Suppose I Do....

Note: I wrote this post last September. So ignore the back to school references, and just pretend that I haven't had this sitting in my drafts for 6 months.


All across West Texas this morning, thousands of alarms were heard, thousands of cries of cranky children, and glorious shouts of joy were heard as everyone got up and headed back to school. (You know, back in August when I actually wrote this, so please allow for a small time delay, you've been warned.)

Unfortunately I wasn't immune. Not because I'm a teacher, or because I have children, but because I'm crazy and decided to continue to finish my degree. I keep hoping someone will invent a cure for crazy. I'd do it, but I'm an accounting major, not chemistry.

Sitting in church yesterday morning, after our pastor made a comment, that at the moment I can't remember. I'm blaming it on sleep deprivation and all the info that has been thrown my way today. My mind wandered a little.

More on that later. Simply because you need info for this to make sense. You know, in case you are just tuning in. And because I want to confuse you totally before you get to the good stuff.

My husband and I spent a couple of years (a lot of years ago) doing infertility treatments. We made the choice to continue on child-free, at least for the time being. Yet, there was some part of both of us that won't let go of that hope that someday, somehow, someway we will have that child that we both so want.

So as our pastor was discussing how they were rebuilding and how they were doing it together, and next to, and beside each other, and how all of these people were doing what they needed to do to get the job done, he said something that I just couldn't stop hearing over and over in my head.

And I'm not really sure if he actually said it, or if it was just how I took it. Maybe both. Because I seriously didn't know how my husband would feel about me scrambling to write down exactly how it came across, which by the way honey, no more not doing that, I'll regret it later. Especially since the frenzy would be so I could write a post for you to read.

Pastor B said something about trusting that they were doing what they were always meant to do. That they were following God's plan. That they were trusting God's plan, and that in the middle of the horrible, unbelievable, most horrific moment, God was right there.

It's so easy to tell someone else that, but it's much harder, especially for a control freak like myself, to believe it. I've given lots of situations over to God. I've given him my grandfather's life, I've given him my husband's, my marriage, I've handed over job loss and the unknown when there is no income coming in, I've even given him parts of my life. Not all of it, just parts of it. Because there's this one area that I just can't seem to let go of. I want to, but just about the time that I reach out to hand it over, my heart wants to cling to it.

Yet yesterday morning, sitting in that chair, in that freezing worship center, I heard God tell me to be patient. To have faith. To let it go. Trust. I've got some fabulous plans, ones that even you won't argue with.

Yep, apparently God is sarcastic. He knows what gets my attention.

It's not the first time, I've heard those words either.

Obviously you can see a pattern here too. And here. And here.

I still haven't obeyed. I still haven't managed to let her go.

Yes, I said her.

I've never doubted that I would have a little girl. There is nothing wrong with little boys, and the more time I spend with a certain 4 year old, I'd take one of them too. But I always known that there would be a little girl in there too. No matter what, I would have a girl. I've seen her face, I've dreamed about her. I've smelled her. I've held her. No, not in my arms, but I've dreamed about her for so long, that she's as real to me as my nieces and nephews. She's beautiful, she's perfect, she's everything that I always imagined she would be, but that's made her so much harder to give up. That's what's made it so much harder to walk away from.

Saturday I thought that my dogs might not live to see another day. Every behavioral issue with them was magnified about a bajillion times. They whined, they barked, they escaped, they got in the trash, they got mud in my car because they felt the need to escape. Everything that they did that annoyed me, they did it twice, and way worse than usual. So I lost my patience, I might have grabbed one, and held their sweet little face in my hands and told them that if they didn't quit, I would send them to the other side of town to the burrito place with questionable ingredients. I think they knew I was serious, because they backed off. Yet, if it had came down to it, I couldn't have walked up to some random stranger and given them away. I'm not sure I could even hand them over to my parents.

Insert smoke, and the Jeopardy theme song. You know, while the wheels are turning.

No, I wouldn't want to do it, but yeah, I could.

Well, crap. This wasn't the direction that this was supposed to be going.

Maybe that's why this issue keeps coming up. Because I refuse to have faith that God has my best interests at heart. I've seen to many close calls that should have ended differently to not believe that God is way more brilliant and has a better plan in mind. I keep going back to January when John lost his job. I love his job now, and if I had pushed him to take the job that he was offered making $9 an hour, we would be barely getting by. I'd be so stressed and so worried about how we were going to pay this bills while I went to school and only got a part time paycheck instead of a full time paycheck. But because I trusted John that this company was going to offer him the job. I believed that God would take care of us. I took a big leap of faith. Big. And 6 months later, we are fine. Because I let go.

Too bad there isn't a class that teaches letting go. Of course, I'd probably fail it. Several times.

Letting go is hard for me. I analyze everything. Every.thing. And then, I try and predict how each possible outcome will actually work out, so that I can try and predict the future. I try to manipulate everything to what I could have said different or done different or...anything different. I know that until I learn to let it go, it's going to do nothing but cause me undue heartache and headaches. It's going to be an area of my life that I second guess, and that will continue to break my heart.

"Some people think it's holding on that makes you strong. Sometimes it's letting go." ~Sylvia Robinson

"When God takes something from your grasp, He's not punishing you, but merely opening your hands to receive something better." ~Author Unknown

Love is....

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.  ~1 Corinthians 13:4-10

John's sister got married on Saturday, her ceremony was a little different than one I have been to before, as there was audience participation in a part asking that we help to guide them and support them. There was nothing wrong with it, just different.

As the pastor got to a section in their ceremony, as often happens, the famous "Love is patient" spiel began. Yet, at the love is kind section, I got a little side tracked.

Love is kind.

Love is supposed to be kind, but somewhere along the way we all screw that up. Every.single.person.

After the sit down with my inlaws a few months ago, I had hoped that relationship was on the road to recovery. Instead I think that relationship might not ever "heal". To a certain extent, I think that the majority of the parties involved have gotten to a place of comfort, a place that's easy, and instead of pushing forward and trying to change things, so that the past doesn't repeat itself, I think that we have moved on.

We are still often excluded from things. But, with wedding planning taking up a lot of time, we ignored it. Until we found out about John's grandmother being in the hospital, again...via Facebook. No phone call, no text. No nothing, just a post on Facebook, asking for prayers.

So while the pastor was reciting the passage from 1 Corinthians all I could think about was that love was supposed to be kind. I wished I could have stood up and shouted at John's parents, his brother and family and his sister. Love is kind. It's not supposed to hurt. They don't have to love me, but don't they realize what their indifference has done to their son, to their brother. It's not supposed to keep score. Yes, I've screwed up. I'm not perfect. But then again, I keep forgiving them, I keep turning the other cheek, I keep trying to be patient and kind. I often feel that I fail. Here lately they have certainly added to my own self esteem and self image issues. I'm critical enough of myself, I certainly don't need them worming into my head.

Love is patient.

Granted, no one is not going to get mad at someone that they care about. I love John, but every now and then he gets on my very last nerve and I get angry and say things that I shouldn't, and that I honestly don't mean. Yet, I often keep my mouth shut for a while and wait until I'm way past the boiling point, and all the little frustrations come spewing out too. It's not perfect, but it's who I am. Yet John is patient, he lets me vent my frustration, often at his expense, and then he wants to love me. Which, to a certain extent really annoys me. I want to be mad at him and he wants to hold me and tell me how much he loves me. Which is a total mad killer, just in case you were curious. Yet, at the same time I know that he still loves me, even if I did just threaten to beat him to death with the bag of trash.

I'll admit I've acted with less than patient intentions towards John's family. I've screwed up with them too, but to a certain extent, I feel like they want to hold that against me. John's brother's wife isn't willing to forgive. She isn't willing to sit down and at least tell me what we did wrong. She's made up her mind and she isn't willing to move forward. I'd like to tattoo the verse "it keeps no records of wrongs" on her forehead. Wonder if she would notice that?

There are big plans for our future. Plans that I'm not yet willing to post for the whole wide world to see. Mostly because I'm not 100% ready to take that step off the cliff into the unknown. These plans, will change our life. They are going to harbor moments of pure terror, heartache, joy, happiness, and love. They are big enough moments that we have told only a select few people who are important to us, because we simply are terrified. We want to be sure. Plus, after a few conversations with John, I think that we want to see what the future holds with my inlaws. They will play a small part in our future plans, and we need to be prepared for them to play there part and things go back to normal, or for our relationship to change completely.

Love never fails.

A Lesson In Patience

It's hard to believe that my husband will have been unemployed one month to the day on Saturday. It's hard to believe that for all of the jobs that he has applied for nothing, has made it official yet, that is until today.

And now he has two job offers. Two. Which sounds all kinds of awesome, except for the wife who worries. And if you want to meet her, well, she is the one who's going to write this post today.

She's the one who worries that everything won't work out and that the rent will be due and that will mean money pulled out of the savings account that she doesn't want to touch, for fear that we will need that money later. Even though technically we need it now. So she's the freak who is writing this post today.

Amazingly so I, er she, hasn't been as freaked out about this unemployment period as she should have been, as she typically would have been. She has tried to remain calm and not panic. Yet as the days continue to pass, and with two offers on the table (one of which has no been turned down), she feels the need to panic. Because what if...

-something goes wrong and they change their mind
-he doesn't pass the physical
-he doesn't really like the job
-I don't really like his job

And the list goes on and on. She's trying to be patient. She's trying to trust God for a change instead of pushing her husband into taking the safe route. She's trying.

This job, well, it's kinda the job that dreams are made of. It's making more money than the job he lost. It's for a good, solid company, with some excellant benefits. It offers the possibility of promotions and a career instead of just a job, and let's face it, I'm (so is she) a find a career job, not just a paycheck. Because every job that I've had, I've loved. Could be why I've had so few jobs in my life, I've been lucky, very lucky. They like him enough, that they are already thinking of promotions for him, based on his experience and him.

I...er she talked, via text message to a good friend last week, and her response was "God is good!"

Yes, yes he is. The job is amazing. He has orientation on Monday at 10am. So the job is basically his. Just one more hurdle to overcome. One that I'm hoping will open his eyes to some other areas of his life that need some attention and some work as well.

Heck, it's some areas that my her life chould use as well.

It's funny, I've felt God's presence in my life more in the last month than I think I have my entire life. Sure, I've felt his precense in the weeks after my grandfather died, and the weeks that Papa laid in the hospital, waiting. But instead of comfort, it was peace and a lack of worry that I was given. I'm pretty sure that last Friday I heard laughter and the voice that had an "I told you so" quality about it telling me "See what happens when you let go of things and let me take care of it."

Point taken.

Then for half a moment I wondered just how different my life would be, if I could give my infertility away like that. I've wondered a dozen or more times if that little girl that I've dreamed about might be a reality by now, if I had just been patient, and had more faith in God's timing instead of my desire for right this minute.

I've also learned that it's ok that I haven't given up on her. That voice reassured me that "I'm not supposed too" give up on her just yet.

*Note to the family reading this - no, I'm not pregnant. No, I'm not going to be attempting to get pregnant. But I know that I'm not holding on to that little girl so tightly that I'm missing out on the child I could have if I would fill out the adoption paperwork. I believe with all my heart that isn't what we are supposed to do. So I'm not giving up, I'm just going to keep going. Like I've done every single day for that last 6 years. I'm going to hope, that I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be.

Expectations

*If you haven't done so, please read yesterday's post Puzzling, in order to fully grasp the story behind today's post.

Have I lowered my expectations of God?

I tell people that God can do anything. And I believe that he can. In their lives. I've witnessed miracles in other people's lives, and even in my own. I've witnessed my grandfather, whom doctor's told us wouldn't make it through the night, live another 11 years. I've witnessed a good friend's daughter, born very, very early not only survive the first few weeks of her life, but thrive as a happy 5 year old. I've witnessed a wreck that changed my husband's life, not completely destroy him.

Yet I'm not 100% sure that I haven't "given up". I didn't get the results that I wanted, so I just assumed that it wasn't meant to be. That it wasn't the way that things were planned to go. That the grand design of my life, just meant I wasn't supposed to have a child of my own.

Instead, today, I'm questioning whether I gave up. If I simply got tired of the drugs, the emotions, the everything and gave up.

After debating about it, I know that I was the one who lowered their expectations. I know that after the 3rd round of drugs (and the craziness that went with that) that I was tired. I was beaten, I wasn't sure how much longer I could stand to do the treatments. They had taken a toll emotionally, physically, mentally and financially. I was tired. I was tired of hoping for a miracle, praying that this month would be "the" month. I was tired.

To be honest, I'm not even sure my marriage would have survived. We were both so tired of performing and we were so drained financially that it wasn't even funny. I think that my head knew that my heart needed a break. That I needed to figure out what Plan B was going to be. Because let's face it. There wasn't ever an option for Plan A to not go as planned. We were going to get pregnant. There simply hadn't been any other alternative. Then when Plan A wasn't going the way I envisioned it, I just didn't know what to do or where to go anymore. I didn't even know who I was anymore.

So for months I wallowed in self pity. I had gained weight, I couldn't give my husband the child that he wanted, I was useless. It took months to crawl out from under that. It took months for me to realize that I had more to offer than my ability to get knocked up.

Did I quit believing that God could perform miracles? No. I just didn't believe that He was going to hand one out in our case. I didn't believe that I was going to get pregnant.

Did I lower my expectations? Maybe. I honestly don't know. I know that in the weeks and months, and even as I type this, I wonder if I gave up too easily. I wonder if I quit fighting. I'll always have that to wonder about though. Would one more treatment have done it? Would something different have done it? I don't know. I probably won't ever know the answers to those questions.

I know I stopped hoping. That I gave up. But unless you've been there done that, you can't begin to imagine the hope that you put out while you wait on hold for the results of a blood pregnancy test. I held my breath. I gripped the phone, I prayed. I begged, I tried not to cry. I tried to imagine getting the good news. Instead of the apologetic voice on the other end of the phone telling you that your results were negative that they would transfer to scheduling to set up your next appointment. Now, I can imagine how much those people who scheduled those appointments hated their job. Because I know that I can't be the only one who choked back tears while they were on the phone.

My expectations weren't met, but they certainly don't feel like they have been lowered.  Instead I feel like they are higher now than they were then.

I had to come up with Plan B. I had to figure out how I was going to spend the rest of my life now that I wasn't going to have a child's needs to deal with.

My expectations today, are high. I expect a lot out of myself. I expect to get good grades in school. I expect to study hard. I expect to help cook dinner. I expect my husband to be there to cheer me on. If any of that doesn't happen, I will certainly be disappointed, but at the same time, most of those, the fault is with me. I don't expect God to drop a baby on my doorstep (a million dollars yes, a baby, no(kidding)). I don't expect to ever get pregnant. If I do it will be a miracle. And I'm pretty sure that if it's going to happen, it will be a miracle.

The only thing I think I lowered is hope. I have forgotten how to fully hope and believe that something will work out the way I want it too. I just can't find it in myself to hope. At least for a baby.

Even though my hope is definitely lower, my expectations of getting pregnant are too. However, I do know, that if by some miracle I were to get pregnant, God would be the only one who had anything to do with it.

Puzzling

Have you ever put together a puzzle? You have all these pieces of various shapes and you are trying to make them fit together to make one glorious picture. And the bragging rights that come with having the patience to see it through until the end.

My husband and I have recently started attending church on a regular basis again.

I know, I know. This is something that we should have been doing anyway, but sometimes, we needed the rest more often than we needed to get up early on a Sunday morning. Selfish - absolutely. Did we miss going? More than you can imagine.

Apparently going to church is good blogging material. *Note to self - go to church more = less writer's block.

Got it!

Yet, sometimes church is a painful reminder of what is missing in our life. They talked yesterday, often of raising children. And as I squirmed in my seat and looked around the room, I wondered if there was someone else in the room who could relate. Or if we were the only ones there. I imagined their discomfort. I watched the young, unmarried guy sitting to our left, and the young unmarried girl sitting next to me, and I wondered, as they both set there listening intently if they had any idea how life could be so cruel. You could see them both mentally making notes about their future children. And all I could think about was "if you only knew".

Neither one of them have any guarantees that they will have a child. One of them might just find themselves in our boat.

See we are that one piece of the puzzle that you are sure fits right "there", and you turn it and turn it and try to make it fit, but nothing lines up like it should, there are gaps, there are pegs where holes are supposed to be. We can't relate, and instead of actually listening to everything that our pastor said this morning, I only half way paid attention. Because all I could think about what how I would never fit.

We can't won't go to Sunday School, because the college class is too old for both of us, the newly married - well, we will be married 12 years this year, so I'm pretty sure we are past that stage. Well, the next stage - young families. Then parents of students. Then the golden oldies. They discuss parenting and raising children. It's hard enough to walk into Tar.get and see the tiny Halloween costumes and not remember what I'm missing out on, let alone sit through and participate in a class that I can't relate too.

So all the while I'm sitting there, thinking about what great parents we would make, and how I wish that the pastor would understand that not every single person in his congregation can relate. Some of us will never have to raise a child to obey Jesus. Some will never have that opportunity.

The bad thing is that, me, being me, wants to fit. I want the puzzle piece to just magically fall into place. I want to be able to not sit there and think about how I can't relate and how much that sucks. I want to be able to follow through and look into adoption. I want to have a child of my own. I don't want to be that one piece of the puzzle that feels like an "outsider" or that I'm some how flawed.

Yes, I realize that I'm not "flawed", that it's just all part of the grand scheme of things, but at the same time, it would be nice to not feel like an outsider, because I can't relate. I realize that it's not intentional, it's just a fact of life.

Thankfully, at some point, my attention focused back in on what the pastor was saying. If my husband wasn't "busy" with something else that the pastor was doing, I probably would have walked out. Because it's a profound thought. He was using an analogy about how we have lower expectations for ourselves, for our children and he questioned whether or not we had the same issue with God.

Have I lowered my expectations of God?



Read tomorrow's post for that answer. Bring tissues. It's a tear jerker.

Where I'm supposed to be?

Most of the time life just chugs along with no hiccups or bumps in the road. Most of the time things go, mostly, according to plan. But every now and then those bumps that you detoured around 100 miles ago are back, and you wonder if you are just driving around in circles.

Some days my infertility doesn't bother me. Some days it doesn't define who I am. Some days I can picture our lives in 10 years without children. I can imagine our friends becoming grandparents and not feel jealousy or sadness. I can see statuses on Facebook proclaiming the newest bundle of joy and not want to strangle myself with my computer mouse. Today isn't one of those days.

Yet there are other days that I think I have a giant I painted on my shirt for the whole world to see. I think that every person I meet and who I have to explain that I don't have any kids just sees me as an outsider or an oddity. It's almost like because I don't have kids I don't have any credibility. My opinions and my expertise in areas related to kids and even not related to kids goes way down. My opinion only matters when there are no other more credible people around. That's probably not an accurate rendition, but it's most certainly feels like the truth.

Take this past weekend. I had a good friend who was "home" visiting friends and family for a grandparents birthday. She came over to my parents with her two nieces, who are 3 and 2 years old. The baby isn't potty trained yet, but her big sister is. So the baby came up to her Aunt and told her she needed to go potty. And she wanted to go use the big girl's potty. My friend freaked. She told her she had a diaper on, to just go it was ok, but the baby insisted. So I told her, take her to the bathroom, take her diaper off, sit her on the potty and give her some time to do her thing. She balked. She just kept saying that she didn't know what to do. Until my mother reaffirmed what I had told her, she didn't budge. Once someone with experience spoke up, she wasn't willing to go ahead with what I had originally said. She wasn't 100% sure that my opinion could be trusted. Now, if we were talking about breastfeeding or labor, yes, then ignore my thoughts, because I haven't been there done that. But we have both babysat enough kids as well as been around nieces and nephews to have picked up a few things.

Then Monday when I was walking around the mall after getting 10 inches cut off my hair, I saw an ad for adoption. And it made me wonder if that's something that I'll ever be ready for. All the books, all the experts, all the doctors, all the social workers tell you that you have to grieve for the biological child that you won't have before you are ready to move forward. Most of the time I think I've done this. Most of the time I think I've been there done that, and then other times I think that I haven't even begun. There are days that my life is perfect, and there are days, that I would give anything to experience that particular blessing. There are days that I can't imagine giving up on the little girl with my nose and John's eyes or the little boy with his feet and my cheekbones.

After listening to a friend talk about their infertility treatments and just beginning that road it's hard to imagine the hope that they have. It's hard to remember anything but negative pregnancy tests and tears. Our marriage almost didn't survive those years of heartache. I almost didn't survive those years of heartache.

I'm not sure where this is going, because this isn't certainly what I had in mind when I started writing this blog post. I simply wanted to vent, to think on paper. Instead I find myself with less questions and less answers. I don't know what the solution is. I don't know what the solution will be. I just hope that part of me isn't holding on so tightly that I miss out on grabbing at an opportunity that comes my way. I hope that I'm not holding on so much that when I need to have faith and step out of my comfort zone that I just cling tighter and miss out on something amazing. Because the thought that has kept me up at night here lately is what if - because of my stubbornness and refusal to let go I've already missed out. Then again, what if this is what the rest of my life looks like? Can I live with that choice too?


Tomorrow: back to my regularly snarky, sarcastic self. I just needed to get my head and my heart back on the same page, instead of in two completely different books.

Wordless Wedensday

Because this week has just been so full of "suck". I'm leaving you with cute pictures of my babies. 

Baby, it's cold inside!

Homework Interrupted



I'm calling in sick!



Praying that John will turn off the air!

These pictures were taken with my blackberry, so pardon the sucky quality.  My major is in accounting, not in photography.

PS.  I found my spell check!!!!

The Right Path

A few days ago I made a post regarding becoming a mother. When I made that post I had been talking online to someone who has been helping me deal with several issues in my life. Frankly there are a lot of issues. I work full time, go to school full time and live with a grumpy, irresponsible 76 year old man. So to say that I have my hands full is an understatement.

My husband and I struggled for several years to have a baby. We both love children, and we had both wanted to have a child. Unfortunately Apparently, God has other plans. Today, after being bored at work and spending time on facebook, I was reminded of something.

I am right where God wants me to be.

I'm doing exactly what I need to be doing. The good, and the bad. Do I still want a baby? Absolutely! But today, for the first time in weeks, I have peace about it. I don't sit at work wondering why everyone else can have children and I can't. I'm not wondering what I have "done" to deserve this. Why there are people that are having abortions and whining about an unplanned pregnancy, when I would give my right arm to be in their shoes. Today, I have peace.

I am right where God wants me to be.

It has definitely taken some time to get here, and while I will always want to have a baby, there is something else that God has in store for me. Something that I couldn't, or wouldn't be equipped to do if I had a child.

Yes, I can relate so much to the Thoughts on Becoming a Mother post I made. I can relate to the shots, and the pills. I can relate to the feeling out of control of your own body, the hormones, the mood swings, the paranoia, the feeling like a lab rat. I can relate to wanting a baby and the hurt and disappointment that comes with each negative result. I can also understand why so many couples doing infertility treatments end up in divorce, and even suicide. Those treatments give you a walk in someone else's shoes, someone who deals with severe depression, and obssession.

I am right where God wants me to be.

While this isn't the path that I would have taken, given the choice, it's where I am meant to be. Even though my life is crazy busy, it's where I'm supposed to be. I was supposed to go back to school at 30. I was supposed to get married at 20. I was supposed to lose the baby we lost in 2006.

I am right where God wants me to be.

While this isn't some cleaver and witty post, like my 4 readers are used to, this is something that we all need to be reminded about from time to time. And besides this is my blog and I'll write what I want too. Ahhh, sarcasm, there you are. :)

Sometimes we walk through life and complain about the obstacles that get in the way of our plans. We forget that we are right where we need to be, where we are supposed to be at that exact moment. We forget that by being where we are God is protecting us from something even worse. Think of the people who were late to work because a child dwaddled, or they missed their train, or it was their turn to bring the donuts, or my personal favorite, a guy had bought a new pair of shoes and was breaking them in walking to work, and they rubbed a blister and he stopped to get a band-aid, saved thier lives on September 11th. Or the lady whose phone was ringing when she was trying to leave the house, and she went in to answer it, and it was a wrong number. Those extra few seconds, that they were annoyed by, God had them exactly where they needed to be. Just like me.

I am exactly where God wants me to be.

I have tried, over the last few months, to put more faith into God, and stop trying to question the things I don't understand in my life. Thanks to the insight of some special people in my life, as well as way to much time at work to analyze things, as well as facebook, today I am at peace with what the future holds. Today I feel like I could climb Mt. Everest, or rebuild an engine. I feel better than I have in weeks about a lot of things. Thanks to facebook. Here was my status thanks to an application there "Be joyful always; pray continually; GIVE THANKS IN ALL CIRCUMSTANCES, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18" Bet you wouldn't have thought that facebook would provide such profound insight. But then again, I was right where God needed me to be to get the message.


"He who has faith has... an inward reservoir of courage, hope, confidence, calmness, and assuring trust that all will come out well - even though to the world it may appear to come out most badly." ~B.C. Forbes

"Faith enables persons to be persons because it lets God be God." ~Carter Lindberg

"I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish that He didn't trust me so much." ~Mother Teresa

Pets

I love animals. My mom can tell you horror stories of me adopting animals from the surrounding 12 counties and dragging them home. Of course my mom, being the meanie that she was forced me to get rid of them. It probably didn't help that I brough home an average of 1-2 a week.

I don't resucue animals near as often as an adult as I did when I was a kid. I have to be practical, which bites. But I can't afford to feed every stray critter in the county. It just breaks my heart to see a stray dog running around with it's ribs sticking out. I just want to pick them up and take them home and love on them.

I'm not too sure how my babies would feel about that. I have two babies, or as some people call them pets. But these two aren't just pets they are a part of our family. They are missed when we are away, they are spoiled, they get birthday and Christmas presents and treats. These are my babies.

This was in my email, and I wanted to share it with you.

A PET'S TEN COMMANDMENTS

1. My life is likely to last 10-15 years. Any separation from you is likely to be painful.

2. Give me time to understand what you want of me.

3. Place your trust in me. It is crucial for my well-being.

4. Don't be angry with me for long and don't lock me up as punishment. You have your work, your friends, your entertainment, but I have only you.

5. Talk to me. Even if I don't understand your words, I do understand your voice when speaking to me.

6. Be aware that however you treat me, I will never forget it.

7. Before you hit me, before you strike me, remember that I could hurt you, and yet, I choose not to bite you.

8. Before you scold me for being lazy or uncooperative, ask yourself if something might be bothering me. Perhaps I'm not getting the right food, I have been in the sun too long, or my heart might be getting old or weak.

9. Please take care of me when I grow old. You too, will grow old.

10. On the ultimate difficult journey, go with me please. Never say you can't bear to watch. Don't make me face this alone. Everything is easier for me if you are there, because I love you so.

"If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man." ~Mark Twain

"Ever consider what dogs must think of us? I mean, here we come back from a grocery store with the most amazing haul -- chicken, pork, half a cow. They must think we're the greatest hunters on earth!" ~Anne Tyler

"I wonder if other dogs think poodles are members of a weird religious cult." ~Rita Rudner