Perhaps it is just me, but I wonder if you’ve ever had a “friend” that wasn’t a person?

Since I was very small, books have been my friends.

We were first introduced through picture books: rhyming words, bright colors, thick, sturdy pages. The story in my family goes, that my dad read Green Eggs and Ham  (over and over and over…). I spent hours with Richard Scarry’s Best Word Book and The Berenstain Bears; A Baby Sister for Frances by Lillian Hoban and many others while growing up. There was Super Fudge, Ramona and Beezus and Mr. Popper’s Penguins, each that I remember specifically for various reasons. My memories of turning to books for comfort, joy, adventure and story are clear and so many.

In 4th grade, I was mesmerized by the poetry of Shel Silverstein after being introduced to him by one of my favorite teachers, Mr. Vandenberg. When I went sometime that year to have my first surgery to give me the best outcomes with cerebral palsy, my class gave me copy of Where the Side Walk Ends, with all their signatures. It is still important to me, right there on my overflowing bookshelves’ today. While The Giving Tree touched my sensitive heart in other ways, I spent long hours recovering that year also memorizing, SARAH CYNTHIA SYLVIA STOUT WOULD NOT TAKE THE GARBAGE OUT  and another called, SICK. I loved the melodic rhymes, the quirky illustrations and the sound of the poems as I recited them.

While I didn’t participate in sports growing up, but had some academic successes in the areas of writing and comprehension. I’m not sure if anyone could’ve known what those meant to me or did for my confidence, including being chosen for Young Authors at Hope College, getting decent grades on writing assignments and writing stories that my friends in high school begged me to finish. It was where I found my confidence, at least back then.

In 6th grade, my teacher would read aloud for about a half hour after recess and it was BY FAR, my favorite hour of the day! While I don’t remember all the books he chose, one stands out to me with details and  every word so clear I almost feel like I could still walk straight into those pages now, through the Ozarks to meet Little Ann and Big Dan… the sounds of the wind in the trees, a rushing river and those hounds, running through the well-worn paths to tree a fat raccoon…

I fell in love with those dogs as Mr. Borchers read Where the Red Fern Grows, by Wilson Rawls. It is a story of pure devotion, running through the woods and riverbanks, hard work and effort, coming of age and understanding grief. Funny, how all those things are still so central in my personal and professional lives.

Although they couldn’t talk in my terms, they had a language of their own that was easy to understand. Sometimes I would see the answer in their eyes, and again it would be in the friendly wagging of their tails. Other times I could hear the answer in a low whine or feel it in the soft caress of a warm flickering tongue. In some way, they would always answer.”
― Wilson Rawls, Where the Red Fern Grows

There are images and lessons are so clear to me that I still use a few in therapy sessions today. (6th grade was long ago!)

I read the Sweet Valley High series as if the characters were actually my best friends. This was also how I met two of my favorite authors, Lisa and Matt McMann. Lisa, at the time, was a manager of a local bookstore and where she would later hire me. (Pooh’s Corner). I worked there all the way through high school and college. Lisa is smart, funny, wise and talented. She had a way of making me feel like the funniest person in the room, as well as teaching me to interact intelligently with customers, had a tremendous love for and knowledge of books. When she started dating Matt and brought him to the store, I was so honored to meet him too. They were both completely at ease with me and CP, which is not always my experience.

In the last few years, our friendship has shifted again as I’ve had the honor of being a sensitivity reader for Lisa’s New York Times bestselling series, The Forgotten Five. It has been a joy to play a small part of the development of Lada, a pretty badass teen who also has CP.

Bookstores continue to be some of my favorite, comforting places. I am notorious for finding some great local ones, spectacular used ones or even a national chain if I am really hard-pressed. Husband did not grow up as a “read for fun” guy, but he knows there is nowhere else that I enjoy shopping more. Our budget for books has always been fairly fluid, the understanding of my background, career and hobby are all wrapped up in the magic of words, grammar, pictures and all the ways they all come together.

While I could give you an absolutely exhaustive list of the current things I’m reading, this post is really about the picture book that shows me again, an example of Jesus, that I identify purpose with, and even though is was written in November 1982, is the story of life, love, adventure and calling.

Miss Rumphius is one of the first books Lisa introduced me too when I began working at Pooh’s Corner. The story of Alice Rumphius, an independent, strong, storied women who is told by her uncle, that along with her dreams of traveling the world and living in a house by the sea, she needs to do something to make the world more beautiful. Following her many travels, she does indeed buy a house by the sea. She suffers a back injury, takes her time healing and soaking in the loveliness of her house by sea,  then Alice discovers her way of making the world more beautiful. She fills her pockets with seeds of Lupines, then scatters them everywhere she goes. EVERYWHERE.

The flowers are beautiful, she is beautiful and it is a picture of how the smallest thing can make everything more beautiful.

But for me, it is picture of something even bigger.

Before I knew it, I was contemplating my own ways of making the world more beautiful, the ways of Miss Rumphius, Jesus and all the people around me who do that too.

My mom, who for my whole life has brought the best pies, cookies, meals and bunches of flower gladiolas to everyone in need. (“Because I am so gladiola to see you,” she always tells them.) My dad, who has such a heart for those rehabbing after surgery. His call to Physical Therapy has carried on well-past “retirement.” My sister who has a huge heart and wants to help more often than anyone realizes. Dear friends who have the gifts of love and giving like I’ve never known.

Honestly, this list could go on and on…I truly can find the seeds that each and every one of us sows without thinking about it.

Yes, there are also the “bad seeds,” sometimes, but I think the good is always there, even if it is hard to find.

When I was just out of college, my job in relational ministry taught me so much more than I could teach. One afternoon, I was bringing a group of girls to a basketball game. I picked them up and as we drove, we passed a group of little kids who were selling rocks and lemonade. We drove by, then before I knew it, I was turning around. I got out, bought a bunch of rocks and lemonade, left the kids a 20, then got back in the car.

I handed the rocks to these high school girls, talked to them about “standing stones” in the Bible, monuments to the holy moments in our lives, the opportunities to mark the moments where we experience God’s absolute miracles. I asked them to remember those for themselves, then asked them to also remember to bless others (kids selling rocks and lemonade, for instance,) whenever possible.

I can’t tell you where that came from….

I know, when I look back on my life, I see now how I believe in kindness, the power of how we treat people, the power of words and how I experience Jesus in all of it.

I want to leave a room, making others feel better after I leave than when I arrive. I want people to see, feel Jesus when they spend time with me, or if they don’t know Jesus, wonder what is different…

I believe in the ways of Mr. Rogers, the seeds of kindness, goodness and listening…seeing others.

Mostly, I want the seeds of my life be the seeds He (Jesus) would want me to sow, the ones as close to the ones he sows, everywhere.

If you need some inspiration, read Miss Rumphius, and/or the life of her author, Barbara Cooney. Lupines are lovely, goodness is lovelier.

Think about the ways you both intentionally and unintentionally sow your seeds, every day.

Maybe it is doing a bit extra at your job, to help out a co-worker. Perhaps it is helping a young mom at Target with two babies in her cart and trying to put her groceries in her backseat. It may be the words we choose with a co-worker who is not our cup of tea, the person in the drive-thru, or going out of your way to be kind, generous and humble, like so many do every single day.

There is tremendous, unprecedented tension in our world as we speak. We are at a critical threshold where we desperately need hope, kindness and love in our world.

I must’ve been longing for that this week because out of the blue, I found myself searching Etsy for Miss Rumphuis. I came across some beautiful, creative treasures inspired by Miss Alice and her Lupines. My favorite was a peg doll.

I told my ultra-creative youngest daughter about it, then a few hours later, she handed me my own, Miss Rumphius. I am in awe…

(do you see the seeds falling out of her pockets?)

By the grace of God, may we, be those who sow seeds of grace, kindness and beauty because indeed, that is how the world becomes more beautiful. May we see each other, even those we disagree with (especially this week) as worthy of kindness, grace and beauty, because we all are. And may we both give and receive these as if our lives depend on it…

As Aundi Kolber wrote, “ Please do not, for one moment, underestimate what it means to offer others or yourself a glimpse of safety, (especially in times like these.)  It matters.”

Both/And

Xoxo

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows James 1:17