It is easy to take liberty for granted,
when you have never had it taken from you.
~Author Unknown
As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.
~John Fitzgerald Kennedy
The most persistent sound which reverberates through men’s history
is the beating of war drums.
~Arthur Koestler
I dream of giving birth to a child who will ask,
“Mother, what was war?”
~Eve Merriam
But fame is theirs—and future days
On pillar’d brass shall tell their praise;
Shall tell—when cold neglect is dead—
“These for their country fought and bled.”
~Philip Freneau
I sleep with my radio on at night, tuned to NPR (WPLN here in Nashville, of which I am a contributing member) because they play classical music all night, and then I can wake up listening to Morning Edition and find out what’s going on in the world. This morning, I woke up to the strains of the Sesame Street theme song and hearing one of the correspondents wish this “experiment in children’s television” a happy 40th birthday. Yep, that’s right. Big Bird, Oscar, and friends have been on TV for forty years!
Now, I haven’t watched a full episode of the show since the early 1990s (back when I was in college and we didn’t have cable and there was nothing else on TV during the day but SS and soap operas), and I know there are tons of new characters and that they’ve even “updated” the theme song. But I thought it would be fun today to share our memories about growing up watching Sesame Street (or watching it with your kids now—how has it changed?).
Here’s the piece that was on NPR this morning.
And here are a couple of my absolute favorite memories from Sesame Street:
I haven’t consciously set out to blog about my journey of finding a new church home, but as that’s a major part of my life right now, it’s only natural that I should share some of that journey here. As those of you who’ve been regular readers for at least the last few months know, I’ve been struggling with trying to find a church where I feel like I fit in, where I feel like I belong and am not just an observer—whether it’s as a single adult in a congregation where marriage is the key to fitting in or whether it’s as a “recovering Baptist” attending churches of different denominations/worship styles.
Yesterday marked the third week I’ve visited the church I’m feeling increasingly called to. (I don’t see myself making a decision to join before the end of the year, because I want to make certain that this is definitely the right church, a long-term church, before making the commitment to joining this church as well as going through whatever red-tape I have to go through to become a member of a different denomination.) So I figured it was time to start visiting Sunday School classes. I read through the list of classes on the church’s website and chose one of the first listed. Here’s part of the description from the website:
. . . We share values of love for “family” (including our biological family
as well as family as defined by close, caring relationships).
We value respect and tolerance for others while working toward
justice for the disenfranchised, responsibility toward the global
community, and the search for truth. As we strive to follow the
example of Jesus, we welcome all people to our class regardless
of age, race, gender, ethnicity, religious beliefs, sexual orientation,
culture, socio-economic status, political position, disability, or any
other defining characteristics. We have members of 35 years,
and we also welcome newcomers throughout the year. . . .
Now, what I did not realize was that the statement “We have members of 35 years” was not referring to age but length of membership in the class. But still, it was quite enjoyable as the guest speaker (this class apparently does not have a regular teacher but a succession of guest lecturers) was teaching out of Jonah. (Oh, and I’ve been told by several life-long members of this denomination that they don’t consider themselves as very strong when it comes to knowledge of the Bible. It was amazing to me how many of these people ages 55+ had to “pass” when the teacher asked the class to go around the room and tell the story of Jonah, even after she’d been teaching from the book for three weeks!)
The Sunday School lesson made a very interesting juxtaposition to the sermon, which was on finding our call to service. As you probably already know, the crux of the story of Jonah is that God called Jonah to serve—by going to Nineveh and telling them that God was going to judge them for their sins. Jonah tried to run from God and the calling, but as we all know, you can’t run from God. So Jonah got to chill out in the belly of a great fish for three days before being belched back up onto the land and the next time God called, Jonah went to Nineveh. (Observation: the book of Jonah does not record the actual message God gave Jonah, only the message that Jonah gave the Ninevites—that Nineveh would be destroyed in 40 days if they didn’t repent, but not what would happen if they did repent.) When the Ninevite king heard Jonah’s message, he dressed in sackcloth and repented, and he ordered every person and animal in the city do the same. God relented and withdrew His judgment from the city because of their repentance. Jonah, who’d wanted them to be punished (total annihilation) was furious when it didn’t happen. And he sulked. (“This is exactly why I didn’t want to come in the first place. I knew You were going to make me look a fool!”) Like a child, he sat down and pouted. God looked on him with compassion and made a plant grow up overnight to provide him shade. But did Jonah thank God for it? No! So God sent a worm that ate the plant and it withered the next night. Jonah got even angrier. And then God did something that I love. He started in with the sarcastic, rhetorical questions*: “Who are you to get angry with Me? Did you cause the plant to grow? But you cared more about the fate of a plant—which came to life overnight—than Nineveh. Shouldn’t I have more compassion for 120,000 people (and the animals), whom you were willing to see destroyed, than you do for a plant?”
Jonah didn’t want to do the service God called him to do. God not only had to call him twice, but had to go to extreme measures to ensure Jonah would go the second time God called him. One of the most interesting contrasts in the story of Jonah is Jonah’s prayer in chapter 2 and Jonah’s reaction to God’s saving Nineveh in chapter 4. He goes from saying, “But I will sacrifice to You with the voice of thanksgiving; that which I have vowed I will pay. Salvation is from the LORD” at the end of his prayer from the belly of the fish to saying, “I have good reason to be angry, even to death,” when God asked him why he was angry about the plant withering away.
So I went from this lesson about someone who went and performed his service reluctantly—and then got angry with God about the compassionate and loving result—into the worship service in which the message drew from 1 Corinthians 12:4–12, which discusses the ways in which we are each uniquely gifted by the Holy Spirit for service. I’ve taken many spiritual gift surveys in my adult life, and they always come back with the same results—my top gifts are administration, teaching, and leadership; my bottom/non-existent gifts are mercy, hospitality, and giving. So, logical areas of ministry/service for me are as a teacher, on committees, or as an officer in organizations like the choir or my writing groups. The two main points the pastor made were that we are all called to ministry and we are all gifted for ministry. But we cannot allow ourselves to be browbeaten into thinking that any area of ministry is more important/more glamorous/more spiritual than any other. We must be fully attentive to God’s presence in our lives and what our gifts and talents are and what God’s given us a heart for.
“God calls us to those places where the world’s greatest
needs and our greatest joys intersect.”
He is not going to call us to do something of which we are not capable. Nor is He going to call us to do something that will make us miserable. It was not God’s calling upon Jonah’s life that made Jonah miserable. It was Jonah’s attitude toward the Ninevites and response toward God that made Jonah miserable.
I’ve mentioned many times that it was not until I was in my late twenties that I realized God was calling me to pursue publication. And while others may see my writing as a ministry, I see it as a vocation—because for me, it isn’t the stories I’m writing that is my ministry. It’s the connections I’ve made with people—the people I’ve been able to mentor through the writing groups in which I’ve been involved and through the blog. It’s the people I’ve come to know because they contacted me after reading one of my books. It’s the opportunities I’ve had to go out and meet people I never would have met before through speaking engagements and book signing events. It’s the new venues of opportunity I’ve had to meet people from all over the world that I see as my main ministry (in addition to my local writing group and, hopefully soon, being an active part of a local church congregation).
So what is your ministry? Where are you seeing God at work around you? To what do you feel God is calling you? Where are you encountering Christ? What gives you your greatest joy?
*For my favorite list of God’s sarcastic, rhetorical questions, see Job 38–41.
Fall is my favorite time of the year, and since we’ve actually started having some fall (rather than pre-winter) weather here in Middle Tennessee, it’s put me in a mind to list a few of my favorite things about the season.
- New TV season starts. With the exception of a few shows I watch on cable that run contrary to the regular season schedule (like the now-shortened Law & Order: Criminal Intent on USA, Primeval on BBC-A, and Army Wives on Lifetime), the new season begins in September (which, when I was in school, I never understood). I’ve already discussed, at length, what I watch. But I just want to give another shout-out to Flash Forward, which is my favorite new show this year.
- LSU Football! Anyone who’s known me for any length of time knows that I’m an LSU football fanatic—though I believe I have mellowed out about it in the past couple of years (since the last National Championship run in 2007).
Sleeves, Sweaters, and Jackets. Anyone who hates what short/cap sleeves/sleeveless shirts do to our upper arms (i.e., emphasize what doesn’t look good to begin with) is with me on this one. I love it when I can break out the 3/4- and long-sleeved shirts. And I especially love it when it gets cool enough to just throw on a jacket and not have to worry about what top I’m going to wear somewhere. This year, apparently, is the year of the cardigan. I have a few, and I’m okay with that, but I think I look better in the tailored jackets instead of the bulky sweaters. But sometimes, that fluffy sweater is just what’s needed. (In fact, CJ Banks is having a 40% off sale this week, and I went back and got this sweater that I modeled for them a couple of weeks ago—oh, and the tan faux-suede skirt, too.)- The end of hot weather (at least for a few months). Unlike most people who feel sluggish and hibernative during the cold-weather months, that’s what I feel like during the months when the daily temperature is above about 80 degrees. I have very little tolerance for hot weather—I overheat and dehydrate easily and then end up with a heat-induced migraine. So for me, when the temperature starts falling, my energy level starts rising. Even though the hours of daylight are shorter, I can get much more accomplished during the fall and winter months simply because I have more energy.
- Lower electric bills! Very important . . . when the temperature stays in the 60s and 70s for daytime highs, as it has been doing for the last couple of weeks, I need neither the AC nor the heater running to keep the house comfortably between 68 and 70 degrees. During these months, when there are no extremes to the temperature outside, my electric bill can be as low as $40 (compared to the highest it’s ever been, two years ago when we had five weeks of 100+ temperatures and it was $150).
- Anticipation of the holidays. For someone who lives alone in a city where I’m six to eight hours away from the members of my immediate family, I highly anticipate both Thanksgiving and Christmas because it means I’m going to get to spend time with my family. This year, I won’t get to see my sister’s family at Thanksgiving, which is usually one of the two times that I get to see them during the year. But it makes me glad that I was able to spend a week with them when I went to Baton Rouge early this summer. And I’ll get to see them for the ten or so days I’ll be in BR for Christmas. I also look forward to putting together the “Gift-a-Day” package for my niece and nephews. I remember what it was like to be a little kid and have a present to open every day during December (we had an aunt who did that for us a couple of years), so I’ve revived that tradition and do that for them now. Which means I need to get on the ball and get started shopping for that stuff, since I’ll have to ship it this year!
- Fall Colors. How could I have a list like this and not include my absolute favorite part of fall . . . the changing of the leaves. Here are some pictures I took at Shiloh National Military Park a couple of weeks ago:
Okay, so I have this whole, long, drama-queen story about why I’ve been offline almost all day today . . . but that’s not why I’m posting. I’m posting to say: get on over to Krista Phillips’s blog before midnight (central) Thursday, November 4. Krista did a fun interview with me, and we’re giving away a signed copy of Ransome’s Honor to one lucky commenter on her blog.
You can find out what brand of toilet paper I prefer and see how I fared at creating a thirty-second elevator pitch on the fly:
Kaye & Krista, 2008 MTCW Christmas Book Signing Event
At least a week before Halloween, my Kroger store had put up a Coca-Cola Christmas display just inside the front doors—right in front of the double-wide aisle of Halloween stuff. When I mentioned this on Twitter, I got several messages back from people who admitted they were already listening to Christmas music.
Back when I used to sing in choir at church (have not done so regularly in several years), I know the Christmas music would come out some time in October—or even September in the church I attended in college which did a huge Living Christmas Tree production every year (which was only half of the program—there was a first hour that was done on stage in front of the tree structure—the couple of years I was in it, I think we had upwards of 250 people singing). So I was used to listening to all of that music in the car or at home to practice and memorize it from October on. But I still waited until closer to Thanksgiving to pull out what I consider to be “real” Christmas music.
Well, I had to make a Target run last night and while I was there, I picked up the Yo-Yo Ma and Friends Christmas CD. Which meant I of course had to listen to it on the way home. And it made me want to come home and pull out the rest of my Christmas music (well, pull it up on the computer, because I automatically rip all of my CDs to the computer as soon as I get them) and start listening. I even downloaded it all onto my MP3 player to take in the car with me as I run errands around town this afternoon.
So I figured that would be a good discussion topic for the blog today.
When do you start listening to Christmas music? Have you pulled yours out already? What’s your favorite Christmas song? What’s your favorite album?
This year, I started listening to Christmas music . . .
Yesterday!
Favorite Song:
“Peace on Earth/Silent Night” (Dean Martin, on Christmas with the Rat Pack)
Favorite Album:
As you can tell by the counter in the right-hand navigation bar, I’m barely more than halfway through the draft of Ransome’s Crossing—which is due in twenty-nine days (and there’s a holiday in there somewhere, too). I spent almost all day Saturday reading the galley of A Case for Love so that I could get my edits sent back this weekend (wasn’t due until Thursday, but with a new editing job coming either today or tomorrow, I wanted to get that out of the way while I could). In addition to getting Ransome’s Crossing finished this month, I have two relatively major freelance jobs to do this month—one due on November 17 and the other one on November 30. When I think about those and then think about how much I still need to accomplish on RC, it seems overwhelming—and that, in addition to general financial worries, is what led me to do some stress eating last week, which kept me from having any loss at the scale at WW yesterday.
But at WW, I had an interesting one-on-one conversation with the leader—started out talking about stress eating, then about the deadlines looming and how it’s so easy to get overwhelmed by stuff like that, especially at this time of the year. And of course, our meeting topic was on . . . dealing with all of the stress in our lives at this time of the year! It served as a great reminder that yes, while there’s a whole lot of stuff going on, I can’t lump it all together and try to tackle it all at once. If I plan and schedule my time wisely—and stick to that schedule—I’ll be able to get everything accomplished. (Of course, as far as the financial stress goes, I just keep running out to the mailbox every afternoon to see if the checks I’m desperately waiting for have arrived. And when they aren’t there, I just keep hoping and praying they’ll be there the next day.)
So those are the stresses I’m dealing with right now: getting RC finished, two big editing projects this month, financial worries, and wanting to be able to have as much time as possible to spend with my folks at Thanksgiving.
What is stressing you out right now? What’s a plan of action you can come up with (or can I help you with) to meet those stressors and deal with each one without getting overwhelmed by it?
Last year, I shared a list of the “scariest” movies I’ve ever seen. (Proving once and for all what a total wimp I am when it comes to scary movies. If you want to see a list of movies that’ll scare the socks off of you, check out cousin Caleb’s Horrorfest on his blog.)
Upon occasion, I enjoy a suspenseful movie—and TV shows like Lost or FlashForward (man, am I loving that show!). Most of the time, I get my fix for that adrenaline rush that comes from suspense through action-oriented films, rather than those that are specifically “suspense” movies—mostly because I’m leery of those, not knowing just how scary they’re going to be. So, here we go . . . my favorite “scary” movies. (I hope I can come up with five!)
5. Silence of the Lambs. Though I’ve never watched this movie all the way through a second time, my memory of the first time I ever saw this film is strong enough that it deserves a place on this list. This film came out when I was in school at LSU. My best friend and I decided to wait until it came out on video to watch it—because that way, we could have all the lights on and if it got too scary, we could walk away/turn it off. We, along with her sister, watched it all the way through (I think by the end all three of us were sitting on one cushion on the sofa) and it left an indelible great memory—more of the friendship shared than of the movie. But looking back, I remember so much more about that movie than about any other film I’ve only watched once, which indicates it is truly a well-written, well-acted, well-made movie.
4. The Sixth Sense. This is actually my favorite M. Night Shyamalan movie, and one of my top 10 movies of all time . . . but the reason I’ve only ranked it at #4 is because it’s not really that “scary.” Great suspense and a fantastic twist at the end, but only a couple of mild “jump” moments. This is the movie that I always use as an example and recommend people study when I’m talking to writers about surprise endings and the “unreliable narrator.” If you’ve never seen it, you need to—especially if you are at all interested in storytelling/writing. And if you’ve watched it but you’ve never taken time to watch the “rules and clues” piece (should be in the special features section on the DVD), you should watch it, just to see what went into putting a story like this together.
3. Dead Again. After having seen and fallen in love with Kenneth Branagh and Emma Thompson in Henry V a year earlier, when I saw the previews for this movie (another one that came out when I was at LSU), I knew I wanted to watch it. Again, I waited for it to come out on video, but this one I watched alone—and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. Sure, it deals with reincarnation, but what movie doesn’t ask us to suspend our disbelief for a couple of hours? There are a few little jump moments, but it’s the distrust and tension that builds through the telling of the stories of the modern-day and 1940s couples that makes this a wonderful suspense movie.
2. Jekyll. Okay, this is a little bit of a cheat, because it’s a miniseries instead of a theatrical-release film. As the title indicates, it’s a modern-day retelling of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde—and it’s one of my favorite suspenseful “movies” I’ve ever watched—multiple times. James Nesbitt, as Dr. Jackman, is superb in the dual Jekyll/Hyde role—as the tortured soul and the torturer—and the dialogue is brilliant. Part of this is a mystery—as Dr. Jackman struggles to figure out who he is and why he has this condition. Part of it is science fiction, as he’s captured and put through tests. Part of it is conspiracy-theory suspense as a plot unfolds that shows “the government” knows more about him than he knows himself. And all of it is just good, old-fashioned mayhem.
1. Signs. I get laughed at a lot when I admit that this is my favorite “scary” movie, but there’s no accounting for tastes, right? You know the scene when the alien’s locked in the pantry and Mel Gibson gets down on the floor to look under the door and the alien suddenly sticks its fingers out? Not only do I experience a high level of anxiety as that scene unfolds, but I jump every single time I watch it, even though I know what’s going to happen. Sure, the solution to how to get rid of the aliens is pretty lame, but the rest of the story is so well written and acted that it’s easy to forgive M. Night Shyamalan for his lack of imagination when it came to finishing off the bad guys in this film.
I just got off the phone with an editor at one of the publishing houses for which I freelance. She called to offer me a great opportunity: a regular freelance copy-editing gig for at least the next six months as they launch a new fiction series. I’d receive the manuscript of a novel each month and have two weeks to turn it around and get it turned in—about twenty-five to forty hours of work. I’m scared to say yes, because I’m nowhere near being finished with Ransome’s Crossing, which is due December 1; and then as soon as I turn that in, I have to write Love Remains and have it turned in by February 1.
I know those of you who work full-time and still find time to write are looking at that—forty hours in one month—and thinking that’s only a week’s work. Yes, it is. However, when I’m trying to get a book written in less than two months’ time, that usually saps me of all energy, takes up most of my time, and makes it hard for me to do much else.
But I’m also scared to turn down this opportunity—because even though I’ve had a lot of jobs that came to me in August and September, they all turned out to be relatively short ones, which meant they didn’t bring in much money—which means I feel like I’d be an idiot to turn down work that would guarantee a certain amount of income every month for at least the next six months—if not upwards of two years or more, depending on how long this series ends up being.
Of course, I don’t have to look too far back in my own personal history to find times when I’ve had more than one thing going on—like back in 2004 and 2005 when I was employed full-time, was working on my master’s degree, was a leader/part-time SS teacher at my church, and was an officer with ACFW, especially in 2005 when the conference was here. But I also know that one of the things I learned during that season of my life was not to overcommit myself.
So I have about fifteen or sixteen hours to decide if this offer is a blessing I’d be a fool to pass up or another one of those character-building learning opportunities God is so fond of laying at my feet to see if I’ll trip on it, step on it, or stop and see it for what it is and change direction.
