It has been a month, and I am stuck in OZ

Hi Daddy, I can't believe it has been a month already, I still forget you are gone, I still go to call your cellphone as I am driving from job to job, you are still on my "favorites" list on my phone.  I don't think I'll ever be able to take that off.

You know those dreams that jolt you awake suddenly...that has been what it has been like since you have been gone, I am going along fine and then suddenly I am jolted awake by that terrible reminder that you are gone.  It is not fun.

Everyone says you are in a better place, which obviously I believe, and I truly am so happy for you that you have a healthy cancer-free body, and I am so happy you are with your Dad, and with Jesus-you were so excited to meet Jesus and give your Dad a hug again and tell him about what has been going on.

But the thing is, I am stuck here, and I just want you to give me a hug again, and say "Hey Bud!  What's going on?  You rock!"  I miss you so much Daddy.
It is encouraging to know you have made it to the promised land, so full of milk and honey, and so absent of cancer, tears, pain, and stupid people.
But the thing is, I am stuck here in Oz.  I feel like Dorothy.  All I want is to put on some pretty glittery ruby red slippers and get back to my Auntie Ann, you.  Yes, Oz can be nice, it is green and shiny.  There are lots of people that make Oz enjoyable, and who skip along the yellow brick road with me.  There are fun songs to sing and pretty flowers to smell.  But...there are also some crazy flying monkeys and scary witches that bring along pain and heartache.  And really, not even the wizard, or Glinda, or my fun new friends like tinman and scarecrow can take away the pain of missing you.

But....I also know this is God's command for now.  Like Joshua and the Israelites were commanded to get circumcised and then go to war...I too am commanded to undergo some painful trials that don't really make sense [YES I understand the parallel I just drew, leave me alone I am grieving]. God's commands are not always comfortable, or as we would choose.  But they ultimately develop our growth and our complete dependence on God.

So that is how I feel today. kinda blah. and wanting to miss my Dad, so I am going to. and I might cry a little, my counselor demanded me to cry more, she also said I need to run more, so I will if she says so, because I don't like crying or hurting or missing you.
But for today, I am going to do all of the above. except run because theres no time for that today and I have ran the last 3 days which is more than I have the whole month.

Now, go hug your Dad.

My talk from Daddy's service.

At my very last XC race senior year of college, my parents were talking to the mom of a teammate who was battling cancer, she was telling them how “the doctors can give me all kinds of expectations and limitations, but only God knows when my time will come”.  That was a month and half before Dad was diagnosed.  That became our motto and such encouragement through this time.  They gave my Dad 9months, he lived 2years&9months.

And that's how my dad lived his life, he just loved Jesus and he trusted him so much.  My dad just shone Jesus no matter where he was and who he was with.  

Email from dad…

“If God is for us who can be against us? Romans 8:31.  I read this in my quiet time today….  If this verse does not allow you to operate your life with no fear of the future I don’t know what will.  For you guys to fully understand the power of this verse, this thought you need to understand how amazingly powerful, personal and loving our God is.

 I want you 2 to live boldly for Christ.  Not to leave in fear of what may come since God is for us.  Even though God has allowed this evil cancer to enter my body, God is for me….. He can completely heal me if he decides that is the course to take or worse case I will live in the Glory of eternity with Him and no cancer.  If that happens what will happen with you guys and Mom?  Nothing to be fearful of since God is for you. God will bless your futures, and I am looking forward to what he has planned for both of you.  Remember to “delight in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your hear”

You guys are awesome! “

My dad was the best.

 He was my coach and personal cheerleader; he drove me early morning to soccer tournaments, critically evaluated my play to help me improve when I told him I wanted to be Brandi Chastain when I was older, researched Achilles tendonitis when I got injured in HS and listened to all my complaining about stress fractures, he was at every cross country race and would be wherever I told him to be on the course-sprinting across the course in his faded jeans, grey Santa Clara sweatshirt, and baseball cap, even fall of my sr year, I had to call him before every race.

He was my buddy: sang along to my favorite song for about 5 years “another dumb blonde”, spent Friday nights watching everybody loves Raymond with his exhausted graduate student, talked to me about boys and agreed that they are sometimes stupid, expressed his concerns if a boy was too serious to appreciate Dwight from the office, he drove to sb and back in one day just to take me to dinner because I was homesick.  He was the best person to verbally process to, the best listener ever

He was also my patient math tutor, until it got to stats my sr year of college, then he paid my friend to take his place.

He was my spiritual leader; met the lord on a day he convinced me to go to church, helped me through old/new/cd as a poor public school kid who never paid attn in Sunday school, sent me email tips on bible studies I led for my campers, my go to search engine for a verse, gave me club talk tips as I went through yl trainer-here you go dad this qualifies as my first club talk.  There would be times I would be walking into his room wanting him to pray and he would start before I even asked him to-he always knew what I needed when I needed it.

There is so much I will miss about spending time with my dad: my nightly bedtime cuddles, him kissing my head telling me “goodnight sweetie, you rock, you’re awesome, you’re the best”.  Conversations which turn into major spiritual insights without meaning to, laughing at the office, having him rub between my toes-pretty sure no other man will offer that, acting embarrassed when he sings even though I really love it, having him read the night before xmas, having him pray for me,

I don’t know what to do now that he is gone, I keep telling people I wish there was a guidebook, and like my coach told me yesterday “it isn’t good what happened to your dad, but life is still going to be good”.  Besides not knowing what to do with my dad gone, I don’t know where my career is taking me I’ve got 50 jobs and no clue where they are headed, Taylor is graduating college and he doesn’t know, my mom doesn’t know what she is going to do with her time.  But, as I was running a few days ago this song called banner of love came on and it talks about our responsibility to raise Jesus’ banner of love over the world…and I realized that is what my dad would want us to do, love Jesus, love each other, and lead others closer to Jesus by the love we show.

Why today was good: sharing

Yesterday was good because I got to share one of my favorite lessons from this whole cancer thing with one of my athletes.
He found out he has lymphatic cancer yesterday.
I went to visit him in the hospital, thank goodness it was not the oncology floor, I wouldn't have done it.
Before I left I told him I only wanted to give him one word of wisdom.  This is own journey I did not want to take away from it.  So I told him; "the doctors can tell you lots of things, lots of diagnosis', expectations, etc., BUT the only one who actually knows exactly what is going on is God."

So that was why yesterday/today was good, I got to use my experience.

Why today is good.

Today a man who works at SLAC and a regular attendee of the gym here walked past and asked how I was...naturally I said good.  He asked, how is that?  How do you do that, be good?  And i thought to myself JESUS my friend, Jesus.  But I did not say that, so I said, well, lots of reasons!  And he said ok give me one tip each day to being good/or one reason you are good, so I gave him one.

Reason #1. Go to bed at 9:30pm.  

So this begins, my new blog, a reason a day why life is still good.
Book idea?
maybe ;)

Dad does not fit in a box.

Today I am grumpy.  Today I do not like this new normal.  It is not fun, and it is also not fun when they bring your "Dad" home in a box the size of my study bible.  I mean, I know my Dad got skinny, but last I checked he wasn't that small.  So dear man who called this box in a white gift bag "my Dad", YOU SUCK.  That is not my Dad, and you do not have the rights to call it my Dad.
That box cannot tell me he loves me, hold me as I cry, rub my feet which are blistered from my new fall boots.  That box cannot read the Night Before Christmas to me, watch Everybody Loves Raymond, laugh at Dwight and Andy on the office, or play Sequence with me.  That box cannot grill some mean veggies for me, eat cookies n cream ice cream like its his job, sip on diet 7up with me.
That box cannot walk me down the aisle when I get married or cheer on Tayman at his graduation or coach our future kids in sports.
So NO.  That box is not my Dad.

But the sun peering through the clouds this morning looking oh so heavenly might be, depending on the hour you ask me today because my emotions change by the hour.

2 Corinthians 4:17

New Living Translation (NLT)

¹⁷ For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever!

#Let'shopetheydontlastlong

Titanic, cancer, and Hitler

Well, titantic sunk.  No matter how many times you watch that movie, you always hope the ship misses that iceberg and jack lives a long, wrinkly life.
We knew the cancer would strike its final blow at some point, but I think I was still having a child-like faith that a miracle could happen...

God knew this day was coming, from the moment he started forming the stars, he knew the path my Dad's life would take.
Just like he knew titantic would sink...
So why let all those innocent people get on board that ship?  Why not cause a storm that canceled their crossing?  Why not break the ship's engine before they set off so no one could go?

In my bible study we are reading letters from a skeptic, a lot of our questions cover topics like why does an all powerful God let evil, and bad, and cancer, and ship wrecks enter the world...if He is so powerful why not have Hitler's mom have a miscarriage before this evil man was born so that Hitler never led the Holocaust?

I do not know exactly why God does not stop bad stuff before it happens, we know that bad stuff is here because of the fall blah, blah, blah...but I don't know why bad stuff happens still if God has the power to cause the flood, the red sea to part, to resurrect Jesus from the dead, wiping out cancer or Hitler should be as easy as blinking for Him...

Here is what I do know, because I am a fan of looking on the bright side or "watering the grass where I am" (name that Bieber song reference)...

I know that everyone grows from hard stuff.

We are usually wiser/stronger/hopefully closer to God for it, it makes people think about God more and cling to Him more than usual which deepens our relationship with Him.  Just like with any relationship, if you have a shared experience with someone, you are closer than you were without it.
Without the hard stuff, we are american girl dolls roaming around in our perfect barbie dream houses, not growing, or changing, or experiencing.
Maybe we go through hard stuff because it gives us a glimpse of what Jesus did for us on the cross, this shared experience of pain, betrayal, sacrifice, death, sadness, brings us closer to Christ because we are able to taste a bit of the reality of what He did for us.

If I was dating a boy who had never ran in his life...heck yes I would make him try running so he understood me better.
When I meet fellow Boston Marathoners, we don't have to explain the pain, we simply nod, respect the other person a great deal, because they GET IT, they get the training it took to qualify, to register, to wait, to train again, and to run something harder than anything we have ever ran.  They understand why we could not walk normal for a week after.
When my uncle mentioned taylor's name at the service and the whole church laughed after, we all understood why, we had a shared understanding that Taylor is crazy lol

So theres a few thoughts on hard stuff.
I'll wait for a more in depth answer when I go join Daddy.

What i have seen....is that God PREPARES us, and he reveals His plan in PERFECT timing (HIS).

If we had found out when I was a baby that my Dad would get cancer when I was 21 years old, the first 21 years of my life would have had this looming cloud, I would be afraid of getting too close to someone I knew I would have to say bye to sooner rather than later.  Instead, I got an awesome, carefree 21 years with my Dad, and another 3 years of deep growth with him and my family.  I wouldn't have wanted to know earlier.
God revealed it to us when Taytay and I were deep enough in our faith to comprehend God.  When we had a strong community.  The list goes on. God prepared us for this and revealed it in great timing.
Cancer is not always great timing, but God is.

So even though bad stuff enters this world, God still has the upper hand.