Even In His Sleep, He's Entertaining

I opened my eyes to see him sitting up, staring intently at the foot of the bed.

Me: "What are you looking at?"
Him: "Might be turning into vegetables."
Me: "Who, us?"
Him: "Noooo...potential teenagers."

And then he laid back down, chuckling to himself.

Maybe he'd been dreaming about this:

Sleeptalking Husbands Are Almost As Entertaining As First Graders

I woke up in the middle of the night recently to my husband sitting up, laughing to himself. 

Him: "So you think I should just go out there in my shorts and nothing else?"
Me: "Huh?!"
Him: "You know, to confuse the crowds!"
Me: "What are you talking about?"
Him: "Oh, you're just not tracking with my train of thought." (Condescending laugh)

True. Very true.

The Year of Being Thirty: Life Upside Down (and God Exactly the Same as He's Always Been)

One of the sweetest things to measure from this year:  tons of great together time with  a guy I adore.

Writing is my favorite way to log where I've been. I'm fortified to move forward with confidence when I have concrete evidence of how I felt in past craziness AND how I saw God bring me through it.

On my thirtieth birthday last year, I wrote about trusting God with my future, believing that the things He's chosen to put into my life are part of His "inheritance" for me -- and believing that I will be able to look back and say those very things are "good." Not just bearable, but good. And I stepped into my thirty-first year with expectancy.

I cannot believe all the things that happened to me when I was thirty. The list is overwhelming:

I started grad school, pursuing an exciting Masters in Literacy Education program.
I wrote like a fiend for the first five months, putting 2011 on track to have far more blog posts than any previous year.
I watched a friendship with an amazing guy blossom into...something more.
I summoned every giddy bone in my body when he called to ask me out -- and quickly said yes.
I flew over the handlebars of my moped (on our second date, just thirteen days later), spent three days in the hospital, and came home diagnosed with a mild-to-moderate brain injury.
I spent months with my curtains drawn, sleeping half the day, avoiding noisy or bright places, living a tiny sliver of the frantic schedule I'd kept up in my former life.
I learned to watch TV. In large amounts.

I cried when I was told I couldn't return to work this year because of the injury.
I left my grad program behind for the same reason, but with less emotional fanfare.

I enjoyed countless hours with Dave (the aforementioned amazing guy, who proved to be even more amazing by sticking with me through everything and contributing way more than his share to our relationship!).
I logged hundreds of hours at therapy appointments and doctor visits.
I gained enormous amounts of knowledge about medical bills and health insurance.
I experienced far greater generosity than I could ever have anticipated.
I said goodbye to my roommate of six years, and I moved in with my brother and his family.

All of these things, in less than twelve months.

I'm six months into year thirty-one, and from this near position, I can already look back and see that what God has included is good. Not often easy, but good. And I am grateful.

Not A Question I Expected

Last Sunday, my boyfriend and I paid a visit to a family who's very special to me (I was their nanny for the past two summers, and I love those kids dearly!). I was so excited to see them -hadn't since August- and to introduce them to Dave.

We arrived, and of course dad had to go rustle up the kids from their hiding spots. "Megan's here, guys!"

Mr. Five Year Old came into the entry, took a long, hard look at Dave and me, and paused. Then he looked up at his parents and asked, "Which one is Megan?"

While I can understand him not quite recognizing me (I was wearing a hat, after all), I can't say I expect Dave and myself to face that question again...

We've been told we're sappy, crazy, and over-the-top cute, but never before that we are indistinguishable.

A Tale of Two Waiting Rooms

This couch is the focal point of the waiting room in Clinic A.

At Clinic B, I wait in a row of chairs in the hallway.

Since my accident in July, I have spent a lot of time at two excellent clinics (I'll call them Clinic A and Clinic B) here in the Twin Cities, receiving therapy for different repercussions of my injuries. I am so grateful for the doctors and therapists who've treated me in both places, have been impressed by their knowledge and compassion, and will gladly recommend each of them to anyone.

I'm not sure I feel the same way about their waiting rooms, however. You see, I've spent a fair amount of time waiting at each of these clinics, and it's the waiting that sometimes has the strongest effect on me. Based on my waiting room experiences, I have to recommend Clinic B.

Don't get me wrong: I'm not complaining about EITHER clinic running behind schedule (especially not since I've had such attentive, helpful appointments once getting in). The actual waiting hasn't been the problem. Rather, the problem is my heart, and one waiting room seems to be much better therapy for it than the other.

Clinic A sports the most luxurious clinic waiting room I've ever experienced. It's obvious that an interior designer had a hand in its appearance. It's lovely. Some furniture still fits the waiting room mold, but the room is flavored with something akin to opulence.

Clinic B, on the other hand, ran out of waiting room space a long time ago. Patients wait in the corridors of this hospital-turned-clinic space. There is no classical music playing while you wait here. Instead, the constant bustling of patients being transported to appointments and clinicians conferring with each other as they hurry to their next assignment provides background noise.

The activity and noise in the hallways of Clinic B have not always been comfortable for my oversensitive brain; however, the things I've observed while waiting in those hallways have been good for my heart.

See, when I'm at Clinic A, I look around and see people who, like me, have choices about the medical care they seek and the places they go. In that waiting room, I'm often reminded of what I don't have. I find that suddenly I'm concerned whether I wore the right pair of shoes to match the jacket I chose that morning. I think deep thoughts like, "Why did I not switch purses before I came?" I worry about fitting in and measuring up.

That's not true at Clinic B. There, I see people who have limited choices, people who have injuries far more severe than mine. One man I saw regularly for weeks had just one leg. Another had screws holding his head and neck brace in place. Some people are there as inpatients because there is no one to provide support or care at home. I've seen people who are making it, but who face immense challenges.

And I'm reminded of how much I have. How much is still intact. How much I have to be grateful for. How much I have to give. Instead of discontentment, I often walk out of Clinic B with a profound sense of wealth. I pray that sense may turn to gratefulness and compassion. I hope that what I've seen while waiting there changes the way I see the world and live in it.

Letters to an Absent Miss Djerf

One question I’ve constantly fielded this winter is “Are you missing teaching?” There are two answers:

 No, I’m not missing the stress of teaching. Right now, the idea of managing the noise and activity of first and second graders all day is synonymous with thoughts of torture.

But yes, I’m missing the students. Terribly!

I missed them even more when I received letters from the class near Christmas. Their unfettered affection, creative spelling, and imaginative drawings (one featured me snowboarding down a steep mountain with the caption "your wining Miss Djerf", while another depicted me with some serious eyelash augmentation) triggered all kinds of warm-fuzzy emotions. 

Here are a few of these precious missives, nothing added except for titles (which double as summaries of my experiences with those particular children):

The Compassionate One

Dear Miss Djerf

I am having a good time at sckool. it was nicer when you wher hery. today wee are having hot choclit. The sckool has chached sinc your gon. But I feel bad that you hert.

The Enthusiastic One

Dear miss Djerf,

I was excited when I hrd this nys!

I hrd this

I hrd i wus cuming in youer klasrum.

I jumpd up!

I wos so hape!

I love your voys

it sos god.

you or nis

The Distracted One

Dear Miss Djerf

I hop you feel betr so you can come to shcool but after the shcool yer you are going to go to shcool so you will feel betr so you can go to shcool nest yer

I hop you cood feel betr I like you a lot

The Precise One

Dear Miss Djerf,

I really am looking forward to seeing you next year. Why not come on February third that is my dad’s half birthday.

Merry Christmas.

Boy, do I miss them.

A New Favorite Grocery Shopping Story

[image: mbeans.com]

Last month, my mother, niece, and nephew brought me to the grocery store for the first time in over eight weeks. (I'm still recovering from the moped accident and brain injury, and up until now, have been receiving grocery deliveries from others. So getting to go along was a BIG DEAL.) I have never had so much fun grocery shopping.

So many things about it were delightful; I don't even know where to start...

I'm still smiling about my one-year-old nephew's evident belief that we were doing this all FOR him. He displayed his jubilation and expectation with grunts, yells, arm-waving, and leg-kicking every time we put something in the cart. Quite the show, and he didn't lose a bit of enthusiasm throughout the store.

I haven't yet stopped teasing my mom about caving to my two-year-old niece's constant suggestions throughout the store. "Grammy, don't you think we should get a treat? Grammy, don't you think we should buy a ball to play with? Grammy, don't you think we should buy some macaroni and cheese?" The first time I saw Grammy turn her down was when she brought a clock (I know, a clock? In a grocery store?) she'd found down an aisle somewhere. Had the clock been made of chocolate, I think it would have ended differently...

We made our way so, so slowly through the store, and I loved it. (I was a pretty slow person before this brain injury, and now I just have a great excuse.) I chuckled later to realize that my niece and I had constantly walked right in front of people throughout the whole store, though for different reasons. She was lost in her imaginative chatter (and occasional suggestions to Grammy), while I've grown accustomed to wearing my hat pulled down low in bright environments and sometimes miss things peripherally as a result.

But the best part, the cherry on top, was the woman who came up to me as I was waiting at the checkout. Pointing to my niece's hair, she said, "Wow, her hair is so blond it's almost white. MY daughter's hair was like that when she was a little girl..."

I agreed that her hair is white-blond, to which the woman responded with several more assurances that her daughter's hair had, indeed, been so blond it could be mistaken for white. (Apparently, having a small child with you is an invitation for people to conduct random conversations with you in public places.)

I'd almost stopped listening when she ended with this gem: "And you know what was the strangest thing about it?" She paused dramatically, and then continued in a hushed voice. "When it was wet, it smelled like chicken feathers."

I say, every once in a while, you just need a story that ends up being about chicken feathers.

Detours: Under Construction, Part Two

“You might let me cry/ You might let me sing, 

You might let me feel a fraction of Your suffering/ but You won’t let me down.” 

(Never Let Me Down by Andy Gullahorn) 

Image: www.signsshipped.com

While there are multiple word pictures I’m holding on to in this season of life (perhaps I’ll blog another time about beetles or dahlias), the one that resonates the most is the one of construction and detours, leftover from an unpublished blog post written last summer.

Then, many of my thoughts were in the theoretical range. Now, some of those ideas are defining my life, and I have a few more thoughts to add.

The analogy in that blog post broke down because I knew the outcome of the driveway construction in five days. Five days of upheaval, and then poof! Beauty. But life isn’t like that.

Life construction happens more like the massive highway overpass project that’s been underway near my home for the past two years. You don’t build bridges and re-route roads and revamp intersections (all while keeping pace with traffic) in a quick-and-easy fashion. It takes time.

In fact, the first leg of the project was simply bringing massive piles of dirt to settle where the bridge would eventually be erected. They sat there all winter. Big, ugly piles of dirt.

Once the actual construction began, the hallmark was its detours.  Three major roads meet at that place, and none of them was ever closed down for more than a few hours at a time (usually in the dead of night). Those of us who commuted daily on these roads had no alternatives in this area but to keep driving on them. Or, to be precise, to keep driving on the detours which bore their names.

Some early changes remained constant, while other sections were completely new every few weeks. I learned that zoning out while driving home from work was not an option. If I wasn’t paying attention, it was easy to miss my exit or end up heading the wrong direction.

Nearly four months ago, I was in an accident which left me with a mild-to-moderate traumatic brain injury (TBI).  It could have been so much worse, and I’m incredibly grateful for all that is intact in my body and mind, as well as for the myriad ways I have seen the love and faithfulness of God as a result of the accident.

However, the recovery has been one of detour upon detour.

In the hospital, I was told that I’d likely be back to normal in a month. (I now know that 80-85% of people with this type of head injury recover fully within a month, so to be told such wasn’t out of line.)

Nearly a month later, and nowhere near my former “normal,” I learned that it could be more like three months before I could drive again or return to work. Starting the school year with my students was out of the question. I cried for hours after that appointment.

Just recently (fourteen weeks after the accident) I had a similar appointment with that doctor. This time she delivered the news that I cannot return to work at all this school year. My progress has not been consistent enough to consider adding the load of teaching (or any work right now).

Detours, and more detours. Just when I think I know where things are headed, the road veers a different direction, and I squint into the future, looking for signs of any sort. Any reassurance I’m still on the right road.

There have been days lately when I've been consumed by wondering about this detour. How long will it last? Will it ever end? Will I be able to cope with the transition to the next season? If this detour has been difficult, how will I ever face more challenging things?

Two thoughts are lighting the way before me, giving me enough confidence to keep moving even though this detour is both uncomfortable and unrecognizable.

First, I trust the One who can see the whole project, both the work inside my heart and the work in His world. He has demonstrated His trustworthiness to me time and again, and the past sixteen weeks have been no different, except in one measure: the acuity of my need. Keen awareness of my need for God –not as an insurance policy over my agenda at large, but instead as the air I breathe and the strength I must have to do whatever He’s placed before me- is a gift, however it is packaged.

Second, when I picture the final result of that overpass project by my house, I smile. The finished product is far superior to the previous, dangerous intersection. Whoever planned and executed that project did a good job. How much more can I trust my Heavenly Father to do a good job in me?

 “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?” (Romans 8:31-32)

Demolition: Under Construction, Part One

[Note: I wrote this entry over a year ago (August 2010), but didn’t feel right about posting it then. I do now. How strange to peruse my drafts folder recently and realize that I’d received a word picture for a future time frame! Have more to say, but that will be another post.]

[Image from seamanconstruction.com]

Several weeks ago [as I said, August 2010], I woke up early on a Monday morning to the sound of a giant piece of machinery pounding our driveway into bits, while a Bobcat zipped around leveraging chunks out and lifting them into waiting dump truck. By the end of the day, the assault was over, and no pavement remained. (Things like this can happen to your driveway when you share it with all the other townhome residents and the association decides what happens to it and when.) 

As many things do, it got me thinking. I've felt a little like I've been under construction this summer.  A brush with ill health and physical limitations, along with a shift from many of my typical activities, have left my identity on the ground, cracked and fragile. I'm pondering who I am underneath, what's left beneath the things I do.

Being sick -even though it only lasted a few weeks- revealed how flimsy my grasp on health and independence is, and it scared me. Life changes quickly, easily, and we don't usually see those demolitions or detours coming. Instead, you wake up one morning and something you have no control over is tearing up the pavement. The things that defined you, gave you purpose, secured your position in the world -- those same things are being mercilessly hauled away. And you wonder what to do with what's left.

I've recently watched several people in my life face this kind of major upheaval, due to health problems, loss of a job, consequences of choices, or fallout from the choices of others.  Few, if any, have the luxury of seeing where they're headed; all they know is that life is different. Entirely different.    

In front of my house, the purpose behind the upheaval was revealed soon enough. Over the rest of the week, other workers (and vehicles) arrived to level the dirt, pour new concrete, and eventually spread and smooth new asphalt.  [The freshly minted driveways make me want to dig out my rollerblades and go for a spin. If a driveway can be drop-dead gorgeous, mine is.]

It's at this point that this comparison falls apart, because life construction happens at a MUCH slower pace.  We see the piles of rubble, but we cannot envision what will replace them. 

  

Seems that God knows we won’t usually sign ourselves up for construction.

I don't know God's timetable, but I do know that the big-picture blueprint states that He is working to transform me into His likeness (2 Cor. 4), and that He who began a good work in me will be faithful to complete it until the day of Jesus Christ (Philippians 1).