(My church is publishing their own small group material which includes short devotionals from congregants.  I was asked to write a reflection on the topic ‘who is in control.’  This reflects a personal experience from my grad school days.)

Psalm 55:16-17, 22 – But I call to God, and the Lord saves me.  Evening, morning and noon I cry out in distress, and he hears my voice…Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous fall. 

I was 30,000 feet in the air, boxed into an airplane window-seat, when I had the first panic attack of my life.  Suddenly, my heart started pounding against my chest, my feet and hands went numb and I felt faint.  I thought I was having a heart attack.  My mind was screaming to call the flight attendant and ask for a doctor or an emergency landing.  I was so desperate to get to solid ground that I even thought about opening a door and jumping out of the plane.  I was trapped in that plane, frozen to my seat with fear, for the next three hours.  Never had I felt so out of control.  

My life had been spiraling downward for months, ever since I began experiencing persistent nausea, dizziness and fatigue.  I went to my doctor several times as my symptoms increased.  She thought I was depressed, but I knew there was something physically wrong with me.  My symptoms grew worse until I struggled with debilitating vertigo.  My anxiety over my health eventually led a series of panic attacks spread over several months.    

Being constantly sick, helpless and fearing the unknown – possibly death – left me emotionally drained.  I knew everyday that I had no control over my life.  There was nothing I could do but follow the example of Psalm 55 and call out to God.  Curled up in bed each night, I would recite Psalm 23:4 over and over, “even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.”  I clung to the promise of Psalm 121, “my help comes from the Lord.”  Speaking and praying the goodness and promises of God sustained me while I waited for help, which God provided through a new and attentive doctor.  Physically healing, I learned how to diffuse my anxiety and avoid panic.  When I look back at that time of helplessness, I rejoice in both my return to health and the proof that God – the only one who is in control – is my salvation in every circumstance.

Challenge for today:  Get a piece of paper and your Bible.  Label the paper He Will Sustain Me.  Look through your Bible and record references for passages and verses that will sustain you through difficulty.  Look for the promises God makes to his people.  Write down examples of God’s good character.  Fold it up and keep it in your Bible.  Next time you are worried, pull out your list and pray the promises of God.

At my last work place, I always dreaded the holidays.  The students were anticipating finals, some by partying and others by stressing.  Chaos ensued.  As a Residence Director I had to oversee the closing process for two buildings and nearly 400 students leaving over 5 days.  It was stressful but manageable.  What was overwhelming was juggling all the Christmas parties packed in to the final two weeks.  I had a party with my student staff, a coworker party, a student staff department party, a professional department party, an all employee brunch, the President’s open house, a Scandinavian friends gathering and a celebration at church.  Added to managing gift expectations for various parties, friends and family, I ended up dreading what had been my favorite holiday season. 

I’ve learned a lot about how to manage my life during the holidays.  The desire for sanity coupled with a lean budget has led me to simplify over the years.  Now I enjoy the Christmas season because I take a different approach.  There are hundreds of ways to simplify your life at Christmas time.  Here are a few that have worked for me.

1. Party-wise, Less is More  – If you’ve been overwhelmed with party invitations, give yourself the gift of choice.  You don’t have to go to  every party you have been invited to.  An invitation, in the truest sense of the word, is not an obligation.  Think about how many parties you will have the time, energy and budget for, then accept only that many invitations.  If you are afraid of offending someone whose party you will not attend, send them a personal card thanking them for the invitation, tell them you can’t make it and include a few sincere words about how you have appreciated them this year.  Limiting your parties will help you fully enjoy the parties you do attend.  If you do, then you’ll be positive, cheerful and energetic, making your presence a gift to your host, rather than grumpy, begrudging and resigned.  No one wants Scrooge at their party.
2. Paperless cards and letters – I enjoy sending a yearly postcard during the holidays.  This year, I don’t have the money to spend on production and postage so I’m sending it electronically.  It’s easy to create holiday newsletters and cards on various computer programs like Word or Publisher.  You can personalize them with your own messages and pictures.  Then you simply PDF the finished product and email them to your friends and family.  Viola!  If you don’t have the time to make it too personal but still want to send a card, sites like Hallmark.com have all kinds of e-cards which you can sign your name to and send to multiple addresses.  At Hallmark, a single card will cost you 99 cents or you can purchase a subscription for $9.99 and send unlimited e-cards for a year!  Paperless greetings can seem impersonal, but you save money and trees.
3. Limit your gifts – If you just can’t celebrate without spending money, then simplify by limiting the amount of gifts and/or money you spend for each person.  As a child, it was never the number of gifts that made my holiday so special, it was the thoughtfulness of a single, well-chosen gift.  Demonstrate your love by giving a gift that may not be expensive or exactly what they’ve asked for, but something that shows you thought carefully about who they are and why you value them.  Getting what you want will feel good for a limited time.  Getting something meaningful will be a gift you remember for years.  One of the best gifts I ever received was a small glass jar filled tiny mustard seeds and a card with encouraging personal messages.  My friend spent little money on the gift but the spiritual significance and personal meaning has given me joy for the past seven years.
4. Low budget gifts – Handmade gifts are a great way to personalize your holiday giving.  Since I like to bake, and do it well, I often make recipes my gift.  I either give out cards with some of my favorite recipes, or I give mason jars artfully filled with dry dessert ingredients and attach a recipe card.  One year I spent hours making beautiful quilted ornaments to grace other people’s trees – one friend emails me ever Christmas when she puts it on her tree.  If you can knit or cook or draw, paint, whittle, build or sew, then consider making your gifts.  It’s usually much cheaper and more meaningful than purchasing a mass-produced commercial gift from a box store.  If you lack hand-skills, then gift an activity, event, or act of service.  Plan a date filled with fun and thoughtful things to do.  Create a day or few hours of quality time that is extra special. 
5. No budget gifts – I don’t have money to spend this Christmas so I’m trying to be extra thoughtful and creative.  For my nieces, who are obsessed with princesses, I am writing fairy tales starring each of them.  The adults in my life will receive a card or email or spoken words of affirmation.  I will tell them why I love them, how they are significant to me, and share my wishes and prayer for them in the coming year.  Words are powerful and free; they make great gifts.  When was the last time that you shared your heart with someone you love, speaking directly to their significance in your life?  It’s one thing to say “I love you.”  It’s another to gather significant examples of your love for another and speak them in person.  In our technology-focused, consumeristic culture, we’ve wooed away from the personal, the vulnerable, the intimate face to face sharing of life.  Here’s a challenge to love freely this Christmas.  Really look at the people you love.  Reflect on how they enrich your life.  Be present to them.  Open your heart and give verbal or written gifts of thankfulness and appreciation.  These are the things that will delight both giver and receiver.

In a recent phone conversation with my brother Brandon, I mentioned that I’m not spending money this Christmas.  Generally, I’m not a big spender.  When you make as little money as I have in the past, the only way to survive is to spend less.  Now, out of work and living off savings for the last eight months, I don’t spend money as a rule.   It’s just not wise.  So I keep a little petty cash in my wallet and only pull it out for things I really need.  I have a credit card and a debit card, but they stay neatly tucked away.  I’ve been practicing this for months; it’s not very hard – anymore. 

Brandon congratulated me on my lack of spending.  He says I should write a book about it, (something he encourages me to do often), but I’m not sure I could write a book’s worth on the subject.  Still, the economy stinks, the holidays are here and we Americans aren’t exactly known for our frugal ways during the holidays, so I think I could write a few helpful suggestions in two parts.  First, I’ll pass along my hints on how to spend less in general.  Later this week I’ll pass on some good ideas on how to give great Christmas gifts, without spending too much money.  Hopefully these ideas can help you have a spendless Christmas or a more bountiful life.

How to tighten your purse strings without a painful pinch!

1. Save first – Several years ago I realized that I wouldn’t save money if I didn’t save money.  What I mean by that is, if I didn’t save a portion of my paycheck automatically, I would have little left to save at the end of the month.  Concerned with this personal trend, I hightailed it to the bank to set up an automatic transfer from checking to savings each time I received a pay check.  That move saved me thousands of dollars a year (even on a meager salary), which has been my bread and butter these last eight months.
2. Stay connected to your bank account – If you can, get on-line access to your bank account so you visually see your spending as you spend.  If you watch your spending numbers go up while your income stays the same (or for many of us, decreases), you should feel unnerved, concerned or even sick to your stomach.  Your conscience should give you a kick toward curbing your spending.  If not, it’s time to ask for accountability.
3. Shop carefully – One, short sentence trained me to be a conscientious consumer – “Do I need this?”  I walk around the store with the desired items in my cart.  Then I take an extra lap around the store staring at each of the items and ask myself, “Do I need this XYZ?”  I ask this about each of the items and then return the ones I don’t need before I get to the checkout lanes.  Like any other human being, I occasionally splurge but I limit unplanned purchases to under $20.  (When I’m unemployed I don’t make unplanned, unnecessary purchases.)  If you don’t trust yourself to follow through, then take along a friend who knows your new rules and can help you make good choices.
4. Don’t shop – There is no better way to spend less than to avoid temptation.  Typically, I do not sit around and think about all the things I want but don’t have.  Getting to that good place, I think, is a result of limiting my visual encounters with things.  I haven’t been to a mall in months.  When I watch TV, I either fast-forward through the commercials or mute them and read a few pages of a book.  I don’t cruise on-line retail sites and the only stores I visit are the post office and the grocery store.  When I limit my exposure to things, I just don’t crave them as much. 
5. Explore cheaper or free alternatives to what you want – Ever heard of a library?  I promise you, they are not as archaic as they sound.  In fact, they are accessible, offer a ton of events, programs resources and have things we all enjoy like newspapers, magazines, books, CDs and DVDs.  All for free!  I love books and reading.  If I could survive off the written word alone, I would.  But the fact is I can’t afford to buy a copy of every book I’m interested in, so I go the library.  This means I have to wait for books that are well-known, but in the meantime I discover new authors and subjects and styles.  I’m saving money and expanding my brain.  Whatever it is you can’t live without, use your imagination and think of ways you can get them cheaper or free. 
6. Give away your money – If you have a steady income but feel caught in the saber-toothed trap of consumerism, a great way to change your habits is to give your money away.  A common practice for Christians is giving 10% of our income to a need or an important cause as an act of thankfulness to God for being our ultimate and real provider.  I’ve given to homeless shelters, women’s domestic violence shelters, relief workers and organizations, to local churches, charities and to people in need.  When I give, it’s a physical act of opening my hands to the world around me and a symbolic act of acknowledging people and things that are more important that my needs or desires.  Giving money to something good is rewarding because it keeps my life in perspective.  So I tithe, then save, then spend on my needs and then spend a limited amount on my wants.  This way I remain healthy, satisfied and debt-free, even while I’m unemployed.

I’ve been job searching for 13 months.

I’ve been unemployed for 8 months. 

I’ve applied to over 50 jobs nationwide. 

Less than 15 of these potential employers have contacted me in any way.

Most employers want you to send your resume and cover letter by email.  They request that you do not call with inquiries but they never email you to confirm that they received your materials. 

One of the few rejection letters I received told me I was 1 of 2,000 applicants. 

(I estimate that postage for the rejection letters cost this particular church more than 900 dollars.) 

I’ve interviewed with 4 potential ministries. 

I made the top 5 in a national search, but did not get a second interview.

I made the top 2 after a second interview in a local search, but did not get the job.

I made the top 5 of 170 applicants nationwide, had three interviews, but did not reach the top 2.

I’m in the middle of an interview process for a job I am overqualified for and am not sure I want.  The interviewers said they were very impressed with me but I know better than to assume I will get an offer.

After every interview, my contacts tell me how gifted I am.  They are very affirming and say they are impressed with my skills and strengths.  Then they say that they are going with a candidate that has more experience. 

Today, there are over 15 million unemployed Americans.  I am just 1 of them.  My brother’s job contract, which was supposed to extend till the new year, was terminated a week before Thanksgiving.  He has 4 children to support.  Unexpectedly, my father was laid off last Wednesday, just 4 months after his company paid to move him from Ohio to Arizona. 

Unemployment doesn’t make any sense.  I stopped trying to make sense of this mess months ago.  I imagine that most cases of unemployment today are not personal but are a reflection of our abysmal economy.  But when you spend countless hours job searching, reworking your resume, writing good cover letters, networking and interviewing, only to receive rejections (or, even worse, silence), unemployment feels personal.  It can make confident people doubt their abilities, wise people question their decisions, joyful people deflated.  Even people with a great sense of direction end up lost, circling an endless, crowded cul-da-sac.  All that doubt and frustration and disappointment is difficult to deal with. I’ve been there. 

My experience has increased my empathy for the millions of unemployed people in our nation and our world.  It’s led me to pray.  (See my recent post, Prayer for the Unemployed.)  My imagination has been engaged.  As bad at this is, I think that things could be much, much worse.  I could have no money, but I have a little.  I could be hungry, but I have food.  I could be homeless, but I’ve been welcomed in.  I could be alone, but I have many supportive friends.  I could be hopeless, but I clutch the belief that good will come.  I could despair, but I choose to sing.    

Please join me in supporting the unemployed.  In any way that you can – help.  Look to your right and your left.  Your brother or sister, your own neighbor is in need.  Offer shelter, donate food, give encouragement, listen well, pray unceasingly, sing loudly.

“Walking, stumbling on these shadowfeet
towards home, a land that I’ve never seen
I am changing; less and less asleep
made of different stuff than when I began
And I’ve sensed it all along
fast approaching is the day

when the world has fallen out from under me
I’ll be found in you, still standing
When the sky rolls up and the mountains fall on their knees
when time and space are through
I’ll be found in you

There’s distraction buzzing in my head
saying in the shadows it’s easier to stay
but I’ve heard rumours of true reality
whispers of a well-lit way

when the world has fallen out from under me
I’ll be found in you, still standing
When the sky rolls up and the mountains fall on their knees
when time and space are through
I’ll be found in you”

lyrics from Brooke Fraser’s “Shadowfeet”

I’ve been laying in bed for three hours, wide awake.  I knew this would happen, even predicted to my parents several hours ago, recalling the two cups of coffee and two diet Pepsis I drank today.  My caffeine consumption is a fraction of the average person’s and though I usually avoid the stuff or, at least, limit my intake, today I was indulgent at breakfast and careless at dinner.  So here I am at two am, glasses on, at the computer in the kitchen, the occasional sound of passing cars through the open window and my fingers padding the keys the only sounds in the house.  

In those three hours of laying in bed my mind circled through the current events of my life – my day, a recent job interview, a self-reminder to call and check on the IRA rollover paperwork that I should have received in the mail weeks ago.  Current events exhausted, the fan spinning round and round above me pushing cool air onto my cheeks, I turned my alert mind to all the friends I am missing, especially those in Pennsylvania.  I smiled in the darkness, my toes flexing with excitement, knowing that in little more than a week I will be on a plane east to visit these friends I miss so keenly.  Soon I’ll spend four days with Karen and her kids and celebrate her birthday on her birthday!  Then I’ll visit former students of mine in Philly, then to Harrisburg for more reunions with students and coworkers and dear friends.  I’ll drink far too much coffee because it goes hand in hand with all the good conversations I will have.  I’ll give and receive a hundred hugs and laugh loudly.  It will be nice to be there and to be happy at the same time because I was so miserable when I left. 

Anticipation of my trip led me to pray.  I had to say ‘thank you’ for the frequent flyer miles and rich relationships that have been gifted to me.  After I prayed, I thought about the fact that most of my prayer happens at night before I sleep.  When I was a child, my father used to tuck me in every night.  I’d wait under the covers and he would come sit on the edge of my bed and he would ask, “who’s going first?”  Sometimes he’d start, other times I would, but we both always prayed.  I learned to pattern my prayers after his…”Dear heavenly father, thank you for today, thank you for…”  Then dad would say goodnight and leave quietly and I would lay there and often start praying again.  It was more of a conversation really, speaking my long thoughts and passionate feelings out into the quietness of my bedroom, knowing that the most important listening from the most important listener was happening. 

Tonight I remembered that when I was about 10 years old, I started hearing this strange noise in my room before I would fall asleep.  It was a muffled scratching noise, maybe like bits of styrofoam shuffling together in a cardboard box.  I lived with that noise a long time, trying to puzzle it out.  I’d get up, turn on the lights and walk the rectangle of my room, investigating.  Finding nothing, I’d lay back down and try to sleep.  Sometimes I’d go get my dad so he could hear the sound, but it took a few times for me to convince him I wasn’t making it all up and then a few more times for him to hear it too.  For months I studied that sound and later determined it was not scratching, it was munching, like a child taking the first two or three bites of freshly poured cereal just splashed with cold milk.  Dad and I finally isolated the sound to my windowsill.  One day he took a crowbar to the wood frame below the window and we discovered hundreds of small, curving tunnels made by thousands of hungry carpenter ants.  I was relieved to find out I was not crazy after all.

I had an irrational fear of fire when I was a child.  When I was old enough to put myself to bed in an empty house, I used to lay there startled by every sound.  Our house was old and always moving and settling with the small shifts in the Ohio earth.  The hardwood floors cracked and popped in the extremes of cold or heat, the stairs and banisters creaked sporadically.  Every small noise set my pulse jumping and my mind would skitter off to thinking that the pops and creaks were the sound of fire igniting in my house.  I’d jump out of bed and open my door, peering out into the hallway looking for any kind of orange glow, my nose slowly sniffing for the scent of smoke.  Ironically, the only time we ever had a fire in our house (not in our fireplace, that is) was when I was home alone, but I was not in bed and it was not at night.  Lint clogged in our dryer vent caused a load of towels to overheat and combust.  With smoke filling our basement, I called the fire department and then ran across the street until they came to save the day.

I don’t have quite so much fear when I lay in bed as an adult.  I’m not scared of fire anymore, but I do occasionally worry that my money will run out before I find a job.  Then, knowing that worrying about money won’t bring me anything but nausea, I usually pray.  My prayers are very simple these nights in my bed.  I usually start with, “God.  Thank you for loving me.  Thank you for giving me a place to live.  Thank you for Skype so I can see my friends and family.  Thank you for helping me save money last year.  Thank you for sunshine in October.  Thank you for my nieces and nephews; I miss them, please bless them.  God, you know I need a job, that I need and want a purpose beyond reading and cleaning and making dinner.  Please give me your patience.  Thank you for…”  Prayers said, my mind might keep circling and my ears might still be attending to the night sounds of cars and the swish of the fan and the neighbors yappy dog, but I know I’ll eventually fall asleep.   I’m not afraid because I’m safe.  I’m peaceful because I’ll experience love tomorrow.  I’m thankful because I have a place to sleep.

It’s three am.  Time to go back to bed and try to sleep, again.

Yahweh, you listened to the cries of your people when they were slaves of brutal masters, when they were lost in a desert, thirsty and hungry, when they quaked before vast armies, when they were scattered across kingdoms, when they were hunted, persecuted, and killed for following your way.  You gave your people what they needed to overcome.  We need your overcoming power again.

Unemployment is the new menace, a global pandemic that has left 15 million people jobless in this country alone. We’ve been fired and laid off with little thanks for our contributions.  Our economies are propped up on hollow legs of stimulus and complicated relief strategies.  The idleness of our hands and minds threatens our self-confidence. We are people of purpose, called to do good, but our days are filled with searches, applications, inquiries and questions sent into an electronic void.  We lose a sense of identity as we reduce all the experience and knowing of our lives to faceless lists sent to faceless employers.  We work hard to change our situation but few responses come.  Some are going hungry. 

There are so many of us in need, but not too many for you. 

If you can free slaves and guide the hungry to abundance and help a young shepherd overcome a giant, and preserve a persecuted minority to spread good news across the globe, then you can cure this pandemic.  This is my prayer, a plea for my sisters and brothers and neighbors around the world that are desperate for help.

Warrior God, be our champion.  Conquer our great fear over this time of unemployment that stretches into the shadows of our future.  Strike down the possibility of depression.  Give wise and workable solutions to our leaders.  Train us to buy only what we need.  Do not let our present challenges swallow our sense of self, dissolve our confidence, or disconnect us from sustaining fellowship.  Let no one steal the joy we have in you.  Fight for us and protect us because you love us.

Comforter, give us peace.  When the bills pile up and bank accounts run low and anxieties threaten to overwhelm us, stay with us.  Pass us your peace because this place makes no sense at all.  Bolster us with your presence, your word and friends that encourage. Give us confidence that though we are unemployed, we are not unemployable.  Remind us that we are more than a list of experiences, more than the sum total of all the hours we have worked.  We are people of great value and you know each of us by name.  We are children in need of assurance from our parent.  Warm us with your love.

Provider God, provide.  Transform us from misers to givers so we can make food pantries overflow.  Give the jobless hope that tomorrow there may be another opportunity. Give us energy to endure and search one more day, and then another…  Share your patience with us while we wait to hear a yes.  Fill our idleness with good things to do and think about.  Give us reasons to smile and to laugh in the meantime.  Meet our needs.

Merciful One, show mercy.  We pray for those who do not know you and those who doubt or blame you.  Provide for them so their grudges are erased and their doubts are voided.  Show them that your strength reigns in a world of weakness and need.  Shower them with your love and provision so they will know the joy of belonging to a God who gives us what we don’t deserve and sustains us with what we haven’t earned. 

Amen and amen.

There’s a popular American saying that the college years are the best four years of your life.  Having spent eight years in higher education and the past six years working with college students in Canada and the U.S., I know from experience that these wonder years are possible, but they are not guaranteed.  For all the fun, opportunities and achievements that college can bring there are also challenges so intense that they reduce capable, sensible young adults into people their loved ones hardly recognize.  The college experience can be tremendous, abysmal or something in between.  The key to achieving the best four years of your life is in the approach.  To help you get a good start, I’m offering some tried and true professional advice for the new college year.

Chose Well – Making good choices is fundamental to a successful college experience.  Success begins with choosing a college that is good fit for you, meaning that it provides an overall experience that will both challenge and nurture you personally and academically.  (Notice that the focus is on your needs and desires, not those of your parents.)  The same principle applies when choosing a major.  Ask yourself, what major matches my gifts and interests?  What do I want to learn?  What motivates me?  What are my goals?  The answers to these questions should lead you to a major.  While you shouldn’t ignore how a specific degree will lead to a job and a sustaining income, neither should you become a slave to the rigid ideal of finding the “right” major.  Most of us will walk down several career paths in life and most of those paths will have no obvious link to our college major.  College is not just about what you learn but about how you learn to think.  These four years are packed with huge choices – where to go, what to study, how to manage your sexuality, how to have healthy relationships, how to handle money, etc.  If you can use these years to learn how to make decisions that build up your life and the lives of others, then you will reach graduation ten giant leaps ahead of your peers.

Build a Support System – Too often a common denominator of students in crisis is a lack of support.  To ensure that you healthfully navigate the inevitable challenges of college, you will need a support system.  Imagine yourself in the center of a web of relationships.  With whom can you openly share your joys and struggles?  Who loves you enough to be honest with you when you need perspective or correction?  Who loves to laugh with you?  Who can handle your tears?  These are the people you need to stay connected with.  Be bold and ask a few people to make a commitment to be available to you and to check in with you periodically.  Remember that a support system is only as good as the information they have to go on.  If you never share your needs, how can anyone know you need help?  Forcing yourself to be vulnerable to others is a necessary step toward effective support.  Vulnerability initially takes courage and long-term practice to become comfortable.  But if you share regularly with people who truly care for you, you’ll find yourself better able to cope with all types of challenges.

Take Charge of your Academics – Students often blame their advisors and professors for messing up their class schedule and graduation date.  Usually much of their distress could have been avoided if the students had taken the time to inform themselves by reading the academic catalog, mapping out a four-year plan and making a specific list of questions/concerns to present to advisors, department heads or the registrar.  You need to consider that Colleges and departments are in a constant state of flux due to credentialing, staffing, budgets and the general desire to offer you compelling and competitive academic packages.  This isn’t high school where your education is dictated by others; you’re now in the realm of adult education where you have both choice and responsibility.  The money you forked over for your education may be staggering, but that doesn’t mean you can or will be catered to on an individual basis.  That may be a hard message to swallow, but you need to accept that the professionals that assist you have expectations and limitations.  So take charge of your education and you’ll be much happier along the way.

Reserve a Column for Mistakes – We all fail.  Period.  In my six years of working with college students I ran across too many people who were incapable of dealing with their failures or mistakes.  When “the worst” happened, my students would do everything but accept responsibility (which is called denial) or they would act like their life was over (which is despair).  I understand the problem – it’s difficult to be motivated toward excellence academically or goodness personally and then fall short.  The healthy way to deal with failure is a cathartic action between denial and despair.  A wise professor of mine once said, “We should always reserve a column for mistakes.”  For me, this simple sentence was a breakthrough.  Accepting – even expecting – mistakes and acknowledging that I am not perfect or in control of every outcome, would help me deal with the inevitable failures.  It’s helpful to picture mistakes as pebbles and stones on the pathways of life, failures as the rocks and boulders that might trip us up or stand in our way.  The good news is that these obstacles can be overcome and rarely end our journey along the path.  Filing a column for mistakes next to the column for success in our brains allows each of us to throw up our hands and say with abandon, “I messed up!”  Then we look in the mirror and say, “I messed up, but I’ll have another opportunity to do better.”  We become wiser every time we live out the lessons learned from past mistakes and failures. 

Go Residential – With the rising cost of higher education, more students are saving money by living at home and commuting to local colleges.  While this is not detrimental to a positive college experience, those who live at home miss out on one of the treasures of college: living on campus.  There is no experience to match living in a residence hall; it’s where all the spontaneous fun and good conversations happen that build life-long friendships and memories.  If you can, go residential for at least a year.  It’s especially helpful to live on campus your first year because most residential schools have programs and resources designed to connect you to the pulse of campus life. 

Have Fun – One of my college roommates buried herself in her books, almost literally, so she could get straight A’s and get into medical school.  She slept sporadically, rarely socialized, was involved in nothing and was often sick.  Never have I seen such a pristine academic record or a more miserable person!  I don’t think my roommate enjoyed her first two years of college but she eventually learned that it is possible to have fun and succeed academically.  In fact, some of the best students I’ve known have balanced their life with healthy habits and lots of fun.

Sleep – To function optimally, our bodies need regular patterns of work and rest so it’s unfortunate that college life has the honored tradition of midnight pranks and sleepless nights cramming for exams.  Exhaustion is an epidemic on campuses that negatively impacts students academically, physically and emotionally.  Going without sleep for 24 hours has the same impairments as being legally intoxicated!  I’m not saying the occasional midnight food run or study group will derail your entire college experience, but habitual lack of sleep can be detrimental to far more than your grades.  Be kind to your body, mind, relationships and grades by getting adequate sleep as often as you can.

Tap into Resources – Colleges are stuffed with professionals, departments and programs that equip students for success in college and beyond.  Resources like rec sports, clubs, career centers, peer tutoring, computer labs, service opportunities and counseling can usually be accessed for free or for a nominal fee.  There is no reason to be bored or feel helpless when all the resources you could need or want are within reach.

Communicate for Healthy Relationships – Few things can build us up or tear us down like our relationships can.  Since relationships are vital to personal wellness, it’s important that we do what we can to have healthy ones.  I’ve witnessed some very ugly and depressing scenes on college campuses – roommates destroying each other’s property, threats of violence, theft, false accusations of mental illness, screamed racial slurs and the heartbreaking loss of once-cherished relationships.  I observed that most of these horrors stemmed from a lack of communication.  Feelings, assumptions and misunderstandings were never acknowledged or clarified in a timely fashion within these relationships.  Avoidance led to more hurt feelings and more assumptions, which fueled frustration, anger and pain.  You can only hold all of that in for so long before it blows.  And when it blows, it’s often ugly.  If you want roommate experiences, friendships and romantic relationships to enhance your life in college, then you MUST communicate.  Learn how to acknowledge hurts and concerns to others in ways that do not point the finger of blame or twist the knife of revenge.  If open, honest communication is the foundation of your relationships then you’ll rarely get to the ugly and irreparable. 

Study Abroad – College’s across the country offer programs to spend a semester abroad.  When I was in college, I spent a summer term in the Middle East and a full semester on a study tour of Europe.  Both experiences were invaluable because I got to learn about the history, culture, politics and art of other societies while in them!  No well-written text-book can transport you in the same way.  If you can, grab the chance to study abroad; it will broaden your mind and worldview and open your heart and imagination to all kinds of new things.

Nurture your Mental Health – Many of the above suggestions are ways that you can maintain good emotional health.  Unfortunately, depression, anxiety, eating disorders and cutting are common among the college population.  In my student development career, I supported students in emotional crisis, many of whom had reached the point of contemplating suicide before they sought any kind of help.  No one should get to such a point of helplessness.  If you’re feeling sad or scared, anxious or confused, then see if your student health center offers counseling and sign up.  Even if you are coping well with the demands of college, counseling is a great way to process doubt, confusion and hurts, both past and present, with an objective professional.  On another note, many students come into college already taking medications for various behavioral and emotional conditions (ADD, ADHD, depression, anxiety, etc).  I’ve seen students quickly sink into a deep pit of depression or academic failure and withdraw from school because they have gone off their meds without the consent and supervision of a medical professional.  You may have moved into a dorm overnight, but your new “adult” status won’t coincide with a sudden healing from your condition.  Make good choices about your medication and care for your mental well-being.

Prepare to be Tempted – Alcohol, drugs, pornography, gambling, and hooking-up are just a few of the potential perils of college life.  Some need to be abused to be harmful, most are inherently so.  Research shows that the above are common issues on campuses across the country whether the institutions are large or small, private or public, religious or not.  Nothing can sink your success faster than one bad choice.  A few years ago, one of my favorite students was drinking with his friends off campus.  Intoxicated with his judgment impaired, he decided he was okay to drive home.  He drove his friend’s car through a fence.  Thankfully my friend was not physically hurt, but he is still dealing with the consequences: the loss of friendship over the ruined car, his arrest, the cost of damages, fines, legal fees, a DUI on his record, suspension of his license, community service, tanking grade and the sense of shame that made him keep this mistake a secret from all of his friends.  I know my student deeply regrets his actions and that this incident tainted his whole college experience.  Unfortunately, this story is common with college students.  Temptation will be all around you in college.  Intelligent people make single decisions that worsen their lives.  The best advice I can offer you is to think ahead about how you will deal the above issues, and choose wisely.

My nieces at the Tulip Festival in May

This month I spent a week with three of my favorite girls.  My nieces, Kennedy, Kingsley and Kherington live in Holland, Michigan.  I cherish the time I get to spend as Auntie Coco and in the last year I’ve visited them four times.  Before my recent visit, my sister-in-law asked Kennedy what she would like to do when I came to visit.  She responded with, “Dance in the basement with Coco, of course!” 

Dancing is one of our favorite things to do together.  Kennedy loves to twirl around in circles with her hands floating in the air.  Occasionally she’ll hop erratically on one foot or put her hands on the carpet and lift a leg in the air.  These dance moves have all the sincerity and bumbling grace of a fawn prancing around on its way to sure footing.  Kingsley always wants me to hold her when we dance so it’s a good thing she only weighs twenty-some pounds.  She perches on my outstretched arm like an acrobat on a trapeze, dressed in a princess pajama shirt and a diaper rather than a leotard and tutu.  She has a signature move where she sits on my bicep, extends bare legs in front of her, points her toes like a professional gymnast, and clasps my left thumb in her tiny right hand.  “Spin! Go faster,” she says.  She leans her head back slightly, her eyes half-open.  We spin and spin until I’m queasy and afraid I’ll fall over.  Delighted with her daring flight, Kingsley wears the superior smile of an indulged queen.  “Again!” she commands from her lofty perch.

The girls have all grown several inches in the past year, but their ever-developing personalities surprise and delight me most.  Baby Kherington will soon turn one.  At Christmas she contentedly watched our basement dances from the safety of her dad’s lap.  Then I called her Bubbles because she always had saliva bubbles hanging off her lower lip.  Two seasons later, Kherington is quite the explorer and she’s missing the endearing slobber.  She’s only still when someone holds her.  The stairs and the toy bins are her favorite destination.  Her sisters are not happy that Kherington chews on their Barbies and steals their stuffed animals, but it’s hard to discipline this adorable little girl.  Summer has tanned her skin to a rich brown despite the gallons of sun block used by her parents.  Her hair is bleached toe-head blond because she refuses to keep a hat on.  Her cheeks are round and soft and often bunched up to show her toothy grin.  When she looks at me with her big hazel eyes, I struggle to say no.

Kingsley has always been a fraidy-cat and turning three has done little to diminish her fears.  Sudden, loud noises make her freeze.  With fear quivering across her little face, she’ll ask the nearest adult, “What was that?”  A year ago, if I chased her a little too fast or roared too much like a lion, she would run to her daddy and avoid me for an hour.  Now she is more courageous, but only a bit.  When I took her to the bathroom at the pool a few weeks ago, she squealed and clapped her hands over her ears when I flushed the toilet.  She instantly wanted me to pick her up and leave the noisy bathroom.  The one place where Kingsley is fearless is in the water.  She loves to swim; her technique is as awkward and efficient as a tadpole.  She plunges underwater and then kicks and squirms her way to the surface where she blinks madly and spits water off her lips.  My little niece is a big girl now, despite her lack of hair.  She has only enough to sprout off the top of her head or gather in two piggies above her ears.  Her slight size, short hair, cheeky smiles and whisper soft voice make her the ultimate heart-slayer. 

My oldest niece Kennedy is four and a half.  She loves to compete and hates to lose, traits she inevitably inherited from parents who were both scholarship athletes at Purdue University.  Everything Kennedy does becomes a race or match.  Who has the longest gummy worm?  Who can get in their car seat first?  Who can put on their shoes before Coco?  During my recent visit Kennedy asked me to play Candy Land with her.  Her first move was to stack the deck so she would get the Princess Lollipop card and advance to the end of the board.  I gently steered her away from cheating.  Three minutes into the game, when I was farther along the board than Kennedy, she declared, “This game isn’t working; I don’t want to play anymore.”  She dumped Candy Land back in its box and pulled out the ladybug game – a simple board game that involves no skills other than rolling dice and counting to six.  When my ladybug overtook hers, Kennedy insisted, “I don’t like this game” in a forlorn tone and tried to cheat to regain the lead.  When that didn’t work, she tried to quit.  I encouraged her to keep playing and launched into a lecture about chance.  She was reluctant to stay in the game but she gloated loudly once she won three times.  The next day when she wanted to play Chutes and Ladders I asked, “What are the rules when we play a game with Coco?”  She looked up at me, smiled, threw both fists in the air and yelled, “Never give up!” 

I’m a little crazy about my nieces.  Not everything they do is cute and adorable, but the cute and adorable are all I seem to remember after I leave them.  I count myself lucky to be their Coco.

Summer Coolness is a decadent dessert that gently melts away on your tongue.  It’s composed of a baked crust of butter, flour and crushed walnuts, topped with cream cheese, chocolate pudding and fluffy whipped cream.  Though heavy on the calories, it’s easy to ignore the impending weight gain and focus solely on the sweet pleasure of taste and the smooth texture.  When I eat Summer Coolness I am transported halfway to heaven, which is my grandmother’s kitchen.  

If you came with me to Mariann Ford’s kitchen you’d feel like you stepped into the 1960s.  Complete with muted linoleum floors, cheerfully busy wallpaper in a pattern of brown, orange and yellow, stacks of tin cracker boxes, white tile countertops with grout lines creamed by age, and a squat yellow refrigerator – grandma’s kitchen is a tribute to the days when families ate in every night.  The eating area is small, barely enough room to seat a family of six.  I can picture my mother and her three siblings growing up and sharing stories in this kitchen.  Like all siblings, I’m sure they laughed and squabbled over their dinners of roast beef and mashed potatoes.  I wonder, as their forks slid through pumpkin pie or Jell-O salad served on original pattern Pfaltzgraff, if the sweetness of their mother’s creations had them dreaming equally sweet dreams of their future. 

Most of my childhood memories of my grandmother feature her kitchen and her cooking.  Grandma is of the generation of women that lavish their loved ones with square meals and sweets in equal measure.  When I was a child, we would spend summer weeks and holidays at my grandparents’ house in Youngstown, Ohio – an old steel and mill town as vintage as grandma’s kitchen.  The moment we arrived for a visit, I’d jump out of our conversion van and go straight to the kitchen.  There grandma always was, finishing a batch of cookies or prepping a roast for dinner.  At my greeting she’d turn and exclaim, “Well, hi Corrie; how are ya babe?” and give me a kiss.  The counters were littered with yellowed Tupperware full of cookies and fudge and brittle.  The oven was usually on, the little TV in the corner showing reruns of M.A.S.H or Murder She Wrote.  I could hear Grandpa snoring from his recliner in the living room.  I’d kiss Mariann’s soft cheek and inhale her perfume of flour, butter and sugar.  It was instant love.  I was at home here, in this kitchen with these sounds and smells and with this woman, just as much as I was at home in my Columbus kitchen. 

I got to know my grandmother by helping her in the kitchen.  She made me her assistant and taught me all the staples of the Ford family recipe book.  Grandma patiently demonstrated how to make marshmallow sweet rolls, a must-have at large family gatherings.  It’s a process of wrapping a marshmallow in crescent dough, dipping it in melted butter and rolling it in gritty cinnamon-sugar.  My fingers became sugar sticks that I licked clean while grandma washed the dishes and told me stories from her past.  I was shocked to discover that when she was a young woman at college, grandma sent her dirty laundry home through the mail!  Her mother would wash, iron, and neatly fold the clothes and bedding and send them back.  Stories like these were as unbelievable as the gooeyness of her baked marshmallow rolls or the buttery flakiness of her from-scratch pie crust.

Mariann Ford kept her flock of children and grandchildren nourished with wholesome foods and an abundance of treats.  I know she loved our visits because she would bake ten or twelve different batches of cookies for our arrival.  For the kids it was Hershey kiss, chocolate chip and sugar cookies.  For my mother it was peanut butter cookies, oatmeal raisin for my aunt, and molasses for my father.  It seemed like grandma wasn’t happy unless everyone was satisfied according to their individual cravings.  My cousins and I stuffed ourselves sick with cookies over the years, often sneaking into the kitchen after bedtime and snatching handfuls of snickerdoodles. 

Grandma Ford’s generosity in the kitchen mirrored her abundant love for her family.  Now, most of the grandchildren are grown and we don’t make it to Youngstown much.  But I imagine that grandma’s kitchen and confections are as iconic for my cousins as they are for me.  I think of our childhood visits and recall memories like the time my cousin Jared laughed so hard he spit his milk all over our beautiful Thanksgiving dinner, or the remake of A Christmas Carole that we produced in the basement with a plate of cookies supplied to fuel the starving actors.  Every year we watched The Sound of Music and grandma made us bowls of freshly popped corn tossed with real butter and salt.  Summer meals by the pool were followed by delicious Summer Coolness.  But the memory that stands out the most is grandma singing Sweet Little Jesus Boy at every Christmas Eve church service.  We’d all drive back through the snowy streets to my grandparent’s house and have our annual birthday party for Jesus – complete with a frosted cake decked with candles, made by our sweet, generous, loving grandma Ford. 

Recipe for Summer Coolness:  Cream 1½ cups sifted flour and 1½ sticks of butter.   Combine with 1 cup chopped walnuts.  Press into 9×13 pan and baked for 20 minutes at 350 degrees.  (Do not let crust brown.)  Set crust aside until fully cool.  In a bowl mix together one 8oz package of cream cheese, 1 cup confectioners sugar and ½ of a large carton of Cool Whip.  In another bowl, mix together two 3oz packages of instant chocolate pudding and 3 cups of cold milk.  When crust is cooled, spread the cream cheese mixture on top.  Then layer on the pudding.  Top with the remainder of Cool Whip.  Keep refrigerated unless serving.

When I entered my sabbatical in April I was full of things to say and write about.  It’s not difficult for me to fill space or silence in general, and with so much to process, I knew I could blog twice a week and not run out of topics.  Like all the professors and pastors I’ve known to take sabbatical, I thought I would write a few articles or begin drafting a book I have been mulling over.  Clearly, the sparse postings since spring are evidence that something else happened, and for me it was something pretty shocking.  This verbal, often verbose woman was flushed out of words. 

Between April and July, several good ideas for blog posts and articles came to me and flitted away before I got to paper, pen or computer.  Even when I simultaneously had these tools in hand and a compelling thought, I couldn’t put anything on the page.  It wasn’t writer’s block.  I was entering into a deeper level of rest than I knew was necessary.  

I’ve long suspected and now learned that sabbatical can hollow you out.  If you let it, it scoops out all the stuff that fills you, and then sifts through the jumble exposing burdens, joys, wounds, trophies, distractions, and all kinds of excess.  You have the unique opportunity to survey your life, take stock of all that you see, and make choices.  One of the important choices is what to hold and what to release.  The hold or release could be for a time, like the length of the sabbatical, or for good.  

I was stunned to realize that to rest most deeply, I needed to release words.  I began to listen to those times that I sat at the computer but couldn’t move my fingers.  The frustration I felt when I forgot ideas and topics became a flashing billboard in my brain.   I heard and read, “You don’t need to do that now.  Let the words be and the ideas go.”  This release of words created for me a new space and a new way of being.  There was dense quiet at the core of my life.  In the quiet I was able to release questions I couldn’t answer (why did this happen?) problems I couldn’t fix (what could I have done?) and hurts that would keep me in pain (did they value me?).  Instead of expressing myself and relating to the world through storytelling, conversations, or writing, I said little and wrote less.  All the narrative was internal, hushed and gentle, not meant to be shared with the world.  This was uncomfortable because it’s not my usual way, but eventually it was good.  I felt emptied, then cleansed, and finally, unfurled. 

In late June, I was blessed with several opportunities to reunite with dear friends.  These gifts of time and sharing allowed me to return to my usual way of being – expressive and verbal.  Conversation and stories again danced out of me and around me.  Cleansed by quiet and good rest, I welcomed the end of sabbatical as a renewed person.  I’ve begun to put pen to paper again.  I’ve easily just typed 528 words.