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Breathings From My Heart

Category Archives: Gratitudes

Remembering

28 Monday Sep 2015

Posted by BRomero in Free Thinking, Gratitudes

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Processed with VSCOcam with c1 presetToday I attended a funeral with my 88-year-old dad. It was the funeral of a woman who lived across the street from my family when I was growing up, a woman for whom I feel much admiration and affection.  She and her husband, along with their children, go as far back as my memory goes of my family living on that street. We moved in when I was three months shy of turning four, and they were across the street two doors down. At that time they had three children; the other three would come later, as would my only sibling. When we moved to that street, I was still an only child. I guess my parents celebrated the move by conceiving my little sister who was born nine months later.

As we sat in the church today, my eyes on the grown children mourning their mother (my friends from childhood), I thought about that street and our years growing up there. I thought about their house and the people in it.  I thought about their family of six children and how to me, one of two children, it seemed to be a house full of laughter and fun, a mysterious way to live having all those siblings. Of course, our house had plenty of laughter and fun, too, but I didn’t have all those siblings.  And even though at the time I could hardly stand the one sibling I had, wasn’t it perfectly natural to think having more would be preferable? At least in theory?  I thought about the fact that of those six children, one of them became my sister’s best neighborhood friend. I thought about their mom, of course, and their dad who pre-deceased her.  I thought quite a bit about all our moms,  houses, and all our childhoods.

Sharing a street growing up means sharing a part of your own personal history.  It means sharing a collective memory.  We can all remember the saplings that have now become proud and beautiful trees, remember the daisy chains we made while sitting in the grass (do children still sit in the grass?),  remember the boys (and sometimes the girls) drinking from water hoses, remember the small fleet of our bikes and riding them together down the street and beyond, remember climbing trees, remember baseball games in an empty field, remember the voices of our mothers calling us home from the porch instead of a cell phone, remember when our street that was originally gravel was paved, remember the birth of every family’s younger children, remember Halloweens after Halloweens, trick or treating together in a band of goblins made up of various ages and sizes, older siblings responsible for the younger ones as we walked the boundaries we’d been given.  There was no need for our parents to walk along with us.  It was such an innocent time.  We remember and remember.  There were many houses on our street with children, and when we were all playing outside, we were quite a number.  Of course, we didn’t all play together.  There was a natural pecking order, and it was determined by age.  It was as much a rule of nature on our block of that street as day following night, and it was something to which we strictly adhered. After all, it gave us a much-needed break from playing with our siblings.

I thought about the fact that since I was only three when we moved there, I wasn’t allowed to cross the street, so I sat on our front steps waving to the little girl (not much older) who lived directly across the street. She’d wave back, and it seems now that we sat there for hours waving and grinning at each other, but I’m sure it wasn’t for that long.  I do know it was everyday.  I suppose we had to wait for a parent to walk one of us over to the other. That little girl and I grew up together on that street, as did the family sitting in the church today saying good-bye to their mother, and we remained close friends.  She was my best neighborhood friend.  Don’t we all have one?  We all grew up on that street, all of us from the different families.  All the way up.  We all started school on that street, and we all graduated from high school while living there, too.  When we were in lower elementary school, most of our families had only one car.  Our dads would car pool to work – though not all to the same place – and so our moms would car pool taking us to school.  Sitting cramped in an automobile decades before required seatbelts is an almost indescribable experience. Later, when we were older, we formed unplanned gangs with the other neighborhood kids from Processed with VSCOcam with c1 presetother streets to walk to and from school.  Most of us went on to graduate from college, most of us from this blue-collar neighborhood with parents who badly wanted college educations for their baby-boomer children. All of us married while our parents were still neighbors, with some of us still living at home.

Now we’ve all lost at least one parent, some of us both.  Now we know the perils of adulthood, that good marriages last but bad marriages don’t.  All our parents somehow had good marriages.  Some of us weren’t as fortunate.  For some of us it took more than one marriage to get that good one. We know the joys and the trials of parenthood, and we certainly know the grief, the raw grief of losing the parents whose voices called us home in the evenings and worked to give us everything they could, including a childhood worth remembering.  And they gave us each other.  We don’t see each other much these days, but we know we’re all only a phone call or Facebook post away.  And we remember.

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Trust

04 Thursday Sep 2014

Posted by BRomero in Family, Gratitudes

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I started this post on Tuesday morning, September 2, but apparently I didn’t need to finish it until this morning.trust is the bridge

TODAY.  Woke at 3:36 a.m.  When that happens, lately more often than not, I wonder in my semi-conscious state, what reason is behind my waking.  Is it that I woke myself by rolling over?  Could it be that I’ve been wakened so that I can contemplate the day ahead? Am I called to pray?  In this case, awakened on this particular morning, I knew I certainly had much to contemplate and more than enough to approach with prayer.  TODAY marks one more week before my daughter’s date with an operating room at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, TX.  One more week until we, her husband, her parents, and her sister will be there waiting, waiting, waiting, to hear the doctor’s words as he exits the OR and tells us what he found.  One more week until the baby I birthed 36 years ago knows for sure that her cancer is contained, that it will not interfere with her mothering of the babies she’s birthed in her adult life, those that she now holds most dear to her.   One more week to worry, to dread all things connected to surgery, to fear hearing the wrong news, to hope and pray of hearing the right news.  One more week from today.

TODAY.  My sister wakes to start a new chemo regimen necessitated because her body has rebelled against the original therapy prescribed by her oncologist.  Yes, my sister and my daughter both have cancer at this moment in time, this blink in our universe, which is much shorter than how this particular blink in our family feels.  Today my sister will have yet another needle feed her body life-saving chemicals that just happen to make her life sometimes not worth living.  In this case, the cure really does appear to be worse than the disease, although logically we all know better.

TODAY.  Seven days left to be ready to face my daughter’s surgery, put on my best mom face, the one that has comforted her all of her life and will comfort her in this, her hardest obstacle she faces so far. May I wear the face she needs to see, say the words she needs to hear, and be the mother once more she will require (even though as an adult she feels so much more independent).  After her surgery, once released from the hospital, she’ll come to us to recover while her husband flies back to Malaysia (where they presently reside) to his job, but more importantly to their two oldest children who need at least one parent with them as they experience their children’s understanding as to what is happening with their mommy and why she can’t be with them.

Once again in my life I wish I could be in two places at one time. Is there anyone who hasn’t wished that at least once?  How I wish I would be here with my daughter and yet there with my grandchildren.  Good that I realize that though I can’t manage quite a feat, our God can manage that and so much more. Our God can watch over my daughter, be near her (and all of us) through her entire ordeal at MD Anderson, carry her into the operating room, guide her surgeon’s hands, and even read the results of her pathology tests with the specialist who will physically hold the reports in his hands. Our God already has next week handled. He already knows those days that we can only this morning imagine. He can be with my grandchildren in Malaysia, too, comforting their children’s hearts, filling the emptiness that is the place where their mommy belongs, until He sends her home so that she can fill it once again.

Our God is with my sister during her chemo (another case of my wishing to be two places at once), guiding those that administer her treatment, and in the days following it when she experiences the weakness, the dehydration, and other side effects, He invites her to lean on Him in the darkest moments. That last part is something I must remind myself to do each and every day, I who read morning devotionals, pray regularly, believe that I trust in God, that I trust my loved ones to Him. Still, I must remind myself to lean on Him in my darkest moments, to bring my fears to Him, and to let Him still my internal chaos.

This morning I will quote the Psalmist who wrote, “This is the day the Lord has made. We will rejoice and be glad in it.” Psalm 118:24. May I remember to quote it as my daughter is taken into surgery next week, as my sister faces down her illness, and as any and all of us think certain days can’t be faced at all.

God is good. All the time. Just because we don’t understand His ways can never change that fact.

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Remembering To Ask

17 Saturday May 2014

39c1fb04c2aaaab2228a3668bf712028>What do we do when the “busyness” of our lives, even the “busyness” of God’s work that includes reaching out for our church in our community, leaves us tired? What must we think when we find ourselves tired, even as we think how glad we are that we were there, that we were at the school helping show the children a good time (proudly wearing the shirt with our church’s name on it), or maybe the time we’re at the school to read a book to a class of second-graders, or another time to tuck ourselves into a corner there with only one student, to listen to her, to hear about her troubled home life, and then read her a story (thinking the story will distract her, or show we care, or even help her with reading, when we know what she needs is more than what we can give….but we try to give something?). What must we think when rushing to a meeting of the local Habitat for Humanity, planning to build a home for someone less fortunate, talking about a Faith Build in our community, talking about our church’s place in the inter-faith community to make a house happen, postpones our dinner, and causes our stomach to growl? Shouldn’t these activities give us energy? After all, we’re doing the work of Christ, we’re His hands and His feet, spreading His message (not by words but by action) where people need to feel loved. The same thing can be said about helping the elderly, being there for our parents when they need us, showing patience to them and to our children, to anyone who needs us. What can we do about the weariness that overcomes us when it seems everyone needs us, and there isn’t enough of the “us” to go around?

What is the root of this weariness? Is it because the “busyness” of being the hands and feet of Christ is sometimes just that – being the hands and feet, but not the heart? Do we sometimes become so busy ourselves doing God’s work that we forget who is the One we’re representing, the One we’re modeling? Do we forget it isn’t only US out there, attending the meeting, volunteering at the school, ministering in our way to our parents, our friends, and children? Maybe the weariness comes from the our presuming we’re representing God while forgetting to include God? Are we so busy that we forget to ask for God’s help? Do we forget that we are the heart of God, too, and not just His hands and feet? Do we forget that all things we do should be for the glory of God?

Speaking for myself, I know I’m only flesh and blood. I get up every day, drink coffee, and go about the personal business of planning my day, occupied with my concerns and obligations, distracted by the minutia of what the hours before me hold. Most of the time I’m not all that weary or tired…..yet. Most of the time I have the energy, the desire, to live my day out the way I plan. I can always count on a few surprises in my day, and those surprises are sometimes good, sometimes refreshing, making me realize that my plans aren’t God’s plan, at least not as much as I’d like to think. Even when the surprises aren’t the good kind, I’m still reminded to ask of myself, “Who am I to think I control my day”? How good I am at practicing the illusion of control. I’m quite the master.

So, where does the weariness come in, why does the faint feeling of fatigue reach my bones when I’ve spent the afternoon helping children who are, for the most part under-privileged, have fun and know that we care about them? Here’s where.

When I try to do anything, but especially God’s work, on my own steam, my own strength, and with my own enthusiasm alone, then I grow tired. When I’m doing it with God, when I let God power my energy and be the power behind my “busyness” in His name, the fatigue usually isn’t there, and when it is, I don’t notice it as much. If I remember to include God in the activities, to ask for His strength for the things I’m doing for Him, remarkably there is enough energy to handle pushing myself, breaking through the human condition of needing to stop and rest. When I am also God’s heart and not only His hands and feet, I move to a different plane altogether, one where the strength and ability to do these works in His name isn’t difficult, for aren’t I doing them in love? Aren’t I doing them in love for my fellow man the way what He does for me in love?

The antidote for fatigue and weariness when doing what I know to be God’s work is to let God really work through me, to power my hands and feet when I present myself as HIS hands and feet. When I go about my business, thinking I’m doing His work but using my own small store of energy, not asking for His strength to get me through, or His will to guide me as I represent Him, I can grow tired, I can grow weary, I can wonder if I’m doing enough, and mostly, I can grow frustrated. Doing God’s work without including God is much like running on empty. Doing God’s work without including God is more about doing my own work, and no matter how good it may be, it only represents me until I let God in.

So that’s it. The antidote to that fatigue and frustration is God. If I always, always let God do His work through me (instead of telling God, “I’ve got this; You can handle something else today”) I will experience renewed energy, renewed gratitude, and renewed spirit. I will experience God.

This thought process isn’t new. I know better, but the human in me thinks I can handle most things. The human in me forgets that my Father is waiting and willing to fill me with His sprit and His love so that I truly am doing His work instead of mine, truly becoming His hands and feet instead of using mine in His name while actually drawing from my own shallow stores of energy. Well-intentioned I may be, but only half of God’s work is happening. Yes, His servant (me) is serving His people, but I’ve left Him behind in attempting to do it all on my own. I’ve not offered my activity up to Him, have not asked for His guidance and strength. Don’t misunderstand, there are plenty of times when I do just that, when I know I need Him, I need His strength and guidance to do His work. It’s simply that sometimes I get so busy that I’m even too busy to stop and ask for what I need. That simply doesn’t make sense, and smacks of arrogance on my part.

Some of us have to learn the same lesson many times. When will I ever learn?

Oh God, my Father, Maker of Heaven and Earth, help me to always, always remember it is YOU who is guiding my attempts to minister, to help my fellow human beings in Your name. Help me to remember to always include You and ask for Your strength. Thank you, Father, for all the blessings you bestowed upon me, and when I share those blessings with others, may I include You, my benefactor, in my feeble and human efforts. I ask this of you in the name of your precious and holy son, Amen.

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Posted by BRomero | Filed under Gratitudes

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The Gratitude Antidote

27 Sunday Apr 2014

Posted by BRomero in Free Thinking, Gratitudes

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88ec1c8388a0372b82f0b1881a8fe1fcToday we had a guest speaker at church who stood in for our pastor for Sunday services. She gave a good message, one that addressed fear over faith. Listening to her speak, I remembered a sentence from Ann Voskamp’s book, ONE THOUSAND GIFTS, in which is stated, “It is impossible to give thanks and feel fear simultaneously.” That sentence, one among many that I’ve remembered from the book, seems to make its way to the forefront of my memory often.

Each and every day we all face fears, different kinds of things that make us afraid. Sometimes our own fears are small compared to those others are facing. Sometimes we’re the ones facing the huge, important, life-changing fears. No matter, to remember that point, that when giving gratitude to God for what do have, it is impossible to feel fear at that exact moment, is to remember a way to face the fear without letting it win. I’ve tested the thought more times than I can count. It’s always been true. Whenever I’ve felt fear, whether over something important or important only to me, I’ve noticed that remembering to give thanks for something in my life cancels out the fear.

If we’ve lived to a certain age, at least past our twenties, and maybe into our thirties, we “get it”. Once we’ve grown out of adolescence, and perhaps married and taken on parenthood, we realize how much we have to be thankful for in our lives. Some people take longer to make the connection, to understand that what we consider to be “ours” is actually only ours because God is gracious enough to let us have it, be that anything material or (more importantly) the people in our lives that have become so important to us. I know that’s where I often stumble. I don’t want to be reminded that my loved ones, my children and my grandchildren, my husband, my extended family, my friends, all those I cherish are but gifts from God. He has given me the gift of having those precious beings in my life, but in reality they belong to Him. Many times those very ones who bring me such joy, who have special places in my heart, are the ones who cause me the most fear. It’s at those times, when I can feel the fear taking over and winning, that if I remember to thank God for the very existence of them, for the very opportunity and gift of loving them, that I can no longer fear. Thanking Him for my loved ones reminds me that they are really His, and the fear that is surrounding me on their behalf begins to dissipate. It doesn’t happen immediately, but it does happen.

Doing the gratitude thing to cancel out fear works in all sorts of situations, not only when it comes to our loved ones. For as many times as we feel fear and for as many reasons, there is always something right in front of us that we know is a gift from God. We know it like we know our names, but we don’t always think it. When we consciously take a moment to think it, to make ourselves see it, and to name it so that we can thank God for it, that fear living inside us seems to evaporate. In my case I can feel a type of lightening of my load (which is usually the world carried on my shoulders). It’s nice to give that up for awhile, even if only a few minutes, to that One much larger than I. Later, of course, the fear may come back. When that happens, giving gratitude will once again chase it away.

I’m more than a little glad that I read Ann Voskamp’s book. I’m more than a little glad that I know gratitude can counteract fear. Gratitude can slow us down, make us realize that we’ve been given countless things from God, and that in the larger scheme of things (for after all, in the midst of our fears we seem to have tunnel vision), He cares for us enough to have given us what we already have. Knowing that, it’s easier to realize He is with us in our fears and that those, too, are under His power. Those, too, those scary things that cause our fear, are not insurmountable to God. Nothing is.

So, this morning, sitting there in church, morning light shining through stained glass windows, our guest speaker giving a message on fear vs. faith, I couldn’t help but remember what I’ve already learned about the power of gratitude to God in the face of any fear. Showing our gratitude, naming our gratitude, telling God of our gratitude, is a powerful weapon against any fear at all.

Today I am grateful for the reminder given me this morning. Today I am grateful that I know the power of gratitude. Now if I can only continue to remember it and apply it whenever I need an antidote of a fear I’m facing.

Today I’m grateful for you and that you’re reading this post!

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Gratitude – elusive emotion, especially in a high school classroom

30 Sunday Mar 2014

Posted by BRomero in Free Thinking, Gratitudes, Retirement

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poetry test

84a534d852bc8fc544609bfd6961cd18(Written last week in a high school English class)

Sitting in the midst of teenagers reluctantly taking a poetry test, I watch them for the wrong turn of the head, a suspicious glance of an eye. Sitting ever vigilant, moving my own eyes across the room, hearing an errant complaint mumbled into the atmosphere, I guard the integrity of Room N103.

What am I doing here? I’m retired. I no longer help the not knowing to know any knowledge. I don’t quiet the talkative, hush the whisperer, correct the cheater, coerce the unwilling. I don’t calm classrooms, study students, or examine the examinees. Not now – not in this, the second year of my retirement. I don’t take a test on keeping the classroom quiet while students take a test on poetry.

I am wrong! I am substituting for a friend, a former colleague who had surgery, and I realize that old habits die hard.

These teenagers will take the test and take it honestly. Sitting in the back of the classroom (the better perch from which to observe), I still notice the tilt of a pony tail, any movement not in sync with test-taking. I’ve only known these students a few days, and yet I’ve known them for decades it seems, the practiced stretch, the distracting cough, the exaggerated head rolls. I have not forgotten the language of their bodies. I can still translate.

Ah! Poor babies! They think the word “substitute” on my name tag means “clueless”; they would never imagine it means “veteran.” They’ve been warned. They took no heed.

Suddenly, in spite of my frustration and fatigue, in spite of my wanting to be somewhere – almost anywhere – else, I feel a shocking rush of gratitude. From nowhere. Gratitude for this day has taken over this moment, gratitude for the opportunity to keep my skills honed, gratitude for the chance to help out a colleague, gratitude for the fact that I’m healthy and able to be here, even gratitude for the few students who appreciate what I’m doing when setting boundaries. I feel gratitude galore for the friendly faces of my friends on the faculty, my family from my teaching years whom I love to this day.

Suddenly, in spite of the nervous twitching around me, the efforts to slip something by me, the energy it takes me to stay vigilant……suddenly I’m reminded from a power so much greater than I that life is good. All really is, at this moment, right with the world.

That doesn’t mean I wasn’t grateful when the day was over!

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The Gift of a New Book Study

05 Wednesday Mar 2014

Posted by BRomero in Gratitudes, The Book Study

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Soon we begin a new book study at my church. I am leading the study along with a few friends who studied the same book with me last fall. Our friendship and fellowship during that first study ignited a desire to give other women the opportunity to benefit from the book as well.

The book is about giving thanks to God in all things, in the easy times and in the hard times, also. It speaks about the idea that thanksgiving always precedes the miracle and reminds us that even at the last supper, the night before his cruxifiction, Christ gave thanks before breaking the bread and drinking the wine. I know from many personal experiences that it isn’t always easy to give thanks. I know that when the going gets tough, I don’t always get going. Sadly, I don’t always offer praise and thanksgiving to God during tough times. During good times it’s easier to be thankful, but sometimes instead we draw away, subconsciously thinking we don’t have as great a need.

When we dare to take a real look at our lives, we discover that we are surrounded by blessings, real gifts from God. They are everywhere. Those of us old enough to have made it to the other side of hard times (which come in many different categories) know that we gain something from them. We may not know exactly what it is that we’ve gained until much later. Time and distance is sometimes necessary. Still, the hard times can bring gratitude, too.

The book study will have us make lists of the everyday gifts that God bestows upon us starting with each new sunrise. Throughout the day we’ll take better notice of the unnoticed, pay attention where before there was inattention, and learn to be more thankful along the way.

Right now I’m grateful for many things, but my heart is especially full of thanks to God for the group of women who have been pulled, been lead to do the study with us. I pray that these women will find their way to us easily with no obstacles in their paths. I pray for them to feel the gentle pull of their Lord, theirs and mine, to the book study. There we will make a practice of not only worshipping Him, and loving Him, but thanking Him, too. Regularly. There we will become list makers, noticing and paying attention to our gifts and showing gratitude for them as we may never have before. We’ll be counting our blessings.

Dear God, maker of all things, Holy of Holies, our Lord and Our Redeemer, thank you for the group of women who will start the new study together Sunday night. Bless each one. Clear her path to you so that nothing can block her way. Amen.

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A blog about feelings that need expression.

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BRomero

BRomero

A wife, mother, and grandmother, I have a rich supply of family material from which to draw, but I also want to write about other things that weigh on my heart and mind. We'll see.

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