Monthly Archives: February 2009

“Remember, man, you are dust
and to dust you will return.”
(Genesis 3:19)

It is difficult for many people to understand why Catholics wear ashes on their foreheads on Ash Wednesday.  After all, Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead.  In that one perfect sacrifice, all was fulfilled, and the only thing left is for us to accept the work that has already been completed in Jesus.

Exactly so!  Jesus’ death and resurrection took care of everything.  There is nothing we could have ever done, or ever can do, that would have atoned for our own sins, let alone the sins of the entire world.  And that is the point, actually.  We are nothing more than dust, and without God, we have no meaning, no purpose. It is only through Jesus that we can ever hope to become something more.

But it is so easy to forget what God did for us.  So easy to become self-reliant, self-sufficient.  We can easily begin to believe that we are ‘good enough’ and that we don’t really ‘need’ God.  We are lulled into believing that we’re special, of our own accord.  Unless of course we find ourselves in dire circumstances, in which even atheists start to call upon the name of the Lord!!

So, on Ash Wednesday, we wear ashes on our foreheads to remind ourselves of who and what we really are.  And, most of all, they remind us why we need the amazing God who was willing to sacrifice His only Son on a cross to lift us from the ashes of death to the glories of eternity.

Things have changed so much since Gaylon and I first looked for a home. Back in the old days, you had to pour over the classifieds in the local newspaper to find a place to live. Not today! Yesterday, Gaylon and I spent two hours on the phone while I looked up houses for sale on Realtor.com, and gave him the directions to get to each one. Then, he would drive by and tell me what he saw, while I looked at the “Birds Eye” view of where he was on Google Maps! (Yeah, you think the government can’t watch your every move. . .)

We found several that were pretty cool. When I go out next month, I will look at them with him, in a more traditional way, LOL!

And just a little sidenote: we noticed that the more expensive neighborhoods had very few trampolines, but the less expensive neighborhoods had them in seemingly every-other-yard. Swimming pools seemed to be about the same in both. What’s up with that???

Limbo -

n.   pl. lim·bos

1. often Limbo Roman Catholic Church The abode of unbaptized but innocent or righteous souls, as those of infants or virtuous individuals who lived before the coming of Christ.
2. A region or condition of oblivion or neglect: Management kept her promotion in limbo for months.
3. A state or place of confinement.
4. An intermediate place or state.

[Middle English, from Medieval Latin (in) limbō, (in) Limbo, ablative of limbus, Limbo, from Latin, border.]

So, this is how I am feeling.  Like I am in Limbo.  Gaylon is in Texas, and we are in North Carolina, and the whole thing is just really surreal.  We love North Carolina, but we need to be where there is work.  And we really need to all be together again.  We are praying really hard that God will send a buyer really soon.  We know the economy is terrible (doesn’t take much more than a lab rat to figure that one out) but we also know that with God, all things are possible.  So, if anyone would like to pray in agreement with us that our home will sell really soon, we would appreciate it.

I promise to be more “upbeat” next time I post.

One more thing:  about Limbo.  “Limbo” is NOT an official Catholic dogma, just a popular belief.  The Church DOES NOT teach that unbaptized children don’t go to Heaven.  That’s why I crossed out the first definition of Limbo above. This post is not in any way meant to open up some weird discussion about theology.

Ready for the Father/Daughter Dance

Today has been a really wonderful, busy, day. This afternoon, we attended the Annual Homeschool Valentine’s Skating Party.  It is always a lot of fun, and the kids love it.  Alex gets to flirt with all the pretty girls, (and for some reason, they flirt back) and Faith gets to hang out with her friends.  I get to visit with all of my friends and try to not eat all of the amazing goodies that everyone always brings.  It is hard to believe that this is our 14th such party.  The skating rink has undergone a massive makeover during that time, and many of the faces have changed over the years.  I remember Kendall learning how to skate there, and today he couldn’t join us because he was in class. . . at college!!!  Wow. . . I can’t believe how old I’m getting!!!

Tonight, Gaylon took Faith to the Father/Daughter Dance at our Church.  Faith has been so excited for weeks now, looking forward to her special night with her Daddy.   She got all dressed up, and I even let her wear a tiny bit of makeup for the big event.  Gaylon made sure that he flew in from Texas this weekend, just so he could be here to take her to this dance.  They are so crazy about each other, and I think it’s wonderful.  I never had that sort of relationship with my own father, and am so grateful that God has blessed me with a husband who is crazy about our children.  It’s awesome!

Tomorrow morning, I will make my traditional Valentine’s Day breakfast of heart-shaped pancakes, and we will all stuff ourselves.  Food = Love, right?   Then, tomorrow night, it will be my turn to celebrate Valentine’s Day with Gaylon!  All of the kids are spending the night with friends, and Mom is even going down to a “Pajama Party” with some of her friends down in South Carolina.  So, Gaylon and I will have the house to ourselves for the entire night. . . I can’t remember the last time that happened!!!  Now our biggest decision is whether we want to have cornish hens or grilled steaks.  Ummmm . . .

Perhaps everyone’s households are as bizarre as ours, and they just don’t talk about it. If that’s true, I’d love to hear from others about the weird things they experience in any given day. Our household is never dull! For example, we have six cats. That in itself keeps things exciting. But two of them only sleep on their backs, which is a very strange sight.  Cats also make navigating the stairs a bit tricky, since they love to lay across the steps, and we’ve had as many as 4 cats lounging on the stairs at one time.

Then there’s Faith’s cat, Bandit. Bandit has more personality than any cat I’ve ever known, and more than most people, for that matter. He is forever getting into trouble! And he does strange things, like lay his head on the side of his water dish, and just sort of roll his head to the side when he wants a drink. However, the other day I found him laid out in the most ridiculous position on our couch, and I had to take a picture.

Jabba the Cat

But the weirdness in our home is not restricted to our cat population.  My children are very strange, too!  I mentioned in my last post that Faith had been playing with an 8″ model of a human skeleton.  Faith is my ‘normal’ child.  For example, when she bought fish for her new aquarium yesterday, she couldn’t wait for Kendall to come home so she could show him.  His comment, upon seeing her carefully prepared aquarium housing two new Guppies and one tiny red snail was, “Mmmm, tasty!”  Faith’s response?  “No, they’re not big enough to eat!  But even if they were, I wouldn’t let you.”  Um, okay.  And, while they may not be big enough to eat, there will be enough of them for a meal very soon.  One of them, I’m told, is pregnant.  Oh, great!

And, last, but certainly not least, there’s Alex.  He would be terribly hurt if I didn’t explain that he is my ‘weird’ child.  No worries, he certainly qualifies!!  He is always creating new songs on his guitar, and most of them are beautiful.  Some however, well, sound like a train wreck!  But, I’m thinking he may be working on some sort of new look, based on the big hair of 1980’s Hair Metal.  This is what he showed up with last night:

Sir Alex of the Freaky Hair

He was really proud of his new ‘look’.  In fact, he got up this morning and did it again, then topped it off with some sort of plaid hat that might remind you of an old Bogart detective movie.  Kendall couldn’t really say anything.  After all, his hair used to be Neon Blue.

I have had my own website for almost five years now. Not long after I published my first website (Brooks Bunch of NC) I decided to start up a blog. I used Bravenet for a couple of years, then switched over to Typepad, and ultimately Gaylon convinced me to get my own domain and I started using Wordpress here, which I really do like. Why am I telling you this? To make the point that before MySpace, and before Facebook, I had a website!! My own website, and I didn’t use a template, I wrote the code myself. I confess, I’m an internet snob.

But everyone told me I needed to get on MySpace, so I did. And it’s okay, but it really is, for the most part, for kids. There are plenty of “grown-ups” on it, but it still has such a high school feel to it. And I would have loved something like that when I was in high school. I have to admit that I was offended when my brother found my MySpace and thought that was my website. Yeah, snobbery again.

Then I started hearing that Facebook was taking over the world, and that it was much better than MySpace. But I was pretty sure it was just for kids in high school and college. Until my cousin’s wife (Hi, Laura!) sent me an “invitation” to join FB. So, I thought I’d try it out. It made sense, since both of my boys have Facebook accounts, I could see what they were up to.

It was completely bewildering at first. But then, bit-by-bit, I starting finding friends there. The first real breakthrough was when a lot of my friends from our homeschool support group got on there. Then I started finding and being found by people I went to High School with. Most of them still look a whole lot better than I do, but it’s still cool to “talk” to them again. Some of them have posted a lot of old high school pictures. Wow. . .the 80’s really was the decade of the Fashion Rapist!!!

And now, my mom wants to get on Facebook! Wow. She is still email resistant, so I’m not sure how much she’ll get out of FB, but we’ll give it a go.

Now I have to go do school with Faith. . .which is always interesting. Yesterday I found her playing with an 8″ model of a human skeleton, putting erasers on it’s feet for shoes. Yeah. I’m thinking she was not really getting into that math test she was supposed to be doing! Today we’re going to study rocks and Ancient Greece, I think. Last week we spent the week learning how to do Power Point. It’s never dull!

I am so amazed by Jennifer Hudson! Wow, that woman can SING! Her rendition of the National Anthem was one of the best I’ve ever heard. And, having heard it, I am now done with the Super Bowl, because I couldn’t care less about the Steelers or the Cardinals.

I did love the “Pre-Game Show”, though. Very patriotic, and I think that is exactly what we need right now. These are scary times, and everything seems so uncertain. We have a president who is working very hard to make sure that thousands of tiny preborn Americans never see the light of day, and while he’s at it, he’s going to make sure that our tax dollars go to help lots of preborn babies in other countries be denied their basic right to life, as well. The economy is crumbling and things look very bleak.

So it really is encouraging to see thousands of people come together to cheer for their teams and enjoy the evening. It was cool to see the “Fly-by” after the national anthem, too. There is just something awesome about that. As I said before, I don’t care who wins, but am glad to see some all-out patriotism on my television for a change. This is STILL the greatest country this world has ever seen, and hopefully it will continue to be so.

God Bless America! (And GO SPURS!!)