More Memphis Snow Mania

Well, it did snow...but only barely. I was going to add a picture of it today, but it did not last long enough to get a good one.

All area schools were closed except for the Memphis City School District, so my boys were up and out as usual. Boy 2 was duly disappointed. Snow brings him great joy, more even than a day off from school. I snuggled him while he cried a bit this morning, cleansing his heart of its bitter disappointment. Then he got on with the morning and had a good day at school...

...that is, until school was dismissed an hour early. Another part of the Memphis Snow Mania. It was not, in fact, snowing again, nor was it predicted to do so. It was, however, feared that with dropping temperatures and increasing winds roadways would freeze (even though there was not much, if anything, there to freeze).

So off I went at 1PM to drive carpool at Boy 2's school while Boy 1 was dropped off from his school by the carpool. On the way home I stopped at a neighbor's to bring her son over to play in the tidbit of snow with Boy 2, which they were dying to do and did for all of 15 minutes (not much one can do with only a dusting of snow).

So with Wee 1 napping blissfully, Boy 1 loading more information into his self-created Latin website, and Boy 2 and friend playing Wii, I have no where else to be today. All are happy and warm in the Parker Home.

Let It Snow!!

As is typical, the forecast for the major snow event has lessened both in severity and possibility over the course of the week. Of course, that did not put a damper on the preparations Memphians make for snow I wrote about yesterday nor on the ever optimistic hopes of our children. It has, however, put a damper on my own dreams of a cozy day at home with no carpool, piano lesson, errands, etc.

Visions of giving my GPS a well-earned day off tomorrow were dancing merrily in my head this afternoon as I sat in the blizzard temperatures waiting to pick the kids up from school today.

Alas, as I write, snow chances have lessened by at least 20% and if we get any it won't be a wintry-wonderland of 3-6 inches, but a mere dusting of half an inch with winds blowing it swiftly away.

That is life here south of Tipton County; all the hopes of snow, very little of the reality. Still, no one in Memphis will regret having a few extra frozen pizzas lying around. One does not have to be snowed in to enjoy such fine eating!

Prepared for Possible Snow

It might snow later this week. In Memphis, the "might" in that phrase is a pretty big one. Snow only comes to Memphis at most once a year, and we are thrilled if an inch of it stays on the ground an entire afternoon.

Regardless of how much does, or does not, fall, though, we take our snow very seriously!

There is strict protocol all Memphians adhere to when we might get our snow. The first thing we all do is assume that everything will be cancelled and closed the day the snow might come...even if it hasn't come and might not come. Blackberries and iPhones in hand, we begin checking our calendar for the date of the supposed snow event and systematically cancelling everything, just in case.

Once all the cancelling is complete, it's off to the local grocer to buy all the milk, water, and other necessities (soda, frozen pizza, ice cream) we may need during the hours we may spend stuck at home due to the inch of lovely white stuff all over the ground in shady spots.

Finally, anyone not already subscribing to Netflix heads to Blockbuster or finds a Red Box to stock up on all the hottest new releases to get through until conditions improve without too much boredom.

Once all the stores are laid in and preparations made (which may or may not include remembering to cover the outdoor faucets), we incessantly check the forecast to see if the snow is still a possibility or if, once again, it is going to go just north of us.

With the possibility of about an inch of snow coming our way after midnight tomorrow, preparation across Memphis is already well underway. Store parking lots are packed as if it were the day after Thanksgiving, and I have already sent the e-mail reminder to my office staff that we close for snow only if the schools close.

There are lots of things one can say about Memphis and the people who live here, but the one thing that will always be true is that we are definitely interesting!

The Good Doctor is Late

The new graduate school semester started today with a surprising call that my Tuesday class was actually a Monday class. After rushing home to get my books and laptop and to gulp down some lunch, I casually strolled onto campus 15 minutes early.

Since the professor for this Tuesday class that actually meets on Mondays is in Germany this week another professor was to stand in his stead and wax eloquently over the introductory issues and controversies of Acts.

There are five students in this seminar, only one of whom I knew very well. As we awaited the beginning of class I chatted with the three new to me, getting to know the stories of their lives. Time flew and we were all surprised when we noticed that we were 20 minutes past the start of class and had no professor.

Many students may have seen this as an opportunity to get away with something and, having given the standard 15 minute wait for the PhD, abandoned class with glee. At Harding University Graduate School of Religion, however, we are a different breed altogether.

Some students commute as much as 3-4 hours once a week to come to class, while others (like me) fit graduate school into a very tight time limit which allows more important things to have appropriate priority. And all of us really enjoy school and the subject matter at hand. These are just a few of the things that kept us hanging around class longer.

39 minutes into class time with still no professor in sight and having caught up on my emailing, I began to listen more intently to the conversation of my fellow-students which I had only peripherally engaged in since our first realization that the doctor was late.

The talk revolved around college football, a coach named Leech (sp?), and the fact that there is a golf course in Dubai named for Tiger Woods. This turned chit-chat to Tiger's current status and the rumors about where he is and who he's with.

The natural progression of the conversation led to various sports mega-stars, past and present, and whether they were jerks or should be applauded for their willingness to do whatever it took to get where they got. Finally, in response to a question posed by me, there was a 15 minute discussion of fantasy football and it's rules, regulations, and worthiness as a pursuit in life.

The banter described above perhaps illustrates one of the best reasons we all stuck around until our worthy professor graced us with his arrival 59 minutes after the official start of class: students at HUGSR are fun to be around.

Sure, we can be boring when bogged down in conversation better saved for when we write our commentaries. And we can be loud in our ardent expressions of personal views. We can even be, dare I say, obnoxious in our use of big words to say pretty simple things. But when you get right down to it, we're a decent group of folks who really do enjoy each other's company and the larger community offered by HUGSR, where our motto is (unofficially and quite tongue-in-cheek) Hugs-R-Us.

(By the way, one might well be impressed that our revered professor, who was late due to multi-level miscommunication, was nonetheless able to lecture intelligently for nearly two hours with no preparation time.)

Mitigon the Mighty and Sira the Strong

My wonderful husband just finished a mini-renovation of my home office as a Christmas gift to me. In the sorting and reorganizing of my office things, I came across a Christmas gift he created for me 13 years ago.

In 1995 we were living in Croatia and awaiting the birth of Boy 1. Through circumstances beyond our control we had moved only two weeks before Christmas into another apartment, yet Mark still found time to create a timeless gift...a book, a love story just for me.

It is titled Mitigon the Mighty and Sira the Strong: A True-Love Tale for Christine Parker. Not only did he write this original three chapter short story, but he turned it into a lovingly adorned book which he bound himself.

The tale is the story of a king and queen of neighboring kingdoms who are brought together through the suffering of her people and their shared love and service for all people and for God. Mitigon was called Mighty because he was so full of love that his subjects could think of no better word to describe him. Sira's people called her Strong because she was "the kindest, most generous person in the kingdom."

As the story progresses, the two marry and ultimately sacrifice themselves and a life happy ever after in mitigating the suffering of Sira's people. When Sira offers the last drops of water in her drought-ruined land to a dying child, she dies in the boy's stead. Mitigon discovers the final sacrifice of his beloved upon his return from his own kingdom with water and other supplies for Sira's people.

Both kingdoms mourn the loss of Sira the Strong such that their tears flood the plains and high places of her kingdom and the drought is relieved as, "In the midst of grief, God made flowers bloom once again."

Mitigon, weeping over his bride and lovingly caressing her cheek, feels the warmth slowly passing back into her lifeless form. "Once again," the tale tells, "God had turned tears of sorrow into tears of joy."

At the point in our life together when Mark wrote me this story, God had already turned sorrow into tears many times. He had made us witness to His working of sadness to joy in the lives of countless others. And he had allowed us every time to return to the warmth of each other's might and strength.

Now, 13 years later, this story is more real than I could ever have imagined. I thank my God daily for my Mitigon the Mighty.

Pretty Blogs

I have not been part of the blogging world for very long. Only since my 39th birthday in November of last year. I started my blog on a whim and used a blogger template to get it going thinking I would go back later and pretty it up.

I have some friends who have super-pretty blogs. One friend has completely customized her blogspot with photographs she herself has taken, sidebars leading you to spots where you can purchase her photos, and many other cool and pretty items. Another friend changes her banner from one lovely picture to another whenever the fancy strikes her, and the new always is prettier than the old. A couple living overseas not only has a pretty blog, but they have tons of cool gadgets that allow their followers to customize where, when and how they receive blog information.

Nearly two months into my blog it still looks the same as always. I am fairly computer savvy and can manipulate most programs to do what I want. I have sat down to pretty my blog several times, but each time I end up writing instead.

It may turn out that my 365 days of blogging will all look exactly the same. I hope, though, that in the course of the writing you gain something of the pretty of life from my words, if not from my layout.

Inspired to Look More Closely

I never really saw him for the great man he was. By the time I met him he was 70-ish and had been retired for many years, and I knew him primarily as Dr. Jack's brother. He had the persona of a jolly old man who never tired of telling me blonde jokes (which I loved!). He was famous for his jokes and would e-mail really good ones to all his friends.

But there was so much more to him than I ever saw.

I attended his funeral yesterday and was moved by the story of his life. Raised on a farm, he went to college and became a successful accountant. He was an accomplished musician and during WWII often was called on to play Taps for fallen soldiers. He and his wife stayed married until her death in the early 1990s and raised two daughters together. One of his daughters spent 30 years of her 37-year life in an iron lung due to the effects of polio. Not wishing her to be denied more of life than she already had, he designed and built a "portable" iron lung so that she could go on short trips with the family.

He served God's Kingdom as deacon, elder, and, most important, faithful child of God. After retiring he spent 13 years in nearly full-time volunteer service digitizing the card catalog for the largest theological library in the south. At the church he and his surviving daughter, who grew into a woman who displayed his same passion for serving others, and her family attended, he built the church's library into one of the best church library's around.

All the while he lived a deeply frugal, but not ungenerous, life and by the time of his death had contributed $50,000 to the endowed scholarship fund created in loving memory of his wife and dedicated to the training of God's ministers on earth.

I don't blame myself for not really seeing him. We cannot truly see the depths of everyone with whom we cross paths. I don't know that my relationship with this laughter-loving man of God would have changed had I known his heart more deeply, but I do know that in his death he has inspired me to look closely and pay rapt attention to those I do have the blessing of truly knowing and seeing in this life.