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Infinity Pool

We have flown to a sunnier, warmer place for two weeks, and we’ve taken along my sister Worthy, Liliana’s auntie and namesake.

It was a quiet weekend, spent by and in the pool, listening to iPod mixes, mixing drinks, and eating crackers and Camembert and prosciutto.  Today, we take little L to the beach for the first time.

Dan and I have concocted sleeping arrangements for Liliana at the foot of our bed, using a long outdoor chaise.  The open side is toward the bed.  The other three sides are lined with pillows and protected by the high wood sides, so she can’t roll anywhere, seeing as she’s a very active sleeper.  I’ve brought along her Sleepy Baby mix, Bella the Bunny, and Mouse (very adorable lanky mouse that reminds us of Kevin Henkes’ Lilly’s Purple Plastic Purse).  Wherever we go, Liliana not only acquires lollipops but stuffed animals.  The Embassy Suites that we stayed at in Charlotte gave her Panda, and she’s added it to her posse of animals, which she adores and scolds and coos to.

Just before we left, I was asked by a friend to please, for his sake, reiterate what kind of Christian I was.  After all, he and his wife have been reading the blog intermittently, and since I’ve been so open about religion and/or spirituality, he thought I might not be offended.  I wasn’t, because I could tell he wanted to know (not in a mean way, but in a healthy, curious way).  But it made me think, rather quickly, of distilling my faith down to a simply e-mail entry, which wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t hard, either, given the fact that I’ve been pretty open about how many questions I have.  It made me realize how far I’ve come from my childhood, and my brief stint at Biola University (a four-year liberal arts Christian university in southern CA), then my years at UCLA, and my rather stodgy and strict beliefs that stemmed more from what I thought my parents had believed rather than what I had actually experienced.  I was encouraged to reread the e-mails, seeing how far I’d come.  It makes sense to me that in a relationship (here, I’m talking about mine with God), things change continually, based on your experience with the person.  And since I’m made in God’s image, I would think that He and I could have a very natural relationship, based on humanlike emotions and humanlike thought processes.  This scares some of my friends, I know, because I’m humanizing God, but I immediately want to ask, “So what then does that phrase mean–“made in the image of God”?  God’s been pretty clear all through Scripture that He has feminine and male traits.  Jesus wept.  God grew angry at His creation of people (Noah’s day) and wanted to wipe them all off the face of the earth, after He claimed that His creation was good.  God changed his mind with Abraham and Hezekiah and Samuel, after they pleaded with Him.  There was a give-and-take, as I believe there is today.

Because I’m a biologist at heart, too, I realize that there are natural laws that have been set in motion.  Gravity.  Motion.  Disease.  Planetary orbits.  Just because I love God does not make me immune to these forces.  Just because I get sick or sprain my ankle…or Dan and I have a rough time acquiring our daughter in the Ukraine…doesn’t mean that God has it “out for us.”  It simply means that viruses and bacteria have to run their courses.  I wasn’t watching where I was going, and I sprained my ankle.  You get my point.

There are horrible, despicable people in the world–and people who turn a blind eye and deaf ear.  That’s how Darfur and the Holocaust can happen.  I believe God grieves even more than we do.  After all, He made us.

When you read Eve, if you choose to, you’ll see that I have Eve asking these very questions.  They’re questions I think she would ask, after having seen and having talked with Elohim.  And even then she can’t get it right.  I think this is the way it is in any relationship.  Do I really know Dan after 17 years of marriage?  I would hope so, but I know I don’t.  How can anyone possibly know the deepest and innermost you, especially if you’re changing day by day–or hopefully you are, as you assimilate new experiences and life lessons?

This is what I’m thinking about as I sit here in bed, knowing that my dear husband has woken early with Liliana to give me a break, and I can hear them out there now, whispering, “Mama sleeping, Mama sleeping.”

Is there anything more sweet?

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