DEATH BY WHITE STAG!!!

Egads, GGG! Where have you been?? Inquiring minds need to know...!!

Patience, my pretties, patience. Actually, I do appreciate the concerned comments. Mama P, I named this blog especially for you. I nearly fell outta my chair when I read, "Death by White Stag?" What a frightening thought, to meet one's demise in the smarmy, unmonitored dressing "rooms" of one's local Wal-Mart. If there is a God in heaven above, I pray that the Almighty would see fit to spare me such a gnarly demise -- haven't I suffered enough?!?

OK. All joking aside. I'd love to just put out a blanket, "I've been really busy," excuse, but you, the Readership, would have none of that. Let's take a stroll through the past 30 days:

Picture it: Alabama, April 4, 2008. A hot, young widow struggles with the forces of nature and Homeland Security to fall into the strong arms of the Pookie who loves her. (Did I mention how amazingly attractive this girl is?!? I digress...) I spent a weekend having some much-needed Pookie time. We ate, we drank, we ate some more, we went to the Space Museum in Huntsville and saw exhibits and a great IMAX film, "The Miracle of Flight." I felt like I was on a middle school science field trip. It was great. BTW, did I mention that this is where NASA hosts Space Camp for kids??? And did I mention that going to Space Camp was, like my DREAM ever since the space shuttle Challenger's unbelieveable demise?!?!? It was so neat to see all that stuff. Anyhoo, we had a nice, long dinner at a great German restaurant and just had some much-needed down time, for once being in the same zip code.

They also had the coolest OCC Liberty Bike on display (that's "Orange County Chopper," for those not in the know). The whole thing was made out of bronze and had various effects incorporating the Statue of Liberty. Such a cool bike. I'm sure Paulie designed the bike -- such a creative guy!

In addition to being a globe-trotting GGG (does that now make me "4G"??), I have been in full immersion mode for Lay Ministry training. I've been working at getting ahead in my assignments, and as of about 15 APR, I blew a fuse. The material I had to read, especially from, "Where God Meets Man," was so intense and meaty that I ended up limp with exhaustion and nursing a raging headache for three days after I finished reading it. Between the eye strain and the incredible amounts of great information I digested, I just could not function; I went into safe mode.

Let me add some theological insight here: I am learning daily what it means to me to not only be a Christian, but what it means to express that through the denominational affiliation of being Lutheran. Being raised in the Lutheran church is not exactly the most charismatic of experiences. So many of us who choose to attend denominational churches are "box checkers" or conformists, which disgusts me to no end. On the other hand, as I'm growing and reading more and understanding more clearly, I am alarmed and concerned at things that I hear other churches passing off as gospel truth and sound preaching. What is so frightening is that the basic tenets of what they put forth as truth are not fundamentally wrong; however, it is in the fine details that people are not getting a transparent view of our God, our Holy Scriptures, and the world around us. These fine details are most destructive when they become so embedded in the parts that are true that one cannot separate one from the other. My bottomline comes down to these two points: 1) Challenge your beliefs and articulate exactly what you believe as often as you can, and 2) Search out the parts of your belief system that conflicts or doesn't have a clear meaning or explanation to you. How can we offer the Truth of the Gospel to unbelievers and skeptics when our own beliefs don't make sense to us? Do you know basic meanings of the words you use to share the message of the Gospel, so that you can explain what they mean to a person who has no earthly idea what you're talking about??? Just because you read something in the Bible and think it's talking about A, B, or C doesn't mean even you truly understand what you've just read. Question and research what pastors and teachers tell you. We are all human. What they are teaching and preaching should really be driving us to interact with God and the Word for ourselves, praying that the Spirit would reveal truth to us and give us understanding of what we read.

Also, don't just stop there. Take your body and your mind and squeeze yourself into the text and times of our Scriptures. Don't be blindly fundamental or flaky and symbolic. Do the work -- search it out -- open your heart and prepare to have your socks blown off!

And DON'T attend a church because you like the pastor, the music is good, your kids' friends attend the youth group, or the programs are great. Choose your faith community wisely. Don't just look at what one congregation says it believes, although that is hugely important. Look at what the denomination as a whole professes. If they ordain gays and lesbians and you don't agree with it, you might as well start agreeing with it if you decide to attend church there. If they say that Jesus was merely a human who was adopted as God's Son at His baptism (aka Adoptionists) and you don't agree with it, you might as well start agreeing with it. What you hear preached in your church will be impacted by the doctrines of the larger church, so don't think it doesn't matter! And you Non-Denoms, you don't escape this conundrum, either. I think you guys actually have to be even more discerning because you do not have as many affiliations and larger administration covering doctrinal matters. I simply think we've all got to do a lot more looking at the fine print to make sure things are not slipping past us that appear benign but, grain of sand at a time, can build up quickly to be major stumbling blocks on our spiritual paths. OK...sermon is over!

Dateline: 26 APR 08, My town, Texas... TORNADO!!! This is not an actual picture of my neighborhood, but it was the closest thing I could find on Google Images to what I actually saw. Here's how the near-deadly scene unfolded:

Lil' G had a violin recital last Friday evening. She and Bud were bathed, dressed, and waiting patiently on the couch watching "Go, Diego, Go," and I was putting the final touches on my hot self. I mean, it's difficult to improve upon near perfection, but what can I say... Anyhoo, after sprucing up, I was on my way out of my bedroom when I happened to look out my window, which is usually behind the closed blinds by this time of day. I noticed a weird looking cloud and lots of wind. Thinking that the clouds looked awful greenish-grey and that the wind was really churning, I went out to the back porch. The weather sirens were blaring through the town, and I could see a wall of rain headed north and a black wall of clouds headed south. Uh, yeah, we're not leaving for the recital. Amidst the angered cries for Diego, I told the kids to go sit in our "safe place" for bad weather as I checked the local TV station for the latest weather update...

"...Fire Station 2 on XYZ Road has just confirmed a tornado on the ground just west of the high school and coming south across the lake on FM 1234..."

If you could run your fingers over a map of where I live, you would take XYZ Road and drag your finger west of said fire station. Leave that finger there. Take another finger and cross over the lake on FM 1234. The intersection of those two paths leads to, LITERALLY, my backyard. So what do I do? Well, I do what any good Texan does -- I go stand out on the back porch to watch it go by!!! Really, it did not touch down until it was about 3 miles south of my house, so it must not have touched down for too long near me. The bigger story was the SOFTBALL sized hail that commenced afterward. By the time the tornado was well out of our way, I was debating whether or not to load up and still try to make the recital. After all, we still had 15 minutes until it started. No sooner had the thought passed through my pea-sized brain, I heard a strange 'thud' in the road. It came faster and faster. Apparently there must be a girls' softball team in heaven, and boy were they pissed! We had huge hail and heavy rain for 15 solid minutes. On one hand, I was so thankful that my car was inside the garage. On the other hand, I halfway considered backing it out in the driveway -- Lord knows it would've been totalled and I would be sportin' a new ride by now! Oh well...stupid conscience...

Lastly, and possibly more importantly, I've been in a bit of a funk, too. I don't know how I find the time to devote the kinds of energy it takes to really pull this off well, but I somehow manage to do it with flying colors. I'm at a point in my life where my love life and my life with friends -- close female friends -- are both very important to me. I won't expound on my love life here, other than to say that yes, in fact, I do still have one and that it is truly full of love. Perhaps that is precisely what makes being so far away from him so hard. Understanding the "why" behind it doesn't make it any more pleasant to deal with. I live for the few hours a month we get to see each other, and the time we spend keeping in touch in between. I look at where my life was a year ago today, and just gush when I think about where things are now, in this department.

The arena of friendship has been a very difficult pill to swallow ever since I left the security of my former life as a military spouse to the wilderness of civilian life with a military heart. Long distance relationships are hard to maintain, be they between sweethearts or even close friends of any gender. I pine for the days when I could wander in and out of the homes of my friends, meet and socialize, be involved in activities together.

I also feel caught in the middle of two dimensions of existence: domestic goddess and young, single modern woman. The two have almost nothing in common with each other. Domestic Goddess makes Gap and Old Navy cotton look chic. She thrives off of having a clean, organized home, age level-appropriate toys and TV for her children, healthy, balanced meals, sparkling laundry rooms complete with empty hampers, a handle on the ins and outs of running a household and being a homeowner. Young, Single, Modern Woman is focused on what she does, her interests, her hobbies, her health and fitness, how to fill weekends with down time and social interaction, mingling, networking, keeping an open mind in relationships, being well-rounded, etc. I love being a mom. It is the single most important job I've ever had, and my two children are some of the only things in my life I have managed to "do" right. If I died before the end of this post, I would feel like my life finally had meaning once these two beautiful creatures entered into my life. However, I'm not married. I can't always be domestic. I'm young and cute (OK, hot), and having to do the North American DoDo Mating Dance, which is so damned frustrating! (Rewarding yet frustrating at this age...) I'm not divorced, I don't have a husband to complain about, but people who are single don't have to care about being covered in nasty toddler diahrrea 15 minutes after they were supposed to have taken someone to school or showed up at a board meeting. Obviously, I have a hard time discerning what category(ies) I fall into. This translates itself in the friendship arena as trying to figure out with whom I share the most in common. To whom will I feel the closest bond? Will my married friends ever forsake sacred family time to come spend time with a single friend? Is it appropriate to even ask? Who will return the gesture of my friendship? I sit at home every single night, waiting for my evening phone call. When it comes after a night of socializing with friends, I admit I feel so jealous that he can have that outlet and I do not. Don't misunderstand me: I love the domestic side of my life. It's just so complex to weave these two sides together.

I could go on about several of these topics, but I think I've had enough of a bloggy blowout to satisfy some of you for at least a day or two. Things are still good, ever busy, and I can't wait for next week to be over. Bit o' advance warning: don't expect much blogging for another week or so. But I am still here. Steady and sure, as the heartbeat of a newborn baby trying to survive in a world she doesn't understand and in which she feels completely vulnerable all the time...