Caroling to the Alpaca Lady--Who Works with Suicide Prevention

Christmas can be the happiest season of the year--or the saddest.

Hundreds of people, especially familes with children, lined the streets in Calhan during the Calhan Christmas parade a couple weeks ago. Tired of the lockdowns and mandates and masks, they stood out in the fresh air, spread out along one town block after another, waiting for the next lit up float.  Our friends drove a tractor and wagon with lights and Christmas music,  inviting me to jump on when they passed Jonathan, Danny, and me watching on the sidewalk.

I jumped on!

We waved to people and told them all, "Merry Christmas!"

'Cause in hometown Calhan you can do that without getting into trouble. 

And Rose followed right behind on her horse, complete with battery-run, multi-colored lights and a band of bells. Her horse did a super job of not getting spooked but letting people pet her. 

Kids loved that horse. 

Rose rode that same horse last night when we went caroling with two sets of friends--a home school family, and a couple from church who had first had supper with us. 

Borsch and cornmeal muffins.

And then we went caroling in the cool dark--getting our boots powdery with dust instead of snow since it's been so dry lately.

Not everyone is blessed to be as happy as we this Christmas. Some have lost a wife, a son, a spouse, a sibling, or have this year gone through a bitter divorce. 

Some are thinking of ending it all.

When we arrived at a neighbor down on the next circle to carol to her, she was just parking her pickup near the barn, getting ready to unload hay and feed for her alpacas. 

Those bales of hay were heavy, as were the feed sacks, and so was her heart, we found out afterward.

There we were, piling out of our vehicles and starting to sing "Away in a Manger" near that barn with all its mangers.

And then "The First Noel."

And the lady stood in the dark, asking us to please sing another one.

So we sang, "O Little Town of Bethlehem," and we watched the lady sing with us under her knitted cap, under the starry sky. 

Our boys and the other boys jumped onto the back of her truck and promptly unloaded those bales of hay. They took in the feed sacks as well, probably the funnest part of their evening!

And then we heard what was on the "alpaca lady's" heart.

She works on a Suicide Prevention Phone line for the Veterans Administration, and last night she had a really tough call. She was dreading being on call again tonight.

Christmas time is really bad for many vets, and some just want to end it all. 

"I was dreading this night," the alpaca lady told us. "And then you came and sang, and my whole evening changed."

We pray some wounded, worn out, and weary vet's evening and Christmas will also be changed. 

Beside their weary road, may they hear the angels sing!

She Had Waited All Week to See Baby Jesus

 Pastor Durr's wife babysits a little girl, whom she tells about Jesus. Last week, several of our family helped with a live nativity in front of the little log church in Elizabeth, and this little girl's family came.

"She has been waiting all week to see Baby Jesus!" Kayla explained, as she brought the little girl to the manger. 

 All week, she had been waiting to see "Baby Jesus" and His mommy and daddy--Mary and Joseph--played by Sam and Carrie that particular evening.

It's been a busy Christmas season, and now it's almost over. Tomorrow is Christmas already.  

Have we been waiting all week to see Jesus?

I don't know how to best keep Christ the center of Christmas, but every year, we make the effort.

And long past bedtime Christmas Eve, I was washing dishes and setting the table for breakfast--with the names of Jesus printed onto little wooden circles that Danny had sawed and wrapped for me. 

For our devotional after breakfast, each one around the table is to choose his favorite name of Jesus and read the verse containing it.

I hope it will remind us that Jesus is our everything--from being our Savior to the Good Shepherd, to our Redeemer, to our Counselor.

Like that little girl, have we waited all week to see Jesus?

I hope these little homemade ornaments scattered along the center of the Christmas breakfast table will help us to see Him.

He is everything we need!

"And the Mother of Jesus Was There"

 Yesterday I sat down to read in John 2 where I am in my devotions. (I decided to take a break from Ezekiel during this Christmas season!)

And I couldn't get past the first verse. "On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there."

It was not the wedding that drew my attention, or the place called Cana of Galilee, although songs have been written about Galilee, sweet Galilee, such as the one my sister Dorcas and I used to sing together as a duet--"Blue Galilee, Sweet Galilee, where Jesus loved so much to be." No, it wasn't about Galilee, however sweet and blue that sea was, which often threw itself into nasty fits during storms. 

It wasn't even about Jesus' mother--even though many Christmas songs include her, sung by Christmas carolers like the ones that went out recently to sing to shut ins, as if she wore some invisible golden halo.

It was the simple word "there" that stood out to me. 

Julie Griffiths, an old friend of Jonathan's, who just lost both her mother and father this last year, wrote to us all the way from England where she lives now with her husband. She wrote after Jonathan's mother died, and what she said resonated with Jonathan and me as much as any card resonated,

  when she said, "The loss of a mother leaves a big hole in your life--all that wisdom, love, goodies, and general 'thereness' is now gone..."

"Love, goodies, and general 'thereness.'"

         It couldn't have been stated better. One of the biggest things about good moms is the 'thereness.' 

The mother of Jesus submitted to God's will when the angel announced the virgin birth. Later after the shepherds came to the manger, Mary "kept all these things and pondered them in her heart."  But here is another aspect of Mary's motherhood that I hadn't thought of before.

                                                                   Mary was there.

She was not off where she shouldn't have been; she wasn't out in the wilderness like John the Baptist eating locust and wild honey and then preaching repentance and laying the Pharisees out for their hypocrisies. That was okay and right for John, the rugged evangelist. But not for Mary.

She was not out tending the sheep like the shepherds, hoping to see angels again. That was okay for the shepherds, but not for Mary. 

She was not working at Herod's palace like the servants. That was okay for those girls, but not for Mary. 

She was not traveling from the east on camels bringing rich gifts to Christ. That was okay for the wise men but not for Mary.

She was not even praying in the temple, however spiritual that was. 

That was the right thing for Simon and Anna, old saints who thus served God, but not for Mary.

Mary could have run off and done a myriad of other good and right things. But those were not the things for her to do or the places for her to be. Mary was simply there.

Right where she should have been in the moment. At a special event. With her friends, relatives, and Son. 

This Christmas season, we mothers have an awesome privilege of simply being "there" for our family. Not running off trying to collect more expensive gadgets we don't even need; not so distracted with "much serving" that we cannot be "there." Not hiding in a corner somewhere complaining about the grumpy great uncle and aunt we can't stand but whom we feel obligated to have for Christmas dinner; not surfing for hours on our phone and spacing out about our family.

But truly being "there," a mom with love, goodies, and "thereness." Thank you, Julie, our friend in England now, for this special thought!

Gasoline in the Diesel Tank--and What a Christmas Gift!

                                             Yeah, we got this call just at the end of supper.  

 

Rose, Timmy, and Danny were on their way home from their second trip to town to gather up logs and parts of logs from all over town where the storm had laid down trees. 

They had taken Jonathan's truck and dump trailer, and stopped to fill the empty tank. 

And Timmy accidentally put gasoline in the diesel fuel tank! 

We heard Jonathan groan, "TIMMY!" over the phone, and we knew something bad had happened. We were all watching and listening and trying to hear what Timmy was saying. We thought it was an accident. Thankfully Timmy realized what he had done before starting the engine. Anyway, Jonathan had to decide what to do.

"Just sit!" he commanded Timmy. No starting of the engine!

We really didn't need the Christmas gift of a ruined truck engine!

I offered to put on my duds and go out to collect several gas cans from outside to put in the back of the van for Timmy and Jonathan to siphon gas into, and Jonathan left to go buy a siphon hose at Home Depot. The truck was about 40 minutes away.

It was a disappointing way to finish a good day, but we were thankful it wasn't worse. Timmy hadn't started the engine. It hadn't been an accident. The children had been doing a good and profitable thing--gathering up logs to turn into firewood. And Jonathan didn't get mad. I don't know how he stays so almost perfectly calm. My head would have been circling like eagles over the Missouri possum Crystal almost hit on her way home. I'd have been pulling my last few hairs out.

Not Jonathan! He sits there and tries to think what kind of hose, and where to buy a siphon, and whether Sam can take time off since he's on call at the fire station, and stuff like that. Never once raising his voice or gasping around or rolling his eyes or getting upset.  

After a few hours, they all came pulling in.

They had siphoned 35 gallons of gasoline out; the truck started just fine and ran just fine. 

But the best Christmas gift Tim could have this season is patience and forgiveness from the dad whose truck he almost ruined!

Terrible Wind Devastates Areas of Colorado Springs

Jonathan called me today and said we don't need to go to Kentucky to help clean up after a tornado. We have our own!

 

Jonathan said the interstate was shut down because of semi trucks blown over.

Here is one Danny and I saw when we were taking chain saws in for Jonathan.

 

 (Danny counted 10 blown over within a few miles later in the day.) 

Trees were down all over the place. 

Jonathan said it looked like a war zone when had to go check out a downed tree at a cottage his crew had worked on.

 

 It had fallen on the electric wire, but the electricity was off, so Jonathan and Danny and later Sam got that tree cut  down and taken care of. 

 Some of the roofing felt from the roof Jonathan's guys had been working on got tangled in the transformer.  

Meanwhile I had taken chain saws to town for Jonathan, 

 and met him at Lowes parking lot which looked like this, with metal sheds completely demolished.

 I had also taken food for supper at his dad's, but hadn't been able to reach him by phone. And I arrived at his drive only to discover that Dad Lucas's house was dark as midnight. "He must be gone," I thought, until I looked around and realized the other houses were dark, too! Dad L. came cautiously to the door, wondering who I was! There was no electricity to bake the supper I'd taken in, and neither could Grandpa drive anywhere because the garage door opener wouldn't work, and he can't open the garage by himself anymore. His fences were blown down, his decorative windmill was blown over, and dead branches and twigs were down. 

(This is just a picture of another tree down on the street where Jonathan was.)

So I took Dad L. a few blocks away to Esther's house (his daughter), nearly running into a huge fir tree just around the corner from Daddy's house. It was nearly all the way across the road. Thankfully I was able to go up on the sidewalk and get around it, but then a few blocks later, in the pitch dark, suddenly there was a person just sitting on his motor bike on the side of the road. Especially after hearing about the break-in on Jonathan's job site down south of town last night, where the person(s) scraped up the brand new vinyl flooring trying to drag the new fridge out and not being able to get it out any door, I was so unnerved that poor Dad L. probably wished he were driving as he kept telling me which way to go. There were seven turns between his place and Esther's not far away. The electricity was off at her house, too, and Daddy L.  heard it would not be on till morning. Jonathan saw the huge poles broken like matchsticks further away, which held the wires for all that section of town.

Jonathan's brother Rob had a huge ponderosa snap into three at his place, part of which landed on the neighbor's roof. Jonathan was going to go over to help but the neighbor was scared of just anyone doing it, and wanted professionals to come. So okay, that's less for Jonathan to deal with.

Our friends in Black Forest had a tree blow over. They said in town and at construction sites, portajohns were blown over everywhere. Walls they were trying to put up today blew down. A piece of metal roofing blew into one man's windshield and he got cut from the glass.

Winds of 107 mph were registered near Monument.

So many accidents, besides. On their way home, Jonathan and Danny saw jaws of life trying to rescue a driver from a bad accident on a rural road.

The "Sensible Christmas" Skit

Yesterday our family was scheduled to sing and play for an assisted living apartment complex in town. When we arrived, the activity center where we were to be was beautifully decorated.

The three girls played most of the Christmas carols. I sang with one of them, the Christmas version of "Hallelujah."

 We had decided to do a little reading and skit like we did two years ago. That time we had done the story of the "Tumbleweed Christmas." 

We had found the biggest tumbleweed we could find to be the Christmas tree in the story.

 This year, I had opened up my book, The Guideposts Christmas Treasury, and the first story I read somewhere near the front was the one I picked--"The Year We Had a Sensible Christmas." No need to look for a better story!

Carrie read of how for as long as the author remembered, his family had talked about having a "sensible" Christmas without all the fuss and bother. (and could I ever relate after a very busy afternoon of getting ready after having company for Sunday dinner and  packing up extra food to take to Grandpa in town after the program. I was going pretty crazy!

 Mom in the story would come limping home from shopping or sink into a chair after hours of baking. (Note apron!)

 "Next year we're going to have a sensible Christmas!" she would gasp.

And the children lived in dread the parents would actually follow through.

Until it happened.

But there was one thing Henry and his sister Lizzie did wish would change. 

 

And that was Uncle Lloyd and Aunt Amelia.

"Many a time Lizzie and I wondered why families had to have relatives, and especially why it was our fate to inherit Uncle Lloyd and Aunt Amelia. They were a sour and formal pair who came to us every Christmas, bringing Lizzie and me handkerchiefs as gifts and expecting in return silence, respect, service, and for me to surrender my bedroom."

If only those two could be deleted from the Christmas story, they would be happy. 

But Great Uncle and Aunt were as much a part of Christmas "as mistletoe."

 

 And then one year it happened. After Henry went to college, Mom came up with the brilliant idea that this year would be the year to have a "sensible Christmas." They would not exhaust themselves with "all the folderol," she wrote Henry. And besides, Dad added, they would not spend more than one dollar for gifts for each other. "For once," he said, "we'll worry about the thought behind the gifts, and not about its price."

Both Mom and Dad agreed with Henry's suggestion that Christmas be limited to just the four of them. Mom wrote a gracious letter to the great uncle and aunt explaining that the family was not doing much for Christmas this year and therefore great uncle and aunt might prefer not to make the great effort to come. Dad added a nice check to the card. 

And voila! No great uncle and aunt to deal with this time!

The tree was small that year, but everyone thought their one-dollar gifts were enormously clever. They enjoyed a meal at Dempsey where Mom didn't have to bake a turkey or pies or any such thing. The only awkward moment was when they weren't quite sure whether to hold hands around the table as they did at home, but in short order, they got over that, and then "in unison we refused to be intimidated by a public eating place and held hands and said grace."

 

Everyone had time to sit around and rest and read.  

And discuss Mom's missing fruit cake which Lizzie un-diplomatically declared she did not like anyway.

"But Aunt Amelia adored it," Mom remembered. "And so did Mrs. Donegan down the street," who hadn't gotten her Christmas gift this year.

Dad (whose part was played by  Danny) fell asleep behind the newspaper, snoring loudly,

much to the amusement of the rest of the family.

But when Henry went to the refrigerator to pick at the leftover turkey, only to discover none, that did it.

Mom burst into tears. 

 "This terrible, dreadful, sensible Christmas!" was all she could say.

"Our Christmas had been as artificial as that Christmas tree; at some point the spirit of the day had just quietly crept away from us. In our efforts at common sense we had lost the reason for Christmas and had forgotten about others; this denied Him whose birthday it was all about."

 

"Mom feels," Lizzie wrote Henry later when he was back at college, "that the strains and stresses are the birth pangs of Christmas..I'm certain that it is out of our efforts and tiredness and turmoil that some sudden, quiet, shining, priceless thing occurs."

 

 The next Christmas the family poured heart and soul into their celebration.

Uncle Lloyd and Aunt Amelia came to join them, almost merry this time, as well!

But it was when they joined hands around the table that Henry realized something he never noticed before. 

Aunt Amelia's hand he was holding was cold. And gnarled.

Years of agonizing arthritis had twisted them. 

Yet as usual, there had been the gift of handkerchiefs, painstakingly embroidered by those very gnarled hands! 

Those handkerchiefs--Aunt Amelia's gift of love for them!