The Measure of a Life

I was browsing through the bookstore night-before-last, and I stumbled upon an interesting little book. It was only about half the size of a postcard, so its size alone attracted my attention. My interest was piqued even further by the book’s slick-looking cover jacket and trendy illustration (a hip little diva in glamorous clothing and high heels). I read the title, and I was hooked. This little book was going to tell me “What Every Woman Should Do Once.” Every woman, including me.

I have to admit, I’m a sucker for this sort of thing. So I flipped open the little book and began to read.

Make up an alias. Never done it.

Skinny dip. Never done it. (Really.)

Insist on being called Your Majesty for a day. Have thought about it. Never done it.

Sleep under the stars. Not a bad idea, but … never done it.

Things were beginning to get pretty depressing. According to the law of averages, my life was half over, and I hadn’t done any of the things every woman should do.

Then, glory of glories, I found one:

Dance on top of a bar. Yep, that one I’d done. Never mind the fact that I was only about five years old at the time, the bar was owned by one of my mom’s friends, and my little performance (which Momma and her friends found very cute) occurred while the bar was closed. I was encouraged.

I turned the page and kept reading, reserving judgment on the fullness of my life until I’d gotten further through the list.

Now, honestly, some of the ideas really did sound fun. I’d like to learn to tango, create my own holiday and celebrate it every year, and wear a feather boa and movie star glasses to the grocery store. And what woman in her right mind wouldn’t want to go on a carriage ride in Central Park?

But the more I read, the more heartbroken I became.

Write your acceptance speech for the Woman of the Year Award.
Date a guy you met on the Internet.
Audition for reality tv.
Give someone famous your autograph.
Buy a round for everyone at the bar.
Be the boss.
Send yourself a dozen roses.
Have a three-martini lunch and go back to work refreshed.
Call in sick and spend a whole day shopping with your best friend.
Dye your hair blonde, and see if they really do have more fun.
Kiss a guy from every state.
Forget about what your mother would think.
Try an extreme sport.
Make a voodoo doll of your ex.
Taste every variety of margarita.
And my personal favorite …
Have an anonymous encounter.


The book was meant to be given as a light-hearted, happy (albeit serious) little gift. What broke my heart was the view of life it advocated – and which I see advocated by so many things designed for women today.

Sure, the editors threw in some politically correct ideas for good measure (volunteer at a homeless shelter, adopt a pet, run for a worthy cause). And there was an occasional gem of an idea (like the carriage ride in Central Park).

But for the most part, the ideas were self-serving, self-gratifying and shallow. In fact, I found the list to be sadly ironic. Instead of the full and robust life the book’s title suggested, I couldn’t help thinking what a hollow existence any life measured by this list would be.

Quote of the Week

Community is always poised between two poles: solitude and togetherness. Without togetherness, community disperses; without solitude, community collapses into a mass, a crowd.

David Steindl-Rast

Holiday revelation

Two oddball places God gives me some of my greatest revelations:

(1) the shower, when the water's heating up my brain, and

(2) the check-out line at Wal-Mart.

Now, there's no rhyme or reason to my shower-induced revelations. Topically, they run the gamut, from new homeschool strategies to scriptural insights to child psychology.

The revelations I've had in Wal-Mart's check-out line, on the other hand, almost always have to do with my personal shortcomings. Here are a few examples:

"I'm an impatient/inconsistent/terrible/etc. mother." (That one hits me whenever I scream at, threaten or, maybe worst of all, lose my children while unloading the grocery cart).

"I'm a total idiot." (I arrived at that little jewel of self-insight after shopping for $200 worth of groceries only to discover that I'd left every form of payment in some other purse at home).

"I will never live within a budget." (That, after spending over budget AGAIN because I just couldn't live without that Josh Groban CD.)

See what I mean?

But I had a very different sort of revelation in the Wal-Mart line just a few days before Christmas. It came as a result of a conversation I had with a really nice, professional-looking gentleman. Just as I finished filling the conveyor belt with my groceries, the man came up behind me. He could see that my transaction was going to take a while, so he asked the other guy with him to go over to customer service and purchase the gift cards they needed. Remember, Christmas was only days away.

Here's how the conversation went:

Gentleman, somewhat loudly, to the other guy as he walked away: "18. Tell them we need 18 100-dollar gift cards."

Me, jokingly: "Go ahead and make it 19, if you don't mind."

Gentleman, laughing: "From the looks of things, you'd spend it all right now."

Me: "Not hard to do, when you're feeding a family of six."

Gentleman: "I can't even imagine."

pause

Gentleman again: "So, what's the age range of the kids?"

Me: "12, 10, 5 and 3."

Gentleman: "Great. So you have at least two believers, then."

Me, surprised and excited at his question: "Yes, we do."

Him: "What about the 10-year-old?"

Me: "Oh, yes, he joined the church just a few weeks ago."

long pause

Him: "No. No. I mean't believers in Santa Claus."

Now, I wish I could report that I shared the gospel with him at this point or at least said something semi-spiritual. I didn't. Instead, I explained away my own response ("We don't do Santa Claus, never have. My husband works in full-time ministry, so my mind naturally goes that direction."). Then I paid for my groceries and headed out the door, beating myself up again: "I am such an idiot. I should have known what he was talking about. Do I even have a brain?"

And then the revelation hit: "My mind doesn't naturally turn to spiritual things; that's the Holy Spirit's doing. The Holy Spirit is turning my heart away from the things of the world and toward the things of God; that's why it didn't occur to me that the man mean't Santa Claus. God really is changing me, he really is changing his children. We are in this world, but we are not of it!