A book brought this all on. "Silver Boxes: The Gift of Encouragement" by Florence Littauer. It is full of ideas on how to encourage one another, and how it affects both the encourager and the encouraged. Wonderful book. Some of you might find it syrupy and fluffy, but I think that is because we aren't much given encouragement these days. Not nearly enough!
In my former life, when I was young, I was quite...obnoxious... in my faith and life view. I miss those days, when things were so positive and I felt the most grounded ever. But I kind of bulldozed people who stood in front of me with my... zeal. I was still human and prone to mistakes. Oh, I hurt some dear friends with my lack of maturity and understanding of actions and consequences!
My faith was real. IS real. founded in the love and encouragement of people around me, the prayers of people I barely remember. When I was too little to know better, I knew about heaven and hell, good and bad. I just knew. While my Grandma Maginity was teaching me the twenty-third psalm, and I was getting prizes from the "quiet box" at church, I knew with great depth and certainty about these things.
This was the time of life full of kittens and puppies and camping, family gatherings and laughter. This was also the time of the Vietnam "conflict" which was broadcast on the news nightly, with friends and family members and neighbors suffering losses and ungodly nightmares. As a child, I was terrified of sonic booms and jets flying over the house.
As a child, there were secrets to be kept, things to keep hidden. Shame. I was always looking for someone to like me, to approve of me, as a child.
A memory of riding to church in the church van. John Deemer took it on himself to get kids to church
Because my big sister went, I wanted to go to. So I did. It was Adelle Deemer who heard me quietly singing to myself on the way to church one morning. She took me under her wing and coached me to sing a pretty little song, sing it as a special. "Jewels" it was called. I still know it by heart. I can still hear her voice, and how she played piano. She twinkled the piano-there is no other way to describe it. And I can still hear Leo Putney, his giant deep voice saying AMEN when he didn't look like such a voice would come from him.
When I became a teenager, my values changed.
Oh, you can blame hormones for teenagers but there is still a brain attached to the person in question. It may be a mess inside, but still there! Church was something for old folks and children. I still went. Something to do outside of home, you know. But I had found a boy that I chased with single-minded determination. I don't know why. (At the same time, my now husband was chasing me, but I didn't quite see things the same way as he back then.) I ended up shanghaied to youth camp in 1977. I DID NOT want to go. But I am very, very glad I did.
My best friend after a bit, (she didn't like me at all at first!) introduced me to another author, Ann Keimel Anderson. I can hear her tiny voice on the cassette tapes we used to listen to, quietly singing "something beautiful, something good. All my confusion, He understood. All I had to offer Him was brokenness and strife...He's making something beautiful out of my life" Something Beautiful, Something Good by Bill Gaither
From this year forward, I was growing up. Not without making a total mess of things along the way.
Not all confetti is pretty. Sometimes it is overwhelming, obscuring the whole picture. You may have watched AFV, at the end when the winners are announced? Suddenly, CONFETTI!!!!!!!
This kind of confetti holds memories like these: The night of my Dad's open heart surgery, when I was on the phone all night with "that boy" because I was so SCARED! Going 800 miles away from home to start over, and ending up both times going with someone from Benzie County! Foiled! (By the way, it doesn't work. You can't leave who you are behind and start from scratch. You still are you.) My first wedding, getting married without planning ANYTHING. Like, where we were going to live, for instance. My daughter's birth. Nothing can compare to anything to do with my girl. She has been the most amazing life experience for me, and continues to fill me with joy as the adult she has become. The day my Dad died, thirteen years after the open heart surgery. The loss of my great uncle Ray by way of him being a good samaritan just at the wrong time. Family strife of all kinds over the years. The fading and then loss of my Mom. Marrying my old friend and neighbor who is such a good match to me. Coming home to the old house.
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| Mom and Dad on the left on their wedding day. |
Sometimes the confetti gets into uncomfortable places. That's life, right?
And in the light and darkness of things that were my life, God is there. Faith gives me reasons to open my eyes in the morning, to keep trying to live and work and be me. Hope give me reason not to go hide somewhere and keep the terrible news from coming in. Friends and family give me reason to believe in love and compassion and to hold on to the memories, both kinds. Light glitters off all the confetti of our lives. Maybe some of that light will catch someone who needs it and give them a reason to keep going for the day if not longer.
What makes up your confetti?
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