Faith

Two days until my 25 yr reunion, three days until I leave to go back to Florida and plenty on my mind. However, as much as of an angst-filled day I've had, I feel vindicated in my beliefs and actions today. I have a sick mother who has been in and out of the hospital too numerous times to count in the past twenty years. However, she seems to have more lives than a cat. I think it's because she has a will of steel. When I think back in time she has made no regrets about her life.  Today I feel like I am hoping I can make my way from now on like her. Making my way with great faith.

I guess the disagreement/ argument I had today with someone close to me has made me want to do the things I need to do on my own. I'm tired, frustrated and just not willing to wait any more. This has put a fire under me and I'm glad.  It makes me feel more secure in me and the faith of God supporting me.

And if there was any doubt in this, while I was writing this I was scanning the tv stations, I found Joyce Meyer.  Whenever I run across her I know she has a message just for me. This time was no different.  Her message was loud and clear. I guess I have been so busy looking for the proof of God before I put my faith in Him. I need to build this faith by using my voice over and over.  Also, it is quite easy to give into the flesh whenever there is a storm.  And it's so easy to talk about the storm. To analyze it. To try and predict where it is heading and it's effect on me and my environment.  The doubt  that comes from this storm is born from me.  The real problem is I believe God can do it but I haven't believed God would do it for me. Why not? I believe in the air that I breathe, that the sun comes out every day yet why is it such a stretch that I can have God's support in anything I need and want to do? All valid questions.

Fear seems to be at the base of faith that is undermined. Really, what do I have to be fearful of? I have been at a low for a long time now. However, there always seems to be room for joy, for laughter, the relishing of my children, my friendships and heck, even a peanut buster parfait. I've finally become tired of fear. It is not motivating me any longer. Here is what is motivating me: Two job possibilities, moving into a place of my own in the future, the family I love and a potential new relationship. Oh yeah, and the Gulf of Mexico. So I'm going to write my fears in the proverbial sand with my staff of faith and watch the tide erase them. And if it takes me many days to continue to write those fears in the sand then watch them wash them away, I always know I will be left with my staff of faith.

The Trip to Hacienda

My friend called me and invited me out for a drink at Hacienda last night. Even though it has been over four years since I lived here it is like second nature to drive the back roads. It is amazing how your body is on auto-pilot. I decided to take Brick to Auten all the way to Portage.  As I wound my way around I noticed how lush the trees are here in my little town in Indiana. Florida has its beautiful palms.  Indiana has it's evergreens. The trees had grown taller and houses that I had noticed being built had added features to their yards or for sale signs in them. It felt like yesterday that I had driven this route.

As I stopped at the corner of Ironwood and Auten I noticed the setting sun highlighting the decent of the hill on Auten. I felt a little like a kid going down a snowy hill on a flexible flyer. It was fun to speed up and let the car take the lead as I passed by the Clay Fire Department (which oddly looked closer to the road). I then passed the big yellow house, that as an adult, I dreamt of owning, not far from my friend Danielle's childhood home.  As I followed the turns around the corners, the street to the left that leads to Clay Highschool seemed smaller and more closed in. The vegetation seemed to have expanded while everything else shrunk in it's shadow. For a moment I thought about my children. If they were with me in the car they would remember this just as it is today. Never knowing what I saw twenty five years earlier as a teenager and yet now noticing the differences.  Now I understood when my mom would talk wistfully of her neighborhood back in New Jersey explaining things that had once been there but now weren't. You feel like part of you is gone and it's hard to explain that when someone hasn't seen what you've seen or done what you've done or known who you've known. You just know something is different or a part of your history is missing.

As I rolled to the next stop sign I came to the corner of the house that has the strange face. I don't know if others view a house like I do but I see a face when I look at the front of a home. The windows and door resemble the eyes the mouth and sometimes a nose.  This house has always been very strange to me. Looking at it from the front, the right window on the top is much larger than the rest.  The eye of this house has always seemed to have a palsey. I have always felt sorry for it. Plus this corner could be busy at times and it had that going against it too. There always seemed to be people living in it. However, for me I couldn't live in a house with an uneven face and with an added traffic problem. 

As I travelled over 31 continuing west, I went through the stoplight that if I took a left would lead past a neighborhood that used to have a couple of empty cul-de-sacs when I was in highschool.  I know this because this was the only place my boyfriend and I could be alone. I don't know how he found it but it was nice. I guess it's a teenage boy's job to scope out these things. There are homes on the cul-de-sacs now.

I passed St. Patrick's park and I was about to go on the bridge that crossed over the St. Joseph river. If I weren't meeting a friend I would have stopped and took some pictures. I have never done that. Maybe I will while I am still here. It looked beautiful and I couldn't believe I had never been on a boat on the St. Joe. What a perfect summer thing to do.

I passed by Lilac Rd and thought of my friend Micki's mom's house. I would love to see them but I haven't had a chance to catch up with them. Maybe when the kids get back.

I continued on passed a neighborhood we had once taken the kid's trick or treating then up the hill past the house with the giant, brick fortress for a fence that had to have cost more than the house itself in construction.  As I drove, I noticed the large, luxurious lawns.  My lawn in Florida is the size of a postage stamp and soon it wouldn't be mine at all. Florida grass is coarse and sharp. More like weeds. Plus the fear of snakes and fire ants keep people off of it.

Soon I was turning left onto Portage, almost to my destination. I passed the German Township fire department where we used to buy our Christmas trees and we also did a Stampin' Up class one Saturday morning. So many good memories.

Finally, I turned right into the parking lot of Hacienda which is across from a Kentucky Fried Chicken and a Sonic.This used to be a forest. I pulled into a parking space in front of the restaurant.  I sat for a moment. I felt like I had just been on a tour.  I realized that this little town had given me a good and rich life. I was also grateful for all the small things. Over the years these qualities I noticed surrounded me in my every day life. What made impressions on me and how I came to recognize and link them to an important part of not only where I lived but who I was, what I liked and disliked and what I truly cared about. I'm glad that no matter what life has handed me I am still able to recognize and appreciate the little things. I take comfort in knowing that.  I shut the engine off and closed the car door. I knew I would take a different route home just to experience a few more of my favorite hometown sights.

Nothing

Trying to be in a holding pattern is hard for me. I am always assessing, planning and researching. I have a wonderful friend who has told me that I need to stop "thinking". In essence, for me that also includes worrying and doing, as well.  God is who I need to wait on and all I need.  For a great while I have felt that God is sending me a message that I am not comprehending. In my conversations with God I've even said "God, you need to make your message very plain and clear to me otherwise it is going to pass me by."  I know that the reason my life is where it is at is because I keep doing the same thing over and over to no avail. But what do you do when you don't know any other way?  The answer I believe is in doing nothing. Not going over and over in your mind about it. Not rehashing it with others and not stewing in the feelings that come from the past.  Work on what is given to you in the present and put your concentration there.  This wonderful friend is a messenger to me. He lives his life in the now and the future. When something is over with, he says keep moving and he doesn't look back. 

I think God also sends messages through people who are in our lives. The friend I mentioned above is a wealth of information and life experience. I am envious of his relationship with God and his connection to his faith. I aspire to attain that. He is not the only one. Last night a friend I have not seen since highschool came out to meet us. She had said she had been in her parent's jacuzzi.  I mentioned to her that my folks had a jacuzzi tub but I had never been in it.  She was shocked that I had not been in it. When she asked me why I hadn't, I didn't really have an answer.  I have a great deal of time on my hands yet I neglected to think about doing that for myself.  It is becoming painfully obvious that I am waiting for permission to live my life in so many ways. A jacuzzi bath is even on that list.  This friend was emphatic that I soak in it at least three times before my folks came home and she wanted me to report to her that I had done it.  I guess it feels so self indulgent. However, perhaps it is highly necessary. At the very least, I don't want to let my friend down.

Also, I think it is necessary that in this holding pattern and in my quest to do nothing, I be thankful.  I truly do have so much to be thankful for:  A God who loves me with all my flaws, two wonderful, funny children, giving and gracious parents, a caring brother and sister-in-law and an awe-inspiring group of friends who show me their love and interest in my life. God and the people around me are the nourishment I need. It is through them I receive my greatest gifts and the reminder that I need nothing else.

Passing through the Neighborhood of Introspection

I slowly drove up the hill. I had done this simple act what felt like a million times in my life. This time I was only driving past. It was dark out. I could see the trash cans against the garage door. As I passed slowly I could see through the picture window into the kitchen to the kitchen window. I could see the window valance.  It was mine. They still had it up. Instantaneously I felt like crying. I could never go in again.  The only house I had ever known growing up and then purchasing it as an adult was occupied by other people and would always be.

This feeling lingered with me as I wound my way through the other subdivisions to my parents' home where I am staying. I looked up at the moon and it seemed to be simmering in a haze. I heard loud, in a clear voice inside me say "You can never go back."  The longer I spend in South Bend, the more I miss about it, however. As I travelled the back roads tonight my imagination pulled a memory forward of a snowy night where the snow is swirling and twisting and dancing on the road. I haven't seen snow in over 4 years. Snow reminds me of Christmas Eve and luminaires, mid-winter euchre parties, running noses as you bend to hoist the snow off the driveway onto the snow-covered grass. Did I want to come back to that? I've never been fond of snow or winter for that matter. Sometimes though, you want what you can't have.

I'm jobless and penniless yet rich with family and friends.  It think about the idealic childhood I had here. Even the beginning of my children's lives were started here.  Cook-outs, tee ball, soccer and church functions kept us busy. I don't have that in Florida. Now I have friends here that I have known for years that are also going through divorce and are my age. Can't I have the best of both worlds? Can't I take all these people and experience back down to Florida?  Why can't someone just find me a fantastic job right here? My kids would benefit from the experiences here. I am struggling with where I can, should and be allowed to be. There doesn't seem to be an answer. I just want to be happy but most of all do the right thing.

The Little Things...

Today is the start of a two week period where I will be entirely by myself. No kids, family or dogs. Just me. I want to make sure I relish these moments I have because, as we all know, this kind of freedom usually only comes when you are single, young, with no children.  Plus, I'm not even in my own home so doing little projects around the house is out of the question. So truly, this is time to myself.

The day, though not momentous, was indeed productive and meaningful.  My car window was fixed earlier than expected, I was able to get a special treat of a caramel mocha coffee with hazelnut flavoring at McDonald's and then went home all before 10am. 

My day proceeded with emails and, most importantly, prepping myself for a job I am interviewing for in Student Financial Aid.  I have not been in the field for some time, however, I found myself fascinated with the changes I had discovered to policies and procedures. It actually got me excited about the possibility of doing this type of work and working with the students all over again.  I am anxious for this opportunity to pan out.

This good feeling followed me throughout the rest of my day. I went to the post office and then to the cemetery.  This is the second time I've been to the cemetery since being back in Indiana.  I always visit my best friend's mother's grave first. "Sunshine" had a special place in my life. She was the first adult I had really known outside my family. She has been gone 8 yrs now. I can't believe it.  I stood at her grave with her parents' grave near by, as well.  I kissed my lips to my hand and gave it to her headstone. I can still hear her voice and her laugh. There is some guilt not living in Indiana any more. I can't watch over her grave like I used to for my best friend. I actually looked forward to visiting it and talking to her.  Remembering her fondly brought back that good feeling that had been passing through me today.  From her grave, I moved on to my brother's.

Standing at my brother's grave is very bittersweet. I know with all my heart that he is in a phenomenal place. The reason I know this is the day I learned of his death, I swore I heard his voice in my head saying "Koren, you are never going to believe what it's like here. It is so awesome I can't even describe it." It still doesn't take away the fact that 6 years later I want him to be with me here, in person.  I am just hoping that he is behind the scenes making a path for me that will get me out of this rough patch. That, in itself, brought a smile to my face.  While standing there, gazing down at his name and the pink bunny my daughter had brought last week, I realized I didn't have to hurry and be anywhere. I could plant myself (figuratively) and stay for awhile. 

The ground was wet so I got a trash bag from the car and sat on it facing my brother's headstone with the sun to my back. I picked the soft grass and tried to braid it. It's softness brought to mind the coarseness of Florida's grass and how Indiana grass was like soft carpet to me.  I watched ants wander up blades of grass and out of the dirt and one crawled on my knee. I had to remind myself that Indiana ants weren't the fire ant variety we have in Florida and I should not be alarmed. It was nice to just sit there, examining all the little things around me. It made me happy to know that if I wanted to, I could lie there all day if the feeling struck me. What else did I have to do?

After sitting there on my plastic bag for an undetermined amount of time, I decided to walk the majority of the cemetery.  What caught my attention was the tranquilness of the grass and trees surrounded by the constant movement, the traffic sounds and sights of the cars passing around the cemetery.  Didn't people recognize that all their busyness would come to a halt and soon they would potentially be here?  It was an ironic scene to me: the meaninglessness of the present to meaningfulness of the future. It was futile to try and rationalize it. I just turned my eyes to the sky and felt the sun's warmth. That was the only answer I needed.

From there, a quick run to Walmart. It had been so long since I had been in this Walmart. It was clean. Yes, clean. The same cannot be said for my Walmart back home. It was organized, too.  As I went to get the couple of items I needed, I bumped into a girl I've known since grammar school. It was nice to catch up, standing there, realizing internally, that I didn't have to rush. Imagine, no rushing. No dogs to walk or feed. No children to wrangle.  Just a conversation. An adult conversation, at that.  As we bid our good-byes and I headed to the check out, the best surprise waited for me there.  The cheap bottle of wine I had in my cart prompted my check out gal to ask for my ID. My ID!!!  I can't remember the last time I had that done.  I told her, at 42, she could check my ID anytime she wanted to. My highschool reunion is coming up. Either this was a good sign about my appearance, a fluke by an inexperienced Walmart associate or it could have been just a store policy, I didn't care. I was basking in it. It could have been worse. It could have been Preperation H I was purchasing and they needed a price check as my 7 year old whined about not getting some candy or gum. Yes, this was a good day.

As I drove out of the Walmart parking lot, I realized it was truly the small and what may seem like insignificant things that really added up to a glorious day. The fact that I have 10, working fingers to type this blog. The fact that I get to wear shorts today and the fact that I can even have one more day on this earth to write about is all meaningful. I wouldn't trade a thing.

I Must Have That Kind of Face...

Today my son discovered that someone, overnight, smashed in the car door window and stole my ipod. Normally, this wouldn't be that traumatic since it will be a simple replacement of the window and not too costly. However, my financial situation is such that tonight I told my 7 year old she couldn't have a quarter for the gum ball machine.

I have to admit, I cried a little. When you are going through not just one situation but multiple situations that seem to never be resolving themselves, it's daunting.  I am blessed, however. I have a loving family and I just happen to be home visiting when this happened. It just seems that monetarily and emotionally I have leaned on them a great deal and it doesn't seem to be ending any time soon. I don't like to continually be reliant on others this way. Plus, I didn't want this to create anxiety in my life.  I had, what I thought was and interview, tonight and I didn't want it to effect my demeanor or confidence.

For the interview, I met with this lovely woman and it turns out the job I thought I was meeting with her about was already filled. However, she and I have been in contact for some time and she wanted to find out what I was interested in doing and to see if she could get my resume circulated. Interestingly, there was more to this meeting than met the eye.

We talked about the school and her job but what we talked about for a better part of an hour was about  life. We talked about her divorce, my divorce, my soon-to-be high school reunion and her past reunion, children, goals, parents, death and the meaning behind when you watch a person pass away and faith.  Yes, I know you are probably are thinking "How do you get to that kind of discussion during a introductory meeting/interview?".  All I can say is I must have that kind of face. It happens a lot. People open up to me about their lives in sometimes the most personal of ways. I have to say, I too, am an open book. Perhaps this is why this so easily happens. I am not afraid of my history and I suppose this shows.

Nobody should be afraid of their history. It's the future that can be frightening. However, it should be perceived as exciting and an adventure verses something to be feared.  I use to be in that place when I was in my 20s and childless. Even so, I always thought I could be much more adventurous than I was.  It was true, there are so many things I should have taken a chance on and done.  Now it is not so easy when you have young children and laws and guidelines that you have to adhere to.  It should be easier but it's harder. I just want my history to be something not only my children are proud of but I am proud of ,as well. I want to live life to the nth degree and have as little regrets as possible. I want my children to know to never be afraid of their past or their future.  Most importantly, to make it their own.

Meeting with this lovely woman, gave me another example that my journey is not only in the big things but the every day meetings and conversations. The value in all the people around you.  I've learned that each of these experiences with others is an equal trade in connection and validation. They all add value and various perspectives to your life and how you can move forward. This is my goal, to move forward, to create a fantastic past and a phenomenal future in the absence of fear.

The Learning of a Lesson

How do we learn lessons? In school we are given books and projects to show us things that we are to absorb.  Recalling this way of learning makes me take note that there is so much that I don't recall from this type of experience. It was digested then regurgitated for a quiz, test or paper. But what did it mean?  Not much, apparently.

I think there are a good number of us that live and learn experientially. This requires that we are immersed in situations, feelings, reactions, observations, actions, thoughts and perceptions.  This seems to be the most effective way of learning, whether we desire the lesson or not.

Tonight I met with a friend who I have shared a separate but similar experience with. I won't go into details but she expressed to me what she learned from it. Though the experience was virtually the same as mine, we each took something different from it.  I was impressed with her outlook and her take on the situation. It was obvious her conceptualization was that of a realist. Mine comes from an emotional base. She shared with me things that I had not thought of and it is requiring me to look deeper within myself at how I process my experiences and the world around me.

Because the way I conceptualize my world is emotional, I am coming to the realization that I need to develop the ability to be purely observational.  Emotionality can make a person reactionary.  Sometimes it is the ability to observe that is the greatest gift.  The gift of time. The gift of logically developing avenues of recourse.  The ability to literally just sit in the moment.

Sitting with my friend, I thought about all the things I need answers for in my life. However, just acknowledging that perhaps this is the time to just observe, gave me some peace.  There is no way I can have my questions answered tonight, as I sit drinking a glass of wine. Why not sit in the moment? If I don't have the answer, wondering when it will come isn't going to make it come any faster.

So here I am. I'm not going to wonder what will be. I am just going to sit, wait and observe.  Who knows? I may actually learn something and the answer may lie within that lesson.

The Refiner

Welcome to my blog!  This is one of my favorite stories.  It is this story that I am basing my blog around.  Sometimes life gives us situations that we find exceedingly difficult to bare and live through. However, this story reminds me that life's trials only make us stronger and more in God's image.


Some time ago, a few ladies met to study the scriptures. While reading the third chapter of Malachi, they came upon a remarkable expression in the third verse:  

    "And He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver" (Malachi 3:3).

One lady decided to visit a silversmith, and report to the others on what he said about the subject.

She went accordingly, and without telling him the reason for her visit, begged the silversmith to tell her about the process of refining silver. After he had fully described it to her, she asked, "Sir, do you sit while the work of refining is going on?"


"Oh, yes ma'am," replied the silversmith; "I must sit and watch the furnace constantly, for, if the time necessary for refining is exceeded in the slightest degree, the silver will be injured."

The lady at once saw the beauty and comfort of the expression, "He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver."

God sees it necessary to put His children into the furnace; but His eye is steadily intent on the work of purifying, and His wisdom and love are both engaged in the best manner for us. Our trials do not come at random, and He will not let us be tested beyond what we can endure.

Before she left, the lady asked one final question, "How do you know when the process is complete?"

"That's quite simple," replied the silversmith. "When I can see my own image in the silver, the refining process is finished."

-Author Unknown

I am very excited about this journey of writing and communicating with anyone who is interested. I hope you will be with me on my journey.  I encourage you to comment. 

For those that are friends of mine of Facebook, I may reprint stories I have shared there. Just wanted to give you a heads up in case you see something familiar. Thanks to all for taking this journey with me.

All My Best,

Koren