A Bear and His Boy February 12, 2009

Today, my son’s heart was broken for the third time in less than a year’s span.  In May, his Grandma Rhonda died suddenly.  In June, he lost a papa he thought he could count on forever (see earlier posts for details).  Tomorrow, he will lose his best friend, his confidant, his companion in life – his cat Bear. 

We will make the usually short but painfully long trip in the morning to say goodbye.  Bear is at the vet right now, waiting to be put to sleep.  He has kidney disease, and with his age (over 12 years), the deterioration of his kidneys and his extreme weight loss and dehydration, there’s really nothing we can do that will guarantee survival.  He had lost weight quite quickly about a month or so ago, and Jeremy kept saying it was the new cat food he didn’t like.  So, I finally gave in and bought different cat food, and he seemed to perk up a bit.  His hair looked a little better, he started gaining weight back very slowly over the next week or so.

Last night, I noticed his upper lip was swollen and he had drainage under his bottom lip.  I looked inside, and it looked like he had four absessed teeth.  “That’s why he’s losing weight!  He can’t eat!”, I told everyone.  But a little bit later, I thought to myself “Four teeth at once?  That seems pretty unlikely.  I think there’s something else wrong.”  Yep.  Kidney disease.  The absessed teeth were actually ulcers, due to high elevation of white blood cells.  He looked horrible.

I watched in helplessness as Jonathan cried himself to sleep tonight.  I also cried – obviously I will miss Bear terribly.  But the real source of my tears was the pain I could feel in my gut as I stroked Jonathan’s head, lacking the words to make it all better.  I know how it feels to lose a beloved pet, as all of you do too.  It will cut to the quick for quite a while afterward.  As Jonathan sleeps by himself for the first time in years, my heart hurts for him and the mother in me wishes for the magic cure for heartbreak and loss, disappointment and tears.

Copied from GlennBeck.com December 8, 2008

Once upon a time there was a very happy couple. Their names were freedom and capitalism. They married and had many wonderful children. Their names were independence, self-worth, hard work, dignity, charity, faith and hope. They all lived happily for many years and the children respected their parents and loved them both very much.

But freedom and capitalism later had several naughty children, very naughty. They weren’t so respectful and never appreciated their parents. Their names were wealth envy, environmentalism, animal rights activism, racism, feminism, ultra liberalism. These evil children blamed their parents for everything and hated their parents’ freedom and capitalism. In fact, these unappreciative children began to hate their parents since they didn’t realize their parents gave them everything they had and didn’t realize that they wouldn’t even exist without their parents. They hated their parents so much, they began to plot with their neighbors to kill their parents and to keep their home.

Their neighbors’ names were socialism and communism who on the outside were a very lovely couple but inside they were very, very ugly. They and their children, whose names were despair, poverty, suffering, and repression had been welcomed into every neighborhood they had lived in. But then thrown out after years of suffering and the loss of many lives. So late one night in total darkness because socialism and communism did everything in darkness and the way from the light of the truth, while everyone was asleep, wealth envy, environmentalism, feminism, animal rights, by their younger obnoxious brother, Hollywood, disguised by socialism and communism and let them into the house, freedom and capitalism. It wasn’t hard, for the two parents, freedom and capitalism, always left their gates and their door open for everyone.

Wealth led the way because he knew the house oh, so well. The evil children led socialism and communism throughout the house, one room at a time. And one at a time they killed hard work, then dignity, then independence, self-worth, charity and faith. They finally found the room of freedom and capitalism and killed them as well. It wasn’t hard to do, since freedom and capitalism always left their door unlocked and open for everyone. Only hope survived. Hope survived hiding in the closet. She ran out during the ensuing celebration.

After socialism and communism moved in, things went well for a while but then they decided they didn’t like freedom and capitalism’s evil children, either. They wanted their own children to have the rooms in their new house. So late one night in total darkness because socialism and communism did everything in darkness and away from the light of the truth, they sent their children to kill freedom and capitalism’s remaining evil children. Poverty and suffering killed environmentalism and animal rights first, for they were so hungry, they had to kill all the animals for food and the trees for their wood. And besides, why should animals have rights if people don’t? Hopelessness killed liberalism, the retarded brother of communism. Then poverty, suffering, and repression killed feminism. The retarded sister of liberalism. And Hollywood, the young obnoxious son of freedom and capitalism, was also killed. Finally, wealth envy, who led the attack on his parents, died at the hands of poverty since there was nothing left to envy.

So socialism and communism and their children, poverty, despair, hopelessness, suffering, repression lived in the once beautiful home of freedom and capitalism which was now in great disrepair and they all lived sadly ever after. All that was left of the family of freedom and capitalism was hope who was quietly hiding in the woods.

-Dr. John Rossi

My response to Eugene Cho’s prop 8 topic…see Beauty and Depravity on right November 25, 2008

Michelle Says:
Tuesday, November 25, 2008 at

Here’s my thoughts – as scattered and quick as they might be at the moment.

Changing the definition of ‘marriage’ would be like changing the definition of ‘cow’. Calling a cow a horse doesn’t make it a horse…calling a marriage that is not created by God doesn’t make it a marriage, either. BUT, neither does calling a marriage that is flooded in pornography, adultery, hate, spite, anger, agendas and sin. I don’t know if this makes sense or not, but I don’t really think it matters if Gay Marriage is legalized or not.

Because it’s legal under our judicial system does not make it okay under God. Why don’t we hunt down premarital sex, shacking up, multiple marriages and divorces and teenage pregnancy with the same venengance? What about excessive alcohol consumption, beating our wife in our living rooms, using our children as pawns in our game of life instead of human beings due the same respect as adults? Because those are such commonplace sins that bringing attention to those would bring attention to our own little ‘hidden’ sins we commit behind our personal closet doors. The sins no one knows about. The hateful thoughts we harbor, the way we eat our chocolate only after the kids go to bed, the purchase of shoes and purses that we hide from our husbands, the internet sites we visit, making sure we clear the history so no one knows where we’ve been.

My point is, it really doesn’t matter. Sin is sin is sin, and until the return of Christ, every single one of us is due for redemption – gay or straight.

Such a beautiful morning November 3, 2008

I went into Caedmon’s room early this morning to borrow her comb and spray bottle. She was sleeping, and my attempts at being quiet of course made more noise than necessary. She awoke, but the most amazing thing happened. Not only did she wake up, but when I looked at her, she had a giant smile on her beautiful face. It was a smile that lit up her eyes and lifted my spirit. There was no apparent reason for her joyful countenance, but it touched my heart in a way I haven’t felt in a while. Immediately, her pearly white beam said to me, “Another day! How exciting! I can’t wait!”.

I don’t know about you, but I can assume the vast majority of us do not start our days with that kind of enthusiasm! For the past few months, not only have I not looked forward to the start of a new day, but I have dreaded each start, afraid to feel only anxiety and loss and sadness. I have very reluctantly dragged my broken spirit through every roller coaster of a day; either not feeling at all, or feeling so much I can’t concentrate or even breathe; fighting every invasive thought that enters my confused and angry mind.

Many years ago, long before it had a name, I began ‘cutting’ myself. I would carve tiny incisions into my wrist, just to feel something – to let myself know I wasn’t completely dead inside. For a few days this past month, I wanted so badly to cut myself again, this time engraving words of hate and anger and disgust. Loathe. Hate. Sick. Fear. Hell. Gone. Void. Dead. Fall. Fail. I could envision myself doing it. I contemplated how to go about hiding it from my husband. I imagined what a release it would be to experience the knife in my skin again, shredding away the unwelcome thoughts that trespassed.

A friend of mine reminded me that lamentation is one of many parts of worship. Another friend brought me back to Job, showing me where Job’s relationship with God was purely hearsay before God allowed Satan to destroy everything that was his life, less his beating heart. Job did not truly appreciate the awesomeness of God before he suffered through every adversity imaginable. He learned through writhing pain that because it was from God, it was good and flowing with purpose.

I am struggling without Rhonda. I miss her so much, I think I actually feel my heart ache. Jeremy and I felt so abandoned when we couldn’t be a part of her funeral. Now, it seems Papa Boyd is doing all he knows how to include us. Because of this, we are spending quite a bit of time with him. Wonderful? Yes. Without pain and agony? No. But, we are so grateful for the time he is giving us. Life is just different without Rhonda – she was such a moving force in our lives.

This summer, my family and I have undergone some fairly intense crap. My mother-in-law’s husband of 10+ years somehow decided he was going to come to my house to sleep with me. Ewww. We then found out he had actually invited me via note (which I did not read) to come to his house while Barbara was out of town, and had been planning his visit to my house for quite some time. Needless to say, my kids were crushed, as they loved their papa. That has been the most painful part of this entire drama. That he would do something so stupid, only to risk his relationship with his grandkids he adored? My mother-in-law left him, and is now divorcing him. He is no longer part of our lives, as Jeremy put a stop to that as soon as I told him what happened. Unfortunately, just because he’s not a physical presence, he is the elephant in the room. The kids don’t know exactly what happened, only that it was wrong and we are protecting them. I can still feel him kissing me, touching my shoulder, hugging me, stroking my face…yuck, yuck, yuck.

Life is full of pain. Full of heartache. Full of problems. Trouble. Affliction. Irritation. Torture. Agony. Sin. Only through all of this do we see the beauty of what Christ did for us on the cross of Calvary. The magnificence of His sacrifice on behalf of His creation who sinned against Him. The brilliance of God’s plan to save our souls through Love, not law. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians how important suffering is to our relationship with Christ. Because we suffer, we understand Christ’s suffering. Because we fall, we appreciate the blood that flowed from His sinless veins. Because we hurt, we reach out to those who are hurting, expressing Christ’s love for them through His death. And, as I am going to get tattooed on my hand as a constant reminder, it is the ‘but nots’ of life that give us hope in Jesus :

2 Corinthians 4:8-10

We are hard pressed on every side, BUT NOT crushed;

perplexed, BUT NOT in despair; persecuted, BUT NOT abandoned;

struck down, BUT NOT destroyed.

We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus,

so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.

Nobama…McCanHe? September 9, 2008

My son came home yesterday, ranting and raving about Obama.  Yes, you read me right.  A 10 year-old 5th grader was spewing political jargon all over my kitchen floor.   When asked how his day was, this was his response:  “Awesome!  We get to vote for the presidential election, and everyone is against Obama!”  He then goes on to mimic the many rumors that have surfaced about Obama, specifically the one where Obama ‘refused to say the Pledge of Allegiance.”

Oh, my gosh, did I come unglued.  Not so much outside of my body as inside my head, but unglued I was.  I told him those are only rumors, he shouldn’t believe everything he hears, we shouldn’t be voting against someone, but for someone…blah, blah, blah.

Then it hit me.  Hard.  We’re talking running-full-force-into-a-screen-door hard.  Of course Jonathan is thrilled ‘everyone’s against Obama’!  I tote around my NOBAMA opinion as though he has no opponent!  Just NO to Obama…that’s all I’ve got!   I disagree with his stance on abortion, energy relief and socialist-like economics.   I know 144 days in the senate doesn’t give him near enough know-how to run our country.

But what about McCanhe?  McCain?  Can he? Run our country, that is?  I must say, before Palin came along, I had my serious doubts.  My future vote for McCain was a vote against Obama.  The lesser of two evils.  (Not that I think either of them are evil, mind you).  The best of the worst.  Pretty much, the only vote that might count, being that writing in someone is essentially a wasted ballot.

Now, I’ve been paying more attention to what McCain stands for, what he believes and what he can do for OUR country.  The country he fought for.  The men and women he served.  The country he stayed true to, through beatings and torture and near-starvation.  He believes in the this country.  He believes in us.  He trusts us with our own decisions.  He wants to keep the power here in the United States, instead of creating some sort of Global Alliance, making us equal and dependent to Europe and China.  He wants to use our own energy sources – and now!  Not 10-20 years from now, after we figure out we can’t power our cars on extension cords and corn for any substantial amount of time.

And Palin?  She’s just flat out true to God, her country, her family and herself.  She doesn’t take crap from anyone, and she’s willing to fight for a worthy cause.  She’s not about talking, she likes to walk – power walk.  Effective and active management is what she’s given Alaska, and I believe if need be, she can give it to America as well.  Will it be easy?  Of course not.  Will she mess up?  Of course she will.  Is she ready?  Doubtful.   Were you ready to be a mom?  A wife?  A husband?  Were you ready to support your family through rising energy and grocery and insurance costs?  Were you ready to take on a small business and allow it to grow, through thick and thin, and make it a success?  Were you ready when your child, parent or friend died unexpectedly?  You weren’t even ready when you had warning!  Are we ready for anything?  Of course not, because we do not have the power to be ready.  We can only be.  As much as we like to believe we have control of our future, we don’t even know if we will breathe another breath in this heartbeat.

So, McCain/Palin, I’m voting for you.  Not because I don’t want to vote for Obama, but because I believe in what you stand for, and I admire the guts and determination that go along with your values.

And Jonathan, you and I are going to talk politics tonight…real, true honest politics – no rhetoric, no partisanship, no bull.  We need to discuss what’s important to our family, our country and eventually, every individual we have the opportunity to interact with.

Red State Update – Sarah Palin August 30, 2008

Is my life so lackluster that I almost peed my pants laughing? August 17, 2008

Spiderman vs The Thug July 10, 2008

Lack of service makes customer go crazy July 5, 2008

K, so last summer, I got into this altercation with a store manager. There was swearing, yelling, threatening and all sorts of stuff I am not proud of. I had bought Jonathan a pair of Crocs, and his first walk across a parking lot, the strap broke off. So, we eat our dinner, then go back to the store to return them. Store’s closed. We are back in town Sunday, store’s closed. I wasn’t planning another trip to town soon, so I ordered a pair online. They arrived at my doorstep before I even went to town again.

My next trip in, I take the shoes and the receipt in to return them. Turns out, he had replacement little doohickeys, and could fix the strap. Well, that’s nice and all, but I had already bought another pair. Thus, the story ensues…he refused for about 20 minutes to refund my money, going so far as to tell me that ‘he is the return policy’, when I asked to see a copy of one.  Total jerk, and I was a complete bitch.  I’ve never made a scene (in public) before, and I felt so righteous in my argument with him.  Alas, when I came home to tell Jeremy ‘you will not believe what happened to me today!’, he was less than enthused.  He kicked me off my high horse, and told me I should have never done that – not as a person who professes Jesus Christ to be her freedom from such pettiness.  Hence, the letter to the editor…

From:

Wyoming Tribune-Eagle

Date:

August 26, 2007

Michelle Mechels

Burns

There we were, facing off over the counter, shoes surrounding us, people beginning to hear the argument. He, a not-so-kindly business owner. Me, a chick with a chip on her shoulder. The situation? A pair of broken shoes and the need for vengeance.

Lately, my most consuming pet peeve is lack of customer service. Go even further, and it seems a lot of stores have a complete disregard for the customer’s needs. (Say, for instance, the need for a pair of shoes to take you across a parking lot while staying intact.)

The shoes really have very little to do with this letter. As I was saying, it’s lack of customer service.

I have stopped shopping at a large discount store since the end of spring. Such a huge waste: All of that space, and yet no room to keep their shelves stocked.

My very favorite? Going through a drive-thru, only to find the entire restaurant is being run by 12-year-olds.

To add insult to injury, these adolescents have never experienced drinking with a straw or using a napkin. I assume that since they hand you a cup with a hole in the lid but no way to extract the liquid and pass you greasy fries without a method of clean up.

Back to my shoe guy. He didn’t want to give me my money back due to the fact the shoes had been worn, and, consequently, he had been able to fix them.

I had already bought a different pair online and thought it quite ridiculous to expect anything other than a working shoe while walking.

Long story short, he was rude, and I wasn’t happy. He had no business talking to a customer the way he did, and I had no ground to speak to him, even yelling at him, in the manner I purported.

I took all of my past year’s frustration out on this poor man-child of a business owner who was just trying to keep a profit in his pocket. And for that, sir, I am very ashamed and sorry.

untitled June 24, 2008

careless. useless. hopeless. defenseless. selfish.

tormented. degraded. humiliated. embarrassed. lonely. sad. forgotten.                                        no boundaries.                sleepless. lost. disgusted.

sick. forlorn.                                        desolate.repulsive.              absorbed. confused. pointless.

disregarded.       depressed.                 pathetic.

wondering.

worried.                               woe.