Magnificent May... The First of Many Memories

When Fabi left in the end of May, the summer was before me and I just knew that I would not have sufficient time to write well about our time together.  So, I began vomiting all over my computer, making lists of experiences to flesh out one at a time as I had time.  I forced myself to write some each day no matter how tired I happened to be at the end of it.  It has been a rejuvenating process of reflection so far!  Over the next few weeks and months, you’ll find little snippets of this ever-growing document.   I’ll share funny stories, serious stories, pictures & thoughts about the trip of my recent lifetime with Fabi…

Overlooking the Bright Angel Trail

We watched our first sunset in that perfectly secluded spot overlooking the Bright Angel Trail from the Hermit’s Rest Rim Trail.  We had our Grand Canyon brewed beer while watching the canyon, having opened our beer with the canyon rim!  It was beyond words to see that beauty.  I was reading in Isaiah (2:10-17).  It’s the section that talks about the lofty/proud being brought low.  Some of the examples included nature – like the cedars of Lebanon.  I guess they were some famous and magnificent Cedars in Lebanon.  It made me think of the power of God to crush the Grand Canyon flat in but a moment, a word.  God gives us amazing beauty here to enjoy here on earth, but to read that God will destroy it for one purpose – showing His glorious wrath and making all men look to Him alone.  Wow.  Anyway, it was a precious time for me to spend that sunset with God and Fabian. 

Looking north at the Colorado River from Desert Views

On our way back to the car, we talked about our Bright Angel hike scheduled for the next day.  Would we go all the way to the river or turn back part way?  In a moment of sheer stupid and awesome brilliance, Fabi asked me if I would yell my debit card pin number to him as I was falling over the edge of the canyon if I ever did.  How thoughtful of him! (geez!) So, I yelled seven-two-fiiiiive-niiiiiiiiinnnnnnne… and we laughed hysterically (Mind you, I told him the correct pin, not this stand in for public use.).   He scrambled for paper when I told him that I had actually just then and there told him my correct pin number. Thanks for thinking of what little money I had in my bank account over and above my life! 

The Changing of the Guards

I bought my very first car this week, I mean like, paid for my very first car.  Dads are great people!  Anyway, as fun it is to get a new set of wheels (and it is quite exciting!), there is something difficult for me about selling the old one.

I drove my old blue Taurus into the car wash to soap her down one last time (hopefully) before some new owner takes her away.  I thought about all of the memories that happened in and around that car... Three years at college, carting friends around town.  Road trips.  Camping trips.  Great stories.  Hilarious jokes.  She's brought me to and from work many times.  Taken me to camp.  Got a few of my tears in her seats (Don't tell the new owner!). She was lent out to friends and family during my time in Europe.  I've eaten a lot of meals inside.  The cup holder knows my Dr. Pepper can well.  Inspiring sermons. Housed my closet one summer.

Goodness, I'm just so thankful for her!  We've held hands and went through life together for 6 years!

Holding hands with my dear old friend

 And by now, you all are thinking ... Jaime, it's a CAR! Geez!  But part of my life is trapped in that car.  It will be forever.  Those were good times.

I'm still getting to know my new car.  The way it shifts, takes curves, and the cruise.  I know I'm going to love her someday too.  I'm excited at all of the new adventures we'll have, but right now, she's like the new college roommate who you don't know and you can't figure out why your old one had to transfer upstate!  I know we'll be best friends by November though... after I've spilled ketchup on the leather seats a couple times ...

Making the introductions

Here's to more good times...

The Decade Wanes

2000 to 2009. A Decade.

It's fun to reflect back on these years.

I've traveled to 4 continents in 10 years. I've lived in a foreign country for one of them. I've learned 2 1/2 languages since 2000. I graduated from high school and college. I've lost two grandparents. I've gained sister-in-laws. I have grown in my relationship with Christ. I have learned countless things about myself. I have made life-long friends. God has given me and my family health. He has provided jobs and given innumerable other blessings. He has sustained me, through Christ.

What has been your biggest accomplishment/proudest moment?

What do you hope to do better in the next ten years?

How has your life impacted others? and been impacted by them?

What are a few of the happiest moments of this past decade?

What have you learned?

Those days... [Irrational Fears]

I remember when I was young and every time I got a really bad sore throat, I thought that it was going to close up just like it did for George Washington when he died.

What fears did you have as a child that you've since deemed irrational?

Family Times

We spent last night trekking back in time… to when we set out on an adventure together – to new places and seemingly “more refined” tastes. We started out the day in snow-dusted Solway, saying good-bye to the curved driveway and bare trees. We had packed up our lives into boxes. Each of us had taken a stroll through the house with the video camera, reliving old memories and trying not to forget. For me, it was my first noteworthy venture into complete unknown. I was thankful that I had my family to go through it with the first time. Our dogs, Ginger and Blackie, are quiet and contemplative, as if they feel that was are leaving. Dad shows us the garage… the place where he created, now his vacant workbench and custom shelving. The tractor that carried our wood so many faithful years sits in the corner, to be picked up by a new owner. The yard is a dismal brown, looking so forlorn, even after the winter’s cleansing. The swing set where I first learned to pump my knees. The basketball hoop where I first went Around the World. The memories come rushing back as we view this piece of our lives.

In seconds, we find ourselves saying hello to a new house, even to a new life. First, we are introduced to the office that seemed to set this whole chaos into motion. It was a brown building with several different office spaces inside. Worldbook had the sliver office at the end. My dad was moving up in his company. I am awed by a town that was twice the size of Bemidji, MN. We caught our first views of our street, our drive home. This place would be where we opened our lives, the new chapter. The grass is green in our new manicured lawn. Here, the trees are intentionally placed and not left to come up where the wind blows the seed. As we watch, we are reminiscent of shorter trees, basketball hoop-less driveways, and old wall paper. I remember the new excitement that accompanied this house that has become so acquainted and comfortable. My room has dry-wall on all four sides!

The screen goes blue. I am torn from my reverie, being met again with the reality that it is 14 years later. It is late in the night. There is church tomorrow. All that I want to do is put in the next tape and continue to cuddle with my daddy. Times like these are precious, becoming scarcer with each passing day. I live in the same room that I did while in high school, but so much time has gone by. I can see it in the shooting height of the trees and Cody, in the extra gray hairs around dad’s ears, in my own body’s commencing physical decline. Life continues to go on, picking up speed by the minute. Most days, I long for a cave filled with now…

We hear a song or read a story, & the good feelings get don’t remain inside of us. We are either anticipating them, or we’ve had them and they are gone. We never experience them as now… I’m writing a story about a little girl who discovers a cave where there is a lasting now. – Chaim Potok [The Gift of Asher Lev, p.99]

May you enjoy your Thanksgiving with friends and family, in the now...

Welcome to the Christkindlmarkt!

My new header picture was taken in the Old City section of Innsbruck during the annual Christmas Market festival. There is nothing like it in all of the world. I urge you all to get to a German-style market at Christmas someday. The lights invite and the community connects. Make sure you try the Glühwein!

This time of year always makes me yearn for Tirol. Two years ago today, I first set foot in the States after my au-pair year. What a difficult homecoming it was... and still seems to be. I am a zwischenmensch... a "between person." I still feel between to worlds - both I love so much. I don't know how to come "home," or if I want to.

The lights. They're just magical.

Last Days

The hard thing about being adventurous is that you have to leave a lot and say goodbye. I do not "do goodbyes" well. Today was my last day of work before camp happens and graduate school starts. Yes, I was accepted to the University of Edinburgh for the fall. I'm excited to get back to school... and to explore Scotland!

With all this new adventure, it means saying goodbye to friends, co-workers, and family. And evidently, I'm rather nostalgic. I like to remember all of the experiences I have in a place... to walk the halls one last time... to drink one last cup of good tea... to remember each picture up at my desk... heck, I brought home 10,000 used staples from me desk because I could not say goodbye to them all in one day.

Leaving is such a surreal experience. Sometimes I think it is easier to stay. The same routine. That's nice. But staying means saying no to an incredible adventure!!! I can't believe that God would send me on yet another overseas journey. I am so thankful for His provision. It will build such faith to step out like this again. I guess that's the whole reason I do it.

But first, camp!

His First Day in Heaven

The sky is so blue in this arctic freezer. My clothes make no effort to stop the frigidness from stabbing my body ruthlessly and forever. It makes me feel alive, though painfully. The heat in my car, though new, only makes it feel like a drafty hunting shack. Even the sun looks like it has a layer of ice surrounding it.

The first time I've ever read Jack refer to his father as "dad." Dad has moved on to a place where he can see Jesus face to face. My mind cannot fathom what it is like to lose your best friend of so many years. I did not get to meet Guil, although I feel like I know him - the parts of him that Jack has inherited and become.

There is sadness, knowing that you won't be able to talk about the latest race or revel in the newest soaring stock. He won't be participating in any more coffee clutches. There are so many memories to wade through. The small things, you'll miss. There is stress and exhaustion, thinking about all that must go into grieving and planning for life after dad. eventually. How will mother cope? How will you? But woven through each of these layers is vibrant joy, like sunshine -- Dad did not waste his life! He spent it on the One... And there is more joy, for he is with Him now! He can see Jesus face to face.

It is odd today. Odd for us, but even more odd for him... His first day in Heaven. ... I think I have the wrong size wings. ... When's lunch? ... Whoa, look at all those stars down there! He can see, think and move more clearly than he ever has before. He is not hindered by sin. What joy there is in this day!! He is fully alive, though for us, it is painful.

Infuse, the End of an Era

I stepped into the chapel after most had left and turned on all the lights. As I stood in the back, I recounted all that God had infused into me at this camp. I was trained in life and ministry here, more than in any classroom. It is so home to me.

[click] I turn one light out. I think about how terrified I was at the prospect of cabin-leadering as a junior in high school. What if my campers don't like me? or listen to me? What? - I have to plan a devotion? now, 6? God took over and I learned.

[click.] There was a strange feeling in me as I left my first week of being activities director. Could God have more for me here? Somehow, the answer came YES, but it was very subtle and quiet.

[click.] Two summers of programming taught me more about myself, about what my body can do and about what happens when my body shuts down from exhaustion. I learned even more as I gave up control to the Master of the Universe. I learned to nap on a musty chapel pew surrounded by rowdy campers, manage many staff members and lead large group games. As I play the snapshots in my mind, I see campers loving one another, meeting Christ, and struggling through life together. I see lots of smiles and laughs.

[click.] It is nearly dark now. I moved to Austria, left with a hole the size of Riverside in my heart. I ached for a place to use these gifts that I had developed and been so affirmed in. It's super hard to lead in a different language. :o) I wipe the tears from my face as I think about the hours I spent on the bridge over the river during my re-entry into the States. Those were sweet times in the arms of Jesus, weeping for the hole in my heart now shaped like Austria. I was soothed again by the gentle rushing water flowing between the large rocks.

[click.] One last programming gig before the full time program director takes her post. I have spent so much energy for this camp... wanting so much that Christ would be seen and magnified in it. I was infused with God's love and grace this weekend. My weakness only made His strength more evident.

I turn, back again and I wave sliding slowly backwards as the last click clicks off...

The end of an era, and it's so hard to say goodbye.

Birthdays Birthdays

There have been lots of great memories of this day and celebrations of this day – the day God brought me into this world. And as each one comes and goes and I reflect on them, I become more and more thankful for God’s good provision for me… of family and friends from so many cultures and stages of life. I am truly thankful for all of you.

Some birthday memories:

1991 – The overnight blizzard on Halloween and none of my sleepover guests had boots. I have clear images still in my mind of my daddy carrying my tennis-shoed friends to our station wagon to bring them home after the party.

1993 – What? I’m getting a brother? Yes, I got a really cool bday present exactly TWO weeks after my day.

1994 – My daddy took me to Chicago [we flew from Bemidji , MN ] for a long weekend.

1999 – Sweet 16 – first boy-girl party. Sixteen Candles was my favorite song for weeks.

2003 – First birthday away from home. My cousin KayLynn brought me a huge cake and balloons at NWC and my parents sent me flowers.

2004 – I heard my name over the loud speaker at Sentry Insurance to call security [dream fulfilled] and they wished me a happy birthday. The next day, I forgot my security badge and when I called them to let me in, they were convinced I had forgotten it because I was out carousing on my 21^st birthday.

2006 – My au-pair family threw me a fancy 4-course dinner party. It was my first birthday party where one of the only things I understood was when they sang me Happy Birthday in English. The cards and emails I received from the States were completely overwhelming!

2007 – I organized a photo scavenger hunt in the old city section of Innsbruck for my Austrian friends. The memories made there were so sweet! On the night of my birthday, I attended my first Austrian Ball. I thought I was dreaming.

2008 – Well, I had an “un-birthday” celebration at Riverside this summer when Maria took my joke about July 23 being my birthday seriously. We had “un-birthday cookies” and they sang me “Happy un-birthday.”

On my real birthday this year, I just turned a ¼ century. That’s kind of monumental. Mama bought me a gigantic warm cookie and milk to dunk it in for lunch [dessert.] And the State of WI and the city of Stevens Point decided to unveil one of the most critical exit ramps in the city along I-39 just for the special day. I do feel appreciated.