Author: claire

I awoke to news of yet another mass shooting.

Yet. Another.

And again with the title worst in recent history as if each mass shooting has to outdo the last.

Unlike the Boston Marathon bombing, I’m miles and time zones and and even basic interests away from Las Vegas and country music.

And yet.

My spirit is heavy and my heart is hurting and I cannot listen to the radio and I cannot turn on the TV and I desperately count down the minutes until I hear the pistons of the school bus make its stop at the end of my street because this morning my big girls bickered before 7am and left the house unhappy, and left me and John tired and annoyed and frustrated by yet another small fight before 7am.

I checked in with the handful of friends I know who may have been in or near the tragedy and all have been marked safe.

I scrolled through endless updates that sound so much like the endless updates of the last time this happened.

The last time this happened.

Because this is becoming normal in my adult life. News of mass shootings by crazy people who live in my country.

And I usually put politics and faith and feminism and money and all those other polarizing conversations on the back burner in light of the fact that I entertain a rather diverse set of friends and acquaintances.

So I’ve never hid the fact that I’m a Christian and when it comes up in conversation I’m not terrible at explaining to someone who cares, why I believe what I believe.

But I never write about it in my blog.

And I never post religiously themed Facebook updates.

I realize that the last several conversations I’ve had about church have largely included the fact that I’m up late, again, the night before I must be at church early for coffee duty, a neighborhood joke that somehow has not yet ceased to get old.

Or maybe it has.

But today I’m writing about something I never write about, and then I’m going to freak out for a few hours about hitting “publish” and then I’m probably going to put my computer all the way away and think about how my message is received and worry about the fact that I wrote it and how I said it and what everyone thinks.

Because.

I know I frequently project an attitude that I neither think about, nor care about what others think of me, but the truth is I’m exactly as human and exactly as female as the rest of them.

Here’s the thing.

Another crazy-psycho-evil-human went on a crazy-psycho-evil-rampage last night, and altered individual lives, as well as history, forever.

And though I have, so far, no direct connection to anyone affected, my day and my week have also been altered. Because I’m human. And I have a soul.

Many people today will soapbox gun reform.

Others will question the God I believe in, and why He allows bad things to happen to good people.

Many people will send “positive thoughts” out to the universe in a gesture of goodwill, positivity, and the message of love trumping hate.

And many people (some who have never claimed any sense of religious faith), will recirculate a message of prayer, for Vegas, for those affected, for those connected.

I do believe that love trumps hate.

I do believe in the power of prayer.

I do believe in an all-powerful and holy and good God who does not cause these things to happen, nor is He ambivalently looking down on his creation when they do happen, and doing nothing.

But here’s the rest of my sense of truth, and the part I’m always most afraid to talk about and write about. The part where half of my friends on Facebook stop reading. The part where many people who thought they knew me maybe get annoyed.

I also believe there is evil in the world and for me, it’s name is Satan. And bad things happen to good people because (I believe) Satan is alive and well on this planet we call Earth.

And, I’m sorry, but I believe there is no amount of positive thinking that is going to stop Satan.

Many people seek truth in times of tragedy and all too often, I shy away from dropping my truth bombs, because they are extreme, they are most definitely exclusive, and I don’t want to be lumped into the group of Christians that everyone loves to hate.

When it comes to good and evil, I believe in exactly two sides, and only two sides. I do not believe in a safe neutral middle ground.

If you are feeling hopeless, as is becoming all too common of a national sentiment these days, I actually believe there is Hope.

If you are wondering what will fix this shit planet we’re all trying to share, I believe the solution is already available.

If you ask me to pray for you, I hope you are ready for a miracle. Because what most of you don’t know is that when I pray, I actually believe that miracles will happen. And then, often, they do. And they don’t usually look like the thing all of us humans were looking for.

Call me a freak, but whether you subscribe to my faith or not, if you really looked inside yourself, I know you cannot deny that there is a spiritual something that is part of you. Maybe it is a part of you that you’ve been missing for a while. Maybe it is part of you that seems at odds with every other part of you. Maybe it is just a compulsion to do good when the world seems to keep overflowing with evil.

Because. We are souls. We are not bodies. We are souls.

And I believe we were created for an intimate connection with our Creator.

I have an intimate connection with my Creator. It doesn’t mean my life is perfect, and it doesn’t mean I am fearless, and you know it certainly doesn’t mean I am sinless.

But I’m not also not going to concede that the answer for evil is a general sense of good.

I really do believe there is only One answer.

You are allowed to disagree with me, and weirdly, hah, I can still be friends with you. I merely hope this doesn’t put us at awkward odds.

And now I’m going to kiss my kids. And I’m going to kiss my husband. And I’m going to do good because it feels good and it is the right thing to do.

But I’m also going to pray in such a way and on a level that many people never seek.

And I’m going to expect miracles.

This post may contain affiliate links. Read my full disclosure here.

Anyone else glued to the Hurricane Harvey coverage?

Despite my current love affair with North Carolina, Texas still holds a pretty big chunk of my history and therefore my heart. I have a lot of friends and family in Houston.

12 years ago today I got married in Salado, TX.

12 years ago yesterday, very dear friends from Baylor got married in Houston, TX, and I was in their wedding. One of those things where promises were made and non-refundable plane tickets purchased long before John and I decided to get married and realize we had a very narrow window in which to make it happen if we wanted both of our brothers to be there.

Of course there was also that whole four-week engagement thing. Whatever.
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You might also remember that 12 years ago tomorrow, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast, and everyone was evacuated to Houston.

And I was there. Married for 24 hours, flying home to start work on a Thursday, and not a damn hotel in sight.

So many things make my wedding memorable.

Fast forward to a few years ago when I read Five Days at Memorial and Zeitoun and got a glimpse of Katrina that I had previously somehow missed.

So now, I am glued to this Hurricane Harvey coverage. And you guys, it is bananas.

I checked in on that friend, Nesi, last night, to wish her a happy anniversary and to make sure she’s still alive. In her words, “In typical mom fail mode,” she and her husband Greg left for an anniversary trip to Las Vegas last Thursday. She left her three kids home with a babysitter and plenty of family nearby. You know, when this whole thing was just a storm.

We are watching story after story of people trying to leave. And here’s my friend Nesi, trying to get back in. She said that on Saturday night, her nine year old had been repeatedly calling from the downstairs bathroom slash tornado shelter.

*I really need this to turn out okay, because she sent me this picture earlier this morning and it is cracking me up. Only Nesi, in a state of emergency the size of Texas.*

The nineteen year old nursing student babysitter was apparently holding it together like a champion. (Get this girl in an ER, quick.) Nesi’s mom, mother-in-law, and sister-in-law all live within a mile of her house and had been assuring her that everyone was okay.

“That’s fine and all but I needed to put my eyeballs on them.”

Naturally.

Every flight into Houston was canceled. She and Greg were finally able to get a flight into Dallas, where they rented a car. A total of 13 hours later they arrived to this:

Unlike the rest of the entire female gender (especially those of us with kids), Nesi isn’t much of a crier. She said when they touched down in Dallas the tears flowed. I said from the comfort of my dry couch: “I’m not even there and I’m crying while you type.”

I hope they went ahead and bought the insurance on the rental car. Nesi said they drove as close as they could get and then she got out and ran through the yards.

For now she says her house is dry, they still have power, and of course, they are all together. Not a lot more romantic than sleeping six people and one toilet to a makeshift tornado shelter.

North Carolina started back to school today. There is an unseasonable chill in the air for an August morning and my girls ran back inside to grab sweatshirts before catching the bus. My biggest worry of the day included the erroneous bus number and the fact that it was completely on time for the first day of school.

As it pulled away I suddenly thought, “I hope that wasn’t the middle school bus.”

But my house isn’t under water and I have a pretty good idea of where all my kids are.

It is the 12 year anniversary of a week that changed many people’s lives forever. Next year, the fourth largest city in the US will have the date etched in their hearts as well. It is probably metaphorically fitting that this day in my history has been made famous for hurricanes.

A dozen years and only about a dozen gray hairs. Thanking God for some very little things right now.

Praying for Houston.

This post may contain affiliate links. Read my full disclosure here.

I successfully ignored the hype. I even announced that I was ignoring the hype. Everyone in Winston-Salem was looking, lining up for, and buying the glasses for $20 a pair, and after hearing about how kids and dogs alike were all going to go blind, I kind of figured we’d just pretend like it wasn’t happening and watch it on TV.

Right?

Then I saw that if you are in the Path of Totality, you can view it with the naked eye for the few minutes that the sun is totally covered.

And my parents live directly in the Path of Totality, on Watts Bar Lake, in Rockwood, TN. And my mom had 5 pairs of glasses and always has food and beer.

Sold.
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We woke up Saturday morning, threw a load of laundry in the machine, and were on the road by noon, arriving possibly in better time than when we drive over for holiday weekends.

And now, Eclipse 2017 is officially over, and my Facebook Live inexperience meant I got to semi-experience it without technology and semi-screw up the permanent memory making. But whatever. That was officially the coolest moment of nature I’ve ever experienced. Listen, I’m not saying that this 2 minutes and 39 seconds trumped all other life experience.

But it was pretty freaking cool.

I sort of hate that technology and social media requires us to document everything through our phones.

But I also sort of love it.

I’m throwing this blog post together really quickly because I’m still moderately on a high from the experience. If you caught my very short first-ever Facebook Live experiment, you can see that we are all kind of geeking out over here. This isn’t even Eclipse induced. Just normal geeking out. What follows is a piece-meal conglomeration of what we were able to capture.

I’m embarrassed, a little, because I hate my voice on camera. But I kind of want my kids to have this forever.

Because like I said, it was pretty freaking cool.

And weird, scary, amazing, exhilarating, adrenaline-rushing, laugh-inducing, awe-inspiring…all of those -ings that every single one of the million people who drove to the Path of Totality can attest to.

It turns out, Eclipse 2017 was not over-hyped. It was exactly that cool.

So when you look through the shades, you can’t see anything at all. The sun itself looks like a glowing orb in the distance. Jury is still out as to whether ours are going to cause permanent eye-damage or not.

Then I found this little gem of a good advice on the Facebook this morning, when I was actually searching the time I needed to go outside. Thank you Facebook. Because this was exactly as fun as I make it look.

Though Avery slept through it (and wouldn’t remember it anyway), I’m pretty sure Eliott was planning to experience total darkness on this Huck Finn raft. Unfortunately I was way too worried about their ripe little retinas to let them out of my grasp long enough to get back on their raft.

And finally, what follows are the ridiculous and terrible videos we attempted. I apologize in advance. I know. And if you hate my voice on camera as much as I hate my voice on camera, just skip these. Hindsight, of course, I would not have attempted to actually film the eclipse itself but focused on all of us losing our minds.

I’m actually still giggling because I just can’t even describe it. It was so weird and indescribable. I don’t know. I’m sorry. I’ll stop. Watch or don’t watch. Just please save your criticism for the idiocy of it all. I felt like a little kid and kept forgetting I had to still be a mother to all my kids who, at any moment, might stop and stare directly at the sun.

Like I said. Geeking out.

And still am.

Here, first, is one of Eliott’s videos, covering the twilight stage and also providing commentary.

Then, it all hit at once, and here is Eliott’s unattended camera capturing our first reactions to the total darkness. (What you can’t hear are cheers from around the lake, and the freak-outs of my other two kids and parents a little closer to the house.)

The next two videos are from my phone. It is split into two because as soon as the sun peaked back out I panicked, thinking Carter and Isaiah would both still be staring at the sun and in my haste to be a mom for a minute I accidentally turned the camera off. The time lapse is a fraction of a second, but sadly it serves to break up the best part of the experience, which was the rapid onset of darkness and the rapid reset of light. Also, I didn’t even mention the temperature drop, which was equally dramatic.

Eerie.

Anyway.

Otherwise, that was it.

Roughly four minutes of my life that blew my mind. I didn’t have a profound spiritual awakening, but I was on the verge of tears when it was all over. My heart was racing for about an hour after all of it, and it was hard to shake the overwhelming awe it kind of filled me with.

I asked Eliott, a few hours later, how she wants to remember this. First she said, “It was like night in the middle of the day. It was so weird and cool.” Then I said, “Yes, but, how did it make you feel?”

She had to stop and think about this.

Then she said, “It just went by too fast. I was just freaking out and going crazy. And like, there was so much I wanted to do during the darkness. I wish it would have lasted longer. I wish I could have filled it with a bunch of stuff because it was like night during the day. But that’s how it is. All the best things in life go by super fast and all the worst things take forever.”

So much truth.

Sorry for the raw writing. I typically do a lot more editing and often think through how I want to say things for a bit longer, but I kind of wanted this post to just reflect the immediacy of the moment and its aftermath.

I realize that my rendition will never truly do the experience justice, but I’m glad I didn’t save this one for TV.

*If you noted the lack of outfit changes over the course of about 48 hours, I told you this was very last minute. I didn’t grab a lot of extra clothing.

This post may contain affiliate links. Read my full disclosure here.

Happy Birthday to Me! (You know I’m not above celebrating myself.)

You know I’m also not above going out of my way to get something free.

Whatever.

You’ve probably seen lists of all the places that offer something free on your birthday. The problem I’ve run into with the “Birthday Freebie” Google search, is that many lists are out of date, and often include tons of places I don’t even have in my town. Or worse, these lists include tons of “freebies” that aren’t fully free, aren’t worth the hassle, or aren’t even good, like an appetizer at a restaurant I don’t even like.

So today, for my birthday, I’m sharing only my favorite birthday freebies. These are the ones that are good or simply convenient enough, to take the trouble to make happen.

One piece of advice I wish I would have given myself before sitting down and signing up for any/all of these is this: If I’d have really thought it through, I would have told each of these places that my birthday was the 15th of all the different months, and spread out the free birthday love over a year.
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I know.

I know.

You have to be able to live with that. And when I hit the month of August, which is notoriously busy with back-to-school everything, not to mention that I still have all four kids at home all day, I would have been absolutely able to live with the little white lie of changing the month of my birthday to avoid the pressure of all those ridiculous expiration dates. (I would say you are also completely justified if your birthday falls in the month of December. You have already gotten the Christmas/Birthday shaft, why not accept some half-birthday attention in June?)

As it is, according to Starbucks my birthday is actually in September, because, Pumpkin Spice, duh. This is the only one I actually thought about.

Listen. Do whatever you want. Just note, none of these places actually check your ID, because what kind of a human lies about his birthday in the absence of alcohol, amiright? You have been warned.

Birthday Freebies in Your Email

*The following freebies will come as a coupon to your email. One downside is that you also start getting a whole bunch of spam email from the same companies throughout the rest of the year. Use your college hotmail address to sign up and then just remember to check it during the month of your said-birthday.

1. Biscuitville Club: free biscuit on your birthday. Any biscuit so go ahead and get the bacon. Expires end of same month.

2. Baskin Robbins: free scoop of ice cream or soft serve and 15% off an ice-cream cake. Send your husband through Peter’s Creek Parkway on his way home from work. Expires 5 days after birthday.

3. Sephora: free cosmetic/product gift during the month of your birthday. Often 2 or 3 different options to choose from. Redeem online or in store by providing your email address. Expires at end of birthday month. *Note: I love this freebie and always redeem in store. They wrap it up really nice and in my experience, have been very chill about the expiration date.

Birthday Freebies For Smartphone Only

*For the following freebies, you must download the company app on your smartphone and keep it current by using it at least once a year.

4. Starbucks: free drink or food of your choice plus 15% off of Starbucks dot com. Any drink or any food, so go ahead and get a triple shot Venti and also go ahead and say your birthday is in whatever month your favorites are featured. I’ve recently switched from the PSL to the Gingerbread when it comes to favorites, so my “September” birthday isn’t even late enough. Expires 2 days after your birthday.

5. Dunkin Donuts: free drink. Any drink. 3 month expiration.

6. Krispy Kreme: free donut of your choice and free small Krispy Kreme coffee. 30 day expiration. Krispy Kreme actually gives away free donuts all the time. Join their email list to be alerted.

7. Moe’s: free burrito for your birthday. This one has actually entered my “not worth the hassle” list because Thruway is a pain. But maybe you love Moe’s. Expires in 2 weeks.

Other Birthday Freebies

*This is the final list of freebies I receive that are not exclusive to email or app. 

8. Panera Bread: free pastry. Become a member of the MyPanera Rewards program. 2 month expiration.

9. Kohl’s: $5 YesToYou Reward and $10 YesToYou Reward. These came separately to my email on the same day, and can be used together for a total of $15. I have a Kohl’s charge card (which I use regularly) and I have the Kohl’s app on my phone. Not sure which is tied to which, but both may have to do with the fact that I am a Kohl’s MVC.