Up the Sunbeam

It has been a long while since I have posted anything here. I have been busy completing three years toward my B.A. in English and my senior year is underway. My current class (Creative Writing) has finally given me the space to take off the tight harness of academic writing rules, and it feels SO GOOD!! After reading my first assignment, Mom and Daddy gave it their thumbs up and suggested I make it a blog post, so here it is. It is my story and their story. It's a little longer than my usual posts, but as with everything I have ever posted here, I pray it encourages you to run "up the sunbeam to the sun" (C. S. Lewis). "Follow my example,  as I follow the example of Christ." 1 Corinthians 11:1 NIV I sat above them on the stairs. Looking down through the window-like openings in the partition between the living room and the stairway, I listened to the basketball players, football players, baseball players, wrestlers, track athletes, both the lettermen ...

-- I was stunned at the force of the indignant pride that rushed through me. I was frustrated, feeling disrespected, insulted, and unjustly attacked in an area where I (sad to say) like to pride myself. How dare she?!!! Like the Ashnola River swollen to a boiling fury that belies the bitter cold of the water that courses through its rocky canyon in spring, my heart was boiling with ice-cold, debris-laden haughtiness. The details of what precipitated this reaction are not important at all, and they aren't the reason I haven't been able to stop thinking about it all week. I have been over it countless times in my head, and although I know, in all truthfulness, that I DID nothing wrong, I also know that the thoughts and feelings that were churning around in me were arrogant and uncharitable . . . and altogether unbecoming in a heart where Jesus lives. As soon as that surge of pride hit me, it was like I had suddenly stumbled into a vat of toxic waste. It was repugna...

-- In a jubilant rush from the steep slopes of Mount Sir Donald and the glaciers in the surrounding crown of peaks, come the spectacular liquid jade waters of the Illecillewaet River and Asulkan Brook in my beloved British Columbia.  The two rushing flows come together in a veritable cacophony of sparkle and sound at a place picturesquely called "The Meeting of the Waters." It is a place of contrasts, at once ancient and permanent as well as endlessly new and changing, both a crashing cymbal and a love-tender lullaby. It is a place both exhilarating and hypnotic, thrilling and stilling, wild and loud and boisterous while simultaneously a place of deep peace and heart-quiet. I have a feeling I could spend many months there with terabytes of memory cards and still not capture all its moods and secrets and longings. I perpetually frame pictures, no matter where I am or what I'm doing.  On a bright September day I looked around this magical place, and true to ...

-- "Splendor and majesty are before him;     strength and joy are in his dwelling place. Ascribe to the LORD, all you families of nations,     ascribe to the LORD glory and strength.  Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name;     bring an offering and come before him.  Worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness." 1 Chronicles 16:27-29 NIV I like knowing the names of mountains. I still remember the names of mountains I only saw as a little girl. Not only do I enjoy knowing what the mountains are called, but the stories of how they came to wear the names they do, whether named for a person or for something about the appearance or history of the mountain. For example, the striking home of Angel Glacier (and poetically named) Mount Edith Cavell , was named for a WWI nurse known for giving medical care to all, regardless of which army they served and who was executed by the Germans for  helping over 200 Allied so...

-- Somehow he looked at me and still thought I could do it. Perhaps he was an angel and I was unaware. My little brother Chad and I had just entered the lodge at Cathedral Lakes Provincial Park. Since we were both visiting for the first time, we wanted a little guidance to help us decide which trail to choose for our day trip. We asked the quiet, but friendly young man who had been our driver on the 9-mile, 1-hour, 4-wheel-drive climb from the floor of the Ashnola River Valley up some 5400 feet to the lodge which sits at about 6800 feet above sea level. He told us about the popular but difficult Rim Trail, which I knew would be too hard for me right now (I have a bunch of weight to lose and a lingering problem with one foot that has kept me from doing much walking/hiking for the last few months), so we asked him for a less strenuous recommendation. He told us we could take the Glacier Lake Trail part of the way up to the Rim Trail and still get some beautiful views and that it would...