To Laugh

In the face of change, of disappointment, of stress and of conflict, it seems that I have just one option these days. To laugh. To shake it off, and say, with a few more wrinkles around my eyes and a few more grey hairs, "This too shall pass." Or, "I can do anything for four months." Or, most recently, "So all of my post-graduate work expired without achieving a credential, so now I get to do grad school all over again. Okay. What is the next step?" I want to throw a fit. I want to sob, to kick and scream like a two-year-old in the middle of the mall who is not now, and maybe not ever, getting that ice cream cone. But I have responded that way before, and all it got me was tired, red-eyed, and no closer to anything good. So, here I am, not yet old and wise but older and wiser than the last time, and ready to respond to this new bout of shift changes, work stress (both his and mine), and grad school Round 2 with a little more dignity. One of my favorite verses of all time, Proverbs 31:25, says "She is clothed with strength and dignity, she can laugh at the days to come." I'm choosing to laugh, not because I'm naive or foolish, although I have been both of those things. I'm going to laugh because I am putting on strength and dignity, and when I am wearing such armor there will be no pouting for me.

Not Just A Job

Remember that this is not just a job to him. It is part of his identity, being a peacemaker; who he is. It is a brotherhood, and each day he has to let go of you, knowing that he might not come home because of the choice to step in and save someone else. You must treat your time together as a precious gift, with no guarantee of tomorrow. That is one thing that we police wives have that most people will never understand- we know that our time together is precious. At our best, we love deeply, passionately, unselfishly, knowing that at any moment, our beloved may be called upon to give up his life for another. That is why we are always so incredibly proud of our spouses, and why we become so incredibly angry at people who badmouth them. We know all of what could be, and still we kiss him goodbye, send him off to another night of work, and then come inside and smile at our children, clean up dinner, get everyone to bed, and close our eyes on the pillow, asking “God, my husband belongs to You. I give him up to You. Please protect him, and bring him home to me safely.” And we fall asleep as our husband begins his shift. We can do this because we are rooted in Jesus; because we know that whatever happens, we can have peace and strength; and because God will make us ready to handle the storm as it comes and walk through it with us. “Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9).

Walking In the Wasteland

Once you surrender your fears and worries to God, they don’t just go away. You will still have to face the news, the articles in the paper, the ups and downs of your husband’s mood, the incessant phone calls, the needs of your family, and the black cloud of the trial, incident, shooting, etc. floating over your house. Don’t give up. I have found myself repeating the same words and phrases over and over: “Provide for us, Lord;” “Comfort my husband;” “Protect us, God;” “Help us to sleep in peace;” “Father, please make what I have today enough.” God doesn’t care if you repeat yourself. He hears you, his precious child, and he longs to save you and work his beautiful, perfect, redeeming good out of the mess you are in. He is going to do a new thing in your life, unfold a new plan, and bless you in new ways if you just trust Him to carry you through. A friend once gave me Isaiah 43:19 to hold on to during a trial my husband was going through, and I still just love the imagery of it: “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.” I grew up in Africa, the child of missionary parents. We lived in a parched area of Kenya, desolate and bare of anything but thorn trees for most of the year. Then, suddenly, a cool breeze would blow across the desert sand, carrying with it the smell of rain. We would immediately run for cover indoors, because just after the breeze would come a wall of torrential rain that would beat down mercilessly, sometimes for days, overflowing the nearby river bed with a swift, muddy current that heaved up and flooded the banks. A day or two after the rain, the barren sand would transform into a sea of tiny yellow flowers and fresh green leaves. The massive thorn tree that shaded our house would burst into vivid green as well, and our arid landscape would become lush with vegetation overnight, providing abundant food for people and animals alike. This is what I picture, that when my life at its worst seemed parched, barren, that nothing good could ever follow what we were enduring, God was waiting for the right moment to transform the landscape, to cause beauty to grow out of the bare sand. And he has.

Putting It On

The alarm goes off early, while the world is still dark and sleepy. You fight off the sleep-warm blankets that want to draw you back in to their safety and comfort, and you sit up straight on the edge of the bed and stretch. You stand up, purpose already in your movements, and you begin to put on duty and honor while everyone else sleeps. You go about dressing mostly from memory; same arms into sleeves in the same order as every work day for the last eleven years. The vest is always first, though, and you strap the Velcro pieces into place in the same order as well. Duty is even spelled out in the tools you wear: duty belt, duty weapon. Your hands make miniscule adjustments to your belt, moving gear into place without needing your eyes to tell them where to go. Things need to be where you expect them to be if the unexpected happens; but judging by the way you prepare for your day, it would not be unexpected to you. Today you have the same cough and sore throat that have caused so many others to call in sick for the day, but you did not do that. You knew that would leave your crew short-handed, and so there you are, clearing your throat and stuffing a handful of cough drops into one of your many pockets, duty even in what you don’t do as much as in what you do. There is great faithfulness in how you begin each day, and it speaks to who you are off-duty as well as on. You wear invisible armor as well, which allows words from the ignorant and the cowards to sear, but not wound deeply, because you would fight for them, too, if they called you. They don’t understand this, but you do. It is called duty. And every day, you put it on. Today I was awake early enough to see it.

Dealing With Disappointment

I was in the grocery store with my children last week, browsing the colorful fall produce and figuring out which kind of apples to buy, feeling sort of bewildered by all the different kinds and wondering if the taste was really all that different. I settled on Sweeties, mainly because they looked like Galas, which I usually buy, but cost the same as plain old Red Delicious, which we recently decided have the worst tasting peel of all apples. Yes I know, we are spoiled Americans, and we also live in Washington State, so we are also apparently apple snobs. After I finished bagging our carefully chosen fruit, my older daughter asked, "So, what kind did we get?" I told her we got the Sweeties, thinking the cute name would definitely appeal to a seven-year-old girl. She wanted different apples and commenced with the mother of all whining fits right there in the middle of the produce section, embarrassing the heck out of me and leaving me wondering whose child this was in front of me who suddenly sounded more like Veruca Salt from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory than the reasonable, cheerful, and usually even-tempered child I had in recent years come to expect. I quickly paid for our groceries and got out of Dodge, and when we got home some well-earned consequences were handed out, but I was left feeling incredibly frustrated at the fact that I was still fighting this same battle of responding to disappointment with my children. I thought we had crossed this bridge at four, and again at five, and again and again and again, and then it hit me that we never really get over feeling like shrieking when we perceive that something unfair is being done to us. When we are in preschool, someone takes our toy and won't give it back. When we are in grade school someone cheats at foursquare and beats us. In junior high, someone cheats off our test and gets a better grade then we do. In high school a friend ends up dating the boy we liked first. And then adulthood arrives, and all those problems disappear, because we are grownups now, and we surely don't have to deal with such childish behavior anymore, right? Wrong. Someone else gets the job you worked so hard to get, that you really thought you deserved. Or you are told that you are not right for a position that you know you would be great at! Or you try to have a baby for years while everyone else around you seems to have no trouble at all popping them out. Or you have to move away so that your husband can continue to have his dream job, but you have to leave yours behind. I didn't have to make any of these things up; this is my real life. And I'm sure you have a list of your own that looks pretty similar. What have you had to come to terms with in your life? What have you had nearly in your grasp, but it just seemed it wasn't meant to be? And for the clincher: have you yet said "Thank you!" for not getting what you wanted? If you can put some distance between yourself and your injustices, you might notice that because you didn't get what you wanted, something even greater happened instead, something you could not have imagined when you thought you knew what you wanted. Because I didn't get the boy I thought I wanted, I noticed another boy, one who I fell in love with at 15 years old and have now been married to for eleven years and together with for almost 20. We couldn't have a baby when we first got married, but eventually we had two little girls when the time was right. Our move opened up a new way of life for us, and strengthened our marriage and our faith. Life did not go the way we planned at any step of the way, but we learned (and are still learning) a priceless lesson. What we want, what we think we should have, might not be what we get. We might even have to watch, even smile and applaud, as others get what we think should have been ours. But it is okay, and we can let it go easier the older we get, as we have seen how to be thankful for what we didn't get, and how to wait for the better thing that always comes later. It can still hurt, but I don't have to stew in the hurt if I can remember to get up, brush off, and then expectantly look forward to what else will come along. I now have another job interview sometime in the next two weeks that I'm excited about. My husband is working on some new career goals after being told he can't proceed with something he's always wanted to do. And my daughter told me today that Sweeties are her new favorite apple, and she's sorry she said she didn't want them in the store. "I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord." Psalm 27:13-14

Gotta Get Away?

It is hard to do, especially with children, but you have to take time away with your hubby once in a while if you want to keep that flame alive, even in the healthiest of marriages. Prioritizing time with each other allows you to stay connected to the person to whom you committed your life. You must choose time with him over other people (sometimes even your kids), continually get to know him as you both grow and change, and then you will become again “in his eyes like one bringing contentment” (Song of Songs 8:10). Practical tips for taking time away with your spouse: 1) Choose a destination that you both can enjoy. I love to lay on the beach, but my husband hates it, so we go places that have both poolside lounging for me and shopping and other activities for him. Then we take turns doing things together that the other enjoys, hopefully with no complaining! 2) Make sure you are not too busy on your vacation to hold hands, which reminds him to “enjoy the wife of his youth.” 3) If you do go away with other couples, which can be really fun, be sure to set aside a meal or other time that is just for the two of you. Otherwise you may get home and realize that you had a great time but didn’t really talk to your spouse at all! 4) Go away together at least once a year, and not only on your anniversary, when the stakes are high for things to be perfect. Relax and enjoy each other! What my husband and I have loved most about all our getaways over the years have been the little things: singing along to the radio together in the car, holding hands as we walked around (hard to do at home with little ones in strollers), talking about our future together, and unknowingly creating memories that we still laugh about today, like my sweet husband getting to our honeymoon with only one shoe in his bag, the trip when a trainer let us touch, give commands to, and interact with the dolphins at Sea World because we were the only guests in the park on a rainy Thursday, or the Yosemite trip where I nearly flattened about twenty tourists because I didn’t think I could forget how to ride a bicycle, but was proved wrong. Because of our time spent together, my husband and I have a shared history that carries us through the day to day, that creates an understanding between us that we are on the same team, and that binds us together with affection and laughter on days when there would otherwise be a shortage.

How a grieving family put faith in action: A Legacy of Faith & Safety - Lifeline Training - LawOfficer.com

A Legacy of Faith & Safety - Lifeline Training - LawOfficer.com