Part of the Club

My husband and I joke that our street is a tiny slice of ghetto in a suburbia pie. There are old cars and weeds instead of sculpted lawns, and the cracked concrete probably dates to a time before my birth. But none of this stops the kids of our street from turning our neighborhood strip into a half-mile play zone.

I love the kids. They run and bike and scooter and clump noisily in driveways and stairwells, taller ones toting toddlers. If you stop between car door and front door to talk, shyness will evaporate, brown eyes will sparkle, and suddenly you have a friend.

google pic

Ever since I moved in over a year ago, I've daydreamed of building relationships and even organizing a simple Bible Club with stories, games, and snacks. What could be easier? I live here, right? But my student life left no margin, and I've found time just as scarce now that I'm a working woman. God, I prayed,  I want to be involved somehow, but the thought of starting something from scratch feels so overwhelming. 

Enter: the awesomeness that is answered prayer. Boom. 

I wanted to work out at a nearby gym, but instead of driving, I decided--for the first time ever--to walk.

I was halfway down the street, when I heard an excited female voice ask"...And what do you think Joseph did then? He went right to his brothers and told them his dream!" Who is telling a Bible story? I wondered.

As I rounded a group of parked cars, I saw a tiny crowd of children, all giving rapt attention to an elderly blond woman who held a picture for them to admire. Another elderly woman sat nearby with a curly-headed girl in her lap. I quietly came close and sat cross-legged on the edge of the blanket. This was so much better than lifting weights.

At the end, as the kids smeared their mouths red with popsicles, I introduced myself to the women. I discovered that the Bible Club that God had placed on my heart had already been in progress every week for fourteen years! Their faithfulness humbled me to the core. Ms. M actually lives on my street, and though she usually leaves the storytelling to her friend, it is her willingness to host and fund the Club that has kept it going for over a decade.

Yesterday, I went back, and I feel so encouraged! Here is a place for the dream I've held so long. Here I can meet the kids, show them love, know their names and stories. Here I can use the puppets that have languished, unused, in my old trunk for three years. Here I can learn from the faith and faithfulness of the older women, and begin to make love a tangible verb on my street.

(AND, if you live on my street or anywhere nearby, you should come! 4pm, Wednesdays.)

2 > 1 (Two are Greater Than One)

Have you ever visited Enchanted Rock?

The giant pink granite boulder rises 425 feet above the surrounding landscape, and is a popular site for campers, hikers and bird-watchers in the area west of Austin.

In the past three or four years, it has become a Thanksgiving tradition in my family to scale the monolith early in the morning, just in time to watch the sun spill golden over the earth's edge. This past weekend, I made the traditional climb with my parents, my sister, her husband, and my own sweet love--the first triple date the six of us have ever had!

Laced, jacketed and gloved against the dark cold, we left the sleeping campsite and drove an hour to the base of the mound. By the time we arrived, the coming dawn gave hint of the graceful, curving mass looming above us. We started walking.

Because all was dome, there were no edges to fear, but the higher we climbed the more we fought against Lady Wind. Our ears became aching holes on the sides of our heads and I wished for a scarf.

Then, halfway up, Mom almost turned back. She had stolen a glance behind her, and suddenly realized just how high she stood above the tiny trees and cars below.

Dad and sis quickly took her arms and gently, steadily encouraged her forward. One step, then another, and another. I was so proud of her when we all reached the top!

To be honest, I have had many moments of near-retreat just like Mom's. The mountain may have been less visible, less touchable, but no less real. I remember the many sharp twinges of terror and fear that have threatened to paralyze me, the overwhelming urges to lay down, and simply...quit.

I am so thankful for people like my parents and my husband who laced their arms through mine and lent me the courage to take another step.

"Two are better than one, 

because they have a good return for their labor. 

If either of them falls down, 

one can help the other up. 

But pity anyone who falls

and has no one to help them up." (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10)

Forest Fires and Friends

A friend said yesterday, "It feels like every day at the Y is the same as four regular days at home--so much life happens in 24 hours!"  

On one hand, this is true, because of the sheer numbers of conversations and the volume of fresh thoughts experienced when you're living in new surroundings. 

On the other hand, hubby and I both feel like life has shifted down about a dozen notches from the near-frantic pace of this past semester. We have responsibilities, but they don't consume every waking moment. We have meetings, volunteer shifts, meals, and work, but there is room to breathe clean mountain air, room to get decent sleep, and room to sit down with friends and talk. We like it. :)

Dry Conditions = Forest Fire: 
On Friday, we woke to see an energetic plume of smoke rising above the mountains that encircle the YMCA campus. By lunchtime, the plume had become the rolling, billowing cloud that you can see in this picture I took with my phone>>>

News articles say that the fire started from a lightening strike early Saturday morning.

Don't worry about us--the YMCA and Estes Park are in no danger--but this fire is definitely one of the biggest that Colorado has had to deal with in a long time. Prayers are needed! On Saturday, hot, dry conditions and strong winds expanded the fire from 50 to 200 acres within half an hour, and a recent article says that over 37,000 acres have been burned. 

photo credit: denverpost.com

At this point, the fire is 0% contained, and the fire crews are focusing on evacuation and on keeping buildings from catching fire. Please pray for the fire crews, for all the families affected by this fire, and for some long, soaking rains! 

Project Group:

Even though we can see the smoke, the fire is far enough away that it hasn't affected anything at the YMCA or in the LT program. This weekend, for example, some friends from my project group and I went on a mini-hike to a place called Moraine Park. We ate boxed lunches from the dining hall on top of a big boulder and took some goofy pictures:

Y-M-C-A!

We also saw elk on the other side of the river, only 30 feet away from us!  

I really am enjoying getting to know the girls in my project group and life group. They are all so uniquely sweet, each with her own history, quirks, and personality to bring to the mix. I'm praying that God heals some hurts and fears I've accumulated from past friendships through these new ones, and that I can be an encouragement to them too. 

Slice of Life: Bike Riding

A friend's blog recently featured an entry that she called a "slice of life". Like a slice of layer cake, a slice of life is a bite-sized snapshot of an experience, a relationship, or a moment made memorable by the telling. The concept is supposed to be a weekly recurrance.

I realize that a lot of my posts already do this (like funny moments, or a special visit from a sister), but I got inspired to be more artistic this time. More in-the-moment.

So here is a slice of my life that I will sincerely miss after I graduate and can no longer arrive sweaty to work.

(I wrote it last semester, when I began to play with the initial idea of writing for fun.)

_____________________________________________________

{Biking}

I am visibly glowing, sitting in class without jacket, without overshirt, in sleevless tank top.  It’s October, but I feel like I’ve been through a sauna.  

It's a self-conscious sauna of sweatiness that makes me intently aware of the sweat on my upper lip, at my hair line, and seeping through my cotton shirt. 

I love riding my bike to class for the speed, for the gas it saves, but most of all for the knowledge that I am sneaking in a workout under the guise of transportation.  


What kind of culture do I live in that we SEEK to burn more calories?  Most cultures, today and throughout history, have sought to CONSERVE energy. I feel like a new kind of strange pioneer, living in an age when exercise is more cosmetic than necessary.

The one thing I hate about riding a bike is the dangerous element of invisibility.  

I remember when I was very small, Mom would grab for my hand before we walked through a parking lot or across the street. “The cars can’t see you,” she told me.  

I am big now—bigger than she is—but they still can’t see me when I ride my bike. I think I would be more visible if I were on foot!  No driver expects something as small as the bike to move so fast.  It has brought an entirely new meaning to the term “defensive driving”.  

I launch myself forward, and my legs slowly churn the machinery, gathering speed.  

I love the balance.  

I love leaning into a curve, hearing the rubber of my tires grabbing for traction against the asphalt.

I love the flight downhill, going faster by gravity than I ever could enhance by pedaling. That is when I stop, spread my legs outward like wings, and grin like a two-year-old into the hilarious wind. 

God, let me never stop acting like a kid!  The day when I can’t enjoy a downhill speed-session will be the day I start to die inside.