Jennifer Johnson's Blog

I've been a praying woman for a long time. As long as I have wrestled in my praying with myself, and probably with God, too, though it is more likely God just stands back and waits until I exhaust myself and quit flailing on the ground.

One of the stories in Scripture is about Jacob wrestling and angel, or, I don't know, maybe it was God. The Bible isn't very clear about who this stranger is which Jacob wrestles until nearly daybreak just before he is to meet his brother who had years before threatened to kill him. Now, Jacob has a lot more to lose than his own life. He now has four wives and a bunch of children. What to do when he has news that his brother whom he had wronged and who had sworn revenge is now coming to meet him?

I wonder if this wrestling might have been Jacob wrestling with his own inner demons? Because, let's face it, Jacob has been a jerk. He lied to his old blind father. He cheated his brother out of his blessing and his inheritance. He even tried to bargain with God, saying if God would bless him and protect him, THEN he would serve Him. It's a wonder God didn't strike him dead right then. Instead, God just lets Jacob learn from his own experiences how screwed up life can be when left to our own devices. His marital and family life reads like a soap opera, of sorts. And after years of living on his own terms, he comes to understand how very patient and loving God has been all this time.

I've found a prayer that speaks like that to me. It was written by Thomas Merton, and it goes like this:

My Lord God,
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following your will
does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road,though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though
I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me to face my perils alone. 

I think it is rather lovely.

I've always admitted to being a late bloomer, so when I watched "Love, Actually" for the first time recently, I, well, I fell in love. 15 years after this movie made its debut.

For most of my life, I've been a sucker for a good love story. Heck, as a kid, I used to play with my brother's matchbox cars, and literally match them up for car weddings. Important in my 70s childhood mind was figuring out which car was the "boy" car and which car was the "girl" car, then picking the groom and bride. Then picking this less attractive cars for the attendants.

What I love about "Love, Actually" was the celebration--and exploration--of the many kinds of love. And, I will admit, one of the times I teared up was when Billy Mack, the hilariously self-proclaimed has been singer, leaves Elton John's party to come spend Christmas eve with his manager and friend, Joe.

In my youth, it was all about the romantic love. But as I plod steadily toward 50, I now see the many nuances of love, its many forms, even its brokenness, and it yearning to be whole.

This is probably why, the original movie poster, The Princess Bride, appeals to me more now. The movie has always been a classic favorite of mine. I mean, true love, right? But I wished the movie poster--which has hung in my college dorm room, my graduate dorm room, and now the stairwell in my house--had Wesley and Buttercup embracing instead of the bookend story of the boy and his grandfather. But I realize now, the beauty of that generational relationship really is the more beautiful story. Especially, especially, especially if you've read the book.

Which I recommend highly. I have at least three copies of it, and now I will not lend you one.

I'm Wonder Woman.

Not THAT one. My own one. I Wonder. A lot. I one-der. I am a one-der, and a wonder-er, and a wanderer.

So, I am also:

Oneder Woman

and

Wander Woman

Sometimes, my wandering leads me to different places. Different spaces. Different Times and Places.

Like, the Shire.

I found a bucket list for the Shire. I love this.

Here are a few things I liked:

Her Good Samaritan needs rescuing though he doesn’t know it.
Hospital chaplain Grace Sutton isn't looking for love when she 
becomes stranded in the middle of  nowhere. But when Ches Larson
 and his 4-year-old niece stop to help her, Grace feels drawn to the
gentleman ranger and the adorable child with him.

Raising his teenage daughter and his niece isn’t easy especially when
Ches knows he’s on borrowed time. So when Grace walks into a 
hospital room and finds Ches is the patient, she has to convince him
 his life is worth fighting for, so she can be a part of it, too.


Dating Grace is a Christian Inspirational Romance. It will be released July 31 exclusively at Amazon. It is available both digitally and in print.
Here is an excerpt:
Grace returned his look, and instead of the anticipation of a kiss, she saw instead sadness.She recognized the expression. She’d seen it many times in patients who had just been told they had cancer or some other life-threatening illness, patients who believed there was no treatment available to beat the disease, patients who had been given a death sentence.She reached and grasped his hand.“Ches,” she murmured.“Yes, sugar?”“I want to go out with you again. Next week. I’ll come to your house, or you and the girls can come to mine.”“No,” he whispered.Grace leaned toward him. “You’re not going to die soon.” She didn’t even try to keep the vehemence out of her voice. “You’re going to live to be old. There’s no reason to think otherwise as long as you do what the doctor said.”“You can’t fight gen—”Grace shot up, aimed her mouth on his, wrapped her arms around the breadth of his shoulders, and shut up his hopeless, desolate, determination to die before 40 no matter what.She drew back, but his arms enclosed her. Opening her eyes, she saw the desolation was gone, replaced by appreciation.Perhaps even a glimmer of humor. “Is this how you win an argument?” His arms tightened a fraction.
Here is the link to the Kindle edition: https://tinyurl.com/yctjlrep

The term "herding cats" has become known as a phrase for attempting unsuccessfully to get unwilling people to do what you want. I first heard the term around 1997 when I was serving a church in Mississippi. In another town, a pastor and the church were having problems. The pastor described the ministry to the congregation as "trying to herd cats."

The writer in me loved the splendidly vivid image. I knew exactly the meaning. You can't herd cats. You can't do anything with cats, but put up with them. Many years ago, cats came to be domesticated because of a symbiotic relationship involving mice and grain. People settled down and started planting, harvesting, and storing their own crops. Mice started getting into the grain, so cats entered the civilized arena to catch the mice. Humans thought, "How cute! The cat has a disgusting mice in its mouth. Let's make the nice kitty a pet!"

 But cats are not quite as domesticated as dogs. There's always a bit of a wild side--like how their pupils get large and scary when you wave a feathery wand in front of their feline face. Then they POUNCE! Or, how you can be serenely stroking their furry belly, then they grab you and scratch and bite you, as if you deserved it.

Cats can be trained. I know this because I saw on Johnny Carson many years ago a man who trained cats to do tricks like jumping through hoops. Man, it was amazing. I've never seen anything else like it since. Maybe because training cats is very, very difficult. Hence the phrase "herding cats."

However, it is possible. I know this because I herd cats every morning.

I know because I herd cats every morning.








But there's a method.

You have to be consistent, and there has to be a food source. Cats, like many of us, are creatures of habit. It is my habit to wake up and, shortly thereafter, feed our three inside cats. If I don't get up at a reasonable-to-them time, they jump on the bed and walk on me. They meow in the hallway. Sometimes, they get in a fight.

"Hangry", some people call it.

So, I get up. I usually take a shower first. Before getting in the shower, my cat Clarence rubs against my legs. He purrs. He is such a charming boy when he wants breakfast. I usually scratch his dusty orange head and apologize for making him wait until after I get clean.

When I step out of the bathroom, the three cats are watching me. When I begin to walk into the hallway, they race down the steps.

Haha! I was only going into the bedroom.

When I come back into the hallway, they are ready again. I head to the stairs. They go before me urgently and in perfect movement with each other as if they are synchronized swimmers in the Olympics. They turn on the landing and run down the stairs. This is the herding. I bask in my ability to control them. I entertain the notion of going back upstairs to see how long before they follow me.

But that's cruel. And I'm a nice person. Mostly.

By the time I reach the first floor, the cats are standing at their empty food dishes. I give them breakfast, they eat.

And the herd disperses until the next feeding.

My daughter has impaired eyesight.

A few years ago she made a comment about not being able to see the board in the front of the classroom, so I took her.

In a low light room, I watched as she admitted to the doctor that she couldn't see the letters on the wall which were clearly visible to me. I started to cry. The tears were an outward expression of the sadness and fear I felt that my beautiful beloved child had a defect which impaired her ability to see--and it was severe.

But missed in with the sadness and fear was another emotion--a deep sense of gratitude. I was thankful she'd told me about her struggle, that I had listened and taken her to the optometrist, that we live in a country and have the ability to go to an optometrist, and that he kindly and skillfully sought to give her glasses which exactly fit her need so that she could see again.

Two years later (yesterday), we went again, this time for contacts.

More tears from me as the exam showed further worsening of the eyesight. And yet again when the doctor said of course she could get contacts if she wanted them, left the room, came back with contacts, put them in her eyes, and WOW! she could see without the glasses.

I've been reading books by this guy named Rick Hanson. He is a pretty amazing person who writes about brain neuroplasticity and how we can train our brains to be less anxious and more joyful. I've read three of his books now. One of the practices is to notice those things in your life that you can be thankful for. Our brain doesn't tend to notice things that aren't new, so Dr. Hanson has given me new eyes to see (haha).

My brain is responding in kind.

So it occurs to me, again, how thankful I am to have access to this eye doctor, how kind she and the nurse are because actually there were quite a few letters on the eye chart my daughter got wrong. They didn't fuss at her or even indicate she had missed them. I think this is because they don't want to make her more anxious and, really, they don't want her to guess. They are truly just examining her ability to see.

I think there's a lesson in that. Maybe one about wanting honestly to know how someone is and patiently being present with them so they can be honest back. In this way, we who are helpers can truly help because we all have clear vision of what is needed.

I admit I am unorganized.

So when a few weeks ago I couldn't find my favorite pair of earrings, no big deal, they'll turn up, though I began to look for them. Not in the jewelry box. Not on the bathroom counter or on top of the bookcase where I have a herd of jewelry gathered there because that's where I tend to shed my outer shell, including accouterments.

I had asked my husband to keep a lookout.

Then yesterday, I saw this:

One earring. Only one.

And it was here:

In the bottom of my cart I use when I teach. This cart has been in my car, at the school, at my house, and all of the bumpy pavement and grass covered landscape in between. And I thought, "how could it be there? I wouldn't have set the earrings loose in that cart." It must have been in a bag that I had placed in the cart, and the earrings fell out.

I looked in all of my bags I use. In any given week, I have at least four, and sometimes on my class day, I bring three different bags to teach. So, I searched and searched. Emptying pockets completely.

No earring.

I look on the floor of the classroom. More bags. Floor of the foyer. Pockets of pants and sweaters.

No earring.

So, I begin to search the car, which is no small task since my car is the closest thing I have to an office, and there is a LOT of stuff in it. I have a mountain of items I have removed from the car, and then....!!!!!

There was the lost earring! In the trunk of the car amidst blankets, sweaters, and books.

I'm so happy! I rejoice. I want to tell someone. I want to celebrate, and then something occurs to me. I'm living out the lost parables Jesus talks about in the Gospel of Luke, chapter 15. Probably mine is closest to the woman who loses a coin, but recently I had taught the parable of the lost sheep to some of my children at one of the places where I serve as chaplain.

And this cute little kid drew a comic of the parable. Here is the amazing artwork:

Title  Jesus telling the story
There was a shepherd who had 100 sheep.... Then Searching and searching.... So happy! Rejoice, and now... Let's go home, because for a little kid away from home, that's the best happy ending. "Town 10 Miles" the sign says.
It's amazing how happy I am over such a small item which I actually bought for a few dollars at a second hand store. I can't quite imagine the elation felt by a family when a lost loved one comes back home as in the Parable of the Lost Son, or the joy of being reunited with a family who loves them so, as is the case with some of the people I work with. 
I'm thankful--so thankful--to have both earrings back. And I'm thankful for the loss which allowed me to ruminate on these wonderful stories Jesus told about how happy all of heaven is when one lost person makes their way back into the fold.

God, help me.
I am broken; mend me.
I am parched; quench me.
I am empty; fill me.
I am untouchable; embrace me.
I am angry; hear me.
I am lonely; cherish me.
I am sad; comfort me.

This filthy soul-room needs airing out, dusting, loving attention-giving. The doting humming cheerful calm home-maker, house-keeper, dwelling seeker and giver, with your calling to de-clutter and create order, visit your goodness upon my soul-room. Make it clean and warm. Light it with the illumination of your grace, peace, joy, gratitude, patience, love.

Lord-home-wife-life, I humbly ask for You here now.

Do your called work within me.

Amen.

Available is my short story Finders Seekers for only 99 cents! Exclusive at Amazon.

https://tinyurl.com/y8m49lon

It's not quite a romance, though there are definitely sparks between the characters. Still, it may be the supernatural tension in the air rather than a promise of love.

Very excited to share this new book--never before released, and the third in my *Family Tangles* series.

Here is an excerpt:

Jane sat up to get a better look at him. He wore jeans and a white T-shirt with some logo emblazoned across the back. His hair was cut short, and when he stepped into the ray from the light inside the barn, it looked the color of rust, similar to Mandy’s hair. Who was he? A worker from the Anderson farm, perhaps? She was sure he’d spot her if he looked in her direction, but she didn’t leave the rock.
She watched his progress. Four bags now. Coming out, he swung the door shut and locked it. Then he went to the cab of the truck and retrieved something from inside. The man walked toward the building again, this time going up the staircase. He paused at the door and was in the process of unlocking it, when he stopped, his head turned toward her.
He’s spotted me.
He took a few steps back and placed a hand on the railing. “Buenos dias. ¿Cómo estás?”
He thinks I’m Latina. Well, I am, even if I don’t speak a word of Spanish.
“You’re standing on a balcony, and it’s just past daybreak. Somehow I expected you to say something more inspiring.”
He leaned forward as if to get a better look. “I apologize. You speak English. I thought you might be a migrant worker.”
Jane let his comment pass. “I think your line is supposed to be, ‘Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo?’”
“Not only do you speak English, but you quote English playwrights. What are you doing here in the middle of my soybean fields?”
“Your soybean fields? This land is yours?”
“Yes.”
No hesitation whatsoever. He must be Zachary Anderson. Did he not know that at least half of the land they could see didn’t belong to him or was he just a really good liar? From here, it was difficult to see the expression on his face. “How interesting.”
“You know what I find interesting? A woman sitting on a rock on my land quoting Shakespeare to me.”
Oh, he was smooth, all right. Well, Jane could be smooth right back. “Hark, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.”
He rested his elbows on the railing. “But soft.”
“What?”
“It isn’t’ hark.’ It’s ‘But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.” He turned his face to the lightening sky. “Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, who is already sick and pale with grief, that thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.”
Jane’s mouth fell open in shock. Wow. Shaking off her surprise, she replied, “I’m impressed. A farmer who knows his Bard.”
He straightened. “Thank my tenth grade English teacher, Mrs. Armstrong, for the assignment. I got an A for reciting the soliloquy in front of the class and a date with Emily Jackson who fancied herself a Juliet to my Romeo. Are you alone?”
“If I were, would I tell you?” Jane straightened her legs, stretching them out on the rock top and crossed her ankles.
“I’d rather know if a couple of guys are going to charge up here and kill me while you’re distracting me with clever dialogue and your bare feet.”
Jane’s gaze flickered to her toes. Was he flirting with her? More importantly, was she flirting with him? She didn’t dwell on it. And she certainly didn’t want to reveal too much to Zachary Anderson this morning. Not until she knew the best way to handle this delicate situation of what was likely going to be a property dispute.
“If we were going to kill you, we would have done it while you were unloading bags and putting them in the barn. You get an F from me for observation. I’ve been sitting here the whole time.”
He didn’t speak for a moment, then said, “I was about to brew some coffee. Why don’t I fix you a cup and bring it down to you, and you can tell me why you’re trespassing at just past five in the morning.”
“Coffee sounds good.” Really good. She’d slept in the car last night because Laura wouldn’t agree to stay in a hotel and the furniture rental place couldn’t deliver until today. Jane refused to sleep on the floor in the house until she knew for sure she wouldn’t wake up nose to nose with a rat or a raccoon.
Cotton candy pink and blue painted the sky now. If they were home, she’d be at the diner getting ready for the breakfast crowd. Hard to believe every morning of her life she had missed this gorgeous scenery.
Squeaky hinges sounded above her, and the door closed. Then Zachary’s heavy-booted feet on the wooden balcony and down the stairs. Jane moved to the edge of the rock and hung her feet down over the side. Zachary was walking across the expanse of shorn grass between the barn and the rock with a ceramic cup in each hand. When Jane raised her gaze to his face, their eyes met and something inside of her chest hitched.
She should have left while he was making the coffee. This early morning visit could make an awkward situation even more so. She didn’t want to tell him who she was or why she was here. That conversation needed to happen with Laura.
He stopped next to the rock and held the cups of coffee out to her. The aroma wafted in the air, and her mouth began to water. She took the cups, and he turned his back to her and hoisted himself up beside her. He held out a hand, and she placed one of the mugs in it.
“I’m Bo,” he said.
“Is that a nickname? I thought Zachary Anderson owned this land.” At least part of it, but she wasn’t going to bring that up.
“Are you going to tell me who you are and why you’re sitting on my rock next to my barn in my soybean field?”
He’d had enough of the pleasantries and small talk. Jane sipped the coffee. Oh, it was good, and worth a little information at least.
“My name is Jane, and I’m…staying close by. I read about a rock named Hesed, so I wanted to see if I could find it. This is it, isn’t it?” She patted the surface of the rock, and in the quiet, the slapping sound appeared loud.
He studied her a moment. “Where did you read about Hesed?”
“The courthouse. Property records.” Jane hoped he didn’t ask why she had been looking at property records. If he knew he’d been using land that didn’t belong to him, then even that little bit of information could make him nervous. Not a bad thing necessarily. “The surveyor described a hill and a large rock called Hesed. Did you know this rock had a name?”
Bo sighed, as if he were recalling a happy memory. “Yeah.”
Jane waited for him to say more, but he didn’t. “Hesed. I’ve never heard that word before. Do you know what it means?”
He set his cup next to him and leaned back on his hands. “It’s a Hebrew word for steadfast or loving kindness. You’d think a field that has a boulder in it would have rocky soil, but it doesn’t. The soil is loamy, really good for beans or any crops, really. Hesed is the only rock anywhere around. I used to come here as a kid and make up stories about how it got here.”
Janie didn’t respond right away. It was strange a rock this large would be here when the dirt around it wasn’t rocky at all.
“How did Hesed get here?”
He shrugged. “Who knows?”
He had dismissed the mystery years ago, obviously. The rock simply was, and how or why it was here didn’t matter to him anymore. But it used to matter to him. “You do, don’t you? Or, at least the little-boy-you who made up the stories knows how the rock got here.”
His lips slowly turned up in a smile. “I suppose I could tell the most believable one.”
“All right. I love a good story.”
He cut his eyes to her, making Jane think this really was going to be a good story.
“A long time ago there lived a giant. He was a miner, and he found gold in the foothills of the Appalachians in north Alabama. He grabbed a handful of rock and tore it out of the earth, and he made a cave. He put most of the gold in the cave for safekeeping. But a few pieces of gold he kept, and he threw them as far as he could. They landed here, and he put the piece of the rock he had torn out to make the cave here as a marker, so when he’s ready to claim his gold, he’ll pick up Hesed, and he’ll go back to north Alabama and fit it in like a puzzle piece. Then he’ll know where his gold is.”
“How much time did you spend digging under Hesed looking for the gold he threw?”
He chuckled. “Most of one summer till my dad put me to work in the fields. He said if I wanted to dig in the dirt, I might as well make it productive. It’s been a long time since I thought of that giant or his gold. What about you? How do you think the rock got here?”
Jane sipped her coffee. “I think it had something to do with two families feuding.”
“The Montagues and Capulets?”
“No. I was thinking more like the Hatfields and McCoys. The families hated one another, so they would meet at this hill every Saturday and shoot at each other. One day Gladys Hatfield was looking over her gun barrel and spotted Lancelot McCoy aiming his gun at her. He had the prettiest blue eyes she’d ever seen. He closed one of those pretty blue eyes and pulled the trigger and shot a snake that had been hanging in the tree above her. She fell in love with Lancelot right then. So, after she ate some snake stew, she snuck over to the McCoy homestead that night and kidnapped him, which was fine with Lancelot because Gladys had brought him some stew, and he realized she was a really good cook. So, they eloped to Niagara Falls, and they bought this really big rock at the gift shop as a souvenir and had it delivered to the hill on Sunday when all of their kin was in church. And when the following Saturday rolled around, everybody saw the rock with Gladys and Lancelot sitting on it side-by-side. And Lancelot said, ‘Now folks, we’re neighbors, and the Lord said neighbors is s’posed to love each other as theyselves, so we’s gonna stop fightin’ and start lovin’ ’cause that’s what the Lord said neighbors should do.’ So, everybody put down their guns, and they stopped killing each other and started loving each other as theyselves. And they named the rock He said because when Lancelot told them how it was going to be, they did what Hesed to do.”
Bo groaned. “Jane, that’s about the best and corniest story I’ve ever heard.”
Jane raised her cup and tapped the side of his. “Here’s to loving neighbors as theyselves.”
Bo chuckled and clicked her cup with his own. “’Cause that’s what Hesed to do.”
They both drank from their cups, making the toast complete.

Like what you read?

This book is available digitally and in print.

Here is the link which will take you to a page where you should be able to find most of your favorite digital bookstores.
https://www.books2read.com/u/49PZ10

This link will take you to Amazon for the Kindle and Print version:
https://www.amazon.com/Steadfast-Family-Tangles-Jennifer-Johnson-ebook/dp/B0755N38M6/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8