Eating Alone

I don't like to eat alone. I never have. Growing up I found the I enjoyed being in the kitchen, especially baking. When I moved out for college, I found that it was too hard to cook for myself. I chose ready-to-heat-then-eat items, returning to the pantry two or three times before I completed a meal. I was depressed and lonely. But that's only part of it.

I do cook for breakfasts, usually oatmeal; once in awhile I will treat myself to a German-fried egg (some of you may know it as 'Toast with an Egg in the middle'). It is one of the few things from my Grandfather's legacy that I care to remember and imitate. I improved the tradition, however, by serving it with ketchup. Breakfast of champions!

For lunch, however, I piecemeal things together. A piece of banana-nut bread (no butter), three tablespoons of yogurt, some fruit. Dairy, fruit, and carbohydrates are staples for my finicky stomach. It never complains about them. On warmer days, I snack on carrots with peanut butter or hummus. On cold days, though it's hard to put things together. Leftovers are not always appealing (for no good reason) and I don't want to cook for every meal...what's a girl to do? And I love cooking, trying new recipes, new foods - but not by myself. Ironic.

Although I love my time alone, eating highlights relationships. Sharing a meal with others is always a wonderful experience and it's just not the same by myself. Mealtimes remind me that I am designed to live in community. I harbor competing characteristics: I deeply value my solitude and I love to cook for my loved ones. I marvel at how complex and unique we humans are.

Give me a call if you want to do lunch.

Never Alone

I like watching my dog sleep. Once in awhile, she does my favorite thing: clicking her tongue. I assume she's reliving a tender moment with her mom as a pup. I smile, call her Baby Tanner. Then, I remember how scared she looked with we first saw her. And rightly so.

We drove north to a house on the Reservation. Two houses, actually. One main house and an apartment above the garage, only noticeable when pointed out by the confused house tenant. The woman on the phone didn't mention which dwelling to inquire at. To complicate matters, we had to shout to the house tenant our needs, several yards away from the lighted porch. Three very large, growling Rottweilers paced the property and held us at bay - I've never been to a house where the owners didn't call their dogs off. A very disturbing, other-worldly experience. For the first time in my life, I feared dogs who really might attack me.

Finally, the man pointed us to the apartment and the dogs let us go. We knocked, taking in the strange air, the pen enclosed by flimsy chicken wire with a big communal bowl of food, one for water, one lean-to shelter. No noise. A woman came down and called the pups out. She looked hardened by life. Several pups sleepily crawl out of the lean-to. No, not that one, no...She goes in to coax the black one out. An expert saleswoman, she asked me to hold 'him' because the gate won't shut. Eight weeks old. One of the reasons I broke my promise to leave empty-handed was this scary place where guard dogs could easily intimidate pups through flimsy enclosures.

Her dreams of babyhood are delightful, as well as sad. I suspect she was separated from Mom too early. Separation and loneliness are big issues.

Last night when Baby Tanner was clucking, I personified her, watching her confused face as she was taken away, with her siblings. One by one, they left. She was the last of her litter to be adopted.

It breaks my heart to think of those who are truly alone, abandoned, sold into slavery, abused, treated as objects, used and discarded. I could not handle it. I would not be me anymore. Being alone - really alone, abandoned - does awful things. Being unwanted - that is the hardest part of humanity's fallenness - rejecting relationship.

Praise God that He is not that way. He goes to the ends of the Earth and back again, as far as He possibly can. He does everything to adopt us. "I am with you always, even to the end of the age" (Mt. 28:20).

God, be so very close to the 143 million orphans in this broken world. May they know that You love them, want them. You hold each of them in Your hand, so tenderly.

He is Present,
He is Near,
He gave His own Beloved,
to bring us into the family.