Chapel of Hope Stories

Dear Reader:

I had several ideas for today’s blog but I, soon, realized it was probably going to end up a “smorgasbord” of photos and ideas….so Boo’s Blessings should cover it all.

Since this is the first day of February with Valentines Day winding its way closer and closer, I thought I would jump ahead of the season for once and go on and put up a heart and leave it for the whole month…because actually my own heart is  much lighter today than earlier.

I made the mistake of “assuming” since my blood count has been low when checked at the oncologist’s check-ups that my (every third month) check-up with blood work included, would be low too at my primary doctor’s office. Instead Dr. Montoya came in waving the lab work smiling….the change from one medication to another has definitely affected some former negative side effects… positively.

Without going into a lot of medical  mumbo-jumbo…my body is starting over with this new chemo regime and we are waiting to see how many medical issues have been side-effect consequences from the earlier drug and how many can be directed solely at me and my body at my age.

It is an on-going mystery to solve…but we get closer each time. I think what has taken me awhile to understand is that a person can have blood work done at two different places with totally different outcomes because different items are being checked within different health issue perimeters.

So last Friday at the oncology office…the news was cautiously optimistic and hopeful that the blood count will continue to improve while “little c” is targeted for containment and shrinkage. Yesterday, Tuesday, my primary doctor was looking for overall improvement in on-going health challenges and got a good report.

Dr. Montoya said that immediately upon reading the lab report, she knew something drastic had changed…Becky must be on a new medication. She was right!

So hope is feeling tangible again…so much so that I went to Simple to Sublime and got my brand new, cloth letters to put up on my deck for this year. Our family has a wedding coming up and so many happy occasions that these ‘hopeful’ lab reports sent me climbing into my happy place. I just want to be around for all these happy family occasions.

*Harriett decided her word for 2017 is HOPE because she, too, wants to be around for as long as she can for these latest two precious grandchildren.

I am sure Harriett would agree with me when asked “How are you this morning?“ (like Ann asked the cook at the Sea View Inn) who responded “I am blessed.”  We all are blessed in our lives with family, friends, and adorable pets…and God’s Presence in our lives.

Besides the four cloth letters spelling HOPE, I also got this wooden plaque that jumped out at me…another lesson in listening instead of chattering and advising off the top of my head.

Doesn’t it seem that when you get good news sometimes…everything changes during the day….you are more aware of the beauty of this world right before you? Here are some examples: From Japanese tulip trees to my first Yellow Jessamine blossom on the back fence…winter is still here…but slowly the transition is beginning to makes itself known…”Hello Daffodil!”

Aren’t these all signs that God is present during transitional times in our lives and will be there for every season in our lives?

So despite what the groundhog sees or doesn’t, in reference to his shadow tomorrow, we all know that in the lowcountry we will continue to see “elevator” weather…up and down, up and down, for a few more weeks…until we finally land at the top floor and know summer has arrived early again!

Michele Robertson saw a short devotional on listening that corresponded with one of my earlier blogs, a few days back, and sent it to me. Thanks Michele for sharing!

The Moments That Sustain Us

Psalm 145:1-5

Does peace come naturally for you, or does it feel like a constant struggle? Sometimes it seems as if so many things are actively working against our peace that our spirit may never know a moment’s rest. How can we quiet distractions long enough to hear God’s voice?

The key is found within a word that may make you uncomfortable: meditation. Perhaps you’re thinking, All that meditation stuff is what other religions call “finding yourself.” I’m not going to waste my time with that. What a horrible misconception. My friend, meditation is not about listening to yourself; on the contrary, it is about quieting your own mind and listening for the gentle whispers of the Lord.

Think about your prayer life. Whose voice is more prominent—yours or the Father’s? For most people, the vast majority of prayer time is spent talking to God, thanking Him for what He’s done, and asking for help. There is certainly nothing wrong with this, but if you never give Him time to answer, how will you know what He wants to communicate to you?

The time we spend listening is a good indication of how much we respect and enjoy the relationship. If we dominate the conversation, then we may be showing God by our actions that His opinions are not as important as our own—we’d never say those words so plainly, but our actions may be proclaiming that very message.

Are you listening to God? Commit to listen quietly for what He wants to share with you.

So until tomorrow…May we feel blessed each day, each morning, for the gift of life…for another good day!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

*Don’t forget it is the first day of February so say “Rabbit” for good luck! I put the Valentine wreath over the bunny in the front yard planter and noticed, that it is aging… getting many brown spots….just like its owner!

Dear Reader:

A conversation with a friend triggered an “AHA” moment recently. She was telling me that some retired friends of her, a couple, had gone to one of the auditoriums in Charleston to hear a talk on memory loss. Later, at church, the wife told her she found it most interesting…particularly one piece of information shared. The  speaker emphasized that we all forget nouns faster than any other sentence part with memory loss…starting primarily with proper nouns since we don’t always use them on a regular daily basis.

“Yes!” that’s right” I thought to myself. Now that explains a lot of things. ***Please raise your hands if you have experienced any of the following embarrassing situations. (Misery loves company)

You walk in a room to get something and then you just stand there, feeling like an idiot…wondering what it was you were going to get? You call a business number and then panic as the phone rings because you can’t remember the person’s name you’re suppose to be asking for…someone you have talked with on several occasions. And finally, my worse scenario, I am excitedly telling someone about a movie or television show I like and then I can’t remember the name of it or perhaps the actor or actress who stars in it.

I decided to ‘google’ memory loss and honestly wish I had not. Thank goodness I don’t remember a lot of the complicated medical terms, which basically meant you’re getting older and your brain is losing a certain percentage of its “stuff’ each year that affects memory retention. (I decided after reading the article…that I am doomed…between numerous bouts of chemo plus cholesterol-lowering medicines…(two potential causes of memory loss) it “ain’t” looking good.)

One memory loss condition (definition) however, did bother me, because it really hit home. It was something called anomic asphasia or something like that…it is when you can’t remember the noun or proper noun you want to recall but you can give detailed clues about the person or thing. I do that a lot!

In fact it happened at Pawleys, a couple of weeks ago, during our THIS IS US television episodes marathon… the last Sunday we were at the beach before leaving. You might remember, that after a few days of 70’s and blues skies, the temps dropped over the weekend, the wind picked up, and it poured. We made the decision to wait and leave the next day, Monday instead of that rainy Sunday.

We were “inaugurated” out by then, since we didn’t care what the number in attendance was at the Inauguration (???) and a couple of us had started watching the wonderful new fall television series, THIS IS US. We had missed several episodes while the rest of the Ya’s had never seen it. So before we went to bed Sunday night we literally got caught up on every episode in 2016 and even the first episode in 2017. What a great show!

We would only pause for bathroom and snack breaks…but that was it. We were glued to each episode, sometimes laughing and sometimes crying. It was during this time that I had my ‘personal noun’ crisis. An actor I recognized from another show, Jon Huertas, (don’t be impressed …just googled his name) appeared in some of the early episodes. Every time he was on screen, I kept thinking that I knew who he was (not his actor name) but I recognized him from another show I used to watch…but I couldn’t remember the name of the popular show! Frustration!

I kept saying things like “Oh, come on now, y’all know who he is…he was on that detective show…darn it …what was its name…he played one of the two detectives in it to that pretty actress who was a NYP officer (can’t think of her name) and the cute main actor (can’t think of his name either) who played the part of a famous crime-detective author, who ends up solving crime cases with her?” 

For all that detailed information, I would only get a shrug and a non-committal shake of the head or grunt as everyone was completely absorbed in the show. Finally Jackson came up with it out of the blue. “Castle”…you are talking about “Castle” Boo!

“Yes!” I was deliriously happy! But then Jackson went on to say that she didn’t think the actor in this series was the same one as in “Castle” Still Jackson, being Jackson, my good history teacher comrade, looked it up and humbly (well not too humbly) declared that I was right…it was the same actor but he looked different with silver hair.

OH! The sweet taste of victory! Finally! Doesn’t things like that drive you batty? I hate not being able to pull up a name at the moment I need to have it. I am not going to complain about getting older, however, because I fight too hard daily to keep doing just that…maybe God in all His wisdom helps us slowly ease into the transition of leaving this home for another… by not being able to remember it all.

This morning at 9:00 I will be at Dr. Montoya’s office for my regular check-up…with the new chemo medicine …I feel sure my blood work will most likely show a big dip from an exceptionally good report before the new treatments started. But, hey, I am here, eating well and loving life…there’s a lot to be said just for that.

When I saw this sign…I had to laugh….thank goodness for Medicare and Blue Cross Blue Shield… no office payments! Thank you Lord for making me a teacher…I have made up (and probably surpassed) in medical pensions what I never got in salary! God works in mysterious ways!

So until tomorrow…Father, forgive me my transgressions that I remember doing and those I don’t…You never have a memory loss of what I have or have not done in Your Name…Instead You have given us grace and unconditional love. I will take that any time!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Looks like several of our readers are jumping in on “listen” and like Jan Hilton, “patience” for 2017.  My lovely friend, Carolyn Sweat said she was certainly on board with these terms.

Our wonderful, witty Jo Dufford sent this comment:

This is like a God’s wink for me because I have continued to look for my word this year, and consequently will be a theme for my next Circle program. Over and over the word, Listen, has popped up, and I thought, “That’s it”, but I still kept listening for another word. Then today your message hit me, and I thought, “Well, Jo, that must be what God has been telling you.” Thanks. I love the saying that God gave us one mouth and two ears, so He must have intended us to listen twice as much as we talk.

Ann Graves found her word going back down memory lane and a God Wink too!

Hey Becky,

I had been thinking about what my word for the year would be and then you wrote about “How are you today”. The best answer I’ve ever heard came one summer morning at Pawleys. I would get up before sunrise and walk the beach. I stopped in at the Sea View Inn one morning to relive some memories of a wonderful week spent there in the 80’s. No one was around except the black cook setting up for breakfast. I asked her the question and she looked me in the eye and said I am Blessed.

 So Blessed is my word for the year. Amazing how often it is out there in word and action (from God) when you look for it.

Thank you for your blogs and where they take me emotionally and spiritually.   Peace & Love,  Ann

Dear Reader:

I realize now that I have been aware of God Winks a lot longer than I ever remembered. 1962 was a pivotal year of change and uncertainty in my life…actually somewhat resembling the way 2017 is starting out.

I was in the seventh grade at Horace Sisk Junior High and was being “bussed” to this newly built school outside Fayetteville, North Carolina …closer to Fort Bragg. Besides leaving my neighborhood schools I was on the bus about 30 minutes going and coming from school. Mother had already had a family meeting and told us that she thought we needed to move back to Laurens, South Carolina…her birth place…to help with her aged, ailing mother at the end of the school year.

As if this wasn’t enough change to swallow…the Cuban Missile Crisis hit just two months into the school year…October of 1962. If we couldn’t walk home from school in fifteen minutes…(which I no longer could) mother had to sign a waiver saying that we would stay at school in the basement in case of an emergency situation…which could have possibly been a nuclear holocaust for all of us.

I was terrified and crying every morning that I left for school. Mother tried to reassure my two brothers and myself that everything would work out…masking her own terror no doubt.

One morning, while eating Kellog’s corn flakes, I glanced idly at the box and saw their slogan at the time: “The Best to You Each Morning.” I had been up most of the night again and had prayed so hard that nothing bad happened and then suddenly it was as if God was answering me and letting me know that it was going to be all right.”

It was that same morning, while in Mr. Owen’s dreaded math class, (with the black and white educational televisions on in every class…and the volume partially muted)…that suddenly he jumped up and turned up the volume!

Two of the Soviet ships nearing the blockade around Cuba slowly started turning around. Mr. Owens started shouting and we heard all the teachers cheering in the halls. Walter Cronkite was explaining what was happening and by the next day the iconic line of Secretary of State Dean Rusk was written on the top of each blackboard…“We were eyeball to eyeball and I think the other fellow just blinked.”

God had given everyone concerned the best response to their prayers: “The Best to You Each Morning.” (Even back then I was a visual prayer receiver)

*The only way I remembered this incident was that I was looking through an old scrapbook I started keeping in 1962 until I graduated from college…and even with a few wedding photos. It wasn’t until I came across one page in it from December 31, 1962 that I saw the scribbled Kellogg’s saying on the side of the paper with the word “Remember” in front of it and the memory came flooding back.

I know you can’t read my 13 year-old resolutions that I spelled as “revolutions” (Freudian slip) the night before 1963 but I will show you a withered old page from that evening many moons ago and tell you what I wrote…pretty funny.

1. Do better in school work 2. help more around the house 3. help in church work 4. have more social activities *5. I hope to get braces

*( Later added) I got them and gosh I wish I hadn’t!

I promise to do these things and signed in Becky Barbour….Happy New Year….Tomorrow will be 1963.

***You can barely see on the left side but I wrote: Remember: Kelloggs “The Best to You Each Morning.”

Little did I know then that the next year would unfold with the assassination of Kennedy when I was in the ninth grade. I forget sometimes just how hard it must have been on our parents to raise us ‘baby boomers’ during the Cold War and then the Hot One (Vietnam.) Today I worry for my children and grandchildren like my mother and her mother and her mother did before me.

So until tomorrow…I wish for everyone: “The Best to You Each Morning.” God sure does!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Dear Reader:

Now that I have settled into the New Year with my “perfect” word listening…God is sending me all kinds of winks and clues where to go to get better at this important skill in my life.

One was this little book that I ordered for a penny and 3.99 shipping charges from amazon. It is called Patterns of Grace and since my mind works completely in forming and connecting patterns I figured this devotional would be ‘right up my alley’…and it is.

The first two anecdotes the author, Debbie Macomber, writes about drew me right in to the importance of listening intently. Here is the first one:

Debbie and her husband were having a difficult year because their youngest son, Dale, was having problems with drugs. He had received two DUI tickets and soon, with lots of prayer, entered rehab. Debbie thought their troubles were over after rehab…but it was just the start of an avalanche of more problems for her youngest child. He was sober, but nothing else seem to change…he lost his job and starting taking one personal blow after another.

As matters grew worse, Debbie began to doubt if God was listening or even cared. Why was Dale struggling so when he was working so hard to get his life back together?

She began writing her prayers of frustration in a journal…then one day her frustrations mounted because her pen stopped writing. She burst into tears and threw up her hands in complete surrender. Her husband heard her crying and listened to her wailing over a stuck pen. He calmly took the pen from her, filled up a glass with hot water, placed the pen inside, and a few minutes later returned the pen to her without saying a word.

“When I picked it up again, the ink flowed smoothly and effortlessly. I stared at it for a long time, and with tears in my eyes I recognized what God was attempting to tell me. He was working in Dale’s life. He’s set our son in hot water so that Dale can work out his issues. Everything was happening just the way God meant it to…Dale just had to listen and follow His words.”

The second anecdote is one that I could relate to…taking time to listen to God’s response.

Once again, in this short story, Debbie is feeling the frustration of not ‘hearing’ an answer to a problem that is causing her a lot of pain. One day she asks a close friend, Barb, why she thought she couldn’t communicate with God. Here was her response.

“I don’t know what I am doing wrong” Debbie lamented. “I’ve filled up pages and pages in my prayer journal, pouring out my problem to God. I’ve brought the matter up daily waiting for Him to move in my life. I don’t think He hears my prayers any longer.”

Barb didn’t say anything for a long time. Then she smiled and said, ” Maybe you should try a different tactic.”

“How do you mean?” I said. I was open to any and everything.

Barb smiled and said softly. “Maybe this isn’t a case of God not hearing your prayers, Debbie. I believe He’s always available to his children. Perhaps He’s just waiting for you to listen.”

………………………

After reading these two anecdotes (from Macomber’s daily devotions) I had a kind of epiphany. Maybe that was why I seemed to understand God’s responses better when they appeared in “Wink” form. He must know that I am a visual learner, not an auditory one. So in order to communicate His responses back to me…He has found more success in sending me His “Winks,” within a pattern, that draws my attention faster than an auditory response.

Who knew? God is the teacher who knows everyone of our learning styles and uses individual techniques for each of His children.

So until tomorrow….Father, open our hearts, as well as our eyes and ears, to understand what You are telling us.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

* I think light, in all its forms, bring me the most extraordinary joy on the ordinary days…. inside and outside. Both these photos were taken yesterday morning.

Dear Reader:

How true the quotation title for this blog post is today! (“The only difference between an extraordinary life and an ordinary one is the extraordinary pleasures you find in ordinary things.“) It lets us know that that some of the most beautiful delights can be found in the ordinary days we spend in our life!

For example: I was so excited Thursday (at Anne’s house) to see that some of her daffodils were already popping up. When I got home I checked to see if I saw any evidence of anything popping up… where we had planted lots of birthday daffodil bulbs just a couple of months ago. I saw nothing.

But then…after getting home yesterday…I went back out and one of my “baby” camellia bushes was blooming and filled with buds. As I excitedly went to take its picture…I saw the green shoots beside it where a daffodil (my first) had just peeked its head through the ground!

Soon that whole area will be nothing but camellia bushes and daffodils blooming together in one little spot in the back yard. I am thrilled just thinking about it! Soon something extraordinary will take place from the ordinary.

…But that wasn’t all…I glanced at my old lean-to fence where our state flower, the yellow jessamine, has climbed and it is covered in little buds…only about a day or two away from making its grand entrance for the world to see!

February and March are its months to bloom and shine but it is beating the calendar this year.

In a Mt. Pleasant magazine I was reading… while waiting on my oncology appointment yesterday…Bill Northrop, in a cute little article spoofing winters in the lowcountry (titled “Pub Talk”) nicely poked fun at what he calls “Charleston Cold“… which means that it is winter, the location is Charleston, and “cold” is not “cold”…at least as defined by colder standards in over half of the country.

He ends the article saying ” So as you hear of winter storms up north dumping snow and causing mayhem and as you plan your remaining oyster festival outings and winter here quickly yields to spring, bask in the “cold” of Charleston’s average February highs of 63.0. This is winter here.” (Actually this weekend…we will be in the fifties for a high…so, watch out, we are having a “real” cold front come through…a Charleston Cold or perhaps a Lowcountry Low.)

I think part of my excitement yesterday was the idea of hope rising from the ground up. The last couple of days have been a little strange to say the least…and I needed a little hope to go around.

I had my three-week check-up with my oncologist scheduled for Thursday at 11:00. I woke up Thursday morning (barely morning) at 11:15! I haven’t slept that late since college… I did sleep in the whole time I was at Pawleys but had been getting up, again, between 8 and 9 after I got home.

My only excuse is that I got a wrong number telephone call around midnight and couldn’t get back to sleep. So by 2:30 I decided to take a couple of Night Time Tylenol capsules.  The rest is history…

I was lucky to be able to get worked in yesterday around 10:45…I spent the night at Mandy and John’s, getting up with everyone leaving for school…and I didn’t dare lay back down. I got there early for my appointment. When I gave the receptionist my name she laughed and said “Oh so you’re Sleeping Beauty!” We were all so jealous here in the office. We tried remembering the last time we were able to sleep that late. All of us have small children at home…I have a one-year-old…need I say more?”

I had more blood taken and the blood count is still somewhat low in a few categories… but not critically so…I have just completed two full rounds of the new chemo medication (two months) and nothing has spread any further than it was at the start.

In fact…it is showing shrinkage. This month, the third application, will be an important one in seeing if this trend continues. We are hoping this will be the case! I will keep you updated. For me, metaphorically, it is my ordinary daffodil performing extraordinary feats of growth…and hopefully for me my new treatment allowing hope to rise and “little c” to shrink.

So until tomorrow…Life is what we make it…so let’s make it the best!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

After school R&R…went to see and hear all about Disney World since I left to go to Pawleys as they were coming home. Spent the night so I would be sure to wake up in plenty of time for my doctor appointment!

Dear Reader:

We have all heard the expression “Pennies from Heaven” and several years ago a little poem was written about where they come from and why we, randomly, are selected to find one. It goes like this:

There are many penny stories around and I remember doing some in the older blog posts a few years back. Every penny story I have heard is poignant and makes you stop and bend down to pick it up….your lucky penny.

How many of you, as children, swallowed a penny (or other coin)? According to ER doctors, it is one of the most common children’s emergencies? The parents, if they call first, are usually told to just let the penny run its course, but if it doesn’t naturally come out…to bring the child in for an x-ray.

Mandy and I were talking one day last spring or summer about someone in the family swallowing a coin (an old family story)…Eva Cate got very quiet and later, tearfully, confessed to me (when I spent the night) that she had swallowed one, too, and now was afraid it might hurt her. *When we found out that it had been weeks since the incident, Mandy and I figured she was good to go and she was.

I texted Mollie and asked her if Rutledge didn’t swallow a penny or some coin at some point…I thought I vaguely remembered him doing so…but she laughingly reminded me it was a bean he stuck up his nose that got lodged tightly…not a penny down the throat. ***We want our children to be filled with wonder and curiosity…and swallowed-coins and nose-beans are our reward for endorsing these wonderful traits.

In our Guide Post (Mystery) story today…however a swallowed penny takes a miraculous detour that saves a life.

“A Heaven Sent Lifesaver”

Sonya Mizell-Contributing Editor

“You swallowed a what?”

Illinois mom Julie Van Rossum thought her four-year-old, Ellie, was old enough to know better than to put something small in her mouth. Ellie sat in front of her toy cash register, looking mortified.

“A penny, Mommy!”

Ellie wasn’t choking, and didn’t look sick. “Did you really swallow it?” Julie asked. “Why would you do that?”

“I didn’t mean to!” Ellie said. “It just went down!” Now Julie was concerned. Her daughter didn’t seem to be in pain, but Julie dialed her pediatrician, who advised her to keep an eye out to make sure the penny made its “natural exit.” Ellie would be fine. But the coin didn’t appear, that day or the next. Julie and her husband brought Ellie in for X-rays.

The doctor held the scans up to the light. He frowned, circled something fuzzy, not quite in Ellie’s stomach, but farther up.

“Is that the penny?” Julie asked.

No, the doctor said. He believed it was something else. A CT scan confirmed his fears. A tumor was growing on Ellie’s spine. She would need a biopsy. Even if the tumor was benign, it posed a risk of causing paralysis, or worse. It had to come out. The penny was quickly forgotten.

The surgeon emerged from Ellie’s biopsy to deliver his findings. If the tumor had grown any larger, it would have wrapped itself around the spinal cord and pressed against Ellie’s heart, making it dangerous, maybe even impossible, to remove. “We caught it just in time,” the surgeon said. “I can remove it right now.”

After a four-hour surgery and five days in the hospital, Ellie was able to go home. The biopsy later came back positive for ganglioneuroblastoma. A rare, difficult to detect, aggressive cancer. But they’d gotten it all. No chemotherapy, no more surgeries necessary.

Five years later, Ellie’s scans show no sign of cancer. And that penny? There’s been no sign of that either.

……………………………..

So until tomorrow… A “Penny for our Thoughts” might be the best savings plan…particularly if our thoughts take the form of prayers.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

A luncheon for Nala (pronounced with a short “a” sound) …as in the Lion King’s girlfriend. We all fell in love with her! She was so good in her crate while we all ate a delicious lunch in her honor and then had time to play with her and watch her eat dried hydrangeas…her favorite outdoor snack!

Dear Reader:

When I came across these few lines of prose (below)….I stopped because I understood perfectly what the little boy is feeling and how hard it is to explain to others. After you read it…think about your own feelings of homesickness that can occur even when you are home.

“Music”

When I was a child
I once sat sobbing on the floor
Beside my mother’s piano
As she played and sang
For there was in her singing
A shy yet solemn glory
My smallness could not hold

And when I was asked
Why I was crying
I had no words for it
I only shook my head
And went on crying

Why is it that music
At its most beautiful
Opens a wound in us
An ache a desolation
Deep as a homesickness
For some far-off
And half-forgotten country

I’ve never understood
Why this is so

But there’s an ancient legend
From the other side of the world
That gives away the secret
Of this mysterious sorrow

For centuries on centuries
We have been wandering
But we were made for Paradise
As deer for the forest

And when music comes to us
With its heavenly beauty
It brings us desolation
For when we hear it
We half remember
That lost native country

We dimly remember the fields
Their fragrant windswept clover
The birdsongs in the orchards
The wild white violets in the moss
By the transparent streams

And shining at the heart of it
Is the longed-for beauty
Of the One who waits for us
Who will always wait for us
In those radiant meadows

Yet also came to live with us
And wanders where we wander.

~Anne Porter “Music” from Living Things. © Zoland Books, 2006.

………………………………………

Isn’t that beautiful? C.S. Lewis tried to explain the word “monochopsis” in his own way with this now notable quote.

“If I find in myself longings which nothing in this world can satisfy or heal, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.”

I remember telling you readers, in a couple of earlier posts, about my “chronic” problem with homesickness (that I suffered from) throughout my childhood. At the time I thought it was more about the fear of losing mother and not having a parent but now I realize that this persistent “homesickness” was bigger than that.

The most common time for it to hit was twilight…just as the sun was setting. It is the time when the (especially in the summer and I was at camp writing mother) the “crickets are ‘a’cricketing” and I am “a-crying.” I was listening to the crickets, the grasshoppers, the whip-poor-wills, and katydids, just to name a few.

Twilight time at camp was also when we convened for Vespers and sang several spirituals and camp songs that seemed familiar to me from another time and space. We would all hold hands but I would have to keep letting go of a fellow camper’s hand to wipe my eyes.

Looking back on this time, now, as an adult, I realize that once I got back home…these same feelings of homesickness persisted about the same time each evening…I really felt homesick for some place that I had been once before… but I was now lost and wandering trying to get back.

Like C.S. Lewis I yearn for another world that I catch glimpses of for a few shimmering moments at intervals in my life. John Cheever thinks that homesickness is the search within ourselves… with these words:

“Fifty percent of the people in the world are homesick all the time. You don’t really long for another country. You long for something in yourself that you don’t have, or haven’t been able to find.” 

*The last two or three times little Eva Cate has come to spend the night with me she has gotten homesick. She would never call it that…but just about twilight she starts getting a tummy ache…it doesn’t seem to matter what she has eaten or not eaten…the tummy ache lasts until it is dark and we are watching movies or playing games and it disappears as quickly and quietly as it came.

She doesn’t like to be outside during twilight…she wants me to check and make sure everything is locked up which I assure her it is. One day Eva Cate will realize that her “tummy ache” was a different kind of ache…a longing to return to a place where she was unconditionally loved and never lost. But for right now…a piece of peppermint candy and a funny movie does the trick.

Jeremiah 1: 5  “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

So until tomorrow…The next time you get homesick think about if you are listening to music, man’s or nature’s, and is the melody taking you back to a home, a world, that you once knew but have forgotten since birth?

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Guess  who just recently got adopted by Anne…part-lab, springer spaniel…Nala! I wanted to give you a sneak peek…more to come in tomorrow’s blog… from her welcome home party.

* Jan Hilton: “I think that my word for this year will be patience. I need to be patient with those things that I cannot control and look to the good Lord above to take control!”  (I think we can all agree that this is a good word for all of us!)

Dear Reader:

My “perfect” word for 2017, listening, is subtly making its presence known to me through random articles, quotes, conversations and personal encounters. Suddenly I am more aware of the power of this word. In the title Mary Oliver quote (Listen. Are you breathing just a little and calling it a life?) the message hits pretty close to home some days.

I have come to realize that I hold my breath much more than I should when confronted with a problem or situation that is out of my control… from my end.

It can be waiting to hear the results of a health problem, a financial crisis, or news about a friend or loved one’s stressful predicament and, unconsciously, I hold my breath or take small shallow breaths…like someone tip-toeing around who doesn’t want to be heard or seen…just vanish into thin air.

I have never been good at direct frontal confrontations (thus the shallow breathing). I like to sneak in the back door. I am, also, a people pleaser and fixer. I want to make everything good again for everybody…which creates scenarios where I advise instead of just listening. I am slowly becoming aware that, in most cases, listening is the best advice…just being present for people.

God is helping me with my new ‘perfect’ word so far this year by sending Winks and Advice my way if “I am still and listen.” For example this quote popped up on Google while researching quotes on listening. Listen and Silent contain the same number of letters…a lesson in using the two words simultaneously…being one and the same.

Really paying attention to the world around us and taking time to listen is such a gift and so important in the way we learn, understand, and perceive the world God created for us.

When we really listen to someone else…it is the most unselfish act of compassion we can give. We aren’t thinking about us or our agenda for the day or how to bring an end to an uncomfortable conversation so we can leave…we simply listen.

Yesterday my regularly scheduled weekly article from Amit. Awakin showed up… and as you can imagine it is about the gift of listening over random advising. Here is an excerpt from it.

My Misgivings About Advice

Parker Palmer

My misgivings about advice began with my first experience of clinical depression thirty-five years ago. The people who tried to support me had good intentions. But, for the most part, what they did left me feeling more depressed.
Some went for the nature cure: “Why don’t you get outside and enjoy the sunshine and fresh air? Everything is blooming and it’s such a beautiful day!” When you’re depressed, you know intellectually that it’s beautiful out there. But you can’t feel a bit of that beauty because your feelings are dead — and being reminded of that gap is depressing.

Other would-be helpers tried to spruce up my self-image: “Why so down on yourself? You’ve helped so many people.” But when you’re depressed, the only voice you can hear is one that tells you that you’re a worthless fraud. Those compliments deepened my depression by making me feel that I’d defrauded yet another person: “If he knew what a worm I am, he’d never speak to me again.”

Here’s the deal. The human soul doesn’t want to be advised or fixed or saved. It simply wants to be witnessed — to be seen, heard and companioned exactly as it is. When we make that kind of deep bow to the soul of a suffering person, our respect reinforces the soul’s healing resources, the only resources that can help the sufferer make it through.

Aye, there’s the rub. Many of us “helper” types are as much or more concerned with being seen as good helpers as we are with serving the soul-deep needs of the person who needs help. Witnessing and companioning take time and patience, which we often lack — especially when we’re in the presence of suffering so painful we can barely stand to be there, as if we were in danger of catching a contagious disease. We want to apply our “fix,” then cut and run, figuring we’ve done the best we can to “save” the other person.

And yet, we have something better: our gift of self in the form of personal presence and attention, the kind that invites the other’s soul to show up. As Mary Oliver has written, “This is the first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness.”

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As I continue to see more connections between me and the universe I understand what the poet Mary Oliver means when she says:

“Ten times a day something happens to me like this – some strengthening throb of amazement – some good sweet empathic ping and swell. This is the first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness.”

So until tomorrow: I am, finally, recognizing the ‘throbs and pings’ of every day life now and how witnessing simple acts of kindness can bring tears to my eyes. I know my soul is reacting to these daily “Winks” and alerting the rest of me to pay attention to the small things in life…to listen to my soul talking to me…to listen to God whisper from my soul.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

*I got a real scare from Samantha, my lovely friend, at Simple to Sublime. Like all good (retired) teachers I didn’t read the fine print but went “big picture” and thought Samantha was closing her shop. I had to go get some tissue, calm down enough to read the cute “wink” about closing sales on Short Central, not shops, and I was happy again and ready to spread the good news!!!

Don’t panic, no one is going out of business. The opposite in fact! In order to make room for expansions and new selections, several stores need to reduce the current, awesome inventory! At Simple To Sublime many items in all categories will be HALF OFF!

Sale starts Thursday and ends Feb 4 (or sooner). Piazza Home is sprucing up with new carpet and is offering 25% off everything in their store. Four Green Fields Summerville is also offering 25% off storewide, including clearance! So come shop Short Central!! Please note that Simple To Sublime will closed on Weds 25th to prepare for the sale!

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*Last night I remembered (just as the sun was sinking in the west) that I had forgotten to take out the trash bin for pick-up today. After I dragged out the bin…I felt such beauty all around me and while picking up some debris from the garden all the lanterns started coming on.

It truly felt like a fairy was flying from solar lantern to solar lantern waving her magic wand and turning each one on. When the bottle tree with the colored bottles all came on…I gasped. That was magic…usually only one or two colored light bottles come on at night…never all together. It was a special night reminding me how much I love my ‘Happy Place”..- my home!

Dear Reader:

Before I left to go to Pawley’s  Island last Wednesday I worked diligently on the five extra blog posts needed to cover the five days I would be gone… based on our earlier decision to stay from Wednesday to Sunday.  Then last Saturday afternoon, with the fog, rain, and tornado warnings, we decided that all of us would wait until Monday to come home.

It was like an albatross was lifted off our shoulders…none of us were ready to leave! We had such a good time catching up on each other’s lives and planning for future adventures… that we couldn’t bring ourselves to part Sunday. It made our last ‘eat-out’ finale meal Saturday night even better ….because it wasn’t going to be our “Last Supper” together after all. (We were happier than the clams in the clam chowder soup.)

I did some research on Pawley’s Island (before I left) to see if there was a new legend or ghost story or just an interesting place to visit while we were there this year…since by now we have “hit” most of the more famous spots. When I googled “Best of the Pawley Island Legends” up popped “The Legend of the Pawley’s Island Shell.”

When I realized that the Pawley’s Island Shell was made famous by John Whitmire of Whitmire’s Fine Jewelry… which is located in The Hammock Shops off Highway 17 and one of our annual “haunts” for shopping… I was thrilled!

Friday, the most beautiful of all the days at Pawley’s, we went there first and what a wonderful experience we had visiting the shop and finding out more about the legend and the tedious process of turning Pawley’s Island shells into beautiful silver and gold jewelry…lasting mementos for tourists and their indelible stay at Pawleys. The whole process is done right there in the shop.

Mr. Whitmire was out-of-town but his young apprentice/assistant was there by the name of Jeremy Cambrey. *It is so nice to meet young people who are passionate about what they do and they want to share the experience with you… that is exactly what happened.

The whole process from sea shell to silver or gold jewelry is around 34 hours and no more than five shell pieces can be done at a time. *Jeremy, I wish I could remember all the techniques and terms but I am just going to pick out some of the photos I took from the simulated procedure to give readers the main idea….the time and knowledge that goes into making silver and gold Pawley’s Island shells is mind-blowing. Here are a few peeks into just some of the steps involved.

It really is like watching a potter start with a piece of clay and turn out a beautiful Grecian urn at the end. It was just amazing and how kind of Jeremy to take the time to show us in the back room what all goes into making a Pawley’s Island silver or gold piece of jewelry.

As I said…these are just some of the intricate, time-consuming steps that go into making Whitmire’s Pawleys Island Shell jewelry. I really felt like I had gone back to the colonial period and was watching a young apprentice learning and perfecting his trade. Absolutely fascinating!

On several different internet resources I read before leaving,  the story begins with John Whitmire leaving the Piedmont/Mountain regions of the state to move to the coast. He immediately began acquainting himself with his new surroundings by taking long walks on the beach and collecting a variety of shells. He was looking for something indigenous to the area, so as to make a beautiful piece of jewelry, something to connect with the area…an exquisite memento for tourists.

When he kept finding some particular shells that he could not identify…he began asking “home-grown” inhabitants of the Pawley’s Island area what they were. Most people shrugged and said, “Oh that is our Pawley’s Island shell.” He knew he had found what he was looking for.

He experimented until he had created the beautiful pieces one sees immediately upon entering Whitmire’s Fine Jewelry shop. Then he advertised his new addition to his jewelry collection and the rest is history.

*It wasn’t until later he discovered that the Pawley’s Island Shell and the Imperial Venus Clam are one and the same. They are also found in other areas besides Pawleys…but still this was the shell inhabitants of the region identified and claimed as theirs… because of its abundance in the area.

Jeremy gave me a Pawley’s Island shell with a little written legend accompanying it as a gift.

(I brought the shell and slip of paper containing the story and put it in front of my small centerpiece on the table…so I will remember it.)

Jeremy, I want to thank you and, also, to tell you that the Ya’s came to Whitmire’s Fine Jewelry first and left with the shell and legend. As many times as we have come to Pawley’s for  this mid-winter retreat…this year’s  topped all the others…the weather was warm… three days of bright blue skies…we all left the mid-winter retreat certainly feeling blessed beyond measure. It truly is “The Blessed Isle.”

One observation I made while we were able to readily access the front porch this year with temps in the 60’s and 70’s is that we are all creatures of habit. Every time we went out on the porch everyone went to their “assigned” seat/rocking chair. It was where everyone felt most comfortable…no one has ever changed places…from past to present retreats. What we learned, however, is that the rocking chairs were all we had control over…the weather conditions and lights were something else.

No matter how hard we tried to continue the status quo Mother Nature played her part changing the light and shadows of the views from the porch, as well as, the porch itself. No day is exactly the same as the one before it or after it. Each day is uniquely special…that is why we must seize the moment!

I love this little historically preserved old bait house across the street from Carolina Corner…I am drawn to it each year. If its walls could talk what tales it could tell!

What happens at the beach does stay there…it is an oasis of freedom of speech at its best….we all know everything there is to know about each other and love each Ya unconditionally. What a gift this is…and we know it.

*Linda and Sherrod, thank you, thank you, thank you, for this unique opportunity to be together in paradise a few days each winter.

Seafood began and ended our mid-winter retreat. Brooke, Jackson, and I met at the River Room, as usual, in Georgetown (on the way down) to get the party going on!

Brooke’s smile is rather pensive….she left her wallet in her grandson’s baby stroller the day before we left; it was packed up and went home with her son Riley and his wife Veronica. She didn’t even know she didn’t have it until Wednesday morning…the day we left!

Wonderful Veronica fed-ex’ed it right to the beach house arriving Thursday by noon. Brooke just confidently but slowly drove to Pawleys Wednesday…a woman of steel. Nothing was keeping her from Pawleys! “You are woman…hear you roar” girl!

So until tomorrow…I feel re-invigorated, full as a tick, happy, and ready to take on the world again with all its problems…I know how blessed I am to have friends to retreat with when  life gets a little bumpy! Glad to be back home now with my blog and readers!

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

*More WORDS TO LIVE BY: Libby, Brooke, and Jackson thought about their ‘perfect’ word for 2017 and here are their selections

1. EMBRACE: Libby wants to embrace new possibilities and changes in her life that will help her grow both inwardly and outwardly… reaching towards new horizons

2. RENEWAL: After such an invigorating mid-winter retreat Brooke decided her word for the New Year was renewal…for giving herself time to rest and reflect on doing what she needs to do to be the best she can be…for herself and others.

3. AWARENESS: Jackson first considered the word “strong” and then decided on “awareness.” She wants to be strong in her commitment to be aware of local, national, and global injustices that do not promote equality or kindness among mankind…and then react.

Be back online tomorrow!