Savor

Savor: taste (food or drink) and enjoy it completely; enjoy or appreciate (something pleasant) completely.

~Synonyms: relish, enjoy (to the full), appreciate, delight in, revel in, luxuriate in, bask in

I am enamored with this word and for all it means. In terms of food, not many have this down. To truly savor something, there is a strategy. One must eat slow, enjoying each and every little bite. Savoring involves the smell, the look, the feel, and the atmosphere. One cannot simply make eating food a matter of the taste buds. Every little aspect counts, for, a good cookie is not as good in front of a television at midnight as it is right out of the oven, next to your mother who took time and care to make it with you. The food needs good company. No one should savor alone. One must focus on only the piece of art that they are eating when they are eating. The food must be pretty. As I learned in What's 4 Dessert, presentation is everything. Take a lesson from little kids,  any food that is not beautiful is not worth eating. If the texture or smell is not perfect, the consumption will not be savored. Finally, the food needs good company. If anything throws off the experience, why eat it? Why even waste the calories?

Before you think I am food critic, I will tell you that I am more of a life critic. Isn't that what we writers are anywho? I am not so much interested in savoring my chocolate chip cookie as I am in savoring my life. Although, savoring a chocolate chip cookie right now would probably be a very good idea.

There is also a strategy to savoring life. I want to savor every morsel, every bite. I want to make it beautiful and worthwhile.  I don't want to waste time with diverted focus. I want to be fully present in every single moment of my life. The details count- the smells, the textures, the atmosphere, the company, the presentation. 

I wonder, how much of my life am I truly savoring? How much am I living each moment? Enjoying it, appreciating it to the full?

Have you ever seen someone who does this? They don't waste time with the food that isn't worth it. They don't eat the food that isn't the best for their life. That is to say, they do not worry about the things that don't matter. They purge their lives of the cares which cages the world in such obsession. Their lives are void of absent minded meals. Instead, they live every day, enjoying every moment to the full, with good company and with beauty.  

Abundant- existing or available in large quantities, plentiful; extreme

~Synonyms: rich, lavish, abounding, bountiful, overflowing, prolific

In return for savor, one receives abundance. 

Savoring life means living life abundantly. The two go hand in hand. 

Please, do not miss your life. Do not forget to savor. Focus on the eternal- what matters.  Close your eyes and smell the aroma. Open them and behold its beauty. Bite slow, chew on every morsel, swallow with care. Share it with others. Do not savor alone. 

And finally, live life abundantly.

Onions

I just finished a book that tastes like onions, long after the last page is turned.

I am vexed.

The book's premise was based on the idea that because someone is in love, they can be as obnoxiously selfish as they want to be. Love explains and excuses every action. Love is the quintessential band-aid for all evils. Love yada yada. After reading this book, if this is what love is, I simply don't want anything to do with it. 

Onions also make people cry. Doesn't anyone feel their stinging eyes?

This is reality people. We live in world that believes this. I can leave my husband if I fall in love with another man. I can sign the divorce papers and force my kids to watch their world fall apart. I can ignore my friends and family to be with the person that sucks up my existence. I can have sex with a guy when I'm 14 and have his baby with no money or maturity to support because we are "in love." I can abuse, steal, kill, defile- I AM IN LOVE. I mean, no one can help their feelings, right?

Is this love? Or onions?

New York Times Bestsellers List- you failed.

I need to go brush my teeth. If I am to find true love today, I refuse to find it with onion breath.

A Greater Love- A Journey of Pink Tricycles and Gum Balls

When I was little I used to think that Pink was the ultimate door to perfection. Anything pink made me a princess. Pink could send you to the moon. Pink made things look, smell, feel, sound, and taste better. The color pink gave or elevated any object's worth. Pink was my childhood juju.

For instance, I always wanted the pink gum ball at the machines. I would waste quarter after quarter trying to get the pink gum ball. I was convinced the other colors did not taste nearly as delicious. I devised different rituals to ensure I would get the pink one. I would spin around in circles, jump up and down 2.5 times, stomp 4 times, and kiss the quarter for a perfect delivery. (Okay, maybe not quite that exotic but you get the idea). Unfortunately, most times I didn't get the pink gum ball. Usually I got stuck with the other dopey colors. It is a traumatic experience, let me tell you. 

Of course then there was safety town- abounding with Smokey the Bear, stickers, and a fake town that you ride around in a rainbow array of tricycles. Everything was going great until they let us loose on the tricycles. I soon realized on the first day that there was only ONE pink tricycle. ONE!!!! Are they crazy?? What are they thinking? Everyday of safety town my new mission was to get that pink tricycle. Okay this is where the obsession bit comes in, but I prefer to look at it as driven. I don't think I actually learned anything in safety town because I spent the whole day devising ways to win the pink tricycle. I was convinced nothing would stop me.  I RAN every day, saddle shoes to the pavement, shoving other kids nonchalantly on the way, to achieve my mission. Day after day, my mission failed. At least my pink fantasies, Mr. Tricycle and Mr. Gum Ball, could be friends in their continued defeat. 

In my nineteen year old life, I have come across many different colored gum balls and tricycles in search for the pink one. I mean, in a more literal sense, I have searched for the best thing, the right thing, the pink tricycle or gum ball so to speak. 

In recent weeks, I have realized the rules have changed. They are even more complicated. Many times, I have thought I arrived at the pink in victory, only to realize that the pink wasn't real. Gum balls and tricycles decked out in camouflage to get me to next step in my journey for the real pink.

It is disappointing, you know? It hurts to separate from that which I have come to love. It is painful to break off another relationship that I thought might be IT. It pangs me to leave a church that I came to love so much. It aches to withdraw so suddenly from the closest people to me. Maybe it stings more to separate from the idea that I finally found the pink. 

God has taught me that he doesn't want us to find the pink right away. We need to learn from the other colors he puts into our lives. He wants us to live by faith that he will get us there. When God separates us from something we come to love, it isn't because he doesn't love us. He just knows that what we love isn't really pink, even though our own eyes deceive us. We spit out our gum and step away from our tricycle.

I am a little girl, waiting at the gum ball machine, running toward the tricycles at safety town. I can feel my hand in my Daddy's hand, waiting and running, together. I imagine after quite a bit of blues and greens and yellows and reds and oranges, I finally get to ride the Pink Tricycle. There will be a Pink Gum Ball in the basket. 

 

 

After a long, painful absence, Only Questions

Questions I have been asking as of late:

What is the church?

Since when did it become a black widow and decide to eat its own?

If it can't take care of its own people, then how the hell is it going to reach out to other people in the world? How can it take care of all the other crap?

How does God manage to take such a tormenting situation and turn it into a refreshing one?

Why do my glasses always have spots on the lenses?

Do I eat too much chocolate?

When was the last time I really thanked God for everything he has done? 

Am I going to pull a B in Politics Class? Do I care?

How am I going to survive a month without Stephanie Taylor?

Should I get people anything for Christmas this year? Would I be contributing to the Consumerism that dehydrates our society? 

Is it possible for a 19 year old to write a smashing book full of everything she needs to say? 

Have I become too cynical? Do I sound like an old bitter woman with her lips pursed too tight?

Why do I even wonder at these things when next door, someone is probably wondering things like, "Where is my next meal coming from?" and "I wonder if anyone loves me?" 

Answers:

According to Mrs. Smith, my Junior High History Teacher, the answer is always 2. 

According to Paul, my attitude should be like Christ and become a servant. He also advised that I should rejoice no matter the circumstances.

According to the ceiling tiles I am staring at, well, nothing. They are rather indignant in their silence. 

There is no more time to wallow or to question. I have no more time to wonder at the things I cannot control. Only time to act. 

It is the end of this day and my body will surrender to the flowered sheets. Yet I hope for tomorrow. I pray for a will empowered by the Spirit to leave behind all unanswered questions. I suppose I do not need them answered anyway. At least not in one sitting. Or maybe not all in one lifetime. I am convinced the only essential is a God who knows all of those answers already, and now is the ultimate time to strip down to the essentials.