Quick Guide to Life

Stress is everywhere. The latest edition of my favorite magazine, “Experience Life,” has articles titled, “Overcome Anxiety,” “Relax and Renew,“ and “How to Avoid Holiday Overload.” As if we didn’t have enough stress with the economy and unemployment, here come the holidays, and all the commercials trying to convince us that this toy will make our kids happy, or that this piece of jewelry is the only way to show your love, or this technological gadget will make our lives complete.

I’m not the world’s expert on stress by any means, but after thinking for awhile, I came up with three ways I try to handle stress. They sound simple, but they can get really complicated. The Journey to Simplicity is frequently not simple.

Change and the wisdom to know
Go with the flow
Let go

The wisdom to know is from my favorite prayer, the Serenity Prayer. I’ve blogged about it several times and it never loses its power for me. “God grant me the ability to accept the things I cannot change, change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” If we sat down and made a list of things we worry about, and divided those up into “what I can change” and “what I can’t change,” already our lists would be shortened. And yet... there are some things you may realize you can’t change on your own, but integrity demands you follow through anyway (such as voting for a lost cause on election day). Of course, as admirable as it is to want to change society for the better, and as much as I would encourage it, the fastest and most productive way to effect change is to change yourself. “Be the change you want to see in the world.”

Going with the flow is a tricky one. There are times you need to go with the flow, and there are times you need to fight your way upstream. Again, the wisdom to know the difference is the key. Our daughter, Rachel, has a tendency to be anxious, especially when her best laid plans go awry. I wrote letters to both kids until they were 18, when I had them bound and gave the collection to them. I included a final letter from their dad, giving advice to each child. For Rachel, he told her she needed to be more like the tree that bends in the wind, and less like the tree that is so hard and inflexible that it breaks in a storm. The expression, I believe, is that we make plans and God laughs. Things rarely turn out exactly as planned. And yet...integrity sometimes demands that you hold your ground or fight against the current. Ah, the wisdom to know the difference!

Let go, “Let go and let God.” Release the lifeline, open your hand, let go of everything you think you need for security. Let go of your need for control. Let go of your need for excessive material goods, let go of your need to please people in a way that violates your integrity, let go of expectations. That latter one is so hard. I gave a children’s Advent sermon once where I held up a sign with the word EXPECT in big letters on one side. I told the kids that the Jews expected the Messiah, they expected a king, they expected a glorious revolution. They wanted God to fulfill his promise to them. Then I turned the sign over. On that side was the the same group of letters rearranged - the word EXCEPT in big letters. The Jews got God’s promise fulfilled, EXCEPT it wasn’t in the way they EXPECTED it. Sometimes we have to let go of expectations. Yet....sometimes you have to expect a miracle, or expect happiness, or expect that things will work out. Some people call this release of positive energy, others call it faith. There are times we believe something utterly unrealistic, something others may mock or scorn, but we know in our hearts it can be done...it WILL be done. In those cases we have to hold on to our expectations with all our might. Sometimes you have to hold tight to expectations for yourself. I never would have given up Cokes or learned to tolerate flying if I had not expected so much of myself. I learned that I can accomplish more than I think - I now have that expectation.

So it all comes down to wisdom - to know when to hold your ground or give in, to know what you can change and how to change it, to know when to hold on and when to let go, to know when to expect success or to allow life to bring surprises, to know when to work toward your dreams, and when to let go of your dreams, or just change your dreams.

I used to think wisdom was knowledge, but eventually I learned the difference. Knowledge is easy to get. In fact, I know a lot of smart people who know more than I will ever know about anything, but I think they lack wisdom. It’s quite elusive. In the end, it is the one gift I hope we gave to our children, not just for the holiday season, but for all their lives - the wisdom to know the difference.

Overnight lessons

I had a dream last night that I lived in a big house with many rooms (when I dream, the house always symbolizes myself - the multifaceted being that I am!), and as a surprise, friends from my life showed up to spend some days with me. The funny thing was that a few of them I didn’t remember ever meeting before, and they only stayed one night, but some more familiar faces stayed several days and beyond. Unfortunately, as delighted as I was, I spent the whole time rushing around cleaning and straightening (as I had had no warning that they were coming) and never spent time with my visitors.

When I awoke, I started thinking of all the people who have come in and out of my life; some have only stayed for a few moments, and others for decades. No matter how short or long their interactions with me, they have affected me in some way. Former neighbors, fellow students, the friends of my children, teachers from official school and “the school of life,” parishioners from past churches were Ed was the pastor, choirs I have sung with - all have left their mark, no matter how superficial or transient my association was them may have been. Of course, those are people I physically encountered. Then there are the people that I have never met in person, but whose life situations, personalities, generosity or lack thereof, wisdom or foolishness, taught me things that made me a better person - the patients I transcribe about, people I see or read about in the news, authors of books that changed my life. There are even people who have skills that inspire or teach me - such as Sylvia Woods (the Celtic harpist), Caroline’s violin teacher whom I never met, and even the anonymous folks who post videos on You-Tube - such as the one I saw the other day which showed very clearly the technique of putting in an invisible zipper!

All the people mentioned above and many others apparently come to visit me throughout my life. Some faces I recognize, some are strangers, some are friends I haven’t seen for years, and some are friends and relatives I saw yesterday. They are all a part of me. I have learned from them what to do or what not to do. I have received from some of them inspiration and reassurance that maybe I can learn something new. I have received from others a warning about how greed or power can warp my priorities. I have learned from some how to deal with grief and loss, or how to bear up under unimaginable circumstances.

The second lesson from the dream, of course, is that I need to live in the present. I couldn’t enjoy my visitors because I had my mind on other things. The other day I was driving home from work and I had the discomforting experience of seeing the rising moon in the sky in front of me and the setting sun in back of me. I had the feeling that I was caught between two worlds - the future and the past. Somehow the whole drive made me feel in limbo - that whatever I was doing in the present was not real. It’s the time of year again when we think about, as Scrooge had to, Christmas Past, Christmas Present, and Christmas Future, and you can add Thanksgiving to those time delineations as well. Planning and scheduling - are we having Thanksgiving on Thursday or Friday in our family this year? Who is hosting? What should I bake? Do Matt and Sarah plan on having us out for Christmas Eve this year? If so, should we try to spend the night with Rachel’s family so we don’t have to drive back to Hancock at night? Should we even buy a Christmas tree this year? What presents should I buy and when? What should I wear for the family Christmas picture we take on Thanksgiving?......and on and on. And each of these questions is matched with “Well, what did we do LAST year?”

I have always had a difficulty living in the present, not just living, but being fully and wholly engaged in the present moment. I’m a great planner and list-maker. I haven’t finished sewing my blouse, but already I’ve bought fabric for the next thing to sew. Last night’s dream just reminded me once again of what I need to work on. Of all the teachers in my life, my dreams (where my mind processes my life experiences) have been exceedingly important. The insights they provide have been invaluable on my journey.

My Excuses

I’m one of these poor souls who gets into the Christmas spirit early. I usually start listening to Christmas CDs in my car around September. It’s really not my fault. There are two good reasons for this: 1) I’m a seamstress/quilter/crafter. 2) I’m a choir director’s daughter.

Everyone knows if you make some of your Christmas presents, you have to get started early. Many years have I ignored this caveat and spent late nights with little sleep trying to finish a project near the deadline. (Projects invariably take longer than I assumed they would.) So, as much as I get frustrated with seeing stores change over to Christmas merchandise the day after (or day of or days before!) Halloween, I need to get in the Christmas spirit if I am planning to make one or more of my gifts. I also need to be able to buy the holiday-related materials for my projects.

On top of that, I’m a choir director’s daughter. Choirs always have a Christmas program, and, well, you need lots of weeks to practice, so as a choir member, you’re used to singing Christmas music starting in October.

Now, we hear all about how hard it is to be a PK (Preacher’s Kid - just ask Matt and Rachel), but nobody ever talks about the wild lives of a Choir Director’s Kids. Here is a rundown of what you would have done as a CDK growing up in our family: For one thing, you're inducted into the choir early - like 12 years old. The choir needs another soprano or alto, and the choir director's daughters just fit the bill. If you play the piano, you will have to fill in for the organist when a substitute cannot be found. Church is your second home - Sunday mornings, Sunday nights, Wednesday nights, and some weekends. Your parents take you to the church on some Saturdays, where you go into the tiny dark choir room and take music out of file drawers and stack it in piles on a long pew in the sanctuary. Then you take all the sung anthems (choir music) out of the folios (music holder folders) and place the new anthems in said folios, in the order in which they will be used. While you’re there, you are even asked to tidy up the place! But it’s not all work and no fun. You can always find a few minutes to stand at the pulpit and pretend you’re the preacher. You can do a lot of things when you’re the only people in the building.

Of course, Christmas at church was special for Joy and me. I mean, really - the choir was singing our names! “While by our sheep, we watched at night, glad tidings brought an angel bright. How great our Joy! (echo: Great our joy). Joy, Joy, Joy! (echo: Joy, joy, joy). Praise we the Lord in heav’n on high! (echo: Praise we the Lord in heav’n on high!)” I’m not counting, but that’s 7 Joys in each refrain. My sister en”joy”ed every moment. I got her back, though, when we got to “I heard the bells on Christmas Day, their old familiar carols play...” Of course, those are within the lyrics - but titles were actually in the bulletin, where we could see our names in print. She got “Joy to the World” in the bulletin, but I got her back with “Carol of the Bells.” (I just don’t understand that nasty rumor that Joy and I were always competing.)

The sad thing is - I work on Sundays now and haven't been in a choir in over a decade. I also don't know if I have enough time to make any of my Christmas gifts this year. Nevertheless, it's in my genes to have my eyes focused on December 25 months ahead of time.

Halloween will be over tomorrow night, then it’s all speed ahead!

Dear Charities:

Dear Worthwhile Charities:

I understand your need for money. Indeed, times are tight for all of us. We all must step up to the plate and help our fellow man/woman. I give regularly to several charities, and have for many years, the primary two being Habitat for Humanity and Komen Breast Cancer Research. I understand that if I give you $10 one year, I am on your mailing list for the rest of my life. I appreciate your return-address stickers, your labels, your little cards, your calendars, and your heartfelt letters stating your cases.

I remember a letter to an advice columnist a few years ago from a lady who received such "gifts" in the mail. She said she felt guilty keeping them if she didn't send any money back, but was she supposed to just throw them away? The columnist said the items had not been solicited, and therefore were hers to keep and do whatever she wanted with them.

Knowing that I cannot possibly send money to every charity that writes me, I have to selectively choose which ones to support. For every one I support, there are at least 30 more of you that send me solicitations. It seems like such a waste - you are paying for envelopes, paper, plus your little "gifts," and I am sending you nothing. I guess it is just a risk you take. Maybe you feel that people are more likely to send money when they receive a little nicety.

But this year you have gone too far. You are sending me nickels and dimes. You state, "Just send this nickel/dime back to us with your check." Now this really upsets me because it puts me in a quandary. I don't like quandaries. I like to do the right thing. I certainly don't like guilt. Yet, here I am with these nickels and dimes. I can't afford to support your charity, so I can't send a check, yet I have your nickel or dime. I don't really see the value in paying 43 cents postage to mail back your 10 cents. I certainly can't throw it away.

I'm sure you started this gem of salesmanship because your marketing guys thought it was a great idea to pour on the guilt. I'm sure they did research that says people will feel guilty enough to write a check twice as fast if they get a nickel or dime than if they get some labels. You are deliberately putting people in a quandary. I may not be able to afford to donate to your causes, but I certainly don't want to take money from you instead!

So here is my compromise. We are keeping a jar of all the nickels and dimes from you good charities that we receive. When the Salvation Army bell ringers appear, we will take the jar and drop its contents in their kettle. That way, the money still stays in the charity realm. It just changes hands.

Now, honorable charities, I would really appreciate it if you ask your marketing guys to use their collective genius and think of another way to ask for donations, because your current method is not playing fair with our consciences. Take a cue from our Good Shepherd Food Bank here in Maine. They sent me a 3 x 5 card with an envelope. No gifts, no gadgets, no guilt. In 12 precise sentences, it states the facts of their need far greater than your 2-page letters and stickers. I am sending them a check next week.

Keep up your good work, my friends. I hope you prosper. But please - nix the coins. Thanks.

Sincerely,

Carol Tiffin James

Kudos!

We have holidays to honor mothers, fathers, grandparents, bosses, secretaries, plus the usual weeks to honor various careers. (A favorite topic on MT Chat is “What did your company do for Medical Transcription Week?”) I saw a topic on the web today that asks this question: If you could create a new holiday, what person or event would it honor and how would you want people to celebrate it?

I didn’t even have to think about it. I would create a “Tell the Boss Day.” Let me explain. I read a letter in one of the national advice columns years ago that said something like this: “If you find that someone in his/her employment capacity did an outstanding job, went above the call of duty, helped you in some special way, or represented the company in an admirable manner, complimenting that employee is a wonderful think to do. But go one better - TELL THE BOSS.”

Ed and I have done this many times. It’s the best feeling in the world to go “up the ladder” and tell a restaurant manager that our waitress did such a great job. Sometimes we do this in front of the employee; other times, we don’t know if the employee ever realized our intervention. People tend more to complain than to compliment, so when a customer makes a boss aware of an exemplary employee, I imagine that would brighten the boss’s day too. Everyone involved - the complimenter, the employee, and the boss - can benefit from a major attitude shift toward the positive. Most of the time, it involves just a little effort to pass on the commendation.

At my job, I try to go the extra mile if I can, especially as our hospital’s mission is quality, timely patient care. For instance, if a patient is admitted and a recent office note has not been yet transcribed and the dictator verbalizes how helpful it would be if she had access to that note, I will find the note and transcribe it if possible, then send an e-mail to the dictator that it was ready to view. I will most of the time get a gracious thank-you. On other occasions, I have sent e-mails to doctors asking for clarification on a misspeak in their dictation - and they write back that they are so thankful that I was paying attention enough to catch the error in question. Those are very satisfying moments for me, of course. Any MT will tell you that a compliment from a practitioner is always well received. However - if that practitioner had actually contacted my boss to relay the “job well done” message, that would have been even more exciting!

(Oh, and by the way, this works with parents, too. There is nothing in the world like having a stranger, friend, teacher, or whoever, come up to you, stating, "Your child has such nice manners!" or other such compliments.)

So since my suggestion for such a national holiday is unlikely to be granted anytime in the near future, I propose that we all take advantage of our opportunity to make every day Tell the Boss Day. Pass it on!

Creation

I’ve been listening to two new Christmas harp CDs I bought last week. The performances are incredible! I can picture in my mind those professional, talented fingers just gliding over the keys, seemingly effortlessly. They put my poor attempts at harp-playing to shame.

I used to wonder why I even try to play the harp. If I want to hear harp music, all I have to do is pop in a CD and hear professionals execute exemplary form, perfect rhythm, and flawless technique. I’m also an adequate pianist, but why spend time playing on my old digital keyboard, when I can download from iTunes the great Van Cliburn playing a Steinway?

After questioning myself, I cannot deny that the above statements are logical and practical. But beyond logic and practicality, there is something else going on here. It’s the ability to create. To lean the harp against my body and pluck one string after another and hear them vibrate their beautiful sounds - there’s nothing like it. To sit down at the piano and be able to play “Moonlight Sonata” or “As Time Goes By” as I touch the keys and give my expression to the pieces - wow! Oh, certainly, I wish I knew more of what I was doing. I wish that on piano and harp I used the correct fingering, hit all the notes I should, and could create a seamless performance. But perfection is not the goal here. It is creation.

Ed and I recently watched a show on PBS about crafts in America. The show highlighted the apprentices and masters still in this country who try to create objects of beauty, from jewelry to pottery. The section that impressed me most was the part featuring people who make violins. I never thought about where violins came from or who made them - at least the non-mass-produced kind - but the whole process looks intriguing, starting with a cutout of a violin-shaped piece of wood and taking it from there. I could see the pride in their work, their joy at creating something so beautiful. Each violin is its own unique self.

And so are my performances. Every piece I play is different - it has its own beauty and imperfections. But it’s mine - I own it - I create it from the depth of my soul. I take an inanimate, silent instrument and bring it to life. I take various fabrics and sew them into a one-of-a-kind quilt. I take flour and water and salt and a couple of other ingredients and bake a loaf of bread that didn’t exist yesterday.

God has many nuances, but one of those is the Creator. Ed always said that when we make something in this world, we are co-creators with God. We see the joy of bringing something to life with our stamp on it. It doesn’t matter who wrote the music, built the harp or piano, wove the fabric, or grew the wheat - the bringing it all together is the thing that brings me incredible satisfaction.

An old “rule” for quilters is that you leave one error in your finished quilt - to remind you that only God is perfect. In other words, give up trying to make the perfect quilt or play the perfect song. The satisfaction is from the creating, not the perfection. Those harp CDs are lovely, but actually sitting down to a harp and plucking it - that’s the real joy!

Birthday Reflections

There are two times every year when I reflect on my life, values, goals, weaknesses, desires, and priorities. One is, of course, on December 31. The other is September 27, my birthday. Hence, the following list of things I have learned in the last 12 months:

1. I don’t want to play for any more weddings. Most weddings are lovely, but the hassle of accompanying them on piano or organ is just no longer worth the trouble. I receive much more pleasure being just a guest and enjoying the festivities, rather than waiting for cues from the minister, wondering if the piano is in tune and if I have good lighting, trying to lengthen or shorten pieces according to the wedding party movements, and other distractions. I might consider singing for weddings in the future, as that is not so time-consuming, but I think I will retire my accompanist availability.

2. Speaking of singing, I have learned this year that I had no idea how important it was to me. I started singing at an early age, and my father, a choir director, roped me into singing in the choir at age 12, and I’ve been singing ever since. I’ve sung in churches, schools, nursing homes, and countless other places. I’ve sung with the choruses of two operas. I’ve sung as the mother in Amahl and the Night Visitors. I’ve sung in church dinner theaters. I’ve sung solos, duets, trios, quartets, in small choirs of 6 and larger choruses of more than 200. I’ve sung at weddings (including my sister’s) and funerals (including my father’s). I’ve sung in French and Italian. I’ve sung torch songs sitting on a piano in a sequined purple evening gown (see picture above, courtesy of the best photographer Memphis ever had, Earl Major), and I’ve sung stirring Mozart and Handel arias on Easter Sunday. I’ve always taken singing for granted...that is, until I had my thyroid surgery in August. I panicked when I tried my first note after the surgery, and even though the surgeon assured me that my voice would come back as the swelling went down and my tissues healed, I wondered what I would do if it didn’t. I can’t imagine a life without singing. As I gradually get my singing voice back, I think I will never take it for granted again.

3. I’ve learned if you have specialized shoes for playing the organ, and you don’t use them for over a decade and store them in a plastic bag which at times has sat in a storage unit between moves between houses, they will mildew and you have to throw them out.

4. I’ve learned that my electronic piano that I’ve had for 20 years sounds a lot worse than I thought it did, thanks to a week of playing my sister’s perfect, shiny baby grand piano. The comparison is simply incredible.

5. I’ve learned that instead of printing out family photos at Walgreen’s here in Maine, sticking them in an envelope and taking them to the post office to be mailed to my mother in Collierville, Tennessee, I can upload them to Walgreen’s online, pay for them, and request that they be printed out at the Walgreen’s store in Collierville, where my sister will kindly pick them up for her!

6. I’ve learned never to trust a corporation, specifically a credit-card company, because they will stick it to you no matter how good and reliable a customer you are.

7. I’ve learned that my sister Joy has more generosity, patience, and strength - and our mother has more resilience and determination - than I ever thought possible. For Joy to take our mother (and her dog) into her home after Mom’s wreck and surgery demonstrates a love that knows no bounds. Joy had to turn her dining room into a hospital room, put up with potty chairs and wheelchairs and sleepless nights and everything else to take care of Mother. For our mom to come through the trauma of an MVA at 85 years old, hip and ankle surgery, constant pain, immobility, and having to leave her own home and her independence behind - without giving up and staying in bed the rest of her life - awes me. She was determined to get out of that wheelchair and walk again, and now even does light household chores. What remarkable role models my family has in these two strong women!

8. I’ve learned that having grandchildren is fantastic, but having a granddog is kind of fun, too!

9. I’ve learned that remembering my age is much easier when I’m 55 than when I was 54. Those increments of 5 really help.

10. I’ve learned in reading a book about the beginnings of American exploration that Hernando Desoto joins many of his fellow conquerors/explorers in having carrying out horrible atrocities and now I wonder why they honored him with the Hernando Desoto bridge over the Mississippi River at Memphis. We have peculiar heroes.

10. Finally, I was astonished that America in my lifetime would elect a man of color as President of the United States.

So this is what I have learned over the past 12 months. Life is certainly full of learning experiences, and I'm sure there will be many more to come!

Yes, I love those "party's"

I know I'm considered part of the infamous "grammar police." And I know that not everyone is so picky about punctuation and spelling. But really - I saw a web site for a Halloween costume for adolescent/young teenage girls for a skimpy Dorothy (WOZ) costume that floored me. The costume, trashy though it may be, is not what startled me. It was the "comments" section.

Now I realize the web is considered an informal setting, and I do know that that site is not a professional one, but, oh my! I can't imagine that this is the way our kids are taught to write!

Its a great costume and really sexy. it makes me, a little chubby (not fat, just not skinny, normal basicly) look tottaly skinny its easy to move around in, and is just awesome. i love mine [...]i am siked for halloween cause i will look amazing! NEED TO GET THE RIGHT SIZE. Dont get it to small or to big. too small and you can't breath, to big and it jsut looks gross, i got mine a bit small but it looks amazing still/ i deffinetly recomend it.

I love this product! Dorothy has always been my favorite storybook character, and now i get to be her myself! i used this at a Halloween party, and the boys were checking me out! also its real comfy! the one problem- i have medium sized thighs and a big rear so the white made my thighs look a little big and the skirt emphasized my behind, which would have been fine except the fact that the teachers were there! oh well! no one else seemed to notice! but be warned... even if you're self conscious in this outfit, it still looks hott!

The Dorothy Costume is so cute and you get alot of people telling you how cute it is. But wear shorts if your a tall person!

I cant wait to wear it to all my Halloween party's!!

Please - PLEASE - someone tell me this is not the norm! It just makes me sick to my stomach. Have grammar, spelling, and punctuation gone out of style now? Are they still being taught in schools? Am I just an old fuddy-duddy? (Don't answer that last question to someone who just celebrated her 55th birthday!)

Two approaches

It’s been a little over a year since we got high-speed internet, and I still do not take it for granted. Every time I’m shopping on a web site, for instance, I hit the “see all” button and all the products pop up on the screen. I couldn’t do that with dial-up, which let me see a few objects at a time. When I pay a bill online, I appreciate my fast internet connection. When my daughter sends me pictures of the grandkids, I can receive them all without a problem. I am so thankful!

Of course, “being thankful” and “taking for granted” are mutually exclusive. If you have one, it’s pretty unlikely you have the other.

What other things have I not taken for granted since we moved out of the giant house in town into the small house in the country? The sound of birds, the ability to walk around without much traffic, our new soft mattress, having our first couch in a decade, the peace and quiet. Every day, I thank God I still have a wonderful job that I enjoy.

Ever analyzing the past, I realize that I took so much for granted in the old house. The big closet, the garage in the winter, the huge exercise room, my sewing room, extra rooms for guests, a 4-block walk to work, and the ability to step outside our front door and get the mail (we now go 1/2 a mile). It is true that we don’t realize what we have until it’s gone.

Going further back in my life, it was easy to take people for granted. I took it for granted I would have my sweet cousin Mike and my best friend Bernie for a longer time than they were allotted in years. I loved my Dad so much and was devastated when he died at age 64 (when I was 26). I didn’t take him for granted per se, thank God, but I took it for granted that he would always be here.

I took my body for granted in my younger years, its ability to physically do pretty much whatever I asked without pain. An ache in my right knee and a left ankle/heel with plantar fasciitis and who knows what else changed all that.

Part of the Journey to Simplicity is to encourage the “thankful for” and discourage the “for granted” feelings. At first, I was overcome with sadness and regret when I thought about the people and things I have had in my life whose presence I took for granted. But then I became just more determined to learn from that - and to appreciate everyone and everything I have now. I do not want to look back in years to come and regret a “take-for-granted” approach to my world that I might have had in 2009. I know some lessons we have to keep learning over and over, but I certainly hope this one sticks. It is a painful lesson, but I truly believe that mastering it is one step closer to a fulfilled life.

Sew Amazed!

I used to sew most of my own clothes. I started sewing in high school in Home Ec classes (do they even have them anymore?). Mom sewed simple dresses for my sister and me until we were old enough to sew ourselves. In 1989, the quilting bug hit and I tapered off fashion sewing and branched out into quilting. For many years, my former sewing machines, and later my present machine, mostly sat unused except for straight stitching for piecing quilts, an occasional embroidery for my uncle's handkerchiefs, and zig-zag for applique. Nothing difficult and nothing really creative - usually just simple straight stitching.

Now my quilting friend Sally has returned to sewing clothes again, and apparently having a wonderful time doing it. Her infectious enthusiasm, my ongoing disappointment with store-bought clothes quality, the lack of clothing choices in Maine, the frustration with ordering clothes on-line and their not fitting when I receive them (and the continual difficulty of successfully fitting my body) led me to think about getting back into sewing clothes myself. Yeah, it would be kind of fun to get back in the swing of things! Once I decided to do so, I knew I had to renew a working relationship with my sewing machine.

My machine is a New Home/Janome Memory Craft 8000. I can't remember the year I bought it (it was well before we moved to Maine) but I do remember it was expensive and close to top of the line at the time.

I've been taking the manual to work every day and studying it at lunch. I am flabbergasted! I had forgotten (or never known) that my machine can do so many things, so many stitches using so many feet. (For you non-seamstresses, the pressure foot holds the fabric down and different ones serve different functions.) My machine came with an assortment of feet, and through the years I bought more, yet I have hardly used most of them! I know nothing about most of them! I can't believe I have to learn all the wonderful things my machine can do - things I've never utilized for whatever reason. I have had the power all along to make anything in my imagination with this machine sitting here right in front of me. It's as if I had used an iPhone just to make telephone calls!

I think at some point in our lives we're all like my sewing machine. We can do so much more than we think, certainly more than we attempt. Our various talents and gifts (yes, everyone has them!) are lying dormant, just waiting to be called upon. Our accumulated wisdom is waiting to be put to use. Our life stories are waiting to be told to teach another generation. Our creativity is asleep. Opportunities for personal growth are wasted. We are either sitting in the corner unplugged, or are used minimally with neither artistry or challenge to enrich our lives and the lives of others.

I think that when I start up my machine and use all its features, I'll be reawakening something within myself also. Whether it's learning to fly on a plane, transcribing a very grueling dictation, passing my certification test, or mastering a difficult piece of music, I always appreciate another opportunity to smile and say to myself, "Wow! I actually did that!" Or, using Matt's favorite quote from the movie Santa Claus is Coming to Town: "I'm not such a loser after all!"

Chances and Choices

I’ll be turning 55 this month, and, as is common with me in the past few years, it’s time again to get introspective. I have been thinking about all my life, how my life has been intertwined with the lives of others, how my life’s progress has been determined by the choices I have made along the way, as well as chance circumstances that changed my course. Everyone talks about nature and nurture, and along those same lines I’d like to talk about chances and choices.

Of course, the odds of my being here at all were low. My parents had been married for 12 years and had given up (at least relatives had) on ever conceiving. Then, like a miracle, Mom became pregnant with me, and two years later, my sister was born. I was influenced by our neighborhood, our family church, and the school I attended. I was influenced by my dad’s interest in music and my mom’s ability to sew. Our annual family vacation trips instilled in me a love for history. All these experiences were basically out of my control; these were the circumstances that Life handed me in the beginning.

I made a choice one year to be a Candy Striper at Methodist Hospital. How little I realized that that decision would set my life on another course and spur my lifelong interest in the medical field - a choice that charted another course for my life. (When I went to work after I got married, I applied for an entry-level job with that hospital, and from that day on, I never had a job that was not in a hospital.)

I tried to go to college because it was what every “smart” kid was supposed to do, and it was something my parents wanted for me that they had never had. I only lasted one year at Lambuth College, and I just decided that college was not where I wanted to be.

Meanwhile, Ed James had been married for a short time, divorced, served in Vietnam, worked on his family’s farm, and had been in and out of Lambuth College so many times it seemed ridiculous. That one year I was there was one of the times Ed was there, too. The odds of our getting together were low. His family was wealthy; mine were not. He and his family were drinkers; we were teetotalers. He and his family smoked; we did not. He was not drawn to music or French or anything else I was interested in. He was crude, unorganized, and undependable. I already had a boyfriend back in Memphis. Yet --- Ed and I met and fell in love during that one year. If I had been there the year before, we would not have met. If I had been there the year after, we would not have met. That one year was the pivotal time.

Of course, the most intriguing choice in my life was our decision to move from Tennessee to Maine in 1996. We told Rachel, age 18 when we moved, that she would be going to the University of Maine, and Matt, who was 13 when we moved, was given no choice in the matter either. What has become of that move? Rachel went into teaching, fell in love with Matt’s 7th grade science teacher, and got married. Several years later, Matt fell in love with another University of Maine student and got married. Their spouses were native Mainers who had never been to Tennessee, had no reason to visit Tennessee, and undoubtedly never would have met our kids, had we stayed in Tennessee. Rachel at the time was not happy at all about the move to Maine, understandably. She had friends and a boyfriend and was not anxious to uproot her life for the unknown. “What if it’s destiny, and your future husband is waiting for you in Maine?” I asked her. She said, “It would be my luck that his mom in Maine is telling him that his future wife is in Tennessee and we’ll just pass each other on the interstate.”

Now we have 2 granddaughters born of our daughter’s marriage, who never would have existed had we stayed in Tennessee. Our choice to move has forever changed the lives of our children.

Our choice to move to Ellsworth put us right in the perfect location for our daughter to meet her husband (who taught in the Ellsworth school system, where she was student teaching). It also put me 4 blocks from the local hospital which just happened to have an opening for a medical transcriptionist the first month we were here. I had finally found my calling - the job that would use all my gifts and bring me so much satisfaction - 13 years and counting.

These are just the major life choices/chances. My life has also been enhanced by seemingly insignificant interactions that have changed me a great deal - the young lady in the church choir who got me interested in quilting, the older lady in our rural church in Tennessee who taught me all about sourdough starter, the man playing a Celtic harp in a local store at Christmas one year who got me wanting to learn harp, and other people who were just minimally involved in my life but who played a major role because they helped enlarge the scope and passions of my life.

Do you ever wonder what your life would have been like if choices and chances like these had been different? I can see the threads in my life branching off just like a family tree, with each instance/choice/chance encounter giving off its own thread in a new direction, each path in life arising from the one before it - all make up the person I am today - my likes and dislikes, my achievements and failures, my joys and my regrets, my politics, my faith, my hobbies, my memories from the past and my hopes and dreams for the future.

I’m so glad things turned out the way they did. I must not rest in contentment, though. Sometimes when you get settled in life, you think the tree has stopped branching. You build your nest and think things will always be the same. Not so. The tree keeps growing, the threads keep intertwining, and life continually surprises. The choices we made years ago are still coming to fruition, and the chance encounter we have tomorrow may just change our lives in ways we never could have imagined.

A decade of living

Our 35th wedding anniversary was yesterday, and for a splurge, we bought ourselves a 10-year journal. The whole idea intrigued me - here in front of me, pages ready for information, is a book that will detail the next 10 years of our life together.

Each page has one date, for example, January 1, and four lines for 2009, four lines for 2010, all the way up through 2019. The next page has the same layout for January 2, and so on. Of course,we’ll be starting 2009 in the middle of the year, but that’s OK. I’m planning on recording the highlights of each day; Ed wants to record the temperatures and weather conditions. It will be fun to take one date, say, August 24, and see what we did on that date through all ten years.

The journal also has a section with blank undated but numbered pages for extra room if the requisite four lines are not enough to record a special day. Each dated page has a little blank where we can write the page number to turn to for the “overflow.”

Also the journal has a special section for our medical and car upkeep. There is a page for each year, 40 or so lines, one column for medical, one column for our car. We can write down our doctor appointments, lab tests, etc., in the first column, and car repairs, registration records, etc., in the second column.

My dad was a big record-keeper. He could show you the record of a utility bill that was decades old. He could tell you what he spent on a family vacation 20 years before. I really like the idea of being able to look back on things like that.

As I opened the new journal yesterday and discovered what it had to offer, my mind just took off. Ten years! In ten years, this book will be filled with all our activities, our joys and sorrows, births and deaths, quilts/clothes I’ve made, trips, weather, books we’ve read - you name it. The future is a mystery, for sure, but this we can assume: In ten years, Caroline will be learning to drive, and Charlotte will turn into a teenager! I will be able, should I take that option, to apply for Social Security! Rachel will be in her 40s, and Matt in his late 30s, Ed in his (gulp) 70s! What will our house look like? Will we have painted inside by then? Will we finally have grass? Will we have given up and purchased a snow blower? Will I have finished Matt and Sarah’s quilt? Will we have a new grandchild in the family? What will technology look like - the technology that changes almost every day? What inventions will be the norm that we’ve never dreamed of? Will there still be newspapers? Who will be president of the USA? Will we still be in Iraq and Afghanistan? How many digital pictures will I have on my computer (since I have over 20,000 today)? Will there even be digital pictures, or will some other technology for photographs appear? How will our health be? How much will gasoline cost? Will researchers have made great strides in curing cancer and other diseases? Will I still be blogging?

Of course, after all these questions went through my head, I realized that I was sounding like soap opera teasers: "Will Debbie marry Bill? Will Amanda find her son she abandoned years ago? Will Stanley recover his vision? Will Ramona awake from her coma?"

Well, we have plenty of time to find out where our personal soap opera goes, and we will diligently write it down as the future unfolds. Stay tuned!

Investing

I had the pleasure this weekend of visiting with my grandkids other grandma, Alice. We were talking about yard sales, and the subject came around to Beanie Babies (which she had gotten at a yard sale for the girls and brought with her). Alice said that she knew a woman who “back then” thought Beanie Babies would be a good investment, only to increase in value. At least that’s what people told her. At any rate, she now has a Beanie Baby worth practically nothing, for which she originally paid $700.

You hear the word “investment” tossed around frequently in a troubled economy. Everyone wonders what to invest in. Stocks? Real estate? CDs? Oil? The choices are many.

Investment has three major definitions. The first: “The action or process of investing money for profit or material result.” The second: “A thing that is worth buying because it may be profitable or useful in the future.” Both of those, of course, deal primarily with money. I like the third definition: “An act of devoting time, effort, or energy to a particular undertaking with the expectation of a worthwhile result.”

I think a lot of life’s results are the results of what we deem worthy of investment. Most of the time, we don’t really see it as investment. We associate the word investment with money so much that we forget the third definition - time, effort, or energy. Money, of course, can also be used in the third definition - you can invest money in causes, such as the environment, that you likely won’t see immediate benefit but which you feel will “pay off” in the future.

At work, for example, I’m trying to teach other MTs that taking the time (unpaid time, off the clock) to learn our word expander inside and out, to build glossaries, to find shortcuts, is an investment in time that will eventually make them more productive after a while. Of course, during the time they’re doing the “investing,” it seems to be a waste. The payoff comes later - but it will come.

Then we stretch the definition of payoff to involve others. I’ve told this story before, but there once was an elderly man who was planting an apple tree. A young boy came by, watched for a while, then said, “You know, old man, you’re never going to live to eat one single apple of that tree.” The old man replied, “I know, but others will.”

The best investments, it seems to me, result in a payoff not for ourselves, but for other people, whether it involves money, time, effort, or energy. We had a local man die last year who bequeathed an investment of a million dollars to our new emergency room. He will obviously never reap the benefits, but he did it anyway. Ed invested in the future of the ministry when he paid a year’s tuition anonymously for a deserving fellow student at the seminary where he was attending. We invest in future generations when we recycle and look for alternative forms of energy. We invest in the future when we spend time with our children and make memories with them, when we take action to help families become functional again, when we write a poem or piece of music to be enjoyed in years to come. We could never have heard the great composers if they hadn’t invested time in writing and editing their symphonies, or the great singers such as Beverly Sills, if they hadn’t invested time in learning and practicing.

Our society is so addicted to the instant gratification that we forget some investments take a long time to “pay off.” Long-term benefits versus short-term pleasures. It can be a hard lesson. Sometimes in the Journey to Simplicity, we don’t see the results of your choices until they become cumulative. Then we can finally see some results - but it can take years of wading through difficult choices.

My hope for the world is that we are choosing our investments wisely, and that we have the patience and wisdom to understand exactly what we are investing and why.

The Scenario

Here’s a shocking story: Last week, a group of people wearing masks strapped a woman down on a table, knocked her out, and with a sharp knife they slit her neck!

The group of people, of course, consisted of a surgeon, anesthetist, and various nurses. The woman was me, and the “slit in the neck” was a thyroidectomy.

I once wondered what aliens would think if they came to Earth and saw the scene described above. Would they get the idea that I was being harmed, with all those people bending over me with knives? I thought that was kind of ironic - someone from another planet might have tried to rescue me, when in reality, the people were helping me, not hurting me. The aliens just wouldn’t have had the whole picture, and would have jumped to the wrong conclusion.

I frequently think of that Bible verse, “now we see through a glass darkly.” This is why we really can’t judge others, because we can’t ever have the whole picture of someone’s life. We don’t know what their upbringing was, if they were lucky enough to have a strong family unit, as we may have had. We don’t know the obstacles they had to overcome, the peer pressures they encountered, the abuse they suffered, the hopelessness with which they were burdened. We don’t know if they had lousy teachers or a learning disability. We don’t know if they are genetically predisposed to addiction. We don’t know, and even if we think we know people well, we cannot know them well enough to be able to pass judgment. Our focus is too small, our fund of knowledge is too limited.

Every time I transcribe a report of a pregnant woman taking illegal drugs or a patient with severe lung disease who still insists on smoking, my tendency is to shake my head at their choices. I must try to remember that I don’t have the whole picture. I’ve been very blessed in my life, and many, many others have had struggle after struggle, for whatever reasons not known to me. Empathy, yes. Judgment? I’ll think I’ll pass.