Welcome to Sunday. Join us! Please, use this as a space to let the Word speak, and let’s keep our own words small today. Link up with a photo and just a few, brief words of inspiration. Then, grab the Sunday button from the link at the top of the page to post at your place. If it fits into your day, take a minute or two to visit the others who’ve linked up here. Grace and peace to you…

ShareTweet

Not long after I wrote that bit about my hair for TheHighCalling.org, I decided to let my hair go natural again. Perhaps you’ve noticed? I don’t know; maybe I’d made the decision long before that, and writing about my hair was the thing that helped me realize it.

It’s more than a notion.

There are YouTube channels and Facebook pages and entire Web sites dedicated to the natural hair journey. I had no idea. The last time I went natural, there was no such thing as Facebook.

The most important thing about transitioning from hair that is relaxed to hair that isn’t, is minding the breaking point. The point where the relaxed hair and the natural hair meet is so fragile and brittle it will simply break off into the sink or onto the bathroom floor or onto your pillow if it’s not treated with care. For this reason, those of us going through the transition from relaxed to natural hair search those YouTube channels and Facebook pages and Web sites to find transition styles for our hair – styles that will allow us to treat that breaking point with care.

There are three primary transitioning options: protective styling (braids, weaves, wigs, extensions), the long grow out (dealing with the two different textures for months), and the big chop (cutting off the relaxer and wearing your natural hair ultra short).

Right around the time I decided to go natural, one of the best opportunities of my entire life dropped right into my lap. It’s one of those stories other people tell. You know the kind of stories I’m talking about. The ones that make you shake your head in wonder and amazement. It’s one of those moments where the door opens up wide in front of you, and you didn’t even know there was a door there at all. I still can hardly believe it. I’ll be leaving my job at the insurance company to be the managing editor for TheHighCalling.org.

It seems more than my hair is in transition.

My last day at the insurance company is Thursday, June 7, and I am being careful to mind the breaking point. In fact, the transition styles for hair transfer right over to the rest of life. The relationships I’ve built at the insurance company have been my salvation (and I mean that) as I tried to find my way after moving to Nebraska in 2005. Leaving my coworkers will break my heart in many ways. Without them, however, I would never have been ready to take up this new challenge.

Of course, I knew I’d be leaving the insurance company for a while before I actually told my manager. Those days before I told her were like the protective styling phase – where I knew I was headed in a new direction, but I hadn’t made any changes that were too noticeable to onlookers. That couldn’t last forever, though.

In the days since telling my manager, I’ve been living the long grow out, with my mind and my alliances in two different realms. It’s exactly where I am with my hair. In the morning, I struggle to find a compromise between the relaxed and natural hair textures that share space on my head. In the same way, I am trying to be present in both the insurance company and at The High Calling, two places that share space in my head.. Some days are easier than others, and this won’t last forever.

On June 7, I’ll leave the insurance company for the last time. In many ways, it will be like the big chop. I’m sure there will be tears. And there will be celebration. On a day not far from June 7, I’ll sit in the chair at my favorite salon and ask my stylist to cut the relaxer off. I don’t think I’ll cry, but I probably won’t look in the mirror until it’s all over. I hope I’ll celebrate.

One thing I know is that once I drive out of the parking lot at the insurance company, and after the last bit of relaxer has been cut from my hair, there will be no turning back. What I’ll have left will be completely new – virgin even. Sometimes it scares me nearly to death and I say to myself, “What are you doing?!?! Have you lost your mind?!?!”

But I am past the point of no return, and it looks as if there’s light ahead. And did I mention this is one of the best opportunities of my life?

How about you? Are you in transition, heading toward transition, or finishing up some sort of transition? Do these transition styles resonate with you?

(Oh! You can click here to Like The High Calling on Facebook, or click here to subscribe to TheHighCalling.org.)

ShareTweet

We were riding our bikes down miles of country road, beneath a sky that never ends and a sun that turned my shoulders the color of summer. That’s when I remembered the things that matter most.

~~~

With Jennifer today…

ShareTweet

Long ago, I was a personal trainer. One of my clients was a Catholic Priest. He was patient with me. I was intolerant. He talked of icons and creeds and I closed my mind.

~~~

Years ago, in New York City, I stopped to use the restroom at a gas station on a road with six lanes and potholes and restaurants with foods from Africa and Asia. The gas station was the old fashioned kind, with a garage where vehicles had been raised on lifts to have their oil or spark plugs or tires replaced.

I scurried past the man sitting behind bullet-proof glass and made my way to the restroom, where I hovered to do what I’d come there for. I washed my hands and let them drip dry because there was no paper towel and I tried not to touch the doorknob too firmly so the germs would just stay put, and not go home with me.

When I stepped into the hallway, my eyes glimpsed something behind the cracked door to the gas station’s storage closet, so I peeked through the opening. A man in gas station coveralls had spread out a beautifully woven cloth on top of a large piece of cardboard. He laid that mat in the direction of Mecca, on the filth of the gas station’s storage room, removed his shoes, knelt on the handcrafted holy mat and lowered his head to the floor.

~~~

Two weeks ago, I pulled the car into a rest stop somewhere on The Ohio Turnpike. I needed water, and my traveling companions needed to stretch their legs. I parked in one of the parking spaces marked with diagonal yellow lines, along with the rest of the road weary travelers who hoped to find a spark of energy from a cup of coffee, a stroll in the sun, or a bag of fries from the fast food vendor inside.

Just a few cars away, behind his white Toyota parked diagonally, a man spread out a beautiful woven rug, removed his shoes, turned to face Mecca, and lowered his forehead to the ground in prayer. Cars slowed and drivers gawked and the man sat back on his heels with his eyes closed and his palms pressed together at his chest in prayer position.

I stared at him. I stared at the drivers who slowed to stare at the man praying, and the man praying lowered his forehead to the rug without ever opening his eyes.

~~~

Yesterday, H recited the Apostle’s Creed and I asked him to say it again. Out loud.  He recites the prayer three times a day as part of The Daily Office. I haven’t memorized it, and I don’t say it. But I believe it.

“Why don’t Baptists do creeds?” I ask him.

“I guess it’s because all those many years ago, Baptists were so upset with the Catholics that they just threw everything away,” he said.

“Say it again,” I say.

“What?” he asks. “The Creed? I just said it.”

“I know. But I like to hear your voice say the words.”

“I believe in God, the Father Almighty,” he begins, and I love the way he says almighty as if it’s three separate words: All. Might. Tee. I lean back in my chair and listen. And I am sure that I believe it, too.

~~~

In the morning, while spiders weave mirrored glass from one tree limb to another, and the sun peeks through to shine a spotlight, I recite the Lord’s Prayer while my body moves through all the yoga poses of sun salutation. It’s amazing how it fits so well.

I lift my face from the ground and I am saying “…for thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever (and I can’t help it – I add “and ever”)” and my hands reach toward the treetops before I press my palms together in front of my chest in prayer position.

My mind skips back to Ash Wednesday and I can hear the minister telling me, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” The palms of my hands are muddy from holding downward facing dog in the grass.

~~~

If I get back from the wilderness in time, I’ll be linking with Michelle…

…and with Laura.

ShareTweet

Welcome to Sunday. Join us! Please, use this as a space to let the Word speak, and let’s keep our own words small today. Link up with a photo and just a few, brief words of inspiration. Then, grab the (new!) Sunday button from the link at the top of the page to post at your place. If it fits into your day, take a minute or two to visit the others who’ve linked up here. Grace and peace to you…

ShareTweet

H and I are camping for the Memorial Day weekend. If all goes well, and I don’t break under the pressure, I will leave my laptop and my cell phone at home. I emailed contact info to family members in case of emergency. REAL emergency. My goal is to give my husband my undivided attention this weekend. Lately, it’s been way too divided.

(Whatever you’re thinking, you’re probably on the right track.)

I am taking a book with me, though. A real book. Not one I downloaded on my Kindle. A book with pages that I can turn down or underline or highlight or draw diagrams in. Just in case.

What are you doing/reading/leaving?

ShareTweet

Someone should give my delivery guy some type of award. I am quite sure when that guy sees my address on his route and a box from DaySpring in the back of his truck, he must send up a few heartfelt prayers to God. He probably says something like this:

Join me over at (in)courage for the rest of the fun. I’m hanging out at the (in)spired deals page where DaySpring is giving you a chance to win gifts! For free! See you over there…

(Photo courtesy of DaySpring)

ShareTweet

I just said goodbye to my son. I hugged him tight – all 23 years of him – and told him he is my favorite son. I always tell him that. He hugged me back. He hardly ever does that.

I told him I loved him so much I didn’t even have words for it – “And I have a lot of words,” I told him. “Mmm-hmm,” he said.

These days, I have to reach up to rest my chin on his shoulder and the scruff of his five o’clock shadow is rough next to my face. Where has the time gone?

I reach my right hand up and place it on the crown of his head. I squeeze my eyes shut and stop myself from saying something that will ruin the moment, and I realize it’s not so hard anymore to know exactly what that might be. Instead, I say it to myself and hope that God can hear me. “Bless him, please,” I say inside of me.

I say it three times, and the third time I realize I am squeezing the crown of his head and I wonder if he’s noticed. I’m the one who breaks away, trying to beat him to it.

The other day I asked my dad, “When you were raising us, did you have any idea what you were doing?” He looked past me to some place on the horizon, or some place long ago and shook his head. “No,” he said.

I used to lay out my prayers for my children in front of God the way my dad used to spread out the map on the hood of our light blue Pontiac Tempest. I used a yellow highlighter to show God the path I wanted him to make my children take. I’d stand there at the crossroads, my bossy words blowing air through a whistle that hung from my lips, squeaking and squawking and waving a bright red stop sign, as if I were the one in charge. God was patient with me, but my plans were not his plans, and I was never the one in charge.

These days, I try my best to do the one thing I know I am good at. I am good at loving my son. That is all I know how to do. I am good at loving him so much that the words run out and I stand there and whisper blessings over him, on the inside of me.

~~~

With Jennifer Lee, my friend and The High Calling colleague...

ShareTweet

Yesterday’s sermon had me squirming in the pew, so I drove out to the local vineyard after church. (It’s not what you think.) I didn’t even change my clothes. I just grabbed my camera, my phone, my laptop, my bible, my pen, my purse, my keys, and my bottled water and jumped in the car.

I was missing the point.

Yesterday’s sermon was about abiding in Jesus, and H talked about the part in the bible where Jesus says he’s the vine and we are the branches. Then, H walked us through the part in the bible where Jesus says that if I haven’t been abiding in Him, it doesn’t matter if I do good things and stay out of trouble and tell people how much God loves them. Without Jesus at the root of it all, I’m just blowing hot air and it is all pointless. Whatever I do that doesn’t have its root in Jesus? Well, it may look good, and sound pretty, and make people feel special, but it will have no lasting impact. And what good is temporary?

When I got home from church, after hearing that message, I needed a word picture. I needed to know what it looks like to abide in Jesus, because I don’t want to do temporary. That’s when I remembered the vineyard, packed up all my technology, and started driving. Clearly, I reasoned, God wanted me to abide at the vineyard and He would meet me there and share deep insights with me and I should record them right away to report back to you on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram. Immediately.

At the vineyard, I got the wifi password from the guy at the front desk, opened my laptop, and readied my iPhone for photos that I could instantly share in my Twitter stream so that you wouldn’t miss out on anything. But there was no connection. No matter how I tried, I could not get connected to the internet, and my iPhone refused to take any photos. In retrospect, I am quite sure God must have been shaking His holy head.

So, there I sat. Totally disconnected. And that, I think, was the point.

Sitting there at the vineyard, I leaned back in the white plastic chair and gazed up at the sky. Slowly, I packed up all my technology and put it back in the trunk of my car. Then, with my camera in one hand, and the hem of my maxi dress in the other hand, I wandered the pathways that wound through rows upon rows of grapevines.

I leaned in between the leaves and stared at the small, pink grapes forming on fragile stems. Sunlight warmed my shoulders and my sandals pressed down the soil. I got up close and saw the vine is rugged and strong. The gnarled and twisted vine made me cry and I took a step back, even though I wanted to reach out and touch it. I could see small branches being grafted in and trained to stay close to the vine. And I kept asking, “What are you saying, God? What’s next?”

I noticed tendrils that reached for the sun – away from the vine. They were beautiful. And fruitless.

I know what God says about being fruitless and I gazed at one of those beautiful, wayward tendrils and said, “I wonder what’s going to happen to you?” The answer was at my feet where dry, brown, fruitless tendrils lay that had been cut from the vine. Dead.

Seeing those dead, wayward branches on the ground at my feet while birds sang concertos and the breeze ran its fingers through my hair and the sun beamed brightly overhead in a spectacular sky? It was heavy. “What are you saying, God? What’s next?” I asked.

“Stay close.”

If God speaks in words, I think it’s a whisper. It’s not that booming voice Charlton Heston heard.

It was the whisper that got through to me. It was that whisper that made me realize there probably isn’t anything more important than staying close to God. Not my family. Not my paycheck. Not my health. Not even this blog post. Not any blog post.

When I go off searching for God just so that I’ll have something to write about here, I think I must be a bit like that wayward tendril that looks really good with its green leaf against the turquoise of a Nebraska sky on a Sunday afternoon. It might be beautiful, but it’s fruitless.

I don’t want fruitless.

God, I don’t want fruitless.

You didn’t choose me, remember; I chose you, and put you in the world to bear fruit, fruit that won’t spoil. ~John 15:16 (MSG)

~~~

With Michelle…

and Laura…

ShareTweet