I Love.......

Things I rediscovered my love for this Thanksgiving.....

....pecan pie.

....being lazy on an inner tube on the Lazy River.

....loud relatives.

....my mom's homemade enchiladas.

....long naps under the background noise and clamor of a family reunion.

....Psalm 103.

....refusing to get up and shop just because everything is on sale.

....salsa late into the night in the middle of the week.

Aaah the holidays..... :)

Things I Love About My Church Family.....

my utterly beautiful soul-sistah lindsey.

It's Turkey Day!!! Well, almost. This evening all the adult leaders/volunteers/churchgoers from Rosedale Church gathered at a family's home for chili, yummy desserts, games, and loud, loud, loud fellowship. (I did attend, so the latter is almost a given.) Thirty+ adults and kids squeezed into a living room and kitchen oh-so-tight, kids crawling under tables and over chairs and into laps, people spilling over onto couches and windowsills, balancing bowls of chili on their knees and yelling across the room for someone to bring them a napkin or another bowl of chili or a homemade rootbeer, because they're stuck between the table and couch and can't get out. A ridiculous game of Catchphrase in which my team was royally spanked, and of course the line-by-line replay of Nacho Libre by yours truly et al. :)

I still am humbled and amazed by the people that surround me every Sunday morning and evening. Humbled because I feel I don't deserve a community of friends that accepts me so willingly, openly, without hesitation. Amazed that God brought me to them at just the right time in my life, in a city of 1 million+.

And of course, since it is Thanksgiving week, I thought of more I'm thankful for...

...for community - in that I have found myself, in under 6 months of discovering Rosedale, part of a family that genuinely loves and looks out for each other; a group of people from different backgrounds, different styles of worship, different stories of faith - who come together and worship the Lord Jesus as one.

...for a church family that is interested, above all else, in pursuing God's will in their own individual lives and in the direction of the church as a whole.

...for people that accept the crazy, loud, fun-loving side of me and are perhaps a little crazy themselves too....at times...:o)

...for a God who gave His followers the Church, so that we can experience the presence of Christ here on earth, His unconditional love, His compassion, His sense of humor, His arms of comfort during times of sorrow, His shouts of joy during times of excitement. His hands and feet, still touching and walking among those of us left here on earth.

Familiarity.

I'm back at work for the night. Sitting at the little blue desk behind a fiberglass window, hello, what's your name, why is your child sick, sign here please, thank you.



I often think of the familiarity with which nurses treat the human body. And the utter trust that most people place in our hands, just because we have the letters "RN" behind our name on our badge. Complete strangers, trusting that we will do no harm, will work our best to bring their children back to complete health - or at least in a bit better shape than they were brought in.



I find myself holding hands, stroking forheads, patting backs, of children and anxious parents I was unaware existed minutes ago. Asking teenagers to allow me to ask them the most personal, embarrassing questions, to expose their awkward bodies to me, to divulge secrets even their best friends don't know. Listening and holding kleenex's out to parents as they pour out their stories to me, stories of abandonment and struggling as a single mom and the loss of trust between loved ones, even though I can't remember their first name, because I'm there and I ask and my vocation calls for compassion in all situations - and they understand that.



Some of favorite moments of work - those, "aha! this is why I'm a nurse" - come when I'm simply standing in a room next to a child, lying with eyes closed, lights darkened, or maybe even eyes open and staring up at me, those dark, lash-framed, slightly fearful yet trustful at the same time. I hold my stethescope up to their chest, or I slowly push a medicine through their IV that will relieve their pain or ease their breathing. Three or four minutes, nothing said between us, yet I can hear their raspy breaths, the hiccups of a child who's just finished a crying spell, the long tired sigh of a parent struggling to stay awake after sixteen or eighteen hours of caring for a sick child. Nursing opens the door for me to step into someone else's world, to accept that the relief of their pain and suffering is my responsibility - sometimes that responsibility can be heavy.

I also have decided, through my nursing work, that our culture is incredibly touch-deprived. Yes there is plenty of I'm-needy-touching of bodies, satisfy-my-needs-touching, make-me-feel-good-touching; an overload perhaps. But the focus of all of the above is me, me, me. That touch that says - I'm here, I care about you, I am present with you in your pain, in your good times, in your life - it is a rare person who knows how to employ that without any selfish ambition at all. With simply the desire to give hope and encouragement to that person. Just ask yourself - when was the last time that you were given a good, I-care-about-you-and-think-you're-great huge with anyone other than your significant other?

Being a nurse makes me think about all these things - about true compassion, the frailty of the human body, the need for empathetic touch. Nursing is an expression of Christ to the world, in a sense.

"Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience." "Finally, all of you, live in harmony with one another; be sympathetic, love as brothers, be compassionate and humble." "He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds."

"Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people. 24News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed, and he healed them."

It's easy for me, as a follower of Christ, to simply go to my job, do the motions, to reject the deeper meaning of my vocation. Yet then I have those quiet moments, almost like that moment in the movie Big Fish, where Ewan McGregor's character freezes the motion in the circus tent, brushes aside popcorn from in the air, and stares intently into the blue eyes of a fresh-faced girl, because he knows instinctively that this moment contains crucial meaning for his life. It's easy to let those moments flash past me.

Yet God is speaking to me through every person I care for - that meth-addicted mom screaming frustratedly at her toddler; the 16-year-old looking at me with empty eyes as she describes her rape; the chubby 5th-grader trying to catch his breath before the asthma catches him and ends him for good; they are all Jesus. He looks up at me with those empty eyes, walks past me in the hall, asks impatiently when he will be seen - asking me, Will you love me, in every shape, form, size, color, smell? Will you see me for who I really am?

Do you love Me?

Travelling Mercies.

I am infinitely blessed to have friends who are as much bookworms as I am, and will occasionally nudge me towards books I otherwise would not have picked up. Travelling Mercies by Anne Lamott is one of those books that certainly stretched my idea of "religious nonfiction."

First off, I have to say a few things: I love her hair. Someday, maybe when I am a little more liberated (or off in the boonies in Africa and just tired of dealing with my hair), I will get dreadlocks. Second, I briefly considered becoming Episcopalian/Anglican upon my return to the States after Sudan, but the kneeling/standing up/kneeling routine literally made me ill - not that that was a real reason for deciding against it, but I digress. I do wish my church did Communion every week though, as I do believe it's a Sacrament meant to be done frequently. However it is sometimes difficult to do anything with reverence in the church I attend, with 50+ inner city kids screaming and squirming. In saying that, I enjoy any books about people in the more liturgical churches, such as Lauren Winner's Girl Meets God, another one of my favorites.

Anne Lamott certainly has a way of expressing her faith in God, and her doubts, and her fears about motherhood and love, in ways that startle you, whip your head around, and listen. The friend who lent me the book told me before I started, "Just to warn you - she drops the f-bomb like nobody's business. She's just like, Hey, God, this is who I am and what I'm dealing with." And it is interesting to note that I couldn't find any of her books at Mardell's. Make the connection.

What is faith? What is spirituality? Who is God? Is he/she distant, absent, not caring about the world; does he have any interest in the fact that I'm suffering down here, surrounded by suffering, pain inside and out, living in a world gone terribly wrong? (can I even use the pronoun "She" to describe God without more traditional/conservative Christians accusing me of paganism? When Jesus himself describes himself in Matthew as a mother hen?)

I don't agree with all of her theology. But what is theology - simply my human attempt to describe God. For instance, I don't believe Buddhism is simply "another way of seeing God", or that it is simply, for the Buddhist, "the way he understands God." I can never get away from the God who said simply, in black in white, in human flesh, I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

But how do we relate to God? Lamott says the two best prayers you can ever pray are, "Thank you, thank you, thank you," and "Help me, help me, help me." (which certainly makes me feel better about my spiritual maturity, considering those are the two prayers I cry out the most!) Do I live my life as two selves - the self I give to God, allow him to make holy, to act in certain ways; and the self I keep to myself, the self I hold back, where once in a while those fleshly desires leap out at me from the depths that I refuse to let God plunge into.

God has a lot more grace than I give him credit for. Lamott describes in detail her alcoholism, abortion, unsuccessful love affairs, struggles to raise a son as a single mom, supporting numerous friends with cancer and AIDS and children with horrible chronic diseases. Not that I doubt God's ability to love someone out of horrible situations; no, it humbles me because I look at myself somtimes and doubt God's ability to redeem me. Then I remember Who I'm talking about.

He also wants more of me than I realize, and perhaps am willing to give.

Global Missions Health Conference 2008

I spent Thursday - Saturday this week absorbed into the fascinating, challenging, provoking world of community/public health, refugee/IDP crises, relief work, community development projects, evangelism, urban ministry......medical missions.

I joined 6 other Kansas Citians in a 8 hour drive to Louisville, KY to the Global Missions Health Conference held at Southeast Christian Church (aka Six Flags Over Jesus, per Dr Condra from Children's Mercy - no offense meant to anyone - but it IS a flippin' huge church). I don't even know how many thousands of people were at this conference - dozens of hour-long breakout sessions over topics like urban neighborhood transformation through community-based medical care, refugee health in Afghanistan, how to allocate limited resources in the mission field, how to be a medical missionary despite your student loans, community-based primary healthcare and how it reduces the under-five mortality rates in rural India, how to avoid dependence syndrome and promote sustainability in overseas medical projects.........

Yes, if your mind gets boggled just reading all of the above, imagine being completely immersed in it for 48 hours.

I loved every minute of it.

What was even better was the fact that every person in the conference, or at least the vast majority of them, were motivated by the fact that their relationship with a Compassionate Creator motivated them to work in transforming the spiritual and physical lives of people who are born in utter poverty in the darkest corners of the world - from Memphis, Tennessee to Kabul, Afghanistan.

High points -

• Meeting various relief workers who had been in Sudan and worked with my coworkers (the NGO world is really incredibly tiny)
• Listening to Dr Carl Taylor, Dr John Patrick, and Admiral Zeimer
• Hearing Dr Donlon speak about his work in inner city Memphis, providing low cost medical care to refugees and how his work positively impacted the development of skills the ministry workers later used in their long-term work in places like Somalia and Sudan
• Talking with the physician who will be leading the team to Afghanistan in May of which I will insha'allah be a member
• Receiving total confirmation from the Lord that - yes - Kansas City is where I want you to be right now; and yes - I am sending you to the mission field in the future; and yes - I want you to go back to school!!!

There were so many quotes, words of wisdom, practical resources, just information that was poured into me over the few days of the conference, I feel it's going to take me weeks to sort through it all and start applying towards my future and current work.

Maybe even just as incredible as all the speakers and lecturers was the group I went with. I cannot even begin to describe the comeraderie and unity of spirit in that group - despite our very diverse backgrounds and experiences, male and female, nurses and med student, frequent fliers and non-passport-holders, country music lovers and folk music lovers and rap music lovers (that becomes very crucial information when you are in a car for 8+ hours with someone!), Catholic and Protestant - it is amazing how the passion for the Lord and for his people joins such diverse people together, and how much you learn and grow when you open yourself up to new experiences and new friends. I loved it!!!!! :)

Needless to say, I am terribly excited about what God has for me. I have no idea what I'll be doing in 6 months, where I'll be living, if I'll still be a "night owl" or not, but I just long so much to draw closer to God and see him take me down an incredible path of faith.

Let's rock 'n' roll!!!!

the world fascinates me.

Limbo, limbo, limbo...

Tonight I took a journey down memory lane and went to Skate World with the elementary kids from Rosedale Church. Imagine about 50 four- to ten-year olds who have been skating maybe once before in their lives, all stumbling, shuffling, falling, shrieking out on the cold floor of the skating rink, loud Christian rock and rap music videos being played out, projected onto the concrete back wall, and the adult volunteers trying desperately to avoid wiping out with the one or two kids who are clinging to their arms and legs like barnacles to the side of a whale.

I have many, many fond memories of going to Skate City in Chanute, taking kids from Cherry Street, going myself in my neon-green-and-hot-pink roller blades with gel wheels!!! and always wanting to be on the skate racing team....yeah I still get yelled at in the skating rink for going too fast...Skating always feels so freeing, just gliding along in circles, movin' to the music, following the disco ball lights with your feet, playing limbo, falling flat on your face, laughing, getting back up, skating backwards, and just moving.

These kids from Rosedale Church were so fun to take skating. Lots of them had never been before, and I have to admit, as long as the kid doesn't knock himself out, it's hilarious to watch them skate around the rink, legs wobbly, arms flailing out in an attempt to keep their balance, shrieking with laughter when they collide with each other or the wall - I only saw one kid actually come off the rink crying. And I've decided that my new favorite thing in the world is those Fisher Price toddler skates - the ones that don't really roll, just kinda chink-chink-chink across the floor, and you don't really have to worry about the kid falling too awful much.

Sooooo in closing - I love roller skating. I think I should take it up as my new hobby.....

And I'm going to a three-day medical missions conference this week in Louisville, Kentucky this week! Going with a bunch of friends from church and work, we're road-trippin' it up there and back, and it is gonna be the bomb. I am pumped. Of course we're leaving Thursday morning at 8 am....and I work Wednesday night, 7 pm - 7 am....so I will be either delirious or comatose or both by the time we get there Thursday afternoon....woop woop for medical missions!!!

Logos.

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it..."

- John 1:1-5

Regardless of how many times I read this, it never fails to awe me with its simple statement of truth, fact, reality. Word = logos, reason; per Heraclitus, the rational principle that pervades human thought; the reason that rules the universe; the moment of beginning or root cause; genesis - the beginning.

The Word - Logos - was with God in the beginning...Jesus, the God-Man, as the Root Cause, the Beginning, the Rational Principle - embodied in vulnerable flesh and making his dwelling among us. And the world did not recognize him...

"He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him." (Jn 1:11). How tragic that a world, the kosmos of mankind, has become so twisted, strayed so far from true Reality that it does not welcome him, embrace him when he walks among us as one of us.

"...but in these last days, He has spoken to us by his Son...The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word." (Heb. 1:2-3).

Jesus, as the exact representation of the LORD, the embodiment in flesh of the Creator. If I truly desire to be a Christ-follower, an embodiment myself of Jesus and thus of God, how different would I live my life? Would I recognize this fragile shell as redeemed, transformed by the sacrifice of Christ, and now a holy representation of God himself?

In him was life....the One and Only Son, who is at the Father's side, has made the LORD known to the world.

Now do-si-do your partner round.....

Last night I had the first experience of my life with square dancing...

(don't they look like they're having fun???)

"Square dance is a folk dance with four couples (eight dancers) arranged in a square, with one couple on each side, beginning with Couple 1 facing away from the music and going counter-clockwise until getting to Couple 4. Couples 1 and 3 are known as the head couples, while Couples 2 and 4 are the side couples. Each dance begins and ends each sequence with "sets-in-order" in the square formation. The dance was first described in 17th century England but was also quite common in France and throughout Europe and bears a marked similarity to Scottish Country Dancing. It has become associated with the United States of America due to its historic development in that country. Nineteen U.S. states have designated it as their official state dance." (Wikipedia.com)


One of the guys from my church concocted a plan to take all the adult volunteers on a "fellowship night" to Raytown, MO to learn square dancing. I have to admit that although I love dancing, I was a little apprehensive about this. Mostly because,

a) I hate country music. I don't just mean, oh I don't like it very much; I mean I physically leave the room if a truly country song comes on. Yes I am prejudiced and I apologize and I give you permission to make fun of my favorite musical styles. I can handle a lil Hank Williams or Johnny Cash, mostly for its folk-music quality. But strains of Tim McGraw makes me want to vomit a lil in my mouth.

b) We were "requested" by Justin to wear plaid, cowboy boots and hats, or some other countrified apparatus to show our true affinity with - heck, I don't know, I guess the square dancers. I don't own plaid. Correction - I own one shirt with a very faint plaid-resembling pattern. No boots, no hat. I wore a black shirt and trouser jeans with ballet slippers and my amazing red-patterned scarf/shawl from Kassala, Sudan. I know, I'm such a bad sport.

c) Square dancing is a calling dance - meaning, they have a guy up front who calls out different moves and you're expected to immediately start moving in a specific pattern. I have serious problems with verbal directions - a big reason why I no longer do casino rueda salsa. Because when you mess up, you mess up the entire group of people dancing, and they start getting peeved looks on their faces, your partner furrows his brow and says, Ok, let's get it right now, and the whole situation is just awkward...

We finally arrived at the church after a false start at a different one (did we really think a church with a building and people that young would have square dancing???), and were immediately plunged into huge hoola-hoop-sized "fruffly" skirts, golden bloomers, panty-hose-enclosed legs ending in sturdy black orthopedic shoes, old men with hair slicked back with Aussie gel, scattered styrofoam cups stained with coffee and old pink lipstick, Wrangler pearl-snap mens' shirts stretched taut over potbellies, tappin' your toe, do-si-do, plain ol' good clean country fun.

I honestly don't know who had more fun - the eleven "teenagers" staring at the caller, trying to listen intently to the dance moves called out, clenching tightly the hand of whatever poor senior citizen was recruited to yank them through each dance move; or the gray-haired woman or man saying, Now go, that way, hold your hand out, stop, pass through, bow to your corner, no this way, no stay! Through half the dance, all of us collapsed in laughter, we at the fact we were so incompetent in our dancing skills and unable to keep a square "square", the older folks at the antics of those youngsters who would periodically break out a hip hop move or a disco hand when the beat suddenly struck us and we simply did whatever felt natural to us - which is certainly not to promenade or make a half-turn star.

All of us "teenagers" - that's what they kept calling us, teenagers, although none of us are under 21, but I suppose that when you're 75, anything under 30 looks like a high schooler to you! - all of us teenagers expressed amazement that by 10 pm, we were ready to keel over from exhaustion, while the older folks kept on dancing, dancing, dancing. Of course when you drink coffee constantly for the first 2 hours, you can handle pretty much anything that comes your way!

Over and over before we left, I heard from the older folks, You bring so much life to our dancing! And I would stop, and look over the room - on average, 50 years' difference between the people now holding each others' hands, laughing as they share a hilarious blunder on the younger's part. Really, we come from different worlds - the America they experienced and grew up in has now transformed into a totally different country. Some of those people may not even live to see the next President inaugerated. Yet what a beautiful thing when those differences are blurred and you discover that you share something with the grey-haired, wrinkly, smiling, bobbing lady next to you; a love of life.

Passionate Nomad

So I refuse to discuss American politics on my blog ... there are enough people out there to voice their more educated opinions so that I would have nothing original to add ... however foreign politics is different......

Speaking of foreign, I just finished a biography today of Freya Stark - an incredible traveller and writer of the Middle East.

Passionate Nomad, by Jane Fletcher Geniesse, is 300+ pages of pure adventure. Freya Stark was a woman born in the late 1800's who went on to travel independently in the Middle East, beginning in the 1920's, when women simply didn't do that. She spoke multiple Arabic dialects fluently, published dozen of books on Arabic history and culture and multiple travelogues, and worked to promote democracy in Iraq and Egypt during World War II. She stated often that her one great regret was that she "was not born a beauty"; but Freya more than made up for that with her adventures of crossing uncharted desert territory with a few donkeys and Arab servants, playfully sweet talking guards into letting her through closed borders, and keeping up a constant communique of all her travels with friends and family at home. Yemen, Iraq, Egypt, Lebanon, Afghanistan - she knew the Middle East like the back of her hand.

What was interesting to me about this book was the picture of the Middle East during the early 1900's that emerged, and the history lessons taught through Freya's travels. It was also revealing to read about Britain's decline as the world's great superpower, and how America firmly grasped that role following WWII. I really do wonder at how America so quickly forgot the occupation that gave birth to our Revolution, and now feels very little regret over instituting its own occupation of foreign lands. Maybe - just maybe - that will change. (And that's as close as I'm coming.......).

This was especially inspiring to me because her life as a traveller and writer really didn't start until she was in her late 20's - and even then, she really found her niche in her post-40 years. She was also single, except for a brief unsucessful attempt at marriage in her late 50's (The man was homosexual, so it's really no wonder it didn't work out). Of course reading it made me want to jump on a plane and run away to Jordan, or Syria or Lebanon, or at least take a look at the Egyptian pyramids, for crying out loud. My time will come...

Nicaragua Travel Tips...

Since I profess to be a frequent wanderer of the world ... I wander in my mind a lot too but that's a different post ... I thought I'd give you fellow travellers some quick tips on my recent trip to Nicaragua.

Our first and last nights in Managua, we stayed at the Best Western Las Mercedes. It is literally right across the street from Augusto C. Sandino International Airport. It's $85/night for a double. Rooms were clean; most of the staff spoke English; they had free Nicaraguan coffee in the lobby and a great breakfast buffet. The hotel isn't one building with a bunch of rooms inside; it's really a collection of small rows of rooms, connected by covered walkways that fortunately protect you from the rain, and if you wander around lost trying to find your way back to your room (like I did), you at least get to enjoy small gardens that show off Nicaraguan flora. There are also two pools on the grounds - we tried them both out and they were great.

In Rio Blanco, we stayed at Hotel Bosawas. One small room with two twins and A/C and a bathroom w/shower and running water costs about $15/night. Sheets and pillows provided were clean. It's set on the edge of town, so it's pretty quiet, and it has a great view of the town and surrounding mountains. There's a small bar on the premises, and the owners love to play bachata music loudly through the night. The center courtyard was all torn up and gutted while we were there - it looked like a Roman achaeological dig. Sorry I don't have contact information for the hotel - I'm too lazy to dig the numbers out of my travel gear packed away.....

On our way to Granada, we stopped at Mombacho Volcano and did a canopy tour on ziplines. It took about an hour and a half, cost $23, and was more than worth it. Nothing like hanging 100 feet above the ground with only a metal cable and harness between you and the sky. :) You can even convince the tour guides to let you do the zip line upside down or belly down Superman-style. To get to the zipline course, the guides drive you up the side of the volcano through beautiful rain forest trees and coffee plants. While on the zip line and on the platforms, you can look out over Granada and the surrounding area - incredible views. The reservation also offers a 3-hour hiking tour and other activities, although we only had time for the canopy tours.

Granada itself - we basically stopped in the historical square, ate at Mona Lisa Pizza Shoppe, bought a few trinkets from the sidewalk vendors of "folk handicrafts", and then left. I wasn't too horribly impressed with what I saw - including a street show of a giant woman puppet and a midget man acting out a blow job; the boys who afterward emerged from their costumes and went around with a hat asking for money didn't get any donations from me for that performance. I think they were the same 10-year-olds I had seen earlier in the day lounging against the side of a building smoking a joint and making kissing faces at me when I walked by....

On our way back to Managua, we stopped at Masaya at the marketplace, and the shopping there was fantastic. Tons of touristy handicrafts, clothing, paintings, pottery, coffee, cigars, leather shoes and bags, and tons and tons of hammocks. Definitely the place to go if you like shopping.

Things to buy while in Nicaragua -

Coffee (hint - most of the tourist places want to sell you fancy-looking bags of coffee wrapped up in burlap sacks for $8/lb; just go across the street to the local grocery store and you can pick up the same quality of coffee for $2.50/lb.

Hammocks - the quality and durability of Nicaraguan hammocks is proved by the fact that everywhere you go, you see Nics enjoying the evening breeze on their hammocks. You can pick up one for anywhere between $15-30 in the marketplaces.

Textiles - the marketplaces had beautiful blankets, bags, scarves, etc with ethnic designs, not too expensive.

Pottery - think Mayan.........

Last night was Rosedale Church's Halloween Bash. I swear there is nothing cuter than kids running arounda gym, boys with funky superhero masks over their heads, carrying too-big swords, or girls with pink frilly princess dresses on, tottering around in heels and carrying their magic wands to "make your wishes come true!" And of course getting all hyped-up on pure refined sugar!

It was also amazing to see the Body of Christ come together. We had dozens of volunteer adults, many of them coming in their own amazing costumes (yours truly included!) and chasing after kids, giving out candy, making sure the whole bash came off fantastically. All for the love of kids and Jesus.

It made me laughingly remember my Halloweens - or lack thereof - when I was growing up as a kid. I have distinct memories of dressing up until I was about 5 or 6 years old - costumes included Batwoman and a detective - and then Halloween was labelled "evil" and no longer celebrated. Instead we dutifully trampled off to the church's "Harvest Party" - conveniently held on Halloween night in order to give good Christians an alternative to trick-or-treating and whose requirements included coming dressed as a Bible character - or staying home with my parents and siblings, closing the drapes and shutting off all the lights so no kids would come to our door asking for candy, and watching Apocalypse and end-times themed Christian movies from the 80's. Which, by the way, are just as scary as some of Halloween's entertainments for a 10-year-old with a hyper imagination.

It really does make me laugh to remember it all - not in a mocking or derogatory way, but just that my experiences are so drastically different than many of the kids we saw last night. Some of the kids didn't have costumes - not because their parents were morally opposed to Halloween but because they didn't have the money, or were working too many hours to take their kids shopping for costumes, or simply didn't care enough to make the effort.

Because I am still very much in touch with my inner child, I absolutely relish in Halloween. The imaginations of children is something I think should be encouraged freely; the idea that today, you are a superhero out to save the world, or you are the most beautiful princess in the universe, or you are a slimy scary spider - the idea that kids can act as something else or become something else helps them explore the world they live in. Not to even mention they are too dang cute in their snug-as-a-bug costumes; especially the babies with their fat cheeks poking out of the face hole of some caterpillar onesie.

Let the kids dress up, for crying out loud!!!