God Sightings

Wonder stops us in our tracks. It compels us to let go of focusing on dogged accomplishing and doing, and instead to simply be open and vulnerable to the mysteriously wonderful presence that is God-With-Us.

The above quote was part of an e-mail message that stopped me in my tracks on November 22, a week before Advent. The message came across the church mailing list from our pastor, inviting us to prepare our hearts for Advent, and introducing the season's worship theme: Seized By Wonder!

The message included specific statements of invitation for each of the weeks of Advent, and said, "If one of these statements of invitation reminds you of a story or some thoughts you'd like to share with the congregation, please contact a member of the committee..."

The statement of invitation for November 29 was "Share the ways you see God here and now." November 29. One week away. Sunday after Thanksgiving, a weekend of travel. End-of-semester crunch. Surely that message wasn't for me.

But it was.

I found myself in worship-committee conversations, and writing a reflection (which pretty much wrote itself) on the bus to work and in the car on the way to Thanksgiving celebrations.

It was a strange paradox, that being open to being stopped in my tracks, and releasing the load of accomplishing & doing, entailed taking on one more accomplishing/doing task. Yet who am I to argue with the Spirit? Besides, I had been preparing for that reflection for over a year. By writing this blog.

Elvis Sightings = breakthrough moments of wonder.

I know I've got the Grinker coinage of the term Elvis Sightings up on the sidebar: a one-time utterance or action that comes surprisingly out of nowhere, and then disappears again. It's a fascinating aspect of our experience with Joy and her autism. However, the chronicles here at Elvis Sightings have by no means been confined to that narrow a definition. Instead, I've been writing about moments worth sharing. Happenings that make me think. And above all, the sightings of wonder that -- even when I don't make the explicit connection in the blog post -- make me aware of God's presence in our lives, here and now.

Some recent examples:

• Snow Day
  
  
• Elvis Wants a Cookie
  
  
• A Dream
  
  
• You're Always Doing Something
  
  
• Kisses in High Places

Seized by wonder! God is here.

Breakthrough moments of wonder = God sightings.

It was a privilege to share some of these reflections with the congregation.

My wish for you this new year -- and maybe it can count as a resolution for myself -- is that we pay attention to the moments of wonder in our lives, taking a few additional moments of contemplation and gratitude.

May your "sightings" in 2010 be frequent and marvellous!

Squishy-face

JoyDad got Chicago-Bears gear (it was available at massive discount this year!)

Rose got a Barbie and an Only Hearts doll (the one named Lily Rose).

JoyMama got a hot bath and a nap (Christmas BLISS.)

And Joy got squishy-face.


She pulls your hand toward her face, asking wordlessly for pressure across her forehead or cheekbones. Then when the squishy-face has been given, a great big grin erupts. And she signs "more" or pulls your hand again.

Not that she didn't like the presents. This year, she tolerated quite nicely being asked to tear the wrapping paper, again and again.


She's enjoying the jack-in-the-box, and the light-up ring-stacker, both of which she's been playing with functionally on and off through the day. Even more so, though, she has enjoyed a particularly long & shiny ribbon... and a piece of bubble wrap... and the lid to a package of greeting cards. And squishy-face.

We are all joyful here today, in our own ways.

May joy be yours as well. Merry Christmas!

Practicing Christmas

It started out with Rose and a gingerbread house from a kit. This is the third year we've done any such thing. The first year, we bought a house in pieces-parts. Took a while to get it properly constructed, and then Rose wanted it to perfectly match the picture in the instructions. Which meant that mama did all the icing, and Rose would put on the candies.

Second year, we got smart and bought a pre-constructed house kit. Rose actually started piping some of the icing herself, on the less-challenging bits.

This year, she designed and piped the whole thing (except for the door which she asked me to do).


Well, there was quite a bit of icing left, which got me thinking. What if I made a smaller house with graham crackers so Joy could do some decorating?

Joy wasn't thrilled with the sit-down work, but did a pretty good job of poking some M&Ms at the icing blobs. Letting go of the candy was a tough part. But she didn't much seem to mind letting the candies become part of the house, as long as she got to eat a few!


Then today -- since einmal ist keinmal -- we did another one. Rose did the icing blobs...


and Joy poked on the candies again, with some guidance.


I was delighted at how Joy seemed to realize this time that she needed to let the candy go so it would stick!


Then, for a bit more Christmas practice, I set her up to help me stir the peppernut dough:


I think we've got some good Christmas practices going here.

Artifact from Another Era, Take 2

I mentioned a few posts ago that we had visited my mother's mother, my magnificent 100 year old grandmother, at Thanksgiving. It was an end-of-an-era kind of occasion, in that we helped with the packing to move from the retirement apartment, where she'd lived with my late grandfather for more than half my life, into a smaller assisted-living apartment.

Of course, when you make a move like that, there's lots of downsizing to be done. We helped with that too, sorting things to give away, things to discard, things to keep. In addition to the books and family photos that I knew were going to be coming home with us, we also provided a home for various keepsakes, usable kitchenware (we've already made jello from her cupboard in her casserole dish!) and other odds and ends.

Grandma has always been good at saving pretty paper things to use in making Valentines and decorations. We brought home several packets of long-saved paper doilies for art-projects at our place.

It wasn't until we got home that I got a peek at the back of one of those doily-packets. These weren't just ANY old paper doilies, let me tell you. No, these were Roylies. And they have astonishing super powers...


Here's the text, if you don't want to burn out your eyes looking too closely at the image on the screen:

Nothing wins a man more than feminine fastidiousness! Famous movie actors, writers, artists, bankers and bon vivants have oft said when interviewed that good grooming in a woman is far more important than good looks. And the pampered male is quite as particular about fastidiousness in his lady's habits as in her habit!

Next time your best beau (or your husband's boss, for that matter) comes to dinner, let lovely Roylies enhance your feminine graces. Slip a dainty Roylie under the cocktail glass or tomato bisque. Frame that layer cake you baked specially for the occasion in a large round Roylie. It will look twice as beautiful!

The most inaccessible bachelor in town is bound to melt under the appealing influence of feminine daintiness done in the Roylie manner. Roylies are such a help in so many ways, there's no reason why they shouldn't help you get your man!

Hey JoyDad? Sorry I didn't have the Roylies thing going on when we met. But you married me anyway. Next time your boss comes to dinner, though, and I've got my eye to climb the social ladder, I'll see how well these work... oh, right, she's female. Never mind.

Artifact from Another Era

The semester ended. And I looked around the house, rather shocked at what I saw. Oh, the piles of "stuff"! And the dust-bunnies!

And, we're hosting our fellowship-group from church for a potluck on Saturday!

So I started to dig out, and organize the piles and bags and boxes that have somehow accumulated all over the place. One bag that I dug into to organize was Joy's little bunny-backpack, which serves as a diaper bag.

At the bottom of the bag, I found an artifact from another era. It was a syringe of emergency medication, for use in case of a seizure that lasted emergency-long.

We never came close to an occasion to use it, and the seizures eventually faded, and we go entire days (weeks?) without thinking of them. It was time to move the medication -- still well within its "good till" date -- into the medicine cabinet and not carry it around everywhere.

Those days may yet return. For now, though, it feels really good to take that medicine out of the diaper bag. The less unnecessary stuff, the better.

P.S. I think I'll tackle the piles of paper on the desk tomorrow. And clean the bathrooms. Wish me luck.

Generation Gap

JoyDad and I had the privilege of attending Rose's 2nd/3rd grade music program at her school yesterday morning. The music teacher had built the program on the theme of "Mexico," connected to a social studies unit they'd all just finished. The entire show was bi-lingual, giving the Spanish-speakers a chance to shine and the English-speakers an exciting learning challenge. They even had a seasonal touch, a song from the tradition of "Las Posadas" which re-enacts the procession of Mary and Joseph from door to door in Bethlehem until they finally find shelter and welcome. It was very well done, and of course the sight of my first-born up there singing and moving so enthusiastically brought tears to my eyes!

After the program, I got a chance to visit Rose's classroom, something I've not been able to do this fall during school hours with all my LEND overload.

She'd talked several times about a certain little fellow whom we'll call "R" who sits near her and is apparently "in love" with her. When she speaks of him, I've thought I hear a sense of being flattered, but mostly buried under words of annoyance. Was looking forward to meeting the kid, and prepared to be kinda charmed -- puppy-love and all that, so cute!

And in her classroom I did meet R, and he is indeed a cutie, bright eyes and big smile and full of energy.

Then he spoke to me.

"Hey, are you Rose's grandma?"

GRANDMA?!?!

Rose, sweetie? Feel free to be annoyed. I won't discourage you in that stance, not one little bit!

Snow Day

Eighteen inches of snow, ladies and gentlemen!

The schools closed down. The university closed down. State government closed down. Buses stopped running.

It's a thing of shivery beauty.

Joy approves.

She started out at the edge of the sidewalk where the snow was thin...


But soon began to blaze a wobbly trail for herself, all through the front yard.


When she had thoroughly explored the front yard, she headed around the corner:


After visiting our neighbor-granny at her kitchen door, Joy trailed along our backyard fence (look at that heavy-work!):



Finding that she couldn't get into our backyard because the fence was snowed shut, Joy plowed through neighbor-granny's backyard to her deck. Finding the deck-steps to be a solid hill of snow, Joy attempted one step... and then turned to me and ASKED FOR HELP!! (OK, so she used the "more" sign. It was still a huge, novel help request!)

So I boosted her up the steps, we went out the driveway and down the street...

and continued onward in our winter wonderland.



P.S. Rose is out sledding right now at a neighbor's. We'd left Joy at home to take an early-afternoon rest... but the neighbor's son was asking to play with her after his nap! So we'll be back out into the snow soon.