So many times I look at my life and wonder, "Is this what I was meant to do? or "Is this what I was meant to be?"
I never found a bigger or more interesting "calling", I never wanted to graduate high school and blaze trails and be the "top" of my field, whatever field that was. My desires were simple. To work, to love, to be loved, and be happy.
I never wanted to be one of those women with multiple children under age five and two in diapers at the same time and do nothing but talk to little people all day long. A mother wasn't something I aspired to be, in fact, when I was in my late teens/early 20's I swore up and down I wasn't going to have kids, but when the time came, God peeled back a layer of whatever was covering my heart and I discovered profound love for two beautiful girls I have been blessed to hear call me "mom". In the days of gestation, I rubbed my belly and talked to them, telling them both how much I loved them, that I couldn't wait to meet them and be their mommy. Seeing each one for the first time was breathtaking and I felt like God opened a little window for me to see just a taste of heaven. I cannot imagine my life without either one and in His infinite wisdom, God did not give me two children close in age, rather they're 14 1/2 years apart. I have been able to enjoy each girl on her own and though they love one another dearly and deeply, each one has been raised like an only child and that's given me a unique time with both of them, a time to relish watching them grow and learn and become the interesting, captivating, deep, funny, intelligent young lady both of them are.
I had a learning disability we later on learned was ADD, a condition that is the bane of some people's existences, and a blessing to others. I can multitask like a boss, but cannot focus for any great length of time on anything. I was the kid that whose report cards read, "Needs to pay attention in class." All my life I told myself I was stupid, and as I've aged and gleaned wisdom from age and life, He peeled back another layer of whatever was covering my heart and I discovered I'm REALLY quite intelligent and wise and capable. I cannot read a book and put anything together without copious amounts of confusion and rereading over and over and then just shelving the book, but I can, with eyes and hands and effort, figure pretty much ANYTHING out and do very well. I am QUITE smart, I just didn't need academia's approval or the world's approval and a degree to hang on the wall. I have my own approval and my degree from the University of Hard Knocks is in satisfaction with how I truly am and acceptance of how my brain works.
I never went through my childhood thinking, "When I grow up I want to be a calligrapher." Unless you were born in the middle ages, I think we all pretty much wanted to grow up to be flight attendants, nurses, doctors, astronauts, writers, teachers, or some other profession that paid well and people looked up to. I was 26 when a thought dropped into my lap and after a trip to Michaels and the purchase of a book and a pen set, in 13 years and over 1,700 weddings and events and commissioned pieces, I took an old fashioned art form, in Greek, the word kallos graphe literally mean "beautiful writing", and turned it into something that has enabled me to work with clients from the United Kingdom to Hong Kong, clients in every single state in the country, to Michael Jordan's 50th birthday to the Bat Mitzvah of the daughter of the former head of HBO, to countless weddings and birthdays and anniversaries and family gatherings, to the heartfelt words of a father to a daughter, a husband to a wife, a wife to her children, people trust me with words that come from their heart and I put those words to paper, glass, wood, canvas, stethoscopes, envelopes, and every other medium. I've penned lyrics of songs for a widow that thinks of her husband every time she passes by the picture frame. I've penned a love letter from a father to his daughter. I have worked with clients I wished I could adopt or could adopt ME, and I've encountered brides so self-absorbed and shallow I wanted to call their fiances and go, "Pssst! It's called the Witness Protection Program--let's go! They can hide you!" It's crazy, creative, colorful, exhausting, gratifying and horrifying, but it's a life I've been blessed to create with a gift from the giver of gifts, God himself. I didn't think when I was in Mrs. Storey's Offices Practices class that one day I'd ditch the typewriter and attorneys for ink well and nib and parchment paper, but I wouldn't trade this for the world.
I watched my friends and girls I knew date man after man after man and go out on a seemingly endless string of dates with different guys, and I was always the one that sat home on Saturday nights crocheting afghans with intermittent boys and men placed here and there. I didn't realize I gave off a vibe that told men to "get lost" but apparently when I found myself at Denver International Airport on September 25, 2001 to see the man that would be my husband for the first time in 20 years, that vibe disappeared and so did my longing for those endless strings of dates as a tentative man I hadn't seen since 1981 walked towards me and I can honestly say I've been loved passionately and deeply and should he go Home before I do, I would be quite content never standing beside another man because I have had the love that all women hope for but sadly, some never find, and it was all in His time, not mine.
I come from a smallish family that has its idiosyncracies and flaws and as time has marched on, those idiosyncracies and flaws have grown in size and depth and I have had to shut doors on some and some have shut the door on me. There are times it bothers me, and other times I'm relieved not to have the drama around me, but I have learned to surround myself in my life with those that will love me regardless of whatever I've done in the past or whatever expectation I've not lived up to in someone else's eyes. I have the family I wish to have, a husband and two beautiful daughters, and a son-in-law, and should God decide to open doors and bring more to the table, that's fine, but I have learned to find contentment among those I do have and love deeply.
I have friends from all of my walks of life and like a garden of flowers, each one is different and beautiful and strong and tender and blooms at times different from others' blooming, but put them all together and when I find myself walking through that garden, I get to enjoy the sweet fragrance of kindness, compassion, talents, abilities, gifts, shortcomings, longcomings, and blessings. He has shown me how to eliminate the weeds of jealousy and envy that would choke out the beauty and how to nurture and feed the flowers that make my life rich and colorful and beautiful. Some bloom in the spring, like bulbs, and some bloom in the fall, like dahlias, and some bloom all year long, but each "flower" is precious and special to me and I love the garden He has given me.
When I ask myself, "Is this what I was meant to do? or "Is this what I was meant to be?", I have to honestly answer, "Yes." To pursue any thing else would be to upset the applecart that God has wheeled into my world. To pine after something He doesn't intend for me to have would be to unfairly take my appreciation and attention from what He HAS given me, and given to me abundantly and fully. If we take our eyes off what we think we "want" and focus instead on what we "have" and thank Him from whom all blessings flow, you will probably find you're exactly where He wanted you all along and doing what He wanted you to do all along. It's your calling. It's your life. It's His gift.
Friday, July 18, 2014
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
Hey you! You're important.
Before I had kids, friends of mine with kids would tell me how agonizing it was when they'd get the parents to babysit and they'd go out to dinner with their spouse, and all they did was stare at the ice melting in their water glasses and talk about..........the kids.
I can hereby confirm that once I became a parent, yes, you do, in fact, do just that.
Fast forward several years and now I'm the mother of a 24 year old and an almost ten year old. I often say "with age comes wisdom." It's so true and that is the ONE thing I think I love most about getting older. The wisdom I glean from every day life.
Today, my daughter went to a water park with her youth group from church. She has quite an unusual life--she's home schooled. That means we are around each other 24/7. Not only are she and I around each other 24/7, her father is with us 24/7 as well. It does require some getting used to and at times, I can say without hesitation that going to the grocery store is the only time I may find peace and quiet. In the middle of a busy grocery store. There may be a dozen kids screaming for mom, but none of them are mine and I have developed quite the talent for tuning out other people's kids.
Today, the house is quiet. Phineas and Pherb isn't on, no Disney shows are on. Art paper and pens aren't strung all over the living room floor. The television is off, there is no hounding to get on the computer or go swimming, there is no showing me the newest drawing, no telling me about her latest book, no whining about anything. It is quiet. I love my daughters, both of them. Endlessly I love them. But I also deeply appreciate quiet "me" time. Today, after I dropped her off, I came home and relished the quiet. I knew the things I needed to accomplish and I am getting to them one at a time, not rushing through them, but thoughtfully accomplishing what needs accomplishing and tossing out the clutter that jams up my life with busyness. I am getting REALLY good at tossing out the needless and unnecessary. I am thinking complete thoughts, I am enjoying time in the bathroom with no one pounding on the door that she has "to pee like yesterday, c'mon mom, hurry up!" I can put clean clothes on her bed and not hear a huff of exasperation. No indignant comments. But also missing are the hugs and the "I love you so much, mom". You take the good with the bad and put it all on the floor in a pile and you call it life.
So, today, I've cleaned a bit, cleaned out piles of things that needed my attention. I hit a wall earlier this week, shutting off all social media and shutting my own self up from commenting on anything, from watching news, from listening to that horrid man in the People's House say ANYTHING. I have shut it all out. Yesterday, out of the blue, I dropped down on the bed and slept three hours, waking only to make dinner, clean up the kitchen, make the bed with new sheets, catch the season finale of 24, and then I slept for 12 more hours. Obviously I needed the sleep. I feel more rested and clear today than I've felt for a long, long time. I refuse to drain myself dry anymore of energy, clarity, peace. Let the world survive on the "news as it happens" lifestyle. I have too many flowers to stop and smell.
I'm nearing the end of my to-do list, reading the last few magazines I need to get through and discard. I have envelopes needing done, and they'll get done. I have one and a half hours before Ms. Thing will need to be picked up. I hope she's had a fun day, being a kid, laughing, splashing, making friends, just having a good old time. I purposely don't volunteer to help out on any of these events because she needs to be away from mom and dad and just have fun being a kid on her own. It always makes her appreciate time with us so much more and we appreciate being around that much more after she's been away for a while. I am relishing the quiet, the slower pace, the need to just breathe and enjoy some peace. That will all change once she hits the door and has to tell me all about her adventures on the water slide and who said what to whom and where's my cat? as she scoops Gilbert up in her arms to spend some time with him as she winds down.
Today, I have to honestly say I've not thought a lot about her being gone. There's nothing wrong with that. Somehow in our society we have become guilt-ridden if we don't saturate ourselves every single second with our children. We have forced ourselves to forget that at one time we were individuals and had lives and had uninterrupted thoughts and spoke on complete sentences. Then children arrived and we have been told that unless you make them the center of your universe and breathe every cell of them into your lungs you're an awful parent and don't deserve to have them. I have dropped the ball plenty of times as a mom and my daughters know they are loved, but they are not the center of my universe. God is. Then my husband. Then my daughters. Each is important, but at the end of my life, I will not have to stand and give account of my life to either my husband or my daughters. It is God I will answer to. It is God I seek for direction and answers. If I don't have Him at the center, wheel is lopsided and I head in directions I don't want to go.
I am grateful for this day away from Ali and I'm sure she's grateful for the day away from us. There is nothing wrong with that. Quit letting the world tell you that you're the next Hitler if you don't feel guilty about them not being with you 24/7. You are the one your children see as the example-setters in their lives. Show them that they, by themselves, individually, are important. You have to take care of yourself, recharge your battery, fill your soul back up with oxygen and life. You can be nothing to anyone else if you aren't taking care of being something for you. Take care of YOU because few others will.
I can hereby confirm that once I became a parent, yes, you do, in fact, do just that.
Fast forward several years and now I'm the mother of a 24 year old and an almost ten year old. I often say "with age comes wisdom." It's so true and that is the ONE thing I think I love most about getting older. The wisdom I glean from every day life.
Today, my daughter went to a water park with her youth group from church. She has quite an unusual life--she's home schooled. That means we are around each other 24/7. Not only are she and I around each other 24/7, her father is with us 24/7 as well. It does require some getting used to and at times, I can say without hesitation that going to the grocery store is the only time I may find peace and quiet. In the middle of a busy grocery store. There may be a dozen kids screaming for mom, but none of them are mine and I have developed quite the talent for tuning out other people's kids.
Today, the house is quiet. Phineas and Pherb isn't on, no Disney shows are on. Art paper and pens aren't strung all over the living room floor. The television is off, there is no hounding to get on the computer or go swimming, there is no showing me the newest drawing, no telling me about her latest book, no whining about anything. It is quiet. I love my daughters, both of them. Endlessly I love them. But I also deeply appreciate quiet "me" time. Today, after I dropped her off, I came home and relished the quiet. I knew the things I needed to accomplish and I am getting to them one at a time, not rushing through them, but thoughtfully accomplishing what needs accomplishing and tossing out the clutter that jams up my life with busyness. I am getting REALLY good at tossing out the needless and unnecessary. I am thinking complete thoughts, I am enjoying time in the bathroom with no one pounding on the door that she has "to pee like yesterday, c'mon mom, hurry up!" I can put clean clothes on her bed and not hear a huff of exasperation. No indignant comments. But also missing are the hugs and the "I love you so much, mom". You take the good with the bad and put it all on the floor in a pile and you call it life.
So, today, I've cleaned a bit, cleaned out piles of things that needed my attention. I hit a wall earlier this week, shutting off all social media and shutting my own self up from commenting on anything, from watching news, from listening to that horrid man in the People's House say ANYTHING. I have shut it all out. Yesterday, out of the blue, I dropped down on the bed and slept three hours, waking only to make dinner, clean up the kitchen, make the bed with new sheets, catch the season finale of 24, and then I slept for 12 more hours. Obviously I needed the sleep. I feel more rested and clear today than I've felt for a long, long time. I refuse to drain myself dry anymore of energy, clarity, peace. Let the world survive on the "news as it happens" lifestyle. I have too many flowers to stop and smell.
I'm nearing the end of my to-do list, reading the last few magazines I need to get through and discard. I have envelopes needing done, and they'll get done. I have one and a half hours before Ms. Thing will need to be picked up. I hope she's had a fun day, being a kid, laughing, splashing, making friends, just having a good old time. I purposely don't volunteer to help out on any of these events because she needs to be away from mom and dad and just have fun being a kid on her own. It always makes her appreciate time with us so much more and we appreciate being around that much more after she's been away for a while. I am relishing the quiet, the slower pace, the need to just breathe and enjoy some peace. That will all change once she hits the door and has to tell me all about her adventures on the water slide and who said what to whom and where's my cat? as she scoops Gilbert up in her arms to spend some time with him as she winds down.
Today, I have to honestly say I've not thought a lot about her being gone. There's nothing wrong with that. Somehow in our society we have become guilt-ridden if we don't saturate ourselves every single second with our children. We have forced ourselves to forget that at one time we were individuals and had lives and had uninterrupted thoughts and spoke on complete sentences. Then children arrived and we have been told that unless you make them the center of your universe and breathe every cell of them into your lungs you're an awful parent and don't deserve to have them. I have dropped the ball plenty of times as a mom and my daughters know they are loved, but they are not the center of my universe. God is. Then my husband. Then my daughters. Each is important, but at the end of my life, I will not have to stand and give account of my life to either my husband or my daughters. It is God I will answer to. It is God I seek for direction and answers. If I don't have Him at the center, wheel is lopsided and I head in directions I don't want to go.
I am grateful for this day away from Ali and I'm sure she's grateful for the day away from us. There is nothing wrong with that. Quit letting the world tell you that you're the next Hitler if you don't feel guilty about them not being with you 24/7. You are the one your children see as the example-setters in their lives. Show them that they, by themselves, individually, are important. You have to take care of yourself, recharge your battery, fill your soul back up with oxygen and life. You can be nothing to anyone else if you aren't taking care of being something for you. Take care of YOU because few others will.
Monday, July 14, 2014
It's Monday morning and your president is STILL breaking the law
Good morning, America.
After a good night's sleep and a refreshed mind, I wake to start my day and find the following BEAUTIFUL rant by Judge Jeanine Pirro:
http://video.foxnews.com/v/3672753276001/judge-jeanine-president-needs-to-fix-border-mess-he-created/#sp=show-clips
It is DEPLORABLE and DISGUSTING what this man has done. He's put out the call to all of South America and Mexico to send us your kids (after all, who can turn away the face of a child?) and we'll cram them into the nooks and crannies of our country, put them on the welfare rolls (classic Cloward and Piven) and provide for their every need. He doesn't care that they have sexually transmitted diseases, lice, scabies, tuberculosis, foot and mouth disease, his goal all his life has been to knock the United States off its pedestal and make it no better than a third world country in Africa. He wants Americans living in the same corrugated tin and cardboard shacks that residents in third world countries live in, while he and that wookie he's married to jet off to vacay after vacay in the name of relaxation, because being an asshole is SUCH exhausting work.
Yes, I just called the president of the United States an asshole. VERY mild considering what I could call him.
He has broken the law over and over. Eric Holder has broken the law time and time again. So has Valerie Jarrett. The Three Amigos of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue are finally being seen for what they truly are and what we have known the are for a long, long time: criminals. And like the Clintons, there is a string of dead bodies behind them, the bodies of those that spoke out or raised their voices in opposition to their actions. We HAVE to find our balls as a nation and begin speaking out without fearing reprisal. Too many men and women have died in the name of defending our country for these criminals to destroy the gift of America and freedom that has been given to us. This is a nation of rights given to us by God Himself. If you are too lazy or ignorant to fight for those rights, then you deserve whatever befalls you as this nation dries up and blows away. Those of us with voices loud and clear and intentions strong as iron won't go down without a fight. But the first place we begin this fight is on our knees.
It is absolutely imperative that America falls to her knees in prayer and humility and apology to Him for the 56 million babies aborted in the name of freedom and choice. We need to seek forgiveness for the celebration of the gay and lesbian lifestyle choices that threaten to divide our nation along the lines of sexual choice. And it IS a choice, being gay. You were NOT born that way, despite what Lady Gaga wants you to believe.
Read the words in Leviticus and Romans, the words divinely imparted from God to men, His thoughts and words about a man burning with lust for another man, or a woman exchanging natural affections for men with another woman. In God's own words those choices are an ABOMINATION. Why then, if God is without imperfection or error, would He create a man to burn with lust for another man or a woman to exchange her natural affection for another man with a woman if in His own words those are an ABOMINATION in his eyes? God does not contradict himself.
We need to seek forgiveness for promoting sex outside of marriage, for being such a disposable society that children are murdered and tossed into dumpsters and ditches with no afterthought or remorse. We as a nation spend millions of dollars and countless hours watching the spectacular pimping by Kris Jenner of her family in the name of making millions, yet we ridicule or even ban group prayer in public places and fight to remove crosses from roadsides because athiests object over their very visible existence.
America, we are TOTALLY and COMPLETELY screwed up. With each instance of ignoring Israel, or turning our backs on her by this administration, we are setting America up for disaster and failure of biblical proportions. As Anne Graham Lotz has said, and I paraphrase, "God is a gentleman. If He's asked to leave he will not overstay His welcome or overstep his bounds. He will leave."
But then what are our first words crying out when disaster hits because He's removed his hand of protection from us? "God, please! Come help us!"
America, you don't get it both ways. You don't get to stand at the door and with one hand point Him in the direction away from you with your right hand, while at the same time, beckoning Him to you with your left. God doesn't play that game.
Those of us that "get it" need to brace ourselves and our houses and stifle the desire to say, "I told you so" when the proverbial poo does hit the fan. And it will. Should the LORD tarry, it's just a matter of time before it all comes flying back in our faces.
Then who will America call? Can't be God because you've chased Him out, and the Ghostbusters are too old and one has died. America, you're on your own.
After a good night's sleep and a refreshed mind, I wake to start my day and find the following BEAUTIFUL rant by Judge Jeanine Pirro:
http://video.foxnews.com/v/3672753276001/judge-jeanine-president-needs-to-fix-border-mess-he-created/#sp=show-clips
It is DEPLORABLE and DISGUSTING what this man has done. He's put out the call to all of South America and Mexico to send us your kids (after all, who can turn away the face of a child?) and we'll cram them into the nooks and crannies of our country, put them on the welfare rolls (classic Cloward and Piven) and provide for their every need. He doesn't care that they have sexually transmitted diseases, lice, scabies, tuberculosis, foot and mouth disease, his goal all his life has been to knock the United States off its pedestal and make it no better than a third world country in Africa. He wants Americans living in the same corrugated tin and cardboard shacks that residents in third world countries live in, while he and that wookie he's married to jet off to vacay after vacay in the name of relaxation, because being an asshole is SUCH exhausting work.
Yes, I just called the president of the United States an asshole. VERY mild considering what I could call him.
He has broken the law over and over. Eric Holder has broken the law time and time again. So has Valerie Jarrett. The Three Amigos of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue are finally being seen for what they truly are and what we have known the are for a long, long time: criminals. And like the Clintons, there is a string of dead bodies behind them, the bodies of those that spoke out or raised their voices in opposition to their actions. We HAVE to find our balls as a nation and begin speaking out without fearing reprisal. Too many men and women have died in the name of defending our country for these criminals to destroy the gift of America and freedom that has been given to us. This is a nation of rights given to us by God Himself. If you are too lazy or ignorant to fight for those rights, then you deserve whatever befalls you as this nation dries up and blows away. Those of us with voices loud and clear and intentions strong as iron won't go down without a fight. But the first place we begin this fight is on our knees.
It is absolutely imperative that America falls to her knees in prayer and humility and apology to Him for the 56 million babies aborted in the name of freedom and choice. We need to seek forgiveness for the celebration of the gay and lesbian lifestyle choices that threaten to divide our nation along the lines of sexual choice. And it IS a choice, being gay. You were NOT born that way, despite what Lady Gaga wants you to believe.
Read the words in Leviticus and Romans, the words divinely imparted from God to men, His thoughts and words about a man burning with lust for another man, or a woman exchanging natural affections for men with another woman. In God's own words those choices are an ABOMINATION. Why then, if God is without imperfection or error, would He create a man to burn with lust for another man or a woman to exchange her natural affection for another man with a woman if in His own words those are an ABOMINATION in his eyes? God does not contradict himself.
We need to seek forgiveness for promoting sex outside of marriage, for being such a disposable society that children are murdered and tossed into dumpsters and ditches with no afterthought or remorse. We as a nation spend millions of dollars and countless hours watching the spectacular pimping by Kris Jenner of her family in the name of making millions, yet we ridicule or even ban group prayer in public places and fight to remove crosses from roadsides because athiests object over their very visible existence.
America, we are TOTALLY and COMPLETELY screwed up. With each instance of ignoring Israel, or turning our backs on her by this administration, we are setting America up for disaster and failure of biblical proportions. As Anne Graham Lotz has said, and I paraphrase, "God is a gentleman. If He's asked to leave he will not overstay His welcome or overstep his bounds. He will leave."
But then what are our first words crying out when disaster hits because He's removed his hand of protection from us? "God, please! Come help us!"
America, you don't get it both ways. You don't get to stand at the door and with one hand point Him in the direction away from you with your right hand, while at the same time, beckoning Him to you with your left. God doesn't play that game.
Those of us that "get it" need to brace ourselves and our houses and stifle the desire to say, "I told you so" when the proverbial poo does hit the fan. And it will. Should the LORD tarry, it's just a matter of time before it all comes flying back in our faces.
Then who will America call? Can't be God because you've chased Him out, and the Ghostbusters are too old and one has died. America, you're on your own.
Sunday, July 13, 2014
Recharging a very, very tired battery
I am a very compulsive person. Somewhere along the line of me becoming me, I don't think anyone checked the "self-control" or "she's had enough" gene mix. I literally lack the component that says "enough is enough" and will do something until I am a burned out wreck of a human being, overloaded, saturated, burned out. Whether it's a chemical ingested, a habit, or a behavior, I go until I can go no more and then I spend time recuperating and refilling myself. The older I get, the more I find myself needing quiet time to rebalance and correct my head and heart. The older I get, the less I can saturate myself with news of the world and drama queens, people that turn any situation into a panty-bunching, hand-wringing episode of idiocy.
When I first met my ex-mother-in-law way back in 1986, she walked in the front door of her house after she got off work. It was September and the sun set about 6:30-7:00 at night by that time. She was home from work by 5:15. She entered the front door, shut and locked it, and then went around the living room and drew all the blinds closed, while it was still fairly sunny outside. I looked quizically at her and she said, "When I come home from work, I want nothing to do with the world or anyone in it, this is my time and my space and my family time." I thought she was nuts.
Until I became the age that she was at that time.
When I'm home, the doors are shut and locked, unless it's a nice day, the windows are shut, nighttime comes and the world is shut out by the blinds, and I am completely and fully happy shutting out the world and everyone in it. I want nothing from the outside or the world making its way inside and when I get to where I'm at today, I don't even want the news on. I sure as hell don't want to hear the voice of the White House squatter. It is an unspoken rule in our house: The television is muted before one word comes out of his mouth.
World overload sneaks up on me. It's not something I'm truly conscious of, I just know that all of a sudden, it's very clear to me that I've had enough and I can't get away from the world fast enough. I'm worn out. Add to that worldly exhaustion a husband that needs seemingly constant medical attention, a nearly 10 year old with the normal 10 year old angst and heavily immersed in puberty, and a business that can suck the very life out of me, and I hit a wall head-on, very hard and very fast. I am not unusual or exceptional or extra-special. I'm just me. A woman of 49 that is tired. I realize the world isn't going to give me a break so I do what I have to and take the break myself.
Facebook is a contradiction of itself. Social media is supposed to make us more "social" yet Facebook can be one of the most isolating phenomena I've ever seen. For something so "social", people isolate themselves by sitting in their houses "chatting" with "friends", most of whom they've never met, as is the case with me. Having these "friends" has been a blessing because I've met many believers and like-minded people through Facebook, while at the same time, I've been shunned, unfriended, and cut-off by people I've known since fifth grade because, even though they've known my outspokenness since childhood, I'm suddenly not worth "knowing" as friend on Facebook, yet if they see me in town they will act as though I'm a long-lost buddy. It's ludicrous and much of the time, comical. I'd MUCH rather they just completely ignore me if that's going to be the case, and thankfully, many do comply. In some ways, a person's true colors come out through their words and some actually save you the time it would take to find out they're not really worth having in your life after all.
I've seen people use Facebook to go on rants about family, completely upsetting the apple cart and destroying relationships. Such as the case with my husband's daughter. Her husband posted a ridiculous rant about a family member, without pointing out WHICH family member the rant was about. We responded thinking it was about us, and because of all of that, and I'm sure many more things, doors were shut and we no longer communicate with them, much to our relief. God has a most wonderful way of separating the wheat from the chaff.
So, I'm spending this down time catching up on rest, cleaning out, tossing out, organizing, restructuring, my annual purge. I relish the fact that there are drawers in this house that are completely empty because I don't feel the need to keep anything past its usefulness. Unlike my mother, who keeps everything to the point someone will need a front loader when she dies and the house is cleaned out, and since I'm persona non grata in that house, it won't be me, thank the LORD, I don't have to worry about it. I keep what is necessary or important to us and get rid of the rest. Most importantly, I'm ridding myself of the black cloud of overload and over-information and over-stress by shutting out social media for a while and the news.
My favorite saying has become "with age comes wisdom". Such true words, but the biggest gift of wisdom is the realization that although I may not have been born with the gene that allows me the self-control to not over-indulge, I now recognize the signs when I've done that and I realize how valuable the power that I possess is that I can just shut the world out with the flick of a switch or the click of the mouse. t Log out of Facebook, click off Fox News, shut out the world, and find my little island of peace in a world of chaos.
When I first met my ex-mother-in-law way back in 1986, she walked in the front door of her house after she got off work. It was September and the sun set about 6:30-7:00 at night by that time. She was home from work by 5:15. She entered the front door, shut and locked it, and then went around the living room and drew all the blinds closed, while it was still fairly sunny outside. I looked quizically at her and she said, "When I come home from work, I want nothing to do with the world or anyone in it, this is my time and my space and my family time." I thought she was nuts.
Until I became the age that she was at that time.
When I'm home, the doors are shut and locked, unless it's a nice day, the windows are shut, nighttime comes and the world is shut out by the blinds, and I am completely and fully happy shutting out the world and everyone in it. I want nothing from the outside or the world making its way inside and when I get to where I'm at today, I don't even want the news on. I sure as hell don't want to hear the voice of the White House squatter. It is an unspoken rule in our house: The television is muted before one word comes out of his mouth.
World overload sneaks up on me. It's not something I'm truly conscious of, I just know that all of a sudden, it's very clear to me that I've had enough and I can't get away from the world fast enough. I'm worn out. Add to that worldly exhaustion a husband that needs seemingly constant medical attention, a nearly 10 year old with the normal 10 year old angst and heavily immersed in puberty, and a business that can suck the very life out of me, and I hit a wall head-on, very hard and very fast. I am not unusual or exceptional or extra-special. I'm just me. A woman of 49 that is tired. I realize the world isn't going to give me a break so I do what I have to and take the break myself.
Facebook is a contradiction of itself. Social media is supposed to make us more "social" yet Facebook can be one of the most isolating phenomena I've ever seen. For something so "social", people isolate themselves by sitting in their houses "chatting" with "friends", most of whom they've never met, as is the case with me. Having these "friends" has been a blessing because I've met many believers and like-minded people through Facebook, while at the same time, I've been shunned, unfriended, and cut-off by people I've known since fifth grade because, even though they've known my outspokenness since childhood, I'm suddenly not worth "knowing" as friend on Facebook, yet if they see me in town they will act as though I'm a long-lost buddy. It's ludicrous and much of the time, comical. I'd MUCH rather they just completely ignore me if that's going to be the case, and thankfully, many do comply. In some ways, a person's true colors come out through their words and some actually save you the time it would take to find out they're not really worth having in your life after all.
I've seen people use Facebook to go on rants about family, completely upsetting the apple cart and destroying relationships. Such as the case with my husband's daughter. Her husband posted a ridiculous rant about a family member, without pointing out WHICH family member the rant was about. We responded thinking it was about us, and because of all of that, and I'm sure many more things, doors were shut and we no longer communicate with them, much to our relief. God has a most wonderful way of separating the wheat from the chaff.
So, I'm spending this down time catching up on rest, cleaning out, tossing out, organizing, restructuring, my annual purge. I relish the fact that there are drawers in this house that are completely empty because I don't feel the need to keep anything past its usefulness. Unlike my mother, who keeps everything to the point someone will need a front loader when she dies and the house is cleaned out, and since I'm persona non grata in that house, it won't be me, thank the LORD, I don't have to worry about it. I keep what is necessary or important to us and get rid of the rest. Most importantly, I'm ridding myself of the black cloud of overload and over-information and over-stress by shutting out social media for a while and the news.
My favorite saying has become "with age comes wisdom". Such true words, but the biggest gift of wisdom is the realization that although I may not have been born with the gene that allows me the self-control to not over-indulge, I now recognize the signs when I've done that and I realize how valuable the power that I possess is that I can just shut the world out with the flick of a switch or the click of the mouse. t Log out of Facebook, click off Fox News, shut out the world, and find my little island of peace in a world of chaos.
Thursday, July 10, 2014
Tired
From time to time, I pull in feelers from the world and shut that world out, needing peace and quiet while I think over life issues. Hello to that time, I'm back. I'm tired of social media and all the stupidity that goes along with it. Taking a break refreshes the soul and reminds you that there is a silent partner you take for granted, God. He will never leave you nor forsake you, as He tells you in the scriptures, but He can go dark (silent) sometimes while He waits for you to turn your face away from yourself and the world and turn back to Him. Then there are times when He gets tired of waiting and just stands in front of you and SMACK! you run right into Him and He says, "Now that I have your attention, let's talk." I've had SMACK! more times than I care to remember and this time I turned to Him without having to walk into Him.
There are also times when I have to just tune the world out from all the murders, attacks, nations fighting nation. Having done through the murder of a loved on, that changed me forever. I don't have the absorption I used to, taking in news story after news story and not letting it bother me. I know the world is ugly and dark and I can do nothing to change that, this side of heaven. But I CAN turn if off from my senses for a while and focus on my family. I am doing just that. Alison has given and given and given. Yesterday, thanks to her sister, we were able to enjoy the first day of a two month summer pass at Kroc Center and as we walked down the steps into the pool, I saw that young lady light up like she hasn't in a long time--she was in water again, she was at home. Happy, throwing herself around in the water, standing under the tipping cups of water, in and out of the water, up the stairs to the water slide, she made a new friend, a boy named Chris, and they played in the water and had a great time. Even I attempted the water slide and I assure you, a grown woman sliding down three stories of water slide and shooting into a pool of water--quite a sight to see but it was soooooo fun! I hit the water at the bottom and became disoriented for a second but once I surfaced, victorious! Many more days will be spent there until our pass runs out and hopefully by then the scholarship I applied for will be approved and we can keep going.
Mike has to make a hard decision about his leg. We have a man to talk to about orthotics and that will help formulate his decision. He's in so much pain right now. No quality of life whatsoever. This was not the way we expected things to turn out, but you can't anticipate the way things have happened.
Lord, I'm tired. Bone tired, worn out, peace is hard to come by. I need YOU. I need to wrap myself in the folds of Your robe and never come out. Right now, You are my life ring and all I have. Maranatha, Father. Maranatha.
There are also times when I have to just tune the world out from all the murders, attacks, nations fighting nation. Having done through the murder of a loved on, that changed me forever. I don't have the absorption I used to, taking in news story after news story and not letting it bother me. I know the world is ugly and dark and I can do nothing to change that, this side of heaven. But I CAN turn if off from my senses for a while and focus on my family. I am doing just that. Alison has given and given and given. Yesterday, thanks to her sister, we were able to enjoy the first day of a two month summer pass at Kroc Center and as we walked down the steps into the pool, I saw that young lady light up like she hasn't in a long time--she was in water again, she was at home. Happy, throwing herself around in the water, standing under the tipping cups of water, in and out of the water, up the stairs to the water slide, she made a new friend, a boy named Chris, and they played in the water and had a great time. Even I attempted the water slide and I assure you, a grown woman sliding down three stories of water slide and shooting into a pool of water--quite a sight to see but it was soooooo fun! I hit the water at the bottom and became disoriented for a second but once I surfaced, victorious! Many more days will be spent there until our pass runs out and hopefully by then the scholarship I applied for will be approved and we can keep going.
Mike has to make a hard decision about his leg. We have a man to talk to about orthotics and that will help formulate his decision. He's in so much pain right now. No quality of life whatsoever. This was not the way we expected things to turn out, but you can't anticipate the way things have happened.
Lord, I'm tired. Bone tired, worn out, peace is hard to come by. I need YOU. I need to wrap myself in the folds of Your robe and never come out. Right now, You are my life ring and all I have. Maranatha, Father. Maranatha.
Monday, July 7, 2014
A House Divided Cannot Stand
http://news.yahoo.com/u-needs-immigrant-children-official-175713681.html
This is yet another situation that is deeply dividing our country. Remember, a house divided cannot stand. Every single thing that is going on in our country you have to view through the eyes of conservative/progressive, right/wrong. You HAVE to remove the emotion from your thought process or you will fall right into the trap this administration has set up.
George Soros is a man that has funded every single thing that has happened in this country since Obama took office. One of his political groups is one that fights for open borders. He's a communist, a progressive, a self-hating Jew that turned in his own fellow Jews during World War II if they possessed anything of value such as land or money. He has collapsed the financial systems of four countries in his lifetime, and the cherry on his evil sundae would be collapsing the financial structure and system of the United States. It appears he's well on his way to accomplishing this through Cloward & Piven. Overload the welfare system and government programs with as many people as you can until the system collapses and people have no choice but to rely on goverment for everything. Hello communism.
You cannot have the One World Order (which is very real and very much coming together very quickly) if you have borders. Removing American excellence and achievement and the borders that keep the world out of our country is key to achieving that. However, the American people are vigilant about watching illegal adults crossing those borders and we have no problem whatsoever about demanding that they be deported once caught. What the Obama administration has done exceeds creepy and evil.
They've made the focus the children. They are sending in children to the work that adults wouldn't get away with here.
By encouraging South American countries to send their children up here, now you have a whole different ball game. What American wants to look bad in the eyes of his or her fellow American by protesting taking care of these poor children that have walked for days or weeks (more realistically they were bussed to within a few miles of the border and told to walk until they cross the dotted line) and have been dumped here with no mommy or daddy and they're in need of care and shelter so we MUST put aside all complaining and take care of the children. Do I feel sorry for these kids? Absolutely. I feel sorry for them because they are unwitting pawns being used by politicians and world leaders. But it is disgusting and despicable for any government to use CHILDREN to further their political advancement by appealing to our emotions (as liberals and progressives are so good at it) by making us feel like hideous turds for demanding that these kids be sent back home. These children come from countries that have diseases we have fought so hard to eradicate in our own country. They bring filth, lice, scabies, intestinal bugs, diseases--problems we have under control here through years of vigilance, cleanliness, innoculations, and research.
We have poverty levels in this country right now that haven't been seen in decades since the Great Depression. We have more Americans on the government rolls for food and shelter than ever before. We have a generation of vets that are living in the streets after they fought in foreign countries to protect our rights as American citizens. We have vets dying because our own Veterans' Administration is so rife with chaos and corruption that brave men and women that served our country proudly are dying on gurneys and in hospital beds because the red tape and ignorance are so thick that dying is sometimes the ONLY way out for these dear men and women. And then some politician says we need to "do right" by these kids?
As a mom and as an American, dear Mr. or Ms. Politician, you can kindly shove your guilt trip up your ass, if you can find room alongside your head that's already buried deep up there. My father, all three uncles, ex husband, husband, daughter, and son-in-law and countless friends and honorary sons and daughters of mine served this country proudly and are FAR more deserving of being taken care of than these poor kids that you're using as political pawns in a chess game that spans the world.
As Americans, square your shoulders, set your jaw, stand tall, quit worrying about political correctness and the worry that you might offend someone and protect our country from being overrun with diseases and chaos that exists already in the countries these kids traveled from. Let your elected officials know in no uncertain terms that the political equivalent of sticking out your quivering lower lip and sad eyes is pathetic to use against a country of people that were BORN Americans but are facing having EVERYTHING stripped away in the name of global governance.
This is yet another situation that is deeply dividing our country. Remember, a house divided cannot stand. Every single thing that is going on in our country you have to view through the eyes of conservative/progressive, right/wrong. You HAVE to remove the emotion from your thought process or you will fall right into the trap this administration has set up.
George Soros is a man that has funded every single thing that has happened in this country since Obama took office. One of his political groups is one that fights for open borders. He's a communist, a progressive, a self-hating Jew that turned in his own fellow Jews during World War II if they possessed anything of value such as land or money. He has collapsed the financial systems of four countries in his lifetime, and the cherry on his evil sundae would be collapsing the financial structure and system of the United States. It appears he's well on his way to accomplishing this through Cloward & Piven. Overload the welfare system and government programs with as many people as you can until the system collapses and people have no choice but to rely on goverment for everything. Hello communism.
You cannot have the One World Order (which is very real and very much coming together very quickly) if you have borders. Removing American excellence and achievement and the borders that keep the world out of our country is key to achieving that. However, the American people are vigilant about watching illegal adults crossing those borders and we have no problem whatsoever about demanding that they be deported once caught. What the Obama administration has done exceeds creepy and evil.
They've made the focus the children. They are sending in children to the work that adults wouldn't get away with here.
By encouraging South American countries to send their children up here, now you have a whole different ball game. What American wants to look bad in the eyes of his or her fellow American by protesting taking care of these poor children that have walked for days or weeks (more realistically they were bussed to within a few miles of the border and told to walk until they cross the dotted line) and have been dumped here with no mommy or daddy and they're in need of care and shelter so we MUST put aside all complaining and take care of the children. Do I feel sorry for these kids? Absolutely. I feel sorry for them because they are unwitting pawns being used by politicians and world leaders. But it is disgusting and despicable for any government to use CHILDREN to further their political advancement by appealing to our emotions (as liberals and progressives are so good at it) by making us feel like hideous turds for demanding that these kids be sent back home. These children come from countries that have diseases we have fought so hard to eradicate in our own country. They bring filth, lice, scabies, intestinal bugs, diseases--problems we have under control here through years of vigilance, cleanliness, innoculations, and research.
We have poverty levels in this country right now that haven't been seen in decades since the Great Depression. We have more Americans on the government rolls for food and shelter than ever before. We have a generation of vets that are living in the streets after they fought in foreign countries to protect our rights as American citizens. We have vets dying because our own Veterans' Administration is so rife with chaos and corruption that brave men and women that served our country proudly are dying on gurneys and in hospital beds because the red tape and ignorance are so thick that dying is sometimes the ONLY way out for these dear men and women. And then some politician says we need to "do right" by these kids?
As a mom and as an American, dear Mr. or Ms. Politician, you can kindly shove your guilt trip up your ass, if you can find room alongside your head that's already buried deep up there. My father, all three uncles, ex husband, husband, daughter, and son-in-law and countless friends and honorary sons and daughters of mine served this country proudly and are FAR more deserving of being taken care of than these poor kids that you're using as political pawns in a chess game that spans the world.
As Americans, square your shoulders, set your jaw, stand tall, quit worrying about political correctness and the worry that you might offend someone and protect our country from being overrun with diseases and chaos that exists already in the countries these kids traveled from. Let your elected officials know in no uncertain terms that the political equivalent of sticking out your quivering lower lip and sad eyes is pathetic to use against a country of people that were BORN Americans but are facing having EVERYTHING stripped away in the name of global governance.
Sunday, July 6, 2014
Conservative v. Liberal
Conservative v. Liberal
Conservatives see possibility. Liberals see limitations.
Conservatives see opportunities. Liberals see more work than they want to take on.
Conservatives see logic. Liberals can't see through a cloud of emotion.
Conservatives see potential. Liberals see problems.
A conservative is at point A and wants to get to point B. Begin walking. Even if there are mountains and oceans between you and what you want, begin walking. You will eventually end up at your desired destination and sometimes, another hill arises in your walk that takes you to an even BETTER place than the destination you wanted to go in the first place.
A liberal is at point A and wants to get to get to point B. Sit down and cry about having the disadvantage of your sex, your race, your sexual orientation, your humble beginnings, your lack of opportunity and wait until someone picks you up and carries you to point B. Unfortunately, you may be waiting a very, very long time and in that time, you'll be watching your conservative counterpart arriving at his destination years before you will. Sucks to be you.
Conservatives see someone in a high position in a company and decide they want a high position in a company so they either go to college to get the training and education they will need and are willing to start out in the mail room and work their way up. OR, they begin their own company and surround themselves with people willing to work as hard as they are willing to work, and as they rise, they bring others up with them. Success is more fun when shared with people that stood behind you all the way to the top.
Liberals see someone in a high position and whine that it's not far someone is in a higher position than they are. They don't want to start out at minimum wage, they think they should be paid a living wage no matter how hard they do or don't work. Life isn't fair. People aren't fair. Circumstances aren't fair. Beginnings aren't fair. Being fair is a HUGE thing to liberals. Everything has to be fair. Level the playing field so everyone has the same, no one has more than anyone else so no one feels badly about what they don't have.
That's called socialism.
Conservatives see capitalism as a good thing. Capitalism is business and commerce and using your brain and your talents to make money. With a few exceptions, most business builders (not to be confused with a business owner. Anyone can OWN a business if you fill out the right forms to file with the state. A BUSINESS BUILDER is someone not content to merely be called the owner of a business, but is willing to invest every cell of their being into their business to and be accountable for all that happens, good or bad.) are conservatives. They had an idea or saw an opportunity, knew they could do it. They rolled up their sleeves and jumped in feet first, making sacrifices along the way.
My uncle and aunt are BUSINESS BUILDERS. They had a dream and they worked night and day for years. They made money and they lost money but they took responsibility for everything, good and bad, and embraced the opportunities as they came. My mother watched them with scorn for all the years my father worked for my uncle and complained that they went on trips to Hawaii and vacations as a family, complained that they had things she and my dad didn't have. My aunt and uncle were willing to work hard and take risks. My mother has spent her entire life living in fear of failing was content working for someone else for much less money but complained and whined about not having anything. Conservative v. liberal. Whining is huge.
Liberals see capitalism and commerce as something bad. Something that needs apologizing for throughout the world. Remarkably, though, some liberals make buttloads of money (read: Michael Moore and his franchises of documentaries. The man is worth MILLIONS yet decries the disgust of capitalism and the successes of the very country that allowed him to be successful. Liberals can be quite confusing and many times, I don't even know if THEY know how ridiculous they are to the rest of us.) and do everything they can to apologize for it. Who apologizes for making money? Liberals. They placate their guilt by spearheading what they call philanthropy, donating tons of money to causes usually outside our country, like saving the Amazon rain forests so they're more palatable in the eyes of other liberals that watch them closely to see what they do with their excesses. They must feel good about themselves at all costs. Guilt is a common ingredient in the lives of liberals.
Conservatives see our education system as broken, flawed, indoctrinating, lacking, failing. Conservatives see early childhood as the place to begin teaching your child the basics of reading, language, morals. Mom and dad are the first teachers of children, and those early years are full of character lessons and learning respect for your peers. Homeschooling has picked up steam exponentially over the years because parents are seeing how keeping a close eye on what goes into your child's mind actually feeds them and teaches them something. Conservatives understand that the three R's and moral and character building are infinitely more beneficial to their child than reading about Heather's Two Mommies and Penelope's Trip to Planned Parenthood.
Liberals see our education system as an opportunity to indoctrinate children to think like failures. Liberals see early childhood as a time to put kids into Head Start and separate them from mommy and daddy so they can have their minds molded into thinking like little liberals, little victims. Everyone gets a participation trophy, there are no winners or losers. The L word: Loser. Losing is good. It teaches you to try harder next time. Liberals can't have losers because they don't want you to try harder than anyone else and be better than anyone else. Level playing field, remember? Teach them that if all else fails, you can sign up for food stamps and welfare and let the system take care of you, cradle to grave. Liberals see our public education system as a way to build voting rolls for the Democratic party.
Unless you have considerable inner strength and can get through college actually learning to think and earn a useful degree like Criminal Psychology (proud to say my daughter is pursuing that degree beautifully), about the only thing our colleges are turning out are anti-war protestors and names on the unemployment and food stamp rolls. Four year degrees are a springboard to heading out into the world to build an empire and make a good life for yourself and your family, not majoring in Underwater Lesbian Basket Weaving or the Elizabethan Languages so you can spend mommy and daddy's hard-earned money spent on your college tuition protesting the mysterious 1% and taking dumps on cop cars in major cities across the country, protesting while wearing Nike hats, Columbia Sportswear sweatshirts, planning protests on your Apple iPad, and connecting with your fellow protestors on your Apple iPhones. Protest the corporations while wearing everything and using everything from the corporations.
Did I say hypocrisy is a benchmark of liberalism? There. I just did.
Conservatives want the borders closed YESTERDAY. My maternal grandfather immigrated to this country from Ireland early in the last century. He came in through legal channels, having a sponsor, learning the language, filing all the appropriate paperwork, becoming an American citizen. He built a successful life for himself. Conservatives don't have a problem with LEGAL immigration. But pour over the borders illegally and bring your diseases and pestilences and crime and ignorance with you and we will have a HUGE problem with that. My mother, a liberal, looks emotionally at this. The Mexicans "belong here. They have every right to our happiness." Bzzzt. Wrong answer. Come through the proper legal channels, show us you want to abide by our rules and work hard to be an AMERICAN, you're welcome. Any other way is unacceptable to a conservative.
Liberals like open borders. Eliminating the excellence and high standards of America is key to them. Apologize to the world and level the playing field, don't let our country be greater than any other country. You don't see Americans piling on rafts to Cuba, do you? America is excellent for a reason. Read the Constitution and see why. Our freedoms create success. To liberals, you can't be a success because no one can achieve anything more than anyone else because they don't want you to feel bad about failing. Liberal think is a dog chasing its tail. Eventually the dog gets dizzy and sick and pukes and there you have a liberal trainwreck: Confusion and vomit. And you can't have anyone cleaning up the vomit because it may make someone feel bad about themselves that they're the one that has to clean up vomit.
Conservatives celebrate our country's early years and the men that led us here. Conservatives celebrate the courage and strength it took to come to a strange land, suffer and die for a cause called freedom and opportunity. Were it not for them we'd all have bad teeth and still be having tea and crumpets at 4:00 every afternoon instead of knocking back a beer and a hotdog at a ball park and hearing the crack of the bat against a ball, standing with hats over hearts and singing the Star Spangled Banner at the beginning of sporting events.
Liberals decry the selfishness of our founding fathers for wanting to leave England to come over and take this country from the native Indians, most of which weren't "native" to this place at all, but they themselves actually migrated here like we did. Liberals feel the need to apologize to everyone for everything, resulting in scores and scores of blacks demanding apologies and recompense for slavery, something not ONE of them actually had to endure. But we apologize to them anyway, burying the fact that that the very first slave owner was ACTUALLY a black man. Yeah, that isn't taught in schools. They only hear that crackers want to keep the black man down and that's enough gas to pour on their indignant fire do they can riot and overturn cars in the name of equality.
The BEST comparison of conservatives and liberals I ever heard was this:
You're out in the ocean in a boat. The boat sinks. A conservative rows a boat out to within 30 feet from you, tosses you a life ring, and expects you to swim to it, grab the ring, and swim the rest of the way back to shore.
A liberal rows out to you while you're floating in the water. Another liberal jumps in the water, swims to you, has you jump on their back, grabs a rope tied to the boat, and they're both towed back to shore.
Which one are you? Conservative or liberal? Figure it out and you will know without any doubt just how far you will go in life.
Conservatives see possibility. Liberals see limitations.
Conservatives see opportunities. Liberals see more work than they want to take on.
Conservatives see logic. Liberals can't see through a cloud of emotion.
Conservatives see potential. Liberals see problems.
A conservative is at point A and wants to get to point B. Begin walking. Even if there are mountains and oceans between you and what you want, begin walking. You will eventually end up at your desired destination and sometimes, another hill arises in your walk that takes you to an even BETTER place than the destination you wanted to go in the first place.
A liberal is at point A and wants to get to get to point B. Sit down and cry about having the disadvantage of your sex, your race, your sexual orientation, your humble beginnings, your lack of opportunity and wait until someone picks you up and carries you to point B. Unfortunately, you may be waiting a very, very long time and in that time, you'll be watching your conservative counterpart arriving at his destination years before you will. Sucks to be you.
Conservatives see someone in a high position in a company and decide they want a high position in a company so they either go to college to get the training and education they will need and are willing to start out in the mail room and work their way up. OR, they begin their own company and surround themselves with people willing to work as hard as they are willing to work, and as they rise, they bring others up with them. Success is more fun when shared with people that stood behind you all the way to the top.
Liberals see someone in a high position and whine that it's not far someone is in a higher position than they are. They don't want to start out at minimum wage, they think they should be paid a living wage no matter how hard they do or don't work. Life isn't fair. People aren't fair. Circumstances aren't fair. Beginnings aren't fair. Being fair is a HUGE thing to liberals. Everything has to be fair. Level the playing field so everyone has the same, no one has more than anyone else so no one feels badly about what they don't have.
That's called socialism.
Conservatives see capitalism as a good thing. Capitalism is business and commerce and using your brain and your talents to make money. With a few exceptions, most business builders (not to be confused with a business owner. Anyone can OWN a business if you fill out the right forms to file with the state. A BUSINESS BUILDER is someone not content to merely be called the owner of a business, but is willing to invest every cell of their being into their business to and be accountable for all that happens, good or bad.) are conservatives. They had an idea or saw an opportunity, knew they could do it. They rolled up their sleeves and jumped in feet first, making sacrifices along the way.
My uncle and aunt are BUSINESS BUILDERS. They had a dream and they worked night and day for years. They made money and they lost money but they took responsibility for everything, good and bad, and embraced the opportunities as they came. My mother watched them with scorn for all the years my father worked for my uncle and complained that they went on trips to Hawaii and vacations as a family, complained that they had things she and my dad didn't have. My aunt and uncle were willing to work hard and take risks. My mother has spent her entire life living in fear of failing was content working for someone else for much less money but complained and whined about not having anything. Conservative v. liberal. Whining is huge.
Liberals see capitalism and commerce as something bad. Something that needs apologizing for throughout the world. Remarkably, though, some liberals make buttloads of money (read: Michael Moore and his franchises of documentaries. The man is worth MILLIONS yet decries the disgust of capitalism and the successes of the very country that allowed him to be successful. Liberals can be quite confusing and many times, I don't even know if THEY know how ridiculous they are to the rest of us.) and do everything they can to apologize for it. Who apologizes for making money? Liberals. They placate their guilt by spearheading what they call philanthropy, donating tons of money to causes usually outside our country, like saving the Amazon rain forests so they're more palatable in the eyes of other liberals that watch them closely to see what they do with their excesses. They must feel good about themselves at all costs. Guilt is a common ingredient in the lives of liberals.
Conservatives see our education system as broken, flawed, indoctrinating, lacking, failing. Conservatives see early childhood as the place to begin teaching your child the basics of reading, language, morals. Mom and dad are the first teachers of children, and those early years are full of character lessons and learning respect for your peers. Homeschooling has picked up steam exponentially over the years because parents are seeing how keeping a close eye on what goes into your child's mind actually feeds them and teaches them something. Conservatives understand that the three R's and moral and character building are infinitely more beneficial to their child than reading about Heather's Two Mommies and Penelope's Trip to Planned Parenthood.
Liberals see our education system as an opportunity to indoctrinate children to think like failures. Liberals see early childhood as a time to put kids into Head Start and separate them from mommy and daddy so they can have their minds molded into thinking like little liberals, little victims. Everyone gets a participation trophy, there are no winners or losers. The L word: Loser. Losing is good. It teaches you to try harder next time. Liberals can't have losers because they don't want you to try harder than anyone else and be better than anyone else. Level playing field, remember? Teach them that if all else fails, you can sign up for food stamps and welfare and let the system take care of you, cradle to grave. Liberals see our public education system as a way to build voting rolls for the Democratic party.
Unless you have considerable inner strength and can get through college actually learning to think and earn a useful degree like Criminal Psychology (proud to say my daughter is pursuing that degree beautifully), about the only thing our colleges are turning out are anti-war protestors and names on the unemployment and food stamp rolls. Four year degrees are a springboard to heading out into the world to build an empire and make a good life for yourself and your family, not majoring in Underwater Lesbian Basket Weaving or the Elizabethan Languages so you can spend mommy and daddy's hard-earned money spent on your college tuition protesting the mysterious 1% and taking dumps on cop cars in major cities across the country, protesting while wearing Nike hats, Columbia Sportswear sweatshirts, planning protests on your Apple iPad, and connecting with your fellow protestors on your Apple iPhones. Protest the corporations while wearing everything and using everything from the corporations.
Did I say hypocrisy is a benchmark of liberalism? There. I just did.
Conservatives want the borders closed YESTERDAY. My maternal grandfather immigrated to this country from Ireland early in the last century. He came in through legal channels, having a sponsor, learning the language, filing all the appropriate paperwork, becoming an American citizen. He built a successful life for himself. Conservatives don't have a problem with LEGAL immigration. But pour over the borders illegally and bring your diseases and pestilences and crime and ignorance with you and we will have a HUGE problem with that. My mother, a liberal, looks emotionally at this. The Mexicans "belong here. They have every right to our happiness." Bzzzt. Wrong answer. Come through the proper legal channels, show us you want to abide by our rules and work hard to be an AMERICAN, you're welcome. Any other way is unacceptable to a conservative.
Liberals like open borders. Eliminating the excellence and high standards of America is key to them. Apologize to the world and level the playing field, don't let our country be greater than any other country. You don't see Americans piling on rafts to Cuba, do you? America is excellent for a reason. Read the Constitution and see why. Our freedoms create success. To liberals, you can't be a success because no one can achieve anything more than anyone else because they don't want you to feel bad about failing. Liberal think is a dog chasing its tail. Eventually the dog gets dizzy and sick and pukes and there you have a liberal trainwreck: Confusion and vomit. And you can't have anyone cleaning up the vomit because it may make someone feel bad about themselves that they're the one that has to clean up vomit.
Conservatives celebrate our country's early years and the men that led us here. Conservatives celebrate the courage and strength it took to come to a strange land, suffer and die for a cause called freedom and opportunity. Were it not for them we'd all have bad teeth and still be having tea and crumpets at 4:00 every afternoon instead of knocking back a beer and a hotdog at a ball park and hearing the crack of the bat against a ball, standing with hats over hearts and singing the Star Spangled Banner at the beginning of sporting events.
Liberals decry the selfishness of our founding fathers for wanting to leave England to come over and take this country from the native Indians, most of which weren't "native" to this place at all, but they themselves actually migrated here like we did. Liberals feel the need to apologize to everyone for everything, resulting in scores and scores of blacks demanding apologies and recompense for slavery, something not ONE of them actually had to endure. But we apologize to them anyway, burying the fact that that the very first slave owner was ACTUALLY a black man. Yeah, that isn't taught in schools. They only hear that crackers want to keep the black man down and that's enough gas to pour on their indignant fire do they can riot and overturn cars in the name of equality.
The BEST comparison of conservatives and liberals I ever heard was this:
You're out in the ocean in a boat. The boat sinks. A conservative rows a boat out to within 30 feet from you, tosses you a life ring, and expects you to swim to it, grab the ring, and swim the rest of the way back to shore.
A liberal rows out to you while you're floating in the water. Another liberal jumps in the water, swims to you, has you jump on their back, grabs a rope tied to the boat, and they're both towed back to shore.
Which one are you? Conservative or liberal? Figure it out and you will know without any doubt just how far you will go in life.
Saturday, July 5, 2014
When it's time to walk away.....
December 2003, a young girl contacted us through friends. She was looking for her dad. Mike. He'd left when she was five. He'd married her mother, who for all intents and purposes saw Mike as an opportunity to get out out of the house. She got pregnant so he did what he thought was the right thing and married her. Her parents were Salvation Army chaplains and they'd managed to raise six of the most worthless kids ever to draw a breath. Unfortunately, one of them became Mike's wife. Were it not for some of his friends, of whom I've spoken to, verifying the stories he's told me I wouldn't believe that one person could wreak that much havoc people's lives. By the time he drove out of Kansas he'd lost his career, his house, his self-esteem, everything. He was a broken as a man could be. Hearing his friends all these years relate more stories of her destruction stuns the imagination. She was a lying, thieving, unfaithful, stealing, mountain of chaos. She refused to allow him to see his daughter. The one time she needed a break and sent her out to him for three weeks, the child arrived with a head full of lice. She ended up being absent from much of second grade with lice infestation.
For ten years after she found her father, each time she'd come into our lives it was stressful and tenuous at best. She seethes in anger and won't confront the one person responsible for all that chaos and anger in her life: Her mother. Her dad spent many hours on the phone talking with her, explaining what happened and why. He's apologized over and over for how things were ultimately handled. There comes a time when a man is so broken the only thing he can do is walk away. He spent the first six months of his life after he left Kansas waking up every morning with a gun in his hand trying to come up with reasons NOT to shoot himself in the head. After she found us in 2003, there were times of communication and times of being shut out. We reconnected in 2010 and spent quite a bit of money on her and her children, our grandchildren. We got to meet them in September 2011 and fell instantly in love with all three of those beautiful kids. We planned to move out to where they lived to help with the kids while she finished nursing school and her husband worked at his job, but disease struck Mike and he nearly died from flesh eating bacteria. We had to back out of the move and ultimately, she discovered that having a relationship with anyone is work and decided that we weren't worth the work. Once again, doors were closed.
Fast forward to May when it was discovered that his daughter had hooked up with his mother, a disgusting woman in and of herself. That's when this took a turn of hilarity.
Mike's mom is one of the most evil women I've ever heard of. I've heard story after story by family members in the know of things she's done. In fact, a teacher that Mike and I both had for fifth grade verified the story that Mike had shared a few years earlier of a beating she administered to Mike for a theft she alleged he committed, her bar tips disappearing. Turns out his brother was the culprit, but not before she beat him nearly to death. He returned to school the next day, bruised, bloodied, wincing with pain at every step. The teacher saw the welts and hand marks, bruises and skin tears and begged Mike to let him call the authorities. Mike declined, knowing the result of that phone call would be worse than any punishment she could administer. She pilfered her own father's bank accounts and wrote checks to herself, draining the money, until she had control of all of it. She then went to her remaining brother and her sister (sister being equally a piece of human debris) and told them if they divorced their spouses she'd give them each a sizable sum of money from her father's accounts. Dave, married to his high school sweet heart for over 40 years, told her to shove it. Her sister accepted the offer, not surprisingly.
We have a ringside seat to one of the biggest freak shows in history. A girl looking to put the screws to her father, a woman that wants to put the screws to whomever she can, and the girl's mother, equally slimy (literally) in every aspect of her life. One person using another person using another person using another person. A trifecta of lies, sleaze, underhandedness, subterfuge, sneakiness, deceit. It's a three-way storm of something that defies definition. Each one is about as disingenuous as you can possibly be. And none of them quite understand how very LITTLE the other cares for any of the others. It's a race to the finish line for three women that will ultimately destroy no one but themselves in a quest to hurt the one person that won't give any of them the time of day: My husband.
Our lives are moving on We know we will probably never see the grandkids again and as much as that hurts, we accept it in order to gain the peace of mind that comes with not having any one of these people in our lives. What Mike and I find even more laughable is Laurie's ignorance. She thinks she's found a friend in her "grandma". This is a woman that, the minute she was told Laurie's mom was pregnant, made sure she told EVERYBODY that "the kid ain't Mike's." This was just an attempt to stir controversy and to give Donna (Mike's mom) something to talk about to make her own value seem more important. "Oh, that poor woman, what her son must be going through, being lied to. Let's all feel sorry for Donna."
Neither one of these two, Donna or Laurie, cannot stand not being the center of their own three ring circus. Sure, she'll say nice things about the photos of the kids, her great-grandkids, but Laurie better hope and pray that she does NOT let her grandmother see a picture of her because her father can hear it now: All it will be is how fat Laurie is, Laurie's hair is so long and stringy, how she doesn't look like her dad, that's not something from her side of the family, how short she is, how Mike could not possibly be the father, something he's questioned all along himself because she exhibits none of the traits of her father: The intelligence, the strength, the compassion, courage, common sense. Donna will go on incessantly to all of her so-called friends, she'll chuckle and all the while make Laurie think that she likes her. She has a use for Laurie in her life. How can we say all these things? Mike was unlucky enough to have Donna as his mother. He knows this is all just a giant farce and his daughter is too stupid to know what she's messing with. But that's alright. We're enjoying the building train wreck that's coming and Laurie, I know that people back door their way into this blog because we know you cannot stand to not have your dad react to your stupidity but guess what? You're riding the stupid train and we don't care. You ARE just like your mother and we have no time for any of it. As a matter of fact, the best Christmas, birthday, and Father's Day gift for your dad would be a paternity test because not only is Alison prettier, smarter, and at age 10, taller than you, I know that she is truly your dad's child, 100%.
We can laugh about and just sit back and watch the meltdowns, which inevitably will come because now, this was the perfect time to just walk away.........
For ten years after she found her father, each time she'd come into our lives it was stressful and tenuous at best. She seethes in anger and won't confront the one person responsible for all that chaos and anger in her life: Her mother. Her dad spent many hours on the phone talking with her, explaining what happened and why. He's apologized over and over for how things were ultimately handled. There comes a time when a man is so broken the only thing he can do is walk away. He spent the first six months of his life after he left Kansas waking up every morning with a gun in his hand trying to come up with reasons NOT to shoot himself in the head. After she found us in 2003, there were times of communication and times of being shut out. We reconnected in 2010 and spent quite a bit of money on her and her children, our grandchildren. We got to meet them in September 2011 and fell instantly in love with all three of those beautiful kids. We planned to move out to where they lived to help with the kids while she finished nursing school and her husband worked at his job, but disease struck Mike and he nearly died from flesh eating bacteria. We had to back out of the move and ultimately, she discovered that having a relationship with anyone is work and decided that we weren't worth the work. Once again, doors were closed.
Fast forward to May when it was discovered that his daughter had hooked up with his mother, a disgusting woman in and of herself. That's when this took a turn of hilarity.
Mike's mom is one of the most evil women I've ever heard of. I've heard story after story by family members in the know of things she's done. In fact, a teacher that Mike and I both had for fifth grade verified the story that Mike had shared a few years earlier of a beating she administered to Mike for a theft she alleged he committed, her bar tips disappearing. Turns out his brother was the culprit, but not before she beat him nearly to death. He returned to school the next day, bruised, bloodied, wincing with pain at every step. The teacher saw the welts and hand marks, bruises and skin tears and begged Mike to let him call the authorities. Mike declined, knowing the result of that phone call would be worse than any punishment she could administer. She pilfered her own father's bank accounts and wrote checks to herself, draining the money, until she had control of all of it. She then went to her remaining brother and her sister (sister being equally a piece of human debris) and told them if they divorced their spouses she'd give them each a sizable sum of money from her father's accounts. Dave, married to his high school sweet heart for over 40 years, told her to shove it. Her sister accepted the offer, not surprisingly.
We have a ringside seat to one of the biggest freak shows in history. A girl looking to put the screws to her father, a woman that wants to put the screws to whomever she can, and the girl's mother, equally slimy (literally) in every aspect of her life. One person using another person using another person using another person. A trifecta of lies, sleaze, underhandedness, subterfuge, sneakiness, deceit. It's a three-way storm of something that defies definition. Each one is about as disingenuous as you can possibly be. And none of them quite understand how very LITTLE the other cares for any of the others. It's a race to the finish line for three women that will ultimately destroy no one but themselves in a quest to hurt the one person that won't give any of them the time of day: My husband.
Our lives are moving on We know we will probably never see the grandkids again and as much as that hurts, we accept it in order to gain the peace of mind that comes with not having any one of these people in our lives. What Mike and I find even more laughable is Laurie's ignorance. She thinks she's found a friend in her "grandma". This is a woman that, the minute she was told Laurie's mom was pregnant, made sure she told EVERYBODY that "the kid ain't Mike's." This was just an attempt to stir controversy and to give Donna (Mike's mom) something to talk about to make her own value seem more important. "Oh, that poor woman, what her son must be going through, being lied to. Let's all feel sorry for Donna."
Neither one of these two, Donna or Laurie, cannot stand not being the center of their own three ring circus. Sure, she'll say nice things about the photos of the kids, her great-grandkids, but Laurie better hope and pray that she does NOT let her grandmother see a picture of her because her father can hear it now: All it will be is how fat Laurie is, Laurie's hair is so long and stringy, how she doesn't look like her dad, that's not something from her side of the family, how short she is, how Mike could not possibly be the father, something he's questioned all along himself because she exhibits none of the traits of her father: The intelligence, the strength, the compassion, courage, common sense. Donna will go on incessantly to all of her so-called friends, she'll chuckle and all the while make Laurie think that she likes her. She has a use for Laurie in her life. How can we say all these things? Mike was unlucky enough to have Donna as his mother. He knows this is all just a giant farce and his daughter is too stupid to know what she's messing with. But that's alright. We're enjoying the building train wreck that's coming and Laurie, I know that people back door their way into this blog because we know you cannot stand to not have your dad react to your stupidity but guess what? You're riding the stupid train and we don't care. You ARE just like your mother and we have no time for any of it. As a matter of fact, the best Christmas, birthday, and Father's Day gift for your dad would be a paternity test because not only is Alison prettier, smarter, and at age 10, taller than you, I know that she is truly your dad's child, 100%.
We can laugh about and just sit back and watch the meltdowns, which inevitably will come because now, this was the perfect time to just walk away.........
Friday, July 4, 2014
Independence Day
Here we are, another Independence Day.
Honestly this far into the Obama Administration's rule, I'd have thought that by now this day would be outlawed and we'd have police driving up and down streets in armored vehicles arresting those of us that fly our flags proudly and celebrate American independence from England's tyrannical rule. Instead, we continue embracing our God-given rights we have as Americans. We still have the power of the Constitution watching our backs, and we stand on those words in the Constitution, words penned by men a few hundred years ago, as rebuttals to government authorities that lurk around us in the shadows of dark hallways of Congress and fly over our communities in drones, combing through our e-mails and listening in on phone calls seeking key words, watching us, spying on us, trying desperately to turn us into just another third world country, eliminating American excellence and independence. Today, we are faced with the very possible reality of another tyrannical rule staring us right in the face, far worse than the one that our earliest settlers sailed from. One from our very own government, one that smiles to our faces and glares daggers at our backs. One that shoves phones and entitlements at us with one hand, while snatching away dreams and possibilities from us with the other hand. We have a president that calls the Constitution a "document of negative liberties". In other words, the very words that protect US are the same words that restrict HIM from doing exactly as he wants: Ruling with an iron fist, with his pen and cell phone, bypassing Congress, and making this country a direct reflection of what HE thinks this country should be, and not what our founding fathers wanted this country to be.
Daily I see on Facebook people ranting and raving about our government, throwing around words like militia, revolt, and martial law, making impotent little threats of "I'm going to do ___________ (fill in the blank) and they never seem to get around to whatever they were going to do. As if being vocally active is going to do anything. They try to encourage and, at times, incite, those they know into turning on our government in a bloody row and taking back this beloved country of ours. I see words like, "I feel", "I think", "I', "me", "we". I'm sorry to tell you folks, but it is that VERY mindset, that VERY attitude that has brought us to the brink of losing everything we hold dear in this country. After a while, man thought he had all the answers and when man thinks that, that's when the questions change by the powers that be and we find ourselves knowing NOTHING.
We live in a country with rights coming from God. Beginning in the 1950's, people began thinking God was no longer needed. Prayer was taken out of schools. Where once teachers read the scriptures to their classes before the school day began, that's no longer allowed. Children that take their Bibles to school to read during private reading time are being told they can't bring the Bible to school. You can read stories about Bobby having two mommies or Steven and his two daddies, but our kids can't read the Bible in school. In 1963 Madalyn Murray O'Hair filed a lawsuit, Murray v. Curlett, which banned compulsory prayer in public schools. Today, your daughter can get an abortion without your permission, but your kids can't be led in prayer in that same classroom your daughter who just had the abortion learns in.
Women began working outside the home and after that first taste of financial independence landed on their tongues, they soon found themselves questioning the need for husbands and traditional marriage. I've just finished up six past seasons of Mad Men, a period piece that is brilliantly written and staged. The story of Mad Men first began in 1960 when women were forging roads into the man's world of corporate life and these girls were willing to do any and everything they could to taste the teeniest bit of power and financial freedom that men had been enjoying for decades before that. As time and decades marched on, morals were shoved out the door faster than hemlines rose and before long God was being buried under drugs, free love, multiple partners, swinging, divorce, and cohabitation. The early '70's brought us Roe v. Wade, the legalization of abortion. Decades later 56 million babies have been mercilessly sucked out of their mother's wombs in the name of sexual freedom and choice. Two states now have legalized casual use of marijuana. The sanctity of marriage is being usurped by couples that find it just fine to live with someone without the benefit of marriage. In 1969, the Stonewall riots took place wherein the gay community protested and fought against local police and the gay and lesbian movement was brought front and center to our lives. Today, state after state is falling in lockstep with gay marriage. If you're a Christian and own a wedding business, saying "no" to a gay couple that asks to hire you for their "wedding" is a surefire death sentence for you and your family. You're supposed to encourage and applaud THEIR choice to live the gay lifestyle, but you're destroyed financially, emotionally, mentally, and sometimes physically, if you stand up with YOUR choice to say no to them.
In short, we have chased God our of our lives and out of our country like a starving dog chases a steak. Snarling and frothing at the mouth, the name of God has absolutely NO place in our schools, in our courthouses, sometimes in our own homes. Cities attack residents that hold church meetings in their houses, citing city ordinances for parking violations to keep members and believers from gathering in private homes to worship the Lord. Churches are the last safe haven for God and his believers and I fear it won't be much longer before churches are being monitored, if they aren't already, for those "judgmental, hateful, pious, holier-than-thou, Christians". We can't have people that believe in God gathering for prayer and encouragement of each other to stand strong against the freedom loving and moral squashing humanistic beliefs that are prevalent in today's society.
Today, we keep looking for a man to save this country. For the next great candidate, councilman, mailman, SOME man, ANY man, to save us. We think that standing up to our government is going to right the ship that's going under. We think that MAN and man alone can save this country. And that is where the biggest lie and mistake is found.
MAN cannot fix this. NO man can. NO election is going to bring about the answers we need. Running to the poling place ISN'T going to solve our giant myriad of problems. What will?
Falling to our knees and repenting. Praying. 2 Chronicles 7:14: 14 If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
Repentance. Bowing our heads in humility and turning our faces to God, acknowledging that without Him, we are nothing, we accomplish nothing, we HAVE nothing. Repentance also means that you completely turn from your abominable acts and pursue the righteousness of the Lord. Anything else is just being an unconverted convert. Asking forgiveness for everything we have kicked under the bus that is right and righteous, acknowledging Him as the head of our households and the foundation of our country. God has all the power we keep trying to foist off onto a man or possibly a group of men. But we have asked God to leave. No....we have TOLD God to leave. And to paraphrase Anne Graham Lotz, daughter of the great Billy Graham, "God is a gentleman. If he's asked to leave, he's not going to overstay his welcome."
So, now we are at a crossroads. Our country teeters precipitously on the edge of destruction and we have one of two ways we can go. We can keep allowing the darkness of man to drag us into assured destruction, or we can raise our hands to the heavens, ask Him to forgive us of our trespasses, allow Him back into this country that He gave us (and do not confuse this--God GAVE us this country to be a shining beacon to the world, to show the world how great a nation can be when you live by godly principles). Is this going to happen? Honestly? Likely not. Man's arrogance has become suffocating. Man is convinced he doesn't need God and can do this on his own.
Sadly, the realization that that thought process isn't true will probably come too late for us to right this ship. That doesn't mean that there aren't those of us that seek His face every day and seek his wisdom and guidance for every event and decision in our lives. John Adams said it best. "This nation and this Constitution are meant for a god-fearing and moral people. Anything less will be simply inadequate and the nation will fall into ruin." There are PLENTY of believers, but it's very, very lonely at the top.
So while you're watching firewords and gorging yourselves on hotdogs and hamburgers in the name of Independence Day, remember, independence from God isn't going to do anything to save our country. DEPENDENCE on Him will. Independence from God means the destruction of man, and satan stands at the gate, grinning his evil grin, waiting and watching as human after human ends its journey on the highway to hell, fully consumed with their power, and shunning God's righteous power.
Happy Independence Day. What choice will YOU make?
Honestly this far into the Obama Administration's rule, I'd have thought that by now this day would be outlawed and we'd have police driving up and down streets in armored vehicles arresting those of us that fly our flags proudly and celebrate American independence from England's tyrannical rule. Instead, we continue embracing our God-given rights we have as Americans. We still have the power of the Constitution watching our backs, and we stand on those words in the Constitution, words penned by men a few hundred years ago, as rebuttals to government authorities that lurk around us in the shadows of dark hallways of Congress and fly over our communities in drones, combing through our e-mails and listening in on phone calls seeking key words, watching us, spying on us, trying desperately to turn us into just another third world country, eliminating American excellence and independence. Today, we are faced with the very possible reality of another tyrannical rule staring us right in the face, far worse than the one that our earliest settlers sailed from. One from our very own government, one that smiles to our faces and glares daggers at our backs. One that shoves phones and entitlements at us with one hand, while snatching away dreams and possibilities from us with the other hand. We have a president that calls the Constitution a "document of negative liberties". In other words, the very words that protect US are the same words that restrict HIM from doing exactly as he wants: Ruling with an iron fist, with his pen and cell phone, bypassing Congress, and making this country a direct reflection of what HE thinks this country should be, and not what our founding fathers wanted this country to be.
Daily I see on Facebook people ranting and raving about our government, throwing around words like militia, revolt, and martial law, making impotent little threats of "I'm going to do ___________ (fill in the blank) and they never seem to get around to whatever they were going to do. As if being vocally active is going to do anything. They try to encourage and, at times, incite, those they know into turning on our government in a bloody row and taking back this beloved country of ours. I see words like, "I feel", "I think", "I', "me", "we". I'm sorry to tell you folks, but it is that VERY mindset, that VERY attitude that has brought us to the brink of losing everything we hold dear in this country. After a while, man thought he had all the answers and when man thinks that, that's when the questions change by the powers that be and we find ourselves knowing NOTHING.
We live in a country with rights coming from God. Beginning in the 1950's, people began thinking God was no longer needed. Prayer was taken out of schools. Where once teachers read the scriptures to their classes before the school day began, that's no longer allowed. Children that take their Bibles to school to read during private reading time are being told they can't bring the Bible to school. You can read stories about Bobby having two mommies or Steven and his two daddies, but our kids can't read the Bible in school. In 1963 Madalyn Murray O'Hair filed a lawsuit, Murray v. Curlett, which banned compulsory prayer in public schools. Today, your daughter can get an abortion without your permission, but your kids can't be led in prayer in that same classroom your daughter who just had the abortion learns in.
Women began working outside the home and after that first taste of financial independence landed on their tongues, they soon found themselves questioning the need for husbands and traditional marriage. I've just finished up six past seasons of Mad Men, a period piece that is brilliantly written and staged. The story of Mad Men first began in 1960 when women were forging roads into the man's world of corporate life and these girls were willing to do any and everything they could to taste the teeniest bit of power and financial freedom that men had been enjoying for decades before that. As time and decades marched on, morals were shoved out the door faster than hemlines rose and before long God was being buried under drugs, free love, multiple partners, swinging, divorce, and cohabitation. The early '70's brought us Roe v. Wade, the legalization of abortion. Decades later 56 million babies have been mercilessly sucked out of their mother's wombs in the name of sexual freedom and choice. Two states now have legalized casual use of marijuana. The sanctity of marriage is being usurped by couples that find it just fine to live with someone without the benefit of marriage. In 1969, the Stonewall riots took place wherein the gay community protested and fought against local police and the gay and lesbian movement was brought front and center to our lives. Today, state after state is falling in lockstep with gay marriage. If you're a Christian and own a wedding business, saying "no" to a gay couple that asks to hire you for their "wedding" is a surefire death sentence for you and your family. You're supposed to encourage and applaud THEIR choice to live the gay lifestyle, but you're destroyed financially, emotionally, mentally, and sometimes physically, if you stand up with YOUR choice to say no to them.
In short, we have chased God our of our lives and out of our country like a starving dog chases a steak. Snarling and frothing at the mouth, the name of God has absolutely NO place in our schools, in our courthouses, sometimes in our own homes. Cities attack residents that hold church meetings in their houses, citing city ordinances for parking violations to keep members and believers from gathering in private homes to worship the Lord. Churches are the last safe haven for God and his believers and I fear it won't be much longer before churches are being monitored, if they aren't already, for those "judgmental, hateful, pious, holier-than-thou, Christians". We can't have people that believe in God gathering for prayer and encouragement of each other to stand strong against the freedom loving and moral squashing humanistic beliefs that are prevalent in today's society.
Today, we keep looking for a man to save this country. For the next great candidate, councilman, mailman, SOME man, ANY man, to save us. We think that standing up to our government is going to right the ship that's going under. We think that MAN and man alone can save this country. And that is where the biggest lie and mistake is found.
MAN cannot fix this. NO man can. NO election is going to bring about the answers we need. Running to the poling place ISN'T going to solve our giant myriad of problems. What will?
Falling to our knees and repenting. Praying. 2 Chronicles 7:14: 14 If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
Repentance. Bowing our heads in humility and turning our faces to God, acknowledging that without Him, we are nothing, we accomplish nothing, we HAVE nothing. Repentance also means that you completely turn from your abominable acts and pursue the righteousness of the Lord. Anything else is just being an unconverted convert. Asking forgiveness for everything we have kicked under the bus that is right and righteous, acknowledging Him as the head of our households and the foundation of our country. God has all the power we keep trying to foist off onto a man or possibly a group of men. But we have asked God to leave. No....we have TOLD God to leave. And to paraphrase Anne Graham Lotz, daughter of the great Billy Graham, "God is a gentleman. If he's asked to leave, he's not going to overstay his welcome."
So, now we are at a crossroads. Our country teeters precipitously on the edge of destruction and we have one of two ways we can go. We can keep allowing the darkness of man to drag us into assured destruction, or we can raise our hands to the heavens, ask Him to forgive us of our trespasses, allow Him back into this country that He gave us (and do not confuse this--God GAVE us this country to be a shining beacon to the world, to show the world how great a nation can be when you live by godly principles). Is this going to happen? Honestly? Likely not. Man's arrogance has become suffocating. Man is convinced he doesn't need God and can do this on his own.
Sadly, the realization that that thought process isn't true will probably come too late for us to right this ship. That doesn't mean that there aren't those of us that seek His face every day and seek his wisdom and guidance for every event and decision in our lives. John Adams said it best. "This nation and this Constitution are meant for a god-fearing and moral people. Anything less will be simply inadequate and the nation will fall into ruin." There are PLENTY of believers, but it's very, very lonely at the top.
So while you're watching firewords and gorging yourselves on hotdogs and hamburgers in the name of Independence Day, remember, independence from God isn't going to do anything to save our country. DEPENDENCE on Him will. Independence from God means the destruction of man, and satan stands at the gate, grinning his evil grin, waiting and watching as human after human ends its journey on the highway to hell, fully consumed with their power, and shunning God's righteous power.
Happy Independence Day. What choice will YOU make?
Tuesday, July 1, 2014
The Imagined Fantasy War on Women
I'm sure the little girl in Africa or the Middle East having her clitoris and labia sliced through with a shard of glass and stitched closed with a dirty needle and rough thread by someone that hasn't had a second of medical training, all the while enduring this unspeakable agony with absolutely NO anesthetic whatsoever, and then living a life in fear of being doused with acid or doused with gas and set on fire because someone alleges they've done something in appropriate or offended Allah in some imagined way would gladly suffer through the horror of being denied a pill that ends the "burden" that arrives after a night of great, anonymous sex.
THAT is a war on women.
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