31 Days of Something

Throughout the blogosphere, people are starting 31 Days of Writing projects. It's another sign of autumn, right, these 31 days? Get your pumpkin spice latte and write every day for a month.

October 1st sort of snuck up on me this year. I mean, it was a Thursday. Bridesmaid duties had kept me focused on Saturday the 26th, and I wasn't really aware of anything after that date. But here we are, and I'm trying to think of a topic upon which to pour out thoughts for 31 days, and the only cohesive theme that seems to permeate life right now is how everything. is. changing.

And while change is a part of life, this season of change has felt especially difficult to swallow. It is taking me longer to accept new things and reconcile The Way Things Were Before with The Way Things Are Now. This is both a mental and a physical challenge; my weekly schedule is completely different, and I am nothing if not a creature of routine.

I could make a list of all the things in my life that are changing, but I'm afraid that the list would turn into an angry rant about why certain things have changed and why certain things shouldn't change. Mostly I'm afraid that I would write a list and then curl into a sobbing mess on the floor.

Life is so hard sometimes.

There's no neat and tidy way to conclude this; life is difficult especially in the middle of change, and that's where I'm at. I don't have a conclusion or a point to make; I just have my struggles and my confession that I won't be writing every day this month. I will be reading others' struggles, like Micah J. Murray's becoming human series and my dear friend Carla's journey of grieving her stillborn daughter Cora. I will be reading and nodding my head and aching and crying right along with these people, because I am human and I am grieving and life is hard. 

In Loving Memory...

Yesterday was my grandpa's "celebration of life" service. I wish the pictures were on my work computer so I could share some with you, but that will have to wait for another time. Tonight I'd just like to process it all out.

The day started with a yummy breakfast feast from Mums. Our cousins from over the mountains had come over Friday night and spent the night on our air mattress so they could attend the service. My aunt came to the house and drove Grandma to the church. We picked up Sister E from MCs. Sister J got a haircut. We were all running around the house getting dressed and borrowing jewelry and curling each other's hair, and you know how it is with sisters- we love getting dressed up together! It's fun to "get beautiful" together, although sometimes you just want to have the bathroom to yourself for just ten seconds! But really, it's fun. But there was this dimension of solemnity also, that we weren't getting dressed up to go out on the town; we were getting dressed up because we were going to be speaking at a funeral, basically. We were getting dressed up because my grandpa is in Heaven.

I'm so, so grateful that I get to see Grandpa again. There's no way to describe the peace that is within me, and that's good, because Jesus promised us peace that surpasses understanding, and He has been so faithful to provide that. What I'm describing here is just the atmosphere as we were getting ready. There was excitement, some laughter and teasing, and some grief because we miss Grandpa, but also peace, because he is in a much better place and we don't wish him back to earth. It was just different, and it was good.

We got all ready and then we drove to the church. It's only 10 minutes away, if you hit all 3 red lights. Seriously. So we get there, and our dear family friend Laurie has organized lunch for the family, a lot of whom were already there. It was weird to see these people, mainly because we hadn't seen them for at least 5 years. Thankfully, I knew most of their faces from the slideshow I had put together, and since Grandma had identified them to me for the slideshow, my sisters made me go first and say hello. What a good older sister I am. :)

After lunch, my sisters and I snuck into an empty part of the church to practice our speech. We were doing it all at once, popcorn-style, and we wanted to work on our transitions. I think we were all nervous, because we laughed more than we spoke. Somehow we got through it and were able to join the rest of the family and start welcoming guests.

Up to this point, it seemed very surreal. People would come in, hug us, ask how we were doing, and give their regards or say something sweet, and we would respond with "thank you" and "glad you came" and things like that, and then I would think, this is what people say when they've lost someone...I am the person who has lost someone... and it felt very strange.

It was not until we were sitting in the front row of the sanctuary and the pastor started speaking about Grandpa that it really, truly hit me, and I think it hit my sisters too, because all of a sudden there was a pile of used tissues between E and me, and there was more sniffing down the row.

My grandma wrote a letter of sorts, and my mom read it for her. Thankfully I had heard it before, so I was prepared and could make eye contact with Mom as she read. It was so well done, and I'm glad that people could have that understanding of Grandpa's life before the rest of the people spoke.

My dad was next, and this part was surreal again, because my brain couldn't reconcile the fact that my grandpa had died, which meant my dad had lost his dad. I cannot imagine losing my dad, so I think there was still shock or denial going on inside me while Dad spoke. But he spoke so well, and he made people laugh and cry, which is good at Life Celebrations.

My cousin spoke about Grandpa's generosity, which is funny because that was one of the themes my sisters and I found when we were preparing our speech. When it was our turn, we were all composed and doing good, and it all went smoothly except when J started to speak about how Grandpa made everyone feel special and was so giving to everyone...she cried, and she did it gracefully, and I think it brought reality to everyone, because my sisters and I are used to public speaking, so we were all prepared and composed and it was almost easy to forget that we were doing this because Grandpa was gone from us, but her tears reminded everyone that we are all grieving and that even while we shared funny stories or great memories, it hurts! It hurts like hell, and it was a miracle that we all got through it so composedly.

After we shared, most of my tears dried up. There were a few shed when Grandpa's best friend Roy shared and he had to wipe his eyes, and then when we ended with Matt Redmon's song "10,000 Reasons" because this song now has three teary times associated with it. But anyway, the service was completely beautiful and wonderful, and people were so nice, and we came home with literally bags of food that we will have to freeze because there is so much!

I shared my funny Grandpa story on Friday, and now I want to share the story that Sister P shared.
We were at Sunrise for dinner with Grandma and Grandpa, and we asked Grandpa "Do you want water or juice to drink?"
He replied, "Water is for bathing and putting out fires. I want juice!"
The best part of this story is that Grandpa never drank water even before Alzheimer's. He always preferred milk or cocoa or juice, but never water. Too funny, especially considering my love for water...obviously not from that side of the family!

Anyway, the service was great, and my family talked about it and prayed together afterwards, and we recognized that this was some good closure and our hearts are healing and we've had time to grieve and we're doing good. I'm so grateful that everything went smoothly and that there were laughs as wells as tears, and that Jesus was honored through my grandpa's life. That's the point, after all.

Um, yeah…hi.

Ei yi yi. Sorry about the Funny Friday fail. Haha, I just continued my own alliteration. Ok sorry, moving on.
Ok, so like I said previously, lots of things have changed around here and life is busy and crazy and isn't all life? It’s just the adjustment period of getting used to living in a new place and working with other people’s schedules and things like that. Gotta add blogging into the ol’ routine.

So I interviewed for a job on Friday and then another one on Tuesday. They’re for Saturday receptionist positions, which I’m thinking will simply help expedite the buying-a-house-like-a-grown-up process. Woot. The one I interviewed for Tuesday is not going to work- I already emailed the gal and told her thanks but no thanks, so we’ll see if I hear from yonder Friday interviewer today.

Also, hello! Babysitting jobs galore! I signed up for a couple of websites and applied for less than 20 jobs, and BOOM! People email me back! Apparently babysitting for 10 kids at a time makes for pretty decent experience, right, AJ? ;) The answer is yes, for those who don’t know.

Moving on from my weekend habits…

My grandpa’s memorial is this Saturday. Mom helped Grandma narrow the oodles and oodles of pictures down to less than 200. I kid you not. Mom and I went to the store and scanned 173 pictures for the slideshow. So we put those pictures into PowerPoint last night, and today I've sized and cropped and labeled them. Tomorrow I’ll sit down with Grandma and have her identify the people that I can’t. We’ll add music and then we’ll be good to go on Saturday.

My sisters and I are going to share our memories of Grandpa together. We've written down quite a few memories, and then we organized them and determined who is going to share which one, and when J comes home from college on Friday, we’ll run through it and time ourselves. There are several other people speaking, so we need to be timely. I’m sure we’ll do fine, though, since we have so much public speaking experience.

So that’s basically been the extent of life right now: work, work, and the memorial. I will do my utmost to post Funny Friday’s tale this week, but just in case, here is something funny that I’m going to share on Saturday.

Grandpa and I were in the car while Grandma went into the store. A bald gentleman walked in front of the car.
Grandpa: Well, I bet his haircuts are cheap!

Enjoy your week!

Heaven rejoices, I reel

This is the post I knew I would write someday, but am totally unprepared to actually write it.

Yesterday I got the phone call I’d been expecting for a long time, but was totally shocked to receive it.

Yesterday morning, my grandpa went to be with Jesus. He was 92 years old.

All day yesterday and today, through the shock and the pain and the tears and the phone calls home, I bless the Lord. All my family’s prayers were answered concerning Grandpa’s passing from this life into the next.

• Grandpa went to Jesus peacefully; he was not in pain.
• Grandma was not alone; my aunt was with her.
• He had lived to see his 60th wedding anniversary with my grandma

There are many other reasons for me to praise the Lord regarding Grandpa’s life, and I’m amazed at the Lord’s faithfulness. God is so good, even in this agony of loss.
But it’s not true loss. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I will see Grandpa again, and what makes that knowledge even sweeter is that Grandpa doesn’t have Alzheimer’s any more! Even through my tears, I smile, because Alzheimer’s is no match for Heaven. My God wins!

Yes, there is pain, even though we’ve been expecting this for a long time. But there is also Jesus. I cannot describe the peace that has been with me every moment, even when I sob and clench my fists and wonder. His peace really does surpass understanding, and I am so grateful.

My family would appreciate your prayers, especially for my dad, who lost his father, something I shudder to imagine, and for my grandma. But God. God is good, all the time.

Grandpa with his perpetual smile

Heaven rejoices, and I rejoice too

Unexpected Grief

Yesterday I found out that one of my students {from my college job as a TA} died suddenly in his dorm. I don't have many details, just that foul play was not suspected and that the family has been notified.

I didn't know this student extremely well, but I know he was a good student and a nice guy. He wasn't embarrassed when I would say hi to him outside of class, and he was a fairly good writer.

What else can I say? My relationship with him was not close, but I was in close proximity to him for a full semester. I grieve for his family and friends, and for my campus as a whole. Their spring break starts next week; what a somber break it will be for some!

This may sound strange, but when I was driving home last night and talking to Jesus about him, I said Lord, I hope he's with You! And the Lord said he is. At first I didn't know what to think, because I believe that everyone is going to live for eternity; it's just a matter of where you'll be living that you can change.
I thought also that maybe I was answering myself, trying to comfort my shocked brain. But then I thought, well, I'll find out someday. And {although I'm ashamed to admit it} face.book confirmed that this young man identified himself as a Christian, and I think of how sweet God is, that He would tell me this and comfort me, and I think how shameful it is that I believed face.book more readily than the voice of God, and I am humbled by the love and mercy of God that forgives my unbelief.

Please keep this family and community in your prayers.

Heaven is rejoicing

…and on earth we celebrate God’s victory.

Yesterday, Pastor Dennis Trout went to be with Jesus. How sweet for him! And yet here we can only say that we wish we had more time with him.

His legacy is immense-just look at the Facebook page set up for family and friends. 9 out of 10 posts I see are to that page, and this morning it was almost every single post focused on his life, legacy, and eternal life with Jesus.

Pastor Dennis and his lovely wife Linda

But I’m not going to look at Facebook to determine this great man’s legacy. I look to the fruit of his life.

Pastor Dennis was {what an awful word-was…so final and past-tense} our Marriage and Family pastor, basketball coach, Biblical Ethics teacher, and those are just some of his official titles. So to examine his legacy, I look at the fruit.

• practically everyone who has been married at our church has gone through PT’s courtship questions and premarital counseling, and many many people have had him tell their story during their wedding.
• it amazes me how many young men he coached on and off the basketball court! On the facebook page for him, most of the young men addressed him as Coach, and they thanked him for coaching them in life; basketball was only a small aspect of what he trained these men in.
• ahh, 11th grade Ethics class. I remember feeling trepidation on my first day of 11th grade, because I did not know what to expect from PT’s class, and I had heard that he was a hard teacher! But that class ended up being my favorite class {it’s everyone’s favorite, I think!} and Pastor Trout is so endearing. 

He wrote a “Passion Prayer” that each student in the class had to “perform” with all their hearts-yelling, dancing, jumping, etc- and preferably in an accent. Oh, the humiliation. But afterwards, I think we all realized that we as a class were more closely bonded {who wouldn’t be after that experience!?}, and Pastor Trout taught us more seriously about the passion we all should have in our lives.



Pastor Dennis, I know you’re dancing with Jesus right now, and I’m so happy for you, that you are healed and that you are seeing the face of God, the face that you represented so well to us. I’m sad for myself, that I won’t hear you call me Deborah for a while. I’m so, so thankful for everything you are and for your passion. It was not in vain, and I pray that the coming generations can live up to your example. I love you, PT!

Ok, more details

I think I can do this without crying. So here goes.

During the last week of June, my dog Sugar kinda collapsed on her way out the door with my sister. She lay on the porch for a couple minutes, and then was fine and went on the walk. {we found out later that was Heart Attack #1}

On July 2nd, my mom and sis were out on the back porch and Sugar was in the back yard. Another dog jumped into my neighbor’s yard {Sugar has very few doggie friends, I should add} and Sugar went craaaazy barking ferociously and scaring the strange dog away. Mom went out to shoo the other dog away, and when she turned back to our own yard, Sugar was lying belly-up on the ground. She was able to roll over, but couldn't lift her head for like 5 minutes. {Heart Attack #2}

Before I go on, let me say that Sugar was still jumping the back fence like a month ago. Yes, my 14-year-old dog was jumping the fence and roaming the neighborhood like she was in her right mind. A couple years ago, it was a common occurrence for a neighbor/co-worker who lives down the street to call and say “Sugar’s at my house. Want me to bring her back?” and one of us would walk the 3 blocks and go bring her back. We almost expected her to be waiting for us on the front porch even though we left her on a leash in the backyard. It was a family joke that the neighbor kids would come over and ask “Can Sugar come out and play?” because she knew them better than we did.

So the fact that Sugar couldn't lift her head clued us in that something was wrong.

I went to Florida with my friend, and one night when I called home, I noticed my mom sounded like she had a stuffy nose. I asked her if she was sick, and she told me that she had been crying. I was like, uh-oh. what’s up? and she told me that Sugar had been coughing and wheezing and the vet said she had fluid in her lungs. Poor baby.

When I got home, she wasn't coughing anymore, but the medicine the vet had given her to get the fluid out of her lungs was basically a dehydrator and she had lost like 5lbs of water-weight. She was skiiiiinny! Like, homeless skinny. And then Mom tells me she hadn't eaten in 4 days. So the dog was drinking a ton and eating nothing, and not moving very much. {note: I refer to her as “the dog” as a term of endearment. I called her that to her face, just so you know.}

Oh yeah, before the coughing thing, we didn't know if she would survive the 4th of July, because she hates fireworks. Now, some dogs hate fireworks and go hide from them. Sugar hates fireworks and tries to out-volume them with her barking. Yeah. That kind of hate.

So after the two heart incidents, Mom and J took her to the vet 1- to check her out and 2- to get basically tranquilizer drugs for her. The vet told them that Sugar had a heart murmur and basically the two “episodes” were heart attacks, and only half her heart was working. So, the tranquilizers might kill her if we gave them to her, or the barking and excitement from the fireworks might kill her if we didn't give them to her, or she could be fine and last another year. awesome.

We ended up giving her half of a pill and she survived. {I wasn't there for this, so this is second-hand.} But she was really, really mellow after that.

The weekend after the 4th, we wanted to go to our beach cabin. Dad and J literally put Sugar on her rug and carried the rug to the back of the van where her kennel was. This kind of freaked me out, because when Sugar was healthy, she hated being carried or lifted or anything. So when she just looked and Dad and J as they precariously carried her to the van, I knew that something was really, really wrong.

My sis P was in Toronto at the time, working for good old Microsoft. My mom told me that Friday we were hoping Sugar lasted until Sunday so P could say goodbye, and then we were going to put her down on Monday. The end really was near. But it was nearer than we thought.

Saturday, Mom, Dad, J and I are at the beach cabin. Sugar had done pretty well; she had walked around with one of her few doggie friends Grappa {he’s Italian-it’s pronounced “GRAW-puh”} and then she basically lay around. We had guests over, and Mom took them out in the kayaks. I was helping put the last kayak away when I saw J and Dad looking under the front porch, Sugar’s favorite spot where she had been the past couple hours, and then I heard J start to cry, hard, and Dad got up and hugged her. That was when I knew.

Our guests graciously offered to leave, so Mom took them to the ferry while Dad, J, our neighbor and I started to dig a grave for Sugar. Grappa is the second dog our neighbors had; Bailey was their first, and he is buried in their field. Bailey and Sugar basically were best doggie friends; Sugar was the only dog Bailey liked. So our neighbors graciously offered to let us bury Sugar next to Bailey. It took us a couple hours to mow and weed wack and dig, but we got it done, and then the 4 of us buried Sugar and thanked God for the good life she had spent with us.

It was so, so hard to realize that she was dead, and it was harder to think about telling my other 2 sisters.

But on Sunday, we went home and sat down as a family and told them, and we cried together and are good.

It’s hard, and weird sometimes to think that we don’t have a dog anymore, but we are grateful for many things involving this whole situation.

1. She died naturally, in her favorite spot, at home. Because of this, we were able to bury her and will be able to go see her grave if we want.
2. She wasn't in any pain; it was her heart that went, and that was that. 
3. It was a very short time between her first heart attack and her death. She didn't suffer and she was herself up until the very end. We literally would get asked “how old is your puppy?” when we took her on walks. So, so grateful for all the time she had with us.
4. I’m especially glad we didn't have to put her down because a, we would have continually wondered if she had more time left, and b, Sugar hated going to the vet! I’m glad she was comfortable when she died.

This may be really weird for some of my readers, that I’m detailing all this here. Well, first let me say that I am not one of those yay-animals people that is a fan of the animal shelter commercials with the sappy music. Please. Animals are animals, and humans are humans. Check out the Bible for more details on that.

I wanted to document this for a couple reasons. One, it’s cathartic for me to write it all out. It’s helped me get it out of my head, in a sense. My favorite math teacher always told me to get stuff out of my head and “let the paper do the thinking.” So that’s basically what I’m doing with this story.   Two, typing is way faster than me handwriting it. There, that’s the selfish reason. But it relates to my third reason, which is that I do want to remember what happened and how it happened, and I want to remember all the things I’m grateful for involving Sugar’s death. Four, it helped me put things in perspective. Sugar was our family pet and it is sad that we lost her. But at the same time, she’s a dog. I sometimes felt stupid for crying so much over a dog- how do I justify that? It’s not like she’s a person in my immediate family who died, but that’s what it felt like.
So I’m writing about this to get my feelings out.

It kinda seems like I’m contradicting myself, that “she was just a dog” so I wrote a whole blog post about her? What??? It doesn't make sense, I admit. I don’t even understand myself. But I know that this post has helped me, just in writing it, and that in a way I’m getting closure. When I first told you that Sugar had died, I alluded to more details to come. And for the rest of the week, from writing that to writing this, I would think of Sugar or blogging, and I would feel like I needed to finish this story. So now that it’s written out, I have fulfilled my obligations to you, my readers, and to myself, because the tale {terrible timing for a pun, right?} has been told.
Here’s a picture of Sugar just a few weeks before her first heart attack. She was being lazy this time, so I got her lying down. Isn’t she totes adorbs?
so awkward just lying there. silly dog.

Anyway, so I kinda segued into this: I mentioned last post that I want to make sure I've kept my word and actually told you about the things that I didn't finish telling you about. Like the secret project I was working on, or stuff like that. So today I’ll be going through my posts from this year and making sure I followed through. Look for Follow-Through Posts next week!

the post that I don’t want to write

Alright, I’ll be honest. I've been putting of this post all day. Writing this post means accepting the truth, and the truth right now is painful.

My dog died on Saturday.

There, I said it. It’s real.

I mean, it’s been real since it happened, because she’s not there anymore. It was real this morning when I came back from my run and she wasn't lying in the living room waiting for me. It was real when I left for work and didn't have to leave the back door open so she could come in or go out. It was real this evening when I got home and she wasn't there. It was real when the family watched tv downstairs, and she wasn’t behind the tv sleeping and snoring.

But it doesn't feel real when I think of burying her. It feels…surreal. Imagined. Made up. It feels not real.
I want to do a little post for her, sharing my favorite memories about her, but it’s too raw right now.

Oh, speaking of things {on a lighter note} of what I want to do, I’m going to go re-read my previous blog posts from this past year, and if I've ever mentioned something but not gone back to explain it, or referenced something and said “I’ll come back to this” but haven’t, I’ll clear that up. Don’t want to leave you hanging!

And with that, I bid you goodnight.