A Wake Up

This day I no longer have my mother to call on the phone. There are not just miles between us there are worlds. Perhaps that has been true most of my life. The twists and turns of our relationship have never been healed. And now she is gone.

And because of that tumultuous relationship, I worry about my own mother/daughter relationship. I worry that I fail my daughter. Not in the same ways my mother failed me, but in different ways.

Sometimes I can't hear her in her silence. Sometimes I cannot calm the fears that reside within her. Sometimes I just don't know when to hang on and when to let go. She and I are different and the same. I know that she needs to be held, because I do too when I'm lonely, or scared, or sad. I know that words just aren't enough for her sometimes, that she sees beyond words to body language and sincerity. And yet I see too, how words are a valuable commodity to her as well. I fail her though. I know she likes predictability and often I am inconsistent. I know she likes calmness, and I am intense. I know she likes to know plans and I am horrible at planning.

Today, when she woke up she came downstairs and the first words out of her mouth were "Happy Mother's Day!" She said these words with a sparkle in her eyes, then she promptly plopped down on the couch to wake up some more.

I laid beside her on the couch holding her. And I said,

"Thank you for making me a mother."

"But I didn't make you a mother, Thom did."

"You made me a different kind of mother. You made me a cuddly and quiet mother."

I nuzzled into her and held tighter. Again I said, "Thank you, Mikayla" She beamed.


Sometimes I get it right. And sometimes I am just the mother Mikayla needs. I know that I won't always love her perfectly, but these moments remind me that I can be the best mother I know how to be. And so my hope is to have the grace and love to become what we both need.

Easter Illuminati

It's been such a long time since I've written for me. I find it refreshing. Not that I don't write for me all the time. My sermons are usually a message I need to hear. But it's nice not to have to consider how others will interpret my writing.

I write here on the blog, but I also write in a personal journal and a prayer journal. In those journals I can be truly free to write all the ugliness, shame, and sadness and beautiful things like love and grace and forgiveness in a truly intimate way.

I used to write a prayer journal every day. I would read a set of Biblical passages and see what was speaking to me and write on it, usually in the form of prayer. It was Lectio Divina before I even knew what that was. Unfortunately sometime during seminary I lost that practice. I lost God too. Maybe the two coincided. Actually, I'm pretty sure they coincided.

The good news is, I have restored my relationship with God, and with Lectio. And those writings and prayers are helping me restore, redeem, and even resurrect the relationship with myself and others.

And like THE GOOD NEWS, resurrection offers a new body, unlike the one before. A new relationship with myself, with those I love, and with God. Relationships even better than before, healthier, trusting, and full of life. It brings me hope and promise.

Perhaps that is why Easter season lasts forty days........a completeness.

Gracious and Loving God, thank you for starting this transformation, rebirth and resurrection in me this Easter season. And though you and I KNOW that it will take longer than 40 days....I look forward to the journey and to the new habits that are being formed this Easter. Amen.

Like the Prodigal's Father

I wish I had a dog growing up. When I was a child I only had cats. But cats are so different than dogs in the way they react to feeling. My dog senses my feelings sometimes before I even do. He reflects that feeling somehow. Either he comes and sits near me, or he wags his tail in excitement. He even expresses his concern.

When the feeling is intense...sadness or anger, he becomes distant.....perhaps it is too much for even him. But he is never far away. And if the sadness is less intense, he will let me stroke him and hug him and cry. He has his own needs....he often comes over and insists on me petting him. He gets jealous if I give attention to our other dog. Sometimes hes bored and sometimes I think hes a little sad too.

But he loves unconditionally. He loves my children unconditionally. He loves me unconditionally. And though he doesn't understand words he certainly understands love and devotion, and feelings.

He was what I needed as a kid. I could've told him my secrets. He could have witnessed all that happened in my life and held steadfast, still loving. Abiding in my pain. My cats just didn't do that. They weren't very devoted....rather self-centered and aloof most of the time. They witnessed but they ran. They wanted no part of that nonsense. And feelings, well they didn't want much to do with that either.

And so while at times I have understood cats and their need to be independent. I really cherish the devotion, forgiveness, steadfastness of my dogs who love me just as I am. I long to be like them, full of love and life and devotion. As God-like as them. Full of grace and love and forgiveness, unafraid of true feelings.

I thank God for sending dogs, especially Pretzel into my life, that I may know that unconditional love and expectation of all I can become. And I have always wondered at the significance that Dog backward is God. It works for me.

To be held

I need to be held

and just cry into someone's arms

to cry with lament and regret

to cry for loss and sadness and grief



To feel the warmth of love

Someone who will comfort



Such loss cries out for deliverance

For awakening from the darkness of a tomb

a tomb of darkness and violence

of pain and wrath and anger



I seek the comfort of the Mary's

those who mourn for their loss too

I seek the respite and ritual

of letting the past be annointed

with spices and flowers and fragrance



But there is no body left to mourn

nothing but past memories

of things said and not said

things done and not done

things that could've been and maybe even should have been



I want to lean on the Mary's

as I enter that dark tomb and come out again

with no answers but only questions

I want to keep that secret with the womankind

of knowing from the heart and mourning with no words



I want to just hold and be held

and cry tears until there are none left