Tag: hardship

A Story For Christmas

n the very cold, very brutal Pennsylvania winter of 1983, my parents found themselves looking for a new place for our little family to live. 

My stepdad had been working as a farm hand, repairing farm and milking equipment for an old couple that owned a dairy in the tiny town of Shippenville.  As part of his pay, we were allowed to live in a small, nearly dilapidated old house with a sagging roof and rotting porch that was next to the barnyard on their property.  As awful as the house sounds, it was charming to me. The surrounding countryside was nothing short of Idyllic in my childhood memory, with horses and cattle grazing in bucolic fields. My older sister and I helped out on the farm by assisting with the milking every morning and afternoon, tending to the chickens and turkeys and pulling weeds in the vegetable garden. We played for hours in the barn, jumping from the haylofts and playing hide-and-seek. We loved it there as children. We were sad to be leaving.

Unfortunately, earlier that fall, after a gloriously warm summer, we were awakened in the middle of the night by the bright glow of fire outside. The three-story barn was in flames—fully engulfed.  Despite the best efforts of the local fire department, the barn burned to the ground. The farmer had just finished hauling in all the hay and oats from the field. Despite warnings from my stepdad that the hay was wet and in the warmth should not be stored in the barn, the farmer loaded it into the barn anyway. Large fans ran on the crop day and night to keep it dry and to keep mold at bay. And it had been an electrical spark from one of the fans that ignited the fire that burned the barn and everything in it.

The crop of hay and oats, gone.

Left without a barn, the tools and crops it housed and the milking equipment adjacent to it, the old farmer had no way of making money. He was forced to sell the farm and land. Including the little house we lived in.

Finding housing in a crunch in such a rural community took great providence, and by December of that year, my parents felt providence was certainly not smiling on them. I am sure desperate prayers were said.

Finally, on the day before Christmas Eve that year, they found an apartment for rent in the neighboring town of Seneca. The apartment was on the second floor above a small factory that made cemetery vaults—not exactly home-sweet-home. But it was good enough for us, for a time.

The next hurdle that needed jumping was moving our family and all our belongings on the night before Christmas Eve. We had no family near us as western Pennsylvania was not our native home. My mom had moved my sister and I from Utah to Pennsylvania after her divorce 5 years earlier. And after she married our step-dad, we had basically lived like nomads, moving wherever there was work. While we had a church community, our congregation was small and geographically spread all over the area. We were poor, and nearly alone. And we only had one little car to our name. There was no U-haul rental nearby. We had access to neither truck, nor trailer.

To top it off, a storm had blown in. That area was prone to lake effect snow and brutal Canadian winds. The wind chill on that night was 60 below zero. 

It sure didn’t feel like Christmas time. And I remember being disappointed—worried even. We had no Christmas tree, no decorations, no tinsel, no gifts, and no angel on top of the tree to help us remember Christ. I feared there really would be no Christmas.

We spent the majority of that day boxing up our things, taking apart furniture, basically working and moving and moving and working and only pausing now and then to ponder how we were going to get everything to our new place with only our little car to take it all.

I’m not sure how this happened—being a child at the time, most things just seemed to miraculously come to pass. Now, through the lens of adulthood, I recognize my parents must have prayed and put out a call for help—and then prayed some more. But somehow, a decent number of farmers from the surrounding community, began pulling up unceremoniously in front of our little old farmhouse. They brought their trucks, trailers and hay wagons and, in the bitter cold of that night, loaded up our belongings and carried them to our tiny apartment in the neighboring town more than a 30 minute drive away. 

But they didn’t stop there. Despite the ice and cold, they then unloaded all the boxes and furnishings and carefully carried them up the long, narrow flight of stairs and placed them in our new home, before returning to their own homes and own families to finish their many chores and prepare for their Christmas celebrations.

And then, just to make the holiday a little more Christmas-like, someone, one of those blessed farmers, returned to our apartment with a Christmas tree. I still remember that tree. To me, with the recollection of a child, it was tall and fat, and sitting on the very top was the most beautiful angel smiling down on us, reminding me of heaven and the true meaning of Christmas. That tree and the angel on top magically drown out those feelings of worry and disappointment I had had earlier. The memory lasts to this day.

Even though Christmas two years ago—the year of my heart transplant—was truly miraculous for our family, filled with more service than we could ever hope to repay and forever sacred to us, the Christmas we spent in Seneca, Pennsylvania will always stand out. That was the year I learned that the greatest gifts are those that remind us what truly matters: hope, kindness, and the light of Christ we carry within.

In the words of Jeffery R. Holland, “Not all angels are from the other side of the veil. Some of them, we walk with and talk with—here, now, every day. … Indeed, Heaven never seems closer than when we see the love of God manifested in the kindness and devotion of people so good and so pure that angelic is the only word that comes to mind.”

May we each, this Christmas, be that angel for someone else. May we follow a prompting, answer a call, have the faith to say yes, and serve each other as Christ serves us.

That Which Does Not Kill Me

I recently learned that the very thing that drives so many people where I live crazy is also the secret behind our spectacular sunsets. It turns out that the dust, the high altitude, and the bone-dry air—the trio that makes daily life feel like a battle with the elements—are the same ingredients that paint our skies in colors that look almost unreal.

For years I’ve grumbled about the dryness that clogs my nose at night and leaves my eyes feeling like sandpaper. And the dust—don’t even get me started. The slightest breath of wind can fling enough grit into the air to make you wonder if we’re all going to die of black lung. But then evening comes, and suddenly all that irritation feels like the price of admission. Because, wow. Our sunsets don’t just appear; they perform. Bold and fiery—light and color spilling across the sky and over the mountains in a way that can’t be captured in words.

What’s really happening is a little atmospheric artistry. As the sun sets, its light comes through the sky at a lower angle, scattering the shorter wavelengths—the blues and violets—out of sight. The dust particles in the air ramp up the drama, catching and amplifying the remaining reds and oranges. Meanwhile, dry air and high elevation keep those colors pure and intense. The result is a sky that looks like it was painted on purpose—because, in a way, it was.

It’s easy for me to overlook the spectacular shows that play out in the western sky each evening—to just close the blinds and ignore them. Instead, return to rubbing my irritated eyes and smoothing lotion over the dry skin on my knuckles, grumbling about this place and its cold, arid weather. One day, I swear, it’ll be the death of me.

But take me out of this dry, cold, dusty place and what would I notice? What would I learn? Would I go blind to the beautiful trees and grow tired of the moist, damp air somewhere else? Probably.

Funny how quickly we forget to appreciate the things that come to us without any effort. A sunset we barely look up to notice. A body that keeps us going day after day. Hot water we assume will always be there. Even a simple smile from a stranger. Meanwhile, somewhere in the world, someone is wishing for exactly one of those things we take for granted.

My son served a mission in Ghana, and for two years we were lucky enough to video chat with him every Monday morning. He sent home plenty of emails too—photos filled with snakes, chickens, goats, and the everyday chaos of his surroundings. But what stood out most were the smiles. Not just the smiles of the people of Ghana—people who live without so many of the comforts we take for granted—but the smile on our son’s face as well.

Why? Because of contrast. Because there’s benefit to be found in opposition. The things that challenge us, stretch us, or push us outside our comfort zone don’t just test us—they strengthen us. Opposition has a way of reshaping us. 

You’re familiar with the expression, That which does not kill me, makes me stronger.

But here’s the thing: you get to choose. You get to choose what exactly that which does not kill actually does to you or for you.

That which does not kill me grants me new perspective.

That which does not kill me teaches me a lesson.

That which does not kill me makes me more grateful.

That which does not kill me gives me purpose.

That which does not kill  me a writes for me a better life story.

The other day I was watching a clip from Dead Poets Society—the scene where John Keating, the teacher, is explaining the purpose of poetry to his students. He says: “We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race, and the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering—these are all noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love—these are what we stay alive for.”

I would add one more thing to John Keating’s list of reasons to be alive: the sheer richness of learning. The way experiences in life increase our understanding and expand not just our minds but also our lives—one might call it poetic.

Life’s experiences—the good and the painful, the easy and the difficult—give it depth, beauty, and meaning. Sometimes, it’s through the hard times that our purpose quietly unfolds. For this, I am profoundly grateful: for the light and the shadow, the ease and the struggle, each one an opportunity to grow. 

Too many of our days slip by while we’re busy thinking about all the wrong things—dwelling on stress instead of gratitude, worry instead of joy, noise instead of love and learning. And I get it, it isn’t easy. With so many responsibilities, it’s hard to stay positive, to find that good perspective. But even in the busiest times, we still get to choose where our thoughts wander in the quiet moments.

So where will we focus? On the dry, dusty air scratching at our patience? Or on the brilliant sky at sunset, beautifully painted just for us?