Significance

For the rest of my life, today will be a very significant day. My dad died 2 years ago today. At this very moment, 2 years ago, I was sitting on my front porch making phone calls to many loved ones and giving them the news. As I listened to the person on the other side of the phone choke tears, I said the same thing over and over again: "I know, it's ok, I understand, thank you." Afterwards, I sat in the dining room with my family, all of us with glazed looks in our eyes from no sleep for more than 24 hours.

**Now, here's a warning: I need to write this for myself, in fact, I'm finishing it 2 days late because I debated whether this is a good idea to write-some of you might find my thoughts upsetting. For that, I apologize.

If you've read my blog, you'll know the significance of my dad's passing and how the effect the last 2 years have had. As I reflect, the first year seemed easier. That could be due to being in school and well, whatever the steps of grief are. This year was much more difficult. I've spent more time thinking about specific events leading up to the day my dad went home.

One of those significant events is how he took the miraculous healing of a very dear friend of ours from church. She was deathly ill and dad believed that her friends and family (all of us) prayed her back here. We "changed" God's mind in taking her home and we kept her here. I remember debating with dad on how God answers prayer.

It's been preached before: Even if we don't "feel" it, or think He does, God always answers prayers with 1 of 3 answers: 1) Yes 2) No or 3) Wait. Obviously, with our dear friend, when everyone prayed for her while she was forced to allow a respirator breath for her, Dad believed that God answered with "Yes, she can stay here." Or it just wasn't her time. Although Dad saw the blessing in Barb's miraculous healing, he also understood what Barb was missing: the Glory of going home.

The significance is that dad understood what it meant to die. He understood what awaited him, and although he agonized what he would leave behind, he couldn't wait to go home. I saw this agony as he lay in the hospital bed while I told him my graduation plan and he had tears in his eyes when he said, "not until next year?" When he suddenly took a deathly turn, we prayed to God to heal him and let him stay. God answered our prayer with "No, it's time for him to go home." We've battled with why dad was taken so soon, so suddenly and the answer is so simple: because it was time.

This significance hit me even harder when I came across the last Mother's day card he gave me, just a few weeks before his death. This is what he wrote in the card:

One thing about my relationship with my dad: we butt heads. A lot. And he wasn't that great in the praising category. But in the past few years, his heart softened and although I was used to Mr. Critical, for him to write something like this, something that would have been very difficult for him to verbalize is extremely significant. There is so much love in this card. And so much finality. Dad also couldn't spell to save his life. This card is perfect. Perfect in every aspect. The writing, the grammar. The poetic thought. He put so much thought and love and, well, significance into this card that no matter how disappointed I am in myself, I can look at this and know what dad truly thought of me.

And I think Dad did that on purpose. Well, I like to think that. At least I hope so.

Either way, always look for the significance in the events in your life, and what God does in your life, and how God answers prayers.

Be a tree

This is a subject I've wanted to tackle for a long time and I'm not sure why I haven't written about it until now, but something happened last week that made me decide that now was the time.

We have a huge ash tree in our side yard. Sometimes I walk under it and marvel at how large it is. In fact, I've been told you can see the top of the tree if you view our neighborhood in Google earth (or whatever that is). What amazes me about this tree is how it just keeps growing. The roots have traveled under the drive way, cracked the driveway in several places, and intertwined with the roots of the pepper trees in our front yard. The branches of the ash tree span so far that it almost completely shades our side yard and always keeps the front porch nice and cool. With the help of our pepper trees in front, our front yard and curbs are always shaded.

The ash tree is quite daring. It doesn't let anything get in its way, as if it just decides it's gonna' go for it and grow where it wants. It takes a risk and tries one direction. If it doesn't work, it makes it work, or moves its branches and roots in a way that does work, but it just keeps going.

I think that's how decision making should be. Me, I've rarely had difficulty making decisions. I've been the decision maker in every aspect of my life for, well, almost my whole life. I think I get that from my dad. Someone must make a decision, so we're the ones who makes it. My dad use to say to me: "It doesn't matter what you decide to do, you just gotta' do something." and "you can choose to do whatever you want, but you have to pay the consequences too." For the first part of my adult life, I made mostly safe choices. No risks allowed.

Until I was faced with the most difficult decision I had ever made in my entire life. I decided to end my marriage. For most of my marriage I had fought to keep my little family together. Until I realized I couldn't fight anymore. Even when I decided to pack up the boys and leave-that was not a difficult decision. The most difficult decision was to not go back. I was not meant to fight the battle of abuse, alcohol and drugs and giving up didn't break my heart-it was the decision to give up. No one could make this decision for me. I prayed like crazy, sought counsel from my pastor and a few friends. Even my brother-in-law had wise words for me, but in the end, I decided I was finished.

And a new chapter of my life began. Going forth, telling my children's father my decision, filing the divorce, raising my boys, working, trying so hard to make the right choices, but also learning that taking a risk, branching out is so important for my growth and life.

Ok, now a funny story about my friend, Amy. I love Amy. I don't get to hang out with her as much as I like, but when we do hang out, something memorable is bound to happen. One of my favorite memories is spending an evening at Disneyland together and we stopped for dinner. She decided to "go out of her comfort zone" and try something new-chinese food at Disneyland! We sat down and she took one bite and grimaced. Oh I wish you could have seen her face! She couldn't take another bite! She promptly got up and went back to her favorite food (I don't even remember what that was-Mexican?) She even let me take home her chinese to my boys (who devoured it in less than 1 second!) She was not happy with her choice, but I think the point was that she tried something new and she wouldn't have known unless she decided to take a risk and try. Was it worth the risk? I think so-yes!

Now my rant: How many times have I heard "I can't decide, you decide for me." I just want to shake those people and yell "Nnnnnooooo! You can decide-just do it!" Whenever I let someone else decide our plans, it's not because I can't decide, it's because I always decide everything and I'd like to allow someone else to stretch out onto the decision branch, as it were. Take a risk! Decide! If it works, great! If not, then you know what to do next time.

So, what happened last week, you ask? Well, a huge branch from our ash tree broke off. The branch was as big as a small tree and when it fell it covered our driveway and most of the street in front of our house. Don't worry, nothing was broken-no cars, etc... and no one was hurt, well, except the tree. It is time for this tree to be trimmed. It is very top heavy and just keeps growing.

Sometimes, the decisions we make hurt. Just like a broken tree branch, or a marriage, or bad chinese food. But these decisions, these risks are necessary. How will we learn, how will we grow and how will we know if we don't decide to take the risk?