Bloggers…Getting Real

~ Denise ~ 9 Comments

I was following a blog that was both encouraging and informative.  The posts dealt with her Mother’s battle with  Alzheimers Disease.  Right now, I don’t know someone battling that, but I do have a dear friend who cares for her mother-in-law that battles dementia.   I thought the authors posts were well written and would find humor, encouragement and interest in what she would say.  I say her posts “dealt” with because she doesn’t blog anymore.  She had to stop because of “prying internet eyes”.  I don’t know what her past mistakes were that made her feel she must stop, I’m not judging her.  I know what she is today, by her words and the love she shows to her family.  Besides, I have my own past and mistakes.  Don’t we all?  “We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God”.   I miss Sally’s posts.   And I often wonder how her Mother is doing.

My blog posts before they make it to WordPress, generally start out written by hand,  in a spiral journal, scribbled hastily, crossed out if using pen, erased if in pencil, sometimes with extra notes, written exactly the way they are in my head, even if it doesn’t make sense….even to me.  The erasers and cross-outs happen when I read what I wrote.  Sometimes that’s a big mistake, my mind goes off in a whole other direction!

Some don’t make it here.  Well, truth be told….

A lot, don’t make it here.

I am still keenly aware of unknown “eyes” reading what I write.  Well, while I realize there isn’t probably hardly anybody reading what I write, there is always the possibility of “someone” being able to read it.  Most of the time I don’t even know who that “someone” is.

Look, I know my English and Grammar isn’t the best.  I know there are great blogs with “Helpful Hints” and posts to help and all that.  Honestly, I read them.  I do.  However, I don’t want to be an English Major.  If I write, it is because I just want to write.  I do try to do a semi-decent job of “dot the i’s and all that”, but I’m not publishing a book here.  If I was, I’d want an editor for that!  It’s that old “people-pleasing” tendency that rears it’s ugly head, when I don’t post something because I fear what people might think.  Well, there, that’s full disclosure there for ya!

Those “internet eyes”.

There is this underlying tendency (that at least I have) that I want to be transparent, but  pride sometimes just gets in the way of completely baring it all.

So, if I can’t be completely transparent on here, then I don’t post something I have in my journal.    It’s not like I’ve written some great mystery or scandal or something, it is usually when I get in a funk and have that “write what I’m thinking about saying to someone” discussion who has hurt me even if I haven’t seen them in a long time.  I might have written words in anger or written words that do more harm than good, so what would be the point of that?  Especially when I know the person I’m writing about probably wouldn’t read it anyway.  That is when it is better to just lay those words at His feet.

I wonder if other bloggers feel the same way?  It’s hard to blog about your life.  It’s hard to be real about your life and talk about the lessons you’ve learned without talking about people in specifics.    A little while ago I posted about a blogger that is real specific about her family.  They aren’t speaking now.”Disowned” were her words.  I hope that they can reach some reconciliation.  I find there is such a fine line walking with our words honestly and still seeking to be loving in their delivery.  We are all a screwed up bunch of people hopefully trying to become what we are supposed to be.  Anybody that says they got it all together is either lying to you, themselves, or both.

It’s much easier to write about other things.  Things that aren’t personal.  Is that why there are many “how to”, “pet themed”, “travel”, or other “none personal”  blogs?   Life is the theme for me.  I read about all those other things, and I’ll even post about them sometimes, but I’m drawn to the personal.  I’m drawn to the community of those being real.

How do I pick the blogs I follow?  I have no rhyme or reason.  I might be drawn to it on WordPress by the title or a picture.  Someone might like a post of mine, I’ll check theirs out, someone I know blogs,  or I’ll find it on Pinterest.  Why I stay with blogs is for a reason.  I stay with blogs for content, information, enjoyment, and/or the encouragement.

Here are just some of the blogs I follow and why.  Stop by their pages, I’m sure my fellow bloggers will enjoy having you visit!

I really enjoy reading what is happening in Bulgaria with Patrecia a.k.a Miss Whiplash at I’ve Been Thinking About….  She seems to have mastered being able to  laugh at the “internet eyes” and posts what she is thinking about.  I feel like I am sitting in Bulgaria with her having a “cuppa” tea and a good old chat.  When she doesn’t post, I worry that she is alright.

For information on helpful hints, organization, cleaning and other assorted things, I read Jillee’s posts on  OneGoodThing.

A new urban farm and homesteading blog is Dirty Goat Farm.  Rebecca & Keith (names you may recall from Operation Soup & Smokes) blog about their farm, homemade laundry products, canning and other stuff.  Rebecca blogs the way she talks, I can vouch for that….I like that.

Mark at  Docmarks Place Blog and Jeanne over at Jeanne’s Blog…A Nola Girl At Heart are great places for words of encouragement.  More than once their words have matched my own devotional reading.  I love it when God does that!  Jeanne also has some great ideas for around the home and posts beautiful pictures and links to some great music.

Because of our interest in feeding the homeless, I follow Saints on the Street, a blog about a homeless ministry in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  The names and location may be different, but the need is the same.

I visit my friend Courtney to read about life with a larger family and some cute munchkins at Life on Courtney Lane.

I just recently started following two new bloggers so I can hopefully help encourage them to continue.  They are going to post about cupcakes/baking and reading.  You can check Carmen and Grace out at Reading and Sweeting.  I mean cupcakes and stuff…yum!  I get hungry for one when I look at them!  I’m looking forward to seeing what they write.

There are some other bloggers I follow that haven’t posted for a while, I’ll be happy to give them a shout-out when they post again or let you know when I find some other great ones!

Most if not all of the blogs I follow weave their lives into their posts.  They encourage me to continue to do the same.  So, I guess I’ll keep scribbling my posts, striving to be transparent.  You can’t get “right” about something until you are “real” about it “internet eyes” and all.

Here’s to the life story bloggers!  Happy blogging!

Tea for Two

~ Denise ~ 9 Comments

Just tea for two
And two for tea
Just me for you
And you for me

A little tinkle of a melody triggers fond memories and weaves it spell on a few of my favorite things.

As I have often said, I loved to visit and spend time with my maternal Grandmother.  One thing we did together was have tea.

When I was little, we would have what we called “Cambrick Tea”.  Perhaps it had a different name, perhaps I pronounced it wrong.  I did have a little trouble with some of my speech (but that is another story).  This is the way I remember saying it.  It consisted of warm milk, warm water, and sugar.  As I got older, my teacup started having proper tea in it.

Having tea, whether real or Cambrick was special.

Sometimes, we used little teacups, or demi cups, with the daintiest of handles.  Such petite, pretty, cups.  Now, as I’ve ahem, aged  matured, I realize older fingers aren’t as nimble as the younger ones, and wonder if she would have preferred the larger cups.  Grandmom didn’t complain though, she would get out these tiny plastic spoons for stirring sugar in the tea, otherwise we would use gold spoons.

Most times we used regular sized teacups.  There was a large assortment of porcelain cups with pastel roses.  Sometimes we used teacups with an iridescent quality that glistened like pearls.  She also had a cup that a man would use to protect his mustache.  I thought it was the funniest thing.  She told me it was used by my Great Great Grandfather.  The cup was fine white porcelain surrounded with a thin gold band.  I think about that cup when I see all the mustache things now-a-days.  I wonder what happened to that cup?

Some days we would have lunch or some sort of snack on her shell shaped plates where our cups would nestle in the ready made indentation.

I was always allowed to select the cups and the teapot.

She had different teapots, however my favorite was the one that had a wind-up music box on the bottom that played Tea for Two.  If she tired of me always picking the same one, she never complained.

I know we didn’t dress for the occasion.  Often she would sit in her comfortable chair, our tea things placed in a tray on an organ bench in front of her.  I’d sit nearby on an old settee or on my knees on the floor.

When I moved into my first apartment, she gave me a brown teapot which had been in the family for years.  I’d use it once in a while.  But mostly I made my tea in just a mug.

After I was married, and we were moving out of state, the moving truck stopped by Grandmom’s to pick up an old dresser and bed to add to the truck along with “a few things she packed”.  She told me later she “wanted to climb in the truck when she saw all our things”.

When we unpacked, the teapot, teacups and plates were among some of the things she gave us.

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We were blessed to have her visit us in that house we moved to back then, and also to stay with us for a few weeks.  She also was able to visit us in almost every move we made until her death.

Tea, warms me inside.  Somehow, tea tastes better from that little teapot.

Even though there may be only one teacup when tea is served on some occasions, there is always two in my mind and heart.

Just Some Words?

~ Denise ~ 2 Comments

Compassion –  definition of compassion:  sympathetic consciousness of others’ distress together with a desire to alleviate it

On Thursday I drafted a post (which I’m now glad I didn’t post) about a blog that I stumbled upon around a year.  My original draft included a link to the blog; fellow bloggers like ping-backs and the recognition.  I’ve decided against naming the blog because of their recent post which was put up and then removed.

This blogger writes about their life after losing their job and returning to living with their parents.  Some posts I find down right funny.  The posts are well written.  Some posts I find sad.  I can feel the writer’s pain.  Some posts I wonder, even if there is a fictional aspect to the material, how the blogger’s parents (particularly the Mother) would feel if she read the blog.  I guess it is because I am slightly older, okay, middle age, fine, in my mid-50’s and probably close to the blogger’s mother’s age than I’d like to think about.  There have been times when I’ve wondered how would I feel if I knew my children were saying things like that about me?  I would be very hurt.  It’s like I want to know the rest of the story, why do they act the way they do?

Sometimes the way the blogger makes fun of them is well, just plain mean.  But that is just what I think at times.  I often think of the expression “hurting people, hurt people”.

I noticed last night the blogger wrote a post that their parents found out about their blog.  The blogger is trying to produce a web series and a family member posted about it.  Surprise, their parents found out about it.   Their post said it was “weird” at the house and their parents weren’t talking to them.  There were about 7 comments from people saying things like “no big deal”, “what is the harm” “it is comedy” things along those lines.  I rarely comment on that blog.  I choose to yesterday.  I could feel the pain of all of them.  I wanted to help in some way.  I prayed for the right words.  Sometimes, I’m not sure if I “hear” right or if I’m just going off in my own direction.  I finally just sent this off with a prayer:

Comedy can be funny, or it can be mean and is left up to the reader to discern.  Only you know the intentions behind your words.  Only you can explain what you meant to your parents or they are left to their own assumptions.  Talk to them and it won’t be weird anymore.  Don’t worry they will still give you lots of material.  🙂

Words spoken in anger, and hurt can not be taken back and always have consequences.  Words are powerful and accountable.

…For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.  The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.  But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgement for every careless word they have spoken.  For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned. – Matt. 12:14-37

I think about words that I have spoken in anger and hurt over the course of my life, and will probably be guilty of doing again. How about those thoughts, or words in my head, left unspoken, but heard by God?  Sigh.  None of us are exempt.

If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.  If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.  1 John 1:8

Thankfully, there is forgiveness and peace for all who seek it.

This blogger reminds me to keep a watch over my words.

Search me, O God, and know my heart, test me and know my anxious thoughts.  See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.  Psalm 139:23-24

Thank you Jesus for forgiving me when I need it.  Thank you Jesus for all you have done for me/us.

I pray for Him to be known, really known in that family.  I pray for them to experience His peace.   My prayer is also for whomever reads this to experience His peace.

HGTV Home Crasher Feline Host?

~ Denise ~ Leave a comment
“Designer” Fudge

I guess Fudge is either petitioning for his own HGTV Home Crasher show, or he decided that it was time for me to dedicate a post to “cat capers” or something.

Yesterday I heard a distinct “wood” sound from upstairs.  It sounded like my son’s drum sticks rolling into each other.  I thought the cats were playing with them.  It got quiet.  I should have investigated.  You know, quiet children and all that.

I have a dollhouse that I built probably 25 years ago that is finished on the outside, but not on the inside sitting on a table upstairs.  I mentioned the noise to Alex, but then didn’t think about it anymore.

Today, we found the source of the noise.

I am quite sure that the designer is Fudge.  He was quite rambunctious as we were removing the pieces from the floor, and seemed to be very excited as we reviewed the handiwork.  It seems he didn’t like the placement of the handrails for the upstairs.  All little chewed up demolition pieces were thrown out before I realized I should document the process in case the filming crew needed it.

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Pansy pranced around the room, probably indicating that she was not a part of the process, and would not have made such a mess.  Or it could be she was rehearsing for her own series.

Fudge needs to be reminded at the end of the show, the home looks better, not worse!

The designer got kicked out of the room.  His big reveal will have to wait, the door to the room is closed.  Filming was shut down.

Dusty Lemon Memory

~ Denise ~ 6 Comments

Dusting.

There are days when I try to take the speed approach.

I get out the Swiffer.  I zip around (well, as much as I can zip around) and reach and grab at the dust here and there.

For my own particular reason, I find I like what some think is the “old fashioned way”.  I like picking up each piece and wiping down the surface and then wiping each piece before replacing it.

I find you have to think about what you are touching.  Do you like this?  Do you want this?  What does this mean to you?  Whose was this?  Who gave this to you?  Why did you buy this?  And then often – Why is this here?  This touching exercise makes me think about each thing.

Was this my Mom’s way of thinking?  I like to think so.

“Make sure you get everything, including the rungs of the chairs”, were my instructions on dusting from Mom.

“Don’t just gloss over it, when for a few more seconds you’ve got the whole thing”.

Today, some may call it a touch of OCD.  Maybe it was.  I just know that was the way she was taught by her Mother, who was taught by her Mother, and so on.  I was taught the same way.  So then I guess I have it too.

“Dust all the rungs, and don’t forget the bottom of the chairs”,  Mom would remind me.

That thought runs through my head as I dust my own home.

Back then we dusted with an old shirt or a sock slipped on our hand (now you know what to do with that random sock!) and a can of Lemon Pledge.

For years I used old shirts or towels.  Now I use a micro-fiber cloth and a can of Lemon Pledge.  However, the process remains the same.

This mundane task for many provokes memories for me.  The smell of the Lemon Pledge, the sheen of the gleaming wood, and the touch of each item awaken senses and sometimes, I think I can even hear Mom’s voice as I remember dusting with her as a child.

My hand glides over the desk that my Grandmother Miriam sat to write cards, letters or her bills at.  I spray Pledge on the cloth (as appropriately taught) and rub the legs of the side board of Great Great Aunt Anna’s Lemmon side board.  The shine on Nan Nan’s piano brings up the cherry tones while the walnut perks up in the little side table that Great Great Uncle Bill made.  My dust cloth glides over the same wheel spokes of the tea cart that I dusted forty years ago under the direction of my Mom.

Our own present day kitchen table comes back to life with a happy shine and the rungs of the chairs get a happy wipe with special attention to the corners and the bottom rungs.

Mom would be proud.

“Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me”.

~ Denise ~ 8 Comments

There is a documentary that will soon be released that I’ve been interested in.  Interested enough that I’ve been following their website and their Facebook page.

It is called Truth Be Told.  A feature length documentary exploring the lives of former Jehovah’s Witnesses and how being raised as such shaped their lives.

I believe it deals with the emotional toils of ex-JW’s quite well.  I think it is worth your time to check it out.  Private screenings have started, and here is a short video of one person’s opinion.

Shunning is such a “foreign” concept for a lot of people – unless you experience it.
It is uncomfortable to talk about.  Many just hide their pain.  (Most times, if I am feeling pain, I do.)

One thing that I noticed about being an ex-JW though and not often expressed is a feeling of shame.  Not the shame that the JW’s want you to feel.  I mean that’s their reason for shunning you in the first place, treat you wrong, shame you, and then you will turn from your behavior and return to them.

This is a different kind of shame.  (I may not even be able to explain this very well, but here goes.)

They (JW’s)  have already instilled that instinct (shame) in you, so that poison sits there and seeps out in other ways.  Logically you may know you don’t deserve to be treated the way you are and other people will tell you don’t deserve to be treated that way either.  However, continual shunning by family and people that you have known your whole life can twist a web of lies within your mind to somehow think you deserve this treatment.    The occasional (if that even happens) conversation with your family includes things like “you know better” thus reinforcing the “you deserve this” mentality.

So, even though you may logically, rationally, spiritually and from a scriptural  point see they are treating you wrong, their continual avoidance can trigger shame.

Shame to tell your story.  Shame to explain to new people you meet why you don’t have family around.  Sometimes others will unwittingly contribute to this, should you tentatively try to discuss your story, if you misinterpret their uncomfortable silence or quick change of topic.

Shame you don’t constantly confront your family.  By not constantly confronting them, you feel like they win, and then they think they are justified and correct in what they are doing and thinking.  Logically though you understand you can’t change anyone.

Then there is the shame you even fell for the manipulation of the organization.  The lies you believed they told you.  Those same lies you repeated.

I think that is what gets me the most.  I dislike manipulation.  Probably because  I like being in control of myself (another problem I have).    When I find I’m being manipulated or lied to it really triggers pain and hurt.

When you figure out that you’ve been manipulated and lied to, there is this shame that you didn’t figure it out earlier.  It’s like you say to yourself, “Hey, I’m not dumb, why didn’t I see this?”

It doesn’t matter if you were raised in it.  You still feel that way.  You hate to admit that you were played.  Nobody likes being played.

I’ve found the best way to get rid of the shame was giving it a voice.  Giving my story a voice.  Every time I told someone I was an ex-JW it became easier.  Every time I told someone my story it released more pain.

Does that mean there are times when I don’t feel sorrow or hurt?  No.

Sometimes a memory will come and I can be sad.

However, I can tell you that all the deep pain, hurt, shame and bitterness is gone.  That was laid at the foot of the Cross.  With amazing grace, I was found.

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me….
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now, I see.

T’was Grace that taught…
my heart to fear.
And Grace, my fears relieved.
How precious did that Grace appear…
the hour I first believed.

Through many dangers, toils and snares…
we have already come.
T’was Grace that brought us safe thus far…
and Grace will lead us home.

The Lord has promised good to me…
His word my hope secures.
He will my shield and portion be…
as long as life endures.

When we’ve been here ten thousand years…
bright shining as the sun.
We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise…
then when we’ve first begun.

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me….
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now, I see.