Trust in God

 “Nothing can happen to me that God doesn’t want.  And all that He wants, no matter how bad it may appear to us, is really for the best.”

-St. Thomas More

The days last week were filled with sorrow and prayer, interspersed with putty, spackling, and paint.  What a combination!  I sit here this morning pondering Thomas’ quote.  I think of his life, 2020, and last week.  Oh, how we need to trust in God!

Sir Thomas More was introduced to me in my twenties when I took British history in college.  He worked for Henry XIII as an adviser.  Thomas, a good Catholic, opposed the king’s desire for a divorce after the Pope said no.  Thomas also opposed the split from the Catholic Church.  King Henry ended up using Thomas as an example of why people shouldn’t oppose him.  Thomas was imprisoned and later his head was chopped off for his “treason,” speaking truth and not following the party line.  

Fifteen years or so later, I learned Sir Thomas More is also known as Saint Thomas More.  Because he died a Martyr for the faith, he is considered a saint in the Catholic Church.  When I went to Reconciliation with Father Stu (yes, the one from the movie), my penance was to learn about Thomas.  Years later, I visited where he is buried, very moving.  

I respect his courage of telling his king the truth with his life on the line.  Anytime in prison, he could have recanted, but he stood by his beliefs.  I can’t even ask a person to stop gossiping about my parish.  Hum, that sentence came out of nowhere.  I will have to ponder that for a later date.  So, did God want Thomas to lose his head?  Did Thomas want to lose his head?  No on both accounts.  Was it for the best that Thomas died prematurely?  Of course not.  God didn’t want Thomas to die.  But God rejoiced in Thomas remaining steadfast in his faith, in truth, and his father in heaven.

How do we apply this to our life?  My mom chose to end her life by starving.  My son chose to marry a broken woman that led to his being killed by her pistol.  God wants the best for me.  In my heart, I know this to be truth.  How can this be the best for me?  God didn’t take the food from my mom.  God didn’t pull the trigger.  People did that.  Broken people.  The reason it happened to me is because they chose their path.  I just happened to feel the aftershock.

So, how did I get the best in these bad situations?  I could write a book about all the best that happened.  In a simplified answer, the best was all the people who stood with me during the aftermath.  Family and friends helped my sister and I in every way imaginable with my mom’s death.  Mom’s house sold two days after going on the market, the biggest example of best.  What a huge gift!!!  The same happened with Michel’s death including a lawyer, detective, and mortician.  (Okay, that sounds like the start of a good joke.  Opps.)  I wanted justice, revenge.  God gave my heart what it truly needed.  Closure and distance from evil.  If that isn’t the best, I don’t know what is better.

Last week, our community was rocked by a death that should not have happened.  All my emotions from Michel bubbled up to the surface.  They’re still bubbling.  Will the sorrow ever end?  Why does God allow this to happen?  No, the sorrow won’t end.  God doesn’t allow bad things to happen.  He allows us to make our own decisions.  People make bad things happen.  So, I prayed.  While I filled holes, textured, and painted our messed-up wall, I prayed for Michel and another young man.  I prayed for the family and friends of both.  I prayed for a generation that is crying out for truth.  I prayed that God would give the best to the young man’s family as God did for us in our crisis.

In the end, I trust in God.  I pray.

Looking for My Match

 “Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.”

St. Catherine of Siena

I find this quote fitting for the beginning of a new year, especially this new year.  For the past couple of years, I have been wondering who I am.  For the last couple of weeks, I have been pondering my purpose in life.  The last couple of years have shaken my belief in the world, my world.  I have changed.  I want to change more.  Yet, I find I am still very much the person I was before life hit me upside the head to knock me on my backside.

Three years ago, I was a happy wife.  I was a mother of three living children though estranged from one of them.  I hoped for reconciliation.  I was a fantasy writer.  Though not perfect, life was good.  I had written about eight books at this point.  I was in the middle of number nine.  I was scheduled for surgery to replace my hip.  I could barely drive due to the pain.  My mom was doing terrible.  Mental illness had grabbed onto her and wasn’t letting go.  I worried, but God would get me through.

As 2020 progressed, Mom stopped eating and drinking.  My surgery went great, but I couldn’t get into physical therapy.  I finished books nine, ten, and eleven.  Yep, ten books published, and one was being edited.  I still couldn’t drive.  I was being pulled in Mom’s direction, but how do you help someone who doesn’t want help?  I was still raising an anxiety driven child.  My life was unraveling.

No one can help a person who doesn’t want help.  Mom died.  On her death certificate, they wrote suicide by starvation.  June and July were all about the funeral and settling the estate.  In July, I finally got into physical therapy.  August, I rested as we began to look towards my husband deploying to Cuba.  In September, my writing mentor turned against me because of a story I wrote.  He lambasted everything I turned in for the rest of the writing class.  With all the negativity and Jerry leaving, I just started quilting.  Jerry left.  I determined my mission was to get Madelle through her senior year, get through the deployment, and get through my mom’s huge stash of fabric.

My world exploded even more.

The baby with the biggest eyes who made me a mother was shot and killed at the end of November 2020.  My munch, my bear, my Michel left this earth.  The hope of reconciliation with him ended.  I couldn’t save him.  I lost him.  I had failed.  God let me down.  I blamed Jerry.  I blamed myself.  My world ended.  Jerry came home on emergency leave and left again.  We are military.  This is what we do.

I pulled on my combat boots to face 2021.  I wasn’t going to let this experience take me from the world permanently.  The stubbornness kept me going.  Madelle helped.  Clay moved home to help even more.  I bought kayaks.  Jerry made it back only to leave again for a second deployment due to a promotion we couldn’t turn down.  We are military.  Yep, it is what we do.  However, it took its toll.

At the beginning of 2022, I had no idea who God wanted me to be.  I thought He wanted me to be a writer, the mother of three living children, and a wife.  Instead, I faced the coming year not being able to write, the mother of one dead child and two living, and a husband on the other side of the world.  I sat at the sewing machine and lost myself in fabric.  I went through the motions of going to all the church functions.  I prayed.  I searched.  Summer came along and I ignored the kayaks.  I ignored most things besides quilting and church.  I occasionally went out into the garden.  I did what was necessary.  I was completely depressed.  I fought on.  I prayed more.

Jerry came home in November.  The depression lingered sporadically for the first couple of weeks.  He and I left for an adventure.  The depression melted away as the first flight took off leaving the Helena Valley behind us.  I was finally able to run away from my life, from the explosions, even if only for a couple of weeks.  We found ourselves on the vacation.  Yes, I am a wife again!!!  I am meant to be a wife.

Yet, I still am left with questions.  What is my purpose?  Who am I meant to be?  What is my dream?  I have never lived without a dream.  Due to many things, I don’t see myself going back to fantasy writing.  The dream died with everything that happened in 2020.  This year, I will explore nonfiction writing.  My words never have left.  They waited patiently because I just couldn’t face the words until Jerry returned.  He makes me stronger, and I have a feeling I will have to rely on his strength to get through the words that need written, if I find the courage.  I will journal and blog.  Maybe a different writing dream will take hold.  Maybe not.

I have explored and discerned other options of purpose for my life.  I have actually been dreaming some dreams from my childhood.  I have made lists and mission statements.  I know God means me to be his daughter.  I love my relationship with Him.  I am also meant to be a wife (my favorite purpose at the moment) and mom.  I am working out what that means for Michel.  I am learning to be a mom of grownups for Clay and Madelle.  I will continue to quilt and garden.  However, I just feel like God is calling me too more.  I feel there is a bigger purpose.  Maybe it is just a midlife crisis.  

All I know is I am willing to set the world on fire, I just need to find the match.

Stained Glass Window

 

Life resembles a stained glass window.  The majority of the events in life form the design to fill with bright vivid colors.  Sunlight pours through the panes of the happy memories of the past on display for all to see the joy of living.  The black edging of the metal work crawls through the design giving the piece definition of the harshness of each circumstance.  Harsh words spoken or negative emotions, the taint of the human condition that creates shadow on the world.  Occasionally, a storm hits the window exploding chards of glass inward.

For the past few months, I have been working on a stained glass window quilt.  My mom pieced the project together.  She started hand quilting one block but never finished the project.  I puzzled over the quilting she did trying to find a way to continue using the sewing machine.  The blanket is lap sized.  Not horribly bulky to work on the machine if I was to do a straight stitch the length of the quilt but I would have needed to twist and turn the blanket in all direction every three to four inches.  Plus, the stitch would have been off too much.  I grumbled, a lot!  But, I picked up a needle and thread and began hand stitching.

I found a rhythm.  I learned thread types matter.  I broke an embroidery hoop.  I prayed for hours as I stitched.  I watched a lot of television and listened to music.  I began enjoying the task.  My stitches became better, not great, but better.  I tweaked my mother's design to fit my needs; though hers is the better.  Mine is the done.  Near the end, I changed.

My mother and I have always had a rocky relationship, oil and water.  I could carry on for hours with stories.  I could drone on about how I felt about her, especially in the end.  The last ten years were terrible.  Amazingly enough, the last five became even worse.  At the end, I was relieved when the drama ended.  I only cried once and that was out of anger that she couldn't love my sister and I enough to enjoy us, enjoy life.  I didn't miss her at all until a few days ago.

I am not sure what changed or why.  It probably has to do with the bloody stained glass window quilt, all those hours I felt her watching over my shoulder criticizing me.  I know she would not like the way I did the quilt or my stitching.  I am not the perfectionist she was.  However, I found myself missing our good talks on the phone.  Me calling to tell her what I had been up to.  Discussing quilting or gardening.  I didn't/don't want to miss her.  My husband says it is because I want to hold onto the anger.  I disagree.  I don't like being angry.  I think missing her hurts to much.  I don't want to hurt for her because of all the black running through our relationship.  Much of it was an ugly tar that covered the glass that could have been so beautiful.

I even hand sewed on the back of the binding.  More black.  Michel.  Shattered chards of glass laying on the floor.  As I continued to stitch on Thanksgiving, his favorite holiday, I reflected on my emotional health.  I had prepped myself for the possibility of being depressed.  From the time he knew what a feast was, he loved Thanksgiving.  The memories made me smile, not become sad.  However, sad I was.

I miss my husband.  Last year, he was in Fort Bliss getting ready to deploy to Cuba.  This year he is in Fort Bliss again.  He is getting ready to deploy to the Middle East this time.  In the past year and a month, I have seen him a total of three and a half months.  Yes, I am sad.  And as I stitched away, I realized this sadness is the black metal of my stained glass window.  I could dwell on the black until no sunlight spilled through the panes of glass, or I could give the black a respectful nod and continue with my day.  I continued the day by stitching and cooking.

Today marks the day my son's life was taken from him, from us.  The situation will always cause me to have some anger sliding along the black metal.  The panes of glass from his last six years on earth are dark.  I am thankful that most of my days in the last six months have lost the darkness of mourning.  Yes, I have bad moments.  His birthday was a hard day.  It began as black as night.  I prayed.  I baked his favorite cookies to take to school, peanut butter with chocolate chips.  The memories of his childhood brought a happy smile to my face, the sunlight filtered through casting a rainbow of colors in the air.

This holiday season I could easily keep my eyes on the metal.  I could dwell on the anger of Michel's death or the gaping hole of my husband being gone for another year or the state of the world.  Instead, I am going to be thankful for all my blessings.  I have tons of happy memories with Michel.  I have a loving husband who is providing for us and keeping the world a safer place to live.  I have two amazing kids who are standing by me in this crazy life.  Friends and family abound.  Projects literally are spilling out of my craft/writing room.  Okay, they are also in my bedroom closet and garage.  Uff da.

Life is a blessing.  My stained glass window is far from complete.  I plan on adding many more panes to the project.  I know more metal has to be added.  I fear the metal.  I try not to panic, but at the moment, the uncertainty of life is a prevalent part of my human condition.  I say a prayer and move from the darkness that tries to dull the colors.  I concentrate on the blessings.  The joy of my faith keeps the light pushing through to shine on me.

The Cabin

 I am writing this post with my cellphone sitting in a cabin in the woods.  Since my son died, I  only have felt like writing when I am quilting or gardening.   Once I leave the task, I loose my words.  Today the words remain.

I gave changed.  I will never be the same person I was before that terrible night November 27, 2020.  Quite frankly,  I don't know who I am or will become.   To find myself, I have retreated into my faith, quilting, and gardening.   I have kept the world at bay.  I do simple social outings with positive friends and family.  I  have tried to avoid news of any sort.  I  would love to hide completely in a cabin in the woods, but I know that isn't completely healthy.

I want to write my story eventually.   This fall I might begin or next week?  Who knows?  Time.  Time and healing in a quiet life is my goal.   Of course,  I feel the world coming closer as I become stronger.   

I love adventures.  Last year tested that love.  I feel the entire year was an adventure in the worst of humankind, including the suicide of my mother and the murder of my son.  Yes, I said murder.  Nothing was proven,  but my mother's heart knows.  This "adventure " I pray never happens again.   

The adventure of healing took many turns and still does.  I am adding the adventure of finding the new me, and I am enjoying the ride.  I have reaffirmed my relationship with God.   I have witnesses my strength.   I have clawed my way in courage to stay connected to people in my community when in the darkest moments I didn't want to leave my bedroom.   I am still a soldier, warrior, valkyrie.  

Unless I have a major shift in myself,  this summer I have dedicated to nature and fun.  I am spending as much time outside as possible either gardening,  painting,  hiking,  or kayaking.   Of course,  fire season may make it difficult, but time will tell.  Basically,  I will fill my days with faith, hope, and love.

I won't be giving up my writing.   I just don't know where I am going with this love of mine.  Again, time and healing will reveal the outcome with God pointing the way.

Blessings. 

Changing Focus

 

I feel so much joy this morning.  The clouds sweep through the valley with a purpose leaving a beautiful blue sky.  The temperature sores upward to dance in the forties.  The essence of who I am is changing.  How can it not after losing a son?  I have been told I will never be the same since Michel died.  But who am I going to let myself become?  In December, I felt I would be angry for life.  January brought the inevitable sadness.  I don’t want either of those things to be with me.  February has been a roller-coaster but mainly depression.

This past week, I thought about meaning and legacy.  Since about September, I have been working at finishing my mother’s legacy.  I dived deeper to runaway from my grief once Michel died.  I got a little angry that I was spending all this time finishing my mom’s stuff.  I need to be me, not her.  So, while I thought, I worked on a project that I started years ago.  I don’t know what it was going to be, so I decided on a baby blanket.  At the same time, I worked on one of her projects because I can’t waste all the material and half-finished things.  I can turn them into something.  That IS who I am.

Of course, I also thought of Michel.  Where is my relationship with him?  I have my mom in the quilting.  I have my dad in gardening, fishing, and the outdoors.  I have my father-in-law in my birdwatching.  What do I have with Michel? 

My emotions have been too big to face alone; yet, I haven’t wanted to burden my family and friends.  I know, I know.  They all want to help, but I didn’t want skewed thoughts from others who have their opinions of me and the situation.  I wanted someone outside of the circle.  COVID has made that very difficult.  Two weeks ago, I saw the clinic’s therapist who gave me a name of a therapist seeing people in person.  Because of both these amazing ladies, I have been able to open the well of feelings.  On Friday, my new, permanent therapist gave me the safety net to explore my life as a mother to Michel.  For now, I am feeling better.  I am sure I will have some relapses, but right now I am good.  Tired, but good.

While in my deep despair, I thought I would quilt for the rest of my life.  Hiding in my quilting room felt safe.  Now, I have been going out and about.  I knew and know I need to go through the motions.  I have been so busy.  Everyday I have something to do with friends and family.  I know they have been helping me immensely.  I have my stitch group, art people, sushi gang, game night kids, Bible study sisters, and my partner in crime who lives in the neighborhood.  I am so very blessed.  In the last two days though, I am getting ready to leave the quilt room.

No, I am not going far.  In fact, I am only turning my chair around and moving it a few inches to the computer.  I have started journaling again.  I am going to start working on my memories and other grief related ideas.  I am excited because it feels good.  It feels heathy to be back in front of the page.

I knew I would leave the room for gardening, but I am leaving the room next week.  Okay, I will if my surgery goes well tomorrow.  I have to go in for a biopsy.  If I have healed enough, I am going to tear apart the pantry.  The plan is to declutter, clean, and paint.  After that, I am going to tackle the living room entertainment area if the pantry goes well.  If not, I will hire it done.  By the end of March, those areas are going to look good so I can rest with that and hit the gardens, weather permitting.

Yes, I will continue to quilt.  My goal for the year is to finish up a total of 36 projects.  I have accomplished eleven.  I may not make the 36, but even with just the eleven, I have put a dent in the piles.  I do love the quilting.  I just don’t want to stay in the quilt room quite as much.  My focus needs to change.  I need to find the new me.

Here are the two projects I worked on last week.  I still have more sashing to go, quilting, and the border.  I may or may not get them finished up this coming week or two.  I will definitely post them when I do. 

Green

 

Green was the theme.

Last week, I enjoyed finishing up a quilt that I designed from a picture on Pinterest that I found.  I struggled with the green fabric.  I need to go look at the bolt to see what type of cotton blend it is and compare it to other fabrics.  I might be avoiding that type in the future.  The rest of the fabric came from Mom’s stash of strips of fabric.  I still really haven’t put a dent in that pile.  Luckily, I have found other Pinterest pictures to inspire me with other quilts.

 

When I found the top of my next quilting project, I was excited.  The shamrock material and St. Patrick’s Day theme convinced me that Mom was working on this for Kim.  I debated trying my hand at appliqué with the left over fabric I packed with the quilt face.  I worried thought that I would ruin the piece.  I found felt shamrocks.  I started sewing one onto the white block, but I hated the cheap look to the shamrock.  So, I played with stitching a shamrock.  It worked!!!  I loved the way it turned out.  My sister also likes it.  Yay!!!  I will send it to her later this month.

 

This week begins Lent.  I have a bunch of projects I want to do for our ministry at church, but I also want to hit Mom’s piles.  I am not sure I will get anything completed this week, but I will be busy sewing and crocheting for the ministry and Mom.

Wall Hangings

 

My blog seems to have morphed into a quilting blog instead of a hodge podge of all my interests.  I guess that is to be expected due to the nature of my life at the moment.  Last week as I quilted away, I experienced sadness and uncertainty.  I struggled with the loss of my son and faced a biopsy which I will know more about later this month.  The ups and downs of life are difficult but seem even more so during the winter months.

I am excited February arrived.  I am not a fan of this month, but it shows that January is behind me and spring is that much closer.  I am already excited about gardening season and warm weather.  Alas, I continue to fill my days with my mom’s project.

This last week, I worked on two of her wall hangings.  The only thing left on both of them was a little bit of quilting, blocking, and the binding, simple in many ways.  I still had a little to learn.

My mom must have loved to hand sew.  I am not a fan.  When I pulled out both of these projects, I groaned when I saw the hand sewing needles with thread attached to the material.  She was hand quilting both projects.  I might eventually do some hand quilting, but with all the work there is to do, I prefer fast and machine quilting.  I started with the Christmas wall hanging.  The middle block was almost done.  Just one small section needed to be hand stippled.  I did that up quickly to finish the block. 

I turned to the top and bottom blocks.  She had used a pencil to draw where she wanted all the stitching to be done.  On the top, she had crisscrossed lines.  Easy enough.  I finished that up in no time.  On the bottom block, she wanted parallel lines around the design, but stippling up close to the design.  The lines were no problem, but I didn’t want to do all that stippling by hand.  Really, I think it would have been silly.  Her machine does that stitch in two different ways.

I grabbed some throw away fabric to practice on.  The machine stitch was terrible!!!  No wonder she didn’t use this programmed stitch.  I hated it.  Now, over eighteen years ago, I tried stippling with a free motion foot on my machine that I had at the time.  I grabbed Mom’s free motion foot, switched the feet, and played.  The process came back like I did it yesterday.  I took a deep breath.  The first area went without a hitch.  Within about thirty minutes, I finished up the quilting.  Yay.  Now, I can see an issue or two in my work, but nothing that most people would notice.  I blocked the piece and put on the binding.  I am pretty happy with the results.  Oh, I had to hand wash the lines off the material where my mom drew because they could be seen.

 

The next project, I am sure Mom would be annoyed with how I finished it.  On the right and bottom, she chalked where she wanted to put the word WELCOME on the hanging.  I am sure she planned to appliqué the letters.  I am not ready to get to appliqué.  Besides, I think I want to keep this piece and didn’t want the words on the piece.  When I blocked the project, I just cut off the extra fabric.  I also had to wash off the markings. 

 

All in all, I am happy with both projects.  I relearned stippling.  I continue to marvel at how I approach sewing so differently than Mom.  Also, I prefer pins over stitches.  With the before picture of the birdhouse, the stitches to hold the front, middle, and back of the stitch had to be cleaned up.  I prefer using the quilting pins instead.  Of course, I have been quilting for less than a year.  Maybe when I hit Mom’s status, I will be doing this stitching thing too.