Forgive the tongue in cheek title, but I just couldn’t help myself.  This post is about being a friend to people who have experienced the loss of a close loved one.  I tried to come up with a kinder (and less HILARIOUS) title, but once this one came to mind it just stuck.  I myself am a loser many times over in this sense and you may also be a loser.

Much as I hate to have had the severe education in loss, I feel like I do have some knowledge that could be helpful to those who feel helpless and clueless when it comes to talking to the grieving.  I’m sure that I wrote about this years ago, but why not have a review for those who are new to class?

1) Do not avoid mentioning the deceased for fear of reminding the grieved of the loss.  There is no forgetting the loss of a close loved one.  You will not be reminding the person.  When you deliberately avoid the mention, it feels as though you are trying to sweep the deceased under a rug.  We want to remember.  We want to hear stories we’ve never heard.

2) There is nothing you can say that will make it better.  It is not a fixable problem.  The upside is that there is nothing you can say that will make it worse.  The worst has already happened.

3) A friend of ours lost her son some years ago and a mutual friend suggested that she was going to take her out for a girl’s night so she could “forget all her problems for a while.”  I rolled my eyes and snorted when I heard this before I could compose myself and be nice.  This may be related to number one, but it’s worth repeating: When the loss is close, there is no escape from the grief.  It is always there.

4)  When several years have passed it may appear that the grief has subsided and it may be tempting to suggest that your friend has “gotten over it”.  There is no such thing.  I believe that the pain is always there, always deep, always heavy.  Like a body builder develops muscles to make easy work of heavy loads, your friend has learned to carry a heavy weight with greater ease than in the beginning.  There is no getting over it.

5)  While you can’t say anything that will make it worse, there are some things that I personally find annoying that I’d like to mention.  This may be just me in my experience, but it’s easy to assume others might agree.  a) Don’t call me on holidays and tell me that you “know it’s a really hard time”.  Maybe I was actually having a nice time and now I feel guilty for the levity.  b)  Don’t tell me that “Heaven needed my loved one more” than I did.  That makes me think that Heaven is an inconsiderate jerk.  c)  Don’t try to compare scars if you have also experienced loss.  When my brother died, it was nice to hear from others who had also lost a sibling, but hearing hours on end about a dear great grandma who passed unexpectedly at 98 got a little grating.

Feel free to add more in the comments section.  And do keep in mind that this advice is assuming that your friend is mentally stable and spiritually healthy.  Some people believe that they can run away from their grief and that avoiding mention of the deceased is a helpful thing.  Play along to be nice, but know that this is not a healthy way to cope.

I’m not a fan of Christmas.

There.  I said it and I feel a little better for it.

I can’t pretend like I’m virtuous and it’s because I hate the materialism.  I’m all for getting gifts and giving gifts.  I think it’s a lovely gesture and there’s no harm in a little indulgence.  Especially if someone’s love language is giving gifts.  I love those people.

I also can’t pretend that it’s because of all the warring over “Merry Christmas” -v- “Happy Holidays” either.  I think the whole argument is silly and I’ve never understood someone getting red faced about either side.  Instead of keeping Christ in Christmas, how about we insist that we keep Christ in everything?

Maybe I’m a Scrooge.  Maybe this means that I’ll be visited by three life changing ghosts on Christmas Eve that inspire me to have a better attitude.  Or maybe, just maybe, it’s okay to live a life void of the Christmas spirit.

Oddly, I always get a little excited for Groundhog’s Day.  A whole day built around a groundhog’s shadow?  That’s something.

“You’re a great Mom,” I told my friend while her eyes tried to convince me that she believed me.  She was in a dark, sad place and it was some task to try and shore her up for the storms.

As I watched her eyes, I thought of all the times a friend had tried to boost me up by telling me how awesome she thought I was.  I remembered the thoughts that went through my head as she spoke.  I felt compelled to speak those thoughts outloud to my friend.

“You’re a great Mom.  I am telling you that and I want you to know that I know you have flipped out and spoken roughly to your babies.  I know that you have been harsher in your tone than you should, and I know that you have had days where you totally failed at making them feel special.  I know that you are certain that I would be appalled if I walked in on you some days.  I say that because I want you to know that I know all that and I will still tell you that you are a great Mom.”

I concluded my pep talk by showing her my personal flip out face and using my own ear splitting flip out voice, “Do you kids have any idea how tired I am?  Do you even care that I was up half the night cleaning vomit followed by an early morning of making breakfast (gag), scrubbing floors, folding laundry and then making lunch (gag)?  I give and give and all you kids do is ask for more!”  My poor kids have a dramatic Mom.  When I flip out, I totally flip.

If you think you are a perfect Mom, I can’t speak to that.  Good for you.  But if you feel like a pretty big screw up, let me talk to you for a minute.

God will redeem the time (I stole that line from Kathy Tope).  He will redeem those dark moments where you are certain that you have done everything in your power to guarantee your child a spot on the set of “Jerry Springer” in adulthood.  He will redeem the time for His glory.  Your children will not be destroyed to teach you some cosmic lesson.

That last sentence bears repeating in its own paragraph and in bold text.  Read it slowly and own it for its truth.  Your children will not be destroyed to teach you some cosmic lesson.

Your children are on their own journey to truth.  Give them answers when you can, catch them when you must, and make sure they floss the night before a visit to the dentist.  Have mercy on them and have mercy on yourself.  Don’t wallow in the bad days because you will miss the super fantastic ones.

I rarely refer to myself as an “artist”; preferring to skirt around it with words like “artsy”, or “artsy fartsy” (if my Mom isn’t around).  ”Artist” has a heavy sound in my ear and begs to be answered with some fantastic piece of tangible, real art.  I tried actually painting once in kindergarten.  My teacher called my work “bland”.  ”Bland” wasn’t in my vocabulary, being only 5, so I translated it to mean “sour”.  Neither one had a good ring so I determined that I was not to be an artist.

When I made it to the sixth grade I sat lonely in that cafetorium at lunch time and gazed dreamily at the tiny stage set off to the side.  It had thick gold curtains and I would fantasize about those curtains slowly and dramatically opening to reveal… ME! The audience, massive audience, would cheer and toss roses on the stage.  And then one of the guys from NKOTB, whose touring bus had broken down out front, would come up on the stage and declare that he was mesmerized.  In the spring semester of that year I was able to perform in a 20 minute play about spies.  My dream was realized, on a slightly smaller scale.  And the die was cast.  I had found my art.

I love acting.  It is a rather unsung hero of the performing arts (when you’re an amateur).  Musicians can swagger with a guitar slung over their shoulder and draw a crowd anytime they may desire, dancers can go to a dance hall and get a circled audience (as per Grease).  Acting, though, acting can only be done in very precise and well timed events.  Were I to break out in a monologue on a street corner, I would be carted off to a nuthouse.  It must be properly framed.

So I soothed myself with writing.  Crafting known words into new and fantastic essays and prose is a nice outlet for me.  It allows for some drama and, with blogging, an audience.

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you’ve had a nice break from reading.  (You’re welcome.)  I have spent the last year burying myself back into acting because I have finally found the perfect medium for my art and the perfect script.   If you’ve known me for more than 5 minutes, I hope you know that I take the Bible very seriously and adore it for every word.  I know and fully believe that scripture is God breathed and is His divine Word for us.  No other thought of man can be taken as fact if it does not measure up to God’s Word.  What a light bulb, jump on the sofa like Tom Cruise kind of moment it was for me when I realized that God was the perfect script writer!

Memorizing bulk scripture and presenting it dramatically is far more complex and rewarding a task than I imagined.  One cannot simply commit the lines to memory and regurgitate them without first studying the whole of its background, because a good actor always wants to know the unwritten back story.  To present Jonah, I studied Ninevah and its relation to Israel.  I learned about the people, the time, their gods, how they worshiped, how they lived and what they sacrificed.  I learned about Jonah and his home.  I studied about the northern kingdom of Israel and its history.  I learned much that I don’t share in word when presenting Jonah, as it is not in scripture, but I find that I can present it in movement and expression.

I have partnered with a good friend in this work and we have spent countless hours hammering out these scriptures and debating how to best craft the presentations.  This has indeed been a case of “iron sharpening iron” as we wrestle and study and pray together.  What a joy.  What an exhausting joy.

I have a couple of posts rumbling around in my head about the specific scriptures I have memorized and what I have gained from having spent so much intimate time with them.  I hope this post here does a good job of introducing the next few posts.

Do your kids ever find themselves at some function or event at which they end up with a name tag sticker on the back of their shirt (thankyouverymuch, highsecuritychildrenswing@mychurch)?  And then you thoughtlessly toss the shirt or super cute dress into the washing machine?  Suddenly, the tiny homemaker joy of a clean load of laundry – fresh from the dryer – is turned into a petite homemaker panic attack because the laundry has reproduced in a span of one load.  Now you’ll have to take care of it, and it’s not going to be any easy task because the gooey sticky stuff is almost impossible to remove.

This happened to me just last week.  It was on a piece of nice Sunday finery and I only noticed it after I had taken the item from the laundry room and was about to hang it in the kids’ closet.  Deciding that I’d remember to tend to it, I hung it up any way.  And left it.  It nagged me anytime I looked in the direction of the closet door, because even I know that I’ll never get to it.

But last week was different.  Last week I took that cute little vest out of the closet and actually got the mess cleaned off with almost no real effort.  I stood there in the laundry room and had a real moment of joy, pride, and sincere elation.  My deep sigh of satisfaction was met with the hum of the dryer and the kids fighting in the next room.

It made me think of all those moments of honest to goodness triumph that us homemakers have in a day and I wanted to take a minute to give you all a shout out for the stuff that goes unnoticed and unappreciated.  Hat’s off to you girls who clean that area behind the toilet, who gather all the unused hangers from the closet, who keep a running list of socks without mates,  who know the trick to using hand dish soap in the dishwasher, who have an inner clock that alerts you to the rinse cycle.   It is a tough job and our biggest triumphs are often tiny.  Cheers to you and I hope you have a FANTASTIC day at work!

Growing up in the ever shifting Church of Christ community, I have heard one word thrown around more than any other.  You might think that I am going to say something like “instrumental” or perhaps “doctrine”, but you’d be wrong.  The word I hear more than most is “legalistic”.

Oooo.  Just typing it out made me cringe like chewing on tin foil.  Nobody wants to be accused of being legalistic.  It is something my generation often accuses the generations before us of and have devoted a good deal of energy to correcting.

Interesting to note, and really the whole reason for this post, is my more recent thought that my generation, and my parents’ generation to a large degree, has instead taken the ugly dark legalism we were presented with and painted it a lighter, more engaging color.  It’s still legalism, but because it looks different, we call it “better”.

Old school legalists believe that there is only one way to conduct worship and that style of worship is a salvation issue.  New school legalists believe that there are many ways to worship and that crimping someone’s style hinges on salvation issue.  Old school legalists would frown strongly on having a church dance team.  New school legalists think that a dance team is good if it feels good and even better if it makes the church more appealing to the world (the “lost”).  Old school legalists believe that the best way to reach people with the Gospel is to tell them about the five steps to salvation (hear, believe, repent, confess, be baptized) .  New school legalists believe that we need to make friends with the lost, feed the lost, clothe the lost, walk with the lost, and hope that our love for them translates into their understanding the Gospel.

Both the old school legalist and the new school legalist have the same tragic flaw: both claim interest in saving the lost and both execute their plans with a dogged commitment to socially derived ideology.  It would be funny, if it wasn’t so sad.  The pure message of Christ and our need for redemption is lost on both sides. We are eaten up with legalism and those who have it the worst are those who scream the loudest about those dadgum legalists.

Legalism is borne of great intentions to follow God’s will for His church and veers too far into the “I’m doing it more right than you are” way of thinking.  I don’t care if you think women should wear homemade, ankle length dresses or if you think a bikini car wash for Jesus is scriptural:  If you think your way is the better way and you can’t back it up with (the whole of)God’s Word, then you are a legalist.

Stop fighting with people who are pointing fingers at you and take a long look at the finger you are pointing at them.  God’s work is life or death in this world and rolling your eyes at legalists is not going to help anyone get the job done.

Oh yes.  I was living in a tent and attending an elementary school where I was a bit of a misfit.  I was made fun of for my torn up shoes, my ratty hair, and my hand-me-down clothes.  It was painful, but again, it was the necessary kind of pain that creates seriously funny people (ahem. like me).

Fast forward about twenty or so years and you’ve got me and my dear Eric living in a tiny apartment in what I affectionately called an “upper class ghetto”.   My parents would occasionally go out of town and we would happily go to their home to watch their dog, water the plants, stretch our legs, and enjoy the tranquility of their acre+.

On one such occasion, Eric and I were in the backyard enjoying our morning coffee when he started to talk seriously about us moving out of our apartment.  Our seats were facing the direction of Mom and Dad’s travel trailer.  They had lived in it while remodeling their current house.  Eric joked, “Wouldn’t it be so funny if we rented the travel trailer from your parents and just lived in their backyard?”

Soooo funny.

Long story stoopid: we moved into the travel trailer.  It immediately became clear that it was a great idea and we all enjoyed the fun of being around each other, even if our new place made the old place look like a mansion in scope.

Shortly after we moved into the travel trailer, I was asked to speak at a Ladies Retreat for a local congregation.  Being a bit of a drama queen (shocked?  shouldn’t be), I decided to memorize the book of Ruth and present it dramatically (the link is to the youtube video of the presentation).

When I arrived at the retreat, there was a lovely card from a woman who said that she had been specially tapped to pray for me as I prepared for the retreat.  Her name?  Pam Hicks.

What?!  Surely it can’t be…  She lives hundreds of miles from here…  What on earth….?

It was her.  She looked just as I remembered her: big smile, lots of joy, and curly hair that won’t quit.  I told her who I was and she searched her memory for a moment before saying, “I remember you!  You’re family lived in a tent for a while.  How are you doing these days?”

Hear me when I say this, America: I will never, and I mean NEVER, be able to express to you the comedic joy that I got out of my honest response.  ”We’re doing great!  I live in a travel trailer now!”

It was a fantastic weekend and Ms. Hicks was overwhelmingly supportive of my work.  So much of my growing up years was hard, but so very necessary to form me into who I am.  My work for that retreat was only powerful and available because I’ve been where life is hard and I get it.  My testimony about redemption has no weight if there is no need to be redeemed.

The theme of that retreat, serendipitously enough, was “Redemption”.  My ego was completely redeemed, my faithfulness rewarded, and the deliberate leading of my path confirmed.  May you all be blessed with such a time as that.

Our winner of the t-shirt is…..
BRIANA MILLS!!!
Also, my Mama has decided that little Dougy Arnold gets a t-shirt for being the first poster.
Congratulations to our winners and a big thank you to all who participated. Humor is a great salve.

Okay, kids, here’s how this works and why we’re telling jokes about Mamas to celebrate the life of one of America’s finest Mama’s boys.

Nathan and I regularly battled hard core with Your Mama jokes.  It was not unusual for hours to pass after after my victory when Nathan would come charging into my room with one he just thought of.  He almost always won.  Almost.

Today is Nathan’s birthday and to honor one of my favorite qualities about him, his incredible sense of comedy, we are holding our third annual Nathan Dodd Your Mama Joke contest.  To win, you simply leave a comment on this post with a joke about Mamas.  It can be your own original joke or one you copy from somewhere.

The Rules:

1.  One joke per person. Multiple entries per household are allowed.

2.  Keep it clean.  My Mama is the judge.

3.  All entries must be received by August 10.  That is Mackenzie’s birthday and she is also a fan of a good Your Mama joke.

4.  There is not a fourth rule.  I just prefer even numbers.

I’m excited to see your jokes.   As usual, I will start the games with one of my favorites:  Your Mama is so poor, her door bell just says, “Ding”.

Unless you’re new here, you know that I usually have a Your Mama joke contest today to celebrate the birthday of my youngest brother, Nathan.  He would have been 29 today and he loved a good joke about Mamas.

It has been 7 years since I got to tell him “Happy Birthday!”.  Seven long, grey years.  Every year his birthday comes and the days leading up to it I would feel a need to wake him up, dust him off and bring him out so that we could all have a laugh and share a small moment of Nathan’s world.

This year feels different.

This year, he doesn’t feel present.  He feels past.  He feels really gone.  The pictures are less and less current.  The stories are more historical than recent.    There are people that have been born and added to our family for whom Nathan is a mere ancestor.  Countless celebrations and memories have happened for which Nathan was not a guest.  He is gone. And now, this year, the reality of that is stark and oppressive.

I think there has always been a hint of thought lurking in my brain that somehow we just had to get through the agony of losing Nathan and once we got through it things would return to normal and fantastic.  Somehow he would return. We just had to get through the hard part.

So I soldiered on; weeping, wailing, and mourning.  Dutifully bearing the weight of grief because I somehow thought that this cloud would pass and we would get our normal lives back.  This year, the truth of what “normal” looks like is ever present and there is no escaping it.  It has been, in a word, depressing.  There is no bringing him back.  There is no going back to the old days.  There is no fixing this.

It has been a dark couple of weeks leading up to today.  I have done a lot of hiding from my family and escaping to quiet corners with vapid celebrity gossip columns and more chocolate than a person should eat in a lifetime.  I appreciate the patience of those who know me who have allowed me the space to feel this new ache.

So, the current state of grieving is that there is no getting over it, there is no getting past it.  There is only getting through it and I will spend my lifetime getting through it.

Depressed with me yet?

Turn that frown upside down.  Let’s talk about what’s awesome about the grief of the one who believes in Absolute Truth, shall we?  My belief is solid.  I absolutely know that there is a Heaven, there is God, there is The Holy Spirit, there is Jesus Christ, there is salvation for those who bear the name of Christ and there is no question of what Nathan’s reality is today.

I am not of those who grieve without hope.  If you are reading this and you are a flaky Christian, a non-Christian, or one who believes that there are many truths and we must find the one that best suits us: you must be told that one day every knee will bow and every mouth will confess that Jesus is LORD and that His reign will be forever.  There is no getting around that and my prayer for you is that your moment of bent knee and confession isn’t met with the awful, soul crushing reality that you hadn’t done so before His return.

How about we make this just a shade lighter before I sign off?  In a few hours I will be posting the annual Nathan Dodd Your Mama Joke contest along with the very serious rules for participating.  The winner will receive our fabulous t-shirt.  I would link to a picture of the t-shirt from last year, but I lost about a year’s worth of posts to a glitch.  Shame. Just trust me that the shirt is awesome and you want it.