Children

Rainy day thoughts on baseball

Children, Faith, Motherhood, Prayer, Trust, Uncategorized
The hands we held

The hands we held

 

Up at 6:00 a.m. to be an hour and 15 minutes early for an 8:00 game, I am sitting watching rain plop onto my windshield as the coaches discuss the weather. Players, one by one, decide to get out of cars and look at the field. I gaze out at the backs of young men and grown men as they continue to “examine the field” and discuss Lord knows what as they wait to decide…try to “get it in”or leave.

I glance over at my friend, sitting in her car, she and her son…watching as are we as the men watch the rain fall. My son joins the group…so her son follows along. I join her in the passenger seat and together we watch the men watch the rain….oh, the glorious life of a baseball mom!

Minutes later, the young men walk towards us in small groups of two or three. We both wait…we’ll go with flow. We go home or we go back to hotel or we play tomorrow or we come back later.

We’ll be ok with whatever the choice because we’re here, we are doing our part on this journey to our son’s dream…to have baseball be a part of college.

So, decision was made. Game cancelled, we play at 3. It’s likely to be raining then. My friend is a realist. She told me it will be raining there.

No matter, though. We’ll be there an hour 15 minutes before the game. That’s how we roll! 🙂

Back in hotel room…changed into yoga pants enjoying chick fila breakfast in bed and watching ESPN Sports Center (again) I am strangely content, nevertheless hopeful.

Because I have learned and for some wonderfully unknown reason, I am focused on the good of this crazy, expensive, inconvenient, off schedule rainy delayed weekend. The good, cherished time with my son and my friend.

Thanks to my baseball mom friends, here a few bits of advice and reminders:

  1. Moms, we gotta learn to go to sleep when they’re out at night. Start trying now.
  2. Moms, it’s weird for them to be in a hotel room with us…know this and find someplace to go for a few minutes or at least be okay with them going into Pandora zone.
  3. Moms, do NOT visit your son at the dugout…not even the fence.
  4. Moms, try hard not to do anything old lady, crazy, scatter brained or “cool”. You will be the source of entertainment in the dugout.
  5. Moms, try hard not to fix a bad mood after a bad game.
  6. Moms, if we don’t understand why men stare at a rain drenched field for half an hour…doesn’t it make sense that quite possibly we might never understand lots of this baseball journey/process to the path to college play?

FINALLY, Moms…pray about everything. TRUST THE PROCESS…this recruiting thing…especially where God will place your son, which field, campus and coach.

it’s his future, not yours.  Our children are not our puppets.

The hands we held…we release.  The hand we held will be held by God.

P.S.  As I blog, Austin naps…My 6’5″ young man who used to hold my hand.

 

teachers everywhere

Children, Faith, Motherhood, Teaching, Uncategorized
Wisdom

Wisdom

So, Atlanta has been interesting…pitched a good game, not a perfect game. A good game with a smile on his face and a confident gum chewing demeanor. How moms measure good is a stark contrast to sons .

Good gameto moms is more strike outs than walks; more outs than hits, more aggressive throws overs to first to get the runner and more shoulders back, head high, swagger and stride in the trot back to the dugout.

We watch for these good things. Good to moms is decidedly different than to a handsome young man, your son, the pitcher who throws a pitch that’s propelled over the fence. Not good moms…that’s bad.

Good is not the loss, regardless of the circumstances or contributing factors aka errors…loss is not good. A win is the only good. How on earth is a mom to respond? Well, the response is no response. Not natural, I know!

Time will pass with no need for what we perceive as encouragement that is really just a futile effort to make “it all better” like the skinned knee or the failed test or even the broken heart…even that we can buffer. But, pitching… moms, we just can’t fix.

So we sit and we anticipate calls. We gauge our son’s posture, smile, his movements and we watch, we spectate, we support. That is all. That is enough.

Count your blessings if you have coaches who are just the right combination of wisdom, boyish rambunctious, and hindsight… This means they remember being where your son is and they teach, they guide, they remind and most importantly they point upwards to God when challenged with “Why?”

Teachers everywhere…

Your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, This is the way, walk in it.  Isaiah 30:21

by Faith, Lisa

Children, Faith, Prayer, Trust, Uncategorized
Image

HEBREWS 11 Stories of Faith

Have you read, seen, or had conversations about faith? What an intangible, mysterious, difficult to comprehend, yet powerful thing is faith!

Last week, while doing my morning thing with Bible, journal and coffee I turned to Hebrews and read. You know the verse…faith is being sure of what we don’t see. Am I the only person who has a hard time with the unseen, the uncontrollable, the “can’t make it right” ? Certainly not…still; I love, hold tight to, depend on this faith concept.

What an amazing book this Holy Bible is. Personally, I think we often miss out on the most important purpose of God’s word the stories of people who believed in Faith, in God, in his Son, Jesus Christ…even when they had not seen Him. Remember I believe “everybody has a story.”

So, last week; I read beyond the verse we all know…the one about the unseen and I read further about people just like me who were brave enough to say… “I don’t know. But, by Faith I will believe I can.”

Here’s what I did. You should too. Take these two little words…By Faith…and follow them with whatever you struggle with, doubt, agonize over, or dream of. This is powerful and it’s really just sort of cut and paste. We all know cut and paste.

Move your mountains…By Faith.

By faith, Lisa believed that God enabled her and will bless her as she uses her story and her love of words for good.

I do love words. “If you have them, use them.” Me

 

 

 

A different path – graced by God

Children, Faith, Motherhood, Prayer, Uncategorized

 

Grace, peace, and clarity Grace found me and changed me.

Last week, a friend asked me to walk with her. Her journey of a year has been one of challenges and changes, new commitments to change. She has been walking with determination and consistency.

I walk for therapy, for freeing my mind of stress, ear buds in…soul cleansing lyrics in rhythm with my asphalt pounding, power walking steps. It’s good for me. I crave these walks. So, when my friend asked me to walk with her on her mapped out trek through the streets of a strange city at 7:00 a.m., I said sure!  Not really a morning walker; but, sure! Day one was good…good talk…good energy…good start to my day, coffee free…nonetheless, a good start! Tomorrow morning, lobby at 7, same route, we agreed.

Next morning, blaring off the walls alarming sounds calls us to evacuate the hotel. We all find ourselves disheveled, annoyed, expressions of bleary-eyed annoyance outside in a parking lot because of what was thankfully a false alarm. Back in our room, I open my devotional and Bible preparing to post my daily Facebook scripture and any other words God may place on my heart. I struggle.

My attention span is short, aggravated and my searching for pretty words that will bring multiple “likes” feels obligatory, shallow, and insincere.

Isn’t Facebook for the most part just “attention seeking” behavior? Let’s be honest. Sometimes it is. Sometimes, though it’s nourishing and wound-healing. But, that’s God, I’m just the typist, the vessel, the broken clay pot.

So, I tell myself, come back to this. You’ll connect with God’s word later. Go to the lobby, your friend is waiting. There she was, sleepy-eyed and same as me, “just not feelin’ it”. So, we walked; far less energetically, sharing our respective concerns about our children, our husbands, and life as we moaned and groaned about trash on the side of the road and people who seemed to be driving as if they didn’t even see us! Didn’t they know we were walking again?

Our talk continued on this frame with occasional reminders of good things we both have. My friend’s advice, “Trust the process.” is the expression I cherish most. I think she likes my “Let it happen” and “my children are not my puppets.” Kinda just words, that morning though, met with  “Yeah, I know’s” that really meant…”not feeling all that advice, just let me be grouchy”.

So, on we walk…now talking about the dreaded subject of money. Specifically, how much we spend staying in hotels so that our sons can have the opportunity of their dreams…playing college baseball. Just as she’s calculating our current weekend, I glance towards the overgrown, grassy area and I see a young girl, somebody’s little girl, a daughter, God’s creation. My eyes rested on her, filling with tears.

She is thin, reddish brown hair, cascading over her backpack as she lies sleeping on her side, little girl shape, a young woman sleeping beside a busy road, hidden in the tall grass as the day begins. I touch my friend’s back,mouthing “Look.” We stop, quietly, strangely as if we are afraid we will wake her from sweet sleep, lying there, knees drawn up towards her chest. We walk, misty-eyed and I say, “Let’s pray, let’s just be quiet and pray.” We did.

Back in my room I regret not waking her, offering something, giving anything I could. I tell myself I will go back and see what I can do.

I pray again. Then, I seek solace in my devotional since I left that part of my day hanging, incomplete. I open my Bible to Psalms, always a comfort, and my eyes land on the verse God had for me all along…just in his timeframe, his schedule, his graceful and grace-filled plan.

I am overwhelmed by this providence, this plan, moments later as I drive by the spot where the girl slept and see she has awakened. She has begun her journey for this day, a journey now covered in prayer for grace because God blessed the path of my friend and I and roused us, charting our day towards gratitude and grace. Moving this lost and lonely girl towards grace, I know. I believe with all my heart.

My Facebook post for the day, posted just a little later than usual, for that day grace covered our walk:

I lay down and slept. I woke up in safety, for the Lord was watching over me. Psalm 3:5

 

 

Miss “Skricklin”…reflections on a first year of love

Children, Faith, Motherhood, Teaching, Uncategorized
Teaching love

Teaching love….lessons from Heather’s first year

Today, a whole bunch of 4K children will arrive excited to play outdoors at the end of the year party. I hear there will be water involved and most of the day will be outdoors. Summer will begin next week and the lessons will be memories and foundations for their future. They have had their first year of school with a first year teacher…a Teacher who taught lessons and love. I am going to miss my daughter’s stories of connections, concern, comedy, and compassion…my daughter, a teacher who loves.

Here are just a few things I know her students learned this year, the things that will assure them of the goodness of teachers:

If you don’t have a mat for naptime, you use a towel and one day when you least expect it, your teacher will call you up to her desk and whisper, “Look, I got you a mat!” and you will know you are important to her.

If you throw up all over your stuff in your cubby and your classmate’s cubby, you might come to school the next day and your teacher will give you a freshly washed bookbag ’cause your teacher took it home, unpacked it, wiped away the grossness and washed it in her washing machine. You will know that a really, horrible day doesn’t mean tomorrow will be bad, your teacher will make sure of that.

If you don’t have very much food at home and you forget your “weekend backpack” your teacher will show up in front of your house and as you open the door you will see your teacher’s smiling face on your porch ’cause she wants to make sure your weekend is good and she will see you on Monday! You will know that even if she can’t be with you on the weekends, she cares.

If there is something you just can’t learn and nobody can figure it out, your teacher will tell you, “You can, let’s try again.” and even if you ask her over and over “Can you help me?” she will help you and tell you each time, “You can do this.” So, you will know “you can learn if you don’t give up.”

Close to 20 children will be kindergarteners next year and will know what to expect from a teacher. They will remember that a teacher has rules and schedules and likes to be listened to; but, most importantly, they will remember that teachers love!

Thankful to be the mother of a teacher who loves and remembers her first year of being loved by a teacher….the framework for her life…for her students!