I Could Lift You Up, I Could Show You What You Wanna See And Take You Where You Wanna Be

Why yes, I did steal my title from the Capital Cities song "Safe and Sound," thank you for noticing.

If you know me, then you know I like to make things spiritual. Because well, when you choose to be fearful and ridiculous all you do it give power to the dark side and just pave a few more miles of that road to hell. Just saying. I mean, it's far more positive to challenge someone's perspective on a song or a book or a random incident in life than it is to tell them flat out that they are wrong and stand in judgement of their (sometimes poor taste) in music, shows or life choices. 

Safe and Sound is one of those songs that you can not help but like. It first came on my radar at the beginning of this hard season. It is on my Uplifter playlist on YouTube. My son loves it and loves to dance to it. Lyrically, it's one of those songs that when you are between a rock and a hard place that helps you catch that breath and that ray of light that gives you hope. Or maybe that is just me. 

I do want to inspire people. I don't consciously want people to look at me and say that because of me they didn't give up but I have had the pleasure of being told that before. See, where I have just been living life, I seem to have been doing it in such a way that it blips on other people's radar and they want to acknowledge. When I was a young single mom, working and going to school and juggling all the balls, it was just life to me. I never thought of it as a mission or a ministry or anything more than getting by but other people saw a light there that they needed. It made me who I am today and that perspective has enabled to pour into others.

Good ol' American boot-strapping and misguided whatever you want to call it has us all being such rugged individuals that we do things to the exclusion of the inclusiveness that we desire. I may never be the Queen of the Universe as I once planned to be but two fantastic kids call me "Mom." All the money and toys in the world can never replace relationship. The biggest treasure in the world is relationship...with God, with family, with friends, with people. There are so many people in my life that I pray could be released from the bondage of the self-centeredness that has them careening off the rails like a crazy train. 

I could lift you up. You could lift me up. We can pour into each other and get through this life and onto the next. 

I just gotta remember...it's not all about me.

#TBT Kindness in giving creates love.: My obession with provision...

Once upon a time, I blogged under a different title. Not so long ago, I wrote a little post called,"My Obsession With Provision." It's a good little post but then I am a bit biased. A lot has happened since I wrote the post on August 11, 2013...life is in a place that I could have never imagined it would be right. Thankfully, I am still obsessed with provision and have been blessed during these trials. God operates on a just in time inventory basis, so if you are still waiting, wondering have faith. It has been my experience that you get just what you need, just when you need it. 

So without further adieu....

Kindness in giving creates love.: My obession with provision...: If you read the last post you will know that I quit my job. Honestly, I had thought about calling this post "No Applause, Just Send ...

My (New) Peanut Butter Obsession

Sometimes, I have odds and ends in my cupboard that I don't know what to do with them. Recently, it was nutritional yeast. 

It wasn't so much that I wanted to get rid of it. I wanted to find new ways to use it and incorporate into my food choices. I know, I am weird that way. 

Behold the power of peanut butter! 

Two parts peanut butter

One part honey

Nutritional Yeast enough to stiffen the dough

Roll in to balls. Eat. 

Yep, it's that easy. 

Mmmmmm, and oh soo tasty!

 

I can't take all the credit. I found this and a bunch of other tasty recipes on Southern Breast Feeding Support.

Passwords so secure I can't even remember them...

I should do this. I really should.

I don't have a huge problem with passwords except on a couple of sites so I know it is not a user failure. Because let's be honest most of us have a small repertoire of passwords that we rotate through depending on the site requirements. I am no exception to that. So when I get a repeated log in failure it upsets me.

I don't know why. I guess I just expect that things will work. I literally have to reset my password every time I try to log on to one site. I haven't logged into my insurance account in months because it keeps telling me that I don't know my password or who the best man was at my wedding.

Hal has become self-aware and he's a major doucher to boot.

Wonderful.

With my technological luck lately when everything moves to biometrics I'll still be denied.

Ain't technology grand?

In the shuffling madness...

...I was going to call this something like "It has been one week since my last post" but that is not nearly as cool as a Jethro Tull reference.

I have just had so much going on that it has been difficult for me to get into any good writing schedule. Well, blogging schedule because I have written a fair amount of FMEO material lately but being able to plan and post for blog purposes has been a challenge. I don't think it is an accident that when I was trying to think of a cool title that reflected the whirlwind like atmosphere of the past few weeks that this line from "Locomotive Breath" popped into my head.

From "Oceans" to "Locomotive Breath", how does that happen?! My brain is full of entirely too many song lyrics for one. But for two, it's kind of an appropriate song to the way I feel about my life at certain times. After all the whole song is about a guy's life falling apart, not that mine is quite there but I have my moments.

We all do, don't we? A stumble, a roadblock, a detour. It can be frustrating. In my moments today, when I felt overwhelmed with feelings about the circumstances in my life, I left my house and went and hid in plain sight where I had a long conversation with God. It helps a lot. I remind God that I am a spaz sometimes and He reminds me that He's got my back. Always has. Always will.

In the shuffling madness...things get shaken loose. Sometimes good, sometimes bad, sometimes just annoyingly and incessantly. How I react (or don't) is up to me and tonight I choose to thank God for the blessing of my day and to go to sleep secure in the knowledge that the only train wreck in my life is my imagination which is already starting to formulate a locomotive themed playlist.

I am not the little engine that woulda, coulda, shoulda. I am the little engine that will. I will survive the shuffling madness and I will enjoy the ride.

Oceans (Where Feet May Fail): Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Learn to Trust the Lord.

This post has been rattling in my head for the better part of a month now. It's not writer's block that is the problem. Quite the opposite, I am overflowing with things to say right now and I just haven't known where to start or how exactly to finish.

I am without a doubt in a very hard season of my life. A bit like free-falling from 24,000 feet without a parachute. A little out of touch. A little insane but with no choice but to deal with the pain. No choice but to keep moving forward and keep my eyes fixed on God. It's hard to keep your eyes on anything at this velocity. It's hard to not be consumed by the world and pretend that it is progress.

Ah, the world...but I digress.

The full gory TMZ edition of what is happening right now is irrelevant. As is anyone's opinions about what I ought to and what I shouldn't and if it was you what you would do. I am doing exactly what has been laid on my heart. The path of this season is between me and God. Not that I saw it that way at first. Quite the opposite, and unfortunately it was a hard-knocks lesson in what happens when you give the devil a foothold that broke me. God's got my back. Always has. It's a shame it took me 38 years to truly realize the magnitude of His grace and love. Thankfully, He still has that open door policy.

I first heard "Oceans" back in January, maybe the beginning of February, at the house church group that I am a part of. I probably played the song on YouTube a million times that night and through the next week. The song so succinctly spoke to me and how I had been feeling about the circumstances in my life. Especially this:

Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders
Let me walk upon the waters
Wherever You would call me
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander
And my faith will be made stronger
In the presence of my Savior

After my initial obsessive playings of the song, I would hear it from time to time. Then, one morning at church, it just happened to be on the rotation. I could not even sing, all I could do is cry. It was all hitting me that deeply, that profoundly. See, because in this season of my life, I have had my third eye squeegied to the extent of how true the lines,"Where feet may fail and fear surrounds me
You've never failed and You won't start now" I have come to overcome my Peter-like tendencies (mostly).

I have always been a bit of a doubter. A skeptic. A know-it-all pain in you know where. Not now. So many things in my life right now have nothing to do with me. I did nothing...seriously nothing...to connect the dots. Okay, maybe I prayed but on a human level I had exhausted all possibilities. I have reached a level of surrender that I wish I could share with the one person who has diligently prayed for me to surrender for the past several years.

My faith has been made stronger. I have seriously had days where the magnitude of my blessings have had me nearly in tears. I have had days where there was nothing humanly I could do and yet God provided. I have managed in the last 6 months to live in the light and be free and I am so thankful for God's grace that I even after years of being less than I can still come to him and be forgiven.

Everyday is different but God is faithful.

You truly do get just what you need when you need it but you have got to surrender. I guess I just happened to be one of those hard cases and God needed to apply a little tough love. I am good with that because being in a place where I wake up every morning and thank God for the day and for giving me the opportunity to let His light shine through me is far more valuable than anything I thought I was pursuing. To be able to come to a place where the prayer,"Father, glorify yourself" covers more bases than my laundry list of human wants is to come further than I ever knew was possible.
To truly let go of everything you thought to be true and trust wholeheartedly in God...scary, yes...but oh so rewarding. I rarely get wrapped up in worry anymore but when I do I am able to take it to the cross. I am sure to people who have known me for a longtime it might seem that some sort of medication is in order BUT to steal a line from Beth Moore (minus the endearing drawl)...There is no high like the Most High.


After all, if God is for us, who could be against us?

What I can't put into words...

...I usually put into music. Someone else's music, because I sir am no songstress.

I am sitting here tonight. It is currently 11:56pm. In four minutes, it will be April 1.

April 1 always brings this song to mind.
I wore this cassette out. Yes, I said cassette.

Anyway.

Ironically, this song popped into my head before I realized that tomorrow was the first. Nothing like disturbing pictures on the internet to send my monkey-mind reeling through the musical archives of my brain. I would show you the picture but I would prefer not to have to see it again. It's not grotesque or pornographic or sensational or anything you would problem expect to see if someone said they saw disturbing pictures on the internet.

It's just sad and it specifically brought the following lyrics to mind:

Night driving without headlight
Wearin' sunglasses too
Lookin' good but sure don't feel right
Anything to be cool

I was cool once for about half a minute. I think it was a Thursday. Turns out it way better to just be myself. Not to mention way easier!

So, I am going to take that sad image of the sad character in the trite tableau of decay and pray. It's all I can do...until Dr. Phil returns my phone calls. No, seriously, some days, no fooling the only thing you or me or anyone can do it turn it over to God. Just let it go and believe in the promises.

With friends who have studied typography who needs enemies ;-)

For Alice--

Is this better?

Lylas,
Jen

What is My Whole Bohemia?

The phenomenon of misheard lyrics. I heart "The Lady is a Tramp" particularly the Ella Fitzgerald rendition. I am talking like, I used to sit in my room in high school singing into a broom handle in my own weird teenaged torch song. Couple that with other people's having labeled me as "bohemian" or similarly throughout my life, well...

Okay, so I for the longest, longest time thought that the lyric was "my whole bohemia is the place to be" but APPARENTLY the lyric is "my hobohemia is the place to be" Curse my not being born in the 30s. (1930s for those reading this in the future.)

I had stopped my old blog because my best friend had issues. Legitimate issues and out of respect, I ceased publication. It was for the best anyway, my old blog was too narrowly titled for me to really do what I wanted to do. I always felt bound by the title.

My Whole Bohemia seemed perfect. It encapsulates everything. I could blog about anything and everything under this title. I could talk about my husband's band, my daughter's baking, my son's shenanigans and what ever else I would want to ever write about.

Plus, really, it is a pretty cool title.

Life has happened in the meantime and I have let my ass get kicked by it.

Throwing up a big whatever and moving forward. After all, who am I to play small?

My Whole Bohemia is my life...warts and all. I have a lot to say and I know there are people who are interested. I regret that I got bogged down elsewhere and kinda dropped the ball.

This will be sporadic at first because I work when I can and I have a ton of other balls in the air. Although, I am getting better at understand how to use my phone despite my old age, so maybe it will be more regular than I am.

I don't know.

I just know I need to do this.

It makes me happy.