Lonely Pumpkin

Lest you think I work someplace magical, I am here to attest to the fact that it is indeed wonderful, but the same thing happens here as in every other office/workplace on the planet.

No one wants to be the last to finish any food, so they don't have to clean up :)


We love our snacks and treats, yes, we do. And we love to share our treats with people. If you want to share, you put it on the counter in the kitchen. I munched with some friends on some more of my Halloween Peeps, and knew there would be people pleased to see a few of them in the kitchen for a snack. I dropped off the last three or four (double pumpkins, mind you; they come as little jack-o-lanterns attached to each other like a two-tier totem pole).

I walked into the kitchen three and half hours later to find the above. I cracked up.

Happy trick-or-snacking!

So Cute It's Scary

I started wondering if I had any scary pictures to post for Halloween. I was flipping through some and my first thought when I saw this was, "I love this pic--I love these girls!" This was immediately followed by, "Yikes! This is our 20-year reunion shot! Scary!"

So here you have it--three old friends who are so hot we're cool, and so cute we're scary :)

Happy Halloween!

Kathie, Beth and Holly...any guesses what the 30-year pic will look like?
Even better, I predict!

And, actually, here's the scary thing: how can I stand with two very fair women and STILL be the whitest one? For cryin' out loud. Apparently my DNA is incapable of handling melanin...

Hearse Corn

I had an interesting experience one afternoon in September. Two things led to this interesting experience.

• A very kind person in Nampa emailed the staff at headquarters to let us know that they had free sweet corn available to MAF families as a way of thanking us for our missions work.
  
• A friend invited me to a big barbecue at her house.

Said friend added me to the guest list the very afternoon of said barbecue. Wanting to be helpful, I asked what I could do to help.

"I was hoping to pick up some of that corn that was mentioned in the email, but it turns out I won't have time to get over to that side of town. Would you be able to pick some up?" asked said friend.

"Sure!" said Sluss. "How much should I get? How many people are coming?"

"Well, there will be about 12 people, but I was hoping for about 50 ears so I can freeze some."

Sluss makes mental note: "Remember to expect missionary-like answers from missionaries. They prep for winter, you know."

Obedient, helpful Sluss says again, "Sure! Fifty ears. You got directions to the place? Ah, I drive to a funeral home, you say? Hmmm. A...funeral... home."

Have you ever seen Children of the Corn?

A few hours later, I follow the directions and come to a lovely family-owned funeral services home, with a very kind-looking elderly man standing in front of an open garage. He comes out to the car, greets me warmly and asks how he can help. I flash my MAF name tag and my best sweet corn smile, and say I would like 50 ears of corn, please. He ponders a moment, is thrilled to hear I will be joining a barbecue that evening with other MAFers, and says to follow him. Back to the garage we go.

Two sights fill my eyes:

AND

All the corn was neatly bagged into dozens next to the shiny white hearse. We chat for a moment while a few people come out of the inner garage door to the home, men in nice suits who greet me. My nice corn man tells me how two brothers own this home, and they also own corn fields just south of there, and raise their corn specifically to give away as an offering to God's servants. He generously grabs four bags, carries them out to my car, and wishes God's blessings on me.

Um, yeah. Amazingly generous, stunningly incongruent moment. And how was your summer?

Not Looking At The Sky So Much

I figured out this past week that it doesn't help me a ton to always look at the sky when I pray, when I seek God. I am not doing it as often, and I found myself a few times glancing up when I wanted to talk to God, and feeling a little pull on my chin from something in my chest. It was like a little tug from my heart, with a reminder, "I am not up THERE. I am right HERE. Talk to me HERE."

Flashback to June: A British woman I met in Spain asked me an unsolicited question after a Spanish church service. I was sitting quietly, with my heart aching within me after hearing testimonies that week from people who had come to Christ out of Islam and found this amazingly loving, personal God. What should have been celebration in my heart (and a little was) was far more jealousy. There was a clarity, a joy, a spark, a hope in them that was so far from what I felt. It looked exactly like what they say non-believers should see in Christians, drawing them to the love and hope of Christ. Instead, here I was, a believer of 30 years, a missionary, realizing I was missing out on something amazing that I should know about, that I should have. I wanted it and I was a failure because I didn't have it and I didn't get it. I was a phony.

This dear woman came and sat next to me. I could barely speak. She asked me if I ever just held my hands open and received from God. Did I ever just sit in a chair, hands spread wide, telling Him I was willing to receive, not grasp, not clutch, not wrestle to receive more of Him? Did I ever just open my heart and receive?

No.

After that trip, where I had experienced the most significant spiritual warfare I had known to date (terrible, condemning voices all night during my last night in Spain, telling me what a failure I had been, what an embarrassment to my organization I was, that I had no business being at these meetings, that I never should have come--I didn't know it was a spiritual attack until someone pointed it out later), I came home and tried to ask God if I could just receive from Him. I felt so beat up, so battered, so confused, and so needy.

I discovered there were some things I had to drop out of my hands before I could receive. I thought I was holding my empty hands out flat, even cupped a little to catch whatever He wanted to bring. But it took a bit of time to discover I was holding some views and beliefs about God that were preventing more than a trickle of grace or love from pooling in my hands, much less pouring powerfully over my heart.

It's October, my favorite season is here, and I am learning to let go of what I think I know about God, and what he feels for me and expects of me, for what I can't help but find over and again in Scripture is the truth of his nearness and love. He isn't pouring out His love and peace from some distant corner of sky, from stone tablets, from behind the thick, heavy curtain of the Holy of Holies.

He's got His hands cupped under and around mine, sitting across from me, held up close to His face where His breath fills and warms my fingers and palms and stirs new things in my heart and spirit and soul.

Hebrews 8:8b-13, The Message (emph. mine)

Heads up! The days are coming
when I'll set up a new plan
for dealing with Israel and Judah.
I'll throw out the old plan
I set up with their ancestors
when I led them by the hand out of Egypt.
They didn't keep their part of the bargain,
so I looked away and let it go.
This new plan I'm making with Israel
isn't going to be written on paper,
isn't going to be chiseled in stone;
This time I'm writing out the plan in them,
carving it on the lining of their hearts.
I'll be their God,
they'll be my people.
They won't go to school to learn about me,
or buy a book called God in Five Easy Lessons.
They'll all get to know me firsthand,
the little and the big, the small and the great.
They'll get to know me by being kindly forgiven,
with the slate of their sins forever wiped clean.

By coming up with a new plan, a new covenant between God and his people, God put the old plan on the shelf. And there it stays, gathering dust.

The Fun From Friday

Friday afternoon for folks at MAF headquarters was spent dedicating a new airstrip that will be used for training our pilots. We have lots of great strips in the mountains here and wonderful folks who let us use them, but they are all more than an hour away. This one is only 13 miles south of our hangar so it's a great spot to have the pilots practice.

There was an opportunity for people in the office to submit their names for one of the seats on the three planes that flew out for the dedication: two of our training Cessnas, and one Kodiak, which is the type of plane we will be renewing our fleet with starting next year.

I was awarded a seat on one of the Cessnas on the flight back to the hangar after the dedication. The time leading up to the actual ceremony was a great chance to get up close to a Kodiak, which is what I am sitting in with my friend Becky in the previous post. The Kodiaks use jet fuel, which is less expensive and more widely available than aviation gas (as those of you on my mailing list who have been getting news from MAF about the worldwide av gas shortage are well aware). Kodiaks are also specifically outfitted for bush and missions and humanitarian flying, so there is stunningly little refitting that has to happen when we start to acquire them, unlike the great workhorse but refit-necessary Cessnas.

Here are some shots from the afternoon.

Pics of the Kodiak (ours will have a proper MAF red and white paint job, of course!), and Kathie and Karin and Becky outside and climbin' around inside.

Looking up the strip from about midwday. There is a flat area at the top which is where the planes are parked. The land was donated by a very generous family and many volunteers helped complete every phase, from grading to the legal work. What would normally cost about $50,000 to complete cost us about $5000 since so many volunteers and donations were part of acheiving this.

Looking down the strip from about midway. They built it with a 10% grade. No point in having people practice on flat strips for MAF flying :)

The Kodiak cresting the rise as it came in.

One of our Cessnas.

Becky and I were on the same flight home. Nice and cozy, those planes are! If you think you overflow a regular airline seat, try one of these on for size.

From the air. I circled the strip. Looks like a stick of gum, don't it? Try landing when it's got a 15% grade, it's cut into the side of a mountain, and it has a dog-leg or something else crazy in it :)

Just a pretty shot of Nampa from the air.

I thought Mom might like this one. That's the back of the pilot's seat in front, Becky behind him, and the window and tops of towers on the way into landing in between. We can see the tops so well because we are almost sideways :) I didn't lean over to the take the picture from the seat on the right; it was just my view!

Quick Peek

Know what the next post will be about? What I got to do Friday afternoon! Here's a quick peek; more later!


Notice my non-mangled left hand. Whew. Stupidity known only to those who read the blog, not the whole building or any Treasure Valley newspapers :)

Two-Track Brain

Ever have those moments where your brain is running two tracks, with full sound and images, processing one event two completely different ways at exactly the same time? Like, while you are chewing your favorite treat: "Man, these Ding Dongs are just what the doctor ordered for my attitude, all silvery-foil wrapped and cream-filled just for me!" and "Holy cow, does that box seriously say there are 368 calories in two Ding Dongs? Well, I guess 552 calories are almost down my gullet by now. Probably shouldn't proceed to Ding Dong number four as planned. But, oh, the silvery-foil allure!"

Two even more recent examples:

I was getting ready to present in a lovely church in Turlock weekend before last, and the worship music got me completely choked up, very unexpectedly. I am crying and snarfling my way through, "Jesus Messiah," and two tracks are running in my brain:

• Track 1--"Oh, man, this is so beautiful--Jesus is Messiah, Jesus is my Deliverer. Oh my gosh--You can't be my real Deliverer unless I have something real to be delivered from. Oh, I do, I do! Come deliver me from me! Deliver the people I love from themselves! Deliver us all! You are my all!"
• Track 2--"The pastor is going to introduce me in like two minutes! Yikes--I have to present and talk and I am crying like a baby! Tears, red eyes, makeup, runny nose--help, help, help! No tissue with me--help, help, help! Stop crying, you gotta talk!"

Blissfully, the pastor announced a few minutes of "meet and greet" and I got the chance to at least drag my sleeve across my face and walk for a minute. Maesie came and found me, and I went and got a hug from Sarah, who asked if I was nervous. When the pastor introduced me, I smiled and took the mic, and announced to the congregation, "A friend just asked me if I was nervous about talking with you, and I said no, but that I started crying during worship, and I was thinking I need somewhere for my snot to go. So, yeah, that's me this morning." Nice way to start a share time about your ministry work, eh? I told the story to a supporter later and she cracked up. "Kathie, you are so real!" I hope that's good, 'cause my mom is shakin' her head again after reading this :)

Another two-track moment happened one evening this week at work. It was a little after 7:00 PM and the office is pretty empty then...sometimes just me and the cleaning ladies. I went to grab one last thing off the giant printer-copier-scanner beast before going home and discovered that only the first page of my doc had printed; there was some kind of paper jam. I opened the giant paper drawer that the screen told me to and couldn't see anything messed up in the drawer itself, so I stuck my hand up behind the drawer, inside the machine. I was checking to see if there was scrunched paper hiding there, but since there turned out to be nothing, I bumped whatever little mechanism makes the machine think the drawer is closed and it should grab paper. Well, at least it was the "drawer closed paper grabbing" noise I have heard before when the drawer is shut and the machine is working right. Any guess at my two tracks? It's not hard:

• Track 1--As I am desperately trying to yank my hand out from between the back of the drawer and the innards of the machine, and my hand is a little chubby and my watch is getting stuck, "Oh, dear God, please don't let my hand get mangled. Oh my gosh, please, please, I just gotta get my hand out, please don't let it get pulled up into something. Out, out, out!"
• Track 2--"I will be so humiliated if I get hurt in this thing. Oh, geez, the embarrassment, the mocking, the 'What where you doing with your hand in the machine, Slusser?', the having to explain I was a moron. The Base Ops crew will put out some reminder message to the entire headquarters staff about copy machine safety with a picture of my mangled hand and stupid face on it. God, please don't let me be caught being this stupid! Out, out, out!"

I know you have all wondered how special it is to be me. Well, I have given you a glimpse into the depths. Flee, I say. Flee. Or own up to your own insanity and then we can be friends :)

And a couple unrelated-to-the-above thoughts from today:

• My mom sent me a nice note this week to tell me how pretty my tree picture looks and that she can't wait to see it in person for Thanksgiving. Enjoy the colors in the picture, Mom...this morning, I opened the blinds and found a tree with completely brown leaves and lots and lots of them on the grass around the trunk. Night, night, tree!
• It must also be the end of tomato season, even the green ones. As I sliced the last green tomato I had in the house, I also sliced my finger with my spiffy serrated knife. Ouch! At least the slice is covered in Neosporin and a Hello Kitty bandage from Lisa's care package kit last summer :) Night, night, tomatoes!