Look at this lovely girl of mine. I sometimes just gaze at her while she is enthusiastically telling me about the soap opera that is first grade and marvel at her wit and spirit. This picture was taken at her very first piano recital in December.

But here’s the negative turn in this post: for a little over a week now, we’ve been fighting a lice infestation in that beautiful head. Crazy isn’t it? That beautiful hair and yet full of beastly little parasites. (Don’t fear for Ada’s feelings here. Either she’s too young or too self-confident, but she has no idea of the social stigma related to head lice. She just hates sitting still for hours while I scrape out nits with a tiny plastic comb.)

In my own little world, I’m looking forward to an exciting road trip and retreat weekend with my husband. We’re headed to the Dream Year Retreat in Nashville. Two different times this week I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t turn over and go back to sleep as I usually do because I suddenly remembered, “I’m going on a trip!” Big smiles. I love travel and I especially love travel with my husband to a new city. Add to those simple pleasures the promised encouragement and instruction we’re expecting from the retreat itself and I’m THRILLED.

A gorgeous head of hair.

But other things are happening this week. Today Serenity wrote about finally losing her hair. And I hate that. All of it. The losing, the crying, the sickness, the worry. All of it. I want to make it go away and I want her to be cancer-free and I want her boys to think about things like basketball and dinosaurs. I want to fix it. But I can’t.

Stupid lice.

But this is life and I know that hair stays (or comes back) and the lice die. And I probably appreciate that beautiful head of hair on Ada now more than ever since I’ve spent so much time trying to save it. I know I can’t spend this weekend wishing my life away or pouting about life’s injustices. I know I have to enjoy my time, relish every moment.

This is life – with its beauty and its beasts.

Let’s hug!

Check out my new setting! Isn’t it sweet? My husband, Dan the Man, did all this remodeling work. He’s amazing. We’ll be tweaking and adding for a few more days, I expect, but this is the new general look. I’m very happy with it.

If you’re part of the Rare Rocks regulars, then you’ll find things fairly unchanged. All the posts from a particular category are a little easier to find now – see the nifty pictures on the right side bar. New posts will automatically be here, at the top of this home page.

I’m so happy you stopped by! If you feel like being brave in the comments section today, do me a favor and let me know what you like to read here. I’m teaching a speech class this semester and we’re learning about audience analysis. Consider yourself being officially analyzed.

What are your needs or wants, reader friend? I’m not good at Hollywood commentary like Serenity is, and I can’t tell you anything about cloth diapers for your newborn. Grandparenting and pastoring aren’t in my repertoire yet either. I know there are a million places online where you can read about important things, but I’d love to share conversations with you about becoming better people here. I like to read about characters (real or imagined) who make us all want to be stronger just from watching them live well. I like to examine virtues and try them out, even in small ways. And since my family is my setting, I talk about them a lot. They’re cute; you won’t mind. I’ll try not to sound preachy or pretentious if you promise to forgive me when I do (it happens – I’m a true first born).

I just like you and I think we can be special. Rare Rocks, so to speak. What should we talk about? : )

Last week my sisters and my mom and I got haircuts. Short hair for all! Serenity is starting chemotherapy today and the rest of us just wanted to do something physical to show our solidarity and hopefully remind others to pray.

I love the ease of short hair. In fact, I keep wondering why, with all our green inclinations and earth-saving campaigns, our culture has not embraced short hair for women as a logical conclusion. Saves water, saves money, saves power (hair dryers, flat irons, and their kind), saves chemicals (less to highlight, strip, straighten, condition, etc.). Do the true-green among us wear their hair short? Or am I missing something?

Yet for something that makes so much sense, I still get so many comments, especially from other women, such as, “Wow. You look great. I could never pull that off.” Or, just as common, “My husband would never let me do that.”

I’m still a bit taken back by these comments. I’m not bothered by them personally, but I enjoy cultural observations and this one is rife with possibility. The comments themselves probably stand out to me a little more acutely right now because I chose to cut my hair this time for a specific purpose: to support my sister who will likely loose all her hair in the next two weeks. I mean, if you had to choose between being bald or dying, I’m guessing you’d choose bald and everyone around you would be fine with it. Could our attitude about hair tell us anything about our lack of eternal perspective? I’m always reminded of my own vanity when I have short hair – there seems to be no way around it, you wake up looking like a boy every morning – but this time around I’ve really been aware of the cultural/social elements as well.

I mean, it is just hair. But I’m guessing it is more. What I’m wondering is if it is good more or bad more? Or, hm, that’s interesting more? I don’t know yet. But I’m watching, listening, and learning.

In the meantime, best of luck, Seren! Here’s to praying that everything goes better than anyone expects.

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson

Did you read this book as a child? I’m getting ready to read it to my kids as something of a non-liturgical person’s Advent. One chapter each night before Christmas. If you’re a devoted fan, you know there are seven chapters and I really only have six days left. That’s because I’ve built in one night when I know we’ll all say, “JUST ONE MORE CHAPTER!” Brilliant planning, friends, not procrastination.

So, of all books, why do I wish I had written this one? For me, it has all the classic elements. First of all, it is perfectly funny. The narrator is witty and sharp but with a tender heart. She’s a church kid, but she has compassion for those not quite like her. The Herdman’s, the welfare-fed and shockingly rebellious siblings without a stable parental figure, are cartoonishly wicked, and as a kid that is fun stuff to read. When I showed my son Jesse a draft of a children’s story I was working on last year, he loved it but thought I should “let the boy get into a little more trouble.” The Herdman’s are enough trouble to keep everyone entertained.

But after funny, this story is poetically and practically spiritual. I love it when those two elements work together in literature. In this story, the Pharisees, um, church kids, are exposed and the outcasts are celebrated in a re-telling of the Nativity. The Herdman’s understanding of Jesus’ birth spurs them to sacrifice and action. As it should for all of us.

Have you read this classic? Seen the movie? I can’t wait to share it!

A week ago, church communications guru Tim Schraeder wrote a blog post that explored the subject of wonder in the church. His closing question: “When was the last time you left church in awe… not of the production, music, lights, or anything else… but truly left in awe of who God is and what He’s done?”

Now for a girl who likes an experiential, interactive worship service, this question made perfect sense to me. But I know there are others who might question the necessity of a wonder filled experience, especially in a religious setting. Won’t that make us more susceptible to brainwashing? Won’t we be manipulated to react emotionally?

Well, now I have the definitive answer for you. And it comes from Oprah herself.

Pause here for dramatic crowd reaction. Are you shocked? Well, it comes from Oprah somewhat indirectly. I found it in the Favorite Things edition of O Magazine (December 2010).

You can read the fascinating article by David Hochman here, but I’ll sum up by telling you that your need for wonder is now scientifically proven. Mom, believing in Santa is good for you! Dad, standing on mountaintops is practically prescribed! Dan, snuggling newborns makes you a better person!

Hochman describes a university study that asked participants to complete 20 statements that started, “I am . . . ” Divided into two groups, half the participants completed the statements while facing a life-size replica of a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton. The other half completed their statements while sitting in a hallway.

From the article:

The result: People who could see the awe-inducing T. rex were three times likelier to describe themselves as part of something larger (“I am an organic form,” “I am part of the human species”) than those who completed the questionnaire facing the hallway (“I am a soccer player,” “I am a member of the Tri Delta sorority”). In Keltner’s words, awe shifts a person’s thinking “toward the collective.”

“With awe, it’s not, ‘Wow, that’s a really tall dinosaur,’” he says. “It’s, ‘Wow, there’s something bigger than me.’” And the feeling can become a spur to action;

In other words:

Scientists say it pays to cultivate more wonder in your life, whether by forwarding heart-swelling news stories or hiking the Grand Canyon. That’s because channeling awe not only produces pleasant physiological effects—such as the warm feeling in the chest activated by the vagus nerve—and gives a sense of fulfillment; it “can help a person reflect on how an upsetting event fits into their philosophy of life, or how their personal experience unites them with humanity,” says Michelle Shiota, PhD, an assistant professor of psychology at Arizona State University.

Fortunately, there is no season as awe-inspiring as Christmas. If I’m looking for ways to add more wonder to my life, I don’t have to look far right now. In fact, last week it happened in 5th grade music. Struggling with the words to verse three of “Silent Night,” my students needed help decoding the old-fashioned language. Explaining it to them, I was struck by the beauty myself:

Silent Night, Holy Night

Son of God, Love’s pure light

Radiant beams from Thy holy face

With the dawn of redeeming grace

Jesus, Lord at Thy Birth! Jesus, Lord at Thy Birth!

That songwriter had an idea about how to cultivate wonder. Just imagine looking upon the infant Jesus, the God-head humbled into human flesh, and yet shining on his face was the beginning of all our hopes for salvation fulfilled. There’s a little bit of that in every newborn face, too. Wonder isn’t hard to find. If you need some ideas, check O Magazine’s suggestions here. But I think you know what to do.

Chase wonder this holiday season.

Last week I re-read an excerpt from Hannah Whitall Smith’s classic The God of All Comfort. Although my students found the style somewhat repetitive and dull, I was surprised by how deeply Smith’s words resonated with my experience. While my heart was with my sister, Serenity, who was recovering from lung surgery, I found Smith’s challenge to be just what my soul needed. (And I can personally attest to the fact that Serenity was oozing this comfort, despite her physical pain. She’s a star, that girl.)

When in need of comfort, whether because of internal or external circumstances, Smith reminds us that God’s promise is comfort. Every time. I’ve quoted it enough, but I never considered the weight of it: “Blessed are those who mourn for they WILL BE COMFORTED.” Not a suggestion or an idea. Comfort is available.

The in-dwelling Comforter ‘brings to our remembrance’ comforting things concerning our Lord, and, if we believe them, we are comforted by them. A text is brought to our remembrance, perhaps, or the verse of a hymn, or some thought concerning the love of Christ and His tender care for us. If we receive the suggestion in simple faith, we cannot help being comforted.

Our problem, Smith believes, is that we fail to receive that comfort. She describes it as a child who, instead of softening to his mother’s embrace, stiffens his back and refuses to be soothed. I know there have been seasons of trial in my life when I felt an unexplainable peace. So unexplainable, in fact, that I was nervous people might not understand how deeply I was truly suffering if I didn’t complain occasionally or wear a long face. Funny, isn’t it, that I have thought about acting more distraught than I actually was. I couldn’t accept the comfort.

But if we refuse to listen to the voice of our Comforter, and insist instead on listening to the voice of discouragement or despair, no comfort can by any possibility reach our souls.

After reading this scolding from Mrs. Whitall Smith, I felt an intentional shift in my attitude. It didn’t matter that certain issues in my life were completely unsettled and difficult. He offered comfort, and, instead of fighting it, I decided to accept.

And it made all the difference.