I Call Him Sam.

 I may have been around six years old when I first gave my heart to Jesus; I had been a sickly kid and knew what it meant when my mom taught me to pray "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take."  I had been in and out of the hospital a few times with pneumonia, asthma, double-pneumonia, and a whooping cough that mom says just wouldn't lend anyone to believe I was human! Being born about a month premature, weighing in just under six pounds and having to fight for every breath may have contributed to my characteristic meanness because I just won't give up or give in. I don't know how! I'd rather fight my way through a mess than let it take me over, and I sure won't let you or anyone else know I'm dying if I am, I put that sort of nonsense to rest and speak only to God about it. He's in charge, isn't he?

Around the same time I gave my heart and soul to Christ I began asking questions of the preacher, my Sunday School teacher, my mom, granny, and anyone else who I thought may know the answer to the hard questions a little squirt can have.  "Where is Heaven, anyway?", "Was I alive in Heaven before being born here?"  I tend to dream that I was alive and well up in a place much like people describe as Heaven, and I was with a little boy, we were playing and dancing, and I slid in and out of the colors of the Rainbow with him. I'd pop up and have a different color all over me, and we loved that game. He had to be blue, I must be gold. That was the thing, that was the rule - - but he's not Sam. He's probably my best friend and I'll see him again as we both Wait to Fly.

After I became a Christian and got a few answers to my questions, I asked another question about my own personal Guardian Angel because I could feel him over my left shoulder and around my back. He was always there even though I could never actually see him. The thing is, he was the same angel that I knew and felt in Heaven, and even though I didn't see him there either, he was always there helping me and he could be described openly as being the wind, the thing that lifted me, the power behind my belly laugh, he was always there with me. I don't think he even left for a minute between the time I realized I wasn't saved and the time I accepted Christ because the two moments happened almost simultaneously - - what a blessing! I didn't ever, not even for a day, go without knowing Jesus! 

"What's his name?" I asked my Sunday School teacher. "Who?" , she asked. "The angel on my back, the one I talk to. What's his name?"  She wasn't the sort of teacher to shush me, and to tell me to go out and play with the other kids, not to bring up matters that couldn't or shouldn't be discussed.  She leaned into me and said softly, "Well, he's your angel, I suppose you can call him whatever you want to call him. He probably has a name already, but you can name him whatever you want."  That answer must have satisfied me. I immediately began calling my angel - - some would say my imaginary friend - - "Sam". He was Sam now. He was there, he had always been there, he was quiet, but his silence could be quite loud at times when he needed me to pay my utmost attention. He wasn't a frilly silly tiny-wing-flapping angel that had a little halo light and a plastic harp...he was big. I didn't know how big, and I wouldn't know how big until 1981; some 15 years after he and I were on first name terms.

July 27, 1981 rolled around and as usual in Oklahoma, it was hot.  I was driving my little V.W. Bug to church so I could board the bus and head off to Santa Fe, New Mexico for a retreat with about 50 others from both the singles groups and the young married groups of our church.  I was single.  As I sat parked in my car at the light on the main drag of Bethany, Oklahoma waiting on the light I felt a pretty good bump -- it was like something hit my car from behind and maybe it even pushed me forward a bit. I remember looking down at my hands because they weren't on the steering wheel and before I knew it a man in a ball cap and overalls was opening my door and yanking me out of the car!  "Where is the man?" he asked frantically, as he stood holding me (actually hugging me) and pointing to the backseat of my car.  

MY CAR!!! Oh my gosh!!  My back bumper was crinkled and was poking into the back of the drivers seat! The left back fender was gone, the wheel blown out, and the entire left side (driver's side) crunched and crushed in what can only be described as a heap of junk metal.  "There wasn't anyone else in my car, I was alone."  I answered the man - - turns out he was the driver of the Mack dump truck that had literally ran over my car because he wasn't paying attention and when the light turned green up in front of him he just moved forward, not realizing there was a car in front of him. Insisting that there was a man in the backseat, and hugging me tighter than medical professionals would advise these days for someone who had just been pulled from the ruins of a wrecked vehicle, the man was adamant that there was a "White man....a...white....wait, he was white. He was like chalk white, alabaster white. He was...he was huge."  As the man slowed down his description I knew what (who) he had seen. "Oh, that must have been Sam. He's usually on my left side and around my back."  I said this to the poor man as if anyone and everyone hung out with their Guardian Angel on a daily basis...."He's fine, he's behind me. He's OK. You didn't hurt him."

This was of course, before cell phones, so the two of us walked to the drug store just to the left of where we left the vehicles. We called the Bethany police, and we called my dad, who came up from home just a few miles away, and he went on to take me to the church.  The busses were kind enough to wait on me! I was really excited about that. I don't think I gave my car much thought to be honest. I knew my dad had it under control. I just went to Santa Fe and hung out with great people. Glen Campbell the singer gave his testimony that weekend, and I came face to face with a mountain lion for the first time in my life that wasn't at the zoo!  Again, I didn't really get scared, I just walked away quietly and told my friend not to go up that way -- mountain lion.  To say that now makes my eyes pop out just a little. I just wasn't the type to freak out I guess.

Sam made another appearance a few years later, and I could go into all the times we've met face to face, or I've spoken to him through a dream state only to realize I wasn't really sleeping.  Angels are not to be worshipped, they are to be spoken with, appreciated, and even questioned, but never worshipped. I was having that discussion with Sam in my dream state one evening and as I leaned over and said something like ...."you know Sam..."  he stopped me; he put up his hand (which if I'm honest is about the size of a pizza pan) and he said sweetly, "Judy, my name is Theonopholous, just so you know."  LOL...OK! Well, I did think that Theonopholous was a pretty cool name, not gonna lie, but he had been Sam just a bit too long for me to start calling him Theo at this point! Sam it is!  Every now and again I'll lean back a bit and whisper a thank you to the being that he is - - and I've even used his real name once or twice, but just like no one really calls me Judy, the name I was born with, I don't use his real name either. He's always and forever Sam.

Sometimes I wonder if when we get to Heaven if he'll still hang out with me. We won't need guardians at that point.  He must know his days and nights of employment are coming to an end - - but there's just that glimmer of hope that I have that he'll choose to hang with me in eternity and we'll dance and play on that Rainbow again with my buddy and maybe with his guardian angel.  I wonder if Sam knows that particular angel. I'd ask my Sunday School teacher, but she's gone now - - then again, if you think about it, she's up where the REAL answers are! I may have to ask her tonight. 

Be blessed.  Remember what the Bible says about angels -- often times we as humans entertain them and we aren't even aware of it.  Well, often times...we are aware of it. 

Another Pound Bites the Dust!

 YEA!!  YEA!!  It's been just over five months and I'm down over 26 pounds. I have another 25-30 to go if I'm honest with myself, so maybe in a few more months, I can write the blog claiming to have met my goal weight and tell you all the timely and untimely stories, reveal to you all my not-so-well-kept-secrets, and make it all seem like it was just a walk in the FREAKING park!  (You can't see me laughing but I'm about to wipe another wee tear from the corner of my eye!  I lost another pound!!

Today is January 27, 2021, back in early August 2020, I woke up and decided to weigh myself. I said to myself "C'mon, you have to know where you are so you know what you need to do to lose it. You have to know where you are weight-wise so you can know what goals you want to set."  I had NO IDEA what I was about to do was going to send me into such a spiral of emotions! Having not stepped on a scale for almost a year, maybe 8 months, I really didn't have any idea just how heavy I was. You know how it is, all your friends and co-workers say things like, "You look good" or "Well, you could tone a little, but you're OK".  They say that because they don't want to hurt your feelings. OH MY GOSH, my feelings needed to be slaughtered! Those damn feelings were literally sitting on my body and needing to be exercised - - cut off, starved, banned, and forbidden to return! 

I couldn't believe the number, and no I won't say it until I lose all of my weight and can come to you and show you the evidence - - I was too upset to take a photo of the number on the digital scale. I cried and I didn't go anywhere that day. I hadn't started my temporary assignment yet, but if I had started it I would not have been able to go into work from what I call onslaught depression!  I say "depression" because I was instantly saddened by the number, but at the same time I was FURIOUS with myself for having allowed myself to get to the point that I literally weighed almost as much as my fully grown son who of course works out and is absolutely healthy for his size and frame, but I WEIGHED AS MUCH as he did almost, maybe 3 or 4 pounds under him, but that was not acceptable and I knew there had to be another way for me to live.  I did what I always do in these types of cases - - I prayed about it.

Once I left the closet from praying and could see through my tears that were still pouring down my dampened face, I made myself a few promises: I wouldn't overdo it, I wouldn't force it, I wouldn't try to make it happen overnight, and I wouldn't weigh myself until I knew I had lost at least 10 pounds. There was just no reason to keep the feelings raw - - It was war, and war means making plans as well as carrying out those plans without making a big fuss about it and alerting the enemy. In my case, I was my own enemy, so I decided to just do what I knew was best -- stop the insanity by putting down the snacks, walking away from sugar, and changing what I could change to make small but significant differences.

Have you ever walked into your own kitchen, opened up your own cabinets, and taken inventory of what YOU bought at the store? You, if you're like me, maybe a creature of habit, thinking you have to have this snack or that one, you must keep at least two of these in the house, and by all means, you need that!! That, whatever that is, is just so important to your well-being, you couldn't thrive or survive without THAT....that had to go! That was the first thing to hit the trashcan! THAT was sugar! I found jellybeans, Ike & Mikes, Laffy Taffy, Twizzlers, gummie bears, and chocolate mix for my milk. I found breakfast bars that could only be described as sugary oatcakes with fake or nearly fake fruity filling. I found grape juice, and you think "that's not bad, is it?"  Have you seen the amount of sugar poured into Welch's grape juice? Even the 100% juice has about 25 grams of sugar in it, and here I was thinking I was being all healthy -- NOPE.

After I cleaned my cabinets and cupboards of sugar-filled foods I found I had so much more room for vegetables, real fruit, nuts, seeds, and actually healthy protein bars that I could use to supplement my daily diet without making it feel like I was starving to death between meals.  The hardest part would be lowering the portions of food that I ate because I could put down some pasta, let me tell you. If there's one food group I love its noodles and that's just not a good plan when you're at war with your own body.  The amount of carbs in pasta is outrageous - - so outrageous that pasta is literally on my cheat list and I only eat it once a month now - - and I cut my portion in half.  If I lament about any food that would be it. I can do without desserts. I can do without creamy gravy and sauces, but take away my noodles and I stare at you - - drilling holes into your soul. 

After the change in the diet came the change in my exercise routine. I had to get a routine because I had sold mine for sugar a few years back and needed to remind myself that I too was worthy of being both healthy and attractive. I knew that exercising was going to hurt and it was going to be something I couldn't play at - - if I was serious about it I needed to bring in the big guns. I needed to hire a professional. I needed what every woman needs when she's literally 50-60 pounds overweight and realizes that she could be dying without really understanding her own contribution to her own demise. I called my son and asked him to do what he does - - for me this time, not for the soldiers, he's been training for years.  I brought in both the best physical training expert, but one who had a vested interest in seeing to it that his new charge was going to survive his program. 

We started out easy as that's the way to do it.  I went to work about a week after I started the program, and realized that most of the time I was sitting but I could be standing if I wanted to. I put the chair in the corner and chose to stand.  I walked about 5,000 steps every day, measuring it with my new FitBit that I bought just for the occasion.  I gradually worked my way up to 10,000 steps a day, and when that happened the boy put me into a workout program at the YMCA which is literally located across the street from where I live. It's been there the entire five years I've lived here, just to show you how far gone I was. I could have been so much healthier for so much longer, but I CHOSE to be an unhealthy woman...that was ME. I made that decision and it was (and is) time to change that forever.

My daily workout now is so much different than it was five months ago. First of all, I'm working out every day either at the gym or at home. In the beginning, I was only working out every other day and my dang body hurt so much from the last time I worked out, I wasn't able to really push it that hard until after the third month, I'm not kidding. I was still seeing the scale go down but my clothes weren't really feeling much looser than they were; maybe just a little bit.  Finally, after a terrible 60+ days of being the EXACT same weight, I found a way to break through the plateau and make things go in the right direction.  I am NOT kidding. I went 60+ days at the same stupid weight number - by this time I was weighing myself every day because my son insisted on it, telling me that even an ounce difference would be an indicator of what I needed to continue to do or stop doing. He was right.

I bought an online canister of BHB powder and began drinking 8-10 ounces of water with one scoop around 11:00 a.m. every day, just after breakfast and before lunch.  I do the intermittent fasting from 6:00 p.m. to 10:00 a.m. every day, so breakfast at 10, BHB at 11,  work out around noon, lunch around 1, and the only snacking I do is a homemade trail mix that I came up with that has sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, cranberries, walnut pieces, and a few chocolate chips.  I eat a good dinner at or before 6 and I don't eat after that - - I do drink an enormous amount of green tea! I will tell you, from noon to nine when I go to bed (yes, I go to bed at nine) I drink about 10 cups of green tea either hot or cold. It starts out hot, ends up being cold, and I fill it back up with hot, allowing it to get cold again. It's a thing. I don't mind cold green tea - - no sugar.  I'm weird, I know.

So, today I got out of bed and the funniest thing happened; my shorts fell off of my body before I made it to the bathroom.  They do have a drawstring, and I had tightened it I'm sure, but when I got out of bed and walked to the bathroom - - boom! The shorts hit the floor.  There I was, mooning my dog! After going to the bathroom and washing my hands, I did what I do routinely now, I stood on the scale. I sort of halfway expected it to say what it said, but when I looked down and saw it with my own two eyes I felt so ... awesome.  Not only had another pound come off my body, but I could honestly say I will never be officially "obese" again. With that one pound, I went from a BMI level of obese to overweight. I can handle that so much easier - - I'm definitely winning this war. 

What is it then? Is it dieting? The exercise? Is it the routine that is making all this a reality for me? No. It's the prayer.  You have to understand that until you give it all up to God you can't have anything whatsoever. When we think we know what we're doing and leave God out of it, we are doomed from the start.  I remember leaving that closet that August morning and saying "God this is you, this is all you. Tell me how to do it, what to do, when to do it, and I'll do it."  It just feels so much better to know that I am NOT in this alone. I have an awesome God who gives me the nod every day saying I'm doing what I knew to be good and He is pleased.  LISTEN to your heart and follow the Word. That's my advice anyway - - and it seems to be working for me; give it a try.  God bless.  (The photo is my son with his face looking up, and his friend J.J. They are at the Battle Frog obstacle race in Indiana. They do this every year.)  I weighed as much as either one of these guys - - NOT NOW! Woot!!

Girls Don't Fight Fairly - - Why Expect It?

 Please!!  EVERY time I hear someone say "He fights like a girl" I just want to laugh right out loud and say, "Oh, you mean he's about to kick some ass, without taking names? 'Cause I've NEVER known a girl to fight fairly."  (I say "fairly" with the "ly" because it's an adverb situation, and ultimately the proper way to say that particular statement.)

No! Girls do not, do not, do not, fight fairly, and no one on God's green Earth should expect them to. Why in God's raging Hell should we fight fairly? What's the point of fighting if you're just going to obey rules and regulations which could somehow give away your next move? NOPE...we do not, we will not, we should not, and we won't ever fight fairly - - be forewarned.

When my son was just under four months old he and I were living in this tiny rinky-dinky little flat that didn't have central heat and there was only one door in or out, just one entrance.  Sometime in the middle of the night a man I didn't know (drunk, raging angry at his ex) came to my door - - he began pounding on the door and demanding that I give him his baby! He was absolutely insane with his fury, but because I didn't have a telephone at the time (before cell phones) I had to try to convince him that I wasn't his ex, I wasn't who he thought I was, my baby was in fact MY baby, and I needed him to leave before I called the police.  "Ha!" he cried, "I already cut the damn telephone line, bitch", was his retort.  ACTIVATE PLAN B.

Plan B for me was to quickly toss my son into the closet with as many blankets and pillows around him as possible while simultaneously continuing my conversation with the drunk, letting him know I was not about to let him walk into my house and steal my son. I reminded him at least a dozen times that I was not who he thought I was -- all the while talking I was in the kitchen pulling out the drawers and locating two large cutlery knives, one a Butcher the other a serrated slicer. I found the knives, and I also found a half roll of duct tape in the same drawer - - Plan B, Part B crystalized in my brain.

Strapping the two knives to the inside of my wrists (both, and no it wasn't easy) I managed to use my teeth to cut the tape and place myself in an awkwardly dominating position on top of my couch facing the front door  JUST IN CASE the man decided he had heard enough back talk and wanted to enter my home!  He wanted to entered my home!  BOOM! The man used all of his weight and force to come crashing through my door only to see a half naked angry mother bear on top of a couch with two stainless steel killing mechanisms strapped to her in a position of upward motion rather than an obvious downward one - - this man was about to be split six ways to Sunday and I didn't give a damn if he spewed his nasty blood all over me, my couch, my floor, the ceiling, the walls, he was going to DIE! 

It didn't take the man more than his initial first second of entry to realize he was standing at Hell's gate and I was about to Sparta his butt right over the pit!  "Oh!" he let out - - "You ain't Darla!"  NO I AM NOT DARLA!  I am the mother of a baby boy who is resting silently without any knowledge of his maniac mother about to take the life of a would be kidnapper - - I am a MOTHER and you do not ever mess with a momma's baby -- you just never want to do that; even the most gentle of beings will fight to her death when her baby is endangered.  What are rules? What are signs? What are regulations if all we know is to protect?

I'd like to say that I've grown out of the raging maniac stage in my life, but I'd be lying if I said that. If someone tried to take my kid(s) today, my grandkids, even my dog probably, they'd find that I have a really nasty side still thriving inside my veins - - thank God I've kept her quiet all these many years.  Jesus has been such a good friend to keep me at bay and from exposing myself - - (giggles).

The Power of Prayer

 You say to me with clinched jaw,  "I'm not going to give you anything. You can't make me, and I would never give you anything!"  OK, that's fair,  never asked for anything from you.  You see, when I need something I don't ask you; I ask God.  

Let me ask you a few questions, and you tell me from your heart, from your soul the truthful answer. When you need something, when you really truly want something who do you ask? Who do you go to to pray and ask for that desire? I don't bow my head, get on my knees, hide in the closet and ask YOU for anything. No, if I want something, I go straight to God and I ask Him for whatever it is that I want, and you really don't even come into the picture as far as being able to either produce that desire for me, or to have to authority to give it to me. No. You don't, and you can't. You aren't God. You are not Jesus.

If Jesus, being Jesus, opens a door are you able to shut it?  If He should shut a door are you able to open it? I believe there is a verse or two about that; the answer is simply no, we are not able to open that which He has closed, and we are not possibly able to shut that which He has deemed to stay open. Who are we? He is GOD, so we go to GOD, we don't ask men, there's NO ONE alive or dead (for those who pray to Mary, the various saints, or their dead ancestors) who can bring about a thing, a tiny possible thing even if we begged them to produce it. It's not there, it has never been there, it will never be there, ONLY GOD. 

If you ask of something from God am I able to stop it? Would I have some sort of power or authority over you to make whatever it was that you really wanted NOT be given to you? Then if you are able to say no to my question, why would you begin to imagine that you have any authority or power over my prayer or my desire? You don't. Again, we don't pray to men. We ask of God. We don't trust men (I say men, but I also mean women), we ask and trust ONLY God.  Seems so simple, but really, it's very deep and ultimately profound. There is only one name, only one source, only one fount from which that blessing of life is given; and the security of our being sustained. God....through Jesus' name.

I am secure in knowing. I am secure in my believing, and in my faith, that when I bow my head and ask for my heart's desires I am being heard because I have fulfilled my end of the passage's instructions (obligations) in that I have delighted myself solely in God - - HE is my rock, He is my refuge. I will never ask anyone for anything but through the power of the prayer to Him through the name of His Son Jesus, and in doing so, well, the giving has been set in motion hasn't it? Be still and know He alone will be the giver, and He alone can take away. The good news is, He will never tell one person one thing and another person the opposite thing - - that would NOT be God's way.  If it is to be, it is to be, and there is nothing more to do than to thank Him.  Be blessed and know that if you are being prayed for by someone who truly loves you and wants God to bless you - - you will be fine. You are already fine. You are more than fine, you are divinely covered. 

The power of prayer is one thing, but through the name of Jesus is a GREAT and powerful thing. 

Closet Christian. (I am one)

 Do NOT ask me to come out of my closet as a Christian, because I'm INSIDE my closet because I'm praying! When I say be a closet Christian, I really really mean it, I want you to be on your bum in the middle of your closet (I use a chair to sit on actually, which was a talk starter for my friend when she came over to help me clear out my closet of old clothes to donate.) BE IN THE CLOSET and on your knees if you feel more comfortable in that position, but however you may be seated, be in prayer! That's the place to do it, and there is scripture to back me up on this one too just so you know. If you don't have a closet to get into it's OK...God's OK if you go to the bathroom too. Just remember to close the door.

Matthew's account of the Gospel tells us in Chapter 6, verse 6 to go into the closet to pray, and when you go into the closet you are to shut the door. There must be a reason for that direction - - I looked it up further and the reason(s) seem to stem from Greek and Hebrew words that correlate to the word "close". The King James says this:  

"But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly."

Remember the other verses about praying in secret? There's the old tale in the Bible how the proud man stood in front of the window to pray every day so others would think he was pious and doing God's will, but the humbled man, who was ashamed of his personal sin, hid from the view of others, could hardly speak to God, and in fact, he beat himself in anguish because of his sin. That man's prayer was heard, not the prayer of the really proud man -- he received his "reward" having been seen by his peers as being a doer in the word. Aren't many Christians like that today? I mean, c'mon, we all want to be seen doing the right thing, wearing the right clothes, hanging with the right people, and you know -- being RIGHT!  God has another word for it - - it's not pious and it's not righteous when we do that, it's self-serving, it's pride, and it's sin!  Get yourself in that closet and close that door. If someone's looking for you just tell them you're going to pray a minute and ask them to leave you alone for a while; it's OK if they know what you're doing, they don't need to know what you're saying to God; that part is sacred and between the two of you only.

How do you start a prayer in a closet? How do you know God is there listening to you? Well, for me, I just start out being quiet and listening to my heart. Sometimes I know exactly what I'm about to say or ask, and other times I just feel the need to be there in that darker space, maybe with a cat or a dog, maybe just me and the hanging clothes and linens all around me. I start out with the simple things - - I thank God for being God. I thank God for being with me. I thank Him for His Son. I thank Him for my Guardian Angel Sam, (whose real name is Theonaphilus) and I think of a million things I could be without if it wasn't for God - - after that I start my confessions, telling God what I remember and what I hope to repent of, to give up, to try and better, to make amends, and then I go into the part where I need His help and I really would appreciate some direction in this or that matter. The Bible tells us if we ask for wisdom He will supply it in great amounts - - BE CAREFUL. Do not ask for patience....He gives that in great amounts too; and it's usually by putting you through the wringer so you'll rely on Him for literally everything - - if you want patience, you may want to ask for a BIT of patience, as God is truly in the business of absolutely providing your desires and needs.

One more thing before I go: God doesn't lie.  God can't lie. It's impossible for God to deceive, and it's 100% guaranteed, assured, and already set in every stone possible, that God will do exactly what He said He will do.  That being said, if you read Psalms 37:4 you'll find that God promises (covenants) you that if you delight in Him HE will give YOU the desires of your heart. He made a promise - - He will keep it. If you do your part, He does His part - - EVERY SINGLE TIME.  Be joyful, choose to delight in Him even if you think it's hopeless because you have that covenant and you can take that to your Heavenly Bank of Guarantees with Jesus. He will provide, He will answer, He will give you what you desire - - when you delight in HIM, not in yourself.

Back to the closet for one minute - - before you finish, before you open that door and walk out, be sure and leave your prayer right where you sat. God will keep it. You don't need to drag it around with you. He has it - - it's safe. KNOW that your prayers were heard, and are being answered. Sometimes God answers NO. Sometimes God answers YES.  Most of the time God will say "Wait"....and you should. Don't argue, don't get upset, don't wonder if it's a waste of time to go back into that closet and talk about it again; it isn't. God's will and His timing is perfect - - breathe!  Say Amen, open the door, and go about your day -- closets aren't gathering places, they are meant to be private for a reason. You've got this.

Spoiled American or Smarter Than the Average Bear?

 How many of you (go ahead and raise your hand if you knew this) KNEW that most homes in Scotland, and for that matter I'm told all of Europe, don't have electric dryers in the home? How many of you are now staring at the screen absolutely dumbstruck with a head shake saying "What? What do you mean there's no dryer? That's...that's..crazy, right?"  It is crazy - - for Americans anyway.  When I first found this to be true, late last year, I literally asked my Scottish friend if people in Scotland were incredibly poor and couldn't afford an electric dryer - - in which case I could start a Go Fund Me for an entire nation of deprived people, or was it something else entirely? Could it be that (GOD ONLY KNOWS WHY) the citizens of Scotland (and most of Europe) feel there is no need (shaking my head twice, but you can't see it) for anyone to own their own electric dryer. I keep saying electric dryer, but it could just as easily be a gas-heated dryer, they simply don't own dryers in the land of the Scots.  They hang their dampish wet clothes on "green lines" outside instead -- you know, like Great Grandmas used to do back in the ancient times.  Wait? Doesn't it RAIN in Scotland like....you know, all the time?

My friend, a very sweet, upper middle classed man (married, no kids, but has a mortgage, car and full time employment) went on to tell me that women there don't really consider it a chore or out of the question to hand hang the clothes on green lines, or even on these really (I gave a shriek when I saw it) handy-dandy dangling-from-a-cord lattice looking things that resemble a do-it-yourself 4-plank flat shelf that suspends by a cord like a blind suspends from a window. You see this is some homes, and when you do they are in the kitchen area usually where the washing machine is (Yes, I did say that the washing machines are in the kitchen, I know, you're still giggling over the green line, but stay with me, their washing machines are in the kitchen). Sometimes these laundry blinds (we can call them that) are in the hallways or in a utility room perhaps.  

For no reason whatsoever, my friend decided to challenge me to a Scottish laundry dual.  He said OK, my wife and I will do a load of laundry now, hand hang the clothes outside on the green line, you do your thing and we'll see what the difference is.  Couldn't he have just bet me a $100 and be done with it? I don't mind taking his money, really, I don't.  I accepted the challenge.  We set our clocks at 12:00 noon for the following day because his 12:00 noon and my 12:00 noon are 6 hours separate, but we wanted to be sure to have the same type of timing and he wanted the most optimal weather he could muster for his cause, I suppose. I wasn't the least bit worried regarding the outcome - - my dryer works 24/7 and in all sorts of weather. I would be lying if I said it stopped working during a tornado. The only time it would NOT work is during a power outage. We set our watches, said good night, and waited for the next day to arrive.

Noon arrived in Oklahoma City six full hours after it had arrived in Edinburgh, Scotland of course. By now my friend's laundry had been washed and hanging outside for around 5.5 hours, I'm certain. I started my load, pushed the button, pulled my clothes out 36 minutes later and stuck them in that magically wonderful heating apparatus we Americans take for granted 99% of the time. Today, I thanked my dryer just for being a dryer.  Less than 44 minutes later I retrieved my warm clothes, laid them on the bed, let the dogs lay all over them, and made the call to my Old Town music instructor who by the way, was just finishing his dinner dishes without a dishwasher because YOU GUESSED IT, they don't have one in their kitchen! I asked him if he had retrieved his clothes to which he said "most of them were dry" he had to leave a couple of towels out a bit longer, but they were in fact mostly dry. 

WHAT is the point of this story? He's a nutter and I'm apparently spoiled to the core according to him, his wife, his sister, his sister's kids, and the lady next door who just happened to speak to him over the fence line while he checked on the two towels. I'm the SPOILED AMERICAN, that's who I am. I want things given to me too; that's what I am perceived as anyway. I can't take a little hardship. I can't be a little inconvenienced. I am rotten, rotten, rotten - - OR AM I?  Maybe I'm just smarter than the average bear, and I want my dogs to enjoy the cozy warmth of fresh linens from the dryer. It could also be that I'm conditioned to being smarter than the average bear, and I like seeing my furniture and not draping wet underwear over the corners of chairs. I'm told his wife actually hangs up their underwear to dry so it's not seen - - OK, that's one point in their favor.  

How can we be so different in this matter? It makes me wonder if when I do move to Scotland if I give into their ways or bring my own and educate the youth of Mid Lothian so that soon their will be this uprising of children wanting American conveniences. I don't want to be fully responsible for that, so I'll likely just buy a dryer and keep it hidden in the closet. I may leave the green line outside instead of pulling it out the ground so as not to give away my position to the neighbors. I may even put the random load on the line just to seem as if I'm assimilating into their culture - - my dogs will know the truth, and with them my secret will be sacred.  

Dating is Dangerous

 If you don't know me you won't know that I'm single and very much planning on staying that way. I last dated someone in 1999, and even then it was a bit sketchy! The internet dating sites were all the rage at that time, and believe it or not I dabbled in it long enough to learn three things: people lie about their appearance, they lie about their past, and the most certainly lie about their issues which may or may not be a game changer for most sane would be suiters.  I can't tell you how many times I TOLD THE TRUTH about my age, my height, my weight, my body shape, the length of my hair, my likes and dislikes, my spiritual life (walk with Christ) and oh yes, I mentioned that I'd rather take a hike in the woods or up a mountain than on the sandy beaches; that's just me. I TOLD THE TRUTH -- I was the only one who did.

Time after time after time I would meet someone online, we'd talk, make arrangements to meet and do the whole "I'll-bring-a-friend-to-sit-in-the-corner-of-the-cafe-to-save-me-if-I-need-saving" thing, which worked in my favor more times than not.  I'd show up EXACTLY how I said I would be, and either at the pre-discussed table or coming through the door would be this fat, bald, frumpy dump of a soul who either had just combed over his last remaining scrap of hair, or he'd be tucking in the remnants of a shirt tail that just couldn't stay tucked due to the mass of belly punching through - - does that sound mean of me? It's not. I told the truth.  If a man didn't want to meet me after I told him my height, weight, bulk, etc., he had the choice, but GIVE ME THAT CHOICE TOO! I'm not perfect, but caring for yourself is important.  Oh there was this one guy that came to the cafe wearing silver and purple striped pants, a bright red velvet jacket, and a top hat! No, I'm NOT kidding you - - I smiled politely, excused myself after having waved at my friend, who was already standing up and walking toward me with her hand reaching into her purse for her little pea-shooter of a .22, and I simply said "I hope you have a blessed day, sir", before shaking my head and swearing off the sites forever. It only took 6-10 times of liar after liar after liar for me to get it through my head that this just wasn't the way I wanted to meet a man.  Eventually, I did it the old-fashioned way, my friend Nancy set me up with her co-worker Dennis.  It lasted until it didn't, and that was the last of my dating days. March 31, 1999.  

I decided at age 36 that I wasn't going to date again, I had kids to raise. I had an education to obtain, I had work. I simply didn't have time to devote to men; not that my last boyfriend wasn't the best of men, because he was. It just wasn't the time to be connected to anyone who wasn't immediate family. I made the right decision. He married and had kids, something I wasn't going to do for him. God blessed him, and I am forever thankful for that gift for him as well as for me; I can truly say I ended it on a great note, and we are still good friends in our hearts. 

If a man like Dennis was to suddenly find himself divorced in 2021 with three kids ages 14, 10, and 8 in tow, he would have such a difficult time trying to find someone who would both love him and love his kids.  He'd have to find one without kids if he expected to have time for his kids without having to blend families, put up with ex-spouses, grandparents, aunts, uncles, friends, church friends, work friends, anyone and everyone telling him that they saw her online with so-and-so, her social media may say she's in a solid relationship, but her tweets say otherwise, and boy oh boy, he'd have to run tests on her to be sure she wasn't one of the 18%  of singles who are carriers of sexually transmitted diseases these days too!  With the ever increasing means of hiding truths electronically these days, it's hard to know if someone really is working from home, if they're unemployed but saying they have a steady job, or if they are in debt up to their eyebrows just looking for someone to bail them out - - all the while trying to manage daycare, play-dates, shuffling custody situations, and that's IF they get along with their ex - - the list goes on and on and into an eternal horror show when you bring in step-mom, step-dad and those blended schedules that never seem to work out. NO THANK YOU -- I will stay single!

I can't even imagine being a single parent in 2021 - - maybe that's why so many miserable parents are staying married today - - you know, for the kids!  That's BS too because the kids are the ones who suffer the most from that arrangement. You should NEVER stay in a soured relationship for the kids. You shouldn't stay for money either - - but that's another blog. 

NOPE...looking back I know I made the right decision NEVER to date again. I had all the custody issues to deal with, but I didn't have to really bring in the chaos of another soul's life issues with his ex and his ex's ex...which happens more than you may think. If Dennis ever did find himself looking for a woman to love again, and if he asked me for advice I'd tell him to find an older woman who had kids, but doesn't have them now -- she would know how to care for him, for them, and would be more likely to understand the times...and boy howdy, these are indeed some crazy crazy times, aren't they?  THANK YOU JESUS, for giving me the insight to ask for celibacy.  It worked.

Noodlin' -- A Fishy Tale

Let's get one thing straight right off the bat, I'm from Oklahoma, and in Oklahoma we noodle for fish. Noodling, or as we say it here in the Southwest, "noodlin' " is a method of fishing without a pole, without anything really except your bare hands.  It's been legal at times, it's been banned, it's been ignored by the rangers for the most part, but to let you know the gist of how it's done it's simply this: you step about knee to thigh high in some of the muckiest dirtiest water you'll ever see on God's green Earth, and you plunge your arms into the muck about elbow deep searching for and feeling for those wigglin' catfish that tend to cover themselves with the muddy silt of the deeper wider rivers and the lakes in our fair state. When you find one you can try to wrap both hands around the slimy monster but the best way to catch a catfish if you're noodlin' is to cram your bare fisted hand down its throat, lift it up by its midsection, and call it done.  Cheaper on bait, but let me tell you, those boys have teeth! Best to wear gloves.  

Why am I telling you about the ins and outs of noodlin' anyway? Well, I like fish stories I guess. I'm a big fan of the time(s) Jesus took a few fish and broke them up to feed thousands of men, women, and children on the sides of the mounts in Israel. I also like to tell the story of how Jonah had his piss-poor fishing experience, and how my grandpa said Jonah learned really quickly that God has a plan for everyone and everything -- you see, the fish was sent to the very spot Jonah was cast out of the boat, and the FISH obeyed God when God sent it to a part of the world where those larger fish don't often go to -- the FISH obeyed God; let that sink in for a minute.  Jonah ended up doing exactly what God wanted him to do in the first place before he was swallowed by our gilly friend, but the FISH obeyed God the first time. I wonder what sort of reward the big guy received for being on target? Maybe it wasn't a fish at all. Maybe God sent an angel shaped like a whale - - we'll have to ask when we get to Heaven. 

Another fine fish story in the Bible is the one where Jesus tells the bad guys that He does in fact give to Caesar that which is Caesar's and that you should give to God that which is God's.  The Pharisees came up to Jesus claiming He was telling his followers to disobey Caesar and not to pay taxes properly. Jesus thought about it for a second and probably smiled before He sent someone to the lake (just over there) and told them to pick up the first fish -- I wonder if they noodled to get that done.  The fish was already prepared! The fish had at some point, and we don't know at what point, had swallowed a simple coin, but the coin was dropped in the water at some past point, and the fish was curious about it and tried to eat it only to find out that it wouldn't go down his throat - - it was stuck in his mouth. I say "his" but it could have been a girl fish; we don't know. We do know that Jesus KNEW the fish! He knew the EXACT fish to send directly to the disciple He had sent to the water to fetch the first fish found. This was the first fish found - - and in that fish's mouth was a coin, a certain coin, a coin that was large enough or valued enough to pay all of the tax Jesus owed or may have owed. HOW DID JESUS KNOW?   

Here's the point I like to make when I tell people about Jesus and all He's done for me; just relax and let Him have every last care you may think you have. He prepared the fish! He prepared the guy or gal that dropped the coin in the first place! He KNEW it was going to happen, when it was going to happen, that it was going to happen, and then He knew the Pharisees would come up asking about taxes, and He knew He could send a random disciple to the lake to pick up the first fish he found! C'mon, Jesus has organizational skills that are literally out of this world. We cannot out think or out do God. Let Him have your every single teeny tiny care -- and obviously the big cares, that goes without saying.   

Whatcha gonna do with all that spare time you have after you stop worrying?  I don't know, go fish I guess!  Wear gloves. 

Ode de'Manure

 OMG...I am not kidding; if someone would be wise enough to create a manure scented candle I would buy it! I say that, and I mean that but it would need to be a horse manure scent, not a cow patty, and it would also have to have either good alfalfa added to the mix and/or some good 14% protein pellet scents as well. I would buy a dozen candles and keep my house smelling like a barn year around. If you think I'm kidding, you don't know me. If you know me, and you think you don't want to come to visit me if my house smells like a barn, I'm pretty sure you and I are not really that close.  I love my barn.

Toby Keith (good Oklahoma boy) wrote a song about loving his bar, but I could write a song (and may just do that now that I'm thinking about it) about loving my barn.  You can't beat a good barn. You can go by yourself, you can take friends and family. You can stay all day, you can hang out for a few hours. I will say this; I don't think I've ever gone to the barn and left only a few minutes after arriving. You really can't do that even if you're just dropping off feed, hay, tack, or meds. You (I) have to go through the barn, visit every last occupied stall, kiss every last horse, pony, donkey, pig, cow, whatever happens, to be in the barn. I have to find the cats, make sure they're fed. I usually try to locate a dog or two; depending on whether the owner's dogs are out or if some other boarder has brought their hounds. You just (I just) can't leave a barn in under an hour - - it's not happening.

Some of the more interesting things that take place at the barn can't really be recorded in writing otherwise we'd all be in trouble, but we can report that we have poop parties where we dig our arms in elbow high once the manure is on the trailer, and we toss around a few pounds of good healthy horse poop. It's sort of like dodge ball, but not really - - I mean, you dodge obviously, and there is screaming involved....lots of screaming usually.  Did I mention we have a really good time at the barn?   Since our barn is open to us 24/7 we've been known to show up in the middle of the night and have a cookout. We've had pajama parties, nothing inappropriate mind you.  We've had Pyrate Nite at the barn, and we'll do that again. There is of course horseback riding going on, but not usually in the middle of the night as the horses are cognitive of what time it is and they give you that "FACE" that lets you know it's not a good time....come back after the roosters crow! Come back AFTER breakfast.

Most of the time the barn is a sanctuary where we can breathe in good hearty air full of rustic wood chips, stinky mounds of poop, horse sweat, grain, and the occasional dead rodent or possum that got stuck between the walls. (This may surprise you, but I do know the distinct difference in the smell(s) of a dead raccoon vs a dead possum.) Most of the time you can count on friends showing up or already being there when you arrive, and there's someone to go riding with. If you don't feel like riding if your horse doesn't feel like being ridden, or if the weather just isn't cooperating, you can still groom the animals, clean the stalls, rake the arena, mend something that somehow came undone, and you can ALWAYS find something that needs attention at a barn...even if it's just the cats. Attention will be paid.

Yeah, give me the barn. Give me the smell. Give me the sweaty back of a rugged stead every day, call it heaven.  Nothing -- and I do mean NOTHING smells like a horse.  Prove me wrong.