AND THE BONES CRY OUT ... WITH GLADNESS . . .

How does one even begin to describe in mere human words -- in not the most emotive language, no less -- one of the most amazing and fun weekends one has had in a very very long time? One begs the forgiveness of her witnesses and proceeds forth anyway ...

Friday night prayer meeting ...
I haven't been to a PEK-led Friday night prayer meeting at NHF since ... well, since the first one, and admittedly, that was because I and the gang I was with had to. (I know, I know, how wretched am I?!) It wasn't that I always had something to do. Nay, sometimes, I sat on my ass knitting some hideous half-project or watching an episode if "CSI: Miami" I had already seen. But this past Friday, my presence was once again "required," to put together little projects for the NHF Women's Retreat, and then to gather with the retreat organizers, as well as the regular prayer group, to pray for the retreat weekend in particular.

One interesting thing about living a life of faith is how easy it is to forget all the small, seemingly impact-less factors that contribute to the very growth of faith. Certainly one of those factors is prayer, and not just "rub-a-dub-dub, thanks for the grub, yaaaaaay God!" prayer, but prayer for and by a group of people, spoken out loud, lifted up communally, shared implicitly, even if not spoken aloud by everyone. And so it was that on Friday evening, after punching holes, laminating cardstock, hooking nametags, filling goodie-bags and cleaning up the remnants of our dinner, I found myself silent but part of a group of people praying with one purpose, to one God, in one voice. How powerful it was, and how silly of me to forget that power.

And as I stayed silent, I communicated my own prayers to our Father, things I felt too shy and too self-conscious (ironically) to speak aloud in front of others. I asked God to make me less shy and less self-conscious around the thirty or so women with whom I'd be spending the weekend. I asked God to change my personality, just for forty-eight hours, and make me not ACT busy so that I could avoid talking to, sitting next to, socializing with, eating with a woman I didn't know or didn't know very well. I asked God to make me forget about all the hard, sad, bitter, heartbreaking and worrisome things that have been burdening me, and instead make me -- MAKE ME -- think upon only Him and only what He wanted me to learn over the weekend, if anything. I asked God to help me swallow my pride, forget my ego, not worry about what I was wearing or how I looked or how big the developing pimple under my nose was going to grow (quite small, thank God!). I asked God to make me to not criticize anyone for anything, even in the quiet of my own mind, and to make me like an open-hearted baby, ready to reach out to anyone with a goofy smile.

And of course, He did all these things. I can't tell if God worked these miracles in me because a small part of me didn't believe He really would. I didn't fully believe that I would behave any differently than I had in prior retreats. I didn't fully believe that God would make me into the kind of woman who would uncritically embrace new people, new faces, new women. I didn't fully believe that God would remove my pride and my ego from me, and make me into the kind of woman who could share the deepest of her heart with other women, unafraid of their criticism or judgment. I didn't fully believe, but God forgave my unbelief and answered my prayers anyway. Freakin' unbelievable.

And so, my faith in praying in groups was restored. Even if I sit quietly, listening to and absorbing the spoken words of those around me rather than speaking aloud myself, I am refreshed and touched in a way that I am not when I am alone. Power in numbers has new meaning ...

Saturday morning ...
I'm not a morning person. Yes, I get up early and yes, I function quite well in the morning. But I normally am at my best when I have at least two to three hours of silence in which I can think about all the things I need to think about before I can address the needs of the day. Chatter, phone calls, bustling bodies, speeding motorists, all serve to throw me off, and usually make me grumpy until about lunchtime. But after picking up JKA and setting off to run the errands and make the preparations we would have to care for before the retreat got fully under way, I found myself deep in discussion about career choices, giggling over the existence of McDonald's one-dollar coupons, figuring out how to maximize Dunkin' Donuts Dollars, squinting through the windshield to find the driveway into our retreat center, then galloping all over the massive grounds of the center to find the correct entrance, finally kicking ourselves for not seeing the large-as-a-barn keypad right in front of our noses at the front of the obviously-main building. Sigh. How many young professionals do you need to open a locked door with an easy key code, right?

A speedier-than-imagined settling-in period, and the retreat was under way. Women streamed into our conference room doors, grabbed coffee and donuts, chattered and giggled, cooed over the goodie bags and greeted our amazing speaker, Dr. Elaine Eng. And I was smiling and functional, and not one ounce resentful that my morning routine had been thrown off! Will wonders never cease ...

Dr. Elaine Eng ...
She is a blind Chinese-American woman, physician, wife, mother, speaker and author. My brain exploded at reading her c.v. and oozed out my ears. For real. And she spoke wisdom like I had never heard. Simple things, simple truths. No big words, no frills, no pretensions. For crying out loud, the woman brought a cross-section of a plastic uterus to demonstrate to us once and for all that we women are wonderfully and fearfully made by God, IN HIS IMAGE.

And though I know I am not alone in feeling this way, throughout the weekend, I felt like she was speaking straight at me. Every word out of her mouth struck a different chord in my soul. I learned that God has made no mistake in creating me, not physically, not emotionally, not biologically, not spiritually. I learned that there are concrete ways I can lessen my worrying and my constant anxiety. I learned that in all troubles, I need merely to gaze upon the beauty and awe of creation to see exactly how great is my God. I learned that spiritual growth isn't something to win or lose, but something to practice, practice, practice. I learned that submitting to one's husband -- my future husband -- is not slavery, and that the counterpart command to the husband is to love his wife as Christ loved the church. In other words, the husband must DIE for his wife. I learned that the woman described in Proverbs 31 was a caretaker, a businesswoman, hard-working, industrious, well-dressed, beautiful, wily and wise. I learned that I must learn to lean on other women, more than I have been leaning. I learned that instead of searching for Mr. Right, I need to strive to BE Miss Right, a godly woman so as to meet a godly man. I learned that being obedient does not make one lesser than the one whom she obeys.

Oh, to hear such simple, straightforward words. No holds barred, but no judgment given. Just the level wisdom of a woman who really has seen it all ...

Four women ...
I normally dread small-group time at retreats. What, exactly, is the purpose of shoving a small group of people together for the short-lived, clearly temporary and socially awkward purpose of having them answer questions together and pretend to love each other enough to love each other deeply? What, exactly, indeed ...

Dr.K said it best: it's not that you take joy in others' suffering, but knowing that others suffer reminds you that you are not alone and you are not weird and you are not deficient or inferior. NHF has an extraordinary number of incredibly self-sufficient, strong -- physically AND mentally, faithful, capable, well-dressed, put-together women. On the surface, we look like perfection. Perfect jobs, perfect families, perfect homes, perfectly busy and fulfilling calendars, perfect clothes, perfect hair and makeup, perfect accessories, perfectly adorable babies, even. It can be, and is, a difficult standard to try to meet Sunday after Sunday. And yet to see and hear any one of these perfect creations say "my life sucks, I'm a bad wife, I'm a bad mother, I'm a bad daughter, I never trust God with anything, I'm unhappy with my job, I question my singleness, my marriage, my divorce, the existence of my children, my own life" is liberating, to say the least. It's not that I or any of us take joy in another's imperfection. I am not jumping up and down in glee, pointing my finger and shouting "I knew you weren't perfect! I just knew it!" Rather, I am bowing my head and wiping my tears, so humbled by the honesty of women I don't know as well as I should or could, and grateful for the opportunity to care for them, and be cared for by them.

And I really was cared for by them. To be able to bare my soul, even just a corner of it, was freeing, as most confessions are. And to put myself aside and care for another was refreshing, for I am totally boring and I'm sick of me and my own damn whining. Dr. K's words, in particular, moved me and rattled my world view so completely: "Dear God, make her to live to meet Your standards, not the standards of this world, or of the people around her."

Eh, us girls ... we're not so bad after all ...

Baby Jesus with a man's face ...
By the elevator niched two nooks which held two small statues. One statue was of a man -- perhaps meant to be Jesus or a disciple -- with creepy eyes. Every time I passed him, I actually -- and foolishly -- lifted my right hand to cover my face from him, for I did not want to mistakenly look at him, and discover that his eyes were following me! For I know that is within the realm of possibility.

The other nook held a statue of the Virgin Mary holding and extending forth the baby Jesus. Baby Jesus had his hands extended out towards the viewer. Yet he had the Face. Of. A. Grown. Man. I hate that. I hate when artists make baby Jesus have a man face. Shiver! Talk about creepy. The first time I saw it, Banana and I giggled hysterically for a few seconds, then I kept on giggling because it creeped me out so bad. Ick.

Speed Scrabble ...
One should never have to define the words one creates. That's just not fair.

Who the heck sleeps alone?! ...
Each retreat participant had her own room. HER OWN ROOM! What IS that? We never sleep alone on retreats -- that is Just. Not. Done.

How childishly unnerved I was! A sparse room, containing one twin bed, one lamp, one desk and chair, one armchair, one sink, one mirror, linoleum floors. And no one else! With whom would I stay up into the wee hours chatting and giggling? In front of whom would I be self-conscious about snoring or farting during my sleep? (Don't ask -- I've been known to pass gas in all manner of places and circumstances.) And for the record, there was just something super-creepy about the rooms. Creepy, perhaps because there was no one else in it! Oh, dear.

Nonetheless, after slinking from room to room trying to see if anyone else was as dismayed -- no, frightened -- as I, I bravely took a deep breath and closed my door. I changed into my pajamas, washed my face, set out my clothes for the next morning, set my alarm clock, and lay down. And promptly fell asleep. At the most pathetically early retreat-weekend hour of 1:00 a.m. Oh, pish, my days of pulling all-nighters at retreats are long gone.

A.D.D. under control ...
No, I don't really suffer from A.D.D.. Not officially, anyway. But most "quiet times" during retreats, I'm unable to focus on the quiet time available to me. The hour that I could or should be praying, meditating, reading the Bible, taking a prayerful walk or journaling is often spent napping, packing my belongings, or puttering around with self-made busy work, cleaning up or re-arranging chairs or some other nonsensical and unnecessary task.

But Sunday morning found my butt planted in a chair in a quiet corner of the center's dining hall, face lifted to the weak but warm sunlight streaming in through the windows, sipping hot thick coffee, ready to read and pray and study and write. I did all those things. Not for very long -- we only had about forty-five minutes at our disposal -- but for real. How lovely to have a moment to be still and relaxed, to reflect and consider, to make certain resolutions and to ask for help in making others, to sip coffee and savor the very taste of it, and even to recognize the Lord for making the all-hallowed coffee bean. I look back at that span of time as God's gift to me: He knew I wouldn't be able to handle two busy, conversational mornings in a row, so He gave me back my morning routine.

Sing praise, sing praise ...
Oh, goodness, did we evah.

Was it that I was PMS-ing? Was it that I was coming off an emotional, satisfying, honest and liberating weekend retreat? Was it that I am just a humongous mushball who cries at the cotton (the fabric of our lives!) commercials? Perhaps.

Or perhaps it was the driving drumbeat. The enthusiastic lead guitar hopping up and down. The second guitar who barely played for lifting his hands in honoring the Lord. The smiling vocalists, smiling at the unseen and powerful. The voices around me singing so loudly -- more loudly than ever -- I couldn't even hear my own voice. The women around me whom I had come to understand an iota better. The men around me whose lives might be changed by the love and prayers of the women in their lives. My beloved meatballs crawling all over me and trying to force-feed me Nabisco goldfish with stupid grins on their faces. Seeing the Alien and the Melon, having grown so big, and realizing the weight of my responsibility in contributing to their growth, physically, emotionally, biologically, spiritually.

Oh, how I wept. Tears of joy enough to fill a bucket. A big bucket. I even half-fully lifted a pacifier to the skies before realizing I was giving a fleecy red beanie-dog with a green nipple sticking out of its mouth to the Lord. I'm sure He wouldn't have complained, but ... it was a nipple, for heaven's sake.

I lost five dollars ...
After asking Dr. K to make an announcement at NHF about an upcoming baby shower, I bet her five dollars to also announce the new mother's need for a smaller sized bottle nipple, mainly for the purely childish purpose of making her say the word "nipple" in church, from the altar, over a microphone. Damn it if she didn't do it and with a completely serious face too! It helped that she is a pediatrician, so people took her seriously and flinched not at all at the fact that she said "nipple" twice; nevertheless, I gladly handed over the five dollar bill, and Dr. K volunteered to make many more announcements for me.

I've turned into her part-time job.

Ugly dresses and boring speeches ...
The unimaginable occurred on Sunday evening: I started to fall asleep while watching an awards show on television. The Golden Globes just didn't do it for me this year. I didn't have Joan and Melissa annoying the hell out of me on E!, the entire pre-awards hour was taken up by the men watching the end of some stupid football game, everyone's dresses were ugly and all of the women's NIPPLES were showing through their bodices, and I hadn't seen any of the movies and most of the television shows up for awards. I was completely disinterested, AND I was exhausted from staying up late for several nights in a row.

It wasn't until Jaime threw a baby pillow at me while I was dozing on the couch at Camp Capio that I realized, "OH. MY. GAWD. I just fell asleep during the Golden Globes." Pigs flew that night.

The princess and six frogs ...
7:00 a.m. on a day off of work, and I'm sitting in a freezing car, waiting to do something that I'm not sure is going to be worth it. NHF's first major social event of the year, and with Cheese at the head of the social committee, of course it had to be snowboarding. And of course, the other two women going on this expedition live close to the slopes so they are driving themselves, so of course, I end up in Camp Capio's faux-minivan with six man-boys who, first of all, show up late, then spend the hour-long drive giggling (in a very manly and mature way, naturally) at each other's crude stories and lecturing at each other about the correct way to snowboard without falling or hurting oneself. Are we there yet?

(Naturally, I sat in the front seat, even though I was the shortest and smallest person in the car by about two feet and an average of about sixty pounds. Yes, I am a princess -- and damn, that butt-warmer was nice -- but that is what I deserve for BEING ON TIME.)

The nauseating anxiety that kept building in the pit of my stomach at the prospect of leashing myself to a big piece of metal (or whatever the hell it is) and launching myself down a big mountain in the path of other people leashed to like objects pretty much dissipated after my first run down. No major wipeouts, no broken limbs, no incredibly embarrassing incidents, and I didn't even care that I had icicle snots attached to each of my nostrils. It wasn't until after my second run down that Mrs.G bothered to tell me we had just done a black diamond trail. WHAT THE F*CK? Do I not have "goofy, uncoordinated and fearful novice" written all over me? Does the fact that I stick my butt out like I'm riding a horse not indicate that I am not capable of boarding a black diamond trail?

Apparently, no one knew. We just went. And I survived. Twice. No, three times, although the third time down, I crashed so hard I landed on my head and neck and skidded for a few feet before coming to a stop on my back, with my head facing downhill, my board lying uphill, and me seeing tweeting cartoon birds circling above my eyes. I knew only PEK was behind me and I hoped he would just pass and let me suffer in peace, but as I lifted my head feebly to wave him by, I saw him approach me with "Oh my gosh, are you okay?" And as he tried to navigate towards me, he crash-landed and ended up in essentially the same position as I. The blind leading the blind -- it's a beautiful thing.

That was it for me. Even the really easy green trails sucked. I mean, who the heck snowboards on flat land? It's just impossible and you don't learn anything except how hard it is to snowboard on flat land. But my thighs were done. My spirit was still having fun, despite the crash-landing, but my body was failing me. My fear of picking up speed caused me to snow-plow all the way down, putting much more pressure on my knees and exerting much more muscular energy than necessary, and I was weary by mid-afternoon. Besides, the daredevils were being constrained by slowpokes like me, so I sent them off to do their boy thing, and I sipped coffee from the lodge while admiring all the folks who came whizzing (or in some cases, walking) down the mountain, at all level of skill and grace. I listened to three grizzly Russian men in full-on snowsuits at the table next to me hit on their middle-aged waitress and enjoy their Manhattan clam chowder with gusto. I watched a man fall asleep while reading his book and drinking a beer. I watched a table full of round-faced Koreans smoke and drink their way into a frenzy. I watched wee little kids come flying around the final corner of the trail with no poles and with their two-foot-long skis formed into a perfect V-shape. I watched multiple minor collisions and one emergency ski patrol stretcher come zipping down the mountain carrying an unfortunate passenger. And I considered the day that I had had, sheepishly patting myself on the back for surviving the unknown black diamond and not eating too much snow, and coming away with just a few small bruises and no injury to my ego at all.

Plus, I had this cool helmet -- the Jade Beacon, we like to call it -- that even Mrs.G could see from several hundred yards away. "No offense, but I saw you coming down the mountain," she says. No offense taken! That's what it's FOR, so you can SEE me. The mothership calling you home.

Post-script ...
Could I BE in any more pain right now?

I thought a couple of Advils and a long session of stretching would limber me up enough to get me up in the morning, but no. I had to roll myself over and over to the edge of the bed, then roll onto the floor, then get up on all fours, then slowly place a foot at a time on the floor to come to a standing position. Sitting on the toilet was an exercise in patience, and brushing my teeth felt like I was sawing through a redwood tree all by myself. Washing my hair, drying my hair, putting clothes on -- all ordeals. And the worst was yet to come, for I still had to descend two and a half flights of stairs just to get to my car, which I yet had to climb into. Oh, Lord ...

My thighs are burning, even though I'm just sitting here trying my best to make no sudden and unnecessary movements. My neck, back and ribs are stiff and sore from my final crash landing. I have a strange bruise on my elbow, which I can only surmise was created by all my jabbing of those who made fun of my horse-riding posture. I have a large bruise on my knee, which even my knee pads could not prevent. I have matching bruises on the fronts of my ankles and the backs of my calves from where the boots rubbed me just a little bit the wrong way. I have sore jaws and a blister on my tongue from when I bit down really hard my last run down. And I have this most sexy windburn on my face ...

Snowboarding is not my first choice activity, by any means. But knowing I can do it, knowing I can learn better skills, knowing that I have people around me to encourage me and wait for me when I'm being poky, knowing I have someone to lean on when getting off the ski lift ... well, as G.I. Joe would say "knowing is half the battle."

Too bad the battle involves snow-making machines that don't make snow as much as spit out ice.