I love the fact that here in northern Maine we get to experience all four seasons.  Each season has its own special beauty and it’s great to be able to enjoy each one. This last winter was beautifully sunny, in fact it was probably more sunny than all of last spring, summer and fall!

I love watching the snow fall quiet as a whisper.  I love seeing the top layer of blown snow drifting in layers looking just like sand in the desert.  I love the way the sun makes the snow sparkle like its been strewn with diamonds.

I also love the awakening that comes with spring.  As the snow gradually disappears, white is replaced with the color of spring flowers and apple blossoms.  The lilac bushes fill the air with fragrance while tulips, crocuses, daff-a-down-dillys (my favorite name for daffodils), and all manner of other flowers, shrubs and trees sway in the soft spring breeze.  There is the smell of clean earth ready to be planted with tomatoes, lettuce, spinach, carrots…

In the past couple of weeks, the daytime temperatures have increased gradually melting the snow and revealing more ground.  I find myself going from window to window to see how much more ground is visible each day.  I’m checking the ground to see how frozen it still is – the more protected places close to the foundation never really froze and there are new shoots pushing their noses up out of the ground.

I find myself conflicted… As much as I am looking forward to spring, I’m sad to see the snow melting. Somewhere in between the cold whiteness of winter and the fragrant colors of spring there is the muddy slush of dirty melting snow.  That’s where we are right now as I say goodbye to winter and look forward to spring.

…doesn’t just apply to physical fitness.  Just like any other part of your body, the brain needs fitness training to stay sharp.  My mother’s greatest fear was becoming senile. Unfortunately, she did and I think it was due, in large part, because she stopped learning after she retired.

I love learning new things and embracing new technologies.  Even though I feel like I’m always 10 steps behind the younger set – especially when it comes to web-related applications and content – I still enjoy the learning process.

I suffer from an affliction called CRS – Can’t Remember S**t.  I believe it’s because at my age I have a lifetime of learning packed in my brain and some of it has to go so that I can have room to stuff new knowledge. This would seem to indicate that the CRS is just a symtom of a larger disorder – Bulimia of the Brain.  I learn new things in a process of binging and purging except that I purge old knowledge and keep the new.

You know… that’s not such a bad thing. New knowledge can lead to life changes – at any age. So now, if you should ever cross paths with me and I don’t remember your name and why I should know you, you’ll know why.

My sister the minister wrote a post yesterday about an upcoming sermon.  She asks a question: “When did the church I grew up in disconnect the ‘heart’ from obedience?” Good question. I’ve been struggling with disconnect nearly all of my life – mostly by rebelling against both my earthly father and my Heavenly Father.

As my sister pointed out, our father had a rigid mindset when it came to obedience and being a “good” Christian. Barb saw that rigid mindset in the sermons at our church.  I don’t seem to recall that, but then, I opted out when I was still in my early twenties.  For me, what made obedience so hard and rebellion so seemingly necessary were the rules we had to follow in order to be “good” – both as a daughter and a Christian. If you broke the rules you were punished, severely and often physically.  My dad was a firm believer in not sparing the rod. So we obeyed… mostly, but not out of desire or love. We obeyed because we were afraid.  My mother commented once that when our two youngest brothers were still preschool age, when Dad would come home from work they would run to the door to greet him, but we four older kids would run away and hide.  She also said that at dinner, when Dad would lean back and loosen his belt we would flinch.  I’m not sure if my siblings grew up with this belief, but I came to believe that my father was the earthly representation of our Heavenly Father.  Disobeying your father was tantamount to disobeying God.

I wonder if the disconnect between love and obedience didn’t start with the “fire and brimstone” preachers who traveled around the country holding tent revivals.  They presented a gospel that promised a fiery eternity in Hell unless you repented your sins and turned your footsteps to the “straight and narrow” path to heaven.  I have no doubt that there are a lot of unbelievers in the world today whose view of Christianity is exactly that.  In that world view, eChristians are no better than the Muslim extremists; especially Christian leaders like Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson and James Dobson (heresy!).

I am reminded of my first real boss. I worked for tiny Christian radio station in Merced, California and my boss was the Station Manager.  It didn’t seem to matter what I did or how trivial it might have been; his response was always as if I had done him the greatest favor in all the world.  I would have done anything for him.  Why shouldn’t our relationship with God be just like that? John 3:16 says “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (NIV, emphasis mine)  There is no “or else” in that simple statement. Neither does it say that if we don’t love God, He will withhold His love from us.

God loves me whether I am obedient or not.  In fact, He loved us all so much that He gave us free will – to walk away from Him or to run into His arms.  I’m not exactly running yet – there’s still that rebellion issue, but I’m beginning to learn that not only does God love me, He can be incredibly patient with me.

Have you ever noticed how much of Celtic music is written in a minor key? As beautiful as the music can be, it seems as if the Scots and Irish are lost somewhere in the past and mourning what was and can never be again.

Of all the posts I’ve written since I started this blog in 2002 (six years!), the one that has over time generated the greatest number of comments is a memory rediscovered after a great many years.  Apparently when people “google” the name of the song or any part of its lyrics my site is right up there!  At any rate, I want to repost so that the post can still be found.  Enjoy!

When I was in the 8th grade, one of my electives was a chorus class.  Our teacher had been teaching us old traditional tunes, and this particular lullaby was one of them, which is how I happened to know it.  The song was “Sleep, Kentucky Babe” and my guess is that 98% of the people who read this (all 2 of them, no doubt) will go “huh?”.  When I said it was old, I meant it.  The song is from the turn of the century — the LAST century.

My youngest brother is 11 years younger than I, so he would have been about two years old then.  I am the oldest of six kids, three boys and three girls.  At that time we were living in a little three-bedroom, one-bath house in Sacramento.  We kids were split between two bedrooms.  We girls had bunkbeds and a single bed and shared two drawers each in a six-drawer upright dresser.  The two older boys shared bunkbeds and Bob, the baby, was in a crib.  Poor Bob, he was in that crib until he was five!

I”m not sure if my dad was still working for the Salvation Army or was driving a school bus at that particular time, but my mom was an RN working at one of the Sutter Hospitals.  I think she was working the swing shift then, either part- or full-time.  Dad would make sure we all got bathed and put to bed and Bob was always first.  Sometimes I would sit with him while he was falling asleep, stroking his brow so he would close his eyes and I would sing to him:

“Skeeters am a-hummin’ on the honeysuckle vine,
Sleep, Kentucky babe.
Sandman am a-comin’ to this little babe of mine,
Sleep, Kentucky babe.
Silv”ry moon am shinin’ from the heavens up above.
Bob-o-link am pinin’ for it’’s little lady love.
You is mighty lucky, babe from old Kentucky,
Close your eyes and sleep. Fly away (fly away).
Fly away, Kentucky babe, fly away to rest.
Fly away (fly away).
Lay your sleepy little head on your Daddy’’s breast.
Close your eyes and sleep.
Close your eyes and sleep.”

He was so young then I doubt he has any memory of it. And until I got it jogged yesterday, it had totally escaped mine.

Note: The complete original lyrics and author information can be found here.

I still have a freezer full of blueberries from last summer and I can only make so many pies…  I’ve been experimenting with different ways of doing something with them and it’s been fun.  Last fall I found out the hard way that I am sensitive to dextrose so that ruled out the powder pectins.

Then I found some liquid pectin that had no dextrose – no sugar at all! And I remembered seeing commercials for Truvia, the new sweetener made from the Stevia plant.  It’s been available at the health/whole foods stores for some time. Now the FDA has approved it and it’s moving the the sugar isle.  I found some powder Stevia and some Blue Agave syrup, another plant-based sweetener.  But I still needed a jelling agent to replace the sugar – unflavored tapioca!  And in a pinch, cornstarch.

The results were awesome!  I now have homemade blueberry jam with no sugar and no artificial sweeteners.  I can say with all honesty that this is a jam that is good for you!  You’ve got to love that.