By the River

More sights from Charleston

More of the City

Charleston: What we saw

Here are a couple of pictures from the Battery park (I can't remember the name of it) .

It was absolutely beautiful! Here are a couple of pictures of homes.

Charleston: Where we stayed

My sis finally sent me some pictures from Charleston, so I wanted to share some of these. I think I'll just post a few each day over the next week because she sent me several.

This is the building where we stayed. There is a stairway to the left that you can barely see. We were on the second floor in the back half of the building. Below are pictures from the inside of our "apartment."

The building that is barely visible on the left is a restaurant and the two guys hanging out in front are actually the valets for The Oak.

This is the living area. There is a small kitchen area off to the right as well as a full bath with a washer/dryer.

Here Sis and I are the door to the apartment.

This is the bedroom...and at the far end, you can see the second full bath. What you can't see is that above the bathroom area there is a loft that has exposed brick. I'm not sure that you can tell from the pictures, but the ceilings were probably 12-15 feet. The hard wood floors were beautiful and the bathrooms were lovely.

Here is a link to the website

historic charleston accommodations

It was a wonderful place for us to stay and we greatly enjoyed being right downtown where everything was happening! I post more pictures later....

Mothers and Daughters

Standing in the middle of Walgreen's shopping, my 14 year old daughter is trying to decide which type of Axe deodorant she prefers.

I notice a yellow bottle on the bottom shelf. Picking it up, I show her the Jean Nate. In my memory it is that "smelly stuff" that my mother sprayed all over herself.

I simply tell my daughter that my mother who she never knew wore this. She finds the scent pleasing and then hugs me saying, "that must bring back memories." She senses my meloncholy, but what brings tears to my eyes are not the memories from my childhood. What overwhelms me is my daughter's care for me.

Band is my LIFE

Ok...so it's not MY life--it's controlling my life though! Because it's my child's life. I was so sad to miss her very first performance at the first home football game.

But, when I did get to see the half-time show at the pep rally before the second home game, my eyes filled with tears to see my child march!

I don't think that I have ever felt so proud of something that my child has done. She has put so much time and effort into learning Trumpet and all of the marching techniques!

So, band is now OUR life as far as every Friday night game, Saturday competition, Band practices on Monday, Tues. and Thurs afternoons not to mention the Band Fundraisers including RevHub and I helping with the parking for home games! But, I couldn't be prouder of her and her commitment to doing something with excellence!

Move to France

Yeah....I wish it was me! No...it's my brother, sister-in-law and their almost 4 year old daughter! Here is a picture of where they will be living! I can't wait to visit!

He got a transfer to a plant in Grenoble, in the mountains near Italy. What an opportunity to live in a place so beautiful and to experience another culture.

I will miss them, though. It's a three to five year assignment. We hope to get over there at least two or three times, but at this point, it looks like it will be an entire year before I see them for the first time. We are taking an EO tour (4th journey of Paul) that will be a cruise starting at Athens, including Rome and ending in Nice which is about 2 hours from where they will be. So...planning to tack a few days on the trip and visit.

Alabama Constitutional Reform

In the past year, I have had the opportunity to look at some of the issues faced by those in Birmingham and Alabama who live in poverty. One of the things that I have firmly come to believe is that the situation in AL is not going to get much better until we get a new state contitution.

If you are one of my friends living in Alabama, I encourage you to go to this the Alabama Citizens for Constitutional Reform website and read. Look for opportuntities to participate and advocate. Look for ways to help make systemic change for ALL of us!

trying to post a picture

this is just my attempt to post a picture....still trying to figure this thing out!!

more on my OldFriend and others

Well, the one person that I saw in my visit to Albany was my friend Jodi. She was a friend from school and church and we rode the same bus....It was wonderful to see her and catch up and EVERYTHING that had happened since we were 15 years old! She looks great and sounds like she always did. She caught me up on everyone that we could both remember from school and church....I couldn't believe how easy it really was to pick up a conversation that was left off when we were fifteen and before we'd lived so much of our life.....

Then, I emailed my other old friend, the screenwriter. I had a vague memory of his email address (mine had changed and I had lost my address book) ....I guessed right and he was surprised to hear, but we exchanged a few emails and I sent him some of the pictures I took. He caught me up on a few friends that we had both known. But, the coolest thing was that he gave me email addresses for a couple of our teachers (I find this amazing that he had kept up with these two teachers for over 25 years!) Anyway, I have heard back from one of them and hope to talk with her soon by phone.....
the strangest thing of all to learn is that her daughter attended the same college that I did (many years after me!) But, what is bizarre about it is that her daughter grew up in Georgia and this college is in Ohio! I don't think I ever knew anyone at OWU that was from the deep south!

So, why does this all seems so wonderful and amazing to me? I think that I finally figured some of it out....

We lived in Albany for only three years. My brother and sister are both younger than I and do not have many memories of it. They also did not have as positive of an experience living there as I did. For me it was wonderful; I found myself during those years. I was confirmed in the church and began to have a call to ministry. I began to believe in my own abilities and have faith that I could accomplish goals in my life.

There is no one in my life now who knows that part of my life---my parents both have died (over 10 years ago) and there has been no one else with whom I can speak about those days. Re-connecting with all these folks feels like pulling pieces of my life back together--tying it back up into a neat pattern.

When I was in seminary, the meaning of Psalm 139 really hit me. I was farther away from my "home" than I had ever been and on my own for the first time. I longed to have some one in my life who knew all of my life. However, it was then that I realized that only God knows us so intimately. There is no one else who walks with us from birth to death and knows every part of our life as her/his own. I am grateful for the abiding Presence of the Holy Spirit in my life, but I am also grateful that along my journey I have had companions to walk parts of the path with me. And I have been blessed to walk with them through the valleys in their lives and up to the top of the mountains.

Reconnecting with folks from one "era" in my life has re-affirmed the goodness of companionship and friendship as well as reassuring me that God has walked the entire path with me.

our house

Here is the house in which we lived. It looked smaller than I remembered when I saw it in person....but the picture made it look bigger again to me..not sure what that's about. What was definitely different was the trees! There was not a single tree in our yard! no shade whatsoever!

Junior High Schools

So here are the buildings that housed McIntosh Jr. High (7th grade)









and Albany Jr. High (8th and 9th grades) in the late 70's. The AJHS building sits right behind the hospital and is now owned by the hospital. The McIntosh building is now an elementary school---with a new wing added and some of the old building torn down from what I could see.

I had a devil of a time finding the schools because I had just my "bus ride" memories of how to get there.....

Seeing the building just brought a flood of memories from inside the walls...wish I could have walked the halls a bit to see what the inside like, but then perhaps it would have taken away some of the nostaglia!

Crash

Haven't been here for a while....we were on "vacation" last week. It actually turned into a trip to Ohio to visit my sister because she had a car wreck.

She was t-boned by a truck which ran a red light. Her left arm was nicely bruised and she had at least one broken rib, but they kept her in the hospital for three days because she had a lacerated spleen. She was VERY lucky not to have any bleeding from the spleen.

Preachers and Friends....

On Sunday, we had the pleasure of dear friends visiting us from our last church! It was a blessing to see them and share a meal together after services.

We hadn't spent time with them or even seen them since our move 9 months ago. How wonderful to visit! This is the first time that we have moved close enough to the last appointment that this was really possible--to have folks visit without it being a 10 hour drive! (well, ok, I don't count one church because we were only there a year and there really aren't folks there that would visit us!)

Anyway, at lunch one friend said that she is not going to let herself become friendly with any more preachers--it hurts too much when they leave.

Isn't this a dilemma for us all? How do we form friendships within the congregation? especially us United Methodist who know we will be leaving eventually.....

ears to hear

Rev Hub had some interesting comments after his sermon Sunday....

one said, "It was great to hear an anti-war sermon on the 4th of July"

another said, "So Bush is a bully and the US is goliath?"

but the one who loves President Bush thought it was a great sermon about fear and love

what is interesting is that the first two persons probably know RevHub's personal political views best and they "read into" the sermon things that were not there and not said....

I thought it was a great sermon about "perfect love casting out fear"--the word "war" was not in the sermon --neither was anything about the US or the President.....

isn't it interesting what people hear in sermons that is never said?

To bear children or not?

Ok...so a listserv that I am on has a conversation going right now about the spiritual/biblical/christian issues for a single woman trying to decide about having a children by artificial insemination or by adoption..... below are some of my thoughts....post me about what you think! It's something about which I really struggle!

My husband and I struggled with infertility—at first we thought it was me and then we found it was a problem that could only be overcome by donor sperm. We briefly considered artificial insemination, but I really didn’t want to have a child “fathered” by someone other than my husband. But, even more than me, I really was thinking about the cultural pressures…..that somehow we seem to have this need to have our genetic material in the child we raise. I couldn’t understand why we should create another child, when there are so many children that need homes.

We had some friends that said some very painful things to us during that time. They went through invitro and were talking about wanting to have a child who was “really” theirs—implying to us that our beautiful child who we adopted when she was two years old was somehow not “truly” our child. What really angered me at the time was that this couple was spending LOTS of money to have a child….why not spend that money to adopt a child rather than create one?

I think that there is GREAT pressure within our society to produce children that our copies of our best selves. That’s not all bad, but somehow this need to replicate ourselves seems not exactly "Christian” in some way. What I mean is that my understanding about the Christian faith is that we are all “adopted” (Romans 8:15-17). Within the Roman Catholic tradition part of the point of celibacy is about not having children—not relying on our progeny to care for us in old age, but relying on the church. Within our culture isn't there an “the idolatry of the family” ? OK, not sure that all made sense, but what I’m trying to say that as a Christian, our family is about the church--not about the children that we procreate—which the world tells us is the MOST important part of our lives.

Anyway, there’s another issue that I think that we as females have to address when it comes to having children—whether we are married or single. Our society expects two things of women—to marry and have children. Even if we marry, there is a sense in which we are not seen as “fully female” if we have not experienced pregnancy and given birth. In my thirties as I dealt with this, it was a true grieving process for me to know that I would not have that particular experience. But, part of my coming to terms with that had to do with my accepting myself as a wholly female person without the birthing experience being part of my life.

Now, having a child who we adopted 12 years ago and is now 14, there are things that I see differently about adoption. Our daughter came with “issues” some of which are considered genetic and nothing that we did or didn’t do could have changed that……. Maybe it’s not that I see differently, but that I see my own situation more clearly, we chose to adopt a child that in many ways was an unknown and for her there are many things that will never be known..there are genetic and health questions that will always be issues. But, I do believe that we are all better persons for choosing to be a family. As our child has reached her teenage years, the “unknown” part has become more difficult and I am sympathetic in understanding that there is more “control” when we have some input in our child’s creation and birth.

Now, for the theological piece of this for me… (Most of my thinking about all of this was formed under the influence of Stanley Hauerwas and his thinking in Christian ethics )…..for me, being a Christian is about living in faithful community and how we do that is perhaps what is most important in our journey with Christ. I think that we are “called” to be parents just like we have vocational calls. Many people don’t see parenting as a call and don’t live like it is one. Children are gifts to us and we are blessed to have them. (not the other way around---I am not necessarily a blessing to my child). I am not the same person that I was before I became a parent and I am hopefully a better person because of it. I’ve learned things about myself from my child that I never would have learned in any other way.

There is part of me that really believes that part of what Christ asks of us is to live most faithfully within the situation in which we find ourselves. The issue may be to figure out whether there are things that we can do proactively to change our situation or if the situation requires us to live within it.

I think that the most important part of the decision making process is about questioning our motives…

Do I want to be a mother OR do I want to be pregnant and give birth?

Do I want to raise a child who is an “unknown” in many ways (ie, adopt someone who has none of my genetic material and/or “create” a child that would be unknown, in the sense of not having as much info on the father?)

How much am I being influenced by what society expects of me? (to bear children,…to raise a child with my own genetic material?)

So, this may sound like I am “against” artificial insemination and invitro, and in some ways perhaps I am… but I think that what I’m against is putting a great deal of money into “creating” a child when there are so many in need of homes. But, perhaps not all persons are called to be parents by adoption…..and I know the difficulties of raising a child that comes with baggage.

OK, I didn’t mean to go on at such length—it’s just something that I have struggled with and still struggle with! What does God ask of us? I think that it’s hard to hear God’s voice above what society would have us think about our roles as women and parents….

Ain't parsonage livin' grand?

Where does all the crap go?

Well, when you flush the toilet at our house, it goes to the septic tank in the back yard--which today decided that it had had enough!

A flooding toilet led to the septic tank having to be pumped -- and then the inside pipes needed cleared (by separate contactors!)

As best we have been able to determine from church members, it has NEVER been pumped--in 40 years!! The guys that opened it up said that it was "as bad as it gets"!

Parsonage living does have wonderful blessings, but sometimes there are disadvantages. For Methodists this can be complicated by a history of "short appointments." For us, this meant that in the past ten years, four families have lived in the home in which we now reside! No one has lived here long enough to have a memory of what has been done and not done!

Most of the parsonages in which I have lived (this is the fifth) have had a couple of common denominators--there is one place where parsonage families "store" things that they don't like, but aren't willing to put out in the trash or give to goodwill. And the other is a drawer where all the paperwork for all appliances, etc is kept. This house has the former, but not the later!

Our first parsonage was a beautiful home that had been built in 1910 with magnificent walnut moldings and pocket doors and built-in cabinets in the dining room as well as a fireplace and 12 foot ceilings. However, it was not air-conditioned and had not been treated well. BUT, it did have that all important drawer of information and the attic was filled with every light fixture ever removed and replaced as well as several old pieces of furniture.

Each of the homes in which we have lived has been newer and more modern. Each as had the obliglatory drawer of handbooks as well as a space (either garage or attic) filled with "stored" junk. I heard a story from a pastor's wife from one of the previous pastors at one of our churches. She said that when they replaced carpeting in the house, the chair of the parsonage committee requested that the worn out carpeting be stored in the basement in case a future parsonage family would prefer the green shag to the new neutral burber carpet.

Well, there's plenty of "crap" stored in the basement at this parsonage as well. But today, it was the real stuff that was the problem....

Still in one peace

That little "tag line" is how I've seen Leonard Sweet sign some of his stuff--had to steal it for this week....
it's been VBS this week and I'm wiped....didn't realize it had been so long since I had posted anything....
I'm looking forward to a relaxing weekend of cleaning!! and hopefully a little time to surf the web and post a little about VBS!

But, even with the last few hectic weeks I am "still in one peace"!

conference hopping

I never did finish my thoughts on conference memories....just wanted to clarify something....I am United Methodist and was ordained in West Ohio Conference. Served a small congregation for two years there (this is the church created when the church I served, Calvary UMC, merged with the church RevHub served, Memorial). We then transferred to the North Carolina Conference. In NC, I served as an Associate pastor of a large, growing congregation, Orange UMC, and worked on a ThM at Duke. After 5 years at Orange, I went to work for Society of St. Andrew. When the RevHub's parents both became very ill, we decided to move closer to his family so we are now in North Alabama Conference were we have been for five years now.