Shooting Stars!
I figure you get very few chances in this life to see something so amazing. So, i was all about goin out to see it. Then, I felt like the LORD was telling me to go see this. No matter what I read or listened to they were talking about it, The Leonid Meteor Shower. It happens every year and is supposed to be spectacular. I had never seen it and really, really wanted to. It was one of those moments; you just know with everything in your being, you are supposed to witness. I go to bed with anxious anticipation of what I will witness later in the evening. I set my alarm and half wake up about 1:15 in the morning. At about 1:25 I hop my entirely too awake for this hour, self out of bed, put on what I think are warm clothes, and my coat. I hop in the car and head …. Well I wasn’t sure where to head. So I drove south toward the beach because that is the darkest place I know. You can see most of the sky from there; I figured I would see something.
I was not prepared for what I did see. After making several stops along the way to see what I could see, I ended up at the beach where I work. I walked on to the board walk and looked up. I saw something streak across the sky. It left a trail I thought like a jet does in the day time but them it was gone. So I’m standing here thinking to my self……very irritated at myself…. you have built this up in your mind so much that you are imagining shooting stars. Then this kinda calm came over me and a prompting to keep looking. So I lay down on the board walk and just watched. I see another one and another just like the first a bright instant of light streaks across the sky and then it is gone leaving a trail which is also gone in an instant. The most comparable thing it can think of is fireworks. They were that bright but just for an instant. It was so fast that I questioned weather it was happening and then it would happen again.
This experience put many thoughts in motion. The first was to remember quotes from the Bible about the stars falling from heaven when HE comes back. Then I remembered in the Narnia stories how the stars fell from the sky at the end of time there. I remember songs and sayings, and was thankful for all the remembrances.
I began to think about how HE communicates with me. So often I treat HIS presence like my first observation of the shooting stars. I find myself asking, “Did that really just happen?” Or saying something like, “HE couldn’t be telling me that or to do that!” More often then not, in my life, His communication is very quiet, very quick and something, that when I really pay attention that is unlike any other communication. I know it’s HIM. Or maybe a better way to say it is my heart knows it’s HIM. It is something I long to hear or see, or experience and it is unmistakable in it’s………..being…..
I AM

My Cardinals are gone…. Ok, so they are not mine to hold or keep in a cage. I would never even want to do that to something so amazingly wild. I claim them as mine this pair of Cardinals that appear in my life, at the most astonishing times. Probably they are not even the same pair. How astounding would it be if a pair of bright red birds followed me from Baton Rouge to Foley and now camp out at the beach this remote beach? That would be remarkable, indeed. They show up, My Cardinals, when I am speaking to HIM, about the troubles of my day or burdens I have taken again from the LORD. To me they have been a tangible symbol of his presence, a gift that only HE could give. They were a gift that would show up at the most unexpected, yet the most appropriate times. These beautiful living signs of HIS presence, and purposeful interruption in this life HE gave me. They are gone with the seasons and my heart is a little sad, but this life is so much more enriched by the experience. I know HE will continue to show up in other ways, I am on the look out, anxiously waiting and listening.
After writing this we recieved a Christmas gift in the mail for work, attached to the package was a Christmas Card with the most beautiful pair of Cardinals on it. Maybe HE is not done with them yet.

"...just as any bird serves as a sign for any idea. Noah's dove, Macbeth's rooks, Horace's swans, Omar Khayyam's pigeons, Theocritus's nightingale, Count Fosco's canaries--they are no longer birds but usages of birds...I wonder if there ever was a moment whan a cardinal outside my window sat there in blazing splendour signifying nothing." - Alberto Manguel

I want to tell all of you a little about my Granpa, Thomas Clinton Bobe. He was born very weak the doctor didn’t even think he would make it to a year old. In fact the Doctor wanted to adopt him thinking he would have the best chance for life in his constant care. My great grandmother being a woman of fervent prayer refused trusting the Lord with his life, she took him home. He thrived in this home surrounded by family and the Lord. He grew up in Pensacola, working miles from his home at the Sanger Theater to earn a little extra money for the family, then coming home to milk the cow who only liked him. He told us stories of swimming in bayous and fishing off of train trestles, he was an adventurer at heart. He wanted to fly so at 16 or 17 he got permission from my grandmother to quit school to join the Navy. Once in the Navy he didn’t qualify to fly but he could repair anything so they made him a mechanic for the planes and shortly after that sent him to California. In California, on a blind date, he met my grandmother. It was apparently love at first sight because he said, “I knew I was going to marry her the first time I saw her.” Shortly after that they were sent to Guam to repair planes for the war effort and start their family. While there they had 2 children Terry and Janie.
In 1950 T. C., as he was known by his friends, was discharged from the Navy with disability discharge. It was found that he had M.S. he spent several months in Bethesda Hospital before He was sent home to die. The doctors said he didn’t have a chance and even if he did make it he would never walk again. As always, with much prayer and work my grandfather did walk again. In fact he not only walked but became so healthy you would not have known he was sick. He studied for his pilot’s license and earned it not too long afterwards. He flew several small single engine planes for many years until he could not pass the eye exam any longer. During this time he began a business with his wife Wendy that still survives today Bobe’s Hobby House. They also had two more sons Donnie, my father, and John. My grandfather was always seeking the Lord and found innumerable ways to serve HIM through his business and church. He instilled faith in his family who in turn raised their children to know HIM. I miss my Granpa. My favorite memory over the last few months is of the last time he remembered me. I sat holding his hand talking to him, telling him that I loved him. He said he loved me back, he said he was proud of me, that I was serving the LORD. I every visit after that he did not know me. That is ok, because I knew and loved him along with the rest of my family who poured their lives in to him over the last few months. I had the chance to watch my family honor my Granpa and be there for him in any possible way. I am blessed to have known this man and to have bee a part of his family. I pray that I trust in the LORD the way he did and that I have adventures and use my gifts, and live out my dreams in a way that honors my LORD, as my Granpa did. A friend asked me if it felt like what I thought it would feel like to loose my Granpa and this was my answer,I knew I would be sad -- about losing him and not knowing him better than I did. about my grandmother being alone. my dad and aunt and uncles not having a dad. about Sterling my 5 year old cousin not knowing his grandad and not understanding where he is now. I didn't expect to miss -- his smell (like coffee because he drank gallons of it a day), his sense of humor, his big thick glasses, the whistle that was louder than anything i've ever heard, stories about when he was a kid, his voice, his laugh, his really blue eyes that are just like my dad's and mine for that matter, their love - the example it was to all of us, the love he had for the LORD, his shoes, and sweaters, his hands, his smileI didn't expect to miss those things.....I didn't expect the weird feelings, really selfish kinda stuff, like not having a husband to hold my hand through this, wishing he were here for a little longer, angry that i was in BR instead of Pensacola with him this weekend, wishing he knew me the last time i saw him, i didn't expect to feel like such a kidI didn't expect to be peaceful more than sad, or to smile at the thought of him being gone from the struggle of this place and his illnessesi didn't expect to hear my older brother crying when i told him or when he told me he couldn't come, he never cries, i didn't expect my younger brother to have it all together, he is so much like my dad,i didn't expect to be tired and get even more tired at the thought of the next few days.i don't want to go up to the casket..... i don't want to remember him like that.

the path
Closet in a Car

I been accused of living out of my car over the last decade, at any given time you can find just about any kind of clothing article needed for almost any occasion there. This has changed as of late with the purchase of a new vehicle and is not exactly what I had in mind as the topic of this BLOG.
I enjoy driving which is good because I do quite a bit of it. I work just a little over 30 miles from home and my church is 3 and 1/2 hours from where I live so the road has become familiar to me and has become the place of reflection and praise for my LORD. It is often our place to be alone together. It has become my closet. HE meets me there and I come out overwhelmed by LOVE. I want to share this time with you… so forgive my feeble words because they will not do justice to HIM..
I left Baton Rouge, thinking that my heart could not be any fuller of joy, peace, or love, then HE showed up. The light began to change and the coolness of the air mixed with the warm, golden color that made everything around me glow. I blushed, I was surprised! I’ve never been so safe, never felt so loved, and never had this type of embrace. I long for it now. HE gave me gifts for my senses, which brought me from tears to laughter and back again with their beauty. HE reminded me of HIS love. I felt wrapped in HIS arms my head on HIS chest hearing HIS heart beat. Each beat was a whisper of LOVE. Love for me.
I hope you know Him this way. That is my prayer for you….

the path
“Rely on HIS strength!”

That is what someone told me today. That is how we get through this difficult time of slowly losing my grandfather. I find myself praying constantly about how to act and react to the daily rollercoaster of emotions we as a family go through. I don’t know how to act most of the time. Some times I’m really sad. I know I should be sad so put in a song that reminds me of my grandfather and cry while I’m driving the 30 minutes or so back home from work. Sometimes I’m really selfish wanting the end to come and come quickly not trusting in the LORD’S timing for all things. Sometimes I throw myself into work or a project or concerns of friends to kinda avoid thinking about it.
How do I rely on GOD’S strength? I even ask HIM that question because I don’t understand. Does it come from HIS word like wisdom? Is it in that quiet voice that makes my heart leap? Do I find strength from others? Maybe listening to those who know HIM and have walked through similar situations is the way to go! That just doesn’t seem right nor is it even available. I’ve looked and asked.
So, HIS strength, it is what I want, what I long for. It’s the best nothing could be better, right. So I pray I see when HE sends it my way.