Thursday was my day off.

I got some fertilizer and topsoil and started some flowers and some greenery in my front yard.
I felt, a little like, "This Old House". Trying to renew the front yard of my new and precious home.
My camera woman documented everything that I did. What I am thinking about doing and how we placed the first 4 green ground cover, in their place. She was fastidious to include my every word of design desires and to put the camera right in my throat as I thought out my plan.
I want a small path of cement blocks leading from the side to the front patio. I want a simulation botanical garden in the backyard, with a path to nowhere. Elephant ears and shady areas to make preparation for the possibility of young couples being established and place for them to sneak away and show eachother secret affections. I hope that they will establish their nests, in my yard. Both, my children and young birds. Maybe, I will be able to establish an aviary and grow my own finches and such.
I do want puppies and bunnies, in a little cage, out my back door. Ginger and snap are doing well, but peachypoo, seems to have succumbed to a fever from the cold and snowfall, unexpected that we had. I do miss her. She was so beautiful and ostentatious. She had no inhibitions to show her plumes in or outdoors. I am glad we photographed her, but, I will attempt to do CPR on her, in the yard in the Springtime.

They had strawberry plants and blueberry trees, at Lowes, which I was eyeballing, desirously. Maybe, I will be able to include them in my investments to my yard. I needn't write it down, because, my understudies are listening and taping my everyword, those girls. My Evvy has the camera, in my mouth, even when there is no camera. What a great reminder that this is to me, that what I do, they will imitate. Grandma Ruth used to say "Pete and repeat". That meant, a child is in the room and they are sure to hear and reiterate the sentence in the wrong context. We were so often Pete and we were certainly repeat.
Lord, help me to say and do good things for them to imitate. I am so often forgetful of my young understudies. Amen.

I believe a daughter's place is doting on her Daddy!

You only have one daddy!
You girls are blessed with a merciful and kind daddy. Please don't miss this time, when God hasn't snatched you away to another man, to be kind to your daddy. The gleam in my fathers eyes when he opened a card that had a dollar in it, was priceless. He could put on that glance in a moment. It was addictive to hear him say, this is a good cup of coffee, or this is a great meal. "Indian burns!" was my absolute favorite. You are learning skills of love that are best groomed, nowhere else. Natural affections of real tolerance, overlooking faults and love are brewed in the kettle of the family. Learning to make his favorite, biscuits and grits or mac and cheese, is real love. Don't miss this.

Sojourner Truth

A woman of wisdom and honor and truth was Sojourner.
A Black effective abolitionist and a woman. Using her godly and god honoring influence to effect policy in America.Wikipedia article...

A woman theologian?

Poetess, encourager and woman of the Word.
Phyllis!Wikipedia article of Phyllis

reading and thinking cannot be abolished, The impossible dream of being a woman and a writer, in a day when it was against the law for slaves to be taught or to read. Amazing accomplishments, for that day,were hers.

What are we learning from the role of women in the movies, ladies?

Lessons of femininity from the women of the 1930’s and 40’s. Last night’s movie was replete with convictions of the role of women and how it has changed the world. We are in 2010 and there are so many freedoms that we enjoy, but do we allow the freedoms that we enjoy take precedence over the simplicity of relating to one another. The thought that complete strangers would talk through an entire train ride about nothing, is completely gone from our culture. Cell phones and video contraptions keep us mesmerized on such trips and we do not talk to one another or get to know one another unless absolutely necessary. What kind of community is built upon the iPod and the cell phone. We choose who to speak to on the buses and trains.
The beauty and the simplicity of admiring the creation of God in the people around us and with us as we travel outside our sphere is lost. I never see the whole movie, because it hurts to see the decline of communication. It hurts to see the decline of human consideration. It hurts to see the decrease in the skills that make it possible to go the long haul with one another. Instructing and injecting those skills of tolerance and compromise into our young people is a job and a trust. How can I learn what I have not seen? How can I instruct what I have not practiced? Lessons in the stories in the old days are helpful.
Perhaps the mans’ job of preaching and teaching is paralleled in the job of the woman to protect and preserve human graces that lead to peace and peace loving. Are we learning to be Daughters of Eve or daughters of the serpent?

Did I tell you that my mommy sewed those coats we had on.

I remember my mommy being able to work that old Singer sewing machine and making the coats that we wore for Easter, at Aunt Jackie's house. We didn't go to see Aunt Jackie, there in those days, she played second fiddle to "The Matriarch". We went to see "Mu". Mu, lived in the apartment behind Aunt Jackie and Uncle Charles. It was a family obligation to visit her, as often as possible. We did too. Easter meant that we would get a basket from her and a bat and ball. These were more looked forward to than the egg hunt, in Aunt Jackie's back yard. We had an amazing time as little people. Us and Lisa and Rene and Brian and Glenn (Lauren and David were already too grown to play with us) (It is my guess that they hid the eggs). We fought over the candy and who got the biggest basket. We all knew that Glen got the biggest basket, because he was a grandchild and we were greats. Still, that was always noticed. Grandma Hanst did alot of watching the Dodgers when we were over there and Pop was always seated in the chair in the room. We were little and the big people filled the apartment so much that, if we got a good peak at her and a peck on the cheek we were happy. Why were they all hovering around her so? Why was wherever she was 106? Love. She represented love, to all of those people. Every once in a while she yelled and there was silence. All of these people bowed to her every command and then they were gone. They bowed to love. I guess that that is the Christie Legacy in America. We may have little of anything else, but I always say that we have a monopoly on "the mothers' intuition". Everything that Eve said to her daughters was passed on to Mu!
I remember the last day. I remember late in the night being put in the car for the last time to see Mu. She fell and broke her hip. They took her from the back of Uncle Charles' house. We never saw her again. No more baskets, lovingly prepared, with names on them. No more "Mommy made" coats. The era of Mu had changed swiftly and there was much weeping over her.
Everytime the door opened by a gust of wind, Mommy would say, here comes Mu. Thank you for visiting us, Mu. We came to look forward to such occurrences and laugh. But I remember Mu, when she was really there. Beautiful and wrinkled and mine. The commander of a host of children and Grands and Greats (we were the greats).

Last night I dreamed that I was under a fearful threat.

Out of nowhere these 4 very large men defended me from the bad man. They beat him up and he had no bruises. I felt loved and comforted and there was no more threat. When I woke up, I thought about the dream that it could have been Daniel, Mishael, Hananiah and Azariah. I never thought about them being big, even though the scriptures say that their eating had made them fatter and plumper than the other slaves that had gone through the initiation with them.
Whoever these men were, they came out of nowhere and they were bigger than any man that I had seen and very, very fat. A healthy kind of fat and they beat up that threatening man, like nothing that I had ever seen. I am familiar with that kind of fear, but, I must say that I had never felt that kind of defense before. I had given that kind of defense over my sisters and brothers, but I can't say that I ever felt that quite like that before.
I am sure that it was just a dream and I know that the Hebrew boys and Daniel were some of the most peaceful men who ever lived, but it was very comforting to sense that they could be close enough friends to defend me like that. What an imagination, I have.
An interesting dream

In Atlanta was where I learned to put my face in the water.

Aunt Dorothy was so patient with me. I was fearful of water, since infancy. I was destined, never to wash my face. Never to stick my face in the water. Then, we went to Atlanta. I got on the plane with mommy and Ju and baby Jackie. I had no fear of the plane and even if I did, I couldn't cry because I had to be the big girl. They were both crying. Mom couldn't handle 3 of us screaming on the plane?
Aunt Dorothy took us into her home and taught me to stick my face in the water. Maybe 3 times I stuck my face into the facebowl, after sudsing it up. She spent time and attention with me and Patti, together. I learned to travel past my fear and to see the water as an opportunity, instead of a dreaded fearsome grave. Thank you Aunt Dorothy.

He shall lead His flock like...

A Shepherd?
That is the question. How are you leading me, Lord, in this dark veil of tears? So many times, in these sadnesses, I have collapsed and fallen on the ground and hid my eyes. I know, only, that He has had to carry me most of the way from that point on. He sent Evvy to show me how I am. Evvy had a blackboard fall on her leg when she was 18 months old and she didn't walk for a month or so. The doctor said nothing is broken, she is just afraid. I do that, with God.
I can't walk, Lord. I will fall again. I am fallen. I am blind. I say. He takes my hands from my eyes and lifts me from my pallet and shows me how to walk. I am grateful for His mercies.
Bearing one another's burdens means that we love one another through these dark times of incapability. Carrying the paralytic ones to Jesus, in prayer and in our love. I need love, Lord. You are love. I need strength, Lord, You are strong. God has given family and church and community and learning to enjoy Him in and with these good gifts in purity, is the goal. When I sin, I have an advocate with the Father. I don't expect my brethren to be the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, but tools in His hands to give me the grace to be able to stand against the evil day. Having done all, to stand. Having embraced all of the good gifts that God has given richly to enjoy, I stand in obedience to Him and in repentance for my sins. Help me, Lord. Thank you for my brothers and sisters in Christ The richest gift of all, on earth.

I'll not go into the promises I made to God, if He would let me keep my baby.

I stand ever in gratitude for every one of those 21 days of blessed remembrance which are etched indelibly on my mind, through grief. They hurt worse than tongue can say. I am often angry, but also grateful, if someone can understand that. God has let me grieve and talk lucidly to Him in my grief. He is the only one who can understand the pain that the memory brings and the pain that the heart and mind try to reach for in comfort for the loss. There is a comfort that comes, from His mighty hand and the going through the grief process is the only way to enter into that comforting relationship with God. I didn't know that then. God and the precious sense of His love in the beauty and loving hugs of family and friends are sometimes the only comfort the soul can find. There is no stable ground inside of your soul. Everything seems to be shaken, only God's comfort is constant. The hymnwriter said, when all around my soul gives way. That is what he was talking about. I would wish that no one would feel all around their soul give way. Mind and heart and flesh to fail, but if they do, God is still constant. Where shall I go from your spirit? said the Psalmist. There is nowhere on this earth that is truly God forsaken, only hell is God forsaken. When mind and heart are lost, even in distress and pain there is still the light of the sun and the colors of the rainbow that are constant, even if you cannot see them for the craze. God is everywhere.