An Ode to Teachers

At the beginning of October, I began a long-term sub placement.  It was at the school where I served as an “Academic-Behavioral Interventionist” part time for a school year and where I’ve frequently served as substitute teacher amidst my other jobs since.  This fall, with my extensive summer job search and application process proving completely unsuccessful, I found myself in need of a job…and Hillside found itself in need of a sub willing to carry out the day-to-day and teaching for one of their beloved 5^th grade teachers who would be out for a back surgery.  I agreed, thankful for the community I knew was at Hillside and for God’s provision for my needs. 

The fact remains…I’m not a teacher.  I am a decent instructor.  And a notable substitute as I come with enough experience and a bag of tricks to make the day survivable for both me and my class.  But there are MANY reasons I didn’t go to school for elementary education.  It turns out I like lesson planning (I love lists and am a great planner and there is a strategy to lesson plans) but the day in and out of classroom management for talkative pre-pubescent 10 and 11-year-olds proved beyond my key “niche”.  I often felt like an overwhelmed island. I had no idea what I didn’t know or what help to ask for…but I had 29 crashing waves reminding me constantly of what was being asked of me. To say it was a learning curve would be, at least, accurate. 

I found I learned other things as well as time went on.  Mostly about the teachers whom I’ve always appreciated but haven’t been awarded sainthood.  At one point a teacher friend commented something along the lines of “no one will be a bigger supporter of teachers than you after this!”  I responded that I was applying to be president of their fan clubs.  I learned much about what it is like to be a teacher and what is required of them in the classroom.  Below is my (incomplete) list of some of those things.  And, if you are anyway anticipating a third snow/cold day with children whom you love but are wondering, with wide eyes and decreasing patience, how you all are going to make it out alive…thank the teachers you know.  I promise you they don’t hear it enough...

I was in a FULLY STOCKED classroom for less than a week when I felt the compulsion to buy things for my students and room.  I can only imagine what a teacher goes through at the beginning of a school year, pre-anticipating the real needs of students.

Every post about drinking cold coffee is true.  No matter how soon I get to school.  No matter how soon I start the coffee pot and no matter how soon I start drinking the coffee… 

I enjoy an occasional adult beverage.  Sometimes I even enjoy one to wind down.  I VERY rarely drink copiously and never as an escape.  That being said…I find it an absolute miracle that more teachers aren’t raging alcoholics.  If they were, it would make sense to me…

Every time you read something about staying awake, unable to sleep, because of a student, believe it.  It isn’t an over generalized sentiment.  It is impossible to spend 8 hours a day with individuals and not care deeply about who they are as individuals. (I anxiety slept about my class and students almost every night.)

Everyday I looked at students and said “You are NOT stupid! We are still learning this skill!” and “you are going to do something incredible with your life!” and “everyone judges success differently.  I judge it most by people who keep working even when it’s hard!” and “you need to give yourself more credit!  Just because you don’t have it yet, doesn’t mean you won’t. You are half way there!”  I didn’t say these things as platitudes.  I truly believed in my students.  I repeated often to the class “You need to believe in your selves half as much as I do, and you’ll change the world!” Did they believe me?  Maybe not.  But someday I hope they know they are capable and think back not back to me, their long-term sub, but the dozens of teachers who have been saying the same thing for YEARS!

5^th graders, (or many other -graders for that matter), are not necessarily inherently nice kids. I lost count of the times I was called “stupid”, “ugly”, “fat”, and any number of things.  I have been sworn at, kicked, punched, the target of jokes and drawings and gossip that would have made me leave school crying as a 10-year-old.  Teachers would like to say they are immune to these kinds of comments and jabs. (I mean, after all, it most often came on behalf of whatever student whose behavior I most recently corrected. We would have a conversation about the need for me to feel something I didn’t like because they were feeling something they didn’t like. Kids are still working on how to respond in appropriate ways.  Most teachers get this.) But…teachers are human too.  They have like 30 students they give up time and sleep and energy for.  Students they invest into academically and personally.  Students who might thank them for help on a problem, but it may take years – if they ever get there at all – to be thankful for the investment.  Teachers aren’t immune. I’ve seen calloused teachers; I haven’t seen immune teachers.  Stuff builds up.  Stuff hurts. 

Teachers try to prove themselves to each other.  I witnessed some incredible teaching “teams”.  Pockets of teachers in the same grade level who were all committed to working together and sharing ideas and the best worksheets and STEM projects and “crazy red squirrel on crack” student stories.  And yet…there is this subtle recognition that all teachers want to show each other they are doing enough.  Good enough.  I spent pretty much my whole time trying to prove myself.  Sometimes I cut myself enough slack to recognize I wasn’t and am not an elementary teacher.  I was just the long-term sub. That no one was expecting me to understand grade level standards and learning targets or how to take the new reading curriculum that the students DESPISE and make it usable.  But part of me expected it from me.  And most of me tried really hard to convince myself that I wasn’t being thought less of because of my failure to measure up.  And every so often I saw that same flinch in even seasoned teachers who were capable of feeling the same things…

Teachers spend a lot of their non-teaching time doing things that involve their teaching time.  Conferences.  Online trainings. Reading dozens of articles about other teaching strategies, projects and ideas that are working, ways to better care for the whole person of their students, and studies on education.  They are browsing Pinterest for projects, fresh ideas, and encouragement.  They are paying for subscriptions to sites with more tools and helps and premade worksheets.  And yes, based on the conversations I heard and calendars I saw, they are doing this on their summer “breaks” (the ones everyone is always so jealous of…)

Since I mentioned curriculum…I only got my feet wet in the world of “grade level standards”.  I have only a cursory knowledge about what all goes into creating those standards at a state level and barely more about implementing them.  But based on what I saw, experienced, and know about the classroom…to meet all of the grade level standards in all subjects would require 10-hour school days, 6 days a week, for at least 11 months a year.  A classroom without any behavioral issues, perfectly attentive students, and another teacher wouldn’t hurt either.  I have NO IDEA how teachers get through it all!

Group projects.  If you let them choose their partners, they goof off the entire time.  If you choose their partners for them, they fight the whole time.  I’m pretty sure, based on the chaos which ensues by assigning a group project, I know how wars are actually started.  The struggle between “this would be a fun project/this is a good skill/they don’t do enough hands-on things/they need to learn how to work together” and “is this worth curling up in a corner and crying about for three days?” is REAL. 

Speaking of wars…seating charts take the strategy of seasoned Army generals, the patience of UN diplomats, the daring sense of adventure of Indiana Jones, and the problem-solving genius of a published mathematician.  “Billy can’t sit next to Danny, Brad, or Shelly.  He does sit well next to Sally and Robby, but Robby can’t sit next to Sally.  Robby also can’t sit next to Brad or Shelly but works surprisingly well with Danny…” And then the earth-shattering sass when they discover who their new neighbors are…

Teachers say things that just don’t make sense.  It’s like (I imagine) parenting but with 30 super different children with very specific personalities and needs.  At least once a week I said something like “new rule: you can’t make art out of an apple and leave it on your desk.  It needs to go home at the end of the day!” and “I don’t know why I need to remind you of this, but we don’t lick our friends!” and “For the love of recess! Why are your cradling him? Put him down!”

If you have a child whose teacher is out sick, pray for them.  If they are gone for more than a couple of days, consider meals and community gatherings of support; they might be dying.  This wasn’t a case of the sniffles, they are really not okay! The only basis I have for this knowledge is the sheer terror of lesson plans.  Granted, as a non-teacher lesson plans may have been more challenging for me than a gifted teacher who can do such things with flourish and speed.  But, shoot!  I was gone for the equivalent of six school days when I went to Israel and I put an embarrassing amount of time into lesson plans.  What content was reasonable for a sub to cover? Was I leaving enough work? Not enough?  What would I have to reteach when I got back? How did I leave notes on students that didn’t automatically make the sub form negative opinion of students but gave them the information they needed to give my special students the care they needed?  And the headache of having to go through it all and figure it all out again when you come back?  Yeah, teachers don’t take sick days lightly. 

Teacher’s aren’t thanked. Not really.  I can say this because I’m not and wasn’t a real teacher.  I say it as someone who was meaningfully thanked EVERY time I saw the teacher whose classroom I was covering.  I know many phenomenal teachers and they are phenomenal because they didn’t go into teaching for the thanks but because they truly love what they do and, more importantly those they do it for.  But it’s still not taking place. Not in so many words.  If they teach in elementary, there is probably a collection of art from their students or occasionally there is a hug.  Small pieces of a student expressing their love and thanks in ways they know how.  There is the satisfaction of watching a student grow in and own skills in life and academics.  There is the inner knowledge that what they do makes a difference.  But not many people turn around and say, “thank you”.  Not many professions have so many expectations…from law makers, administration, parents, teachers, and childless strangers…with so few actual resources…that are accomplished with joy and creativity and ingenuity and personal sacrifice…and are done with nare a word of acknowledgment or thanks. 

I was asked routinely if I would do it again…I often admit reluctantly I probably wouldn’t.  Reluctant because it makes it sound like a bad experience when mostly it was just a lot.  I was working a 50+ hour week, for the same pay I would make for a sub job that included giving out worksheets and reading homework while the kids were at PE.  I made less than minimum wage, still had to put hours in at my other job, and was still doing homework for my last class.  I wasn’t eating, not sleeping well, and constantly worried about my kids.  I learned I’m capable of many things but that teaching 5^th graders is not likely my life’s calling.  I am thankful for those for whom it is.  I am incredibly grateful for the teachers I’ve had throughout my life who taught, encouraged, inspired, and helped shape me into the person I’ve become.  It is likely you haven’t heard it recently, so thank you. 

Crashing for Turtles

I was driving to Annual Conference the first weekend in June…in Traverse City…after class…in Fort Wayne.  It was a five-hour drive after a four-hour class after an hour-and-a-half drive.  I wasn't exactly looking forward to it. I plugged in an audio book novelette (that I was bound and determined to finish before I arrived…I did) and began the northward journey. 

I was a little more than half way through and driving past Grand Rapids on 131.  Traffic was pretty busy, and, eager to be done with my drive, I weaved in and out of the lanes at 77 mph with the cars merging in and off the expressway.  Until, all of the sudden, the right lane was at a near standstill, hazard lights creating a parade. 

Cars flew by, passing the parade at an otherwise normal speed.  Already in the left lane, I was one of them.  I slowed and looked curiously towards the beginning of the line.  And then I saw the reason for the cautious traffic.  Looking to have made it across the merging lane and into right lane was a huge box turtle.

It took giant steps, racing across the traffic.  I was proud of its persistence but as it made it ever closer to the left lane of northbound traffic, I thought for sure it was toast.  I flew past but looked back several times in my review mirror.  A giant red semi barreled ahead.   I wanted to close my eyes but realizing I was looking in my review mirror, I simply focused on the road ahead, cheering on the turtle I was positive was about to reach its certain doom. 

I glanced back one last time as I merged to the right and saw it.  The semi saw the turtle, now just a dark speck in the dead middle of the lane.  The driver pulled so far to the left, the truck tilted in the ditch.  It’s tail and nose were in the lane, creating a semi-circle hedge of protection as the turtle continued in its unstopped mission to the grass and the truck made its way slowly back onto the road. 

I cheered!  Like literally clapped a couple of times.

And I texted a friend (through voice-to-text, calm yourselves) and told him, in very short version, about the miraculous turtle save and the semi who swerved off the road for it.  He responded shortly after with a message that read “good for the turtle! But be safe! Don’t go crashing for turtles!”

I decided, first, that “Crashing for Turtles” would be an EXCELLENT band name (if you are looking for a band name and use it, please give me at least a nod of credit or let me play kazoo in one song or something because you know it’s a sweet name!).  And then I was struck by the profundity of the phrase.

The idea of what it meant to crash for turtles and whether it was a good thing or bad thing, metaphorically, consumed me all through conference. And then for days.  Even weeks.  I declared it one of the most beautiful images of self-sacrifice I could possibly muster, and I dreamed of writing about it.  The latter might not seem like much but for someone who hasn’t wrote anything of greater worth than a research paper in months, the desire to write fanned the tiniest little spark inside of me. A spark that said maybe all of the pieces of me I thought I once knew weren’t gone…

Then life got in the way.  First it was school: Heady reading and several papers.  Then the end of my job where I was working way too many hours.  Then camp.  Then the start of another class.  Then just about the time I felt compelled to maybe, just maybe, finish my thoughts and what it meant to crash for a turtle in my twisted brain of metaphors and pictures and images…more life got in the way. When I opened the file on my computer marked “crashing for turtles” today – it was dated as “last edited by user on July 17”.  Significant because that was a day before the boy who, technically, coined the phrase (though my brain did all of the running away with it, so it was never really his or had anything to do with him), suddenly but quietly exited my life.  At almost the exact same time, I found out a dear friend was killed in a fatal car accident.  I lost all desire to talk about crashing for anything.  Let alone turtles. 

But more than two months later and the image hasn’t left.  If anything, it’s become richer and more meaningful and poignant.  And harder and more painful and more real… Because, you see, ultimately, the idea of crashing for turtles is about putting yourself on the line for something inferior. It either displays the ultimate heart of service or the reality of being made a slave and the distance between the two is striking. 

There is something incredible, for me, in the concept of the turtle as a person or mission or reality.  Someone not inferior in value or worth but in some other way. (*Insert the first disenfranchised, discriminated, unrecognized, or “forgotten” person or people group that comes to your mind here, for example*).  I love to the point of chills and tears what it means for the biggest and most powerful (of which all off us are in different places and spaces) to throw a piece of themselves off the proverbial road to protect the innocent, the vulnerable, the ones without the means to protect themselves (and yes this can be as simple as greeting the visitors sitting in the fifth row on the right at church even if you’re not really the outgoing type).  Creating that semi-circle of protection.  It's something I witnessed my friend Nick do often...and there were many previous "turtles" who attended his funeral to tell the tales...

And, though the semi put itself at risk, made the choice to protect, it was only part. Because what actually happened, as happened with the right lane of cars previous, is that it forced the cars behind it to stop and take notice. The turtle survived that day because if it was important enough for a big ol’ semi to throw itself off the road, then surely it was important enough for the sedan behind it to at least look towards what it was swerving around.  I was awed by the thought that I passed a mile of cars in the right lane (and merging lane) going nare 10mph with hazard lights on and those in the back would have NO IDEA the reason for the first and yet they too had trusted that the reduced speed and caution was important and necessary. 

I think this kind of crashing for turtles in underused and important and Biblical.  It seems like it is very much like the task of the Good Samaritan, the call of the Rich Young Ruler, and the drive of the early church (among many other things).  In our me-centric world of selfish gain and a gospel that fits my needs and wants and ministry in my comfort zones and is convenient for my schedule and matches my political leanings and my picture of the way the world should go…there is something unfortunately revolutionary and uncommonly heroic about the one who choose to lay aside her [comfortable, convenient, satisfying, desired, etc] life for her friends.  Let alone a vulnerable stranger.

And yet I’m torn. Not with that particular reality but because “crashing for turtles” is a metaphor with a double-edged sword. I’m torn because I realize that if something had happened with that giant red semi, if the itty-bitty little sedan behind it didn’t slow or stop or see, if traffic felt the need to dangerously merge at the wrong time, real people in real time could have been really hurt.  If that had happened, the headlines on the paper wouldn’t read “huge box turtle courageously saved by sacrificial truck driver”, it would have read something terrible like “Alcohol not in play in Thursday’s deadly accident”.  And no one would have easily forgiven the report of “Driver notes turtle cause of Thursday’s crash causing two deaths and seven injuries…”  Because the very real actual turtle was important and worthwhile. But not as valuable or worthwhile as that of a human life. 

And we all crash for these kinds of non-literal turtles.  We all have things in our lives that get valued above and beyond what is right and reasonable.  We have “turtles” which are given worth and importance and investment…turtles that, in seeking to save, we destroy parts of ourselves, parts of lives. I think about the long-toted idols of work and money and busyness and sex and drugs and stuff and gluttony. And the seventeen other deadly sins and whatever else it is that seems like something we are willing to stake our lives on, willing to crash for, things which seem like they are worth something and maybe some are in the short term but aren’t worth anything near a human life.  I think about the nights I didn’t sleep to finish the homework I was unwilling to settle for a “B” on.  I think about the jobs I went above and beyond simply to prove to someone else, somewhere else, that I had what it took.  I think about my sometimes consuming anxiety or my crippling thought obsessions. I think about the relationship with a boy who first caused me, quite unknowingly, to spiral from the phrase “crashing for turtles” at all.  The relationship being something I was willing to crash for but in the end being something which, when it crashed, how it crashed, deeply affected how I knew and understood “me” and what I had in value and worth.  I think about all of the friendships I’ve had which ended in one way or another.  Those too being something I would crash for and did crash for and yet caused the same and even worse crash of identity when it came to trying to decide why some people stay and some people go. 

I think about the ways that “self-care” is becoming a needed and important piece of mental health education…not because of the selfishness created in a me-centric reality but because in knowing and doing and moving and being (often out of an unhealthy core and unhealthy identity) people crash and burn in a way that seems to destroy them and takes others down with them and leaves them no good to themselves or anyone else.  And sometimes those are the same people who thought they were saving some turtle, when in fact nothing was saved and much was lost.

I’m stuck with these competing narratives, the ones warring against each other that demand an answer.  Any answer.  And the answer is important because it seems like the turtles I am willing to crash for or the ones I already do and have say a great deal about who I am and whose I am.  So I’m desperate to know and see and understand. I want the answer telling me how to move forward.  How to know which turtles to crash for and which to entrust.  Answers that say something like “this is how you know what turtles are worth it!” or “here is a definitive way to know whether or not this crash is Christlike or chaos inducing” or “when you encounter a turtle that you are unsure of, proceed with the following seven steps…”  But life isn’t like that, is it?  Life is full of questions and incomprehinsibles and unknowables and things most unfair. 

And so, despite the fact words have finally made it to page, I’m still caught in the tension.  I wish I weren’t.  I like when things wrap up in neat packages.  When there are conclusions and steps to purpose.  When I finish writing something and can tie some sort of bow and say “This. These. Here are the words which have been burning deep and needing to be found.”  But I’m only newly back into the writing world.  And these words themselves are coming out of place of tension – of both insecurity and hope. So, turtles or not, perhaps, the tension must remain.  And maybe little by little it can be less about me and more about the God I wish to serve.  And maybe that will be enough…

The Scar Chronicles

Today is my scar’s 10^th birthday.

Over the years I have come to really love scars – and mine in particular.  (Let’s face it, we have been through A LOT together!)  I love scars for a couple of reasons for sure.  For one, scars have stories!  Oft untold, some unknown, but always more than just the mark they bear.  For two, scars are the reminder of pain but the presence of healing.  It’s proof where something was once broken and hurt, has now been made new.  My scar isn’t “pretty” but the cells used to create that flesh were brand new!  Brand. Freaking. New.  Something broken turned into something healed and whole.  And that will preach…

Everyone told me my scar would be “hardly noticeable” after a year or two but 10 years later and we are still going strong!  Which, honestly, I’m okay with.  I did everything to reduce it early on.  The scar cream and the lotions and protecting it from the sun and hiding it…   But now, if I were to wake up without it one morning?  I think I would miss it.  It is so much a part of me…  And it stands as this incredible reminder.  Life has changed a lot but still it remains.  Much like God’s faithfulness…

Granted, it’s not quite the scar it once was!  From a five inch long slight smile across my neck that was bumpy and slightly grotesque to a nearly 7 ½ inch beauty (second surgery) which was somewhat cosmetically better…to today!  The end is just a faint pink line, but most is still quite visible.    

And so, 10 years later and I still get questions about my scar!  I think when you have a large scar on your arm, people start assuming fun accidents involving ladders or chainsaws or grizzly bears.  When you have a large scar across your neck, people don’t know what to think!  As a result, my scar has garnered quite an array of responses!

When I say array…I literally mean array!  Think less of the color wheel and more of a color spectrum… People’s reactions and responses have been numerous and often hilarious.  Good, bad, ugly, downright confusing… You name it, I’ve probably heard it!

I decided the best celebration of my scar’s 10^th birthday was to chronicle some of those stories.  In the words of another old, good friend – Larry the Cucumber – “I laughed, I cried, they moved me, Bob!”  

So, without further ado…

The Scar Chronicles

When I first came back to SAU after surgery, I didn’t really know how to let people in on the dramatic life changes since we left for Christmas break. Still covered in bloody gauze, I covered my neck with a scarf.  People heard my [nonexistent] voice before they ever saw my neck.  They would always say “Are you sick?”  And, much to my elder sister’s displeasure I would say “Oh! Not really!”  (I thought this was funny because I didn’t have the head cold they expected… Faith did not.)  When they did see my scar, they would gasp ‘what happened?!”  “Umm, over break I found out I had cancer and they took out my thyroid…” was just a little awkward. For the same surprised reaction, however, I found I could tell a better story.  So, I started to say “Well, an old lady came up to me in the Wal-Mart parking lot.  Robbed me at knife point.  Stole my Carmex!” Most looked shocked for like a second, laughed, and then asked what really happened.  While I felt the story softened the blow, I had to stop telling it when the reactions I received included “But why did she want your Carmex?!” and “Was that the Wal-Mart in Jackson?  That is why I NEVER shop there!  I only go to the Meijer.  Way less dangerous!”   People still talk about this story.  Mostly me.

This probably should have deterred me from making up stories but sometimes I still do occasionally for a laugh.  One of my favorites is to tell young people that I was born with my head on backwards, which of course was fine until I wanted to learn how to drive.  So, I had to have a couple of surgeries to turn my head back around.  “If you look closely,” I say while demonstrating “my head still doesn’t sit totally straight.  It kind of points to the left and I can’t get it all the way to the right.  So someday they might have to fix that.”  Most pause and go “nuh-uh! That’s not true!”  And I tell them the real story.  Last year I told it to a kid in a class I subbed (instead of my normal spiel found somewhere below).  He tended to be a bit of a punk and I wanted a reaction out of him.  But he just said “oh” and left. The next day I was in the class again and some other student asked me about my scar.  He whipped around and went “You’re so stupid!  She told us about it yesterday.  She had to have her head turned around because she was born with it backwards!  DUH!”  He body slammed a reading pillow while rolling his eyes at his “ignorant” classmate.  I cleared it up with her.  I have no idea what he believes…

My first scar especially, curved up like a slight smile.  When people ask questions by saying “what is that?” I like to respond with “It’s my second smile!  See!  I smile even when I frown!”  Then I typically frown and trace my smiling scar.  The kids I work with get PUMPED about this. (I was once introduced to a parent by an excited student saying, “see her second smile, mom!”) I can really attribute it back to a friend from college, however.  We worked together on a custodial team and he said, “can I turn your scar into a smiley face?” “Why not!”  I replied, expecting him to take the sharpie in his hands to put two single dots for eyes.  When I realized the dot was becoming a full-fledged eye, it was too late.  What did I do?  Leave it as a cyclops?  Two full sharpie eyes and nose later and my neck had a face!  Which could only be [mostly] removed with 100% acetone!  The smile (without the face) lives. 

For whatever reason, when people see what appears to be a slit throat, they assume the worst.  I’ve gotten many questions about suicide attempts.  My trigeminal nerve, carotid artery, and jugular all sit directly behind my scar (cancer was “carved” off of all three).  If I was aiming with the scar I have, I don’t think I would have missed.  But it also isn’t the residual scar from a rope burn from an attempted hanging.  Guys, I promise I didn’t try to slit my throat! Or hang myself!  Or…anything in that direction!

My scar is (or was), for whatever reason, a people deterrent.  Some have come clean about it.  Others I hear about through the grape vine.  My scar scares people apparently??  It’s how I found out about one of my favorite rumors! 

My junior year I lived on a floor of mostly freshmen.  I pretty much kept to myself (for reasons in another story) but one girl seemed to avoid me like the plague.  For a freshman who didn’t know me, I thought this strange.  But, remember, I was at a pretty tame Christian Liberal Arts College.  We were eating a floor dinner once and I was talking to my RA about my upcoming/recent surgery or something and freshie sat nearby, listening nervously.  At one point she released a visible relief style sigh.  I asked her about it casually.  It was then I found out that, (though it wouldn’t surprise me if it somehow went back to my own mugging at Wal-Mart story…), I found out I was in a gang!  Or had been.  She had been avoiding me because she was afraid.  Because someone told her I had been in a gang.  (This story is WAY funnier if you know anything about me and my general persona in college or high school!).  After her confession, the stories trickled in from others.  At least twice it was reported I got my scar in a gang initiation.  A few times it was in a gang fight.  The most common report was, thank the Lord for redemption, I was in a gang, but I turned my life around and wanted out and they slit my throat.  I’ve never been so hard core before or since!

Not related but part of the “deters people” family of stories…years later I was working in Outdoor Education when I coworker reported the humorous story of a kid who, after being scratched in Reptiles and Amphibians class, declared he didn’t care because girls liked guys with scars!  We laughed collectively before I (it is my fault, really, I don’t know why I said anything!) commented something along the lines of “guys get more attractive with scars, but girls don’t, how does that work??” And a male coworker replied, “It’s true!  I think girls with scars are super unattractive.”  The table went quiet.  Another coworker went, “Dude, Anika has a super noticeable scar…”  To which the first responded with “I know.”  I had long expected my scar was an “attraction deterrent”.  While I had ZERO desire to attract any of my male coworkers, it was the first time it had been voiced so clearly.  Cheers!

Sometimes people get confused about anatomy…

I had a professor that I SUPER appreciated in college.  He cared about his students in and outside of the classroom and prayed and supported me through a lot that first semester especially.  He had this tendency the first few weeks (up to a couple of months) I was back, however, to look at me with these eyes.  Eyes that spoke a pity and an appreciation I didn’t feel I deserved – like maybe I was a living, breathing miracle.  I was in his office middle of the semester, talking about life, and at one point he stopped me.  He said “Wait, when you talk about your thyroid, you keep gesturing to your neck.  Where is the thyroid?”  I explained that it was a butterfly shaped organ that sits over the larynx, toward the base of the neck and I watched a lightbulb go on.  He responded “You’ve always said thyroid, but I think I was thinking hypothalamus.  I thought they opened your neck and went up from there into your brain…  That makes way more sense!”  The conversation moved on from there.  In my mind it was a simple mistake: he thought something first and it lodged.  It happens!  Until I remembered what the hypothalamus does.  No wonder he looked at me like I was a miracle!  Although, I did notice the weird look seemed to stop…

The summer after my first surgery I was counseling at camp.  I, (as part of another no longer remembered conversation), mentioned that I didn’t have a bellybutton (the button was lost with my gallbladder surgery, just the indent-ish hole remains, but saying you don’t have a bellybutton gets a fun response).  The other responded with a quick but otherwise serious “oh! Is that why you have that scar across your neck??”  “No…?” And then I shared the story with my friends and other counselors and we still laugh.

Last year I was subbing in a third-grade classroom.  I had been in this room a few times as the teacher was a friend of mine.  Towards the end of one day, a young gentleman came up to me and said, “Miss Kasper, did you just have a baby?”  I was suddenly very self-conscious and confused.  “No…” I replied hesitantly, waiting for the explanation I knew was coming from this particular young lad.  I braced myself.  “Then why do you have that scar across your neck?”  I chuckled and told him I would tell him tomorrow.  The class left, and I LAUGHED!  At eight years old, I’m glad he didn’t have all of the facts of life figured out yet, but I am still concerned about how he thought babies were born…

Not quite anatomy but questions about my scar sometimes warrant further concern.  Like the young girls who asked about my scar and when I gave them a brief synopsis one replied with wide eyes and not enough laughter to be attempting a joke: “DID YOU DIE???”  She seemed relieved when I told I did not and was still, in fact, very much alive. 

Most people don’t just come up and make comments about my scar unless they are children.  Which I get.  I am totally okay with people asking about my scar and, in fact, I would rather they just ask then create rumors about my shady past.  But I also realize that not everybody is, and I while I know the answer, they don’t!  Others’ stories don’t include a quick surgery.  As a result, however, I am surprised when adults do comment.  Here are some of my favorites: 

• At a grocery store a late teen/early 20’s cashier decided to make small talk by asking “so what’s up with your neck?”  I’m normally pretty vague (because I don’t always have the time or energy to deal emotionally or otherwise with people’s reactions to “cancer”) but perhaps my shock and his abruptness caused me to reply with a simple “Cancer.  Surgery for nearly five hours.”   It is the fastest I have ever seen someone ring up groceries (outside of Aldi – those people are like cheetas!) and he ended with a quick mumbled “have-a-nice-day-ma’am”.  I felt bad for ruining his cheery mood. And also for laughing at him in the car… 
•  As a bonding/why not? activity, I went with my fellow female RA’s and RD boss to do water aerobics my senior year of college. Now, the water aerobics class was about 96% people over the age of 60.  At one point, an elderly(er) gentleman came up to me in the pool.  Pointed to my neck and said “I see you’ve got yourself a zipper! Me too!  Wanna see?”  I didn’t say yes but he moved the swim shorts (pulled up to his chest hair) down to his bellybutton to show me a scar that looked like his gallbladder had been taken out.  I didn’t stick around for the story… 
• I had one concerned stranger tell me in a one sentence lecture that my “neck tattoo” was the reason no one respected my generation. 
• I had someone ask me to explain the meaning behind my confusing “neck tattoo”… 
• I had a kid on a skateboard, however, tell me that my “neck tattoo” was “sick!” with a thumbs up of approval.  Another teen once told me it was a “kickin’ tattoo!”
•  (*Apparently tattoos are like their own section. Do people actually get tattoos to look like scars?  Also, I once joked I would get it tattooed over.  With ivy.  Or barbed wire.  If I wasn’t so attached to my scar as is, I think barbed wire would be sweet!) 
• I have had random people (typically women in their 40’s and 50’s) tell me if they had such a hideous scar they would use some decent cover-up!  Because there is nothing people like better than unsolicited advice from strangers!

My favorite reactions are the ones from kids!  They have less of a filter and less inhibition.  Their natural curiosity lends more quickly to a voiced question.  “Miss Anika, Miss Kasper, Anika…umm, teacher person…” (Depends on the environment) “…what happened to your neck right here?” (as they draw an imaginary line across their own necks…or mine).  I eventually will give them a short health and science lesson that includes them feeling for their own thyroids and telling them some of the important stuff it does and telling them mine “got sick” and had to be taken out.   Before that, however, I always ask “Well, what do you think happened?”  First – it gives them a chance to think about why they asked and what they actually want to know.  Second – it gives me a chance to figure out what people, even little people, think about it.  Third – it often results in funny, occasionally well thought-out, answers…   Including (but nowhere limited to)… 

• You probably just had some sort of surgery or something… 
• A dog attacked you! (I’ve also gotten cat, bear, and dinosaur) 
• You were playing “Red Rover” but they caught you! 
• You dropped your necklace into the fire and you picked up and put it back on when it was still hot and it burned you. 
• You were at a rodeo and the cowboy threw the rope too far 
• You were clothes-lined (this is also a common question of well-meaning adults) 
•  My mom said you shouldn’t play with knives... 
• You were wearing a hoody and you jumped off the playground equipment, but your hood got caught and you just dangled there until someone helped you out of your sweatshirt. *shrug* It happened to my brother once…

*I can’t make this stuff up!  I’ve tried!  Also, when I worked at the daycare it became, unintentionally a favorite story.  Sometimes a preschooler would climb on my lap and request “Miss Anika, will you tell us the story about how you got that thing on your neck?” And then she would summon the others…  I mean, it IS a good story…

I think this synopsis needs to end with the reality that even though I love my scar… I wasn’t always okay with it.  Even when I got past the “make it go away” and found myself relatively attached to it, it also made kind of insecure.  People were/are sometimes weird around my scar.  I can sometimes get weird (unintentionally) around my scar…like it turns darker red when I’m stressed or struggling, and I cover it when I’m feeling vulnerable or overwhelmed…  It left this looming of question of “will people accept me with my scar?”  Not in spite of or despite my scar but with it.  Not because they are able to look past it but because it was so much part of my picture.  It’s no longer the burning question – mostly because I have friends who are stinking amazing…

I was honored to stand in a wedding for dear friends of mine the summer after my second surgery.  That meant that my scar was red, bumpy and noticeable to boot!  I fretted about how I didn’t want attention to be on my scar (for me or others) on their special day.  An older friend said she had some great coverup samples and told me to experiment with them, use what worked, and later give back the rest.  I found one that nearly completely faded it!  BUT it didn’t erase it.  In the end, it was okay.   My newly married friends came and visited around the holidays and brought their wedding album which I had made it into as a member of the bridal party.  My dear friend said, “did I tell you what happened?”  “No…” I replied (trying to figure out if I should tell her I forgot to take my white hair tie off my wrist and it was in like every photo).  She responded “my photographers called when editing photos and said they noticed one of my bridesmaids had a pretty noticeable scar and asked if we wanted it edited out.  I told them ‘no’ and that it was something I loved about you.”  [I told them about the hair tie then because I was a little irritated they could edit out my scar but not my awkward white “bracelet”].  Sometimes when I’m in a funk where I don’t like my scar, or just need to be reminded of the incredible people in my life, I think of this story and tear a little.  I am SO grateful for friends such as these!

So, I raise my glass and toast to the past…because it’s been a hilarious ride!  Happy 10^th Birthday my old friend!  Cheers! 

It's just a sewing tracer! Promise!

After Surgery #1

After Surgery #2 (This is my "I just won a goldfish!"picture)

10 Years Later and Here I Am

Today is my 10-Year Cancer-Versary.

It was December 26, 2007…the microwave clock read 5:17…when the doctor who had done the biopsy only a handful of days before called to let me know that the results were exactly opposite of what he expected.  At the time the most common demographic for thyroid cancer was women over 40 from who had a “Pacific Island” ethnicity…primarily those who had been exposed to a significant degree of radiation. I am…female. So, I had that going for me.  Up to 50% of Americans are expected to have spots on the thyroid. In 2007, approximately 5% of the spots were suspicious and far less were cancerous.  Statistically, thyroid cancer wasn’t really something I, a 19-year-old college sophomore, should have had to worry about.  But there it was. 

And 10 years later, here I am. 

It was part of my picture all through Sophomore and Junior years of college with more surgery and radiation. It lingered (without a surgery or radiation attempt) into my Senior year.  My bloodwork said to hold tight until the remaining cells either died or grew. I felt like a time bomb until 2011 when my bloodwork said I was finally free. 

10 years later, and here I am. 

Cancer is part of my history, my story, but not part of my days.  If it weren’t for the occasional questions about my slightly faded 6 ½ inch scar and the need to mark yes when asked “have you had any kind of cancer” when donating blood, there are many days I wouldn’t think about it at all. 

But here I am. My heart and mind a muddle of memories from the last ten years.

I was trying to decide how to commemorate the last 10 years.  A post seemed obvious as it was during my first processings with cancer that my blog was begun.  In those days my fingers flowed over a keyboard, trying to keep up with the way my brain just wouldn’t stop. And yet…how does one commemorate something like cancer?  Do you?  It’s not typically something you necessarily celebrate…

Still, here I am.

So much has changed.  Yesteryear feels like yesterday today and yet no part of me could have imagined that this is where life would bring me.  And still…I know that where I am is, in many respects, a direct result of the role cancer played in my life.  For good or for bad, I am who I am because of the journey which began a decade ago… People don’t typically celebrate cancer, but, I suppose, in a way I do.  Cancer sucks.  I wish it upon no one – not my worst enemy.  But I am sitting here puzzling over the last ten years and knowing that, given the choice, I would not erase it from my past.  I wouldn’t change the story.  I would again allow something so painful and hard to be in a place for God to work in me and through me and around me.  To see the way God’s strength was and is made perfect in my imperfection.

And maybe that’s enough.  That realization is enough.  Yet, with a head and heart full of memories, I’ve decided to commemorate my 10-Year-Cancer-Versary with 10 of the things I feel like cancer has taught me in the last 10 years.  The pieces which have, in some way, shaped me and continue in their own ways to influence who I am and who I’m becoming.  Some of them are specific to [my] cancer.  Some I think apply to many “hard things” and “painful storms”.  All of them leave me giving thanks for the places I’ve been, the place I find myself, and the way God continues to be the Beauty in my storms… 

  

10 Things I’ve Learned from Cancer Over the Last 10 Years…

1. Time doesn’t heal all wounds…but it does lessen the force of impact.  Fall semester of my Junior year, with another surgery on the schedule and more questions with answers unknown, a professor spoke of his good friend, for whom days were limited as cancer ravaged his body.  My hand immediately went to my scar (a common occurrence which I later realized I did when I felt vulnerable – like I had to protect the rawest part of me), my breathing quickened, and my head started to spin.  I remember that I was standing and that I wished I could sit down without drawing attention to myself.  The idea of cancer consumed me.  A movie with a cancer plotline could leave me in pieces.  A book with cancer left me out of sorts for days and wide awake at night.  But they don’t anymore. There are times when I am still deeply affected.  For the most part, however, there is now just a light sting where the gut wrenching inner destruction used to be.  There is something beautiful about the way God uses the richness of life to slowly but surely begin to heal the places that hurt.

2. Life changes.  If you’re hoping that you can be a 20-year-old college student who has classes to take, grades to make, extracurriculars to pursue, a job to keep, and an identity to preserve…who merely happens to also have cancer, you might be a little crazy.  And you might be me.  I was so convinced that the best kind of kid with cancer was the kind of kid who acted like she didn’t have cancer at all!  While God taught me SO much when life crashed in on me, it crashed in harder than it may have had to because I was secretly convinced that nothing needed to change. I wish I would have been more open to the inevitable change so that I could have helped direct the reconstruction.  Instead there are still a couple pieces out of place!   What’s the modern beatitude? “Blessed is the flexible for they won’t be bent out of shape?” For good or bad, I’m not the person I was on December 25^th of 2007.  Sometimes I miss the old Anika.  Our cores are the same though…the Anika I am and the Anika I was.  Life changes.  It’s gonna be okay. 

3. It’s okay to have hard days.  It’s okay to question.  It’s okay to doubt.  It’s okay to know one thing in your head but feel another one in your reality...  It’s okay to know God is as near as my next breath and still scream into the darkness, asking Him to show up.   I caught a lot of flak – especially early on – at my Christian Liberal Arts school where questions and doubts were a sign of spiritual weakness and a deteriorating relationship with God.  REAL Christians ALWAYS had the joy of the Lord and NEVER were angry at God or enquiring or unsure… But they are.  Real Christians are real humans – and as such have real feelings and real emotions that require real responses.  I didn’t want to go through Christian-ese motions... I wanted my faith to be real – one that didn’t say “God is good!” because I should but because amidst life that wasn’t, I could search and find and know God’s goodness amidst the pain.  I wanted to be to walk through hard stuff and come out on the other end knowing the God I serve is big enough to handle my questions, my doubts, my fight, my storm, and me... And somehow, through it all, God reveals Himself nearer than ever before… 

4. The reality of cancer is hard to digest…especially for other people.  Cancer has this awesome way of affecting absolutely everything.  Health and identity and relationships. And when that effect is felt by those around you, some will rally.  The others will flee.  It used to bother me that so many “left”, that when I needed people the most (but couldn’t always articulate that need), I looked around to find previously occupied presences gone.  The reality is…many just don’t know what to do.  For reasons valid and not.  There is a sense of guilt (they are healthy and you’re not); there is a fear and uncertainty around the idea and the future and the pieces; there is a realization that the role you played in their life has suddenly and drastically changed; there is a lack of knowledge of what to say or do or be, a helplessness… And so, they leave. Does knowing this mean it didn’t hurt?  Not a bit.  Do I think it was my job to help them grieve and cope?  No.  I couldn’t even if I had wanted to!  Have I been the friend on the other side of hard stuff that wonders about the balance between presence and space, perceived need and actual need, their grief and my own?  Yeah. It’s not easy.  Things like cancer are hard.  There are people who, to this day, take a step back when they learn I once had cancer. It’s not something everyone can handle.  Cancer was hard for me to stomach.  But it was hard for those who cared about me too…  

5. If you want to be a good friend, be present and listen.  Show up.  Do things that don’t involve whatever painful thing is going on in her life (because life is already about it).  But be willing to get in the trenches too (because there are times when she will be dying to talk about it and feel like no one wants to hear about it).  Give her space when needed without getting offended.  Learn the phrases “do you want to talk about it?” and “is this a time you want me to give advice and feedback or do you just want me to listen?”  Don’t answer all the questions.  Don’t tell her she has no reason to question or doubt.  Tell her instead that God is big enough for questions and doubts.  Ask what God is teaching amidst the storm.  Help her look for joy.  It’s not an easy job.  I would like to think that cancer has helped me see with different eyes, hear past my ears, and love beyond platitudes.  I’ve tried to be the friend I needed.  I often fail.  But I would rather fail than not have tried.  

6. Not everyone gets the whole story.  This is twofold…a “gets” in terms of reception and in terms of comprehension.  It is ALWAYS a journey to decide how much people get to know about the truest pieces of you.  There are times I overshared.  There were times at the beginning when God was giving me glimpses of Him amidst the crazy and I would spill them to anyone who would listen.  And there were times I didn’t want to share at all.  At the beginning people would find out about “cancer” and would want to know…how I found out, how I was doing, how I was “feeling”.  I hated that question: “How are you feeling?”  I was attending classes fulltime.  I kept my on-campus job.  For many onlookers, I was any normal college sophomore/junior.  When someone asked how I was feeling, it was almost always a polite way of making a surface level connection.  When I responded in kind with a surface level, “tired but okay…good…making life happen…one day at a time…” it was almost always followed by a “well, I’ll be praying for you!” before turning and walking away.  Most never asked beyond my “okay”.  I became protective of my story to save it from the people who didn’t truly care.   And so there were times – many over the last ten years – where people would find out I had cancer and a piece of me would scream on the inside, secretly pleading with the other to ask.  Wishing they would be a safe place to tell my story.  My story isn’t a secret.  But not everyone needs it.  Some I share with don’t get it.  And they won’t.  It’s okay.  Sometimes God nudges me to share with someone I honestly think could care less.  Sometimes I listen to that prod.  Sometimes I share a little.  Sometimes a lot. And over the years, some people have come to know the whole story.  And they get it.  And they get me. It’s an incredible gift. 

7. "Cancer” is a deep layer and I am in charge of protecting the way others respond. While not everyone gets the whole story, it was still my reality. It has become a natural part of my story.  For me, simply stating I had cancer is like saying I also had a dog – who died.  Is it a little sad?  Sure.  Is that declaration deep?  Not for me.  For me, that’s a pretty surface level disclosure. For others, simply saying “I” and “cancer” in the same sentences sounds like I’m bearing my soul.  They aren’t ready to respond to perceived deep layer with one of their own.  (It’s the onion principle of mutual communication). Sometimes I hold off on sharing cancer because I don’t want to scare people away. Sometimes I guard the truth to protect others. When I worked at camp or in the schools and kids would ask me about my scar, I would tell them about the thyroid and how important it is and let them know mine was “really sick”.  Because a word like cancer is scary.  And not every person is in a place to emotionally handle the baggage attached with it.  Some say it’s not my job.  But cancer isn’t just about me…  

8. In the midst of storms, always look for reasons to laugh.  Cancer can be funny!  Do you get to make fun of cancer?  Not without an “in” (aka: a relationship with someone with cancer who participates in the humor and says it’s okay).  Could I?  Yes.  But only of my own (unless given an in with another individual).  And under those parameters, it’s not only okay but even healthy.  One of the greatest balms to my soul early on came in the friends who would joke about cancer and my scar and the ridiculousness of things with me.  I wasn’t dying!  Let’s laugh about being radioactive and the “cancer card” and pity puppy eyes.  I had a resident in my building during my senior year of college with a prosthetic.  The two of us could laugh until our sides hurt exchanging the stories we’d encountered, experienced, and (upon occasion) provoked.  I was most okay with cancer when I could laugh about it… 

9. The un-surrendered life isn’t worth living.  Henry Nouwen tells the story of a women who was committed to a facility for the sake of her mental health.  For her safety she had to be stripped of everything in her possession.  In the end, she clutched something in her hand so tightly her nails dug into the flesh of her palm.  Hours later when, finally, they managed to loosen her grip, there was single coin.  Of almost no value.  Nouwen talks of how we do this with God.  How we hold onto things which have no value and it keeps us from opening our hands to the One who wishes to fill them. Ultimate surrender asks us to hold everything we hold dear in open hands and let go that we may take hold.  Hold of the hand of the One who already holds our hopes and dreams, hurts and fears.  Surrender, is ultimately about trust.  It’s terrifying. But it’s worth it…  

10.  God is Faithful.  When people ask me what cancer taught me, I respond with three words: God is faithful.  It’s one of those phrases that explains everything and yet I can’t explain it. All I know is that God is faithful.  That it is He who sustains.  It is He who guides.  It is He who exists as the purpose amidst something without.  God is faithful.  When the rest of the world slips away, He is constant. God is good.  God is present.  And His faithfulness gives way to hope.  “Yet this I call to mind and so I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.  They are new every morning.  Great is Your faithfulness!” (Lam 3)

    10 years later and still I am here.  And by the grace of God, go I. 


One Year and A Lifetime Ago - AK 2008

Found

From the Anika archives: March 2008

Sometimes desperately frustrated by how far away God felt...longing and yearning for a connection to my Savior...I would close my eyes and simply beg God to show up.  At times there was silence and I would feel no answer at all.  Occasionally there would the remnant of a verse I’d almost forgotten or the briefest whisper of affirmation...the quiet knowledge that God was not as far away as I may have thought.  And every so often my pleas were answered with the vividness of reality playing out before my eyes and in my heart, with the reassurance God has been waiting for me to beg Him to show up...

I am looking. Searching.  Like a game of hide-and-seek where I am the seeker.  The sun is bright and the day beautiful.  I move deliberately, slowly, almost as if I am walking on tiptoes – trying not to make any noise as I look one way, and then the other…behind that tree, in that thicket of flowers.  I bite my bottom lip with a mischievous grin.  The look on my face screams: “You’re not hiding from me, You’re hiding for me.  You are giving me a reason to seek; I just have to keep looking.  This is just a game…” 

But time passes and the sun is not quite so high in the sky.  The flowers are tall on both sides of me and I do not have a good view of the path or expanse of land in either direction.  This no longer feels like a game; this is no longer enjoyable. My breathing quickens; the smile drops from my face.  “Where are You?  Why are You hiding for me anyway?” 

Silence.  I nearly scream into the air but there is no answer.  I begin to walk away.  My pace accelerates and my seeking becomes more of a frantic search.  The branches snap underneath of feet as I walk quickly down the path.  With a quivering voice I shout again.  “I can’t find You!”  My words reverberate off the trees but again there is no answer.   The wind blows and I shiver.  I am cold...alone...desperate.   

And so I start running.  The path is narrow, almost non-existent, and the brush catches me from all sides.  My arms and legs are becoming scratched and bruised.  I continue to run.  A fallen tree limb snags the flesh on my leg.  A branch above slams into my forehead.  While I am conscious of the pain – the blood trickling down my leg, the sudden pounding in my head - I do not have time to stop and see what caused and is causing my pain.  I no longer care.  All I know is that it hurts.  And so I keep running.  Pushing the flowers and branches out of my way, I am dying... dying to know where You are. 

Breathing heavily, I feel myself begin to give up hope.  It is too hard to continue to run; there is no use continuing to try…  And my run becomes a jog and my jog becomes a weary pant.  I am just barely moving and I cannot go on anymore.  As I slow the back of my hand reaches to brush my tousled hair out of my face.  My cheek is wet and I realize I am crying.  My walk slows further, so slow I am just barely moving, and I fall.  My attempts to move are that of a crawl and I am no longer crying, I am sobbing.  I can go no further.  And so, I stop all together.  I have nothing left to give, nothing to go on. 

I sit on the cold ground and am vaguely aware that is all but dusk as my face falls onto my scarred arms.  I bawl.  Salty tears fall into the fresh cuts on my hands and I wince as my arm brazes the raw bump on my head.  “Where are You?”  I whimper.  “You promised if I were to go looking, I would find You.  What happened?  Are you really hiding from me? I can’t see you if You’re not here…”  And my body convulses as I collapse.

And then, just then, You’re there.  Gently, tenderly, You pick me up and place my head on Your shoulder even as I am still sobbing.  You rub my back softly and whisper in my ear:  “Ssshhh... It’s alright.  Just rest.  I’ve got you.  That’s right. Lay your head on my shoulder and rest…” 

My convulsing stops and just a few sobs cause me to shake as my breathing slows.  I lift my head and look into your eyes, “I couldn’t find You…and now I’m dirty and scratched and…” I choke back more tears and am ready to again hide my eyes in Your shoulder when I see them.  There, in the corner of Your eyes, are tears of Your own.

And with Your free hand, You take Your thumb and wipe the tear out of the corner of Your eye.  Your thumb, still wet from Your tear, moves from Your eyes to mine as You use it to wipe the streams from my tear-stained cheeks.  And then I know.  While I was looking for You, You had been waiting, looking for me too.  Your hands rub over my gashes, wounds, bumps, and scars and heal my hurts. The warmness of Your touch overwhelms me.  I would be scarred again and again to be held as I am now being held.  Because in Your arms, in Your eyes, I am perfect, I am Yours, I am found.

And You kiss my forehead as it nestles into Your neck.  With feeling and emotion in Your voice you again whisper into my ear:  “Relax my daughter.  You are safe.  You have fought and you have found.  I have you and I will not let you go.  Just rest…”

Psalm 13...

Rearranging, Readjusting, Rerouting...and Whether I Give it or Not

It’s hard to believe that, as I sit and begin to type these words, it was a week ago that I endeavored to take a group of teens on a local “backyard” mission trip.   It’s hard to believe that it has already been a week since the insanity which still has me shaking my head – and yawning.

It was a trip “doomed” from the beginning…a celebration of Murphy’s Law at its finest.  If it could go wrong, it did.  Sometimes in multiple ways!

Here is the backstory with just a few of the highlights of this endeavor…

• November: Anika gets hired as District Youth Coordinator (works with 66 churches in the district to help their youth ministries be viable).
• Before November is up: Anika has been approached by several distinct churches about doing a “backyard” (local) mission trip as was done a few years prior.
• By the first of the year: Anika sends out information in her bi-weekly newsletter, looking for interest.  Enough interest is garnered to proceed.
• By the end of February: Mission Trip flier makes it into every newsletter.  Individual fliers with information are emailed to every contact.  Individual letters are mailed to every church.  Church specific emails are sent to the initially interested parties.
• By the end of May: one church is committed with zero interest from every other church in the District 

But it was going to be good.  The one church happened to be my own.  The youth happened to be individuals I attempt to invest in on a normal basis.  Teens I thoroughly enjoy.  And their youth leader was not only on board but more excited than I was!  It was nice not to have to try to plan and execute another district event on my own. We would be a small group, but the ducks were so perfectly ordered they could have marched in an infantry!

Fast forward… amidst the insanity of starting classes back up, of trying to put in hours for my other job, of trying to invest in people (including my new nephew and his mom and dad), of trying some reasonable amount of self-care (aka: sleeping for more than a few hours at night) …suddenly the mission trip snuck up out of nowhere.  With it came instant stress.  But it was going to be fine.  Because my ducks were off in the corner doing synchronized baton routines.  Plus, I expressed with deep satisfaction, how my schedule was an accordion – plenty of room for ebb and flow, for flexibility. 

And then my ducks went AWOL.  Not a single one reported for duty. 

It was a little bit of everything you could possibly imagine. 

My youth leader – my precious partner-in-crime and the reason my sanity was still in check – got sick.  I rearranged.  I readjusted.  I rerouted.  I did the last-minute shopping.  I recruited a helper for food prep. Shoot! Half of my youth even showed up in time to eat leftovers!  I mean, they weren’t much help but the spirit was there!

Storms came.  Awesome storms.  With the prospect of more awesome storms.  I rearranged.  I readjusted.  I rerouted.  We delayed leave time.  I created no less than four back up plans.  We set up camp with hardly a sprinkle.

My beloved youth leader was still fantastically sick.  My other adults weren’t available until late that night – per the duck plan.  I had a dozen kids and two vehicles and only one me to transport. I rearranged.  I readjusted.  I rerouted.  I made several calls and was about to get to my “maybe a parent can help…” list when my sister came in and saved all kinds of days (on account of her own AWOL ducks).

The magnificent thunderstorms kept us up much of the night – and cancelled the partnership we had scheduled for the Thursday.  With the help of my now present adult leaders… we rearranged, we readjusted, we rerouted.  We found a new place to invest.  We moved some of Friday to Thursday.  People who had no idea we existed were blessed. 

Friday came with a giant question mark.  I was physically and mentally incapable of rerouting one more time but we had to…because we used Friday’s projects on Thursday.  With the help of my adult leaders…we rearranged, we readjusted, we rerouted.  And then we did it again when the agenda items which shouldn’t have changed, did.  And we had some extra time for community and fun. And people who had no reason to expect anything from anyone were blessed.

And Saturday came and I gave my youth both the Friday night and Saturday morning pep talk…of how the day would go and what I needed from them and that I wanted them to remember who they were and Whose they were.  It was the guaranteed part of the schedule – set in stone, the only piece not open to the accordion.  The free family carnival came and the carnival left and maybe 50 of the 400-expected people came and we spent the day rearranging, readjusting, and rerouting… And the church we partnered with (who couldn’t have pulled anything off without my group) made plans for next year and started reworking ideas and weekends and potential with hope and excitement…

By this point I am not angry.  I am not even upset.  But I am discouraged.  I spent months and put dozens and dozens of hours into a trip I wanted to bless a group of teens and bless a community and bless God.  I was told from the get-go by my superiors that it wasn’t worth attempting and there were too many problems and it just wouldn’t work.  I had stood then with my ever-decreasing list of churches and committed youth and said, “but it is still worth it!”  And now I stood wearily with the 350 unopened prize bags I was packaging neatly into a box and saying, “so much for proving ya’ll wrong…”

I took a deep breath and tried not to get frustrated – mostly with myself.  I had been honest with my team about times where I was disappointed and even overwhelmed by the change of plans.  I desperately sought to make sure my stress didn’t affect how I interacted with them and I praised them for their willingness to go with the flow and serve with joyful hearts.  But now I was tired.  And I could do absolutely no more rerouting.  And I just didn’t know how to pray any more fervently or work any harder for an event which had seemingly nose-dived into the concrete…

And I watched my teens stand in goofy costumes waving viciously at cars passing by… If they were embarrassed, it didn’t show.  They were joyful and energetic. 

And I listened as one of my youth said “where are the people running games?  There are only like three kids here but they deserve to have a good time!”

And I questioned our “bonus youth” (the only one connected to another district church) who stood with the largest, most ridiculous smile on his face, as he informed me that this week - which he had entered into hesitantly – was one of the best of his life.

And I thought back to the fervor my teens put into serving people, (who had no idea they were going to be served!), to the joy and laughter they put into menial tasks which were never part of the plan (and seemingly less “important” than the ones scheduled) – how proud I was of them.

And I considered the fact that while there were a (very) few reminders to rally and to “step it up” in maturity, I never once had to deal with inter-group behavior because they genuinely enjoyed being together…they served in community and out of their community.

And I giggled as they all went up for children’s time at the church we visited (something they always do with the little ones at their home church) to the encouragement and delight of the congregation…

And I near teared as I watched them, without any known instruction or guidance (or adult invitation!), circle up on the church lawn, with their parents waiting in the parking lot, for their own time of prayer before parting ways. 

And I sat, alone, in a very full car in an empty parking lot, for several minutes after everyone had left.  Without warning, I cried violently for several minutes.  It was odd and out of place until I considered the fact that, for the first time in nearly a week, I didn’t have to have my brave face on for my teens and the pressure of needing to be director, leader, mentor, friend, cook, alarm clock, and liaison on a constantly rearranged, readjusted, and rerouted schedule, released in one fellow swoop.

I shook my head (but not my fist) as I drove the mile back to my parents’ house to unpack my car and get started on homework. 

You see, on Wednesday, before I would know the extent of the rearranging, readjusting, and rerouting ahead of me, I had chatted with my friend, the mom of a couple of my teens. After mutually agreeing that despite the wrinkles (thus far!) everything would be fine, I proclaimed half-heartedly and with slightly clenched teeth “God will get the glory whether I want to give it to Him or not!” 

Without the hint (but still the lingering stench) of the irony which so often characterizes my life, I started the homework I was terribly behind on.  It just so happened to include a conversation about the glory of God and how clearly in the Gospels individuals were ready to give Jesus glory for the things which they had expected from Him but how the true glory of God was manifested in the least glorifying way – a criminal’s death.  How whether the glory due God was being given or not, it was being made known. 

I taught and praised my teens.  I encouraged them to dig into their bibles, to think critically about what it meant to be on a mission in service and leadership and outreach.  I was SO proud of them SO many times for the way they took life by the horns and served with joy and hospitality and God’s love.  I thanked God multiple times for my teens.  I don’t remember thanking God for the trip.  I told my youth “do this for Jesus” and we talked about what that meant…  I thanked God for protection and provision and projects.  But I also gift-horsed them as I made sure He knew that while they were “fine”, they weren’t my ducks or my plans. 

The truth is, I didn’t want to give God the glory.  In the stress and chaos inside my head, no part of me wanted to pause and declare God’s goodness for it.  “Thanks for this change of plans, again!  I am tired and overwhelmed and at a loss for my next move and you get the glory for it all!”  I couldn’t say it without sarcasm… 

However, I was leaving out the “but”.  I love to tell my youth how often in scripture the “but of the matter is the heart of the matter”.  What comes first is important, what comes after the “but” is the heart of what is being said.  “God, you get the glory.  These were not my plans, but….”

But…You provided.

But…You protected.

But…You sustained.

But…conversations were had.

But...community was built.

But…people were served.

But…people were blessed.

But…a congregation was encouraged.

But…Your name was made known.

But…my teens (whether they realize it yet or not) grew in understanding of You…

But…you WILL get the glory whether I decide to give it or not…

My list of “buts” could and likely should go on.  Though this was written a week post our leave, it is being posted a week post our return.  It was originally written as a set of my own reflections.  My own way of putting into right perspective and attitude the reality of the experience.  Experiences should always be considered in light of the inherent reality of God’s goodness.   If there is anything other than my reflections here for your, that is alone for you to decide.  I do, however, pray that my life is a testament to the reality of the glory of God.  That I choose to give it all circumstances.  Whether I want to or not.