Finding Strength & Peace

When Mom was diagnosed with ALS, we were devastated. We knew she'd been given a death sentence, and I was grasping for something to hold onto as it felt like I was sinking into a black hole. The day after her diagnosis, I started looking up verses in the Bible that might help us through this difficult time. As I found them, I wrote them on oval-shaped note pad papers and began taping them all over the house to remind us that we didn't face this disease alone. 

Mom told me those verses helped her more than anything else, so I wanted to share them:

God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way, and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, [or though ALS visits our household]. Psalm 46:1-2

Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken, nor my covenant of peace be removed. Isaiah 54:10

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:6-7

Jesus said, 'Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. John 14:27

Perfect love drives out fear. I John 4:18b

He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust. He will cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you will find refuge; His faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. You will not fear the terror of the night. Psalm 91:1-5a

The Lord said, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' For when I am weak, then I am strong. [The Apostle Paul speaking] II Corinthians 12:9-10b

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Matthew 11:28-30

Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, if anything is excellent or praise-worthy, think about such things. Put in practice what you learned in scripture, and the God of peace will be with you. Philippians 4:8-9

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-- and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-- not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Ephesians 2:3-10

'Because she loves me,' says the Lord, 'I will rescue her; I will protect her, for she acknowledges my name. She will call upon me, and I will answer her; I will be with her in trouble, I will deliver her and honor her. With long life will I satisfy her and show her my salvation.' Psalm 91:14-16

And I added a few verses of my own:

We love you more than words can say, Momma, and we're with you every step of the way. I Family 1:1

We want to help you in any way we can, but remember, we're not good at reading minds, and sometimes we're downright dense, so please tell us what we can do for you; talk to us; let us be strong for you once (and a thousand times). I Family 1:2-3

We prayed for healing, but God chose not to miraculously heal Momma in her earthly body. After she lost her ability to speak, I would dream about Mom talking and wondered if God was still going to do something amazing like restore her speech or make her walk again. But He chose not to. So my prayers shifted to ask for strength and wisdom for Dad and me to help Mom with each new challenge the disease presented, and God did answer those prayers. And He gave us a peace within the midst of the storm.

 

The next few posts will share some of the ways and resources we used to help meet Mom's needs along the way.

Necessities vs. Luxuries

Going through periods of waning finances is a good time to stop and think about what is necessary in life versus what is not necessary. I've noticed many in my generation and younger have a difficult time recognizing the difference between the two.

This article will refer to them as necessities and luxuries.

Necessity: noun. an indispensable thing.
                                [indispensable is an adjective meaning absolutely necessary].

Luxury: noun. an inessential, desirable thing.
                             [inessential is an adjective meaning not absolutely necessary].

Many would say there are only four basic necessities of life (air, water, food, shelter), but that only applies to Tarzan.

Johnny Weissmuller as Tarzan; TomSoter.com

After all of an hour thinking about this, the following is my list of necessities in our day (in no particular order after the first nine):

• God [for many of us, but you have the freedom to not believe if you so choose]
• clean air
• clean water 
• food 
• clothing 
• shelter 
• love 
• knowledge 
• wisdom 
• energy/fuel
• companionship/family/friends  
• basic tools for building, repair & maintenance  
• patience
• means of supporting one's family or one's self
• gumption 

Acquiring these necessities are as varied as there are people. And I'm sure some of your necessities are different than mine, but most are indisputable. 

Examples of luxuries (in no particular order, and there are MANY more than these):

• manicure and/or pedicure
• shopping at a convenience store
• eating and/or drinking out 
• beauty or barber shop visit
• retail shopping
• entertaining in or out 
• liquor, cigarettes 
• vacation
• lawn service
• a new anything
• bottled water
• processed foods;  precut fruits and vegetables
• gym membership
• exercise equipment
• landscaped yard and lots of grass that needs watering
• a bigger house than one can afford
• more vehicle(s) than one can afford
• a university degree with huge loan debt
• impatience
• financing anything with a credit card or payday loan
• buying something unnecessary only because it was on sale

Examples of wrong priorities:

• Overheard in the workplace how broke someone was, then seeing that same person eating out with her children
• Choosing to spend a paycheck to pay for their child's birthday gifts and a party in a restaurant for her and her friends instead of getting their car back on the road by renewing its license and inspection sticker
• Impatiently applying for a $40,000 home improvement loan at an interest rate of 15%*
• Skipping out on the first three weeks of school to earn money for an expensive pair of tennis shoes to wear to school
• Paying more for a vehicle than the mobile home one lives in*
• Not using a budget and hoping for the best at the end of the month*
• A father re-selling a new refrigerator donated to his family so he could take them camping one weekend
• Spending money on entertainment instead of the rent or utility bills
• Getting one's nails done and hair frosted instead of buying tennis shoes for one's child so he could play sports at recess without getting blisters on his feet
• A divorced mother trying to maintain the same previous lifestyle for her sons, and losing their house in the process
• Paying on student loans for months instead of the mortgage payments

A precious lady who's gone on to be with the Lord some years ago told us about her husband selling their ranch unbeknownst to her, and they found him dead of natural causes the day he received payment for it. Unfortunately, they never found the money, and she was left penniless. Those tragedies would completely devastate and paralyze just about anyone, but not her. She found a job as a dorm mother at a college, where she worked for years to support herself and her son. She was the poster lady for 'where there's a will, there's a way.'

When the finances are good, we don't have to spend as much time questioning if something is a necessity or luxury as long as we are living within our means. I'm grateful to have family and friends who would help me out if I found myself in dire straits, but I also have a plan to downsize to living in a camper trailer if I find myself unable to earn enough money to support myself in a regular house. Or I can do what Elizabeth did and find a job that provides room and board. But the most important necessity I have will shelter me in the shadow of His wings, and that's the best place for me to be. 

*Personal experience

This One's Juusst Right

In the first two years of our married life, we lived in a one-bedroom bachelor-pad trailer house. We had to put the crib for baby #1 in the dining room, and by time I was expecting baby #2, we knew we had to make some more room.

Since the trailer was well built and included copper wiring, we decided to add on more space to it. And since it contained a perfectly good kitchen and bathroom, which are normally the most expensive rooms, we decided to primarily add space. I designed a brand-new outside of the house that completely enclosed the trailer house. The new space included a great room, a dining room, an extra bedroom and bath, office, and a screened-in back porch. We turned the old living room into a master bedroom, and I discovered a shower stall behind the paneling at the back of the fancy bar in the corner we didn't use. The previous owner had taken out an existing bathroom and enlarged the living room, so it was easy to convert it back into a small bathroom for our master bedroom.

We opened up an eighteen foot span in the side of the trailer adjacent to the great room we'd added on. The living room ceilings were 16' high with huge wooden beams and clerestory windows. Our builder, Pete Gonzales, kept telling me he wasn't a mason, but he built the most beautiful fireplace I've ever seen. I designed it as a right-angled triangle that stood between the dining and living rooms. It went all the way to the ceiling, creating rock walls on the back two sides. People who weren't familiar with our previous abode had no idea a trailer house was anywhere near our new-looking home.

We had more than doubled the size of our modest home, and it more than doubled the workload, too. I loved our newish home, but it soon turned into a huge source of frustration for me because I hadn't developed good habits when it came to keeping it clean and uncluttered. I never considered that when I was having so much fun designing it.

The new addition after we took the trailer house out; 

I'm sure I broke every architecture rule in the book, but we loved our house

Seventeen years later, we took the trailer house part out and built a new kitchen, dining room, master bedroom, bedroom, two bathrooms with walk-in closets, a large utility room, front porch, and carport. That added on another thousand square feet. I loved this house, too, but keeping it clean was still such a chore.

In the last remodeling effort, I used tin buckets to make the three porch lights to run along the long front porch; I punched different designs in each one of them and mounted them with  inexpensive ceramic light fixtures inside.

I now live in a house that's thirteen hundred square feet smaller than that last house I designed, and this one is a perfect fit. When the bigger house took most of the day to clean, it takes less than three hours to clean this one top to bottom. And I can do all the floors-- vacuum, steam-mop, and wax in an hour! I don't dread housework anymore. I have to say that it makes a world of difference to have the right tools, too, and the most expensive isn't necessarily the best.

Our front porch

My parents and I combined two households to move in together, so we both had to get rid of a lot of stuff. And the only problem we've struggled with is keeping the clutter at bay. One of the handiest features about this property has been the attic above the garage, which we use regularly.

Sometimes our eyes get bigger than our common sense when it comes to buying or building a house. Space is nice, but we also need to consider the cost of running and maintaining a larger place. And if we haven't acquired good cleaning habits in a smaller home, they don't magically appear when moving into a larger one. So when planning to upsize, plan on adjusting to the upsized workload, too. Develop those good habits beforehand, and maintaining your bigger house won't turn into a millstone around your neck.

Show & Tell

I have always been a bit introverted, except for around my family and close friends; I cut up as much as the rest of them. But in social and public environments I tend to feel uncomfortable and awkward.  I remember years ago in middle and high school wanting to be noticed and at the same time, not wanting to be noticed.

But even further back to my 3rd grade class, I always wanted to share on Show and Tell Friday but rarely remembered to bring something. My longing reached a tipping point one particular S&T day, and I looked around my desk and meager belongings to find something to show and tell about. I had a small pencil eraser that had come out of the end of a pencil, and I must've previously played around with it-- covering it with pencil lead and rolling it on paper, which made a track of gray like a printer. I decided I would share that marvelous discovery. So when the teacher asked if anyone had anything to share, I raised my hand.

I still cringe when I think about getting up and showing the class that little pencil eraser and what little it could do on paper. So desperate for attention, and getting it in a pitiful way. I don't remember the other students making fun of me or deriding me for presenting something so lame, in fact, some of them seemed truly interested. But I've never forgotten it, and I use the memory to remind myself today that I'd better not be posting lame stuff just to be posting something for show and tell. I don't want to waste people's time with useless words.

I do realize that one of the reasons I now write is to make connections with people, and writing is a very comfortable way for an introvert to do that. At the same time I am cognizant of my aversion to social settings and the strong desire to live in an isolated, emotional cave away from people, so I am attempting to improve those unhealthy areas of my life.

Writing also helps me sort out my thoughts, learn new ideas, change or crystalize my beliefs, and vent. But these days I find myself reserved about sharing my posts, and it's difficult for me to do any kind of self-promoting, which a writer has to do if one wants to sell one's written wares. A constant struggle for me. But I can promise you today that the stories in my novels and posts on my blogs are not empty show and tell efforts. I have the haunting memory of a pencil eraser to thank for that.

Give Blood - A No-Cost Way to Donate

When I was working in a school district, the Blood Bank bus visited one or more of our campuses several times a year, so it was easy for employees to occasionally donate since they came to us. But since I've been working at home, it was harder for me to remember to donate blood.

Last year I learned that the Blood Bank comes to my hometown two days every eight weeks at two locations in my hometown, so it's been easy to get into a routine of donating blood with them. If I can't make it one day, I can go the next.

I'm currently living off of my savings, and I need it to last as long as possible so I've really had to watch my spending. But giving blood is a great way for me to contribute something important without affecting my savings.

It's a part of my calendar now.

Burning Money

Over $15,000 is the average amount of credit card debt in the American households that have debt. Michael, from BusinessInsider.com figures if a person carries that amount of credit card debt, paying an average current rate of 12.83% over a period of 40 years, they would pay the credit card companies over 2.6 million dollars. Did you get that? 2.6 MILLION dollars!! In interest, which means one has nothing to show for spending 2.6 MILLION dollars. 

Think of what you could buy for 2.6 million dollars:

• A house, paid for. 
• Several vehicles, paid for. 
• College degrees for your children, paid for. 
• Nice vacations, paid for.
• A very comfortable retirement, paid for. 

If people turned around and saved the same amount of money burned up in interest payments, they would be millionaires by the time they retired. 

But no, we've trained ourselves to satisfy our every want, on credit, with little thought to how much money we are throwing away in interest due to our impatience and greed.

In the early years of my marriage, my husband and I paid over 15% interest on a $40,000 home improvement loan. We refused to think about how much money we paid to the bank each year due to our inability to wait until interest rates dropped dramatically or until we saved enough money to pay cash. We thought everyone operated this way, that living with debt was normal behavior. And based on our government's modus operandi and example for us to follow, that's the dysfunctional truth.

I never had $15,000 debt on my credit cards, but I did my fair share of interest payments and late fees and even bank overdraft charges in my younger years because I was ignorant about managing my personal finances. And I wasn't disciplined enough to change my sloppy ways until it finally dawned on me how much money I was throwing away every year.

One of the few people in the media promoting debt free living is Dave Ramsey, and it's exciting to listen on the radio when a person or couple calls in to do their debt free scream. I hope to be able to do that one day. Ramsey is a rare voice of sanity and self-control in our out-of-control, over-indulged culture.

Today, I use one credit card to earn travel miles, and I pay it off at the end of each month. Credit card companies are the modern day loan sharks, and they're laughing all the way to the bank as they prey on folks' ignorance and weaknesses.

Keep sweeping

I remember as a young mother driving down a street of very small and humble houses. I saw a woman sweeping the porch of one house and wondered what motivated her to do that. Did someone tell her to sweep the porch? Did she sweep the porch on certain days? Did she sweep the porch only when she noticed it needed sweeping?

My house and porches and carport at that time were big, and it was easy to get behind when it came to keeping it all swept clean. My biggest motivation for cleaning occurred when company was coming, and I felt guilty that I didn't give my family the same consideration on a regular basis. They deserved better than that.

It's taken me years, but I've finally learned to pick a time to clean the floors, which I do once a week unless we've been extra messy, and then I'll use a whisk broom and dustpan in-between times. Tomorrow morning, I'll vacuum the hardwood floors and rugs and then steam-clean the hardwood floors, (for which I gladly abandoned the mop for a light-weight steam cleaner). With the size of our house now, I can get it done in an hour. The porches take about fifteen minutes. And it feels so good to walk on clean floors for a while. Then I don't give it another thought until next week.

Have you ever watched an archeological dig on television? How did entire structures and civilizations get buried over time? I've decided that somebody got behind on their sweeping.