed Western Prayer Formulas

Last New Year’s, a lot of people I know were very excited and relieved to ring in 2014. “We made it! Take that, 2013!” my friends exalted. At the time, I could not shake this terrible sinking feeling not unlike the one you get when you’re only half-way through a horror movie and all the characters turn to each other and say, “Whew! Glad THAT’S over…”

I am profoundly sad about apparently having been right about that.

A couple of Sundays ago, we were invited to spend time with some friends in a crisis. We had (and still have) some of our own kind-of-intense-but-not-life-threatening stuff going on, (in addition to several distinct intense-and-life-threatening things one or two or three rings out from us) and I did not feel up to the task of walking into the room with a clear head and heart to be present with my friends in the way I wanted to.

So I reached out to a priest friend of ours and said, “I need you to come say true things to me so I can try to remember them tomorrow.”

And he did. He said a lot of true things to us, some things in ways I hadn’t thought of before, some things I have written about myself here and other places. One thing that really struck me was the idea that in Western religion, we tend to think that praying is about entering the right formula to get the result we want. If we ask in the right way, if we have behaved the right way, we will get what we ask for from God. I was raised in a tradition that can point to many places in the Bible that seem to corroborate this view (if you read the Bible in other specific ways, you can corroborate the ideas of forced polygamy, stoning women -and only the women- for adultery, and slavery as ‘Biblical’ too…I’m coming to think that the “broadly prescriptive” approach may not always be the best way to read the Bible).

But to be completely honest, I like this formulaic method to a point. It’s simple and clear and I know what I’m supposed to do. The problem with that method is that right now anything I try to write about God makes me sound like either an angry hard-line agnostic, or one of Job’s friends. “God’s ways are not our ways.” and other such platitudes only serve to fuel a growing rage and despair. Or I consider Job. Awful things are happening to him, and his friends are convinced that it is somehow his doing because God, being perfect, wouldn’t do anything to Job that wasn’t perfect. Their conclusion is that God must be punishing Job for something. They can not see another explanation. It must be his fault.

Left with only those two dismal options, everything feels too hard and mean and confusing. Lots of the things people keep saying about God sound like things which are ‘acceptable to such as do not care to know him.’ If popular theology is to be believed, either God is pulling puppet strings in order to make the best show possible (mean), or God is not fully in control and is really more of a cool uncle type (confusing–who’s driving this thing? Where are we going, and why are we in this handbasket?).

When I get into this place, it goes badly with me. I start to wonder what point there is to anything. Somehow George MacDonald is always there to speak truth to me through his books and sermons (when I remember to read them), and somehow he never fails to make me able to see the goodness of God again, even if it’s just a glimpse. Even when that seems impossible.

So I will not try to show my own work here any more. It’s not getting me anywhere. Instead I will try to read and incorporate the words of my “Uncle George,” as many of his devoted readers call him. Even just my excerpts are a little lengthy, but I am posting them all because I find them life giving in some way and I need to read them. I will be bookmarking this post for myself.

 

Some excerpts from “The Voice of Job” by George MacDonald

He feels he has not deserved such suffering, and will neither tell nor listen to lies for God.

Job is nothing of a Stoic, but bemoans himself like a child–a brave child who seems to himself to suffer wrong, and recoils with horror-struck bewilderment from the unreason of the thing.

From a soul whose very consciousness is contradiction, we must not look for logic; misery is rarely logical; it is itself a discord; yet is it nothing less than natural that, feeling as if God wronged him, Job should yet be ever yearning after a sight of God, straining into his presence, longing to stand face to face with him. He would confront the One. He is convinced, or at least cherishes as his one hope the idea, that, if he could but get God to listen to him, if he might but lay his case clear before him, God would not fail to see how the thing was, and would explain the matter to him.

God is not a God to accept the flattery which declares him above obligation to his creatures. His [Job’s] faith is in truth profound, yet is he always complaining. It is but the form his faith takes in his trouble.

He uses language which, used by any living man, would horrify the religious of the present day, in proportion to the lack of truth in them, just as it horrified his three friends, the honest pharisees of the time, whose religion was ‘doctrine’ and rebuke. God speaks not a word of rebuke to Job for the freedom of his speech:–he has always been seeking such as Job to worship him.

It is not at first easy to see wherein God gives Job any answer; I cannot find that he offers him the least explanation of why he has so afflicted him. He calls up before him, one after another, the works of his hands. The answer, like some of our Lord’s answers if not all of them, seems addressed to Job himself, not to his intellect; to the revealing, God-like imagination in the man, and to no logical faculty whatever.

It is through their show, not through their analysis, that we enter into their deepest truths. What they say to the childlike soul is the truest thing to be gathered of them. To know a primrose is a higher thing than to know all the botany of it–just as to know Christ is an infinitely higher thing than to know all theology, all that is said about his person, or babbled about his work.

To deny the existence of God may, paradoxical as the statement will at first seem to some, involve less unbelief than the smallest yielding to doubt of his goodness. I say yielding; for a man may be haunted with doubts, and only grow thereby in faith. Doubts are the messengers of the Living One to rouse the honest. They are the first knock at our door of things that are not yet, but have to be, understood.

One great point in the poem is–that when Job hears the voice of God, though it utters no word of explanation, it is enough to him to hear it: he knows that God is, and that he hears the cry of his creature. Even if Job could not at first follow his argument of divine probability, God settled everything for him when, by answering him out of the whirlwind, he showed him that he had not forsaken him.

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Spirit and Fire and Dew

“You needn’t get in such a fever over it. Do learn to take things calmly, child.”

For Anne to take things calmly would have been to change her nature. All “spirit and fire and dew,” as she was, the pleasures and pains of life came to her with trebled intensity. Marilla felt this and was vaguely troubled over it, realizing that the ups and downs of existence would probably bear hardly on this impulsive soul and not sufficiently understanding that the equally great capacity for delight might more than compensate. Therefore Marilla conceived it to be her duty to drill Anne into a tranquil uniformity of disposition as impossible and alien to her as to a dancing sunbeam in one of the brook shallows. She did not make much headway, as she sorrowfully admitted to herself. The downfall of some dear hope or plan plunged Anne into “deeps of affliction.” The fulfillment thereof exalted her to dizzy realms of delight. Marilla had almost begun to despair of ever fashioning this waif of the world into her model little girl of demure manners and prim deportment. Neither would she have believed that she really liked Anne much better as she was.

Anne of Green Gables, Chapter 22

L. M. Montgomery

 

It is possible, within one’s own head, to play both Marilla and Anne in the same story. But sometimes trying to pretend to be the sort of person you aren’t can just cause you to just be bad at being the sort of person you are. So the answer, then, lies not in changing our selves, but in learning how to keep stuff from piling up on top of those selves such that they become twisted and obscured until we can’t even recognize them any more.

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Homemade Mondays: Vegan Aloo Mash with Chapates

A few years ago we met a lovely lady who taught us how to prepare and enjoy a few Indian dishes. After picking up a taste for it, I started looking into more fun meals that would be easy to prepare and fun to eat. Somehow I came across a recipe for something calling itself “Aloo Bhartha” which my family loved and quickly became a staple. Except that in Hindi, that actually means “Potato Eggplant”. Since there is no eggplant involved, we’ve renamed it (because it’s still delicious, whatever it is and however much it’s not a traditional Indian dish). Also, if you can or will eat butter I highly recommend cooking your chapates in ghee instead of coconut oil like me. Yumm…..butter……

Lastly, this is a good thing to serve with a salad or some other kind of vegetable because otherwise it’s kind of a starchy meal.

Vegan Aloo Mash

Ingredients:

2 smallish potatoes per person, well washed

1 medium onion per 4 people, peeled and chopped

a little oil for the pan (avocado, coconut, or your favorite cooking oil)

whole cumin seeds, 1-2 tsp (to taste)

whole yellow or black mustard seeds 1-2 tsp (to taste)

turmeric (to taste)

salt (to taste)

Method:

Roughly chop the potatoes. Boil as you would for mashed potatoes, until a fork goes easily through them. No need to peel, as long as they’re clean. I cut out bad spots and leave the peels because they are a good source of iron!

Once the potatoes are done, turn them off and set them aside. Heat oil over medium heat in a large fry pan for a minute. Add onions, cumin, and mustard seeds. Cook, stirring constantly, until the seeds begin to crackle a bit. Have a potato masher handy, if you have one (if not, you can mash the potatoes in whatever way you usually do…like with a mixer or whatever). Add the potatoes a little at a time, mashing them up well with the spices and onions before adding more. Add turmeric and salt to taste, and water for texture as you go. You might have to try some to get the flavoring just right. 😉

Chapates

Ingredients:

(sourdough starter)

flour (I use spelt, but whatever all-purpose-ey sort of flour you use will be fine)

water

salt

coconut oil (or ghee)

Method:

Start with sourdough starter if you have it, or a cup of water if you don’t. Add flour a little at a time until you have a workable dough. If your dough gets too dry, add a little water and keep mixing. These roll out on a floured surface much like flour tortillas. Roll them as thin and round as you can while keeping them easy to pick up (mine are often not very round).

Heat a griddle or large fry pan over medium/high heat. Put a chapate on, then put about 1/2-1 teaspoon of coconut oil in the center. Roll out the next chapate while this one is cooking. Once there are small brown spots on the bottom, flip and cook for 30 seconds or so on the other side. Transfer to a serving plate and put the new chapate on, and so on and so forth. If they are cooking too fast for you to keep up, turn the heat down a bit.

Serve chapates and aloo mash immediately with hot sauce or chutneys of your choice, fresh coriander (cilantro), or just plain.

To reheat leftovers, add a little water to them and stir until they are as hot as you like and have the right texture.

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