Dull Moments

I could tell you I run for health benefits, but that would be a lie.  I run because, in running, I am able to process, clean out my head and heart, and exhaust myself like I cannot do with anything else. Mile 1 is just a warm-up. Music jams, I find my pace. Mile 2 is a pace-setter, and discipline. But mile 3 is gold. Somewhere as mile 2 morphs into mile 3, everything becomes crystal clear for me. If something is bothering me, I find my peace. If I am overwhelmed, I find strength. Somehow as I hit mile 3 everything I doubted becomes resolute faith. In mile 3, my soul remembers that God is faithful when I am not. In mile 3, nothing seems as big as it did when I was in mile 1. I want to hear God in big, loud ways. I look for God in the the strong wind to knock me down, in the earthquake to shake me up, in the fire to light my soul. I want God on my terms. I want my life on my terms. But it is never that way, and it is never good that way. I find Him still and small and i...

I have a very distinct memory of my mother, my sister, and me the first Christmas I viewed my mom as also a friend and as well my mother. We were in California, in our family's condo, for Christmas. I mumbled something to my sister about some boy asking me out, someone they all knew ( the horror  of dating someone they approved of). I told my sister how I had uncertain feelings and on that, I had turned him down. Across the room my mom overheard just a snippet and called out to us, " Who  asked you out?"  "No one. I don't want to talk about." 18 year old Chrissy said.  "You'll never guess!" My sister taunted. "It was X!" "You said no?! Why? X is great!" My mom chimed in. They continued to tease me and prod me about this for quite some time. I remember how casual it all was - my parents were no longer panicking at the thought of me dating. I was a grown-up, past those "dangerous teenage years", and my mo...

Earlier this week, I walked into the clinic break room, ready to heat up my lunch. As always, the TV was tuned to the news, where they were discussing what to do with the Boston Marathon bomber's bodies. A conservative, Christian co-worker loudly remarked we shouldn't care. She said they deserved nothing, she spewed out hateful words towards them, their families, and the dealings with their now corpses. Then, something amazing happened. Another co-worker looked right at her and said, "Honey, God may not have been in what they were doing, but he is not in what you are saying right now." My co-worker tried to argue her point, about how evil they were, about how they deserved to be treated like dogs, etc. etc. and my other colleague would not budge. "Coming back with hate is not accomplishing anything", she concluded. I'm not debating calling that which is evil by it's name. I'm not debating the tragedy of what happened. But I will not debate th...

{written on the 20th anniversary of the passing of my paternal grandfather} Did you ever feel grateful our generation's Justin was Timberlake and not Bieber? Who would have ever thought JT was actually kind of ok, all things considered? In the past couple of months, I've felt like our youth is sort of slipping. Not like Robert and I are getting old (though I will not comment on how I fall asleep at 9:30pm regularly), but how I can feel our 20s ending. Robert had his gallbladder out. We are making big life/career decisions. We aren't buying time like we used to. There are realities to this stage of life, good and hard ones. One of the hardest ones, for me, was the cancer diagnosis of my only living grandparent. My days with her are ending. I am no stranger to death, or even death before it's time. So even I am surprised by how hard this reality is for me, though my grandmother is in her 80s. This has all been swirling around in my head, emotions I couldn'...