The Saga of Peter and Me

“Which one is Peter?” I wound my way through the cardboard stand-ups depicting the twelve disciples. “I want to get a picture with him. He’s the disciple I relate to the most.”

Peter: emotional, impulsive, easily angered Peter. Yup, that’s the way I’m wired.

At that moment, I was walking-on-water Peter. We were at the Oshkosh Pathfinder Camporee for what was essentially my public debut as the new editor of Guide magazine. God had taken this middle-aged disabled woman in Tennessee and appointed me to be in charge of the magazine that has had more influence on my life than any other periodical. I was overflowing with gratitude for way God had worked in my life. And there at Oshkosh I would experience so many little miracles and divine appointments, that had you put your ear to the door of my hotel room, you might have heard me speaking out loud to my guardian angel as I just could not keep the joy within me contained to thoughts alone.

This was what the rest of my life was going to look like. I was sure of it. Why would I do anything else now that I was working my dream job?

Then the pandemic hit. Suddenly Idaho felt as though it were on the opposite side of the world from those I had loved and cared about my entire life. Loneliness gripped me and sent me into a depression so severe I cried every day for three months straight.

Would I be happier working back east, even if it wasn’t exactly my dream job? I made a short list of three jobs I would be willing to leave Guide for. Then one day a friend emailed to let me know one of those jobs was open. My friend knew nothing of my list, but I had mentioned my homesickness to her. The job was in Maryland, where I had met and married my husband. We had family and friends there. I wouldn’t be as lonely. But I also wouldn’t be the editor of Guide. I read the job description and decided not to apply.

By now I had reached a level of contentedness in my present situation. My daily tears had stopped, and though I was past the elation phase of my Guide editor experience, I was mostly satisfied with the work I was doing. Making a change would be risky. I wouldn’t want to leave what I loved for something unknown. Staying made sense.

But every once in a while I would have a bad day or I might start feeling lonely, and I would check the job board where the job description resided. For five months this went on.

A New Job
Meanwhile my son was about to start his senior year of college. As we video chatted one afternoon, he mentioned what his financial plan looked like for the coming year.

“Whaaaat?” in a Peter-like outburst I let the entire household know of my shock at the numbers. His tuition, which had been fully covered his freshman year, before I voluntarily gave up subsidy benefits for the job with Guide, was now going to be $1,000 per month more than we had paid the previous year. And that was after student loans.

“I could take that job in Maryland,” I offered as we discussed solutions. “It offers tuition subsidy.”

“No, Mom, don’t give up your dream job for me.”

We decided the best solution was to take the extraordinary amount of vacation time I had saved up and use it to work a seasonal retail job. Soon I was burning the candle at both ends. I would get up at 4 a.m., go to my regular job at 6 a.m. and put in nearly a half day before leaving for a 10 a.m. shift at Kohl’s. Or I would start at Kohl’s and then finish my day working at the office until almost bedtime. Once in a while I would take a full day off from the office, but as much as possible, I tried to fit both jobs in. After all, the less vacation time I used, the longer I’d be able to keep this up—at least theoretically. And besides, the weekly magazine still had to be produced on the same schedule. I didn’t have less work, just less time to do it in. I was constantly stressed, and my Peter-like short fuse grew even shorter. All this, and we still didn’t have a plan for how to pay for second semester.

With tears streaming down my face as I sat in the Kohl’s parking lot before going in, I texted my counselor, whom I hadn’t seen since graduating from my pandemic-induced tearful phase. “I’m back to really, really wanting to quit my job,” I told him. “Do you have any appointments tomorrow before I do something rash?”

At my appointment he confirmed that my idea of applying for the job I had been watching for five months was far from rash. I decided to apply. I could always turn an offer down if it didn’t feel like a good fit.

Before being interviewed, I was asked to write a sample piece. It was a different style of writing than I had ever attempted. I was to retell a Bible story for tweens, but without incorporating any fictional elements. The story was to be fresh and bring out spiritual insights that kids would be able to relate to.

Prayerfully I studied the story in the Bible and in Ellen White’s writings. Then, as I kicked off my shoes and settled down on the couch to type, something amazing happened. The story I had heard a million times before became new and exciting. I was overwhelmed with insights that had never occurred to me before. God’s spirit seemed to draw near as I typed.

Before the afternoon was over, my first draft was done. But I didn’t want to leave my spot on the couch or the lesson I had just written behind. I wanted to linger in the presence that seemed to surround me. Putting my shoes back on didn’t feel right, for certainly I was on holy ground. I had never experienced anything like that before. I knew I wanted to experience it again. I wanted the job.

But once the job was mine, I struggled to recreate the experience. My first lessons took weeks, instead of hours, to write. And they still needed heavy revisions. I rewrote them over and over. My mind felt locked. I prayed and prayed, but I just wasn’t hitting the mark.

Slowly I started to feel like I was starting to grasp this new writing and editing style I was being asked to master. But then new directions would be given, and expectations would change. I would find myself floundering again. I loved studying the Bible stories for fresh insights. I loved those moments of inspiration when life lessons seemed to jump out from the text. But I knew I was missing the mark more often than I should.

Lost
“I suspect that after tomorrow I won’t have a job,” I texted my husband the day before my 90-day review. I was right.

We hadn’t moved to Maryland yet, since we had been waiting for school to let out. Now suddenly we were thrown into a season of uncertainty. I had two months of severance. After that we would be living on my husband’s income, which was less than half of what I had been earning. I felt like I was standing on the edge of a financial cliff.

Two months passed. No job offers. Even those who knew me well seemed nervous to hire someone who had held on to her last job for only three months. And besides, many of the jobs I was finding wanted someone with strong social media skills. My professional social media experience was literally as outdated as dial-up Internet.

I cleared out our savings to pay the mortgage, found a food bank, and started cooking creative meals with ingredients we had on hand.

I also spent hours in my closet crying and asking God about His plans. Wouldn’t I have been better off to just stay in Tennessee where housing was cheaper if this was what was going to happen? I had prayed earnestly about leaving Guide, why had He opened that door so wide, just to slam it shut on my face? But even as I asked these questions, I was comforted in knowing that my path had been prayerfully considered. Somehow, as much as this season of uncertainty hurt, it must be part of God’s plan. I held on to promises that our greatest disappointments will become our greatest blessings and that nothing happens to us that doesn’t first pass through the hands of God.

Four months passed. School was about to start. We needed to settle down for the school year. I knew I was barely within the three-year window where I could reactivate my disability benefits without reapplying. This wasn’t what I wanted to do, but maybe living off disability for a couple more years would allow me to go back to school and fulfill my dream of completing a master’s degree. I made the call to Social Security.

Though full-time jobs were eluding me, freelance opportunities seemed to be chasing me down. I was asked to be part of a select group of people to audition for writing some Bible study guides. An agency whose work I have admired and supported my entire adult life asked me to consider writing press releases. And the new Guide editor (who is also the old Guide editor and my mentor), asked me to use my new-found love of writing true-to-life Bible stories to retell some of Jesus’ miracles.

And that’s the assignment I was doing today when I ran into an old friend: Peter the disciple. It was a familiar story: the one where Jesus invites him to be “fisher of men” and right away he leaves his nets behind and follows Jesus.

“He must have known something about Jesus,” I remember mentioning in a Bible discussion group years ago. “I mean, to leave his career behind, certainly Jesus was more than just a stranger on the beach.”

I had been right, but it hadn’t been until today that I learned the rest of the story. And as I reread this account in the Desire of Ages, it felt as if I were reading about myself.

Peter’s Story
The scene opens up with Peter feeling discouraged. It didn’t take long to make a personal connection there. Discouragement has been my primary emotion for four months now. I knew Peter was discouraged due to not catching any fish the night before. But what I didn’t realize is that was only the tip of the iceberg. Here’s the back story. Peter had initially been one of John the Baptist’s disciples. It wasn’t long after John had introduced Jesus as the Messiah and baptized him that John had been arrested by Herod. And it wasn’t long after that when Jesus found Peter fishing and first invited him to be His disciple. Peter had accepted the invitation—but only on a part time basis. He was part-time fisherman and part-time disciple.

Quitting his job as a fisherman probably didn’t make any sense to Peter at the time. After all, we know he was a family man. He had a wife and was probably taking care of his mother-in-law. He may have even had kids (we don’t know). His family relied on him to put food on the table.

Now that he was following Jesus, he had less time for his wage-earning job of catching fish. I imagine he felt much like I did when I tried working at both Guide and Kohl’s, trying to do the same amount of work in less time. Having just returned from what felt like an unsuccessful trip with Jesus, where he witnessed his master get rejected by the people and challenged by the religious leaders, Peter must have felt that he really needed to have an extra-big catch of fish to make up for the nights of fishing he had missed. Instead, he caught nothing.

Now fishing is one of those jobs that allows one’s mind to wander. And it appears that’s exactly what Peter’s mind did that night. He starts putting all the pieces of the puzzle together. John is in jail, and it doesn’t look like that’s going to go well. Jesus isn’t being treated so nicely. Peter has devoted a lot of his time to following these men. Had it all been a waste? And now how is he going to take care of his family?

Morning comes, and Jesus is taking a stroll on the beach. But He isn’t alone. There are crowds of people stalking him. They want to hear His words of wisdom, or perhaps they’re hoping to experience a miracle. They’re pressing in so close that they’re practically pushing Jesus into the water.

And there sits Peter in his boat. If he’s anything like me (and at this point, I think I’ve established that he probably is), he doesn’t want to be around people right now. He just wants to be alone with his thoughts. But here comes this big group of people, and what do you know, Jesus wants to use his boat as a podium.

So now, Peter, who wears his emotions on his sleeve and probably doesn’t want to be around anyone, is suddenly sitting like an elder on the platform with Jesus, while this Man whom Peter is confused about preaches on, get this, peace. Here’s how Ellen White describes it in the Desire of Ages. “Beside the throng on the shores of Gennesaret [another name for the Sea of Galilee], Jesus in His sermon by the sea had other audiences before His mind. Looking down the ages, He saw His faithful ones in prison and judgment hall, in temptation and loneliness and affliction. Every scene of joy and conflict and perplexity was open before Him. In the words spoken to those gathered about Him, He was speaking also to these other souls the very words which would come to them as a message of hope in trial, of comfort in sorrow, and heavenly light in darkness. Through the Holy Spirit, that voice which was speaking from the fisherman’s boat on the Sea of Galilee would be heard speaking peace to human hearts to the close of time.”

Calling
I don’t think it was any accident that Jesus preached this sermon of peace from Peter’s boat on the very morning Peter was so discouraged. In fact, I can’t help but wonder how many times Peter bent his head down to check his net or turned to look out into the sea to hide from the crowd the emotions covering his face.

When Jesus is done speaking to the crowd, He turns to Peter. Then He does what every professional hates: He tells Peter how to do his job! Go back out, now that it’s broad daylight, and just put your net on the other side of the boat.

I can imagine Peter thinking, That’s not how it works! In fact, he doesn’t just think it, he starts to argue. But then the part of him that is inexplicably drawn to this Man takes over. He’s already given up so much to follow Him around. What could it hurt to throw his net on the other side?

I can imagine him thinking, If this doesn’t work, I’m just going to go home and go to bed and forget this whole thing happened.

But it does work! It works better than he could imagine. With two boats nearly sinking because they are so full of fish, Peter runs and falls at Jesus’ feet, grabbing on to him as he cries, “Depart from me for I am a sinful man!”

His words and his body language aren’t matching, but they both make perfect sense. He feels overwhelmed with guilt for the doubt he had been allowing to take over his mind. But even as he feels unworthy to be around Jesus, he fears losing Him and clings to Him so He will stay.

That’s when Jesus repeats his invitation from earlier: “From now on you will fish for people” (NIV).

Suddenly it clicks. Jesus has just demonstrated He can more-than-adequately take care of Peter’s needs. But he wants Peter to fully follow Him. And that’s what Peter does. He turns His back on his career and starts a new chapter in his life as a full-time disciple of Christ.

As I read this story today, it hit me that Jesus did not invite Peter to take on a more financially secure position. He invited Him to take on a risky, scary position, but not without first giving him evidence that he would be taken care of.

And God has given me that same evidence. He hasn’t given me two large boats full of fish (which is fine, I hate the smell of fish), but He has given me a trickle of blessings that have helped us stay afloat even when my income disappeared: the unexpected tax rebate that arrived just as my paycheck stopped, the family who was happy to pay for a place to stay in our home just as we were running dangerously low on food and gas, the surprisingly large Social Security back-pay check that arrived in time to make a downpayment on another year of Christian school.

I don’t know exactly where He’s calling me to, but I can see His footsteps in front of me. So like Peter, I will cling to Him. I’ll let Him take care of my needs. And I’ll follow Him wherever He goes.

Adventists, Masks, and the Mark of the Beast

I’m so Adventist that my coming-of-age story could be told from the setting of Revelation seminars. My baptism at 11 was right after a large Revelation seminar. My first babysitting experiences were at Revelation seminars. And by the time I was in college, I was checking out the theology majors at Revelation seminars.

Somewhere along the way I learned a little about prophecy. And while I can’t name the seven churches or the seven last plagues without looking them up, there’s one thing I’m pretty clear on: the mark of the beast.

If you’ve ever attended one of these Revelation seminars I grew up with, you know that the mark of the beast is placed the forehead or the hand, representing thoughts or actions people take that go against the law of God. As Adventists we have interpreted this to be an eventual Sunday law that we believe will be passed, preventing those who do not comply from buying and selling. Some will go along with the thinking behind the law, receiving the mark on the forehead (representing their thoughts) and some will disagree with the law but will comply anyway, receiving the mark on their hand (representing actions).

I’m not going to unpack the prophecy here. If this is new to you, you can tune your television or Internet browser to 3ABN, the Hope Channel, Amazing Facts, or Amazing Discoveries pretty much any time of the day or night to catch a Revelation seminar of some sort in progress.

For most of us who have grown up Adventist this isn’t new. It’s so much a part of our culture that the phrase “no buy, no sell” injected into nearly any topic—but particularly current events—will bring about a thoughtful nod and some contemplation.

As Adventists, this prophecy is part of that package we call “the truth.” We’re pretty proud of it, though we often beat ourselves up for not sharing it more with others.

So imagine my surprise, no that’s not the right word (shock? horror? dismay? The desire to put on sackcloth and sit at the gates of Jerusalem and mourn?) when I learned there is a new “truth” being spread in at least one of our Adventist communities.

“Wearing a mask means you have the mark of the beast.” That’s what one of my friends who works in a visible position in an Adventist community was told by 10-15 customers in only one day.

What? My first reaction was the desire to cry. My dad is on the list of people who are highly susceptible to the virus with at least four factors making him a prime target. My dad also lives in this same community. It is not a stretch to say that by trying to avoid this new interpretation of the mark of the beast, someone could literally end up killing my dad.

But let’s take my family out of it for a minute and just look at the theology of this statement. First there is the really hard to overlook fact that the mask is neither worn on the forehead nor on the hand. (And if you are wearing your mask on your forehead or hand, it’s probably not doing anybody any good.)

More importantly, however, I would ask the question: which of God’s laws is wearing a mask causing you to break? There is not one. Yet by not wearing a mask, you are breaking one of Jesus’s two great commandments.

What? There’s a commandment about masks? No, but there is a commandment about loving others (check out Matthew 22: 36-40).

If we do not have enough love for others to put up with some minor discomfort to save the life of somebody, what good is our faith?

I once heard a parable of a man who visited hell. There he found a banquet table overflowing with delicious looking food of all kinds. But the people sitting at the table were starving. Looking more closely, he realized they could not eat because they could not bend their elbows.

Then he visited heaven. The scene was much the same: a bountiful banquet table, elbows that wouldn’t bend. But there was one difference. The saints in heaven were feeding each other. No one went hungry.

Right now we are living in a scenario much like this parable where there is more we can do to help others stay safe than we can do for our own selves. Let’s not get so lost in baseless conspiracy theories that we’re willing to sacrifice our neighbors for what we think will be a golden ticket through the pearly gates.

As Adventists we have an advantage. We have solid prophecy that has stood up through the ages. We don’t need to go chasing after shiny new theories with deadly consequences.

Let us take this opportunity to show the world just a taste of what self-sacrificing love looks like. Let’s wear our masks.

Sooo Good

She sat in the back corner of the classroom, eyes focused toward the front of the room, ready to listen to what I was about to read.

I stood at the front. Excited to share my recently-finished novel. Nervous that she would be among that group of students who would be the first to experience it.

Amy knew good literature. Her mother, who had a master’s in literature education, read with the family frequently. She had been exposed to some of the greats. And I was an unknown author reading my first novel to a group of third and fourth graders.

As I looked up, my eyes naturally went to Amy’s corner of the room. I was reassured seeing her facial expressions match the emotion of the book–and even more reassured when I overheard her whisper to a classmate, “It’s sooo good!”

Then there was Wyndham. I don’t remember what his face looked like as I was reading. I wasn’t sure how much the boys would appreciate a book where two girls were the main characters. But what I do remember was that every time he saw me thereafter, he would stop me and, eyes wide with excitement, ask if I had published my book yet. My answer was no, but he never gave up. For years, he continued asking me the same question.

Sometimes I wonder if he believed in me more than I believed in myself.

It’s been nearly a decade now. I’ve had stops and starts. Periods of encouragement, and periods of discouragement. Book agents who expressed interest in my novel then politely declined to represent me. Years where I’ve put the books aside, and years where I dusted it off to try again.

And all this time, it has been these children’s reactions to my book that have kept bringing me back to my dream of getting it published.

“Is it just me?” I wonder when I see my e-book go for months without a sale. “Am I the only one who thinks this book is any good?”

And then I think about Amy and Wyndham and that classroom of students. That was who the book was written for. They thought it was good. Kids will love my book. I know it. I just need to find adults who can help me get the book into their hands.

Who is Margo?

Today, I did a live reading of chapter 2 from Margo’s Fire.

As I read of  Margo and Alisha tossing skittles to the boys during lunch, I couldn’t help think about my best friend from sixth grade, Alphretta.

Alphretta, my double-jointed friend who could comfortably sit with her legs behind her neck, loved to laugh as much as I did. Lunch time was always an adventure with Alphretta. Sometimes she had tang powder, which we would place in the front part of our mouths then blow out like a puff of smoke. Sometimes, she would bring wafers, which we would tear apart and rebuild so they had double the cream in the middle. And sometimes she brought cheese puffs. Those were the funnest days of all, as the boys in our class loved to catch them in their mouths. I loved being the center of attention when she handed me some cheese puffs to throw at the boys. Though most of my sixth grade was spent wondering if any of the boys would ever notice me, during these fantastic moments, I was noticed and appreciated—if only for the cheese puffs I was tossing their way.

So is that who Margo is? My friend Alphretta? Well, yes…and no. Margo is a fictional character. So she is no one—and she is a conglomerate of many friends who have impacted my life and helped mold me into who I am today.

There’s Debbie, my best friend from fifth grade. Debbie and I would practice “flying” (i.e. jumping from the highest rungs on the jungle gym during recess. We would see how long we could balance on the bar that the teeter-totters rested on. And one time, when the sprinklers were running, we challenged ourselves to see if we could touch the sprinkler without getting wet. (Our teacher wasn’t thrilled when we returned from recess dripping wet.)

Debbie was also my first close-up experience with a serious illness. I remember returning from a piano lesson to see her big sister running while carrying Debbie’s limp body through the hall with a scared expression on her face. Debbie had fainted during P.E., and no one knew why. I remember listening to my parents discuss if I should be allowed to visit her in the hospital. “She’s her best friend, we have to let her visit.” And I remember sitting by her hospital bed as she told me about the chalky substance she had to swallow as hospital staff put her through a series of tests that eventually led to the discovery of juvenile diabetes.

Then there’s the character’s namesake. Margo, with her long red hair, didn’t fit into any of the clicks in high school, nor did she intend to. She was deeply intellectual, getting a kick out of watching political debates with me, both on television and on the campus where my father was a professor. Together, we worded a question that little high school me posed to a guest debater at an exclusive luncheon my father had been able to get us into. Our question got the room buzzing.

But she was also a free spirit. Going to the mall was our default Saturday night activity (when there wasn’t a debate or trivia party to crash at the college). Once, we found some nearly matching strapless dresses that we just had to have. After making the purchase, we headed to her house for a spontaneous photo shoot. My mother quickly bought me a little jacket to make my dress modest enough to wear in public, but on the day those photos got passed around at school, I noticed a little extra smile on some of the guys’ faces—validation that I’d be able to get their attention in other ways besides throwing cheese balls.

And of course there was Shauna, my friend who would stick close by my side as we made the transition to adulthood. Thoughtful and considerate, she would pause before speaking, never uttering a word that might cause distress. We met in line for senior portraits. Both of us were short with young-looking faces. I was a new student, and so she assumed I was a lost freshman. I assumed the same of her, but neither of us said anything. It wasn’t until we got up to the photographer and both had our pictures taken without question that I realized I had possibly met a soul sister—someone who knew the inner pain of not appearing to be the age we were. It was a few weeks later at a Bible conference that someone said, “I bet the two of you have been best friends forever!” We looked at each other, smiled, and nodded. Nearly 30 years later, she’s certainly earned the title of forever friend!

But the inspiration for this book wasn’t one of my peers. It was a little girl named Ellia that was diagnosed with cancer when she was barely old enough to read. A boy at school had punched her in the arm right where the cancer was located. Her swelling arm alerted her family and medical professionals that something was wrong. Her cancer was caught early. I remember when the chemo started. Her energy was drained out of her. She would watch kids playing. Her eyes said she longed to play with them, but she didn’t have the energy to do anything more than snuggle up with her mother and watch.

Today, Ellia is a high school student who laughs and enjoys the company of her friends much as I did growing up.

Ellia is Margo. Shauna is Margo. Margo is Margo. Debbie is Margo. Alphretta is Margo. And perhaps you are Margo too. For Margo is a character resembling anyone who has been strong, faced adversity, and found the joy in life despite it all.

Little Good

My maiden name is of french origin: Pettibone, or literally “Little Good”. My dad has always emphasized that it really means little AND good. Yet, despite my family heritage, I have not changed my profile picture to include the French flag.

It is not because I’m indifferent to what happened on Friday. My heart is very heavy, and I’ve even made the comment that this could have a bigger impact than 9/11.

But I am hesitant to join the rally. For a rally of “us” can quickly become a mob against “them.” And who is “them?” Terrorists, yes. ISIS, probably. But for many people, “them” will broaden to include all Muslims.

We quickly forget that Muslims are also children of Abraham. They worship the God of Abraham as they best understand how. And we, too, worship the God of Abraham as we best understand how.

A careful study of Daniel 11 (see the video series found at www.islamandchristianity.org), seems to indicate that both Muslims and Christians will be a part of the remnant that is left standing when Christ returns. But this will be a small group—those who are truly seeking to worship that same God who has been most clearly described as Love.

But there will be a bigger group, a group that chooses instead to worship the god of Hate. Some will see this as two groups, one carrying the label “Muslims” and one carrying the label “Christians.” But these will not be worshipers of the God of Love.

Hate is hate whether it’s directed at an over-secularized Frenchman or a Sharia-promoting Syrian. And hate can literally do Pettibone (little good–without the and).

As the world chooses sides for a conflict that seems to be at our doorsteps, I choose not the side of the French or the Syrians. I choose that little team that has refused to bow to the god of Hate. I choose love. This team may be little but it is full of goodness—just as my dad defines Pettibone.

How Facebook Almost Killed a Friendship

There was one person I dreaded seeing at my 25-year high school reunion. Ironically, a quarter century earlier he had been one of my close friends. With an intellectual sense of humor and easy-going personality,  Collin* was a natural completion to the trio of friends that also included Tanya* (an opinionated bookworm) and me (a verbose aspiring journalist).

If Collin disagreed with me on my political views, I wasn’t aware of it. Though I wouldn’t have been surprised. In the conservative South, Tanya and I seemed to be the only kids in school who leaned toward liberal viewpoints.

“Are you a Democrat?” a fellow student asked after my second political editorial ran in the school newspaper.

“No!” I responded. “I’m an Independent. Please don’t label me again!” True, I was thinking for myself and hadn’t aligned with any particular party (I would be a few months too young to vote come election day), but my publicly expressed opinions were already starting to place me on the left side of the aisle.

Two decades later when Collin and I reunited on Facebook, I had become more sure of my political leanings—and Collin had become more verbose about his.

At first I was shocked. Certainly he must be misunderstanding the issues? Then I was hurt. Couldn’t he see how I would be harmed if he got his way politically? Eventually, I became angry. I couldn’t see a notification from him without my stomach tightening and my heart pounding. I let my anger affect my responses and said things I would regret.

Finally, I got smart and decided Facebook wasn’t the best place for debates. I sent Collin (and a few other “argumentative” friends) a message apologizing for my actions, promising not to post messages of disagreement, and asking them to do the same for me.

Peace had been made—sort of. But I felt that our friendship had been ruined. So I didn’t know how I would greet him at the reunion. A cool hello? Look the other way? A big fake smile followed by nothing to say?

I didn’t have to wonder for long. While we were waiting for our class picture to be taken, Collin approached me, not with any of the above reactions, but with a friendly hug. “I miss you,” he said.

“There are some things we agree on,” I offered weakly, glad to see the friendship appearing reparable. He quickly brought up one of those subjects that we were in agreement on.

This is good, I thought. As long as we stay on topics of mutual agreement, we can get along like old times. 

But I was wrong. Later that afternoon, we had dived right into one of the subjects that had led to our most volatile Facebook conversations. But this conversation wasn’t anything like our online dialog. I could sense he was understanding my point of view, and I was starting to get a clearer picture of where he was coming from. He got excited about some of the information I shared, and he shared some ideas that inspired me.

I wasn’t shocked, or hurt, or angry. I was energized.

What was the difference? All I can offer is that in-person conversations simply have more depth. When you can look into a person’s eyes, hear the tone in their voice, and see their body language, you get a better idea of what they are communicating. And it’s easier to remember that the person you are talking to isn’t just a storehouse for ideas and opinions. They are, indeed, human—full of history and heart and hope.

Back at home, I messaged Collin. “After this weekend, I’ve come to the conclusion that important things should be discussed in person,” I told him.

“Any time you need me to come down and hash things out, call me,” he responded.

Yup, that’s the Collin I know.

*names have been changed

I Hate Telemarketing!

My first experience with telemarketing was when I was 17. My mother was working as a floor salesperson for a company that sold memberships to a discount club. People would come in for tours, and she would show them all the wonderful things they could purchase at deep discount if they were to join. To get the people to come in, a bank of telemarketers spent the days calling random people. “Congratulations!” we would tell them, “You’ve won…” 

I hated that line. True, they would get a prize at the end of the tour, but they hadn’t really won anything. The prize was just a ploy to get them to come in, and I knew they knew that. I’m guessing they knew that I knew they knew that, because after weeks of phone calls, I didn’t have a single positive response. Every day, a big zero stood by my name on the telemarketing success board that everyone watched.

The closest thing to a positive response was the one guy who sounded genuinely excited about winning (most people hung up or just said “sorry, not interested”). I was so excited that I almost forgot to ask him the qualifying questions. When I did, we were both disappointed, his family didn’t earn enough for him to claim his “prize.” The one person who could have really used the free whatever-it-was, and I couldn’t give it to him. My heart broke for him and for myself.

Meanwhile, I had surpassed the number of days a telemarketer was supposed to go without meeting quota before they were fired. Although I clearly wasn’t succeeding, my mother was one of their best floor salespeople and so they didn’t want to upset her by firing me. Finally they talked to her and she talked to me, and we all agreed that everyone would be happier if I hung up the phone for good.

So why, 26 years later, have I been spending hours over the last few days making phone call after phone call in hopes of selling our services? The answer is love. 

I love my husband, and I want to see his business (one he’s dreamed about for years) succeed. I know that his fear of the phone is even greater than mine. And so, I calmed down the butterflies in my stomach and started calling.

The good news is, this experience has been much different from my first one. Yes, it’s still difficult, and I have to psyche myself up before every phone call, but this time I believe in the service I’m offering, and when I tell a school that we offer free graduation photography services, I can have a clear conscience knowing that what I’m telling them is exactly the truth. Not everyone believes me (and who can blame them with all the scams out there), but by facing my fear I’ve gotten more leads than I had at first dared to hope for.

I still hate telemarketing, and I can’t wait until this is over. But I do love my husband, and I love helping his business succeed!

My White Flag

On February 3, after we had eaten up all the bread that had come pre-wrapped, we started our countdown for 30 days without bread wrappers. Then last night, we stopped again. This time for good. I knew it was time to quit when I noticed my dear husband had put the last remains of our homemade monkey bread in a disposable zip-lock storage bag and the first words that came out of my mouth were, “I hate this blog project!”

It had started as a great idea. To try something new and different and blog about my experiences. I enjoy it when others do this and have appreciated the resulting books and documentaries, but the difference between them and me is that their projects become all-consuming endeavors. Their whole lives are affected by what they’re doing, and it’s their number one focus. I came up with the blog idea around the time my husband started a photography company–the blog was never going to be my number one focus. 

That isn’t to say that I plan to give up on reducing waste. We worked hard to create a system that allows us to use less bread wrappers, and we plan to stick with that system when it’s not an inconvenience. But I’ve also come to the conclusion that I could make all kinds of sacrifices trying to refrain from using bread wrappers, and it wouldn’t make a difference unless the idea caught on at a greater community level.

I came to this conclusion while visiting my mother-in-law over the holidays. She doesn’t have my same obsession for reducing waste as was evidenced by a conversation between her and my father-in-law I overheard one morning:

Dad: “Why is this pizza in the trash?”
Mom: “Because it’s been in the fridge FOREVER!”
Dad: “I put it in there last night!”

But my mother-in-law does have some very environmentally friendly habits that I’ve struggled to implement myself. They’ve been recycling for a lot longer than we have, and she always shops with re-usable grocery bags (something I’ve managed to remember to do a handful of times). Why? Because this is the expectation her community has set. The trash company insists they separate their recycling (we don’t even have a trash company in the area that will pick up recycling!), and the grocery stores where she shops charge extra for plastic bags. 

And so I’ve come to the conclusion that the place where change is going to come from isn’t from little-known blogs but from companies making decisions that encourage everyday people to make environmentally friendly decisions.

Therefore I will not bore you (or myself) any longer with all the details of how to get and store bread without using disposable plastic. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop blogging. I’ve noticed that my most popular blogs have been those that have been slightly off topic, those that were reflections on things I had experienced in my everyday life. To be honest, those were my favorite blogs too. That’s really the blogging style that fits me best.

So with my new focus, I’ll need a new blog name. At first, I figured I’d need a new name before making the transition, but then I thought about how many times I’ve written the story before writing the title. Sometimes you can’t really put a name to something until you know exactly what that something is going to be. 

As we step forward into this unknown adventure (I think I just found my new blog title!), I want to thank you for reading along on my environmental journey and encourage you to stick by as we see what unfolds in the future.

A Confession

Dear Mother Nature,

I must confess. I have not once kept my promise of avoiding disposable bread wrappers. I am so, so sorry. Really I am.

Now, I knew it would be difficult over the holidays, especially when we were staying with family, but what I didn’t take into consideration was how difficult it would be before and after our trip. I also didn’t take into consideration how difficult it would be for my husband (who does most of the grocery shopping) to remember NOT to pick up store-bought bread.

The first time he came home with some, I got upset. “Oh we’ve started that?” he asked, ever so innocently.

“Yes, I mentioned that in my blog.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Um, I read the blog to you.”

So apparently that’s not enough. On take two of this experiment, we’re going to have to have some sort of ceremony to help him remember.

The second time he came home with store-bought bread I was both upset and relieved. After all, we were about to leave on our Christmas trip, and I wasn’t sure when I would have time to bake bread or how homemade bread would hold up on the trip. And if not bread, I wasn’t sure what we would eat on the road.

So we left for our trip with store-bought bread, ate all kinds of store-bought bread on the trip, and returned to (sigh) buy even more store-bought bread. I had to agree with my husband that with the kids scheduled to start school only a couple days after our return, and with those days being packed full of other obligations, store-bought bread only made sense.

The kicker, however, was that this month, even our homemade bread that we purchase from a friend came to us pre-wrapped. There really was no other way. See, my friend lives about an hour from us, but my dad and her parents both live in the same community (for now; her family is getting ready to move overseas). So often we meet up on a day when both of us are visiting our families, or she swings through my town on her way back from a family visit to do some shopping and drop of the bread. But this month was a challenge. We were out of town when she visited her parents, and because her car broke down, her visits were more infrequent than usual. Our only choice was for her to leave the bread in her parents’ freezer until I was in town and could pick up the loaves from them. Naturally, since they don’t have the bread freezing system that I spent six months figuring out for my own home, the bread had to be wrapped in disposable plastic bags.

Since we buy our bread for a month at a time, it looks like it will be February before I’m able to keep my promise to you, Mother Nature. Think of it as a Valentine’s gift. (I really do love you, you know!)

In the meantime, I’m going to have to see if any local bakeries will sell me unwrapped bread. After all, if I’ve learned anything this month, it’s that life can get in the way of the best of intentions.

Love,
Lori

The Quest for Reusables

Perhaps finding a sustainable solution for soda is going to be easier than my quest for a sustainable bread solution.

Yesterday, I went to one of my favorite grocery stores (The Village Market) to see what soda’s they sold in bottles. There were about nine different brands with a variety of flavors on their shelves. Having written down these brand names, I’ve started researching to see if any of them use reusable bottles. Many of these brands weren’t on the list at www.glassbottlesoda.org, and there were a few on that list that indicate they do not use reusables, but I was still able to get several good leads.

One of the brands, Frostie, is bottled at three different bottling plants. And one of those bottling plants does use reusables. I’ve emailed them, as well as several other brands that looked promising but weren’t on the glass bottles list to see how to go about returning reusables.

Stay tuned!