Nancy

The Art of Thankful Giving

November 9, 2017 by Nancy 10 Comments

As Thanksgiving arrives this year our gratitude for what we have seems to run deeper than ever before, doesn’t it? As we look at all the blessings God has placed in our hands, we come to the realization that thanks giving may not be enough. It is rather “thankful giving” that best expresses our gratitude.

I hope to carry this attitude of thankful giving beyond Thanksgiving all the way through the Christmas season this year. While our shopping and wrapping may be scaled down as we focus even more on what matters most, I’m still extremely grateful to have the means to give something to others—and to have others to receive what I give.

Billy Graham said, “God has given us two hands—one to receive with and the other to give with. We are not cisterns made for hoarding; we are channels made for sharing.”

The realization that He has chosen us to be such channels of giving is sometimes humbling and heartrending. One Christmas season my two oldest granddaughters saw princess outfits they loved at a store at the mall. The frilly dresses were ridiculously overpriced, but being the indulgent grandmother I can sometimes be, I went back a few days later and purchased both.

As I was writing out my check the tears started to well up in my eyes. By the time I grabbed my bulky package and left the store they were freely flowing. I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude that I was able to buy gifts for my granddaughters when I knew there were many grandmothers who weren’t able to do the same.

A friend of mine is haunted by a news report she saw. A grandmother in Afghanistan was lying on a dirt floor, too weak to get up and tend to her six grandchildren who sat on the floor around her—their parents unaccounted for. Only God can reconcile the disparity between that woman and those of us who will be able to purchase and wrap gifts for our children and grandchildren for Christmas this year. Certainly the love in her heart is no weaker than that in ours.

“Freely you have received; freely give,” Jesus said (Matthew 10:8 NIV). It truly is more blessed to give than to receive, and sharing what we have received with those we love may be the greatest form of gratitude. This year let’s make an attitude of thankful giving the invisible “add-on” to every package we wrap.

Time for Some Fall-da-ra!

October 16, 2017 by Nancy 26 Comments

I know the word is really folderol, or falderal, and means foolishness or nonsense. But when I used my version to describe a neighbor’s wonderful display of all things autumn at her house we both laughed—so I thought I’d spread the joy!

Actually fall decorations aren’t nonsense, they are delightful and meaningful. The most lavish displays of fall-da-ra I’ve seen in my lifetime are in East Tennessee. Visiting my home state in October, and driving through Pigeon Forge to Gatlinburg and on to Cades Cove in The Great Smoky Mountains National Park, I saw more pumpkins, scarecrows, dried cornstalks, decorative corn and gourds, hay bales and mums than I knew existed. Every street corner, business or residence has a fall display each year, and many rival a Macy’s window at Christmas time in terms of creativity and abundance.

So what motivates us to do this kind of fall decorating? Why do I have three tubs of fall decorations myself, and take great delight in setting out autumn leaves, pumpkins, and all things orange, red, and gold? The tradition actually has very deep roots. Anyone who has farmed or been around a farm knows the activity and celebration that accompanies the harvest season. Once all the hard work is done, the hay is baled and in the barn, the produce is picked and canned for winter, then it’s time to party!

Neighbors in farming communities still come together bringing fresh-baked apple pies and squash casseroles to share. Tables are decorated with mason-jar bouquets of the last blooms from the garden. There might even be a square dance to the tune of a fiddle or two—all under the glow of a big orange harvest moon. After all, in some areas of the country neighbors might not see one another again until the spring thaw. Time to celebrate!

As for the even more meaningful part, harvest is mentioned throughout the Bible. After the great flood detailed in Genesis, God promised Noah: “As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease” (Gen. 8:22). In Exodus 23:16, God named one of the three feasts He expected the Jewish people to celebrate the Feast of Harvest. “Celebrate the Feast of Harvest with the firstfruits of the crops you sow in your field,” He said.

As with most Biblical themes, the harvest is carried through from the Old Testament to the New Testament. So we read in Galatians 6:9: Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

Why have some fall-da-ra? To celebrate hard work completed—that we truly do reap what we sow. To acknowledge God’s abundant blessing in our lives and prepare for the upcoming season of Thanksgiving. To remind ourselves that it’s never too late to live a productive life from which others can glean something useful.

So pile up the pumpkins, make a centerpiece of multi-colored mums, light the spice-scented candles, set the cobbler on the counter to cool. It’s fall. Time for some fall-da-ra!

Grateful for the Golden Days

September 21, 2017 by Nancy 14 Comments

In places that experience a change of seasons it happens every fall. As the days grow shorter, they seem to take on a golden hue that bathes and blesses us. I don’t know how sunlight can change color, but it clearly does. These are the golden days, and we need to embrace them and bask in them before the snow flies.

Life has golden seasons, too, doesn’t it? Several couples we know are celebrating their 50th Anniversaries this fall. My husband and I are in a second marriage, so we laugh that we’ll have to be wheeled into the activities room in assisted living if we make it to our fiftieth celebration—we’ll be 90 and 91. “Look, honey! There’s a cake!” one of us might exclaim.

Which doesn’t mean we don’t appreciate that these are golden years for us, too–and we thank God for them. A recent tragedy experienced by close friends reminds us this could change any time. But as of today we both have our health, the time and inclination to engage in activities that bring us joy, and ministries that make life worth living. We have more family members geographically close than ever before, and we love getting to spend time with them. In our own way, these are our golden years, and we are glad we know it.

I find myself wondering how to spend these glorious, golden days of fall however. What could I do to celebrate all things golden besides binge watch episodes of “The Golden Girls”—which is never a completely bad idea by the way. Maybe I could buy some goldfish to entertain the cats. I’d love to go gallivanting with a litter of Golden Retriever puppies. Or pluck a golden pear from a tree. Or listen to a golden oldies station on the radio and reprise some dance moves from the 60’s and 70’s! Or better than all that, perhaps I should look for golden opportunities to make a positive difference in the world—even to live out the golden rule.

What about you? How will you celebrate these golden days of autumn? Even if life has thrown some crises your way, can you look for the golden aspects of each day? Can you find some time just to sit on a park bench and let the warm autumn sun reach down into your soul? A quote seen on Pinterest read, “These are days we dream about when the sunlight paints us gold.” Yes! The glorious days when the sunlight paints us gold. Let’s live them fully.

One Is Enough

August 28, 2017 by Nancy 18 Comments

Readers who follow my blog posts know that I wrote one in late June titled “Where Have All the Hummers Gone?” Except for one reader who joked that she thought I meant the behemoth, gas-guzzling vehicles, most wrote with sympathetic sentiments about my dearth of hummingbirds and sent helpful suggestions about how to attract some.

In this my last word on the hummingbird (well, for this season anyway), I’m happy to report that I have one! For three months I faithfully watched that forlorn feeder, changing the nectar often. I even tried different varieties of feeders, but no visitors arrived. Finally I saw the familiar, precious silhouette of a hummer early one morning in mid-July. I’m delighted to say that he (and I’m just assuming it’s a he) now visits in the first light of dawn each day. And I have learned to be ever so grateful.

Those of you who enjoy a plethora of hummers dipping, diving, and buzzing around your feeders may wonder how I could seem so content with just one, but it’s all a matter of perspective. Because he always arrives during my morning quiet time, it’s as if the Lord sends him as a special blessing on my day. One is enough to deliver this blessing. One is enough to bring me joy. One is enough.

And there are other lessons to be heard from hummingbirds. I had lunch with a friend a few weeks ago, a friend who lives in a canyon south of town by the mountains and has to fill her feeders several times a day. She commented that the rufous always comes around to chase all the other birds away from the feeder, but then never drinks himself! “Isn’t that just like people?” she mused. “We think we want what somebody else has, but we really don’t need it!”

Another friend texted to tell me her feeder on the west side was buzzing with nine hummers at once. I was pleasantly surprised by my reaction when I realized I wasn’t the least bit jealous! I could have been, but I wasn’t. Instead I was truly happy for her and relieved to know that at least hummingbirds were alive and well somewhere. Anyway, I have one. And one is enough.

Maybe part of my contentment comes because we had the opportunity to go up to the mountains twice this summer and I got to enjoy the hummingbirds there. Or maybe it’s just the old adage that “you don’t miss what you have until it’s gone” at play. I really missed having a lot of hummingbirds, so now I’m content with my one little buddy.

So drink deeply, tiny friend. My offering of nectar is all for you, and I’ll see you in the morning.

On Becoming a Mountain Mama

August 14, 2017 by Nancy 18 Comments

As of this month I’ve been a resident of Colorado for 40 years. As I thought about writing a blog about my transformation from a Tennessee girl to a Colorado mountain mama, I remembered a column I wrote for the Gazette on the occasion of my 20th Anniversary as a Coloradoan! So here it is again.

This month I’ve been a resident of Colorado for twenty years. Twenty falls gilded in aspen leaves. Twenty winters gazing at snow-covered mountains resembling pink cotton candy in the early morning light. Twenty summers of hot days under bright blue skies, and cool nights under a canopy of stars.

Although there’s nothing magical about the number twenty, it forces me to reconsider my status as a Tennessean just passing through. Tennessee will always be home. It only takes an instant to transport myself back to steamy Southern summers where the air is heady with honeysuckle as I sit on the back porch watching for the first lightning bugs to reveal their flight paths. Racing barefooted across the dewy grass to catch one of them in tiny, cupped hands is a memory every child should have.

Those are the summers of my youth, and I’ll always be able to recall them. But more and more frequently I find myself contemplating all I would miss if I couldn’t spend summer here in Colorado.

The Summer of ‘77, I didn’t care. I thought this was the most desolate place I had ever seen, and I couldn’t imagine being exiled here forever. The hot August winds blew through the house and threatened to blow the drapes right off their rods, so I closed the windows. Then, since there was no air-conditioning, I was just sure we would all suffocate.

But soon the fields around our house were full of Black-eyed Susans as far as I could see. I remember walking the dog through those fields and feeling like I was part of a movie set. Just that simply, the twenty-year courtship began.

As if to entice me into declaring Colorado my home state, the Summer of ’97 is especially enchanting. Due to generous spring snows, the roadsides are greener than I’ve ever seen them. On a June road trip, we saw fields of yucca so plush it looked like a marching band in plumed hats was parading toward us. We drove past newborn foals frolicking behind their mothers and sheep lounging in beds of wildflowers.

I think we all come to love what we know. It occurs to me that I know Colorado. I know things like where to buy night crawlers in Cotapaxi or copper pots in Frisco. I know where the picnic tables are on our favorite ski slopes, and due to Colorado’s coquettish, unpredictable weather, I know I’m as likely to be able to picnic there in February as in July.

More than anything, I’ve come to know and love these ever-changing mountains. I’ve seen the “purple mountain majesties” Katharine Lee Bates immortalized when she penned “America the Beautiful” from Pikes Peak. I’ve seen it “raining fire in the sky” in the Western sunset John Denver sings about in “Rocky Mountain High.”

Recently a young buck with fuzzy antlers chose to laze away his afternoon in our back yard. On assignment at an office building on the north end of Colorado Springs, I gazed out the window as a baby fawn on wobbly legs cavorted behind her mother. As I write this, two hummingbirds are vying for position at the feeder at my office window.

Great show, Colorado! It’s taken twenty years, but I’m ready to profess my love for you. Now I officially have two home states. If home is where your heart is, then this feels a lot like home.

May I just add, this is how much I love you, Colorado—times two now that we’ve been together 40 years!

Family Ties

July 30, 2017 by Nancy 24 Comments

Mid-summer brings farmers’ markets, and I can’t visit one without looking for the freshest green beans I can find. Not just because I love fresh green beans, but because of the memory of close family ties they always invoke.

A memory I have of my grandmother feels as if it happened only yesterday. She is sitting on our screened-in back porch with a big silver bowl in her lap and a big brown bag of what we call “string beans” in Tennessee on the table beside her. I am 12, and as I watch her snap, snap, snap I’m lulled by the rhythm of her pace and mesmerized by the sight of her gnarled 90-year-old fingers as she works. The method she used until it was second nature, and which is now second nature to me, involves snapping off each end, peeling down the string, flipping the bean around and giving two quick snaps between your thumb and forefinger. Snap…snap…zip, snap, snap. That’s the string bean symphony.

I remember wondering if the bowl fit perfectly in her lap because it was made to do so, or if her lap had just molded to the shape of the bowl over the years.

On those hot summer afternoons I had my best talks with Granny as I watched her snap. I would occasionally ask a question, knowing it could be quite a few more snaps before I got an answer. My questions were both trivial and monumental, but her answers always seemed profound and comforting.

My grandmother died two days after suffering a stroke on her 90th birthday. Through the years, each time I sit down with a bag of beans to snap I feel tremendously comforted and reassured that everything will be okay. It gives me a feeling of connection that transcends time and location. When my first granddaughter was two and visiting with us, I encouraged her to snap string beans with me. After snapping off each end, I handed the bean to her and told her to break it into little pieces, never dreaming she’d be able to do so without help. Her chubby little hands tightened down on the bean and she twisted it until it snapped. “Ouch!” she said, as if the snapping noise indicated the bean had been hurt. I handed her another bean. “Ouch…ouch,” she exclaimed as she gave it two perfect snaps.

The tears in my eyes as I watched her caught me by surprise. Now a new generation was snapping beans. Ninety-year-old, gnarled fingers…two-year-old, pink, chubby ones…we were all connected. The strings that hold us together can be as simple, and strong, and purposeful as those on the beans. With a lot of “ouch” when they break.

In his book Growing Wise in Family Life, Chuck Swindoll writes, “I know of no realm of life that can provide more companionship in a lonely world or greater feelings of security and purpose in chaotic times than the close ties of a family.” In Psalm 68:6 (NIV) we read, “God sets the lonely in families.” In the day in which we live families are greater gifts than ever. Encourage those you love to remember their family ties and draw strength from them.

If this sounds familiar that’s because it is excerpted in part from my first Back Porch Break newspaper column in 1995! Hope it still brings a smile or a tear–the good kind!