Tag: Opinions

More Than a Merry Christmas

Published on by Marilyn12 Comments

“Merry Christmas” said the gruff, well-seasoned bus driver. He paused. “And if you don’t celebrate Christmas I’m not talking to you!”

In politically correct Cambridge I thought my ears were going to fall off. And I feared a bit for his life. But in the spirit of the season, most people were good-hearted and merry about the interaction, wishing the driver a happy holiday or Merry Christmas as they left the bus.

It also made me think about the “war on Christmas”. I realize it’s not something I’ve fretted over. While I think ‘X’mas’ looks a little silly, I dismiss it quickly. I’ve lived in two Muslim majority countries where we celebrated Christmas without outside forces dictating the rules or grandmas getting run over by reindeer.   And as I walked away from the bus with a ‘Merry Christmas’ in my ears and on my lips, in an epiphany of sorts I was struck that my faith is so far beyond a mere ‘Merry Christmas’.

For this God I love is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. He’s the bright morning star and the fairest of ten thousand. He is the babe in the manger and the King of Kings. He was there when the sea was formed and is there when the mountain goats give birth. He is Creator, Saviour, Comforter all in one. He is, and will always be, so much more than a Merry Christmas.

So today I wish you more than a Merry Christmas. While the magic of the season is limited, the reality of the living God will sustain forever.

*************************

20121219-145917.jpg

Readers & Friends – Thank you….for reading, emailing, commenting, and, right when I’m ready to stop blogging, telling me that what I wrote helped your soul. Yesterday Communicating Across Boundaries made it to over 200,000 views in less than two years – and it’s because of you. I’ll be taking a break for a few days as my kids come in from different corners of the globe through international and domestic terminals. 

RELATED ARTICLES

Valentine’s Day: Enter at Your Own Risk

Published on by Marilyn18 Comments
Author: Bagande
Image via Wikipedia

Valentine’s Day should come with a warning sign. Perhaps even a danger sign complete with skull and crossbones. American women are conditioned to believe things about Valentine’s day that can be fatal to relationships. Single women struggle to find that “someone” so that they will not wear the scarlet letter ‘S’ on their jackets. Married women are conditioned to believe that the day will be a perfectly orchestrated delight of champagne and chocolates. And divorced women are conditioned to believe that they are failures. If they had given a little more then the relationship would not have gone bad.

These are problems. We’ve allowed a day to control us instead of us controlling the day. Last year I posted a piece called “Hijacked by Hallmark” and this is my offering, of sorts, to the day. I re-read it myself so that I could be reminded of the truth of our culture and remember that it doesn’t reflect the truth about my marriage. Because the truth is that I am loved, and I love.

It is a flawed and imperfect love that has had assaults on many fronts – but it is a love based on the God who loves best and relentlessly pursues both of us with that love.

So Happy Valentine’s Day to those of you in countries where it is celebrated. To those who do not celebrate – may you reflect on norms in your culture that may or may not show the truth about relationships and who you are as a woman or a man. Thanks for reading.

Hijacked by Hallmark – Posted a year ago today!

Happy Valentine’s Day! A day of roses, chocolates, love, champagne, and, dare i say, disappointment?

For the record: I’m not a hater! It isn’t that I don’t love romance, or valentine’s day.  Believe me – I do. But what I do know is that I have been hijacked into believing that the images portrayed by Hallmark and Hollywood are reality – and when my life doesn’t match those images, there is a discontent.  In other words, I’ve drunk the koolaid and have bought in to this 17 billion dollar day and need to stop and examine why.

The material and physical pictures portrayed in our stores and media are difficult for women to achieve without multimillion dollar budgets and a good plastic surgeon. We  have been set up for a twisted perception of love by Hallmark and Hollywood and sold an image that  doesn’t work in real life.  We are left thinking this is what love is – and if our husbands/partners/friends don’t measure up (and of course, how can they?) we fall into the abyss of discontent and disappointment.

A true valentine’s day means I won’t let my relationship be hijacked by the industry that wants to define love for me and subtly or blatantly send me messages designed to make money instead of foster a relationship. I want the day to be fun and a  chance to celebrate as opposed to a day of false expectations that may never be met.

So – Don’t be hijacked into thinking there is a specific way this day is supposed to be celebrated – instead enjoy it as a day to creatively express your love for those you care about.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Sorry Folks! Red-Headed Designer Babies Are Off the Menu!

Published on by Marilyn10 Comments

It seems that if you’re male and you pop down to your local sperm bank and are unfortunate enough to have red hair, you are out of luck (even if your IQ is over 140). Potential parents don’t want redheads. Just like a restaurant does away with what isn’t selling well, be it blue cheese & walnut Quiche or club sandwiches, in the menu of choices the redhead option will be gone. They still want blondes with high IQ’s and blue eyes, they still want brunettes with brown eyes, but redheads – their time is over. The world’s largest sperm bank, located in Denmark and servicing 65 different countries, is refusing redheads and Scandinavians. Redheads because no one wants them, Scandinavians because all those Scandinavian men have been busy and they have a “glut”!

The director of the sperm bank, Ole Schou, says this: “I do not think you choose a redhead, unless the partner – for example, the sterile male – has red hair, or because the lone woman has a preference for redheads,” he said, the Telegraph reported. “And that’s perhaps not so many, especially in the latter case.” (Gawker, September 19, 2011)

Other sperm banks back off the accusation of being “against” redheads. One of the first sperm banks in the U.S., in Michigan, says they still have some demand. Their chief executive officer says this: “When parents are seeking sperm, they often prefer donors who are athletically or musically inclined, and they prefer donors who are educated. Sometimes they even want a specific blood type.”

Designer babies – pick the prototype, be it tall (who really wants a short kid, right?) medium, brown-eyed, blue-eyed, brunette, blonde, good at singing, good at sports, you can have it all and pick the delivery date.

The only problem is, the minute that child is born, you’ll learn that your designer baby is not perfect. You may be able to pick skin, eye, and hair color – but you can’t pick if they’ll have colic and scream all night for 6 months. You can’t pick a baby that will turn into a two-year old that doesn’t yell “Mine” and make you decide you will never go into a toy store again, and you can’t pick whether they’ll make you sad or not. The control is limited to sperm bank and delivery date alone, after that, it’s anyone’s guess.

Realistically, if I am fair, the sperm bank is a business and has to market according to the needs of its customers. So, if redheaded babies are going slow, one can’t blame them for making a business decision that may seem biased.

And there-in is the heart of the problem, be it a baby with red hair or a baby with down syndrome. Babies have become a big business, and when a human being becomes only a business opportunity there is a problem. As far as businesses go, there are those who conduct the business with integrity and ethics, and those who don’t. From sperm banks with their menu of choices to adoption agencies with their exorbitant fees and sometimes questionable methods of obtaining babies, there are those for whom this is nothing more, nor less than a dollar decision – supply and demand, and the “bottom line”. For couples who desperately want children, it’s about a baby, dependent on another for all aspects of life and totally unable to care for itself, the most vulnerable of the vulnerable. For God, it’s about a tiny being made in His image.  And I have to ask myself, how far will this go? When will babies cease being about a business, and become babies again?

Readers – would love to hear what your thoughts are! Join the conversation by leaving your comments!

Related articles

The Lunch Table: Where Food,People & Opinion Meet Google

Published on by Marilyn3 Comments

My physical place of work has few redeeming qualities. It is an institutional building much in need of repair. Cubicles line the walls in Soviet style rigidity, indistinguishable apart from the occasional family photo or obsession with stuffed beanie babies that carries over from home into the work place.

The faces of those who work in the building often reflect the atmosphere of the physical space. Many seem to be biding their time until they are eligible for a state pension, while some purchase lottery tickets with one hope in millions of seeing their fortunes change. The lay offs of recent weeks add to the overall morale and the air often feels heavy with uncertainty and frustration.

There is one exception and it is one of the reasons why I have enjoyed my job immensely. We call it the Lunch Table. Around 12:15 daily, at a small round table designed for meetings of four or five, anywhere from seven to nine of us gather. Everyone brings their lunch, sometimes purchased from the plethora of eating establishments in the area, but often brought from home, and we talk. It is food, people and opinion meeting together,  forgetting about time as we delve into subjects that are usually so filled with politically correct verbiage that you never get to the heart of what people think or feel. Not so at the lunch table. Our talk goes from politics to religion to front page news to personal events. Few subjects are off-limits.

Our ideologies along with our political alliances are vastly different. Our religious beliefs differ just as profoundly and our personalities could not be more divergent but all that is put aside at the lively and energetic connection I call “The Lunch Table.”

We talk politics “Will Mitt Romney have a chance in the 2012 election” We talk religion “Why go to church?” We talk business and we talk scandal “I’m telling you, all this unfaithfulness and scandal is a result of Viagra!” claims one person emphatically. We talk family, we talk faith, and we question.

Almost daily we go to Google to aid us in both big and little questions. “How do we use the word ad hominem correctly”. “Are green, yellow, and red peppers all from the same plant?” (they are) “Where is the country of Zanzibar?” and the conversations go on. Each of us brings passions and ideas based on our backgrounds and life experience.  Our passions and dislikes can rarely be hidden and there are some things we would defend with every ounce of our bodies, but we still abide by the important rule of listening as well as talking.

Each person has a unique spot at the lunch table. There’s Rick, a data guy whose mind I would like to travel through on a Magic School Bus with Ms. Frizzle. There’s Gail – pure class and Talbots, she is well-read and has a variety of interests. Gail is the one who makes sure everyone knows they are welcome to this informal gathering. There’s Heather who defended her thesis last year and now has the hard-earned initials of PhD after her name. Beautiful with a wacky sense of humor, she knows the best places in Boston for Old Man Drinks and High Tea. There’s Anita, who is our rock and stability, doing it all while giving us healthy doses of chocolate. There’s Liz – mom of toddler twins and a 5 year-old, who is always thinking and questioning and could subsist on ham, cheese, and chocolate. There’s Mary Lou, fearless leader and entrepreneur par excellence, who has had vision to make sure amazing programs are created and sustained. There are others who come and go, some consultants, some employees who hear the laughter and wander in from other parts of the building.

The mantra is an unspoken commitment to healthy dialogue and a lot of laughter. It is a perfect recipe for opinionated people to survive and thrive.

As I write this, I am acutely aware that our lunch table is about to face deep losses. Gail is retiring after significant state service. Mary Lou is leaving for an excellent opportunity elsewhere and Liz has been moved to a different department through restructuring. It’s like good friends leaving for a distant state or country and there is a sadness that I feel as I think about the discussions and laughter that have defined the lunch table. Discussions that would not have been as rich without the difference in people and opinion.

As we move forward my hope is that the spirit of this table will live on and that food, people and opinion can continue to meet Google.

Hijacked by Hallmark

Published on by Marilyn12 Comments

Valentine’s Day should come with a warning sign. Perhaps even a danger sign complete with skull and crossbone. American women have been conditioned to believe things about Valentine’s day that can be fatal to relationships. Single women struggle to find that “someone” so that they will not wear the scarlet letter ‘S’ on their jackets. Married women are conditioned to believe that the day will be a perfectly orchestrated delight of champagne and chocolates. And divorced women are conditioned to believe that they are failures. If they had given a little more then the relationship would not have gone bad.

These are problems. We’ve allowed a day to control us instead of us controlling the day. Last year I posted a piece called “Hijacked by Hallmark” and this is my offering, of sorts, to the day. I re-read it myself so that I could be reminded of the truth of our culture and remember that it doesn’t reflect the truth about my marriage. Because the truth is that I am loved, and I love. It is a flawed and imperfect love that has had assaults on many fronts – but it is a love based on the God who loves best and relentlessly pursues both of us with that love.

So Happy Valentine’s Day to those of you in countries where it is celebrated. To those who do not celebrate – may you reflect on norms in your culture that may or may not reflect the truth about relationships and who you are as a woman or a man. Thanks for reading.

Hijacked by Hallmark – Posted a year ago today!

Happy Valentine’s Day! A day of roses, chocolates, love, champagne, and, dare i say, disappointment?

For the record: I’m not a hater! It isn’t that I don’t love romance, or valentine’s day.  Believe me – I do. But what I do know is that I have been hijacked into believing that the images portrayed by Hallmark and Hollywood are reality – and when my life doesn’t match those images, there is a discontent.  In other words, I’ve drunk the koolaid and have bought in to this 17 billion dollar day and need to stop and examine why.

The material and physical pictures portrayed in our stores and media are difficult for women to achieve without multimillion dollar budgets and a good plastic surgeon. We  have been set up for a twisted perception of love by Hallmark and Hollywood and sold an image that  doesn’t work in real life.  We are left thinking this is what love is – and if our husbands/partners/friends don’t measure up (and of course, how can they?) we fall into the abyss of discontent and disappointment.

A true valentine’s day means I won’t let my relationship be hijacked by the industry that wants to define love for me and subtly or blatantly send me messages designed to make money instead of foster a relationship. I want the day to be fun and a  chance to celebrate as opposed to a day of false expectations that may never be met.

So – Don’t be hijacked into thinking there is a specific way this day is supposed to be celebrated – instead enjoy it as a day to creatively express your love for those you care about.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.