A Sense of Wonder by Kristen Heitzmann

After faith in God, I think the most important thing we can impart to our children–and maintain ourselves–is a sense of wonder. I was talking to my daughter yesterday who took her husband and tots to see the Steamboat Colorado Ice Castles.

They spent hours in what could have been a five minute pass-through, talking with the creators about how it was formed, looking into every nook and cranny, thinking what this part and that part looked like and thoroughly enjoying the spectacle, while another family–sadly–hustled through and said we paid all that for this?

It made me realize how big a part wonder plays in my life. You all know I’m enamored with the mountains, and what a blow our recent fire was and is. But even in the burn I’ve experienced fascination (okay obsession.)

Last weekend my brother and I took my mom to his place in Carlsbad CA. The ocean is another source of delight for me, though one I don’t experience often. I drank in the coastal view, the sunsets we took in each day we were there, the midday sparkle and crystalline splendor of the water’s surface.

I could have been content, but more than enjoying the view, I wanted to investigate. I went down to the low tide pools and touched the sticky anemone studded with tiny shells that curled in from the brush of my finger.

Observed the sea star posing:

And on the last day in La Jolla:

I am so amazed by God’s creation, but even more by the delight he created in our spirits to revel in the smallest details. Centuries ago Marcus Aurelius put it this way:

“Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

Oh what a gift to dwell on the beauty of life. Or even more, to dwell in it. My prayer for today and every day is that all our moments will be wondrous.

The Painful Joy of Goodness by Kristen Heitzmann

I finally got to see Les Misérables last night. I’d seen it once on stage and read the book years ago, so I knew what I was in for. I went prepared, and sure enough, from the moment of the candlesticks, my eyes were streaming. Such sadness, such inhumanity. The egregious treatment of Jean Valjean. The raw courage and destruction of Fantine in her unfailing love and devotion to Cosette. 

But what really made me weep, was the goodness. The life changing kindness of the bishop, winning Jean for God. Jean’s prayerful acceptance of the charge, shedding the hatred that sustained him and choosing, every time, the right and terrible path. On and on, moments of such piercing beauty.

As always my heart ached for Javert. To receive mercy–the same mercy that gave Jean life–and be so rigid in belief that mercy means failure, means death. Is there a better picture of rejecting God, not in divine justice but prodigal forgiveness?

And Jean’s homecoming, his weary soul free at last, joining those who strove for freedom from fear and bondage. How can our eyes not weep, our hearts not overflow with such an undiluted depiction of fallen man overlapped by the kingdom of God? 

If you haven’t already, I urge you to experience this opera. If you’re like me, your God-place inside will be stirred.

About a month ago, my 81 year old mother had a surgery she hoped would take care of all the problems resulting from radiation treatment in 1975. Some friends took her to the new doctor whom she had pinned her hopes on and scheduled the radical solution before my brother and I could click out heels and turn around. Because she is normally sloooow, I felt she must be very certain about this, and in truth she never wavered.

I gladly spent the days in the hospital with her–she sprang back wonderfully from the anesthesia–and brought her to my home to convalesce. Thus has proceeded–minus man-eating plants–the Little House of Horrors. Did I mention the surgery is a colostomy? I can’t think of a better demonstration of the perfect way God designed the human body, than that particular alteration. The equipment alone is like that scene in Apollo 13 when they dump the parts on the table and order the team to find a way for them to fit together and do something they weren’t intended to do. Then there’s my poor mother’s scoliosis, protruding rib cage on–yes THAT side–and the fact she now weighs eighty pounds, skin and bones. Thank the Lord, he blessed me with an unflappable spirit and a stomach of steel. I have deep compassion to handle the–um–equipment failures. But there’s no way, she’s doing this herself, nope, none, nuh-uh. Not ever.

Over the last few days, I think she’s realized she can’t go back to her house and yesterday we redecorated her room. (During the fire, I’d packed up the handmade things collected at folk art festivals and shops.) She exclaimed over each one and delighted in the process, never saying “I have to get home”. One thing especially touched her, something my daughter bought me years ago. I pulled it out and told her to read this every day. The calligraphy says: A rose of lasting beauty is my mother’s love to me. I cherish our time together and your sweet company. 

 

My dears, I don’t know how much time I’ll have with her, but I can assure you, in spite of every pending disaster, every smell, every inconvenience, I will cherish these moments and her sweet company.

 

 

Mountains and Molehills by Kristen Heitzmann

Yesterday I disintegrated.

I could tell you something big and awful happened, but it didn’t. No terrible news, no world-shaking crisis. The truth is, I was presented a challenge that for some people is no challenge at all. It had to do with the myriad ways we authors have to connect and promote ourselves/our work. Have you ever held a magnifying mirror up very close to your face? Did you see every ridge and valley, every speck and blotch, each scaly skin cell an insult in itself? That’s how I feel about myself when it’s time to promote. Even then, I wouldn’t mind–when the focus is my work–if I only knew HOW.

Accomplishing one small task reminds me of something else I haven’t or don’t know how to do. That reminds me of another that I forgot, and I heap a little dirt on that hill. Very soon I am mountain climbing over molehills.

“Some folks worry and putter, Push and shove, Hunting little molehills to make big mountains of.” from One Day At A Time In Al-Anon.

That is not me. In general, I am pretty low-key. I’m flexible, spontaneous, optimistic, joyful. I love to create. I love the writing life. I’m ecstatic to do it for Jesus. What grace!

So how to explain yesterday… I think this sums it up:

“But we hold this treasure in earthen vessels, that the surpassing power may be of God and not from us.” 2Cor4:7

God graciously reminds me I’m flawed and helpless without him.

“We are afflicted in every way, but not constrained; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our body.” 2Cor4:8-10

God reminds me I should have no expectation of ease.

“For this momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to what is seen but to what is unseen; for what is seen is transitory, but what is unseen is eternal.” 2Cor4:17,18

God knows the plans he has for us, for our work, for the impact we may or may not have. If I strive in my earthen vessel, it is he who shines. And that, dear ones, is a mountain worth climbing!

Change by Kristen Heitzmann

As I sit in this first cold snap and see hanging baskets with darkened, withered leaves and tiny pellets of brittle snow skittering across the balcony, I feel change coming. The geraniums are still blooming pink and unfazed. The grass is still green. Some of the trees are yellow and red. Some are bare from the wind. There is no synchrony, but rather singularity in the parts of nature as the season begins to change. Why is this one staunchly blooming while another has faded away? Like middle school kids, awkwardly entering the next phase at various rates and in unlovely ways.

It strikes me that life is a solitary path, a series of changes that may or may not coincide with anyone else’s readiness to change. I have often spoken of seasons in my life, years in which my creativity took wing through music, through art, and through writing. And within those seasons there were seasons, times of growth, times of drought, times of dormancy and rejuvenation.

Sometimes my husband claims he wants to go live where it’s always summer. I can think of many such lovely places, but then there’s a day like today when I feel the unease of change coming. When I know they’re calling for snow Saturday, and at first I think I need to cancel the mountain hike we planned for my birthday, then imagine hiking it in the snow instead. Excitement springs up. Change.

Without change, I’d grow dull. I need the dissonance that resolves. I think that’s at my core as a writer. Strife, strife, more strife, then resolution. And with that dissonant resolution comes wonder, comes beauty. I rejoice that God in his great wisdom didn’t give us a static world.

Renewal by Kristen Heitzmann

I am constantly amazed by renewal. After the fire that so deeply impacted my community and me personally, I’m seeing signs of life where no life looked possible. Green shoots and leaves thrusting up through blackened ground. I see crews who worked to stop disaster, now tenderly working to restore order. Helicopters that ceaselessly dropped bucket after bucket of water on flames too difficult to reach on foot now drop straw and wood chips on barren ground to hold back the rains that–please God–may come. Building back what was torn down.

Some days ago, my mom had a catastrophic failure of her septic system. At 81 and weighing about that, she had no strength to deal with it, so I went in for the initial inspection–I’ll save you the details and suffice it to say, I never need to experience that again. Did I mention she’s a “saver”? I called in the emergency troops, who were likewise amazed by the scope of the project. We have since learned that every affected part, walls, flooring etc. contains asbestos, so it’s like that scene in E.T. with the space suits and plastic.

I brought my mom to my house the first night where she insisted, “Surely she’d be home by morning. She had so much to do at home.” I assured her there was nothing she could do, since this would not require a mop, but a construction crew. Her gloom was palpable. But after feeding her a mouse sized dinner, I called her outside to the balcony to see something. For the next minutes, we witnessed an Oscar worthy performance in the sky, a cloud show of heavenly beauty.

I said, “Isn’t God amazing. He’s continuously showing off.”

She looked at me and said, “It sure puts my sewer problem in perspective.”

At first I thought, “Honey, you didn’t see your sewer problem.” But then I realized she was absolutely right. I could get that business taken care of, but could I make a cloud and light it up so spectacularly that thousands stood with their faces to heaven and exclaimed in awe and wonder? What glory.

Hallelujah

Morning Visit

One of my favorite places to write is on my front patio in the morning. I take my laptop, coffee, maybe a research tome or two, and settle in beside our landscaped creek. The sound of water, the scent of dewy grass, sunrise creeping on the mountain slopes just beyond the scrub oak act on my spirit like pure grace. Lord, what beauty! What joy You took in creation. How blessed and humbled I am to continue the story You began. As I open my documents to my work-in-progress, read back and settle into my tale, I’m aware of tiny bright yellow birds with black wings darting down from the oak branches to flutter playfully in the water. A hummingbird hovers a few feet away, checking me out before dipping into the throats of hanging basket flowers.  I put my head back down, shaping and moving a suspenseful scene when motion catches my eye. Oh joy! Visitors!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aw, sweet darlings. Thank you for this tender moment. Now–back to angst and mayhem!