The Shelf

“Well, I heard some people talkin’ just the other day, and they said you were gonna put me on a shelf…” (1974) “Already Gone” Recorded By: Eagles Composers: Jack Tempchin & Robb Strandlund.

Although it’s becoming more difficult to save up for college, or trade schools, still a goal for higher education. These days, during the controversies of objections in the curriculum in our public school systems, many parents are hunting for appropriate private schools of education where dark indoctrination isn’t priority. There are many among us who soak in higher education from the streets, and hands-on experience in the real world of industry.

Recently, I have been taught well by a 10×10, non-climate controlled storage unit, on the outskirts of Greenville, Texas.

Many months ago I wrote about my mom’s dementia, forcing a drastic change in her life, and ours. She came to live with us during the final week of November last year. With the alteration of daily life, came the painstaking job of chipping away at cleaning out her old storage unit. She’s been paying monthly for it since the late 90’s. (At that time, $25 /month, now $110/month.) I have been taking the 60 mile drive off/on a few times a month to battle the forest of boxes stacked inside. Below is a picture of my progress when I got to a halfway point. When first diving into the operation, the boxes were from floor to about six feet high, with no path to walk.

When I moved back to Texas, from Buffalo, NY in Aug of 2008, I also added a small few to her cardboard mound, but only to be a temporary pitstop. Yeah, right.

Choking back the collective dust, I have been very careful to open each box, sorting my way through the contents. My mom is a hoarder. She has an issue with throwing anything away. She even saves up gently-used fast food napkins. (Sure, read that again.) You just never know when you’re going to run out, right? With that said, I plow through each and every box, wading through old hotel soap bars, combs and brushes from the 1950’s, and individually wrapped saltine crackers from various restaurants from the last few decades. In about 30% of each box I will discover simple trash…yes, garbage. Trash, in the form of fast food plastic forks and spoons, wadded up paper lunch sacks, discarded Cracker Jack prizes, etc. Trust me, I get challenged when I am sore, hot, and exhausted. I need duct tape for my mouth sometimes.

This cleaning out experience has also taught me well in other areas. If you don’t give up, keep digging through old bank statements, junk mail, and grocery store coupons from 1969, because the bottom of the box can bring forth true treasures.

I found a beautiful blue, blown-glass paperweight, baseball-size, I gave her from a high school choir tour to Colorado Springs. We visited a glass shop where I watched the artist create the glass spectacle.

I was so elated to find my granddad’s Navy pin from WWII.

(I need to clean and clip my fingernails.)

I recovered two ladies dress hats from the days of yore. To this day we do not know if they belonged to my grandmother, or great-grandmother. Either way, they are keepsakes now.

Among the gobs and gobs of photos being rescued, I found about 25 pics from a photo shoot I did for talent agencies going way back to October of 1979. I was 19 at the time.

Remember those shirts?

On the heartbreaking side, I have discovered items that maybe should’ve stayed buried in the warped vortex of boxes. I found the dog tags and collar of my beloved childhood dog, Tickey. She considered him to be another son. He was a treasure. Alone, in that 10×10 aluminum shed, I shook his tags on his collar just to hear the jingle-jangle from my mental dust. It made me smile.

Tickey in 1968.

She had stored tons of letters she had received. Many from old friends, and family, who have gone to be with God. Reading them, it gives me the sense of their spirit, as if they stuck them in the mail just yesterday. Enclosed in one of the boxes, a bundle of letters I had written to her, sharing my sorrows, disappointments and pains during harsh days in my past. In her current condition, I feel most of these would not be appropriate for consumption.

If I don’t stop here, I will go on and on concerning my storage unit adventures.

Yes, I am finding the shelf is indeed a great teacher. A true time capsule. The learning continues.

As for my stuff, I am dedicated to only saving items of family history, documents of family importance, and snapshots which tell my kids and grandkids what was truly golden to me, and to those who came before me. A storage unit can truly speak of who you are…or were. The treasures of the heart, we drag from shelf to shelf, paints a picture of our identity for others who will come after us. One box from my past, reminded me of sins I have had to deal with. Like Jesus does, I tossed it behind me, never to haunt my eyes again.

The shelf has taught me that no matter how important some item can be, it can, and will, be forgotten. Out of sight, out of mind. Some things are meant to be forgotten.

A lesson from the shelf also comes to me in the form of understanding that some “things” which may seem urgent today, may be trivial tomorrow.

The lonely dusty shelf screams out, “NOT EVERYTHING YOU DEEM NOTEWORTHY TODAY IS NOT! ALL WILL FADE, ALL WILL CORRODE!”

Yet, on the spiritual side, it’s gratifying to know, to “store” in your heart, the fact that God Himself never puts YOU on a shelf. In God’s economy, you will never find yourself “put away” in a tin box somewhere, away from His sight, away from His mind. The One Who created dust never has to brush away the settling dust off of those He loves….which includes you.

Unlock the true forgotten treasures just waiting in fuel for the race.

“…I give them eternal life, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.” John 10:28-29 (NAS)

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Standing In The Gap

Recently, I have discovered a new vice in my life. Something that I have noticed in myself before, but shrugged off as a silly diversion. Of late, I have come to realize, I need to guard my time with a bit more scrutiny. While scrolling through my newsfeeds on Facebook, I have found I can get addicted to the various short video clips offered from a plethora of sources. In doing so, I discover I consume much of the clock in that hour without even looking up. What a misuse of precious time. It’s something I need to work on before I slip further down the rabbit hole of a kaleidoscope of clips just waiting to snatch me away from more important things. (Even now, I am tempted to stop here to check out the latest uploads of strange things caught on security cameras. ARG!)

However, now that I have confided in you, concerning the latest leach which sucks on my brain, not all video clips are worthless visuals for the eyes.

Last week, while moving on to the next video clip of the day, I was captured by a very touching, yet painful clip from a cat owner. His beloved cat had a litter in a cubby hole, cave-style, dug out in a sandy area on his property. A couple of the new kittens came up missing from her little makeshift den. It wasn’t difficult to guess what had happened, but he wanted proof. Being a techie, he set up a video camera pointing toward the entrance to the den of little ones. He set it up and reviewed the footage several times a day, often catching the mom’s activities live from his computer screen indoors.

One afternoon, glancing at his screen, the cat owner was shocked at what was displayed. Gazing at the screen, he witnessed his mama cat standing fiercely in the entrance of the cubby hole with teeth showing and hisses spewing out of her mouth. There, directly in front of her, with her babes behind her hidden in the sandy den, was a large snake slithering nearer and nearer to the portal of the home of the kittens. Arching her back, with a strange growl, she swiped the claws of her paw toward the nose of the reptile with every effort of reach she could safely muster in the protective stance she defiantly chose. Time was not on the mama’s side, nor the owner’s. He dropped everything and ran out toward the area of his property where the den of kittens had been prepared. With each step, he contemplated just what his course of action would be once he reached the cubby. He didn’t take note of the species of snake, or the scope of its length. Unsure of what tool he could use to fight the crafty invader, his urgency to run as fast as he could to the mama’s aid took over his mind.

Photo by Diego Madrigal on Pexels.com

As the video continued to record, I could see the snake had advanced to the point of wrapping the mama cat up in a squeezing death grip around her stomach and ribcage. She clawed and fought while her life ebbed away in the same spot where she took her last stand against the enemy of the children. The video shows the owner gripping the body of the resisting reptile where it wound itself around the cat’s torso. With both hands, the owner was able to remove the snake, although it took every ounce of arm strength he had. Simultaneously, a few of the kittens raced out of the protective cave, stampeding over their mother’s lifeless body to escape the danger as the owner continued to wrestle the powerful snake.

After a quick edit of the clip. the owner is shown holding the dead reptile from the tail, followed by the man gathering the kittens who instinctively retreated to various hiding places nearby. Of the kittens she had remaining in the cubby behind her during the fight, not one was lost.

Photo by Cristyan Bohn on Pexels.com

After another edit, the video shows the owner, lovingly and respectfully, placing his cat in a shoebox and placing it in a grave close by.

While watching the clip. I was struck by the bravery of the young mother as she faced an enemy of certain destruction. She fought tooth and nail to defend her brood she had nestled in the dug out shelter. Even as her lifeless body was in the clutch of the snake, her body length stretched out against the opening, kept the reptile from fully entering the little cavern.

Oh, how I mourn for our world, seeing so many mamas seem oblivious to the dragon at the cubby doorway.

My heart goes out to the men and women of Ukraine. So many evacuated their loved ones then stayed to battle the invading military of the serpent from Moscow. Yes, that’s how I feel.

My spirit is also reminded of why Jesus came to rescue the world from itself. If you were to go to the hill, Golgotha, in Jerusalem today, you should not see just a hill. One should say to oneself,

“Here is where the Savior of the world made a stance, a standing in the gap, to give away His life for His own.”

Now imagine with me. What if the mama cat came out of her grave three days later and returned to her babes to nurture, teach, and comfort them? That would be worth an international news conference.

The fact remains, Jesus came to take our spiritual death upon Himself knowing there was no other way to escape the deadly serpent. His resurrection was earthshattering, with enormous evidence that He is truly the Great I AM. He holds the keys to death and the grave. To mindlessly stampede over this truth is an eternal mistake.

The empty garden tomb of Jesus.

Now imagine with me, again. What if only a few kittens took their mama’s sacrifice to heart, escaping certain death, while many more of the litter thought it wise to stay in the cubby with the snake at the door? If not for their willing protective mama, their lame self-wisdom would have cost them their lives. So, the same is true today. Many only see the cross as a trinket for dangling from a rearview mirror. When in reality, the place of the cross is a doorway of safety and comfort. Jesus warned us that there is no other way. No other road. No other hope for eternity.

The beauty of Easter is first found in fuel for the race.

“I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you. After a little while, the world no longer is going to see Me, but you are going to see Me; because I live, you also will live…” (Jesus) – John 14:18-19 (NAS)