When it rains, it pours

To say that it has been a tough week would be an understatement. The last 24 hrs have been brutal. I won't bore you with details, but I will tell you how cancer plays a part in it all.

First, I was told that a wonderful woman of God was rushed to the hospital and a tumor was found. She has already been through cancer twice, and my heart just bled for her. Thankfully, not long after, the news came that it was only a cyst. I just about screamed out, "praise God!" to the entire hair salon. (where I was.) perhaps I should have.

This morning I woke up and realized that my looking for a part time job to help make ends meet has been a complete waste of time. Eddie Bauer has been gracious enough to give me more hours, and I can't even handle those. Four hours of moderately physical labor there and I can do very little for the rest of the day. I had to talk to my manager today and ask that they take back some of the hours they had given me, because I can't physically handle 12 hrs a week. I felt such shame. You would think that after almost 4 years of remission that I would know what I can and can't do, but apparently I don't. I also felt, and feel, very helpless when it comes to our finances. Today we were hit with a huge car repair bill, three times what we can afford. We are, out of necessity, re-examining our adoption plans. How can we add the cost of raising a child as well as the $25,000 loan it will take to get us that child when we can't even keep up with the cost of maintaining a car? It seems our only option may be foster care, which I had hoped to avoid.

As I said in the title, when it rains, it pours, and this week has felt an awful lot like a hurricane. My assurance and hope is that God will get me through no matter what trials may come. He is my rock, my shelter in the storm.

hello again

I haven't posted in what feels like forever. I've had a few blogs run around in my head, but they haven't made it to the computer. They were all too personal and powerful at the time. Also, for whatever reason, I feel like I have to have something super important to say when I write. Today, this will not be the case. Because today I'm writing about gifts. Yeah, gifts! I like gifts. In fact, according to The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman, the primary way that I give and recieve love is through gifts- (2nd is quality time, for you curious types.) As you can probably imagine, all of the "Advent Conspiracy" talk and the minimalist movement tends to make me squirm. While I do agree that we need to give meaningful gifts, and that we can definitely cut back on things, I'm afraid that the pendulum is going to swing too far in the other direction- no gifts at ALL.

ACK! Just the thought of it breaks my heart. But... but... what about people like me? People who enjoy the entire process of choosing the right gift and wrapping it and giving it and seeing the reaction of the recipient? What about people like me who live far away from the people they love so that quality time, acts of service, and physical touch are impossible for all but a couple of weeks a year at best? All that is left are words of encouragement. They are nice and all, but they don't speak love to me like those other things do. Am I doomed to feel an emptiness because the culture (especially Christian culture) is rebelling against an over-abundance of stuff. NO! At the very least I won't let it happen without a fight.

Here is why. This year I bought a devotional-type gift for all of the teens that I minister to locally. I chose each gift specifically for each teen. There is one girl in particular that I really wanted to give to, but I knew that I probably wouldn't see her over the holidays, if ever again. (Broken families are fun, are they not?) I asked her mom to deliver the gift and she did. This girl sent me a very heartfelt thank you on facebook. My gift had made her day, and her thank you made mine. I wish I had pictures of BOTH of our faces, because I know that the smiles would make you grin for hours. I know that many of the other gifts I gave, although small, really spoke alot to these teens. In fact, one girl left my house the other night with the biggest grin I have seen on her in months, another is cherishing a piece of rope.

I love giving gifts. I love receiving gifts. I don't plan on stopping and I hope you don't either. :)