Little Musings
Curt and I are sitting here watching Extreme Home Makeover on Sunday night. It is the end of a long week, full of hard work, various situations, many conversations, dirty diapers, discipline, laughter, anger...and whew! I'm just about wiped out! (This story on EHM this week is just a beautiful, beautiful picture of our Heavenly Papa and us. If you did not see it, I'd suggest hoping onto http://www.abettercommunity.com/ and look up the story for 2.17.08.)
I just have a few thoughts I'd love to share with you tonight, if you have a minute. Here they are (in no particular order):
~There are many questions in this life which will be left unanswered until eternity (if we still care to find out at that point). Many of the 'why's' we pose in our minds dangle there, untouched by logic or reason, until we chose to move on or grow bitter over it. For me, one of those dangling 'why's' was answered this weekend. I assure you, I have long since moved past the wondering. I found the answer to a particular question as I was staying at my parent's home this weekend and was purusing the guest room closet for any neglected treasures that might need a home (in my home!) and lo and behold a FRAMED picture lay there on the shelf, dusty and untouched. Why this particular picture was framed is way, way beyond my understanding, but it is what it is.
Here is the question I used to ask myself (and my mom & dad) countless times through Jr. High: "Why aren't the boys paying attention to me? What's wrong?"
Here, my friend, is the answer I found in the frame, in the closet. (yes, this is humbling to share) :
Those adorable girls in the picture are my sisters Ashley and Kimberly. They were of normal age, size and proportion to be playing in such a kiddie pool. However, the akward adolescent in the picture -the one with the unusually long torso accented by a wide white polyester cumberbund and dark framed glasses that doubled as a 'face shield' -that adolscent should have been directly ushered out of the baby pool into a salon seat.
Oh well...1989 wasn't my best year! (Neither was 90 or the following). My mother said she thought I looked adorable. Her saying that proved to me once and for all that any kind compliment my mom has or will ever give to me is tainted by a mother's prejudice. It will be the same for Annie (although I simply cannot imagine not telling her that her glasses are covering her entire face!!!)
~ So many of you made mention of Hope, our little girl residing in Heaven presently, and asked how last week was for me. For those of you whom I have not had the pleasure of meeting, my husband and I found out at 20 weeks that our baby had a major, terminal complication called Cystic Hygroma with Turners Syndrome. We were given several options and a 100% certain diagnosis that left no room for survival outside the womb. On February 14th, 2005 we went out for Valentines Day Dinner, and I had not felt her move that afternoon on, and I just knew. The next morning at the Specialist, they could not find a heartbeat and i was induced and gave birth to Hope Analiese Miller on February 16th. Her name was chose long before we knew that her earthly story would include all these complications. As I write this, my heart tugs. Yet let me tell you this: I would not ever wish the circumstance on anyone else, and I wouldn't care to go through it again...but our first little girl (whom we did not know was a girl until I gave birth) has made our life richer, our love deeper and our hope clearer-and maybe more than any of our earthly babies could. I would not trade her for anything. Someday I will share a few of the glimpses of Heavenly love we experienced through that time.
For whatever reason, we have been given 2 (and a new life within!) healthy babies after Hope and they have tremendously helped. I'm sure last week would have been terribly more emotional and introspective had there not been two little lives to be involved in.
Thank you for remembering. I encourage you to do that for others that you may know who have had similar situations. (And I encourage myself just the same, as sometimes my personality lends itself to unintentional forgetfulness!!!!)
~Finally (I'm running out of steam), I thank God for protecting my little family this week. We had an incident with the cat and my baby which is causing the cat to make a swift exit out of this home. It could have been a whole lot worse, but for some reason, it wasn't. I could write that it was because God protected her. And I supposed He did...and yet, He is still all-loving and all-good when children are hurt or worse. A few weeks ago I was watching coverage on the devestating tornados that blasted the South. A reporter asked a rep from a local college what he credits to their students surving the tornados and he said "Ya just got to know that God was protecting them". I'm sure He did. But what about the baby who was thrown around like a rag and his parents did not survive? Was He not there to protect them because He was busy at the college? I know, I know...the Rep. meant well, but it left a question in my mind (a person who seeks to serve & love God) and I had to wonder if it did not cause deeper questions in many other minds. Our Father is so far better, smarter and unthinkable than we can comprehend. He is soveriegn.And somehow, out of this mess we sometimes find ourselves in, He is still radiantly Love.
It makes me hopeful. And it makes my mind tired.
I'm off to bed.
I hope it is a good, contented week for you. And if you should find any pictures in your parent's closet, take my recommendation and leave it there!!!!
"We draw inspiration from each other."
I just have a few thoughts I'd love to share with you tonight, if you have a minute. Here they are (in no particular order):
~There are many questions in this life which will be left unanswered until eternity (if we still care to find out at that point). Many of the 'why's' we pose in our minds dangle there, untouched by logic or reason, until we chose to move on or grow bitter over it. For me, one of those dangling 'why's' was answered this weekend. I assure you, I have long since moved past the wondering. I found the answer to a particular question as I was staying at my parent's home this weekend and was purusing the guest room closet for any neglected treasures that might need a home (in my home!) and lo and behold a FRAMED picture lay there on the shelf, dusty and untouched. Why this particular picture was framed is way, way beyond my understanding, but it is what it is.
Here is the question I used to ask myself (and my mom & dad) countless times through Jr. High: "Why aren't the boys paying attention to me? What's wrong?"
Here, my friend, is the answer I found in the frame, in the closet. (yes, this is humbling to share) :
Those adorable girls in the picture are my sisters Ashley and Kimberly. They were of normal age, size and proportion to be playing in such a kiddie pool. However, the akward adolescent in the picture -the one with the unusually long torso accented by a wide white polyester cumberbund and dark framed glasses that doubled as a 'face shield' -that adolscent should have been directly ushered out of the baby pool into a salon seat.
Oh well...1989 wasn't my best year! (Neither was 90 or the following). My mother said she thought I looked adorable. Her saying that proved to me once and for all that any kind compliment my mom has or will ever give to me is tainted by a mother's prejudice. It will be the same for Annie (although I simply cannot imagine not telling her that her glasses are covering her entire face!!!)
~ So many of you made mention of Hope, our little girl residing in Heaven presently, and asked how last week was for me. For those of you whom I have not had the pleasure of meeting, my husband and I found out at 20 weeks that our baby had a major, terminal complication called Cystic Hygroma with Turners Syndrome. We were given several options and a 100% certain diagnosis that left no room for survival outside the womb. On February 14th, 2005 we went out for Valentines Day Dinner, and I had not felt her move that afternoon on, and I just knew. The next morning at the Specialist, they could not find a heartbeat and i was induced and gave birth to Hope Analiese Miller on February 16th. Her name was chose long before we knew that her earthly story would include all these complications. As I write this, my heart tugs. Yet let me tell you this: I would not ever wish the circumstance on anyone else, and I wouldn't care to go through it again...but our first little girl (whom we did not know was a girl until I gave birth) has made our life richer, our love deeper and our hope clearer-and maybe more than any of our earthly babies could. I would not trade her for anything. Someday I will share a few of the glimpses of Heavenly love we experienced through that time.
For whatever reason, we have been given 2 (and a new life within!) healthy babies after Hope and they have tremendously helped. I'm sure last week would have been terribly more emotional and introspective had there not been two little lives to be involved in.
Thank you for remembering. I encourage you to do that for others that you may know who have had similar situations. (And I encourage myself just the same, as sometimes my personality lends itself to unintentional forgetfulness!!!!)
~Finally (I'm running out of steam), I thank God for protecting my little family this week. We had an incident with the cat and my baby which is causing the cat to make a swift exit out of this home. It could have been a whole lot worse, but for some reason, it wasn't. I could write that it was because God protected her. And I supposed He did...and yet, He is still all-loving and all-good when children are hurt or worse. A few weeks ago I was watching coverage on the devestating tornados that blasted the South. A reporter asked a rep from a local college what he credits to their students surving the tornados and he said "Ya just got to know that God was protecting them". I'm sure He did. But what about the baby who was thrown around like a rag and his parents did not survive? Was He not there to protect them because He was busy at the college? I know, I know...the Rep. meant well, but it left a question in my mind (a person who seeks to serve & love God) and I had to wonder if it did not cause deeper questions in many other minds. Our Father is so far better, smarter and unthinkable than we can comprehend. He is soveriegn.And somehow, out of this mess we sometimes find ourselves in, He is still radiantly Love.
It makes me hopeful. And it makes my mind tired.
I'm off to bed.
I hope it is a good, contented week for you. And if you should find any pictures in your parent's closet, take my recommendation and leave it there!!!!
"We draw inspiration from each other."
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