The Beach

Ahhhh...nothing spells relaxation like a holiday at the beach. At least that's how it was until we started going to the beach with two kids. This time, we spent our time frantically chasing C. before he crawled his way into the ocean (that one has NO fear), emptying sand out of his mouth, soothing J.'s fears of the ocean, slathering sunscreen on them, and trying to prevent the early demise of sea gulls since Judah was insistent upon feeding them Teddy Grahams. I did read a page in my book though. Yes, one page. But we wouldn't trade it for anything! We had a great time. Until Friday afternoon, when holiday tourists began showing up, we had the beach nearly to ourselves. (see below) We spent Thursday afternoon and the first half of Friday on the beach. The weather was gorgeous! Though I can't wait for Tim to get a new career and build up in a new town, I can't complain at all about living two hours away from the ocean.

C. maintained a very neutral expression his entire time at the ocean. It was as though he was on the verge of tears or laughter, but he couldn't decide which was appropriate. Though spending days without his famous smile was unusual, he was still true to laid-back, try anything side. He napped, ate sand, drank in the sun, destroyed his brother's sandcastle, ate sand, went out in the waves with Tim, ate sand, sat on the shore with me, and did I mention-ate sand?? Yum!





As I mentioned, J. spent most of his time trying to feed Teddy Grahams to the sea gulls. Needless to say, the gulls weren't very interested, but he would take off running whenever one landed near us. He was not fond of the water; too big and too loud. He told the waves, "Shhh! Shhh!" on several occasions, and emphatically shook his head, "no," whenever we asked if he wanted to go in the water. Tim took him into the waves anyway, convinced that he'd love it after just one more wave....nope. I could hear him screaming, "MAMA!" from the shore! The cookie monster boogie board didn't even help. He came home with plenty of sea shells though, and a lot of fun memories from the shore.


Happy Memorial Day!

All the fun memories we've had this month while Tim has been on leave...
...all the soccer lessons...


...leaving me with nothing to do but dance to the Beatles White Album and Otis Redding with two little boys...



...because Timmy helped out with the lawn. . . (I know those golf clubs were meant for golf, Emma, but he grabs them for all sorts of reasons-other than golf)!



...the changing, the hair, the laundry, the dishes, the discipline and the shopping;

...memories that can continue to be made week after week...
. . .because Tim doesn't have to go back to the desert! Yeah! He comes off of leave Monday, and will be working normal business hours until he goes to a school they are sending him to in a few months. So, we're off to the beach! See you in a few days.

What is Your Favorite Flower?

"For we are to God the aroma of Christ and through us spreads everywhere the knowledge of him." 2 Corinthians 2:14

Dad and Janne helped Tim and I get some basic landscaping planted last year for our new house. Considering our little plot of land was a tobacco farm three years ago, and we live in an area known as "the sand hills," landscaping can be be quite a challenge! But the little white blossom cherry trees, our sugar maple, and the gardenias have done beautifully.

My favorite vegetation is the frangipanier. Sorry, I have no idea what it's called in English; I only know the French name. It's a tree that grows in tropical climates, like SE Asia and the tropics, with sweet, fragrant, white blossoms with yellow centers. They smell so pungently sweet that we derive our English word frangrant from them; my nose can detect one of these trees from blocks away. (http://www.aujardin.info/plantes/frangipanier.php)

My most vivid memory of frangipanier is from a visit to Tuol Sleng in Phnom Penh (otherwise known as S-21). Tuol Sleng, where thousands of Cambodians were tortured by the Khmer Rouge in the 1970's, is now a dilapidated tourist site, left-for the most part-exactly as it was the day Pol Pot walked away from it. There are torture devices rusting in the interrogation cells, and walls of photographs of the prisoners who stayed there, women and infants included. Yet, in the midst of this mire of misdirected human history are dozens of frangipanier trees. I remember standing once on the second story of the prison, just outside of a tiny cell where rats still frequent, looking down at a young Cambodian girl-maybe three years old. She wore a yellow dress and was dancing on the grounds, skipping from tree to tree. She stopped to gather the fallen frangipanier blossoms, smelled them deeply like a patient sucks into a mask who is desperate for oxygen, carefully put them in her hair, and danced some more. Truly, a heavenly fragrance in the hands of a child can drive out all echoes of evil.

Gardenias aren't frangipanier, but they are of the same family, and gardenias grow successfully in America. Since they are of the same family, the scent is similar to that which I gather to wear in my hair whenever I'm in SE Asia when passing a blossoming frangipanier. Our front yard gardenia bushes are just beyond full bloom-when I think plants smell the sweetest, though they are starting to wither-and whenever I step outside I am reminded of my second home, my son's first home: Southeast Asia, and of how beautiful is the fragrance of Christ.

Quack! Quack!

Can you remember when you were
as tall as a goose, as curious as a stranger in a new land,
when Daddy made all the scary things not scary anymore,

and a goose "Honk! Honk!" made you smile a hundred times in a row,
or the first time you saw a duck,
and you ate more of the bread than what you shared with them,
but that was OK because Mom and Dad loved you anyway, and your brother shared enough with our feathered friends for everybody.

Our Visit with Uncle Steve and the Zoo Animals:

Compassion-click on the following:

http://www.willienelson.com/nm/publish/news_164.html

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices in the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perserveres" 1 Cor. 13:4-7.

Remember in Bible school when your teacher would have you replace all the "love"s in that verse with your name? "Tiffany is patient, Tiffany is kind. Tiffany does not envy, she does not boast, she is not proud. . ." The point of that exercise was to remind us, even as children, that love is more than a feeling. "Love is a verb," as the trite saying goes.

That's easy for me to forget. Love isn't just the mushy feeling we get for our spouses, children, or pizza. (Side note: I always thought the great error of the English language was only having one word for love that varies in applicability from pizza to passion. Other languages, like Greek, saw the obvious need for different words). Love is choosing to act lovingly to my two year old when he throws his food on the floor, or my husband, even when he says, "The house looks clean to me-what do you mean?" Yes, love is a verb.

That's why, as I've gotten older and studied world religions, I've come to really appreciate the Buddhist ideal of compassion. If we can say, "The gospel in a word is love," they can say, and the Dalai Lama has made millions in book sales saying, "Buddhism- in a word- is compassion."

Maybe it's because love is such an overused word, but compassion speaks action to me. Love denotes a feeling that may or may not have my stomach twiterpated, spurring me to action. So, when I see that homeless man, that misbehaving child, that grieving widow, the lonely woman with a lost soul, or other "neighbors" as Jesus categorizes them, I've stopped thinking about loving them. I found it too easy to say to myself, "Yep, I love them with the love of the Lord," and walk on. I've come to think, "have compassion on them," which forces me to continue, "by (insert appropriate verb here) them." It's more difficult to feign ignorance, and walk away from citizens of the world when compassion is guiding me.

Timmy sent me this picture via email a while back because he knew they are two of my favorite people: Willie Nelson and the Dalai Lama. You may be thinking, "What a combination!" but if you've listened to the later Willie stuff, and kept up with his social and environmental activities lately, you'd see they are more alike than you think. Apparently, he also cares a lot about copyright infringements because I can't copy and paste the above mentioned picture onto this blog. You have to click on the link at the top, and view it on his website. Sorry. Blame activist Willie. Continuing on, both men also speak often of Compassion. By the way, if you haven't heard the Dalai Lama speak, read a book or watch a PBS special. His wisdom, wit, and grace are captivating. Listening to him I think, "if this is what a man who has given his life to seeking wisdom sounds like, just imagine what the Son of God sounded like!" No wonder thousands of people sat on the desert ground in the heat of middle eastern days straining to hear a not-so-attractive man teach.

So, love may do it for you- spur you to action. If so, hold to it, and love your world. If love seems to have gone a little stale lately, try compassion. It won't take you long to find someone who needs a little of it.

Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive. Dalai Lama

. . .And Daddy Makes Four!
The doorbell rang last night at 7:00 p.m., and guess who it was!? Timmy's home and having a BLAST with two very happy little boys. C-to our surprise-really recognized Tim. He smiled, laughed and tried to claw his way out of his bouncy chair to get to him as soon as Tim came through the door. That made Tim very happy, to say the least. J. hasn't had any attachment issues with him, even though Tim didn't hesitate to put him in time-out within four hours of meeting him. J. hugs him, calls him "Dada,"and signs, "more" whenever Tim takes a break from horseplaying with him. It's going very smoothly. I'm not sure how long he will be here, but it will be close to a month, if not longer. God is good, and we are in awe of our blessings! (Sorry the best picture is fuzzy; we didn't take them!)




Sometimes C. laughs so hard he falls over. It's hilarious. This time it was about the "P" sound. I dont' know why, but whenever J. and I work on the "P" sound (that's a sound he couldn't say, so I'd say "p" into his hand so that he'd feel the air from the "p" until he got it) C. cracks up! So, if you want C. to laugh, just walk up to him and say, "Purple," or "Pineapple." Yep-hilarious!