Rock Love

Rocks speak to me. They always have. Mountains are majestic, the sky is magnificent, the ocean is marvelous—but rocks—well, they rock.

Even as a five-year-old, I was fascinated by rocks. I would pick them up and carry them around the yard and my mother would shout, “Put that rock down. You’re going to hurt yourself. When you drop it on your toe, don’t come crying to me.”

And I didn’t. I carried the rocks around rearranging them and when one slipped out of my hands and hit my foot—which invariably happened—I never went crying to my mother. I sat in the corner of the yard cradling my foot and whimpering until my toe finally quit hurting. Then I would find another rock that needed relocation.

As a child, I built rock mansions for roly-poly bugs and furnished them with grass and jar lids full of water. I seem to remember my mother remarking to my grandmother, “That’s odd, Maybelle. I’m sure this jar had a lid.”

As an adult, I learned to build rock steps, rock walls, and rock siding around houses. To build with rocks, one must first have rocks. I spent countless blissful hours collecting rocks from local ranches and filling the pickup truck up with them until it settled down on the back wheels and the front end was light driving home. Rocks speak to me.

Once I found a huge rock along the side of the road. I was driving the car, not the truck. I stood the rock up on end at the back of the car and wrestled it into the trunk. When I got home with the rock, it took my son and two of his teenage friends to lift the rock out of the trunk. In the tussle, the trunk lock got bent, but I had to take that rock home with me. It hollered at me as I was driving past.

Why this passion for rocks? I can’t explain it. Nor can I explain why as an unchurched child who didn’t own a Bible and didn’t even understand the lyrics to Christmas songs like “Silent Night,” my favorite Psalm was Psalm 27: “In the time of trouble He shall hide me…He shall set me high upon a rock, and now my head shall be lifted up above my enemies.”

“The LORD lives! Blessed be my Rock! Let God be exalted, the Rock of my salvation.” 2 Samuel 22:47.

Physical rocks have sometimes failed me. They have strained my back and arm muscles, dropped on my feet, smashed my fingers, proved to be a hiding place for scorpions that sting when disturbed. But the Rock of my salvation has never failed me.

God is The Rock. He made rocks. The rocks speak to me.

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Justifiable Crankiness?

I remember a song from when I was a kid about walking on the sunny side of the street. Walking our rough collie dog is a constant reminder. When sun batters through clouds in our part of Scotland—which is extremely rare in a marine climate where it rains nearly every day, I want to walk on the sunny side of the street. The best grass and the best sniffing places for Savannah, however, are apparently on the west side of the street where the sun is blocked by eight-foot high hedges and stone fences. So dog happily walks in the shade, sniffing…and I shuffle along behind her casting yearning glances at the other side of the street—the sunny side.

“On the Sunny Side of the Street” was written by Dorothy Fields in the 1930s. Here are a few of the lyrics:

Grab your coat and grab your hat, baby
Leave your worries on the doorstep
Just direct your feet
On the sunny side of the street

Can’t you hear the pitter-pat
That happy tune is your step
Life can be so sweet
On the sunny side of the street

The nearly magical aspect of the sunny side of the street is that you can walk there even in the rain—if you let the peace of God rule your thoughts. You can be someone’s sunshine even on the darkest days.

I failed this morning. I’ve heard of “justifiable homicide,” but I engaged in… justifiable crankiness? Alan received an appointment letter for a home visit from a doctor from the local hospital. The letter directed, “if you are unable to keep this appointment call (number) as soon as possible.” Alan is still in the hospital, so I called that number several times—but it didn’t work. The letter head identified the hospital, but gave no phone number. So, feeling sympathy for older people who don’t have access to the internet, I looked up the number on the computer and called. I should have saved the sympathy for me. The number went to a switchboard, which went to another switchboard, which went to yet a third switchboard that finally quipped, “You cannot leave a message at this number. Please call…” I was on the way out the door to catch the ferry and get across the water to visit Alan, so I didn’t have a pen. I ran back to the desk for a pen and jotted down the number. I called. Yay! A live person. The live person said, “I’ve never heard of that doctor. I have no record of that appointment. If you will just hold…”

“I can’t hold. I’m on the way out the door to catch the ferry.”

“If you will leave your number, I will have someone call you.”

“I won’t be here. I’m on the way to catch the ferry.”

“Someone will call you later…”

“I don’t want anyone to call me latter. I just want to cancel the appointment and catch the ferry.”

“Let me give you another number…”

I hung up. Epic fail. I left the sunny side of the street.

I got to the ferry just in time. The sun came out. It was a beautiful day for riding on the sunny side of the water, but I had left a person behind somewhere at some switchboard sitting under a storm cloud, because I forgot Colossians 3:15, “And let the peace of God rule in your hearts.”

It was Scotland’s NHS. Did that make it justifiable crankiness?

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Scary Words

“Oh, I know who you are. I’ve seen you…”

Scary words. When did they see me? What was I doing? Picking my nose? Scratching some unsavory body part clandestinely? Wearing old clothes—undoubtedly that. Or was it even more sinister?

Was I wearing a grumpy frowny face instead of a smile? Was my attitude or expression akin to the signs some folks post on their gates: “Beware! It Bites!”

Was I slumped over with worry and distress resembling depictions of Atlas condemned to hold up the heavens and the sky—an unacceptable posture for a Christian who is to cast all their care upon God.

Was I being kind? Or unkind? Loving or spiteful? Helpful or impatient?

A smile is such an easy and essential fixture to install—but did I forget and leave my smile at home. “I’ve seen you…”

What did they see?

“Keep yourselves in the love of God.” Jude 21

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Before…and After

Since my first book was published in 2012, I have attempted to write a weekly blog. I have not always succeeded in that goal. There are weeks that go blog-less.

When a friend sent me a picture she took of me – probably 57 years ago – I realized that I could write the shortest blog ever. I didn’t recognize myself in the picture she shared. In fact, the face rather scared me. It was taken before Jesus came into my heart and my life. Looking at that picture, I could understand why I had so few friends in school. I looked grim.

When placed beside a recent picture of me – a picture after Jesus came into my heart and life – the contrast is astounding.

As with everything in life that is important, the explanation is found in the Bible. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation, old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” 2 Corinthians 5:17.

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Crazy – or Insane?

I hate those spineless scammers that go around paying other people’s bills without their knowledge or consent. Mind you, no one has ever paid my bills, but I know these bill-paying scammers exist.

I know because husband Alan McKean is still in the hospital. He has been there since the last week in December. The bills are in his name. I can’t pay them. The only reason I can imagine greedy utility companies refusing money without putting me through a more rigorous security check than the police check I had to pass to enter this country is that mean-spirited scammers go around tricking big corporations by paying other people’s bills.

First it was the phone company. Actually, I am gradually realizing that besides spending half-a-day on the phone to get my name added to the bill so that I was eligible to pay it, sorting out the phone company was a breeze. I had to pass through about the same layers of security and scrutiny as I did to get my visa to remain here in the UK.

But the electric company? “Oh, the electric company,” she moans, hanging her head. Throw in some handwringing. Actually, it was an extremely rough ferry crossing over to the hospital this morning and there was a woman wringing her hands. At the time, I thought it was fear. Now I think it was despair. I think her husband is probably in the hospital, too, and she tried to pay the electric bill for him.

I never got a bill from the electric company. We got dumped by our old company and sucked into a new one, so I didn’t even know the name of the company or how to contact them. Alan handled it through his email—which is password protected. He can’t remember the password. So, I started out asking the company—when I finally found out which one it was—to change the emails to my email address because my husband was in the hospital. Their reply; “We can’t do that unless your husband calls us.”

“But he’s in the hospital.”

“Yes, you’ve told me.”

“He’s been there since after Christmas. I don’t know if he’s getting out.”

“Yes. But he needs to call us and give us permission to add you to the bill.”

“He can’t call. He can barely talk. He’s in the hospital. What am I supposed to do—sit here and not pay you until the lights and the heat go out?”

“You can pay the bill. I just can’t change anything unless he calls us.”

“Oh, good. That’s all I want to do. Pay the bill. How much is it?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“WHAT?”

“Company policy.”

“You want me to pay the bill, but you won’t tell me how much it is? I want to speak to a supervisor.”

“I can transfer you to a supervisor, but they will tell you the same thing. Company policy.”

“Well, if you can’t tell me how much I owe can you just throw a number out for fun? And I’ll pay that.”

“That would be telling you the amount. I could lose my job.”

So…the electric bill is not paid. Any day I will return home from the hospital to a dark cold house. But the lady will have kept her job.

Crazy? No, insane.

Hey, if any of you guys out there know one of those pesky scammers personally—tell them to pay my electric bill for me.

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Little Joys

It is a long walk—a lot of it uncovered and exposed to constant rain—between the little ferry in Gourock and the train station where one can either catch the train, or go through the building and get a taxi or a bus. Before when I made this walk frequently, I was on crutches. I was always the last one to get from the ferry to the front of the station building. When I first began visiting Alan in the hospital nearly every day on the Thursday after Christmas, I was off crutches—but still the last one to reach the front of the building. But now, after all these weeks of walking that route—I can keep up with the frontrunners! I was in the group of the first three folks today to reach the front of the building. Just a little bit of joy to season the day. (I was probably the only one to know that I was ‘racing’ the others!)

Savannah went on a walk with me two nights ago. “Wait,” you might well say. “Don’t dogs usually go on walks with their owners?” Not Savannah. Not after dark. Since the November 5 Guy Fawkes Night fireworks, Savannah has refused to go outside after dark. Every night when the rain is not pouring down I put Savannah’s collar and leash on her and walk to the front door. The leash comes with me. The collar and the dog stay behind. So having her willingly go on a walk with me after dark was a big thing. And it was just another bit of joy to season the day.

My newest Christian cozy mystery-romance came out in paperback today. I got home to find two paperback copies had been dropped through the mail slot. A bit of joy to season the day.

While I was walking around waiting for the ferry yesterday afternoon, I got to take an interesting photo of a building out on a pier, the roof covered with seagulls, and a boat rocking gently in the fog. Today as I waited for the ferry, I got to watch pigeons diligently choose nesting materials and fly off with them sticking out of their beaks. Little joys.

Joy doesn’t have to come in something the size of a shipping container or a new vehicle. It can be small and quiet, a whisper passing through the heart. The Bible says, “In everything give thanks,” 1 Thessalonians 5:18.

A thankful heart finds joy in little things.

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Blame it on Circles

My college art class professor loved circles. He gave us instruction in our class on Monday, then set an art project to be completed by Friday—and he always wanted us to include circles or curves—except for William, of course. William disappeared after Monday’s class, but he unfailingly showed up on Thursday night with a large canvas he had stretched. He applied masking tape to the blank canvas in geometrical shapes, spray painted different areas different colors, and removed the tape. Art project finished in thirty minutes. Result—straight ‘A’s.

It seemed unfair at the time that the 30-minute student in our class always rated an ‘A’ when the rest of us who showed up and worked on our projects all week, diligently including the required circles and curves, did not hit the ‘A’ mark. But I have since learned that life is not fair and I am not an artist. William was.

The country song, “Will the Circle be Unbroken,” recorded in 1935, by the Carter Family has a catchy tune and words: Will the circle be unbroken; By and by, Lord, by and by; There’s a better home a-waiting; In the sky, Lord in the sky. I love that song.

Circles are good in songs. “The Circle of Life” in “Lion King” being a prime example. But I’m beginning to distrust circles. Take the seasons. They curve and circle around enough to please even my art professor. But the circle includes winter (she says wearing three layers of clothes at the computer and shivering). Winter is simply not good for me no matter how many circles—or songs—it creeps into.

However, my main grumble about circles is that they are round. As I go back and forth across the water every day to visit my husband in the hospital, I watch the windows on buildings as the ferry approaches the terminals at each end of the trip. The windows are tall and trim and inflexible. I can’t help thinking that if I maintained the same shape as the windows—my weight would not creep up on me and become a problem. See—I’m not window-shaped. I’m round. And that’s the problem with circles. There is always room in the middle to add something.

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For Such a Time

Sometimes God’s gifts involve having the right people in the right places at the right times.

I just released my 37^th Christian cozy mystery-romance. It would have been impossible for me to write had I not been in the right place at the right time. Bandera, Texas, “Cowboy Capital of the World,” is home of my heart. I set my newest book, “Paid for Murder” at a Texas Hill Country Dude Ranch. The location is fiction, but the flood event at the start of the book is real, based on the historic Medina River Floods of 1978, and 2002. Even though Bandera is home, I have left it several times over the years—most recently now. I am currently living in Scotland. However, God took me back home for the floods that shaped the opening chapters of “Paid for Murder.”

Approximately 15 years ago while I was working at a Bandera newspaper I was sent to interview a Scottish minister who had exchanged pulpits with a Pipe Creek pastor. I rebelled against leaving the newspaper office to do the interview. We were on deadline and I needed to write up my notes from a city council meeting, a county commissioners’ meeting, and a school board meeting. I did not welcome another story to write for that week’s edition. However, the person assigned to interview the Scottish pastor didn’t show up at work that day. The minister was leaving to go back to Scotland. It was the last chance to get a picture of him and interview him. So stomping, spitting, and feeling sorry for my overworked self—I went. The pastor was Alan T McKean, my husband.

I am reminded of the book of Esther in the Bible. Esther was a poor Jewish girl who was in the right place at the right time to become queen. When a jealous rival of her uncle’s planned to kill not only Esther’s uncle, but also the Jewish people, her uncle asked Esther to intercede. He said to her, “Who knows whether you have come into the kingdom for such a time as this?”

There was a law that anyone approaching the king when he had not called for them would be killed. The king had not called for Esther. She said to her uncle, “I will go to the king which is against the law; and if I perish, I perish.”

So Esther bravely went before the king and he not only accepted her, he accepted her people and turned the evil maneuvering of the enemy against himself so that he fell into the trap he had set for Esther’s uncle and the Jewish people.

God gives gifts. Each day of life is a gift from God. He daily loads us with benefits. Sometimes, it is just being in the right place at the right time.

“To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven.” Ecclesiastes 3:1

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Building with Rocks

Approximately 200 years ago, rock masons tamed Dunoon, Scotland, corralling houses, streets, and green spaces behind unending lines of rock fences of various heights and shapes, from ornate curved with little houses attached to the back for coal storage to basic. The years have whisked by with changes to property ownership and streets. The rock fences have remained unchanged.

Sadly, no written record exists to tell the history of the rock fences or to name the rock masons who built such marvelous structures. I’ve searched. It would seem that the rock fences and their builders were deemed too common place and unappreciated to warrant mention. And, yet, year after year—the rock fences remain silently and steadfastly doing their job.

Some of us can relate to the rock fences. Years pass as we faithfully perform the charges that God has given us—often without recognition or reward. Should we ever feel unappreciated and undervalued, we should think of rock fences and the burdens they so faithfully carry with no accolade. Year after year they make the world around them a better place. They don’t get praise for their existence, but they would be missed if they were gone.

Even better, remember Jesus: “Who being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of man. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled Himself, and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.” Philippians 2:6

“Jesus was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death…that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone.” Hebrews 2:9

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Sounds of Joy

We have what is surely one of the most beautiful doorbells in the world. Which is a shame. Hardly anyone ever uses it.

For some reason, delivery people and friends tend to knock on our door rather than ringing the doorbell. Because of that, whenever the lovely musical chimes sound, my reaction is rather like “The Beverly Hillbillies” after they moved into their Hollywood mansion. When their doorbell rang, the entire family would wander around the mansion searching for the source of the sound. I find myself at first startled when our doorbell rings. Then I stand still to listen to the beautiful chimes in awe before finally dashing to the door to open it.

Perhaps I should organize a one-day neighborhood doorbell ringing event. Perhaps even a contest to see if our doorbell really is the most beautiful.

Regardless of how your doorbell sounds, or if you even have a doorbell, may 2003 ring sounds of joy into your life. May the Lord God who created the heavens and the earth sweep into your life with His gifts of love, joy, peace, and provision. In a world where there is no peace, may your life shine forth with a peace that outward circumstances cannot banish or steal. “Peace be within your walls…Peace be within you, because of the house of the LORD our God.” Psalm 122.