rambling rosemarie

Facebook is a community unlike any other. I have friends I have never met. Friends I love not just because we are siblings in Christ, but because I have come to know them from their posts and subsequent our conversations.  Saiko and Sharon Woods (and their children) are an example. We've never met in person but they are welcome at my door anytime. I consider them friends and family in Christ. One of the wonders of having friends you've never met in person is the way it expands your view of the world. I have friends all over this globe that live in different political climes, under different laws and with different perspectives.  As believers in Christ it is perfectly acceptable to have a different view of the world as long as we share the same biblical worldview. There is a very distinct difference between the two and too often that difference gets lost when my view of the world looks so different from theirs. Back to my friend, Saiko, he has a program on Blog Talk Radio...

November 22, 1963 I was sitting in my first grade class. The telephone that hung on the wall rang and my teacher answered it.  That was back when children were taught telephone manners and when the phone rang, especially in your classroom, it was a big deal.  We all got quiet and most of my classmates put their heads together to whisper. I would have too but out of the corner of my eye I saw my teacher's face. The look of confusion and horror caught me off guard so instead of stealing a moment to whisper something silly to my friend, I watched her every move.  She slowly hung up the phone and told us in a trembling voice that we were all going home a little early because something terrible had happened. President Kennedy had been shot. April 4, 1968 I had run home from school I hate two hours of watching television that I could get in before my parents got home. If I ran, I could catch whatever movie was playing on Channel 2 during the Dialing for Dollars show.  I ...

I've been thinking big thoughts. I am normally a pensive person. Over the last few months that habit has intensified to the point that I have been lost in my own head. I enjoy being lost. I find it exhilarating. I know that people fight being alone.They kick and yell and scream and for the life of me, I don't know why. When I am alone  I am expending energy but I'm not struggling to find a way out. I am looking for a way deeper in.  I am busy looking for the road not taken; the reasoning to the rhyme and just what information all those synapses contain. When I am like this every thought is an adventure. I seem to notice things that would normally escape me. I hang on to them. I cherish them. I replay them over and over until like a shard of glass tumbling in the ocean they are smooth and comfortable to hold. My grandson was sitting behind me in the RAV4 while I was driving. He was playing his Game Boy and it had him totally focused. Whatever game he was playing, he was...

 I write for therapy. It soothes my soul to put words to the gnarled thoughts and anxieties that pop around in my brain. Things get stuck for me sometimes, like a pinball that has found that perfect spot between the bumpers. Stuff pings back and forth, mostly unpleasant memories, moments I wish I could take back or fits of anger flash in short bursts of light and obnoxious noise. I am a score keeper. As I try to get through the agonies and annoyances of life, batting at balls with with flippers that are almost enough to keep things going, I am keeping score and remembering the faces of the folks who have wronged me. It is nothing if not exhausting and pointless. Pointless score keeping. How is that for irony? I can recite chapter and verse on the topic of biblical forgiveness.  I know that God's forgiveness of me and my sins is my model for forgiving others.  Love covers a multitude of sins. How many times should I forgive someone? Seventy times seven.  What does...

Often God's mercy feels more like a swift kick to my  backside than the "There, there, little one!" pat on the head that I would prefer. So it is this morning as I skipped church on a day I was physically able to attend, opting instead to stay home and feel sorry for myself, that I once again feel a Jehovah sized boot print on the place with the least amount of padding; my ego.  I am a slow learner. We go through this every year at this time. Is it any wonder that I hate Mother's Day? I don't hate Mother's Day for any of the legitimate reason to despise made up holidays. It doesn't bother me a bit that Hallmark is making a killing on cards or that florists everywhere are being delivered high voltage shocks on their last nerve trying trying to get out orders. Trust me, I was a florist once upon a time. Valentines Day and Mother's Day test the soul of every florist. I hate Mother's Day for much deeper reasons. When I was a kid I hated Mother'...

Really? Am I really sitting here at my computer blogging? I have someone coming over today and my house is in full disarray. I have enough dog and cat hair clinging to the furniture and floors to assemble several more pets. My kitchen is filthy. There are fig trees growing in my sink.  OK, I said that for shock value. The trees are in small pots and they are in the sink because they were just watered, but you get the idea, right?  I should be putting my house in order.  The truth of the matter is I am putting my house in order, my spiritual house is almost always reflected in the way I take care of my home. I need to take a time out, prioritize my life, and the truth is, for all my studying I have been leaving out the doing part. It's all well and good to know the answers regarding what we should do as believers in Christ, but knowing isn't enough.  There is a constant battle we face as believers.  The natural tendency of our hearts is to go to extremes. ...

There's a whole lot of lassitude and torpidity happening here for me today. It is, no doubt, brought about by an even greater amount of self-pity. If there is one thing I am especially accomplished at doing it is feeling sorry for myself.  As my childhood hero Will Sonnet would say-"No brag, just fact." You may wonder what has transpired to bring my countenance so low. Then again you might not give a tinker's damn about my countenance, you're just bored and reading random things on the internet.  No matter, you're here and I am compelled to tell you the cause of my distress.  Tuna. Tuna itself is not evil. It's just a fish. Eating tuna is not evil either, though to my vegan and vegetarian friends may argue with me there. I like to eat tuna and because I do I generally purchase it in mass quantities at Costco.  Yesterday I was craving tuna so I went to my pantry, picked out a can and pulled all the other ingredients  I wanted in my tuna.  Mayonnaise, di...