If I'm not off hiding somewhere with a good book, chances are I'm chasing a toddler or a Jack Russell (or sleeping, because every mom can use a nap!). I found Prince Charming and married him, and now we enjoy the idiosyncrasies of life in an old farmhouse. Oh yeah, and we root for the Buckeyes. Every time.
During this week's Mary Moment on Catholic Moments, I'm reflecting some more on that passage from last week, the one about Mary's selective hearing, though this time I'm rambling down a different path, the path of trust and surrender.
Deacon Tom has a couple of book recommendations (which is what I always need!) and Lisa's interview is going to probably cost me a lot of money. Check it out!
Thank you to everyone for your continued prayers for Poppa Gene. He's doing well after his second heart cath and there's a chance he'll be home tomorrow afternoon. While the stint (or is it stent?) didn't work, and surgical fixes aren't an option for him, the meds are doing their job and the doctor sounded cautiously optimistic.
Thanks again for your prayers and support. We've been so very blessed by Poppa Gene, from the day he married my mother-in-law, to the many adventures he instigates and makes possible. I'm glad, for one, to have some more time with him. I mean, where else will they get their chocolate mustaches if not from Poppa's not-so-secret chocolate stash?
It's Thursday, and I'm not feeling like much of a success. My to-do list has been hijacked for a version of going with the flow that has me praying.
This morning, Poppa Gene has his second heart cath this week. He had a heart attack on Monday and we have reason to be praying hard during the procedure this morning. If you have prayers to spare, we appreciate them.
Now, for my successes:
1. Laundry...done in a spurt of sunshine the other day, utilizing the kitchen timer for two hour increments and the clothesline. (Don't you dare go looking in my laundry room, though. For some reason, the people around here keep wearing clothes and creating more laundry...I really have to look into that!)
2. I haven't worked out this morning, or any morning this week. I've opted for sleep instead. And that, my friends, is a success. (I guess I should call this one "prioritizing," huh?)
3. I have exhibited some pretty awesome constraint this week in order to keep our budget in line. I'm glad tomorrow's payday though. :)
Join in the cheering over at Faith & Family Live today, where, as always, they're hosting the small success round-up.
7:21 AM comes early when you get to bed after 4. Yes, I should know that already. It was worth it, though. A date with my husband in the middle of the night and a movie I'll see again (minus the screaming teenagers and crowded parking lot, thankyouverymuch)...a recipe for either adding or subtracting a year or two from my life.
Poppa Gene will be in the hospital for the rest of the week. He went in on Monday with a heart attack; yesterday morning things looked cautiously fine. Then he had his heart cath. My prayers are for acceptance of God's will. If you can spare some prayers, we would all appreciate them.
Today, we're taking the girls to see Poppa Gene, which will either insert joy into the gloom of the hospital, give the hospital staff something to do, or make me appreciate how much a full night of sleep would have helped me with it. I'm quite sure it will give me plenty of bloggable material.
It's the summer of meet-ups. Over the weekend, we were blessed to meet Sean "the Ductape Guy" McGaughey and his lovely wife Nancy and his sensational daughter Sarah of Catholic Roundup fame. They drove something like 500 miles out of their way, circumnavigating around Lake Erie and making a special stop in a, ahem, very rural campground. I am still touched by this, and by the sight of Sean strumming away and singing to a captivated audience that included our daughters and a little neighbor girl from the campsite next door.
It was a tie with my adventure earlier this summer meeting Deacon Tom, his wife Dee, and their two adorable pooches. My oldest daughter is still asking when we'll see them again.
There's a chance I might see Michelle sometime soon (to deliver a big hug in person), though that's a little up in the air. In a few weeks, I'll get to meet with the lovely Pat, but before that, I think I'm going to get to see my good friend of road trip extravaganzas. Who needs the CNMC? (Kidding on that last part. I really wanted to be in Texas. Boy did I! But I'll take summer meet-ups, however they come to me!)
On the home front, Poppa Gene is doing well. Thank you all for your prayers and support. Keep 'em comin' -- he's still in the hospital for testing and, well, just keep on prayin'.
Also on the home front, tonight is the opening of the new Harry Potter movie. Yes, we are the sort of fans who have lined up an unsuspecting victim sitter for our kids so that we can go to the midnight opening. Our love affair with the Harry Potter series started when the third or fourth book came out, many years ago when we were but beaus. We went to at least three of the book parties and all of the midnight movie parties (or have we? Ah, the dead brain cells won't tell me). We hated the third movie, but loved the fourth fifth one. I'm pretty sure my husband was up most of at least one night over the weekend, watching the marathon on TV (along with the interviews and the sneak peeks). He's like a little kid, even left me a note this morning that
And on the cool stuff front, check out this clickable Periodic Table, which I found after hearing about it on episode 2 of the Catholic Laboratory. I was going to get some stuff done today, but I think, instead, that I'll just see what Mo is...and then I'll send this link to my husband and he won't get a thing done once he's home from work...
I was going along, having a rough-ish sort of Monday morning, and then the phone rang.
It was very cliche, how this one phone call turned everything upside down and made me go all cold inside.
Yesterday, everything was normal.
Yesterday, my biggest gripe was pretty stinkin' small.
Yesterday, we were tooling along and planning and puttering.
Funny how one phone call can change all that.
So, without going into a lot of detail (because, to be honest, there isn't a lot of detail to be had right now), I ask for your prayers for Poppa Gene.
Updated to add: It's been confirmed that he had a heart attack, and he's being transferred to another hospital in the big city. Please keep praying, and thank you!
I've been part of The Catholic Company's Review Program long enough to know what the envelopes look like in my mailbox.
So, on Friday, when I saw that familiar white envelope waiting for me, I was pretty excited. I was supposed to be getting the brand-new Our Lady of Guadalupe: Mother of the Civilization of Love, by Carl Anderson and Eduardo Chavez. And oh! was I excited about that!
But, instead of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the envelope contained...the July Magnificat.
I looked at the packing slip.
Sure enough, it said Our Lady of Guadalupe, review copy.
But there in my hand was the July Magnificat. No Guadalupe in sight.
I couldn't help but feel like maybe this package was a little bit intentional.
Oh, not by the folks at The Catholic Company. By Someone Else.
I used to subscribe to Magnificat. I used to enjoy it and rave about it and really benefit from it.
And then I bought The Christian Prayer Book, which is the lay version of the Liturgy of the Hours. No need to subscribe to Magnificat when I had one volume for the whole year.
Or so I thought.
Then I received the July issue, and I flipped through it.
My heart leaped a little. There were the articles, there were the short prayers, there was the daily saint. Oh, how I had missed Magnificat.
That's nothing against the other prayer options. It's just a reunion of old friends, of a sort. And my prayer time, for the rest of this month, will be delightful enough for me to start saving my money to start another subscription, I think...
The image is the July 2009 cover. Did I mention that every month there's a different beautiful painting on the cover? They're lovely enough to warrant saving them (if you can keep them away from a certain four-year-old who tends to collect interesting things in her desk...).
I love my flower gardens, but I've been struggling with them lately.
You see, there aren't enough hours in the day, or maybe the problem is that I don't have enough motivation. By the end of the day, I look out and see the weeds still out in the flower beds.
I had been beating myself up pretty badly about this when I read about Our Lady of Mount Carmel. My brother-in-law kindly redid my landscaping a couple of years ago, inserting beauty into the chaos that had been around my house. It was so organized and amazing...for one whole summer.
And then, between pregnancy and nursing, between work and juggling, between other priorities and no small amount of slacking, I noticed the landscaping changing into...weedscaping.
If you're inclined, you can read about Our Lady of Mount Carmel, and a hearty dose of insight relating to gardening, over at Today's Catholic Woman.
My latest column at CatholicMom.com, "Only Say the Word," reflects on my favorite part of Mass, the part that usually leads to reflection, no matter how distracted I might be.
Here's a tidbit:
I am kneeling. There’s a squirming child somewhere nearby. If she’s not on my lap, she’s sitting right beside me. Her sister is whispering to me, or looking through my purse, or reaching for something on the other side of me. And yet, in spite of the distractions in the pew with me, I feel the familiar lump in my throat.To read the rest, go to CatholicMom.com.C’mon! I shout in my mind. No crying!
And then it happens.
As I start to respond with the congregation, the lump lets loose.
“Lord, I am not worthy to receive You, but only say the word and I shall be healed.”
--1--
Looks kind of cool, don't you think? I suspect the brothers (who my four-year-old started calling "the boys," much to my amusement) had a little bit of fun with all the big equipment. I mean, it was sort of like the ultimate sandbox adventure! If you, like my brother, need more pictures of holes and equipment, you can find them here.
Cake mix: $4 (give or take)
Remembering at least five blessings every day, seeing with eyes of faith the presence and goodness of God in everything, we begin to understand the heart of God. We begin to be just like Mother Teresa: full of wonder, spontaneously full of joy and energy, because of the realization that everything is gift; all is grace.
Because I can't help it. :)
In my Mary Moment segment of this week's Catholic Moments podcast, I share an excerpt from Mother Teresa: In the Shadow of Our Lady and some thoughts about how Mary listened to just one voice. I'm not so great at ignoring the voices in my head, but I'm inspired by Mary to try.
Don't miss the rest of this week's episode, where Deacon Tom shares reflections on vocation and Lisa interviews a pediatrician who's a musician in his spare time (and his music sounds awesome!).
In this week's Monday Morning Memo, Roy Williams reran a memo from a few years ago and talked about the magic of ELBs, Exponential Little Bits. When I listened to it, I immediately had an "ah-HA!" moment.
"Why, he's talking about small successes!" I thought.
And then it all clicked.
Every week, I try to come up with small successes. I try not to make them too big (though, really, I'm doing good to find three successes of any kind most weeks) and I try not to focus on the "not done" stuff. It's important to have success.
And Williams explains why:
Funny thing... When daily progress meets with progress, it doesn't add, it multiplies. To harness the magic of Exponential Little Bits you must learn to ask yourself, "What difference have I made today?" And never go to sleep until you have done a Little Bit to move yourself closer to your goal. But you must do a Little Bit every day, no matter how tiny the thing might be.So, here are my small successes -- or Exponential Little Bits -- from this week:
The story of how I came to find myself reading Diagnosis Critical: The Urgent Threats Confronting Catholic Healthcare, by Leonard J. Nelson, III, started long ago, when I signed up to be part of The Catholic Company’s Reviewer Program. It’s a great program, and I’ll admit that I love getting free books. I’ve never had a book I didn’t enjoy, but I’ve never really taken a risk with my picks before either.
So when Chris, also fondly called The Free Book Dude, suggested I take a gander at Diagnosis Critical, I thought, “Hmm, sounds interesting.” I should note that I just trusted him on this. I didn’t even bother to really look at the book, aside from the big red letters on the title.
Then it showed up in my mailbox. And I noticed the subheading.
Let’s just say I had something a little, um, lighter in mind for my next book. Diagnosis gathered a bit of dust, peering out from my library pile on my to-read shelf.
After whipping through a novel or two and a couple of other books, I decided not to allow myself to read anything else until I finished Diagnosis. Now, for those of you who have any inkling of what kind of reader I am (you need only keep your eye on my Nose Inserted list in the sidebar), that was like demanding that I start a workout regime during my reading time. (I'm not such a fan of working out.) For one thing, I usually have a couple of books going at any given time: something spiritual, something fun, and something else. To buckle down with a book I hadn’t even opened, before I even opened it...well, that was some kind of reading smackdown on myself.
Now, for the full disclosure: I found myself enjoying Diagnosis once I got over the fact that I hadn’t really wanted to read it. I’ve done a fair bit of reading on the Church’s teaching on sexuality, and Nelson’s treatment and application of this is very good. I didn’t think I cared about healthcare, much less Catholic healthcare -- I’m not saying this is a good attitude, but I tend to be pretty anti-newsy and though I am opinionated, I don’t often want to have someone else’s opinion shoved at me to change my mind. (But, then again, aren’t many of us that way?) So what I expected from Diagnosis Critical was a boring discussion of what’s wrong, how the world is ending, why we’ll all go to hell or, at the very least, purgatory.
There was no basis for my expectation. None at all. I had heard the book was controversial, and maybe that’s true.
What I enjoyed, and what I found, was that I learned a lot about how healthcare works, about the compromises that are being made, about the little steps that are being made, here and there and everywhere, to inch healthcare in a different direction.
I never once felt like Leonard Nelson was trying to change my mind. I never once felt like he was persuading me. He presented the facts and materials, first with a history of Catholic healthcare and then with more specific chapters.
This book left me bothered, and I think that’s probably what’s supposed to happen when you find your head pulled from the sand and facing the storm all around you. I found that, after reading Diagnosis Critical, that I do care about healthcare. It reminded me of the book that changed my mind about history.
Now I’m back to a fun novel in my reading line-up, but I’m changed from my encounter with Diagnosis Critical. And for that, I am thankful.
