jamie's wanderings

      When I was a child, I was told the stories of my grandparents conversion to Protestantism from Catholicism. They later told me how the Catholic church had been dead, with no life, and no hope. Seventy Five years later, the world has changed, and many things for the worse, and others for the better. Since 2013 I have followed and read Pope Francis's thoughts and words as well as even more, his actions to show the world that there is another way. His massive empahsis on mercy and compassion, caring for the least of these in Jesus' name impacted me greatly. Partially, this all touched me more, as in a moment of walking through what my own faith means and what it means to daily practice it, has been in complete upheaval. Those in my past that I thought believed, I have seen through their lives and actions that power was more important that service. That control meant more than compassion and mercy. And that the Gospel to them was correct theology believed, held and prea...

 Last night, we sat at our table and had food, wine and a long talk with an old friend. He's one of the few that have stayed with us for the last 15 years or so. Partly because Granada is such a transitory town, we have had so many come and go, but some still live here and have come and gone as well We laughed, cried, told stories, got all shocked, and sat together late into the night. At one point my friend says, can I have a glass and water, and as they drank, they said, OMGosh why is this so good? I, for my kidney, double filter my water, and it does make it taste good, but I'm so used to it, I had forgotten. As I sipped again, I thought, wow, it is good. And I remember the old words that Jesus stood and said about being the bread of life and the water that makes us never thirst again. Last week I went to a local wine festival, and sat with another old friend and drank and laughed and cried together. For the last taste of wine, we went to one of the stands, and after having ...

 At 1pm this past Monday, after showing a lovely countryside home and property, I popped into the local Lidl to buy one of their cold protein coffees. It was almost lunchtime but I still had at least 35 minutes home in the car. A man waved at me and said Nop, no power. We are trying to get generators up and running but not yet. I stepped outside puzzled. My phone buzzed, Sofi, anxious that there was no power in her flat, thought her bill was unpaid. Michelle buzzed me too, asking if our power was out. The panic started to rise. I called Andrew, once, twice, three times straight to voicemail. I sent messages to Sofi to see if she could talk to him. He did eventually send me messages as I hurried to my car, started it and sped off back home. While listening to my car radio, I realized that this, was not just Granada province, but all of Spain. My mind went where everyones did at one point during the day, was this an attack? Cyber? Nuclear? And later, Andrew mumbled at one point about...

This blog has woven past experiences with current ones of my life here in Spain. However, today's reflection is more of what is going on right now, right here, and how in the midst of it, I am looking to make sense of it with the lens of the Ancient Prayer, The Lord's Prayer. Many of you who read this have confessed to me that you do not believe as I do, and that's ok, but I find the need to express these thoughts below and I invite you to reflect on them with me.  One of the most powerful pieces of Scripture for me is when Jesus responds to the question how do we pray? The ancient words go something like this Our Father, who lives in heaven, holy is your name. May your kingdom come, and your will be done, here on earth as it is in heaven. Give us our daily bread. Help us to forgive others as you have forgiven us. Don't let us fall into temptation,  but! Deliver us from Evil. For yours is the kingdom, all the power, and all the glory are yours. Amen Praise, petition for...

 Last week, the little family from the East and I looked at an apartment, and for 6 days the owners hemmed and hawed about if they were going to help a family in distress or not. The answer finally came, no. I put out feelers, distress SOS, someone I've only spoken to on the phone in smooth Granada Spanish in a deep voice sent me a voice message, Jamie, call Maria Angeles, she's got a place. The little family of four, and myself found ourselves yesterday on the sidewalk outside a tall building. Good location, lots of shops, cafes, bars, parks, buses and metro. 15 minutes walk to the cafe they are running. And before the family joined us, I knew the owner was open to having immigrants. We saw the flat, 2 baths, 4 bedrooms, big living room and a little balcony/terrace to stretch out in after a long day of running the cafe. Heat to keep them warm, aircon to cool, not as much light as would be nice, but everything was well kept. I knew it was theirs when Maria Angeles said, do you ...

 One of the amazing things of growing up as an adult here in Spain, is the two points of view that I'm granted. I'm from one world, but since I was 26 years old, I have lived in another. I live with two Jamies, one that speaks Spanish a little accented one way and another depending on my feelings, sometimes all day long, and another one that speaks clipped Chicago English, especially after I've been on the phone with my brother. I have two points of view and sometimes they don't always live happily together. But one thing that remains steadfast, is that I believe. I believe in God, what we call the mystery that we can only view as a mound that is covered by by a large blanket. I believe He loves us so much, He sent His son to make things simple to us stupid people. But we are also created in His image and to love Him is to love those around us. The immigrant, for one. I've been one, and technically I still am a long term resident of a country I pay taxes and social ...

 The last two weeks have been like seeing a car accident every morning and not being able to look away. Andrew and I have a new house rule, no speaking of current political events until we both have coffee in our hands in the morning. We find ourselves reading, talking, disecting and wondering at what is going to happen next. Someone wrote on their wall on Facebook that they had interacted with AI about the teachings of Jesus and if they were compatible with Christian Nationalism. AI said no. I have always been deeply facinated with politics. My Juinor year of high school, we did video school (before online stuff existed) and my civics class was fascinating as we learned about how the US government worked. The teacher was passionate about the subject and we who watched it became intrigued as well. But the longer I live, and live away from the US, the less I understand. I told a client yesterday that it used to be a law that the Brits weren't permitted to vote after living 15 years ...

 Someone confessed to me last night, I used to be a youth pastor. I responded with, Me too. And we swapped a few details and didn't really need to say much, even though as I do, I probably said too much, because it wasn't needed and we saw each other. Something to the effect of, how could the church have so many empty rooms 99% of the time while the homeless underneath the very sign went without love and help? After the conversation I cried. Yet again. As Uncle Peter says, the plot sickens. I could go on and on about former classmates who went out guns ablazing into the mision field. And got kicked out, run out, burnt out. Or like I heard last week, yet another pastor friend of mine quit. Nothing immoral, nothing really wrong, but no one could agree and he said, this isn't the Gospel I was taught and preach, and left. So many of us have gone, left, faded into the wordwork, pivoted, changed, reinvented ourselves. Walked away. The current lingo is, deconstructed. Some merely ...

This weeks writing has been more focused in an end of the year, thanksgiving note to those that pray and still financiall support us. The list of the former has dwindeled over the years, but it still important nonetheless. Here is a bit that I wrote, not all but some. Yesterday, Andrew took his scooter over to the hospital next door and sat with Sarah, an English widow who hires Andrew to translate for her and her doctors during her medical visits for a chronic disease. After experiencing a number of health crisis in the last month, Andrew spent two hours with her and her doctors to arrange meds, treatment and tests. Afterwards they had a coffee and talked at length. She has had some difficult health and personal issues lately and to thank us for our support and help, she gave us a little holiday package of chocolates and a beautiful card. Later that afternoon, I drove up to visit an elderly English man, who is now confined to a wheelchair. He has lived and worked all over the world, a...

 This week is one fraught with emotion, between the events in Valencia last week of super mega flash floods to the Day that is Today, most awaited US elections. Just writing that sentence above felt heavy. One week ago, the heaven opened up and the storm system called Gota Fria, or cold drop, let over 19 inches of rain to fall in just moments in the Valencia regions. We had much less, perhaps 3 or 4 inches, and as my friend pointed out, we proved the saying, The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain. Since Granada is bumped up against the Sierra Nevada mountain range, and is surrounded by 4 rivers, we watched it all go past us. But in Valencia, it overwhelmingly flash flooded in a way that caught everyone flat footed. Mud, sticks, cars and trucks floated by as if they were toys, and people screamed and cried and terror. Now that the mud has settled, over 850,000 people and 69 different towns and villages have been affected by this horrible act. Worse than this, before the rain ha...

 Andrew and I watch a lot of varied movies, sci fi, drama, action, you name it, we like a lot of it. But I'm reluctant to watch certain genres, horror and some kinds of suspense, as I'm sensitive and have nightmares. Andrew and Sofi have gotten me to step out in the last few days as they claim they need some more scarier movies in their lives, and I've boldly gone where I've not really gone before. Much as I'd hate to admit it, I've actually found it very cathartic and enjoyable in a very different way. We watched, the three of us, the Night of the Living Dead. The ending I was unhappy about, but the cinematography, the fascination that in 1968 there was an amaing African American male lead, and also that this was filmed in Butler county, where my mom and her sisters grew up, and where my grandparents are now buried. The house felt like my great grandmothers house and it felt like a familiar area in so many ways, that I found myself engrossed in yes, even classi...

 I wish I could write it all down. The names, dates, places, and organizations. But, I will refrain. But the indignance, the righteous anger I have, will not be silenced. Yet again, one we know, this time one of our ninos, a student who long ago studied in Granada, and we had moments of connection with, came back. This happens at least once a year. We get a text, phone call or whatever and a name from our past says, "Finally! Bringing the husband/wife/fam, can we have a coffee?" And we get dressed on a windy, fall afternoon and ride Andrew's scooter to the vibing, thriving center of Granada with thousands of tourists gaping up at the buildings, eating icecream and finding a coffee. And we find them, and hug them and sit down and ask, "How are you?" It doesn't take long, and halfway through a cup of coffee, it all come pouring out. Tenative at first, and then all of the nitty, gritty, ,awful details, as my Uncle Peter says, the plot of life then sickens. I kn...

 This blog is not necesarrily a manifesto, but this words have definetly rung over and over in my mind again and again the last several months. I've offended some with these words, and others have affirmed them. So here goes this post. It is my convicted belief that the Kingdom of Heaven began and will be completed at a table, and not a temple, or cathedral, or mosque. It's humble beginnings are first in the 6 banquets Jesus particpates in in the book of Luke, the 7th the momement as Jesus sat and broke bread and drank wine with his disciples, the 8th when he breaks bread as a resurrection Jesus on the road to Emmaus,  and finally,  will be completed when we all sit together with Jesus and finally do the same at the Feast of the End of It All. And, to expand on this theme, another thought has surfaced. Jesus was found on the road to Emmaus, not in a temple, or synagagoe or mosque, but rather walking as a traveler and no one realized who he was, until he sat at the table w...

 In my dashboard, I have three unfinished blogs that are too angry, too over the top to be published and I've let them block my writing, as I have moved through so many emotions and processed through so many situaitons in the last two or three months. When you write a blog that is deeply personal, deeply introspective, this happens. It's not a diary blog of cooking, family life, vacations, travel, but rather, a blog of the experiences of someone who has lived very far from her home and worldview, and has watched the definitions of home and worldview change and evolve and maybe even warp a little over the 20plus years of living not in my passport country. And watching the current events unfold in my passport country have made things even more facinating in the last couple of weeks....I refuse to be political, or at least avertly so in my publishings, but it is easy for me to state at this point, fo the first time in my adult life I'm deeply considering not voting. I sat on t...

 For the second time this month, for a long weekend, I sit in a quite place. The first one was for our anniversary, and we relished being meters away from the coast and hearing the waves crash upon our rocky beach as we sat on the balcony, or merely just opened the door to our bedroom. The bed wasn't anything to write home about, but the small apartment with a balcony, big comfy sofa and nice tv, and a kitchen equipped to do what we needed, is all that we really wanted for those three nights. Today, my views are birds and sky, sheep and rolling olive groves and pretty Spanish villas that used to be second homes. The two dogs alternate coming out on to the terrace to sniff the air, lay in the sun or shade, and make sure we are still around. The pool glistens underneath me, matching the blue of my aptly named Aygo, Blueberry. This weekend we are house sitting and after a long stretch of a lot of work, and some really tough emotional moments, this is respite. It's all I can do, ju...

  A long time ago, my aunt and uncle lived in Granada and we lived in each other's back pockets. They held our hands in language school and those first 10 years as we figured out Granada and culture and life and love and happiness and grief. I will never forget those days. Even though they now live between two other worlds, I know they left a chunk of their hearts here and we talk regularly, sometimes more and sometimes less. This week, as we walk through a family crisis with my dad's health, we have spoken a bit more. They left me, probably without meaning to, a book called L'abri, which discusses a long ago refuge created by the Schaeffers in the 1950s in Switzerland. They were in another time and another place and a different way of communicating, but God provided. They chose to step out in some crazy decisions, but God was there. And so, at my lowest moments, I pull out the book and reread the passages. Last night after shopping, I drove up to the edge of our property. ...

 I don't always publish back to back days, but I've run across a few interesting quotes on the state of life in general and wished to put these thoughts down before they flit across my brain and we are done.. I've again found a fascination with e.e.cummings who broke poetry rules and wrote as he felt, without caps and punctuation. In recent moments I've adapted something of my own of the lists of things that rollout of me without commas or periods so that you can follow where I'm really going. See what I just did? But, he, cummings, is still the King. And when the winter turns to spring far sooner here than the northern reaches of this planet, I remember his simple turns of phrases that suddenly cause us to remember spring pasts. I told Miguel Angel last month that I'm team Spring. So many people crawl out of the woodwork in August longing for cooler weather, and I shake my head at them, because, I'm team Spring. With the almonds bursting into bloom as we wo...

 My super young (no age to protect her innocence ) at heart relative called me today, we talk at least once a month about various issues, sometimes cry, sometimes laugh, usually both, and I feel so blessed to have her. See, her story, just like all stories, has its share of violence, but she abounds in grace. This phrase is stolen from a dear professor of mine from my undergrad days, who needed to show a conservative Bible school that it wasn't just about memorzing theology and verses, but that story is what shapes who we are. So, she had a literature course that dedicated itself to the theme of violence and grace. Those of us who took it drank it in like water from a fire hose and some of the themes I learned almost 30 years ago, echo in my mind time and time again. These moments of violence, be they true violence like disaster, destruction, crime and more, or violence of the heart and emotions, are evil. Being unkind is just as evil as other bits of evil you can imagine, as bones...

 I have been overwhelmed as of late of the deep intense unkindness that has seemed to ooze deep into our society. But, I am reminded of those kindnesses give towards me as well. One does not preclude the other, but sometimes the unkindess has felt echoey, loud and reverbating that I find myself choking back tears late at night wondering what the world has gotten itself into. I am an intense fan of the goodness that we have, both inherantly and also given to to us by God. I believe that many people in this world do not knowingly commit evil, but rather are motivated by selfish desires. I do believe that people can change, and not always say the same, but I believe we can do so because we have been empowered by God, and not only from ourselves. All this to say, I acknowledge the brokeness, the evil in the world, but I hesitate to meditate on the depravity of man. I believe that when we focus on our collective and personal evils, we do nothing but feed them, and allow more evil to per...