A Mountain Adventure

This morning, our 4 yr. old son insisted that we are going to the mountains and began packing the car with essentials such as golden books, rubber balls, a cooler with freshly picked oregano and a picnic blanket . He has previously insisted that we were going to run a hotdog stand or go to the beach, which I had to convince him was not happening - but since we live in West Virginia, I thought this wish wouldn't be too hard to gratify. A little Google-mapping found us North Mountain - 20 minutes away, but we had never gone there before, so we hopped in the car and headed for I-81 North. On the way up, I returned a call from my neighbor who wanted to give me some hosta bulbs she was dividing and told her where we were going. "I was born on that mountain" she said. Knowing her childhood history of mountain pentecostalism and its accompanying strangeness added a touch of eeriness to the adventure.

We drove west through the quaint little overgrown town in the valley, then through farms with grassy fields running into the deep leafy green forest of the mountain side - then up, up to the junction at the top and then with several back tracks to the junction, took all the different routes in turn.

One Stranger

On our way home from church today, we picked up a stranger holding a cardboard sign by the road "No Gas, No Food, No Money".  It's a common sight when you live near a state line truck stop, but since we were all together heading home for Sunday dinner, I asked Caleb if we could take the man home with us, and he being more than willing to do that sort of thing, readily pulled over and picked the man up.

His story was sad - he was traveling to Maine for a new job when his wife, who was suffering from bipolar disorder and postpartum depression had left him in the hotel, taking their five sons and all his things and money.  She had run away before, but usually ended up with family. This time she couldn't be found anywhere. He had a job waiting in Maine, but just needed to get there. It sounded almost too much of a tearjerker to be true, but we figured we could give him dinner and some gas.

Looking Forward

This past winter has been hard in all the ways that winters with little ones (and my own struggle with Lyme disease) are hard. My relief that it is over is so great that I want to hug every tulip and daffodil, drink the air from open windows like wine, and already sigh that the leaves are out because the end of the beginning marks a few days closer to the next winter. I shudder at the memory of the dull skies, illnesses and seeping cold and never want to see it again. The whole earth seems so right. The deadness of winter so wrong - must it ever come again? 

But in the midst of the long, dark winter, God sent us that which that makes the end of this summer a thing to anticipate with hope At first we were overwhelmed in the midst of our weariness, but the hope is growing, and, oh, God-willing, the end of October will bring us new, warm life - a baby. I'm growing hungrier for small fuzzy cheeks and velvet head and a new face with a new name - hungrier than I was for warm skies and violet-studded grass. This is a gift. We never know if a growing baby in the womb will live to see the light of day - all life is in God's hands. But my heart wanted something to anticipate and God granted me a growing belly and sleepless wee hours filled with crazy baby-name conjuring, and midnight snacks and outdoor time with children that leaves me weary to the bone, and the overwhelming reality that a life is in our charge to love and give ourselves to keep. 

In all of this, the Word of God has been near to sustain and teach me. I am learning that when I cannot see the good of life's hard things (and even pregnancy has been a hard thing), their hardness itself is the gift of Him who said "You have need of endurance" to one of his children who would have all things made light and easy. If I could have all things easy here, how would I be kept from the dangerous love of this world? To be weary in the way is to long for the end - final redemption in Jesus' consummated kingdom. Ease does not push me there. "The testing of your faith develops endurance". Whatever motherhood brings, life will not be easy if my God loves me well. He wants me to be as hungry for His kingdom as I have been for spring, as eager to see His face as I am to meet our baby (no, much, much more). He wants me to raise our children to hope in the triumph of King Jesus, and look for redemption outside themselves just as I must daily do. And He is helping me to do want He wants of me.

If none of this makes sense, blame it on my pregnancy brain, but praise the Lord with me, because He does all things well.

The Airing Day

This deliciously spring-like February day with its fresh breezes and happy children watching the laundry waving on the line put all kinds of poetry in my head. A happy wind blew it right into me and here it is. 

[Confession: I did not put out to air all of the items listed in this poem!]

The Airing Day

Sweet wind from the southwest the rain mist is sweeping.

Bold blackbirds awaken the sky from its sleeping.

The chillied new year a fresh spring cloak is wearing –

It’s time for the house to turn out for an airing!

Bring out your doilies and tea towels and cosies,

Hang out your pillow shams, blankets and duvets,

Pull out the rugs from the bugs and the dust,

And beat them in league with the wind if you must!

Bring out your mattress, your couch and your foot puff,

Drag out your latch-hooked rugs, all of the floor stuff.

Clear out the nooks and the crannies and closets,

Eradicate all the dust bunny deposits!

Pin pillows to clotheslines, hang bath mats on porch rails,

While breezes turn all of the bedsheets to boat sails.

Old quilts from the closet come out like brave banners,

Exhibiting brisk, unconventional manners.

All of the linens, grown dusty from living

With winter, are waving a giddy thanksgiving!

Fresh air, flood the windows, thrown open to greet you

Spring day, the whole house is delighted to meet you.

- Alyssa Bohon, February 2018

Multiple Layers of Protection

I've been slowly reading Jonathan Leeman's excellent book, The Church and The Surprising Offense of God's Love, and keep landing on statements that seem to deserve more than the 11-pt. font paragraphs in which I find them. This afternoon, I came upon a paragraph in which Leeman briefly outlined the protections the believer has in the New Covenant, and I copied it into my notebook, thinking how huge these are. Protections. New Covenant. That is, all the ways I am safe because of something that is sure outside of me and in Christ. As someone who catches myself worrying too often, having someone tell me that I am ensconced in five layers of safety is quite reassuring. I need to type these out big.

Leeman points out that in the old covenant, obedient covenant members were promised a safe and prosperous life - 'Keep the words of this covenant and do them, that you may prosper in all you do' (Deut. 29:9). Of course, this depended on their success in keeping the covenant, which dependence itself was a threat to their security, because they weren't very good at keeping the covenant, and therefore not very safe. A new covenant, ordered in all things and sure through Jesus Christ gives us so much more! And, it "affords multiple layers of protection":

First, it provides protection from the wrath of God because sin is forgiven.

Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. - Romans 5:9-10

Second, it protects the soul against those who can harm only the body. All the protections promised in the Psalms essentially become the Christian's, albeit in a reconstituted form.

Because you have made the LORD your dwelling place—the Most High, who is my refuge no evil shall be allowed to befall you,no plague come near your tent. - Psalm 91:9-10

Third, it protects us from ourselves and our inability to fulfill the requirements of the old covenant.

I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them. And I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me. - Jeremiah 32:40

Fourth, it protects the Christian from the enslavement of sin, since sin no longer has mastery over him or her. 

For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace. - Romans 6:14

Fifth, it welcomes Christians into a domain where authority is exercised to create rather than to steal, to build rather than to tear down, which means that the Christian can know the protection of God's people (Matt. 20:25; 1 Pet. 5:3).

- from  The Church and the Surprising Offence of God's Love, chap 5, Scriptures my addition 

Safe from God's anger and eternal punishment, from the devil and all the enemies with him, from my very self, from sin and from ever being really alone.

"A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing."

On Bringing Up Children - An Extensive Quotation

I dearly love George MacDonald's fiction (despite his sometimes faulty theology, which I have found to be unnoticeable in the best of his good and beautiful children's works) , and within the past several years I have traveled through a lesser-known trilogy of his - Annals of A Quiet Neighborhood, The Seaboard Parish, and The Vicar's Daughter. I was pleasantly surprised to find at the end of the last book, a whole chapter on the bringing up of children. It is written by the fictional vicar's daughter herself, but I am sure reflects G.M.'s own principles of child-rearing quite well. I heartily agreed with just about all of it, even though I had never encountered some of the specific ideas articulated, and wanted to put it somewhere where I could access and share it easily. So here is most of the chapter, hunted up and copied from Gutenberg.org:

I think there can be no harm in mentioning a few general principles laid down by my father. They are such as to commend themselves most to the most practical. 

And first for a few negative ones.

1. Never give in to disobedience; and never threaten what you are not prepared to carry out.

A Gastronomic Commonplace

Floris van Dyck - Still-Life

I've been fascinated with references to food, medicine and health (especially off-hand ones) in classic literature, so I decided to keep a log of all the interesting bits I find. Since these are not the type of notes that invite deep contemplation or spiritual enrichment, I decided to skip the hand written commonplace book for these and simply compile them online, (such as convenient copy-pastes from Gutenberg.org).

"I have so often heard Mr. Woodhouse recommend a baked apple. I believe it is the only way that Mr. Woodhouse thinks the fruit thoroughly wholesome....only we do not have them baked more than twice, and Mr. Woodhouse made us promise to have them done three times—but Miss Woodhouse will be so good as not to mention it." - Miss Bates, in Emma by Jane Austen

" He loved to have the cloth laid, because it had been the fashion of his youth, but his conviction of suppers being very unwholesome made him rather sorry to see any thing put on it; and while his hospitality would have welcomed his visitors to every thing, his care for their health made him grieve that they would eat. Such another small basin of thin gruel as his own was all that he could, with thorough self-approbation, recommend" - Mr. Woodhouse, in Emma by Jane Austen

"A husky-voiced gentleman with a rough face, who had been eating out of a sandwich-box nearly all the way, except when he had been drinking out of a bottle, said I was like a boa constrictor who took enough at one meal to last him a long time; after which, he actually brought a rash out upon himself with boiled beef." - Dickens, David Copperfield


"Another day's tramp over a muddy trail, and a night camp on another roaring stream, Red Creek; our supplies quite exhausted, we boiled some onions and ate them with the last of our honey. I felt as if I were eating diphtheria medicine. Next morning we breakfasted on a turkey buzzard shot by Coonskin, and that afternoon my jaded caravan crossed the summit of the plateau, and descended into the beautiful Strawberry Valley in the glow of a gorgeous sunset." - Woodward, On the Hurricane Deck of a Donkey ...Gorgeous scenery is not always accompanied with fine fare!

"If Stubb even, who is but a peg higher than Flask, happens to have but a small appetite, and soon shows symptoms of concluding his repast, then Flask must bestir himself, he will not get more than three mouthfuls that day; for it is against holy usage for Stubb to precede Flask to the deck. Therefore it was that Flask once admitted in private, that ever since he had arisen to the dignity of an officer, from that moment he had never known what it was to be otherwise than hungry, more or less. For what he ate did not so much relieve his hunger, as keep it immortal in him. Peace and satisfaction, thought Flask, have for ever departed from my stomach. I am an officer; but, how I wish I could fish a bit of old-fashioned beef in the forecastle, as I used to when I was before the mast. There’s the fruits of promotion now; there’s the vanity of glory: there’s the insanity of life!" - Melville, Moby Dick 

“Clam or Cod?” she repeated.

“A clam for supper? a cold clam; is that what you mean, Mrs. Hussey?” says I, “but that’s a rather cold and clammy reception in the winter time, ain’t it, Mrs. Hussey?”

But being in a great hurry to resume scolding the man in the purple Shirt, who was waiting for it in the entry, and seeming to hear nothing but the word “clam,” Mrs. Hussey hurried towards an open door leading to the kitchen, and bawling out “clam for two,” disappeared.

“Queequeg,” said I, “do you think that we can make out a supper for us both on one clam?”

However, a warm savory steam from the kitchen served to belie the apparently cheerless prospect before us. But when that smoking chowder came in, the mystery was delightfully explained. Oh, sweet friends! hearken to me. It was made of small juicy clams, scarcely bigger than hazel nuts, mixed with pounded ship biscuit, and salted pork cut up into little flakes; the whole enriched with butter, and plentifully seasoned with pepper and salt. Our appetites being sharpened by the frosty voyage, and in particular, Queequeg seeing his favourite fishing food before him, and the chowder being surpassingly excellent, we despatched it with great expedition: when leaning back a moment and bethinking me of Mrs. Hussey’s clam and cod announcement, I thought I would try a little experiment. Stepping to the kitchen door, I uttered the word “cod” with great emphasis, and resumed my seat. In a few moments the savoury steam came forth again, but with a different flavor, and in good time a fine cod-chowder was placed before us.

We resumed business; and while plying our spoons in the bowl, thinks I to myself, I wonder now if this here has any effect on the head? What’s that stultifying saying about chowder-headed people? “But look, Queequeg, ain’t that a live eel in your bowl? Where’s your harpoon?”

Fishiest of all fishy places was the Try Pots, which well deserved its name; for the pots there were always boiling chowders. Chowder for breakfast, and chowder for dinner, and chowder for supper, till you began to look for fish-bones coming through your clothes. The area before the house was paved with clam-shells. Mrs. Hussey wore a polished necklace of codfish vertebra; and Hosea Hussey had his account books bound in superior old shark-skin. There was a fishy flavor to the milk, too, which I could not at all account for, till one morning happening to take a stroll along the beach among some fishermen’s boats, I saw Hosea’s brindled cow feeding on fish remnants, and marching along the sand with each foot in a cod’s decapitated head, looking very slip-shod, I assure ye." - Ibid

A beautiful example of hospitality from Greek mythology:

When the two heavenly guests crossed the humble threshold, and bowed their heads to pass under the low door, the old man placed a seat, on which Baucis, bustling and attentive, spread a cloth, and begged them to sit down...Her husband collected some pot-herbs in the garden, and she shred them from the stalks, and prepared them for the pot. He reached down with a forked stick a flitch of bacon hanging in the chimney, cut a small piece, and put it in the pot to boil with the herbs, setting away the rest for another time. A beechen bowl was filled with warm water, that their guests might wash. While all was doing, they beguiled the time with conversation.

On the bench designed for the guests was laid a cushion stuffed with sea-weed; and a cloth, only produced on great occasions, but ancient and coarse enough, was spread over that. The old lady, with her apron on, with trembling hand set the table. One leg was shorter than the rest, but a piece of slate put under restored the level. When fixed, she rubbed the table down with some sweet- smelling herbs. Upon it she set some of chaste Minerva's olives, some cornel berries preserved in vinegar, and added radishes and cheese, with eggs lightly cooked in the ashes. All were served in earthen dishes, and an earthenware pitcher, with wooden cups, stood beside them. When all was ready, the stew, smoking hot, was set on the table. Some wine, not of the oldest, was added; and for dessert, apples and wild honey; and over and above all, friendly faces, and simple but hearty welcome. - Baucis and Philemon, Bulfinch's Age of Fable

An interesting anecdote of 16th century Flemish eating:

She set down on the table a dish of hot boiled salmon; and, after flouncing out of the room, returned with the air of the most injured person in the world, bringing in a platter-full of dried peas, likewise boiled. These various ingredients (the salmon was salted) William Hans immediately seized upon, and emptied them into the great bowl we have already mentioned. Then casting off his gown, and tucking up the sleeves of his coat, he mashed them all together; adding various slices of some well-preserved pippins, a wooden spoon's capacity of fine oil, and three of vinegar. Fancy such a mess to eat at eleven o'clock at night, and then go to bed and dream! Boiled salmon and peas! apples and oil! and vinegar to crown it! - Darnley by George Payne Rainsford James

"There is a fine odour of bacon in the air just now - bacon is the staff of life at Thornleigh - for breakfast, in the morning, a slab or two cold, and sometimes raw, between two thick slices of bread for 'baggin'' or lunch, and again, as often as not, for dinner (when the last of the Sunday beef has been disposed of) cooked before the fire, in a deep dish, and served up smoking and savoury with 'taters' in the gravy. Here and there, when you pass the more important dwelling of a 'gradely famer,' you may smell Irish stew, or 'toad in the hole,' but bacon is the staple food of the cottagers and they certainly seem to thrive on it. Look at this child who suddenly comes toddling, spoon in hand, from the rear of this whitewashed cottage, and pauses irresolute at the sight of a stranger. 'There's legs for you!' as Mrs. Poyser would say; and see the bare arms with their delicious roundness and little soft rings at the wrist, the chubby face, sunburnt over its clear red and white...Is not this a good advertisement for Thornleigh air and Thornleigh bacon?" - In A North Country Village  by M. E. Francis

"It was a numerous company—eighteen or twenty perhaps. Of these some five or six were ladies, who sat wedged together in a little phalanx by themselves. All the knives and forks were working away at a rate that was quite alarming; very few words were spoken; and everybody seemed to eat his utmost in self-defence, as if a famine were expected to set in before breakfast time to-morrow morning, and it had become high time to assert the first law of nature. The poultry, which may perhaps be considered to have formed the staple of the entertainment—for there was a turkey at the top, a pair of ducks at the bottom, and two fowls in the middle—disappeared as rapidly as if every bird had had the use of its wings, and had flown in desperation down a human throat. The oysters, stewed and pickled, leaped from their capacious reservoirs, and slid by scores into the mouths of the assembly. The sharpest pickles vanished, whole cucumbers at once, like sugar-plums, and no man winked his eye. Great heaps of indigestible matter melted away as ice before the sun. It was a solemn and an awful thing to see. Dyspeptic individuals bolted their food in wedges; feeding, not themselves, but broods of nightmares, who were continually standing at livery within them. Spare men, with lank and rigid cheeks, came out unsatisfied from the destruction of heavy dishes, and glared with watchful eyes upon the pastry. What Mrs Pawkins felt each day at dinner-time is hidden from all human knowledge. But she had one comfort. It was very soon over."

- Martin Chuzzlewit by Charles Dickens 

To remain under edit indefinitely...