Facebook - Reconnecting with Old Friends

Today is New Year's Eve. Tomorrow is 2009.

I graduated from high school almost 17 years ago and went into the world forgetting about some of the most important things in life - my elementary school friends.

Where would I be today without Cheryl Laventure? She invited me to her church and then her church camp - where I met Jesus in 1985. She is just one of the many elementary school friends who became part of the peripheral vision I acquired starting in 7th grade and have kept until recently.

I joined Facebook quite a while ago with the intention of staying up to date on the lives of the many people in our lives. It's not always easy as a pastor's wife, but I try. I had no idea that Facebook would bring people back into my life from years and years ago.

So - my question is this: Why do we lose touch with our elementary friends?

It's like something strange happened. Those people that we did Girl Scouts with should have been the people that we hugged at our high school graduation. Some of them were; I think - but honestly, I don't remember graduation, and I wasn't consuming alcohol. Something happened on the first day of junior high - and things changed. Then another round of change occurred on the first day of senior high. I can't describe it; I don't remember it; I don't want to re-live it.

Now that I'm an adult, people become more and more important to me. And I don't really know what happened to us all in the meantime - while we were becoming adults. A course of decisions to be made were presented to each of us, and we decided.

Thanks to Facebook, we can now find each other again. Perhaps an adult Girl Scout troop will be formed? I'm not saying that the friends I have now are not important. In fact, please do not hear that. The choices that I've made (and the paths that God has guided, redirected, etc) have brought me to a place with great friends. What I am saying is that I don't understand how things go amiss...but I am thankful for a social networking tool that allows for re-connection to occur.

It's amazing what my husband and I do in bed...

The title is honestly just to get people's eyebrows to go up. There are just so many people whose reactions will be amusing.

I'm pausing here to enjoy the thought of a certain friend who will probably not read past this line. :)

Anyway - tonight we actually talked grammar. At one point, I was laughing so hard imagining us as a Saturday Night Live sketch - Bedtime with the Benders - that taught grammar to the masses of people whose brains are turning to mush (ever see Wall-E???). It even had theme music...at least in my brain. The pastor and wanna-be English teacher are at it again... *wink, wink*

Neither of us can think of the content of the phrase or sentence that brought on the conversation; however, our main grammar struggle tonight has to do with the construct of using "like" in comparison and whether you use the objective or nominative form of pronouns when doing so.

For example - which of the following is correct?

I can run like he.

OR

I can run like him.

We decided the first because "like" is actually a subordinate conjunction with an understood verb at the end of the sentence (I can run like he can run). Fascinating, I'm sure!

We covered a lot of ground in our first episode of "Bedtime with the Benders" (cue music). Stay tuned for more riveting episodes. Next week: The Benders explore the proper uses of apostrophes and clear up the whole "its" vs. "it's" problem.

"So - women don't want their size to be a double digit?"

My son is a smart cookie. Anyone who knows him well has heard his wit. He is also very insightful. Recently, Beth and I were having a conversation with Amy (Spears) about clothing sizes. Siah overheard this and interjected with the title phrase, "So - women don't want their size to be a double digit? Why?"

That's my question. Why?

Clean Bedroom

Why does a clean bedroom make me feel like all is right in the world?

Today I awoke, did some laundry, and thought about the day. I heard Kerry "rummaging" around in the bedroom, so I decided to check in on him. It turned out that he was cleaning the bedroom. People who know us know that we lead a rather fast-paced life, and we often leave clothes lying on the floor in the hurry to the next need. This eventually turns to piles which, of course, turns into a major mess. The major mess had started to get to the point that it was impossible to walk in the already small room. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind small bedrooms. When the bed is the most important of the room and functional, all is well. However, when we start falling down in the middle of the night on the way to bathroom, that is a problem.

So - a messy bedroom had brought on the quarterly (or so) need to clean it out, dust, vacuum, etc. I joined Kerry in this endeavor, and we achieved a wonderfully clean room within a few hours. Just for good measure (since tomorrow is the first day of winter), we changed our quilt from the fall quilt (with autumn type leaves) to the winter quilt (with snowmen, gingerbread cookies, and snowflakes - sleeping under a manger graphic could be weird).

The point is this - I am so happy. I peeked in the room as I went from the living room to the bathroom a few minutes ago, and my heart skipped a beat. Isn't that weird? Or is it just a sign that part of our soul truly resonates with the part of God that prefers order to chaos? Isn't that what the stories of creation and salvation are all about? Creation = God bringing order to the chaos on a cosmic level. Salvation = God bringing order (reinstating relationship with Him) to the chaos that sin had wrought upon humanity.

Things That Really Matter

1. My relationship with God.
2. My husband.
3. My children.
4. My parents...alive and those in heaven...biological and by choice...
5. My grandmothers...three still blessing us with their presence on earth...
6. My extended family...too many to name...seriously - try having 11 aunts/uncles, their spouses, their children....I'm blessed!

Friends...can't list them all....

"Things" that really matter are not things at all. They are people...living (at one time or presently) and giving. I have lived in too many houses to get attached (though I do like the one I have now...but even that belongs to God - seriously). Cars break. Things clutter up the house. But people...people are what really matter.

This Christmas (yes, it's 10 days away), I want to focus more on the things that really matter and less on the things made of matter. Because what will matter most in the end is that people were central to me.

Beth's first impressionistic painting

I'm so proud of Beth. This is her first impressionistic painting. She took a picture of it at school, but she needs to sign it before she makes prints of it.

I told her that she could make photo greeting cards and give them away for Christmas gifts.

She is talented - if this is 7th grade....what could be next??

:)

Breaking Dawn (4th in Twilight series)

Ok, I have to admit that I was "forced" to finish Breaking Dawn. Yes, it sucked me in. :) No pun intended, really. It's just too easy with vampire books, isn't it?

Sorry - onto my thoughts - again...the rules are as follows:
1) No comments in judgement unless you have read the book.
2) I may spoil your read if you continue to read this entry.

If you noticed my last posting, you know that I almost didn't finish this book because it had crossed a line. That line was the creation of a "half human/half vampire" child. Bella and Edward get married and consumate their marriage before she is tranformed into a vampire. She has an accelerated pregnancy (any recently pregnant woman would be jealous of this part) before having a very traumatic birthing experience (not something of which to be jealous). This is where I stopped for a few days. I'm not really sure what bothered me so much. Mythological stories of gods and goddesses creating half-immortals have never concerned me. Why should a modern day "myth" bother me so much? Especially when the author has Bella and Edward wait ot have sex until after they are married? (The book describes Edward as old fashioned - this does bother me. Oh well.) I'm still sifting through the reason behind my discomfort.

The child (girl) is amazingly beautiful, grows at a rapid speed (aging much faster than a typical newborn), and essentially causes a war between Bella's vampire family and friends and the ruling authorities (dun, dun, dun....). I hate summarizing, so I'm going to stop.

Thought #1 about this series: These vampires are "vegetarians" - they don't want to kill humans in their need for blood. They deny themselves of their desires and turn instead to animals when they are thirsty. This correlates very well into a parallel of the sin nature that we all struggle with. Once we have chosen to follow Christ, we need to deny ourselves certain things and turn to alternatives. Positive think here.

Thought #2 about this series: Though very, very sensual in nature, this series does do an outstanding job of presenting a pure until marriage and mating for life theory. That gets a thumbs up from me.

Thought #3 about this series: As you may have read in other posts, I find many facets of the relationships between men and women disturbing. I stand by those thoughts but see them diminishing as Bella and Edward get married. I don't think I would want my daughter or son to treat me the way that Bella does in her marriage, though.

Thought #4: I'm glad I read this entire series, but I'm not I would recommend them to others. They are time-consuming, consuming (can't put them down), and disturbing at times. I have to reserve my recommendation for now.

Twilight series

I finished Eclipse (the third book in the Twilight series), and I'm halfway through Breaking Dawn. Honestly, I'm out of words...the books go down a road that I didn't expect. I'm not even sure that I'm going to be able to finish Breaking Dawn. This makes me so sad.

Psychosomatic Illnesses - are STILL illnesses!!!!

I had the most frustrating encounter with a throat specialist today. He all but told my daughter that she was faking the fact that she cannot speak. After over 2 weeks without a voice, blood tests, and now today a scope down her throat, Beth's diagnosis was "poor vocal functionality." In other words, use your voice, girlfriend. After he ruled out any medical basis for her voice being gone, he questioned her about stress in her home, school, life, etc. Beth shrugged her shoulders and looked at me like, "huh?"

I am speechless (maybe it's catchy!!!).

Update: Beth's voice has returned. We talked through how things get used to being used incorrectly (like when we twist our ankle and baby it too long). She had a choice - figure it out or go to a specialist who would put another scope down her throat. I'm proud to say - she figured it out.

The Bad Waitress

When I find something great, I must share it.

Tonight, the Muddy Waters coffee shop disappeared off of the corner of Lyndale and W 24th in Minneapolis. I don't know where it went, but four times around the block did not reveal it. So - a change in plans led me to The Bad Waitress on the corner of Nicollett and E 26th. First of all, Nicollette Ave is one of the coolest streets in Minneapolis around Christmas time (yes, less than one week after Thanksgiving is officially Christmas-time...well, Sunday was the first week of Advent, so it must be true!). The lights are absolutely beautiful...simple, but beautiful. And the corner of Nicollett and E 26th is one of those cool corners - it could be in a movie.

Enter: The Bad Waitress...a coffee shop but so much more! This cafe serves breakfast all day, has Coke (a must...if you know me), and serves the biggest Rice Krispie bars ever. When you walk in, you will find booths to your right and a variety of high top tables and lower ones to your right. However, if you venture far enough to the right (as my friend and I did), you will find an old brown couch and two sitting chairs. Each of the tables has a superhero or monster graphic on a card to identify it to the "bad waitresses." To order, you must complete an order slip with food and drink (if desired, obviously), noting your table's superhero or monster, and then go to the register to order and pay. Once food and drink are ready, your bad waitress will find your location based on the locator symbol (superhero or monster).

This cafe has a very non-intrusive way about it. No one bothers you over and over with "are you ready to order?" and the like. When you are ready, you take care of it. In addition, the bad waitresses don't check in over and over to be sure that all is well. I am pretty sure if something were amiss, the good customers could approach the register as they did when they ordered and share the problem. I didn't eat any of their real food, so I can't say if I would recommend it to others. However, as far as Rice Krispie bars and a glass of Coke go, I give this cafe a thumb's up.

As usual, my companion was more fun than the cafe itself; however, the cafe was a delightful find to which I hope to return again in the future.

Funny thing - as I drove home, the Muddy Waters coffee shop showed itself. I did laugh out loud as I passed it!