My buddy, Sterling, is having surgery today. As you may recall, he’s had surgery before.
I’d like to ask you to join me in praying for him, his parents and family and his doctors.
In case you can’t read the picture above, here’s some things you can pray for:
1. No vision loss.
2. No loss of movement/weakness on left side.
3. Total removal of the tumor.
4. Seizures to cease.
5. Vital signs and total health.
I am extremely thankful for advances in modern medicine and science that makes this type of surgery possible. I am also thankful for the team of medical professionals who are bringing all of their experience, training and expertise to bear on Sterling’s case. However, I am most thankful that I serve the Great Physician who is able to heal our souls as well as our bodies. I’m asking Him for the miraculous. After all, that’s what He’s best at.
Wow! 21 comments over just three days on a post that is almost five months old is definitely a record for us here at Enigmatic Meanderings. I don’t quite think it was the goal that my brother was shooting for. However, since dusting this thing off has been something I’ve wanted to do for awhile, I guess we’ll go ahead and call it a win.
So… Craig, Heather, Lori, Ronda, Kristi, Shane, Amy, Mom, Teofilo, DUDA, Dad, Ramsey, Kimberly, Tarik, Jane, Sarandipity, Taffy, and lk (is this really Lori with a different email address trying to up the number of comments?) this one’s for you.
1. I’ve never been to Boston, and I like going place I’ve never been before. Actually, there’s a chance I went to Boston on a trip in the fifth grade, but I don’t remember it. So, it doesn’t count.
2. I need a vacation. Yes, I meant to use the word “need” and not the word “want.” I feel selfish and guilty taking a vacation. Most of you probably don’t feel that way about vacations, which means you have less psychological issues than I do, or at least different ones.
3. I’ll get to hang out with some guys that I don’t hang out with enough. Namely this guy and this guy. Plus another guy I don’t know yet.
4. I’ll see the Red Sox play at Fenway park. All of my friends into sports tell me this is something men should do. I’m a man. At least, I like to think so. Therefore, I’m doing it. Bonus: I hear there’s a big, green monster. Awesome!
5. We Kinsleys are supposedly of Irish descent. Well, if I’m not going to Ireland, isn’t Boston the next best thing?
6. I’ll start rebuilding my level of skymiles. Isn’t that what life is all about?
7. I get to put my new iPad to the travel test. Here’s hoping it passes.
I really don’t have that much else to say about this. So, let’s just chalk this whole post up to easing back into the blogosphere.
This is a pretty picture of pesto, but is not a picture of the actual pesto about which this post is written.
My friends Brandi and Shane are in the middle of adopting their daughters and bringing them home from Ukraine. Adoption in general is pretty expensive. International adoption in particular can really be a strain on a young family’s budget. So, some people decided it would be cool to host a benefit in their honor.
Liza was part of the team organizing everything. They had a meeting where, amongst various other topics, they discussed what food to serve as the dinner. It was decided that there would be a pasta bar with different sauces. Liza volunteered me (notice who volunteered who) to make a pesto sauce because, “Chris makes a really good pesto sauce.”
Now, I should clarify Liza’s ringing endorsement of my pesto-production-prowess. There was this one time that we were having people over, and I decided to make lamb chops and a mint-basil pesto with which to garnish them. That’s it. However, in the mind of my ever-affirming wife, that means that I make a really good pesto sauce.
Anyway, despite the fact that I have never, EVER made a pesto sauce for past, I was more than willing to give it a try. I scoured the internet for pesto recipes (which basically means I went to foodnetwork.com, searched “pesto,” clicked on “Giada De Laurentiis” and scanned the results for something I thought would be easy). I found two I liked the sound of and decided to combine them into one mega-recipe. I made a list of needed ingredients for Liza who was kind enough to volunteer to go to the grocery store for me, and that was that.
Yesterday, the day of the benefit, I sat out to make the sauce. My combined recipe (planned out to be enough sauce for 40 people) called for five 10 ounce packages of frozen spinach. These packages had been thawed but I needed to basically squeeze as much of the moisture from them as I could. I grabbed one of the packages to begin and tore it open. What stared back at me was not frozen spinach but frozen broccoli. In fact, three of my five packages were frozen broccoli.
This was just a slight oversight on Liza’s part, but I panicked. I didn’t know what to do. So, I just pressed forward, throwing all kinds of things together in a food processor, adjusting ingredients as I made each batch and praying that it would turn out okay.
Evidently it did. A number of people have said how much they liked it and some extremely kind and flattering souls have even requested the recipe.
I give all of you this backstory to let you know that I don’t really have a recipe. I started with two from Giada (I love you, Giada), but things only devolved from there. However, I’m going to attempt to give you all the recipe here. I would encourage you, though, to experiment with it yourself until you get what you like.
Primo Pesto
Recipe for 8 servings
Ingredients needed:
1 (10 oz.) package frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed almost dry
1 (4 oz.) can artichoke arts, drained
½ cup pine nuts
½ cup slivered almonds
1 cup grated parmesan cheese
¾ cup fresh parsley, packed down
¼ cup fresh basil, packed down
½ cup chicken broth
½ cup extra virgin olive oil
½ teaspoon freshly ground pepper
½ teaspoon kosher salt
1 lemon, zested and juiced
4 cloves of garlic, roasted and peeled
1. Toast the pine nuts and almonds in a single layer in a large skillet over medium heat until fragrant, about 3-5 minutes. Stir occasionally throughout.
2. In a food processor, combine pine nuts, almonds, parmesan cheese, garlic, artichoke hearts salt and pepper. Pulse blend a few times.
3. Add spinach, basil, parsley and lemon. Blend on low a few moments. Then add chicken broth and blend on high.
4. Slowly pour in the olive oil while continuing to blend until smooth.
5. Serve with pasta, chicken, bread, lamb, whatever.
She burst on the scene on October 26, 1996, one daughter in a litter of puppies born to parents Littlest Rebel and Bonnie Abigail. She first entered my life a few weeks later, in early December of that year.
I remember sitting in the kitchen and my dad bringing her in. She was so little and so white. I had done a lot of research and basically convinced my parents that a West Highland White Terrier, or Westie for short, was the type of dog we should get. However, I wasn’t expecting them to get one so soon. But they did, and it was love at first sight.
We’d been a dog family for as long as I could remember. I loved all animals, but dogs in particular. At the time I was a senior in high school and worked part-time at a veterinary office, Ridgetowne Animal Hospital. I had unfortunately been involved in a terrible accident at the vet’s office that had resulted in the death of our most recent pet at that time. That experience had really torn me up. I carried around a lot of guilt about it (still do, actually). His loss had really wounded my heart. However, when she looked at me and I held her for the first time, I felt those wounds begin to heal.
I don’t remember the conversation exactly, but we had a round-table summit in our kitchen that resulted in granting our new dog the inconceivably ridiculous name of Www.mistletoe.com Kinsley. To most people, thankfully, she was known simply as Missy. To Liza and me she’ll always be THE Missy Dog.
Even though she was a family dog, I honestly always considered Missy mine. She and I just seemed to share some kind of special bond from the beginning. At times, this caused some trouble in the house. Missy got into this routine where she would get so excited whenever I walked in the house from being away somewhere that she would urinate wherever she was. Thankfully, this was normally on the kitchen tile and not the living room carpet.
I like to think that Missy cared just as much especially for me. I know that she was very protective of me. A few years after we got her, when Liza and I started dating, we would sometimes go hang out at my parents’ house. Somehow, Missy knew that Liza was really special to me, unlike any of the other girls I had brought home before. She wasn’t sure she cared very much for this new development. Anytime Liza and I sat on the couch, Missy would rush to get beside me before Liza could sit down, or she would wiggle herself down to squeeze in between us. She’d then look up at Liza and let out a low growl, just to let the newcomer know to whom I really belonged.
Missy was never much of a barker. That doesn’t mean she wouldn’t do it, but she didn’t do it much. Instead, she would talk. You may think I’m kidding, but I’m not. Of course, she didn’t really form words, but she would open her mouth and just make noises in this whiny, singsong voice. I learned to mimic her, and there were times where we’d sit around and just have a conversation, neither one really saying anything but both of us understanding the other completely.
While I was in college and my brother and sister were still in high school, they each acquired dogs of their own. My sister had a miniature pekepoo named Baby Dog and my brother a lab named Bailey. Everyone joked that the three dogs each took on the personality of their owners. I won’t describe here what how that played out for Baby or Bailey, but for Missy, it mostly meant that she got annoyed with the other two and often wandered off to find a place where she could be by herself in peace.
Missy didn’t initially come with me when I moved to Birmingham. After all, she was technically a family dog, plus Liza really didn’t consider herself that much of a dog person. However, when my parents decided to move to Africa, I knew that there was no place else she should be than with Liza and me.
While we were making plans for Missy to move to the ‘Ham, Liza made it very clear that she had no intention of taking care of a dog. She would say, “Missy is your dog, Chris. You’re going to have to take care of her. You’re going to feed her. You’re going to walk her. You’re going to clean up her messes. You’re going to bathe her. She’s yours, not mine.” Of course it wasn’t two weeks after Missy got here that she had won over Liza (as she did everyone), and the two of them had formed a little alliance. I quickly realized that I had unknowingly become outmatched in my own house.
Those of you who haven’t had pets and aren’t really that into dogs probably can’t comprehend how greatly a person can care for an animal. But let me tell you, it’s a lot. Many of you know the difficulty Liza and I experienced in trying to have a child. As absurd as it sounds, Missy really filled that void in our lives in a lot of ways. I think especially for Liza. Whenever she calls Missy her “baby,” on some level, she’s not kidding.
Of course, Liza did eventually get pregnant. While we were eagerly anticipating Story’s arrival, we were also trying to assuage our fears, ease our worries and find out as much as we could to prepare ourselves. One of our chief concerns was for Missy. We knew that she had been the “princess” in the household and had long received all of our affection and attention, and now she was about to have to face some major challenges. Once Story was born we would send blankets that she had been wrapped in home with people to place in Missy’s kennel so that Story’s smell would be familiar to her. Then the day we got to come home from the hospital, we made a big deal about getting to introduce them to each other for the first time. Story was asleep in her carrier. So we brought her inside, set her in the middle of the living room floor and then brought Missy over to her. Missy just sniffed at Story once, turned away, walked off, jumped up on her spot on the couch, and laid down. She wasn’t interested.
However, Story eventually won Missy over and vice versa. From the moment we knew about Story, I kept telling Liza that one of the things that pained me the most was thinking that she would probably never remember Missy. I can’t describe to you how much I hate knowing that has come true.
Missy has been slowly fading for a while. She started sleeping a lot more than she used to. She couldn’t quite make it around the block an entire time when we went for walks together. Her hearing had started to go, and she sometimes didn’t eat very much. I haven’t heard her “talk” in months.
She stopped eating sometime last week. She started being sick to her stomach a lot and lost four pounds in about as many days (which is a lot for a dog her size). We took her to the vet to get checked out on Tuesday and the news wasn’t good. Her blood work showed that her kidneys were not working the way that they should be and that toxins were building up in her blood stream as a result. So, we’ve been taking her in for treatment every day this week where she’s received fluids, medicine and special food, all in an effort to cleanse her system and see if we couldn’t jump start her kidneys to start working at least a little better. Today the Dr. ran the same tests he did Tuesday and the results weren’t any better. In fact, they were worse. Knowing that her kidneys weren’t improving and were actually continuing to decline after four days of treatments specifically for them meant that there was not any hope left, especially with her age. And we didn’t want her to suffer as her systems just continued to shut down.
So, Liza, Story and I went by the vet this afternoon to say, “goodbye,” and let her know how much we loved her. At about 4:07 I held her while they gave her a shot through her IV. She went to sleep in my arms as I stroked her fur, and after just a moment, her heart stopped and mine broke.
She was a dog, but she wasn’t just a dog.
I loved her and miss her and will always.
Many of you did, do and will too.
Thank you.
The Missy Dog ~ October 26, 1996-March 26, 2010 ~ The Preciousness
People are not just frightened, but genuinely fearful of the most amazing things. Things like the following:
Anglophobia- Fear of England or English culture.
Deipnophobia- Fear of dining or dinner conversations.
Ephebiphobia- Fear of teenagers.
Hellenologophobia- Fear of Greek terms or complex scientific terminology.
Metrophobia- Fear of poetry.
Sinistrophobia- Fear of things to the left or left-handed.
Zemmiphobia- Fear of the great mole rat.
I’m not making that last one up. Google it.
Of course there are many, many, many more. We all know (and possibly even share) some of the more common ones. Fear of the dark. Fear of loud noises. Fear of enclosed spaces. Fear of spiders. Fear of clowns. However, I don’t think we’d necessarily count these as the real biggies, those fears that, if we give any real consideration to, whatsoever, we’ll end up losing sleep over.
You know the ones I’m talking about.
Fear of ridicule.
Fear of pain.
Fear of death.
Fear of insanity.
Fear of insignificance.
You might even share what, up until recently, would have been my answer to this post’s leading question.
Fear of failure.
So, what happened recently that caused this to stop being my greatest fear? Well, I’m glad you asked.
The simple answer is that I read a book, specifically The War of Art by Steven Pressfield (he wrote The Legend of Bagger Vance). It’s a book about winning your inner creative battles, of which I have many, most of which I seem to lose. So, this book was helpful, helpful like a root canal or invasive surgery or a back-waxing is helpful.
In one particular chapter aptly entitled “Fear” Pressfield revealed to me the fact that failure was not my greatest fear. He accomplished this by making me aware of a greater, deeper fear I’ve held for who-knows-how long without even realizing it. After listing out more of our very real, deep-seeded fears than I have here, he wrote the following on pp. 142-143.
These are serious fears. But they’re not the real fear. Not the Master Fear, the Mother of all Fears that’s so close to us that even when we verbalize it we don’t believe it.
Fear That We Will Succeed.
That we can access the powers we secretly know we possess.
That we can become the person we sense in our hearts we truly are.
This is the most terrifying prospect a human being can face, because it ejects him at one go (he imagines) from all the tribal inclusions his psyche is wired for and has been for fifty million years.
We fear discovering that we are more than we think we are. More than our parents/children/teachers think we are. We fear that we actually possess the talent that our still, small voice tells us. That we actually have the guts, the perseverance, the capacity. We fear that we truly can steer our ship, plant our flag, reach our Promised Land. We fear this because, if it’s true, then we become estranged from all we know. We pass through a membrane. We become monsters and monstrous.
We know that if we embrace our ideals, we must prove worthy of them.
Pressfield closes out the chapter by asking the simple but loaded question, “Do you believe me?”
Now, if I’m honest, I have to admit that, in the time I’ve been mulling over this, I probably haven’t run it through all of the Biblical and theological filters that I should. But, in answer to his question, I think I have to say, “Yes. Yes I do.”
Mission statements became all the rage a couple of decades ago.
They’ve fallen out of fashion a little bit, not that they’ve disappeared all together. They’re just not given quite as much prominence as they once were.
Regardless, I’ve been trying to think what my personal mission statement might be.
Sure, it would be easy (and even appropriate) to go with a Bible verse, but I’m trying to think through it on a much more specific level.
Right now I’m coming up blank, though.
This has me concerned… very concerned.
I’m not sure if it should, but it does.
But you don’t want to hear about that, do you?
Instead, I’m wondering if I might hear from you.
Do you have a personal mission statement? What is it? Does it even matter?
So, the past couple of posts that I actually published here were about Haiti. I figure it only appropriate that this one be as well.
I’ve been continuing to try to figure out just how I can help the people of Haiti. Of course I pray and give but I want to do more. I’m even considering going. Maybe you’d like to join me. At the very least I want to let you know about something else that people are doing and that you have the opportunity to be a part of.
I figured that the outpouring of support would end pretty quickly following a week or two after the devastating earthquake that hit Haiti on January 12. However, here we are a little over a month later, and, while I’m certain that donations have probably slowed, there are still some people actively working in Haiti and others who continue to see what they can do to raise awareness, funds and supplies for the ongoing relief effort there. Right now there’s a group of youth ministry bloggers there with Adventures in Missions. They went to survey what was happening, make connections and help out wherever they could. And they’re seeing some incredible things. You can find out more about it here.
I previously wrote about how you could help tremendously simply by giving to Compassion International’s disaster relief fund (which you can still do). I now want to let you know about something else that Compassion is doing. Shaun Groves (a great songwriter and musician who works with Compassion Bloggers and whom I’ve written about before) has been working tirelessly to see if he couldn’t make something big happen to help Haiti. His idea has been to host a concerts in two different cities to raise awareness and money for Compassion’s efforts in Haiti and to simulcast those concerts. It’s a big idea, especially considering the time-frame in which he has wanted to pull it off.
Well, a number of people have caught Shaun’s vision and joined him and making this idea a reality. The result is Help Haiti Live. Here’s the skinny.
It’s not just Shaun and these artists that have come together to make this happen. This whole thing is being made possible through the effort of numerous other individuals and corporations who all care deeply about the plight of the people of Haiti and who see Compassion’s work there as essential and effective and want to help equip them further with what they need to continue releasing the children of Haiti from poverty in Jesus’ name.
All money raised in response to the Haiti earthquake will be used immediately to re-equip Compassion’s local support structure and to provide for the immediate needs of Compassion-assisted children and families.
Compassion has been meeting the physical and spiritual needs of Haitians for more than forty years and will continue to serve them in this time of extreme need. Already Compassion International has supplied more than 15,000 families with clean water, food, blankets, temporary shelter, medical supplies and counseling. Donations will lay bricks, feed, educate, clothe, heal and rebuild Haiti for many months to come.
Compassion International is the world’s largest Christian child development organization that permanently releases children from poverty. Founded in 1952, Compassion successfully tackles global poverty one child at a time, serving more than 1 million children in 26 of the world’s poorest countries. Recognizing that poverty is more than a lack of money, Compassion works holistically through local churches to address the individual physical, economic, educational and spiritual needs of children, enabling them to thrive, not just survive. Charity Navigator, America’s largest charity evaluator, has awarded Compassion its highest rating “four stars” for eight consecutive years.
So don’t let the opportunity pass you by to join this great group of people in helping some others who could really use it. Just because a month has passed, don’t think that the need is any less great, any less vital, any less urgent.
I’ve written about Aaron Iveybefore and how I not only greatly love and respect him as a person but also as an artist and activist. I think his latest album is fantastic, and one of my favorite cuts is “Amos Story.”
Perhaps it’s that while Liza and I haven’t adopted yet, we share Aaron and Jamie‘s passion for adoption. Maybe it’s because I’ve been able to watch their journey with Amos and Story from afar and have been continuously blessed to be reminded of the faithfulness of God they’ve experienced along the way. It could be that our daughters share the same name (which I might have subconsciously stolen from him, though I really don’t think that’s what happened). Whatever the reason, this song has touched me as one who’s an adopted heir of our Abba Father, as a parent, as a (hopefully and prayerfully) future adoptive parent, and as just a human being.
Today Amos is still in Haiti. He’s relatively okay following all of the destruction his native country has experienced from the earthquake last week. However, I can’t imagine how much more he wants now to be home with his Papa and Mama and brothers and sister. I also can’t imagine how much Aaron and Jamie want him home. You can find out more about Amos and Story as well as the rest of the Ivey’s over at Aaron’s site. But at the very least, please pray for them and for Amos and that their family might finally be united together soon.
Today Aaron posted the music video for “Amos Story,” and I wanted to make sure I shared it with all of you. Be sure to click over to his site and let him know how much you like it.
I’m a little late to the ball game here but this is too important to let pass by.
Unless you’ve been completely out of touch you know that Haiti was hit by a 7.0 earthquake Tuesday, a catastrophe whose epicenter was right around the capital, Port Au Prince.
Government buildings have collapsed. Hospitals have collapsed. Hotels have collapsed. Grocery stores have collapsed. The U.N. headquarters has collapsed. Thousand of homes have been destroyed. The airport is in disarray. Hundreds of thousands are dead and more are homeless.
All of this in a nation that is the poorest in the western hemisphere where two-thirds already live in abject poverty many on less than $2-a-day.
I have friends who have and are adopting from Haiti. They’ve both been able to hear that their children are okay. However, thousands of children are not.
I have friends who havehad the privilege to visit Haiti. They’ve walked the streets, slept in the hotels, ate the food and been blessed by the people. They can’t get them out of their minds.
There are people I respect immediately there who are literally serving as first responders in a country that basically has none.
James 1:27 reads “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”
The world is full of orphans and widows in distress. Right now Haiti is full of them. You are called by almighty God to look after them.
For those of you who know me or have been readers of this blog for any amount of time you know that I love Compassion International and the work they’re doing around the world to release children from poverty in Jesus’ name.
• $35 helps provide a relief pack filled with enough food and water to sustain a family for one week.
• $70 gift helps care for their needs for two weeks.
• $105 helps provide relief packs filled with enough food and water to sustain two families for two weeks.
• $210 gift helps care for two families’ needs.
• $525 helps provide relief packs filled with enough food and water to sustain 10 families for two weeks.
• $1,050 gift helps care for 10 families’ needs.
• $1,500 helps rebuild a home.
• $2,100 helps supply 20 families with the basics for three weeks.
Actually, scratch that. I don’t want you to consider giving. I want you to give.
Compassion’s work in Haiti is run by Haitians. The cream of the crop in Haiti. They don’t have to send people in. They have people there. They are in the right position to make a difference there right now.
There are a lot of people out there warning you to be weary of who you give money to, to make sure that it is actually going to help those in Haiti. Maybe it’s good enough for you that you’ll just take my word for it that Compassion is the real deal and that you can trust him. But if that’s not enough (I don’t take it personally) then check them out over at Charity Navigator.
Chris Kinsley is... Husband to Liza, Father to Story, Friend to the Missy Dog, thinker, writer, speaker, procrastinator, lover of God and people and the Content Creator at Student Life. He also enjoys canoeing and carpentry and reading and traveling. There's more, but you're probably bored already. And we don't want that. Now do we?
