the deep south...

I traveled yesterday from Lynchburg VA to Lakeland GA. It took me a little over ten hours with traffic. I realized last night, however, that I can always tell when I have hit my home sweet home of the deep South. Truly there is nothing like it. Many people make fun of it…I know I do especially since I have been to other places. But for the most part, I am proud to say that I was born and raised here, in the southern United States. It has helped shape me into the woman I am. It has also helped me appreciate things in life that many people take for granted.

There are many ways that I realize I have hit south Georgia. I would like to share some of these.

1. My friend Heather and I realize that for a southerner 50 degrees is cold, but it is quite hilarious when you see a grown man in a fur necked coat, gloves, and a hat when it is 50 degrees. Haha.

2. The next way to know you have hit the south is the opposite extreme. Heather saw a man with no shirt in forty degree weather on the side of the road attaching a trailer to a pick-up truck. The image of this just makes me laugh. You got the one man dressed like an Eskimo and the other one like it is summer time and he is beasting his work. Ha.

3. You know you have hit southern Georgia when you stop at the gas station and every other vehicle is a pick-up truck with a rugged looking man in it….usually with a big antenna or dog box in the back for hunting….hahaha.

4. This one I like. I know that in many places chivalry is dead. Of course the women helped kill it because some of us do not allow men to be men and take care of business. BUT I love the fact that every place I have been so far a man has held the door opened for me or let me cut in line. I mean it is the little things we tend to take for granted but I like it when they do that. Thank you kind sirs for treating me like a lady. :)

5. You know you are in south Georgia when you see several cars parked on the side of the road at a bridge…and standing outside are several old men with fishing poles fishing…over the side of the bridge. Haha. I mean it is cold out and they are still trying to catch a crawdad or something.

6. You know you are in South Georgia when you can’t understand a single word from the man talking to you in the supermarket. Every word sounds like a mumble jumble of syllables…if you could hear me talk like them it would sound really really funny. I can’t even begin to type it out except it would look something like-a wernt ober yonder n gotsda tracterrr outta da woods n billy bob werentttt eben rreredy to goo yetr. (I just stand there and smile sweetly and say yes sir over and over again). I mean I can’t even begin to keep trying to type it out. It reminds me of translating my friend Joey’s talk when we first moved to Lynchburg for school. (sorry Joey. Lol.).

7. So, this is in no way disrespectful but over the last several years I have noticed when I come home that the some women in the south, especially those in their 30s, 40s, and 50s, tend to wear a lot of make-up and big hair. This definitely applied to my recent visit to Tennessee but I notice this difference a lot more recently in my home town. Maybe they believe that is the way a true southern belle should look. I am not sure. But either way the trend has definitely not subsided even with the aging of Dolly Parton whom many of them remind me of. Haha.

I am sure I will think of more of these to come over the weekend. One thing is for certain, the air is definitely fresher down here in the deep south. I took a deep gulp of it when I exited my car yesterday. Too bad I can’t take some of it with me when I leave to go back to Virginia.

This is just a glimpse of the deep South...

render today...

It is easy to get caught up in our own lives-what we want, what we don’t have, what we wish we had, what we think we deserve. (It can be particularly easy to be caught up in these things during the holidays.) It is harder sometimes to wake up in the morning and think of someone else before you think of yourself. We probably equate this with selfishness. Being in my twenties, I know many people who talk about their five year plan, ten year plan, financial plan, etc. In the land of America, we are surrounded by possibilities and in the place I live, the “plans” we have for our own lives. Of course, this may be less so for some people, but when compared to other countries, America can be described as a land of opportunity. Another thing I noticed recently is that many people have a plan of what they want to have done by the time they are thirty, thirty-five, forty, and so forth. There is definitely nothing wrong with making plans and setting things in motion to accomplish great things, especially from a Christian perspective. We want to accomplish great things and many times it may take years to reach goal by goal. I am sure most of us will be laying on our death bed or come to meet Jesus one day and realize all of the things we wanted to do and did not. Okay, maybe we will not have the ability to look back at things that we didn’t do or did do and wish we did or didn’t do. Maybe we did not make the time, maybe the opportunity never came, or maybe we just lived too short of a life.

Something I consistently remember is that I want to make the most of every chance that I have. I do not want to waste a relationship or an opportunity to make a difference in the world or in the life of one person. I realized through the death of a loved one a long time ago that you never know what tomorrow holds. Sometimes, we use the mundane things in life to grow closer to God and to prepare for things in the future. I, however, was saddened recently while doing some research for a paper. Most people in America expect to live a long life. The average life expectancy is 78 years old. What saddened me was the statistics I came across for the country of Haiti. The average life expectancy for someone in Haiti is 29 years old.

Let that sink in. 29 years old. The average person only lives to age 29 in Haiti? It breaks my heart and makes me realize how much we take for granted. That would mean that I only have four years to do what I would “want” to do or to accomplish some kind of “great” things for God as a lot of Christians pray will happen. I mean, granted, we are not guaranteed tomorrow. We may only have this moment right now, this very breath; this very next sentence could be my last. Not to sound overly dramatic but on the grand scheme of things it is true. Not only is it tragic about the people of Haiti and their recent turmoil, but it simply brought up this idea that I am blessed. Most of you reading this are probably blessed too and may not realize it. You probably don’t make your plans thinking you would only live to be 29 years old. Hey, some of you may be past the age of 29. That makes you blessed in and of itself when compared to others. Of course not everyone who lives has an easy life. Those 29 years may be full of turmoil and pain. They may be full of disappointment and uncertainty. I guess it is all a matter of perspective. Regardless of what we endure, I want to have a perspective that God has about our lives-even if what life has brought is not what I thought it would be.

My heart has just been overwhelmed with the thought of how we (how I) would make things different, plan different, love different if I knew I was only expected to have a lifespan of 29 years. That is four years from now for me, so if you are 30 just think about four years from now for you. I hope that if you knew that you would likely die in the next four years that you would…

#1. Find the love of Jesus Christ irresistible. That his heart, his passion, his forgiveness, his compassion, all of it would penetrate to the core person of who you are.

#2. Find that the love of God is perfect and can be shared with other people in all relationships, even to a stranger on the street.

#3. Find that your life is just one note of a very large sheet of music, one word in an extravagant love story, one breath of the billions of people to ever walk the earth.

#4. Find that even the simple things in life should not be taken for granted-that there is always someone who has had to deal with the same things as you if not worse.

#5. Find that money and material possessions only last a moment; you can’t take them with you in the afterlife.

#6. Find that you can make a difference in the life of just one human being and end up making a difference that will make a ripple in life that changes many others, even for eternity.

#7. Find that worrying gets us nowhere, or at least nowhere good and true freedom comes from finding trust and hope in the God of Scripture.

#8. Find that sometimes laughing is the best medicine, even if it is at your own expense.

#9. Find that life, even if the days are numbered (which technically I guess they all are), can be taken slowly and not so busy. This helps with not overlooking something beautiful or neglecting a relationship.

#10. Find that each breath is a gift and that true salvation and contentment do not come from what you first do but in whom you first believe on.

I do not know what it is like to live in a country like Haiti. I have only ever lived in America. This was the card I was dealt at birth. Hopefully one day I will be able to live overseas, but until then I see that we truly do take for granted the time we have. My heart is broken to think that on average in a particular part of the world, people can expect to live only to age 29.

Would I do things differently, act differently, love differently? Would I stand up more for the things that I say I believe in? Would I give my possessions and my heart away more freely? You can ask the same things of yourself. I do not know if it makes a difference in places where the average life expectancy is so low as to how the people act or value life. But I do know that it should. It should also be a wake-up call to those of us who take life for granted and do not love God and love people.

I think that sometimes we simply say that we have tomorrow to do something. To ask God for forgiveness, to love someone we haven’t loved, to be charitable to someone in need, to take a chance on something we never would have…we say that we will do that or this tomorrow but what good are our plans if we don’t carry them out or if we don’t have a tomorrow. I think this is just a challenge, like many of us have heard before, to live life more fully, more intimately, more passionately in the pursuit of Someone greater than ourselves and purposes greater than our own selfish ambitions.

This may take us rendering our hearts, rendering our lives, our hopes, passions, dreams, pursuits. This may take us rendering our hurts and heartaches to move forward and live as if we only had a short time on this earth to make the most of it. It is not about living in fear of dying but living in fear of dying and having wasted the time we have.

May we render our hearts to the plans of God for each day, expecting great things but not banking on any ‘promise’ of tomorrow that may never come.

render today...