Stunningly Beautiful

I heard the sweetest compliment last night that far outshines casual, "You look nice" comments.

David was going home and sometimes I cannot get enough kissing him. It is as if he is the air I breathe, my source of happiness and strength, and my one perfect place in his world where magical moments are mine as long as our lips and souls are connected.

Saying good night is sometimes ... just one more kiss. One more moment of perfect.

I was telling him how handsome he is when he told me, "Tonight when we were having dinner you had a certain expression on your face. Twice I looked at you and you looked exactly as you did when you were 20 years old, stunningly beautiful."

I love that we knew each other in our youth ...

... and what we have now are magical moments.

I Am Not the Holy Spirit

I have been job hunting like crazy.

The daily wear of working at a rescue mission often leaves me utterly depleted. I run the meal ministry in a rescue mission located in 1 of the 10 most depressed areas in the United States. In addition, I am the most front line staff person at the mission because I feed the homeless and hungry, run a meal ministry with over 300 different volunteers/workers who walk through the doors every month and leads that it happens, serve an average of 7,400 meals per month, and am present for the shelter residents all day. Six days a week.

Crime in our city is escalating. Everywhere across town share the same theme ... things are getting worse.

I have lost track of how many people I have had arrested in my 1-1/2 years at the mission and recently I have been aware of more and more that walk through our doors who carry guns and most recently last week a street thug intoxicated, on cocaine with a knife in his pocket I had to ask to leave.

I am also the only staff member every evening when we open the doors and feed the public. Thank God for my wonderful assistant who is there two nights per week covering for me. We are both female.

Sometimes I thrive and love it, other times the needs overwhelm me.

I began Prayer Partners approximately eight months ago where volunteers come in to pray individually with anyone who needs it. It was just what the mission needed.

Last week I began Bible Stories for Kids, where we pull kids out of the parking lot waiting for a meal and bring them in prior to the meal ministry for child-focused lessons from the bible, an activity, and cookies & milk. The children who eat every day in the meal ministry believe they are going to church, extending to them age-appropriate lessons is the least we can do.

The weight of the needs are far bigger than me. Giving until I have nothing left of myself in a population where needs continue to grow bigger often leaves me at ... them or me.

Job hunting empowers me to feel as if I have options. Given a choice would I stay or go?

It is as if one foot is barely moving in front of the other most days and I often feel I am not the person for this position or this position is not the right one for my life.

In this overwhelming place a common theme is happening from workers, to shelter residents, to dinner guests to and to volunteers reinforcing the impact that I personally make there matters. That I do a great job.

It's like being a mom. There are days I feel successful and days I feel like an absolute failure. I apologize often to God for my rotten attitude, short patience and my desire to want to battle with many of them.

I continue to press on giving my best. I also continue to keep my eyes open. Where needs are great, a fresh, re-energized perspective in this position may be what it takes to accomplish what God wants done there in such a wear-n-tear position.

He can decide if it's a season or lifetime.

I am not certain I am the right one for the lifetime though.

I am also not the holy spirit.

Just a girl with God-given personality strengths and weaknesses. Open to be used and quick to fall on I am human.

"Looks Like a Celebrity!"

Brooke and I were walking into her doctors office when her physician said to me, "My gosh, you are so incredibly gorgeous!"

That's always nice to hear and I graciously thank her.

As we sit down in her office she asks Brooke, "Does that embarrass you to hear your mom is beautiful and looks like a celebrity?"

Brooke shakes her head and says, "No, I hear it everywhere we go."

Both of my girls are proud of me and they request I wear certain things to their special events or functions because they like that reaction. I am happy they are proud.

I never want my girls to feel less than. I see their expressions on their faces when boys their age and up notice me and not them. They realize it and one day ... when they come into their own as a woman with experience and confidence like a perfume they put off will be noticed across any room.

I just turned 45 years old and I confess it is still wonderful to hear and every year that passes I wonder when my best years will be behind me.

Perhaps it's not in the caring that removes any desperation of want that becomes a confident woman put together on a mission.