Movie Poster by Rolf Konow of Babette’s Feast (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When I walked outside the Lee University library in Cleveland, Tennessee Thursday night, the parking lot and nearly every parking lot around North Cleveland Church of God was packed with vehicles.

Earlier in the week, I’d seen families walk toward the church and felt nervous driving where all the people were walking. I very slowly drove home, around all the people and cars. Some women had worn kerchiefs Sunday night, tied in back, at the nape of the neck. What was that about? Later, somebody told me they were having a camp meeting at the church.

Feeling like an awful divorcee refugee when I got home, I turned on the TV to some random channel. There were colorful calm scenes of tropical fish swimming in the ocean. My nerves quieted down, my heart quit racing, my thoughts relaxed. It was a prayer. Watching those beautiful fish was a prayer.

Then later I got hungry for something. I heated the French Toast sticks in the microwave and then put some fresh blueberries with them. I tasted and thought it needed something else, then remembered that jar of Polaner‘s Orange All Fruit with bits of real orange peel. I arranged the food on an off-white salad plate, plates I found at Habitat ReStore. The plates have blue stripes at the edge that remind me of the blue stripes on the late Mother Teresa‘s white sari. Did you know they’ve done a study I read or heard about, I don’t remember where, but people’s heart rates calmed down just watching Mother Teresa being kind to people. That’s how powerful love can be.

My little meal last night that was really good, with cold milk to drink, made me think of the film “Babette’s Feast,” which I watched several years ago. The movie is based on a novella by Isak Dinesen/Karen Blixen. The film is by Gabriel Axel. The story is about the pleasures of eating, but more than that. Wanda Avila wrote an excellent piece about the film called “The Discovery of Meaning in Babette’s Feast.” In the story, Babette is a refugee from the French Revolution who decides to prepare a true French meal–a feast–using 10,000 francs she won in a lottery.

Here’s what struck me most about Avila’s article. She wrote that “Babette’s Feast” is “not concerned with the God of organized religion, but with what Rudolph Otto called ‘numinosum,’ the religious rapture…that is beyond any particular religion.”

So there’s really nothing particularly wrong if we don’t want to go to that church meeting or camp meeting all the time. Especially when we feel like a refugee, for whatever reason, it’s understandable–even transcendent–to suddenly feel the peace of God in the quiet little room or under the stars or wherever we are. Sometimes a TV is the only aquarium a person has. For us, God will put Himself in a box.

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Jesus (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Let me tell you about my friends and that doesn’t mean there are a lot and sometimes it feels like there’s not one. My real friends are real people in the best sense of the word, but I’m going to give them made-up names to protect their privacy. We have enough people up in our business, don’t we?

While we ate our lunch with the real good sugar-free pudding for dessert, Mr. Berrigan said he took a hard lick in life many years ago, like many of us do. He said you just can’t fully trust anybody but Jesus. If you take a hard lick in life, Mr. Berrigan almost cried, “You’re a good one if you survive it.” He survived.

Mr. Sibley told me he used to be a real drunk and so did I, so I understood what he meant when he said he never could get enough beer. Once upon a time, I never could get enough wine. Mr. Sibley and I stopped drinking alcohol. Mr. Sibley said Alcoholics Anonymous helped him stop drinking. A friend told him the biggest thing that helps you quit drinking alcohol is the desire to quit drinking alcohol. But when you’re in pain, it’s a hard lick to stop.

For me, stopping alcohol included thinking ahead to the consequences of saying or doing or not saying or doing regretful painful hurtful things to others and myself and feeling dizzy and sick and shaky. By the way, all these new laws they keep trying to pass to control or stop addictions won’t work. This is in the Bible in the book of Romans, where it explains that the more laws you make, the more you make people want to break the laws and find new ways to break them.

Although there are certainly times when the law has to bear the violent away, many times the law might leave the gentle captives alone and leave their healer-doctors alone too, when they’re trying to help. Don’t lawmakers and law enforcers know that addictions are sometimes somebody’s last friend on earth and what do you think happens when you try to take away somebody’s last friend?

Today Ms. LeSueur watered the plants in the front window for us and David showed me a Rosary bracelet he got at Claire’s for around $5 and he said he likes both the Miami Heat and Oklahoma Thunder. Mrs. Day said she didn’t feel like putting the Fourth of July decorations up yet. Mrs. Arendt said good-bye when she went outside to the bright sunshine and the other day, Ms. Goodman gave me her cup of vanilla ice cream. We all like to share and give each other little things. It makes you feel better than pudding.

Friendly people like this are hard to find and we are blessed when we find each other. Mr. and Mrs. Zahn asked me to step outside and see their new white motorcycle, which has a “God is love” decal on the back fender. On the gasoline tank is a beautiful, perfectly-drawn black, white and gray sketch of Jesus wearing the Crown of Thorns and there is a picture of His Sacred Heart, too.

Right before we all went our ways for the day, Mrs. Zahn looked at that picture of Jesus while she looked for her motorcycle helmet, which was in the side satchel. She said, “He’s the best Friend you’ll ever have.” Right this minute, it’s possible to need a friend more than anything in the world. Jesus will be our friend. He says so. Jesus’s earthly friends are human, but let’s try not to leave anybody out or send anybody away. I read a phrase in a book one time that struck me about being “born on purpose.” I don’t remember the book title but I remember that important, life-giving phrase by that author. He said we  are born on purpose and not by accident. Let’s try to choose each other on purpose too.

Yes, Jesus and His real friends try to choose each other on purpose when we’re able. Jesus doesn’t like to leave any searching lonely soul out in the cold and He’ll move heaven and earth to find just one friend and bring him or her home with Him, no matter what. You can trust Jesus when there’s nobody else. Jesus will be there for you and for me. He guaranteed it with His own life and death and Resurrection. He’s in heaven right now, at the right hand of God, praying for His friends.

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Magpie (Photo credit: Sergey Yeliseev)

Yesterday I bragged about that delicious Edward’s Lemon Meringue Pie, but when I looked that pie up today, the Edward’s pie I found on-line had a graham cracker crust. Yesterday’s pie had a flaky flour baked crust. So now I don’t know what brand of pie I ate, but it was very, very good.

Let’s not get bogged down in too many details, because lots of us like or don’t like different desserts. I just wanted you to find a good slice of Lemon Meringue Pie if you’re okay with it. Personally, I prefer baked flour kinds of crusts over graham cracker crusts. If it was possible, I would to go the store and buy bags of crusts for snacks. Especially fruit cobbler crusts with all the juicy fruit flavors and don’t you just love cobblers? Maybe not, but summer is here and there will be cobblers and pies for events and whatever.

Pies go way back, according to Food Timeline. There’s the lemon curd filling in the baked crust with the light fluffy meringue topping. The Food Timeline website said the name “pie” may have come from the word “Magpie,” which is a kind of bird that hoards a variety of things and chatters, too.

So there I was thinking about Lemon Meringue Pie when, of all things, Magpies came up. Of course, I looked up “Magpies” and learned they are not always popular birds. All sorts of bad things can be said about Magpies the birds. Magpies are opportunistic and chatter-y and some say arrogant. (One church-going man just yesterday called me a “troublemaker,” so maybe I’m a Magpie to him. I do have Magpie moments, for sure).

Anyway, I was starting to have a real bad dip in my self-esteem. It’s not like I sit around thinking about how wonderful I am. If I do slip up and think maybe my piggy toes are okay, then it’s time to feel guilty and get ready for a smack-down. Even Jesus wouldn’t let people call Him good and so none of that. It’s too risky.

So after I scavenged around to learn more about those iffy Magpies, I learned a few good things (thank goodness!) from a website by Claire Thomas, a wildlife adviser from across the pond at http://www.repb.org.uk. Ms. Thomas pointed out that while Magpies do eat all sorts of foods (even roadkill) wherever they find food and they do raucously chatter and chat arrogantly sometimes, they are also quite versatile and bold and adaptable, capable of serving as scavengers and scavengers clean up, don’t they? Nobody else sitting there was going to clean up that church baby’s poopy diaper, were they?

Ms. Thomas also noted that Magpies can be quirky and quirky doesn’t have to be bad , does it? Maybe quirky means we get to Hula-Hoop in the K-mart parking lot once in a while.

Most importantly, over where she lives in the United Kingdom, Ms. Thomas wrote that Magpies can be seen sitting atop the heads of cattle or sheep, where the black and white birds eat the pesky, even life-threatening, maggots and insects off the heads of the sheep and cattle. The gentle animals, the wildlife adviser said, have nothing to fear from the Magpie. They get obliviously protected while the Magpie enjoys a tasty snack.

Everybody knows a well-intentioned woman or a well-intentioned mom would do the same if she has to, so she and her family can live. Don’t mess with a Magpie and don’t criticize a woman with good intentions or a heart hangin’ on. Just call her Maggie and keep your name-calling to yourself.

Sometimes a troubled but God-fearing woman does what she has to do to get by and eats the food she has to eat and sometimes she does without and that’s all okay, as long as she doesn’t act like Jezebel or steal another woman’s man while he’s out actin’ stupid. So leave a God-fearing, striving woman alone if you can’t or won’t help her. Just leave her alone and let her live and take care of her children and herself. Back off, Buster!

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Mimosa Bloom (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

You might see a Mimosa tree once in a while in southeastern Tennessee and probably more of them the further you go toward sultry weather.

One time in Montgomery, Alabama I casually dropped some Mimosa seed pods in a yard. I came back weeks or months later and there was a whole tree with pink blossoms.

There’s so much to learn at places like http://www.healthguidance.org, which explains how to grow your first Mimosa tree, if you’d like. Here’s some of what it says about the Mimosa. It’s a “perfect ornamental tree” with a reputation for seeking attention. The Mimosa attracts pretty butterflies and happy birds. It can be planted in shallow soil and doesn’t require much water.

There’s more at davesgarden.com in an article called “Mimosa–Treasure or Trash?” Here are a couple of the negatives cited there. The Mimosa “deteriorates plant diversity” and “degrades wildlife habitat.” The tree is also messy and thus a section called “Mess-Mosa.”

At About.com, Forestry division, more Mimosa problems are outlined. But the tree is also “fragrant and silky” with “pink puffy pompom blooms.”

A Mimosa is also a drink, as maybe billions of people know. I looked up the ingredients at About.com, Cocktails division. Triple sec, orange juice and champagne and if that doesn’t sound like a recipe for triple temptation, I don’t know what does. It says add an orange slice for garnish. As if!

So I’m sitting here and (although I can’t have one) wouldn’t a Mimosa still be nice? For heaven’s sake, you can’t please everybody, can you? If only.

It’s Tuesday and I went to Starbucks last weekend for a small Vanilla Bean Frappuccino that tastes like sweet snow. Maybe I’ll rent another DVD soon. I watched scenes from the original The Matrix Saturday night. I love to watch martial arts with special effects and a good story. It’s powerful and inspiring.

Anyway, if you visit Dave’s Garden, you can learn that people consider the Mimosa tree as either “an invasive exotic species” or a “treasured garden heirloom.”

As with many things, it all depends on our points of view. Let’s try this. Only God can make a tree and He made the Mimosa, too. What was She thinking?

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Prophet Amos, old Russian Orthodox icon (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This morning before I could even clear my throat, a debt collector called and I was sobbing by the end. She wasn’t mean but she meant it and what can I say? I sobbed into my pillow because it’s never enough, is it? But I managed to pick up my “Streams in the Desert” daily devotional book (one of the most helpful I’ve ever read). It said God is “working all night” to help us even if we can’t see it or feel it or imagine it.

So then I did the next thing, like I’ve read we should do when crisis strikes. Sometimes we can’t do the next thing. Sometimes we melt down. Jesus understands. Look at the King James Version of the Bible in Psalm 22. “I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint; my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels.” 

Jesus felt everything it’s possible for a human to feel because, besides being fully God, Jesus was fully human. God wants us to know He knows how we feel. If God didn’t know how we feel, we wouldn’t believe a word He says. So God sent Jesus His Son as the Only Word and the Living Word and the Last Word and like that song says, “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen, Nobody Knows but Jesus.” So cry out, cry out to Jesus.

When I got here at the library, I looked up the Statute of Limitations on debts. I didn’t even know such a thing as a time limit on debts existed until I read about it months ago in the Chattanooga Times Free Press. If you’d like to learn more, try http://www.creditcard.com.

Here’s something else about debts and debtors and rich people and poor people, the haves and have-nots…along with the religious capitalists who existed long before the United States ever fired one revolutionary shot or experienced the infamous 2008 financial meltdown. At Catholic Scripture Study International, you can see that the prophet Amos talked about the need for social justice. God called Amos to warn and blast the religious rich people, who were oppressing God’s poor people. The poor people were barely making ends meet while the wealthy church folks were building winter homes and summer homes. It was unfair and horrible and God intended to do something about it.

Over at breadoflifefellowship.wordpress.com, here’s something else, which the blogger pointed out: “The wealthy people were running to two towers–their homes and their temples.” The blogger referred to scripture, in Amos 3:13-4:5, where God declares: ‘”I will destroy the winter house along with the summer house; the houses of ivory will perish, and the great houses shall have an end,’ says the Lord.”

We have to use discernment, because some people will drive you crazy and I’ve been one of those people. We can’t give everything or anything to everybody and anybody. But as hard as this life gets sometimes, don’t let us be that person in a summer house with a stony heart.

We can’t do it all, but somewhere it says we can relieve some little misery somewhere. I think it was a story about St. Therese. She went around relieving little miseries where she could. She was the little flower.

Please God, help us relieve little miseries if we can within our limitations. Please don’t let us be deaf to a song or blind to a sorrow. Another song made famous by Ethel Waters says God’s eye is on the sparrow (and not just the bluebird). Help me do what I can. Just this. Today just this.

Someday, it will all be all right. Someday, justice will roll down like water. Someday, it will all be okay.

That creditor’s call made me cry, but that creditor tried to help, too, just so you’ll know. She gave me a heads-up and made a helpful suggestion, which calmed me. Compassion starts in the heart, but it can move upward through a kind voice, relieving some little misery somewhere.

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