25 Years is a Long Stretch! So...What Has Changed?

Twenty-five years have passed since Gary and I got married on June 18, 1983. Things have changed...differently than the casual observer might think. I'm a bit (never mind how much a bit is) heavier...my hands and face are more wrinkled and I have some gray hair...our wedding presents are now antiques. (That's scary!) There are two more people in the house. Where did they come from? Oh, yes, I remember now. They grew on us! Ha! And my ankle hurts, and it didn't do that back a bunch of years.
Other than that, what's the difference? Oh, yes, new life! I'm alive! I was dead then and didn't know it. I remember that feeling of inadequacy, that huge hole in my middle. I remember that so well, and never thought it would subside. For a while it got worse! And now it's gone.
I know how to fix up things around the house. And I don't think I'd be as afraid to try a new job if I had one; I don't worry about what people think of me; I don't feel alone; my life is no longer meaningless; now, though, work is not my life; my life revolves around important things, things that matter eternally, like family life, and faith.
Still, aside from all that? I still feel like that 23-year-old, basically. There are a lot of things, I think, that haven't changed. Well, maybe. Well, maybe not. It's better! It's really good. Life is really good. God is really great! Other than aches and weight, I'm not just like when I was 23, I'm happier, more confident, more joyful, at peace, and I didn't even have a clue what joy and peace were back then.
How has Gary changed? In many ways, he too is still the same person he was; yet, he's changed of course too. Well, he has a work history in sales,and he will tell you all about it if you ask! He loves his work. He's a dad who takes pride in his kids. He values family life big-time. The church where his dad pastored back then, he called a "social club." And he didn't attend church back then. I don't think he'd call the one we attend now anything like just a social club!
Back then we lived in Portland, and hadn't really become part of a community. Now, having lived in the Puget Sound area most of these years, we have a huge community of friends, of sisters and brothers in Christ, who we love and cherish. I can't imagine having been without them all these years--and with every year it's only gotten better!
We've gone through some tough times, but God has brought us through them, and through those times, we have learned things about God and ourselves, and about what other people go through, that we never would have learned otherwise. God is truly great. What more can I say? I can only praise God for His goodness in our lives, for what He has done, for all that He has done to help us through these 25 years!

25th Anniversary Weekend to Ourselves!

In celebration of our 25th wedding anniversary, Gary and I decided to go away overnight and leave the kids at home--the first time, yes, ever, since we had kids. That is the first time we went off by ourselves overnight in almost 21 years.
I became a bit out of sorts as the time approached. I had said to Gary various times, "You realize it's our 25th anniversary this year, don't you? What are we going to do?" And he'd just sort of say, "Yeah, we ought to do something." And that's where it stood. I finally ended up making arrangements, and by that time, most places worth a darn were already full. We found a place in Bellevue. Not exotic, not extreme, but it was a good out-of-the-ordinary and somewhat posh weekend. And that's saying a lot for this frugal type. Not that I wouldn't be willing to splurge at other times under the right circumstances, given the means and all.
Katie and Tim have an easier time getting along, it seems, when we do go out than when we're at home. We've left them alone together for dinners out about four times. Ever. Two of those involved Gary's work. The others, I think, were other anniversaries. We leave them with movies and fun foods, and it's good. So I loaded them up with all sorts of great food, some healthy, some totally foolish; we made arrangements for our friend Vonna to give them a ride to church, and we left.
We got out at about 2:00 and realized we hadn't had lunch. My first impulse would have been to go through a drive-thru because "we had to get there by" some certain time. But there was no certain time we had to get there by. And after all, it was our 25th anniversary trip, how do you go to Jack-in-the-Box? Kind of ridiculous, no? So we went to the PF Changs at Alderwood Mall and had a really nice lunch there, Almond Cashew Chicken bowls. Gary always seems to order the same things I do, and I always forget and order first, and then I regret it because we end up with the same thing. We talked about my blog entry, about the bucket list, and I told him what was on it and that maybe he should make one too. I think we could find intersections in our list that we could aim for doing--that would be neat. It's not likely that he'll actually do it, but I'll keep on with him and we'll see.
We went down to Seattle; there's a park there by the Arboretum that is called Foster Island. It's one of Gary's favorite places. We walk along the lake where people are paddling rented canoes and kayaks from the University, and then under the end of the 520 bridge (I think), and then to a park-y area where you can see the really big boats come by really close to the shore. It's fun to see them. Quite a lot of sights to see. We sat on a bench and just watched for a long time.
Then we went down to Pike Place Market. I am always struck by the signs that say, "Sanitary Pike Place Market" or something like that. Sanitary? They wish! I always feel immune to about 20 new diseases after I leave there. It looks grimy and the smells overwhelm me. But it's fun, in a way. Lots of interesting sights. I wish I'd had a camera; we remembered after we left but didn't want to go back and get it. I'm never sorry when it's time to go on to something else after the Market, and I always feel like a bad citizen because of it; you're supposed to love the place, aren't you? The rest of the family loves it. I don't.
After all that we headed east to Bellevue. We checked into our room. The front desk was stunning--they had a stone front to it, with lighting behind that accentuated its transparent yellowness and the patterns of different rivers of color that ran through it. No camera, no picture. Sorry.
Then we went to find a place to go for dinner. I had my teeth sort of set for steak. Gary wanted seafood. He thought Ruth's Chris would be too expensive and we went to McCormicks. I was intending to remind myself that this was a 25th wedding anniversary and not to worry about the price. Still, I couldn't bring myself to let go. The steak was too expensive and I chose salmon on a plank with raspberry sauce. Gary ordered the same thing. Darn it! I forgot again to wait until he ordered.
There was a table next to us with six people. Somehow Gary got across to them that it was our 25th, and at one point a few minutes later they all toasted us. All I had by then was an empty water glass and a nearly dry lemonade glass. (We had intended to get some champagne even though we never drink any more, but at $38--whether bottle or glass, I don't know, no difference, it still shocked me--I couldn't do it. I figure it was God's way of stopping us, maybe. I'm a little disappointed, I kind of thought it would be fun to have that heady feeling once again. Someday, maybe.)
By the time we were done we were too full for dessert. We'd pondered the possibility of Cheesecake Factory but didn't. Just as well.
Our room overlooked Wendy's and at 1:30 I was awake, couldn't sleep. It was amazing--throughout their open hours, any time I looked they had about 6 cars lined up there. Who goes to Wendy's in the middle of the night? I guess we're the only ones who don't.
This morning we headed out to go to church. We decided we wanted to check out the University Presbyterian Church. We know of a few people who've gone there and said it was a pretty neat one. We were out maybe an hour early for their last service of the morning. Gary wanted breakfast, and insisted that we stop at Denny's. There was a line up at the door. There was no time for Denny's if we wanted to get to church on time, so we went to Starbucks. Gary said, "But I don't drink coffee." I suggested he get hot chocolate and so he did--hot chocolate and a pastry. I got caramel frappucino. Yum!
The church was overwhelmingly big, but they had a nice service. They baptized about 5 or 6 babies--by sprinkling--and that was the only thing I'd differ with much. The sermon was good, on Colossians 1, and the pastor seemed sweet. It was fun to see something different, but I love our little church all the more.
So in two days we went out to three places for food. What fun! I guess that's not unheard-of when we're on a trip, but usually with the kids along, much of it is fast food. This was overall such a good time.
When we got home, I just about fell over dead. Tim was carrying out the garbage and had a smile on his face. Katie sounded like it was all a good time. They'd watched the Chipmunk movie and some other, and she told her friend Haley later that they'd eaten "trash." It is true, the trash was empty--but I think she meant unhealthy foods...I hope so!

What Constitutes an Easy Life? Could it be a Matter of Perspective and Temperament...or...who your Spouse is

Recently we had some friends over, and somehow whatever subject we were on brought Gary to say that he had had an easy life. Not just, I assumed, in comparison to the bushmen of Africa, or the people living in huts made of aluminum scraps and pallets. I was speechless, but I've had to ponder it since then. He and I, I would think, had for 25 years had the same life, living in the same house and under what I would think were the same circumstances. It made me realize just how much perspective impacts our view of things. Was I stressing myself out to make his life easy, or was he taking it easy such that it stressed me out? I couldn't see that either case was true. Still...
Except in comparison with things like third-world type living, I wouldn't have ever thought to describe our lives as exactly easy over those years. Am I less resilient? Am I weaker? (Well, I guess in a sense I am.) Am I more negative? Less optimistic? (Probably--Gary is indomitably optimistic.)
When I look back and list the things that I see as making up a major impact in our lives together, the stressors stand out, flood my memory banks and impact the content of my writing; if you've read it you know this to be true. I remember being around 30 and wondering how in the world my grandmother made it to 92, being sure that I wouldn't make it nearly as far. I was tired and stressed! (And anemic; that was significant!)
I wonder at Gary, what he looks back and sees: probably each of our trips (and we did have some good ones, by God's grace--usually accompanying Gary on his work travel; once, Gary won a trip to Lake Louise!), the view from our old house in our crazy old neighborhood (the view was the redeeming feature that he loved about it, looking out over Puget Sound; I rarely felt I had time to appreciate it, and tended to focus on the scarier aspects of the neighborhood...), our various friendships over the years, our two healthy kids and the privilege of home schooling them...of course there were good things. Of course. And if that were all I recalled, I'd say we had an easy life, or at least a good life, too.
Many of our stressors have been the type that would more typically hit the wife harder than the husband. Of course our pregnancies and c-sections would affect me more directly; my other surgeries too; but those all affected him as well, if it were only in that he had to keep house much of the time in addition to his work. In the midst of a six-year period of various surgeries and health problems I had, Gary was head usher at church, and it wasn't until we left that church and suddenly became well that I attributed our constant flow of about 10 colds and 2 flus per year to his hand-shaking there. (He does wash his hands--maybe more now than then?) None of those sicknesses in themselves were major, but they added a dimension onto a substrata of stress, primarily mine since I would generally be the nurturer of the sick.
From his perspective, you would expect that Gary was affected as well by his mother's Alzheimers, by her death and his father's death that followed; by his aunt's and uncle's deaths; all the more by our losses of babies. Those all would seem significant even if the other stressors did not exist. He does handle it differently than I do.
In a recent sermon I heard, the speaker related how his own mother valued a husband who provided a meal on the table; he proposed that it was a universal need in the mind of wives. I don't think of the job gaps as central to our stressors, but it didn't make life any easier. It did train me to be all the more frugal, and above that, to have faith in God's provision outside of the usual means. He has always, always been faithful! We never did lack for basic provision. So in my view of that, maybe I am a complainer, a wimp...thinking of the difficulties rather than glorying in God's continual goodness.
Yesterday I told Katie about her father's strange perspective. She immediately had an explanation: Gary was 33 when we married, and had lost no immediate family members before that; his family life was generally happy and supportive. I was 23 when we married, had been hugely impacted by my father's death, and didn't feel especially happy from age 10 until I came to Christ at 29. So if you analyze anything of what we've been through, Gary's been married less than half his life, and I more than half. Since most of the stressors since the stressors in Gary's life have primarily been since we married and many have had to do with my health...you could certainly say that I'm the monkey wrench in the cake batter of life. Gary's single brother Doug has been telling us this all along in his own way: he has a full head of hair, while their married brother Dave's hair is very thin on top and Gary has nothing but the fringe on the sides. Doug once submitted to us that the hairline corresponds to the stress levels that come with marriage. (Sigh.) Perhaps he had a point.

After 25 Years, Married Life is a Blessed Existence

When Gary and I were first married, we weren't believers. We were about the most ill-equipped couple for marriage, and if I were a betting person, I think looking back, I would have placed some strong bets on our marriage not lasting seven years. I was confrontational, and he was non-confrontational--both in the extreme--and this combination led to some hideous disagreements and frustration. The fact that we have made it to almost 25 years is truly only by God's grace, not by any wisdom or power of our own! I can honestly say, though, that the most recent years have been the best, and this last year may have topped all the others; God is so gracious.
It didn't take long for us to discover the first challenge to our relationship. Gary's mom had been in a severe car accident when Gary was 12--and Gary's dad said she had never been the same since. I honestly have never met a person who was more constantly tense than she was. Seven years after we were married we were told that she'd been diagnosed with Alzheimers', but I'm not sure whether it was truly that, or merely a result of the accident and the constant pain relievers and other drugs that she'd taken over those years. When I first met her, I remember being amazed--I'd never met anyone who was so stuck in an era; she dressed, cooked, and lived as if she still were in the 50's or 60's. (I'd never seen tomato aspic, for example, until we went to their house.) The most troubling thing I remember from that first meeting was that when she gave me an empty dish back to take home, she was desperate to put it in a filmy old plastic bag with a much-used twist-tie wound many times to close it. When I said I didn't need the bag, she became very agitated. This was my strongest initial clue that she might have some trouble going on in her head.
Between her desire for control (plastic bags turned out to be the least of it), Gary's desire to please her, and his non-confrontational nature, I found myself continually coming out on the short end of the stick--so after visits with his parents, I found myself venting at Gary all the way home, fuming and frustrated. This became an awful cycle, and eventually, after Katie was born, I withdrew from their family gatherings, because they seemed to cause more harm to our relationship than good. Though this is far from the ideal outcome, in retrospect I think it was probably the best thing I could have done until I could develop some insight and self-control--at the time my withdrawal was the only solution, given the circumstances.
I received Christ when I was 29, and so while I still couldn't solve the problem, at least I had the power of prayer--no small thing; through it God gave me a useful outlet, a shoulder to cry on so to speak, and He came to my defense in various ways. It was the day after I'd been taught at a woman's retreat to give my problems to God and not take them back upon myself that He brought my in-laws to our house and we were finally told she'd been diagnosed with Alzheimers--two years previously.
From that point on, she became harmless as a kitten. She seemed to lack the fight that she'd had before, to realize that she'd lost hold on the ability to run things. Things became much easier for me, and Gary's dad knew what I'd gone through--his life, of course, hadn't been easy either.
During that time, Gary got a job in the pharmaceutical sales field, which he'd been trying to do for a couple of years. He started traveling about one week per month, and when he was home, he constantly had work to do. I started feeling like a single mom with a paycheck. I was constantly overwhelmed and our relationship wasn't exactly thriving. We hadn't really had any time to get it back into shape before he had started diving into his work...and this continued throughout his time in pharmaceutical sales, about 15 years. Having him so work-oriented was a hard thing to argue with: who can say that a man shouldn't work hard? It's considered a virtue, and a friend during that time was constantly telling me how her husband hated his job; that made it a little easier for me that Gary so loved his.
It took me a long time to realize that Gary's non-confrontational nature, even with its drawbacks, has also had its benefits. If we'd both been confrontational, we might never have lasted a year. The fact that he doesn't take up every issue has made life easy for me in the everyday aspects of life; I know of husbands who pick their wives apart for how they housekeep, how they cook, and whether they're overweight. Maybe it would be good for Gary to speak up more to me; I'd probably have had to develop more self-discipline, but I don't know if I could have coped with all the stresses we already were dealing with plus that type of control.
Now he's between jobs. Due to his age and a downsizing, he was laid off from his first pharmaceutical job after seven years, the year that he was top in sales in that company. Since that time, he has worked as a contracted sales rep--which means a rhythm of about a year and a half with a company, and then a job search. A one-year stint with a beverage company continued the cycle. Usually job stresses add problems to a marriage; in our case they've helped it. We've had to work together in the job searches, and to reconcile issues as they arise. I've also learned not to make a big issue of little things. Our having to work together, and the very fact that we've had so much time together, have been very therapeutic for what had been a very dysfunctional and seemingly rather hopeless situation. Gary's trouble in the job realm seems to be teaching him to rely more on God's power, and the sweetness of our church has greatly helped to draw him closer in this regard as well. Our communication has improved and increased, and overall, we're living in a very blessed time in spite of our finances taking a downward spiral. Even compared to our lives before marriage, our life is at its best now, since faith is more at the center of it and was non-existent then. Money is hardly everything; I think of it as just a number. If the number's in the black, so good regardless of how small it is. I don't want to think of what to say if it hits red, but with God's help we can make good of anything.

A Little Statement of Appreciation is Long Overdue

Rarely do I blog much about my husband Gary. Why is this? Well, perhaps because he is gone much of the day and when he's home he's usually tired and quiet--and working, most of the time, lately, on his computer. But I was thinking this morning and I want to give him kudos for having put up with me all these years. It hasn't been easy.
We've been married going on 25 years. Because of the life circumstances that we've gone through, it's been a bumpy ride. First number of years were heavily impacted by my mother-in-law, who neither Gary nor I knew how to cope with. She had been in a severe car accident when Gary was 12, was on pain medications the rest of her life, and her husband said she had never been the same from that time. I'm sure I never really knew her as she had been. Even when we moved up to the Puget Sound region from Portland, primarily to increase distance between her and ourselves, it seemed that she managed to be part of every conversation, which in effect made her part of many an argument as well.
We were not Christians and had no roadmap to cope with this--and it in fact was one of the biggest burdens that drove me to Christ, so for that I am thankful. In the Bible it says that affliction is good, that we might learn His decrees, and I can and will testify that this is the case!
There were also matters to do with job changes--I think Gary has had about 13 of them since we've been married. That has really built our faith. I don't fear the times between jobs like those who've never been through it, because I've seen that God does provide for His own. So in the process also, we had our share of financial struggles. Again, I've seen that God is our Provider and there's really no earthly explanation why our heads are above water financially. He is good!
We lived in an old house in Everett, and though it wasn't because of the house itself (just a couple of blocks from a hospital--good thing!), I associate that house with lots of illnesses and troubles: tough pregnancies, c-sections, loss of two pregnancies including twins, anemia, colic, a broken foot from a car accident, the death of various relatives...the list goes on. Gary's seen me lying on the couch physically unable to cope with basics of life for more time than I'd like to recall, and he has helped me through so much!
Gary's and my temperaments are opposite, and as dogged as I can be, that has not made it easy for him. I can be stubborn, opinionated, bossy, and there are times when I just don't know when to quit pushing buttons. Had Gary not been the type of guy who clams up (much to my frustration), we might still be arguing today on our first argument ever.
Considering that we knew nothing of Christian faith when we met, God has been so gracious to me. We had a neighbor in our old house who was on her second marriage. Her first husband had been a drug addict, and her second was an alcoholic. I was spared these awful things and many more, not because of any wisdom I had but simply God's grace. The thing that drew me to Gary was that he was kind and gentle (not traits that are the core of my being)--and I valued these traits because they are so different from anything I was familiar with in my family.
And so I am thankful for Gary, for his kindness and gentleness, for his ability to put up with me all these years without complaining about my figure, my housekeeping, my attitude, my many flaws. He's more than I deserve, and God is gracious.

A Cooler and Quirky Sleep Time

Yesterday we went to the Fourth of July celebration at the Greens'. We had a lot of things in the van and when we got home late at night, we forgot to bring the cooler into the house. This morning I got up at 7 and cleaned up a bunch of things around the house before I settled down to work on my Excellent Wife Bible study. (I always do this--getting the dishwasher, washer and dryer going helps me feel like even while I sit, things are getting done. I call it getting my "servants" working.) Well, I actually was busy a couple of hours before the study, because first, a neighbor wanted my help sweeping the fireworks rubble from the street, and then the worker came to work on the house siding and I had various things to prepare for his work.
So there I was working on my study finally, and Gary arrived on the scene from his night's sleep. He was still in his pajamas. A couple of times in the midst of conversation he commented how the cooler was still in the van and we should bring it in. Then while he was sitting at the computer, still in those pajamas, he brought it up again. I started to think that maybe the "we" of "we should bring it in" was the same type of "we" that he meant when he said we were winning or losing when he watched a football game on tv. I was getting a little testy with the repeated comment while I was trying to concentrate on my study, so I looked up, and said with a...well, maybe a whine..."Gary..." I looked down at my study, and then had to smile. It was the chapter on "Submission: The Wife's Joy." I looked up at him again, and said with a laugh, "Sorry, Gary, I can't do it. I'm too busy with my Bible study on Submission!"
Here's a funny anecdote not too closely related to this story, but I think it's worth sharing. Later on today, he was telling a neighbor that last night we were up until 2:30 this morning. Hmmm. That didn't make much sense to me. I looked at Katie. She looked confused as well. It seemed to us that we were up until 12:30, late enough but not that late. As we figured it out, we realized that though we were all tired enough to feel as if it were that late, it was indeed only 12:30 and the reason he thought it was 2:30 was because there was something in front of the 1 on the clock in our room. Since it was dark, all he saw were the remaining three digits, and assumed that it was 2:30. I'm glad. We all needed the sleep!

The Excellent Wife Bible study, and memorizing Scripture

Lately I've been doing the Excellent Wife Bible study by Martha Peace, along with Lanae, another woman from church. She was in the same women's Bible study group with me year before last, and I didn't get to know her too well during that time, and have hardly talked to her since until this study. Still, in a five-minute conversation with her, we found by God's provision that we were both intending to do this study this summer and decided to do it together.
I think if I'd tried doing this study a year sooner, I wouldn't have been ready for it. Here I am, 46 years old, having been a Christian since I was 29, and having been married since I was 23. I wish I'd have studied these things back 23 years ago, or 16 years ago...if I had been ready. I've noticed that the study is not only helpful with marriage (a great focus, of course), but since marriage is of course the most vital earthly relationship in our lives, and the study therefore focuses on making the best of that relationship, it is good for all of our relationships in life. I wish there was one that was for young unmarried women, and another for young unmarried men, with a similar setup and without as much emphasis on marriage itself.
Part of what I like about this study is that the author writes with great insight and reasoning.The most impacting portion of this study, though, is of course the Scripture within it. So what I've been doing is what I do whenever I'm trying to memorize Scripture verses: I take the Scriptures that the study references and put them on index cards, and on the other side, I write the first letter of each word in the verse on the back, so I can quiz myself in studying the verse. I rarely can really memorize a verse so that a month later I could tell it to you verbatim, but even without being so sharp as that, I can still get quite familiar with it, and if that's the best I can do, then that is good enough--or at least better than if I never tried.
I take these cards and punch holes in the top so I can put them in a little binder designed for index cards. While I'm focusing on these verses, I keep them there; when I'm done I put them in a little bin of them. I also write what study they're from. Some I've reviewed two or three times since I started on them a number of years ago. At first I was making lots of cards and not putting them in the binder, but then they don't get used and they more or less go to waste--I have enough to fill a shoebox. So now I just make them with that purpose in mind.
This Bible study has a workbook, and so in it I respond to the various issues that are addressed in the book. My friend and I get together at least on the phone, usually once per week, and discuss the lesson. She's much younger than I am and I tell her I envy her learning it so soon in her marriage! What a good thing!
The study is having at least some of its intended effect. I was ready for it. I'm glad I started it, and hope to see that my worst character traits will subside and that I can more consistently be able to be obedient to God, and submissive to my husband as God wants me to be.
Update: Since this writing, I have mentally revised "I was ready for it" to "I thought I was ready for it." The other day, Gary and I had differing points of view as often happens. With this study in mind, I started saying, "You decide, you're the one in auth---auth--well, you decide." I couldn't quite vocalize that thought. But I'm trying. At least the step was in the right direction.

Joy and Hamburger Helper

Today Pastor Sean spoke about Ecclesiastes 2:24-26, and the joy one can find in work, when one lives to please God, versus the futility that unbelievers find in their work. He pointed out that it has nothing to do with the type of work, or whether it is difficult or frustrating, or whether one is able to even finish it. Last week covered some of the same topic, during which, by way of example, cooking with home-grown, home-butchered, home-combined ingredients on a wood fired stove in Bible times was more work than today when a cook takes a box with a bag of noodles, a bag of seasonings, and a bag of sauce mix and cooks it on their super-duper electric stove--and yet both can be joyful or joyless depending upon a person's point of view.
This hit a nerve. Pastor Sean was talking to me again; I didn't know he knew my story about Hamburger Helper and the frustration I find in it. You would think that if anything I would be delighted by its convenience, but I am not. I like to cook from scratch (though I don't home-grow yet; I will grow some fruit and vegetables this summer if God is willing, but I doubt that I will ever grow animals for food and/or butcher them), and I don't really relish the idea of sitting down to Hamburger Helper. It's helpful, I'll admit, to have it when I'm unexpectedly kept out for the day and have to make dinner in 20 minutes.
Here's the typical scenario that I find: I might make 40 different dinners in pretty regular succession from scratch at our house, and I enjoy doing that. The process of thinking up a meal that can be made from ingredients we have on hand, finding a recipe for it and adapting it to our tastes and ingredients or to make it healthier; then browning the meat, peeling and chopping the vegetables, making the sauce, cooking the noodles or rice, and bringing everything to be done at the same time and before people are hungry enough to eat my arm...I enjoy the challenge of it. So I make the 40 dinners and don't generally hear any comment from my dear husband in appreciation. I'm sure he appreciates it and means to cast no slur on the meal; however, it doesn't occur to him to say so. But the night I make Hamburger Helper, that stuffer of stomachs necessitated by a stressed schedule, well that night, I invariably get a comment. My husband loves that stuff! I think it brings him back to his childhood when his mother made it. She was a working mom, and back then Hamburger Helper mixes were a novelty dream for the working woman, as for some they are still.
Yes, I think I get joy in the process of the usual making dinner. I'm glad that my husband's comments aren't what I live for, though I like to please him and feed all the family nutritiously. I often thought it would make sense to give up and make Hamburger Helper every night, but I can't picture it happening. Now I think I might understand why God built joy into the other form of cooking. Though I know not everyone looks at it that way, I like to think He sees the value in the variety and the process as well.

Come to Me, and I will Give you Rest

The first lesson I learned as a Christian was to give it all to God--and not to take on for myself those things that only God has the power to determine. I can only think of two times since then that I have been unable due to my own stubbornness to let my worries rest with Him; other than that they have been His--what a blessing! "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls." Matthew 11:28-29

One of the first amazing answers to prayer I received once I came to know Christ had to do with my crippled relationship with my husband Gary's mother. (For the purpose of privacy I'll give her a fictitious name; let's call her "Midge.") I don't mean any disrespect to her personally--at the end of my story you'll understand what I mean, and I understand if you disagree at this point.
For me, Midge was in so many ways at the time the classic movie mother-in-law, and I thought at the time that I could write a book on the oh-so-many stories I had to tell. Not a thin book. An authoritative tome! I had kept a stack of letters from her at the time, with which I could document much of what I said if I perceived the need. (Yes, I was bitter--to put it mildly.)
I tried to get along with Midge. How to gain her favor just eluded me. I do believe to this day that I was polite, tried to be pleasant, and managed to hold my tongue quite well. (However I know I also did many things that messed it up, mostly through no intentions of my own.) Midge had known her first daughter-in-law Janet and her parents for so many years, and had accepted her quite well into the family. But my family of origin didn't want anything to do with Midge, and perhaps that insult was one cause.
Looking back, I think Midge also expected that when we married we'd suddenly be financially set--maybe that we'd have some sort of inheritance or huge financial gift given us. I think so because she gave us a subscription to Money magazine one Christmas, and she constantly stressed the importance of a 401(k) (which I know is wise enough but we couldn't consider it at the time); there were other reasons as well. Maybe the fact that we were poor was attributed to me somehow. Whatever.
At any rate, hurt feelings were piling up, and it got so that if we anticipated a visit with them, I would have an anxious stomach-ache that would last until the event was over.
As I related in my last blog, I would bring the latest story to work, and I'd get sympathetic laughs from the hearers. There was huge pent-up hurt, and it was messing up my life and our marriage. Though we'd moved from Portland to Everett basically to create distance in that relationship, Midge was at the core of every meaningful discussion (read, "argument") that we had.
I remember at one point, while running errands, thinking that God was working so slowly on this problem, I suppose because I'd been dealing with it for 9 years. By now I'd barely come to Christ, but it seemed like my prayers weren't getting answered. It seemed to me as if God would answer other people's prayers but not my own. I dared become somewhat indignant in my prayer that day, which I don't recommend. God was gracious not to show me at that moment what He was capable of!
We were attending our first church, and though it wasn't a great church, there was for a short season a wonderful Christian woman, Judy, attending who was in charge of women's ministries. I attended a women's retreat there; remember I had lots of pent-up emotion and by this point I was a brand-new Christian. I sat down in the main room with all the other women; center seat on a couch between two others. All avenues out of the room were packed with women seated two or three deep.
We were handed song sheets as the first activity of the day. I read the title of the first song. "God will make a way." My eyes welled up. I read the words of the song: "God will make a way, when there seems to be no way. He works in ways we cannot see; He will make a way for me. He will be my guide; Hold me closely to His side; With love and strength for each new day; He will make a way; God will make a way." I couldn't hold it in any longer. Even now I have tears in my eyes remembering how directly the message of the song spoke to me. I had to leave the room; flustered, I got up from the couch. Of course my anxiety mounted because I had to disturb various women on the way out!
Well, suffice it to say that they didn't get to singing the song. Women crowded around me and tried to comfort and assure me. I so wished to be alone and was so mortified--yet it was so sweet at the same time; a new experience to be sure. I finally went upstairs and had my good cry, and regained my composure. A long while later I went down with the remnants of a strongly puffy face and sat on the steps listening, keeping what distance I could for the time being.
Judy spoke to the group; she was telling how when we give a burden to the Lord, we so often want to continue carrying it for ourselves anyway. The best way, she said, was to give it all to Him; don't hold back anything, don't carry it yourself. He will carry it for you. She asked us to take some time, then, for prayer, to give our concerns all to Him. That was so perfectly timed for my need. I had been carrying this problem with Midge (and no doubt making it worse by all my dwelling on it), and it was like I'd given Him three pieces of a 300-piece puzzle, and expected Him to work it out.
I went outside and sat in a solitary spot. It was such a relief to pray giving Him the whole thing. I told Him, "I don't understand anything about Midge; I don't know why she hates me so much. I don't know why I can't please her. I can't fix it. Please help me!"
Without my knowing it, Gary was that same day calling his parents to come up to Everett and work it out between them and me. He too was exasperated with the problems we had. So when I returned home, it was only a few hours before they were to arrive.
When they came we sat in the living room and discussed how we weren't getting along. Nothing was working: I asked Midge if we could go to counseling, and she flatly refused. I asked her why she hated me so much, and she stood up and yelled, with fists clenched, "Because you married my son!" Boy. I could only mutter that he married me, too.
I told her that the letters she wrote were hurtful and asked why she would write some of the things she did. She got angry and denied that she had written them. I brought them out. She went out the front door and I could hear her comforting Gary for the lousy wife he had.
Inside, Gary's dad was addressing me. "She's sick," he said. I thought to myself that even the last stages of cancer wouldn't justify the things she said and did. "She's got Alzheimer's. She's been diagnosed for two years." He'd kept it a secret for two years from anyone. I was the first person he told, because it affected me the most, apart from himself. Even their own three sons had not been told. Suddenly everything she had ever said or done to me was like various writings on a chalkboard, and it was all suddenly washed away.
In spite of the huge issue that I made of each thing that she ever said or did at the time, I hardly remember any specifics any more. I used to think that our forgiveness of others had to be in spite of remembering the offense; that God had an advantage in being able to forget our sins. Now I realize that over time, when we forgive others, the forgetfulness of the details comes as a blessing. That day, God enabled me to forgive Midge. I'm thankful that He gave me such a clear explanation; I hope I could have eventually grown to forgive her without it.
Imagine--she'd been diagnosed two years (and perhaps been dealing with it before I met her, 9 years before)! And yet, God chose the day after that prayer to reveal the problem to me. From that point on, she seemed to be aware that her influence had come to an end. She honestly was much easier and sweeter-natured any time I saw her from then on, though the trappings of Alzheimers gave her a whole realm of other problems. She lived about 4 more years. Though most of their friends were quite old, and she had been so unpleasantly sick for so long, she still had about 100 people at her funeral. This convinced me that they had known a Midge that I had never met--that once she had been a sweet, kind, loving and beloved friend to many.