We always pay deeply for chasing after something cheap. [Alexander Solzhenitsyn] 

Flowered Couches.

We had two rooms in our house where all the serious conversations took place. If it was learning about our Great Uncle Jim’s Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma, hearing about my sister’s new boyfriend (with the earrings), or where Aunt Sue and Uncle Vince told us they were pregnant with our sweet little cousin-to-be.  Those were the kitchen table conversations. The ones consisting of larger audiences, carried weight - some heavy with “out of our control” and some heavy with “happily ever afters.”

Then there were the living room conversations. The room with the flowered couches, Mom’s television, and the biggest gazebo window that was perfect for starring out of (especially if you were being reprimanded for writing your name on the furniture). These were the conversations where I learned boundaries, what buttons to push, how to talk, how not to talk, how to “talk” without actually speaking, and you know - the room where the potter shaped the clay. These conversations carried a different weight, one that was specific to the individual, uncertain, unknown, and relying on the expectation we would communicate, hear, understand, learn and apply.

It was in these kitchen table conversations that I learned there was always someone who was the deliverer of news and those who were the receivers.  The deliverer could be matter-of-fact, put things simply and allow the crowd to ask the questions; or the deliverer could be loaded with enough emotion to steer the recipients emotions right along with them. The receiver also had two faces - one who was immediately perplexed and trying to understand exactly what this means.  Why? Who? Where? When? How could this be?  This type of receiver also happens to be the same one who, five months later, is still wrestling with how this old news so quickly became the new norm. Receiver B is master of listening and applying.  They are working off prior knowledge to know what to do next.  Sad news? Tears stream. Happy News? Excitement and gratitude shared! Maybe their prior knowledge is what they learned from watching endless episodes of “Full House” or maybe they just have the emotional intelligence of a guardian angel - either way, this recipient is in the moment with the news. They are breathing the life of spoken words as if they have been reading this book for decades. 

So you are standing in the living room, learning how to be a better person, because that’s what people do in the living room. You concoct the reasons you have for why you did what you did while at the very same time you respond to the emotions and questions of your own actions.  You learn that your delivery of your own news collides with the recipient inside of your own heart and with the ears of the other person in conversation. You breathe a story and suddenly it has a shelf-life; the lies you’ve been concocting are available for a listener to accept or deny - the truths are spoken to ask for grace and forgiveness. 

Then you are free, into your own world.  The living room and kitchen table look different. It’s your Young Life community that asks why you run from problems, it’s your journal that reflects what beautiful things have grown from honest self reflection and application of new ways. It’s your tight jeans that tell you to cut back on the post-dinner whiskey and Happy Hour nachos, and its group texts that become the family table you sit down to when your niece just learned how to walk. 

Suddenly, you realize that this life is not mirroring another Full House episode, it is writing itself and you are main character. Then, there you are, in your own apartment, eating on the love-seat, talking on the phone in the bed, and avoiding the kitchen table - because who sits at an empty table in an apartment of one? Hello 29, you are not the story I heard or the episode I watched. 

You are not prior knowledge or answers to questions. You are the age from off the street - partly filled with adventure and partly stuck in orbit. 

Story from the Sidewalks

Walks to work prove to teach me the most about my neighbors and my own heart. More then ever, I see the detail that went into building our historical neighborhood. I see the people with fancy things living next to those who hope for basic things.  I see the smiles from passing buses, kids taking selfies in back seats, and Moms singing loud. Then I see the fast and careless cars, rushed spirits, and tired hearts.

Denver has been given ~13 inches of snow this week, paired with sub-15 degree mornings.

A mother with three mobile kiddos and one in a stroller, pushed through drifts of un-shoveled snow in wet sneakers, capris, and white cotton socks. She kept ushering her kiddos, reminding them that breakfast awaited at school.

Genuine Jerry also walks to work daily. Brown paper bag and coffee mug in hand. He nods, I wave. Both of us processing what awaits or what we just left behind at our careers. He too is also saving for a vehicle, and prefers the walk because "driving is for wimps."

Three teens stand at the bus stop in light weight jackets. I pray they were just being teenagers with opinions about their sense of style, but my heavy heart fears jackets might not be in the budget.

A gentleman who just had serious neck surgery was shuffling from the health clinic to the corner 7-11 to use the restroom. He started riding the bus at 4 AM only to arrive at the clinic to find that it didn't open until later. With his walker, on these icy sidewalks and serious lack of mobility - he slowly made his way to 7-11. He kept stopping In pain. Asking how I could help, and he said - "keep smiling."

Sweet Sandy, who has to be in her 80's, has greeted me each morning this week.  She's shovels the bottom of her drive because she prefers "to skate on a lake" and not on her driveway.

Part of me cannot wait to get a car; the heated bubble of plastic and medal that lets me be the bigger thing on the road, the faster one to work, and the muscle behind my grocery shopping.

A bigger part of me hopes that I never lose sight of what exists on the sidewalks. The detail, the stories, the eye contact, the emotions. These past two months have given me eyes that see - and I don't want my tinted windows to tint my heart.

It is my walking hope that whenever I can - I hope I GIVE freely, joyfully, and with intent. In this world that tells me to spend more, do more, be more - there is one who knows all, is all, and serves all.  Thank you sweet Jesus for this season to remember that you are the ultimate gift. That you loved so we may love, serve, grow, go, live, lead, forgive, encourage, share, and give.

Love,
Lauren

Birthday Side Effects

I've been alive for 29 years and almost 8 days and I'm suffering from "new age syndrome." Is that a real thing?

With New Belgium's Snow-Day winter beer in hand, Annie F. Downs book opened, and the tub running - I prepared to soak up and rest in the start to this new age of life.

A mini - what I think might be a sliver of a panic attack - later, the water was too hot, the book was annoying me me, and a beer that was downed before it was enjoyed. Nothing was right, everything was wrong, and here I am about to be another day into year 29 and I can't find peace with it. 

It's not that I feel old.

It's not that I regret what has already been.

It's that I have too many stinkin' things I want to do, and too many ideas of where I should start.
It's that my passion is so wide, so tall, so deep - that I get lost in the love, joy, and gratitude I have for all things.

You have to wrestle before you can win.

And that's where I stand, in the arena, time to fight some rounds and get some answers.

Luckily, Denver had 13 inches of snow and I was given the gift of time to listen to James Granger's "God With Us In Rest" sermon.

Take away: "Stopping long enough and consistently enough - to remember who God is, who we are, and who we are not." [James Granger]

I'll pray for that.
I'll cheers to that.
I'll rest in that.