helicopters and babies...

My family loves talking about my trip to Johns Hopkins hospital in a helicopter because we love to rag on my dad for running out of film before I got to the helicopter. Evidently he took a few too many pictures of my mom crying as she said goodbye to me. For some reason I don't remember hearing the story leading up to the helicopter until this week. 

I was born at 1:03 a.m. and my mom said they whisked me away because I was having trouble breathing. Here's the first shocker of the story... my dad left and went home. He claims they told him I just needed some oxygen and I'd be alright, but I'm having a hard time imagining I would ever allow my husband to leave me under normal circumstances let alone if my baby isn't breathing normally. 

Meanwhile my mom was moved into a room by herself which she interpreted as her baby was going to die. She assumed they didn't want her around other new moms when it happened. Evidently a baby died at the hospital the week before and my mom had read about it and then overheard nurses talking about it after I was born. A series of coincidences combined with my lack of normal breathing had her freaking out to say the least. By 7 a.m. when the nurses changed shifts, the new nurse realized my mom hadn't had a chance to hold me and went to get me, but my mom said my chest was rising and falling so heavily that they had to take me back for oxygen pretty quickly. After my doctor arrived they decided I needed to go to Johns Hopkins... in a helicopter... without my mom. Cue photos of my hysterical mom. (I am feeling kind and decided to leave them off the world wide web.)

I've obviously never had a baby, so I can't even pretend to imagine what my mom was going through. To give birth for the first time and not know if your baby is going to live is terrifying to say the least. Usually my family hears the helicopter story and we laugh it off, because despite a slight heart murmur I am healthy and never displayed any signs of what must have been some crazy first hours of life. 

Most of the time the helicopter story is just another silly thing my dad did (or didn't do), but the other night I heard the fear in my mom's voice and saw the anxiety in my dad's eyes. Looking back, most moms would kill for a private room or a chance to give her kid a helicopter ride, but to my mom they were my death sentence. 

There's no point in getting stuck in the past reliving those moments and I'm so thankful my mom didn't let those first scary moments rule her life as a mother and keep me in a glass cage. And while I don't want to be super dramatic, I also don't want to take those moments for granted. I don't know that I was really "near death" but I think my mom would say I was close enough... Our life is such a series of events that could have gone another way but they didn't. Let's be grateful for today.

happily ever after...

I read Karen Kingsbury's newest book today, "The Chance." I've read all of her books and continue to be captivated by her stories... scooped up and drawn into the characters' lives. Sometimes I've wondered whether the stories are too perfect. Don't get me wrong, there's heartache... tears, dying, tragedies... but it always seems like there's a "happily ever after" ending. I'm guessing that's probably a requirement in Christian fiction test polls, but I'm not sure how much of it is real life. Or maybe it's just not wrapped into neatly packaged stories. Our happily ever afters don't always come when we want them.

*SPOILER ALERT* Stop here if you're a die hard Kingsbury reader who hasn't read the book yet... I might give away too much... even if I think you could guess the ending. 

I don't want to give away all the sappy details... because I think the story is worth reading, (obviously if I read all 320 pages in a few hours today) but the story centers around a girl... Ellie. It begins when she's 15 and being whisked away from everything she knows including her best friend, a guy who says he's going to marry her when they grow up. They bury some letters and agree to meet back in 11 years to dig them up just in case they lose touch. Things don't go exactly according to plan, but nevertheless, the guy never stops searching for her and they eventually reunite 11 years later. 

I have dated my fair share of guys and for one reason or another, the relationships haven't worked out. Sometimes we tried again... and again. Sometimes I couldn't run far enough away and sometimes I kept hoping we could give it another try. Occasionally you find one you would wait 11 years for... and sometimes God answers the prayer like Kingsbury's book and there's a happily ever after reunion. But sometimes, God answers the prayer another way... with a different kind of happily ever after. 

I didn't get my happily ever after today, but I feel like I got my answer to a six year prayer. I don't know what my "happily ever after" will look like, but tonight I'm thankful for answers. I am thankful God knows better than I do and I'm thankful for stories that bring hope in the waiting. 

preserving memories...

After college I started journaling pretty regularly. I scribbled randomly during college and have notes from the summer before college, but that's the extent of what I can find pre-college graduation. I remember having diaries when I was a kid, daydreaming about the newest boy I thought was cute, but I'm guessing someone eventually convinced me to chuck them... normally I'm a bit of a pack rat. 

Journaling can be helpful in the moment, because it allows you to express yourself. I started blogging on myspace (shout out to myspace!) in 2005 and eventually transitioned over to blogspot. Sometimes (okay usually) my blog turns into a journal and I pretend I don't have any readers. I know blogging and journaling have been crucial for me to work through things rolling around in my head. 

Not only is it helpful in the moment, I also think journaling is helpful looking back. I love reading journals or blogs from this day five years ago or 10 years ago. I love seeing how far I've come. I love reading about a time when I felt like things were crashing in around me and being able to see how God led me out of it. I love reading about a really good day and having those feelings imprinted on my heart over and over again. 

I'm a little bummed at myself for not capturing high school and college better. I spent six years working at my collegiate alma mater and relived a lot of those memories every day, but I just don't want to forget. Every time someone's collegiate athletic career ends, I think back to my own. I played my last college soccer game November 8, 2002. I actually try to block that game out. We lost in the conference tournament semifinals 3-0 to Greensboro on CNU's field. A combination of bad memories all around. When I think about my last game, I prefer to remember my senior day. We won 2-1 and I assisted the game-winning goal in the last 10 minutes. Of course a couple of my teammates got me a copy of the game (VHS baby!) and my performance was not as glorious as I prefer to remember it. 

I always want to remember the end. I want to remember what it felt like to be a college athlete. I will always be grateful for my coach for giving me a chance to play even when he drove me crazy. I will always be grateful for my teammates... for putting up with me and making me better. 

I wish I had written something that night... November 8... to capture what I was feeling. Being a college athlete doesn't last forever. Every time someone else's career ends, I try to remember what it felt like. I remember no one wanting to stay in Newport News another second and I remember a pretty miserable ride back to Fayetteville. I also remember spending that entire year thinking about the "lasts." I was the only senior on the roster that year, although my teammate Courtney ended up finishing early too, but I felt like no one was as concerned about the season as I was. Until you're a senior, you always know you have another game, another season, another chance. I always think if I could find a way to bottle up a player's commitment and perspective as a senior and sell it to freshmen, I'd be successful. 

How do you convince freshmen it doesn't last forever? How do you convince players to exhaust every option, to work out above and beyond, to do more than expected when they think it will last forever? 

It doesn't last forever, but I'll be forever grateful for the time it lasted. 

a few of my favorite things...

Rather than blowing up facebook or twitter with a ton of links I decided to put them all in one place... here are some things I'm loving this week in no particular order...

1. Rachael Lampa's first Stairwell Session... cool concept... even cooler cover

2. From the Plain Dealer... Love game: Toledo's Ben Pike ends football career to assist ill fiancee

3. Kelli Higgins' "newborn" photography... I have a heart for adoption and some of my favorite people are adopted. It warms my heart to see this adopted mom share a "newborn" experience with her adopted 13-year-old.

From yahoo.com "Three years ago, Kelli Higgins of Crestview, Florida, had five biological children at home and was pregnant with a sixth. She and her husband then adopted two siblings, 5-year-old Chanya and 10-year-old Latrell. Last month, while the family sat around the dinner table, Higgins, a photographer, told the kids that she would be doing a newborn photo session. Latrell, who spent much of his youth in foster care, mentioned to his mother that he didn't have any baby photos of himself. That gave his 12-year-old sister Alycia an idea: Their mom should take "newborn" pictures of Latrell now, at age 13!"

Check out the photos HERE!

4. Prinstant Replays... When I have my own place with a sports room again... these are awesome. It doesn't hurt that the company was started by a Tennessee alum They say... "If you have any connection to a team, their most memorable plays have a special, warm place in your soul. Well, we want to put that feeling on your wall." They essentially take famous plays and make the diagram into art. Check them out HERE! 

5. Big Bang Theory... This isn't anything new, but I've been loving the new episodes. Shelden has inspired me to start a business helping guys buy gifts for their girlfriends or wives. They can register their anniversary and her birthday and get reminders around gift-giving holidays. I'll do the stalking and help create potential gift lists. A branch of personal shopping, but personal shopping for other people. I don't even really like shopping, but I like helping people come up with gifts that will make others happy. 

To be continued... 

the Ray Lewis theology...

I'd like to think I'm a pretty big Ravens fan. I'd even consider myself a Ray Lewis fan. I'm also completely aware there aren't a ton of people outside those of us who grew up in Maryland or live here now who feel the same way. To write a blog anything Ravens related seven days after the Super Bowl is a prime example of showing up late to the party, especially with today's culture of "need it now" information and short-term attention spans. Once again... here I am going against what might be acceptable or preferred. :)

I could probably write a book (and perhaps someone will) about Ray Lewis and his theology, particularly when you frame it next to the Atlanta "incident" from 2000. While I don't have any statistics to support it, I would imagine the majority of America (especially if you didn't poll Marylanders) would consider Lewis a criminal and think he killed one or two people January 31, 2000 at a post-game Super Bowl party. I'll debate that with you another day... Even those willing to admit he's a good player have been sick of all of the retirement hoopla... tired of hearing Lewis rant. Through the Ravens' playoff run, Lewis has been the spiritual leader of sorts wearing his Psalm 91 shirt in the postgame interviews after his last game in Baltimore and continuing to spout "no weapon formed against us shall prosper" leading up to the Super Bowl.

Some people find it ironic that a "murderer" would be preaching to the masses. Other find it rubbish no matter who's preaching. And still some wonder if God and sports go together at all.

There has been plenty of commentary over the years, especially in the last few weeks analyzing God and sports and where God "fits." I'm not sure I have anything new to add to the conversation, but I had to at least say my piece. I really struggled after Lewis' postgame Super Bowl interview when he quoted part of Romans 8:31, "If God is for us, who can be against us?"

First of all, I don't think God "fits" into a nice neat box when it comes to sports or anything else. Some Christians have claimed God doesn't fit onto a football field. What an athlete has to do to compete, doesn't fit with their personality as a Christian off the field. I've never played football, so my opinion doesn't carry a lot of weight, but I think that's crap. I'm taking God with me wherever I go and if I feel like I have to drop him off at the door, then maybe I shouldn't be going there to begin with. God's been in a battle or two... life threatening ones believe it or not and I don't think a football game would scare him away.

Secondly... I have a hard time applying Romans 8:31 to the outcome of a Super Bowl... or any athletic event. If we apply Lewis' assertion literally, he's saying, "If God is for the Ravens, the 49ers can't stop us." Logically, this implies God is not for the 49ers. So God likes the Ravens better than the 49ers? There's nothing theologically sound about that argument. There are Christian men on both teams and I don't think God sits down before every game and weighs the strengths or numbers of Christians against each other between the two teams to pick a winner.

If we buy into Lewis' application, what bad Christians we must be every time we lose a game or miss out on a job opportunity or go through a break up? If we were better Christians, God might be for us instead of the other "guy."

Even if you throw out Lewis' theology (which I have but still completely love him as a former Ravens player), I suppose the next question would then be, what role did God play in the outcome of the Super Bowl? I think if you want to answer the question "Why do good things happen to good or bad people?" we have to go back to "Why do bad things happen to good people?"

We struggle how God could cause or ignore (depending on your beliefs) big disasters like Columbine or 9/11 happen. I believe He gave us free will to make our own choices and there are some evil people that choose poorly and cause disasters and nightmares for others... and other times there are just plain accidents that God doesn't want anymore than we do. I think God still finds a way to use bad things. It doesn't always make anyone that loses anyone feel better right away, but God still finds a way to reach people when things don't make sense. Stories of Columbine students speaking out about their faith spread quickly after the shooting. Churches filled following 9/11. Does that bring any of the dead back to life? No, but maybe another person chooses life.

In the same way, I don't think God causes or ignores good things to happen like Super Bowl victories. I think He wants people to glorify Him... in victory and in defeat. Maybe it's not so black and white. I'm just not sure He cares who wins or loses as much as He cares about how we're living.

Completely unrelated to Ray Lewis or the Ravens but completely related to stories of God working through tragedies... ever since hearing the story of the Laymon family in December, I have not been able to get them out of my head. As Elevation Church describes it... "Their story of unshakeable faith in the midst of pain and loss inspired our church and reminded us all of the real reason the Church exists." It's a bit lengthy, but when you have some time, pop a squat and bring a box of tissues! Scroll down and click WATCH: http://elevationchurch.org/sermons/banneryears/part6

a twitter sidenote...

Anyone that knows anything about developing a blog following will tell you to find a theme and stick with it. I've never been very good at that and tonight is no different. I'm going on an educational rant about twitter... 

I'm not a twitter expert. I don't have anywhere near the following of anyone who is somebody in twitter terms. On the other hand, I have been on twitter longer than most and was tweeting before anyone was really listening. I've watched it grow and change and I'd like to think I get it. With that said... here are my tips of the trade... some things I think are essential for anyone, but especially for people using twitter for work or to develop a brand. 

1. The period. If I'm following you and you start a tweet with @justinbieber and I don't follow him, your tweet won't show up in my feed. I could still go to your "profile" (twitter.com/username) and see the tweet so it's not really private, but unless I'm checking profiles often (most people don't) I won't read it. That's helpful when you're having a conversation you may not want to broadcast (maybe you don't want me to make fun of you for tweeting Justin Bieber) but if you're trying to get information out, you're missing your audience. I've seen this most often with institutions or teams starting their tweet with a handle and making an announcement. If the Ravens tweet (without quotes) "@raylewis is retiring at the end of the season" only people who follow @raylewis will see the tweet. Of course you hope your audience is already following him, but it can be part of your marketing to get your news out... and his handle so all of the people who aren't following him will see his handle and start following. 

Opportunities: 

- Start your tweet with anything else... "Today @raylewis announced he will retire at the end of the season."

- The big trend now is just to start with a period. ".@raylewis is retiring at the end of the season"

2. Hashtag interruption. I would guess the most common complaint about hashtags would be their length. If I have to read it three times to understand it, it's too long. My biggest hashtag pet peeve is all those hashtags that are interrupted by punctuation. Part of this depends on your intention with a hashtag. Sometimes we just use hashtags to imply sarcasm or some kind of humor. The greater use comes in when you're developing a brand or trying to create community amongst your fans. If I tweet about the Tennessee Lady Vols and use the hashtag #LadyVols I can search for or click on the hashtag in my tweet and see everyone else in the world (with public accounts or people I follow) who has tweeted using that hashtag. Some sports teams have tried using a different hashtag for each game and I think that's asking a lot of your fanbase. I'd recommend keeping it simple. But back to my interrupters... too often I see people use a hashtag like #TexasA&M. As soon as you put the & you're breaking the hashtag. Now you can still search for everyone who has tweeted #TexasA&M, but if you try to click on the hashtag, you're going to find everyone who tweeted the hashtag #TexasA. 

Opportunitities: 

- Keep your hashtags simple. The shorter the better. 

- Don't use punctuation!! 

3. The mute blessing. I use echofon on my iphone to access twitter. As a disclaimer, I've never used the general Twitter app and I haven't tried any other apps, so there might be some advantages to something else, but I'm a huge fan of echofon. The biggest reason... the mute option. I follow more than 300 people/organizations and I'm sure more than half of them are people I've never met. If any of these people tweet ridiculousness I can unfollow them... no harm, no foul. If one of my friends/acquaintances starts tweeting ridiculousness, I don't want to unfollow them and potentially offend them or miss out on something, but I don't want to be brought down by their mess so I can mute them on echofon. Muting allows me to still click on their profile and read their tweets, they don't know their muted, but I'm not depressed by their negativity or repulsed by their vulgarity. Again... no harm, no foul. 

Opportunities: 

- Mute until your heart's content and then find some positive, funny, encouraging people/organizations to follow! 

- My other favorite trick is to block people's retweets. Some people retweet too much or retweet accounts that are offensive or stupid. Most often I block retweets from celebrities who just retweet annoying fans asking for retweets. If you log onto twitter from a computer and go to the account's profile and click the drop down head and shoulders, you can turn off retweets for individual accounts. 

4. Bloggers' replay. This one is just a personal pet peeve that real bloggers would tell you to ignore me, but... I can't stand when bloggers tweet their post more than once. I'm sure the strategy is to make sure you reach your entire audience, but I check my timeline all the time so I see them all... you can't miss me. My biggest frustration is when a blogger tricks me and rewords the teaser in a way that makes me think it's a new post when it's really the same one I read last night. 

Opportunities: 

- Completely ignore me and keep blasting your followers so they read your blog. 

- Tweet your blog post at a time when the majority of your followers are awake and checking their twitter. Friday night at 8 p.m. might not be a good time if everyone's out living life off of social media and Tuesday at 7 a.m. might not be great if everyone's still sleeping and your tweet gets buried when they wake up. 

- I have a ton of respect for those who acknowledge they're posting it again (and keep me from getting faked out :)... "In case you missed it last night, here's my new blog..." or "Here's my latest blog post for the afternoon crowd..."

adios 2012...

I know there are some people purely relieved to say goodbye to 2012. Many people use a new year to mark a fresh start and it's helpful to have a mile marker so to speak to give us a chance to really move past whatever might have held us back the year before.

I just re-read my "farewell 2012" blog and the things I learned in 2011... I spent a lot of time reminding myself and sometimes relearning in 2012. I think that's how it goes sometimes. At the same time I don't want to get caught up in wishing away an entire year or an experience because something went wrong. There were a lot of really good things that happened in 2012 and I'm choosing to focus on them as I step into 2013!

My highlights from 2012... in chronological order (I think!)...
1. took a trip to Funchester and hung out with friends before surprising MU women's basketball
2. surprised my mom making it home in time for her birthday dinner
3. flew to Baltimore and back to NC in a day to see the Ravens win a playoff game
4. Vonta Leach retweeted me (sometimes it's the little things :)
5. an awesome man at Snyder's encouragement
6. learned more about forgiveness
7. youth Sunday at Snyder
8. my neighbor and cousin cut my grass when my lawn mower broke
9. ate lunch in the lion's den three times in one day
10. Easter Jam
11. nerd herd reunion in Burlington
12. a day doing absolutely nothing but watching movies
13. Sugarland concert
14. solid night in Raleigh with friends
15. experienced Parker's for the first time
16. my great-aunt turned 104
17. experienced the Sandbar for the first time
18. new lighting in my kitchen
19. first trip to NYC
20. sweet speed boat ride in Charleston
21. friends who helped me survive no AC in NC summer heat
22. all-American 4th of July
23. fun parental visit
24. a new job
25. spent my 30th birthday with my second family
26. Pat Summitt autograph from amazing friends
27. tons of help prepping my house for sale and packing for the move
28. goodbye lunches/dinners
29. FaceTiming during FCA
30. reuniting with MD friends and fam
31. MU volleyball in DC
32. my parents celebrated 35th anniversary
33. Mississippi visit
34. survived Sandy with no damage
35. introduced Lindsey at HOF induction
36. MU women's basketball in PA
37. sometimes my little sister is stronger than me
38. Thanksiving with the family
39. Boy Meets World sequel is official :)
40. shopping with my sisters
41. praying in three languages
42. Christmas celebrations with family and friends

those highlights not limited to a specific day...
43. medical miracles
44. countless lunches and dinners with friends and family
45. dated an amazing guy
46. swimming/laying out at other people's pools
47. four of my friends had healthy babies
48. my mom's homemade meals
49. others keeping an eye on my house
50. NC visits
51. snail mail
52. free movies
53. playing soccer again
54. Orioles and Ravens games
55. family birthday dinners
56. sermons and tv shows to pass the time during the commute
57. video webcasting during games
58. high school friends' 30th birthday reunions
59. read more books
60. helped a friend or two

How can I regret or wish away 2012 when so many good things happened? Here's to hoping 2013 is even better!