rambling rosemarie

It's been a while since I have written. I don't propose to know why for certain.  My theory? There is a level of anxiety and vulnerability inherent in writing, even if very few people read what you write, that I didn't feel like dealing with. Fact, fiction, fantasy;  plumbing the depths of your soul or skimming blithely across the surface the words are yours. Tiny bits of your essence, pieces of your DNA in New Times Roman,  Arial- any font- serif or sans,  they can leave you feeling naked or puffed out like a proud pigeon.  They line up like fledgling birds, some begging to be fed, some bravely taking flight and some needing to be nudged from the nest. I guess I am being nudged. Last night I sat on my front porch anticipating a visit from an old friend. I enjoy anticipation when what you're expecting is good.  I was enjoying memories thirty years old. I lived in a different state, geographically and spiritually. Sometimes it's good to look back and see...

There is something that is completely satisfying for me to be in my home on a gray day with the rain coming down. I like the ebb and flow of the sounds; the rise and fall of rhythms syncopated by God. I like watching the rivulets of water flowing from the downspouts and dispersing on the lawn and hearing the gurgling noise of air and water working out their gravitational ballet. From my bedroom I can hear the wind occasionally lifting a loose piece of vinyl siding. I kid myself and think that one day I will go out and identify the offending piece and have it properly secured.  Truth is, I like it.  I had my landscaper trim the crepe myrtle bush outside my office because it was scraping against the window and threatening to lift the gutters off the west side of house with its unruly branches. I miss their song. It's like I removed the string section of the orchestra during the sonata or the sopranos from the cantata. I actually enjoy cleaning my house during a good rain. ...

I have preconceived ideas about the way people should behave. It is because of this that I find myself in a constant state of disappointment, disbelief or downright disgust. Occasionally I am dumbfounded and rarer still delighted- but who rants about being delighted?  Not I. It seems the more age I pack on the weirder I become but it's coupled with a strange mellowing. Things that were of monumental importance to me once don't merit a blip on the radar screen of my life. Things that formerly would send me into verbal tirades now don't elicit an 'eh.    My annoyance radar has been calibrated to monitor different life obstacles. Age, some wisdom and a lot of sanctification have gone into this change. God's hammered me on His anvil over and over again and I am a better woman for it.  Despite my objections. Sometimes I let circumstances get the better of me and I react to life's challenges with emotion instead of faith.  I find it a most distasteful character fl...

Things I know about myself... and wish I didn't. I can sit for hours on end watching a movie or chatting with a friend while waxing philosophically about obscure topics. My butt hurts in under 15 minutes when I sit and read my bible. I can still recite the Preamble and the Gettysburg Address. I still know all my lines from being Yente in a production of Fiddler on the Roof. I remember the Pledge of Allegiance and know when the Lords of Leaping and Pipers Piping do their thing in the 12 Days of Christmas. I memorized Isaiah 6 at one time. Now? "In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord, high and exalted seated on his throne, and the train of his robe filled the temple....and something something something and then woe is me for I am a man of unclean lips, something else more too." When I did a post on Tommy Jordan shooting his daughter's laptop after she posted some hateful stuff about her parents on her Face Book wall? I knew what she'd done was wrong ...

Ever have one of those days where everything you read convicts you? I feel like I am a pinball and I am being launched with sparks, bell rings and little bursts of energy into the bumpers of conviction that surround me. Never thought of my spiritual journey like a pinball game but that's sort of a perfect analogy for today. I keep being bounced about, falling into holes only to be shot out from the other side of my tiny universe into the next bit of truth or obstacle. I don't mean to sound disrespectful nor do I want to be guilty of blasphemy, but I can actually picture the Holy Spirit using His flippers to keep me in the field of play. Of course His aim is spot on. I've never thought about the sting that little silver ball feels until now. Conviction is sweet but it costs a bit of your backside sometimes. The ladies bible study I am leading is something I spend a lot of time grousing about. I love the ladies and the time I get to spend with them. They are a sharp group...

Going through my old books, papers and stuff. I am finding curious things. This particular one caught my attention and here it is: Duties and Responsibilities Bring Results. Romans 12-15 Romans 12:1 I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, {which is} your spiritual service of worship. Presenting yourself to God results -> become a living, holy sacrifice that pleases Him. Romans 12:2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect. Transformed by a renewed mind results -> able to discover and display the will of God. Romans 12:6-8 6 And since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, {let each exercise them accordingly} if prophecy, according to the proportion of his faith; 7 if service, in his serving; or he who teaches, in his teaching; ...

We've all heard variations of the expression, "Under that gruff exterior lies a heart of gold." It sort of goes with the old standby "Don't judge a book by its cover." The idea being that the ugly, drab, rough exterior often covers something beautiful. I understand the attraction to these idioms. There is a suggestion of hope, an implication that things are not always as bad as they seem. We like those stories. We like to find our heroes and heroines in unlikeable people whose likeability increases the more we come to know them. We like them almost as much as we like stories about 'underdogs' transforming into 'wonderdogs' but why? Because we are enamored by the prospect of being loved despite our unlovable character flaws and with winning against the odds. How else do we account for the number of people playing the lottery and the ever increasing self-help and self-acceptance industry? There are billion dollar industries banking on ou...

I am trying desperately to get rid of things. I am trying to make my life more manageable. I didn't expect to be compromised with a bad neck and back so early into my adventures as a retired person. It's an aggravating experience because it magnifies my flaws. I should have done this decades ago. Somehow I have been too occupied with procrastination and/or attaching emotional significance to things to be able to see them for what they are... dust collectors. Time brings change. I used to work for a Christian college and had a ministry where students came over for dinner and a night away from the dorms. I was the luckiest woman in the world to have these young folks over. Wait, I don't believe in luck. I was blessed. I am learning to be careful how I say things. I fail miserably but this is an easy goof to make and to fix. It wasn't luck but providence that brought these young people into my life. Anyway, besides watching ER and other favorite television progr...

If I had to describe my life right now I would say I was a bit like playing Chutes and Ladders or maybe Chutes and Chutes. The higher I climb the farther I slide down. I am being hammered on all sides. I am fragile, but the pounding continues and I am not breaking. I want to. I want to be shattered into a million little pieces instead of receiving the constant taps with the sanctification hammer. The point is not to be shattered but to be bent and molded into a useful shape. That's not how it feels. It feels like I am being destroyed....bit by bit I am disappearing. To be sure, parts of me are disappearing during my sanctification. That's the point of being refined. Getting rid of the dross to purify the gold- leaving more of Him and less of me. As a Christian, why on earth would I have a problem with that? Because at any minute of any given day I value myself more than I value God. I have fleeting moments when I know that God is the best thing ever and that I am one ble...

I have lost my identity. I was Rosemarie the Opinionated. Rosemarie the Certain. I have been known as Rosemarie do the Right Thing and told I had an uncanny ability to discern what the right thing was. I have become someone else. My opinions are muddled. My way is unsure. The real question I have to answer is whether my identity has been stolen from me or have I given it away? Is who I am being altered by sanctification and I am feeling the growing pains of the woman I am becoming? Have I been seeing through a glass dimly? Have I been blown off course? Lately, I have that horrible feeling of unrest that comes from unspoken sorrow. I am reaping the sour fruit of unspoken words. Somewhere deep in my soul there's a kettle full of self-pity and disappointment simmering over a fire fueled by the bitterness of missed opportunity and realizing my insignificance. Can someone explain to me, like I am a two year old, how a Christian can be bought with so high a price as Jesus pai...

Yesterday was my mother's birthday. She's been gone for over 25 years and I still have difficulty with her birthdays. Normally I try to do something nice for myself on her birthday. I bought my first new car on birthday. I have purchased myself some spectacular jewelry and even bought my first home on her birthday. In keeping with tradition I tried to think of something nice to do for myself yesterday. I don't have the money I used to have so buying myself something extravagant wasn't really a possibility. Even if I'd had some money that wasn't working, I would have had difficulty purchasing something that would have helped me feel better about missing her. I don't need anything, that's for certain. Even more than that, I have come to see that I can't fill the hole that not having a mom has left in my soul. I will never have anyone who loved me like my mom loved me and in my 50s I am wrestling with the pain that truth has brought me. I am c...

I perform a ritual each Sunday I secretly call "playing Marty." Monday is garbage day so each Sunday after church I gather up the garbage, clean the science experiments out of the fridge and roll the garbage can to the end of the driveway in anticipation of an early Monday pickup. Why do I call it playing Marty? Because I lived in a small town where I knew the garbage man by name. His name was Marty. When you live in a small town you develop your own vocabulary. Families have their own languages too. Combine the two and in my family if you had garbage detail it was your turn to play Marty. At my house New Year's Eve was called "Amateur Night" because that's the one night people who normally do not drink think they have built up their sobriety levels to such a point that they are immune to alcohol. Perfectly lovely people think a couple glasses of champagne or a cocktail or two cannot crumble their 364 day run of sobriety. They lose their minds. They ...

I used to think that God had singled me out to go through every crisis known to mankind so I could fulfill what Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians about comforting others with the comfort that we have received. How else could I know what it was they were going through unless I too had been in their situation? When you're full of yourself and bad theology, it's easy to think those sorts of idiotic things. It is also easy to think that you are receiving more than your fair share of hardships whether or not your theology has improved and even though you realize that you are not the center of God's universe. When you're the one that hurts, when your pain is the focus it's easy to lose perspective in large increments. That's when bitterness and/or resentment sets in and takes hold. Bitterness is like a creeping vine that takes root in the cracks between God's truth and your lost perspective. I have been guilty of being focused on my pain of late both physical and ...

I am having a rough day AND I am being vexed by stupid people. Ever notice that when you're grumpy the level of stupidity in those around you increases? Coincidence? I think not. You know you're having a bad day when you happen to watch the The View and find yourself agreeing with Whoopi.... when she's admittedly high on drugs (she took drugs that enable her to be calm enough to fly). Yeah it's been that kind of day and it's only noon. Ms. Goldberg and I find ourselves in agreement on whether or not something Kathy Griffith said was not nice and uncalled for... but then most of what Kathy Griffith says falls into that category. That's why I don't watch her television program, buy tickets to her shows or find myself wanting in any way shape or form to be in her company. Not on the D list, not on the A list... not on any list. So when faced with the probability of seeing her unkind, unfunny self on my TV I practice this technique.... I turn the channe...

I used to have a sign in my locker at work that said, "Poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine." It was a bit of irony since I worked in an emergency dispatch center. It never ceased to amaze me the effort people would invest in making bad decisions; so bad that a call to 9-1-1 would become inevitable. I have a few hundred examples I could use but one particular incident comes to mind. It seems a homeowner decided that he didn't like the looks of the angled section of the stove pipe on his wood stove. Apparently it wasn't quite right and he didn't think it was safe so he removed the section he and went to the local hardware store to find a suitable replacement. Now most people would consider this laudable behavior and it would have been if there had not been a load of live coals and fresh logs in the wood stove. If you are like him and don't see a problem with this scenario, let me introduce you to what firefighters call the...

I went to the doctor yesterday. She asked me how I was feeling and I told her she ought to just take me out behind the building and shoot me. She told me that those weren't the plans she had for me. I handed her the list of complaints I had written out. I was afraid I would forget what it was that I wanted to consult with her about and apologized for having a list. You're fine, she assured me as she systematically went through the list. "Let me see the new moles....ah, no worries we'll freeze those off." Whew! In my family cancer of every variety runs rampant. I also had a good report from mammography. Since my mother, aunt and both grandmothers had breast cancer that's a huge weight off my chest. Pun intended. Next on the list, remind me what are some of the bi-products of having pernicious anemia? "Mood swings, being emotional, loss of concentration, loss of cognitive abilities, loss of balance, loss of energy...." That's it! I am not...

It all started when my pastor said one of his favorite words in Greek sounded like "Go Goose Moose." That seemed like a lighthearted start for a sermon, but.... My pastor is preaching through Hebrews. My friend, James White, is also preaching through Hebrews. Coincidence? I think not. I am being double dipped in the truths of God found in Hebrews. Any time you get immersed in double portions of truth you are bound to be convicted. My guilt glands are definitely swollen, and for good reason. My notes from this morning's sermon have a couple of things that weigh heavily on my mind. 1) Complaining is unbelief. 2) Unbelief is evil. Complaining and grumbling are my specialties. The term gongusmoo means to grumble. The kind of grumbling that is under the surface and incessant, like a dripping faucet. Grousing. In Australia we called it whinging. Whinging is not a clear objection that addresses the source of the unhappiness, it's annoying and persistent; more l...

I remember telling my friend, Keith, that I didn't think God really liked me. In fact, I didn't think He cared for me at all. He had no respect for my personality or talents. He didn't want to see me at all what he wanted to see himself in me. I was raging against such a thought. Keith, a pastor and advocate of truly biblical counseling, thought I was finally talking some sense. A rebellious heart and malcontent thrive in a symbiotic relationship. Loathing God is fertilizer for bitterness which grows entwined with immorality and strife in your soul. Keith knew I was no match for the truth and what I was really saying. He knew my heart was screaming; "Help me! I am a Christian and I don't like God!" Have you ever felt that way? Or, are you one of those people I don't understand? You know, the ones who seem to immediately love Him and are pliable and teachable and are happy with being changed. I really don't get people like that. I know they exi...

There are a lot of really bad drivers in Kentucky and I seem to be in front of and/or behind one each and every time I go somewhere. This is the only place I have ever been where you can literally watch while the wheels come off a car as it motors down the highway and the driver is sober but oblivious. I am very thankful that my father, a truck driver for 50+ years taught me to drive defensively. He taught me that cars don't go out of control, people lose control. He impressed upon me the responsibility assumed by propelling a multi-ton motorized vehicle. You take your life and the lives of everyone else into your hands. If you learn good driving skills you also learn what your vehicle can and cannot do. Mostly you learn to watch out for the other guy- the other driver is the unknown variable. I have wished on multiple occasions that I had a vehicle that was fully armored. One that I could stop on a dime when someone was in such a hurry to get where they are going that driving ...

When I am studying something that bothers me, I do just about anything I can to stall. In doing so I stumble upon a lot of odd information. I love history and any student of history will tell you that most everything we are familiar with has had an odd beginning. Sometimes there will be different odd stories regarding the genesis of a myth, folkway or idiom. Somewhere in the mix the truth can be found. You just have to look. While I lived in Australia I went to a visit a little town on the Murray River called Echuca. Echuca has a wonderful history and boasts the largest collection of paddle steamers in the world. It also has a coach house and carriage museum. It was during my visit to the carriage museum that I was told the origin of the expression to 'drop off to sleep.' According the docent, the carriage cheap seats were the ones outside and on the back. You had a platform to sit on and a rope or rail to hang onto for dear life. During a long trip a poor unfortun...