Sweet Lady

My pastor posted this on his blog.

It is only a couple minutes long but so darn cute that I had to share.

Forgivness

I plan on writing more about my life soon. My Grammy was my best mentor/mother/friend in my childhood, actually in my life. She has been gone for 14 years now but I still hear her telling me how to bring my life to the feet of Jesus. How no matter what I have done my Abba Father would still love me and accept me. Where as it brought up some feelings of resentment telling my mom’s story and feelings of great grief to talk about my dad. When I tell my story about my Grammy I will be full of laughter, love and pride.

I thought that before I moved on to happier aspects of my life I would first talk about forgiveness. We know that when we confess our sins to the Lord that he forgives our sins. That the slate is washed clean with Jesus’ blood.

Oh, what a joy for those
whose disobedience is forgiven,
Whose sins are put out of sight.
Yes, what a joy for those
whose record the Lord has cleared of sin. – Romans 4:7-8

How come it is harder to forgive others sin against us than it is for God to forgive our sins against him? Am I the only one that has at one time or another been stuck on the hamster wheel of holding someone’s sins over their heads? Unable to forgive them for an action that hurt me? What about when you love the person and they hurt you? Break your trust? Use you? How easy is it to just turn the other cheek and say “I forgive you”?

What is Forgiveness? What is the true definition of it?
1. To excuse for a fault or an offense; pardon.
2. To renounce anger or resentment against.

It took me a long time to really understand the depth of walking away from hurt. That I was suppose to treat that person as if nothing happened. But I also learned that the more unforgiveness I carried around the only one I was hurting was myself. I was stealing time from the Lord who wanted to work in my life. I was missing my blessings because I was stuck in unforgiveness.

One day I woke up and it was like God was sitting on the end of my bed. He was begging me to let him heal me. He told me to seek him first to heal my pain. At that moment I realized that I wanted the life he promised. I realized that I could forgive my mom for not being the best parent. I could forgive my dad for the things that were done to me but most of all for dying.

As I sit here today I reflect back on those things that caused me the most pain and I choose to not be a victim. I choose to be a Princess of my Divine Father! I am reconciled, loved, forgiven and most of all His child. My Heavenly Father Loves ME!!! YEAH!!! Guess what…..He loves all of you too.

Forgiveness is giving up hope
that you can change the past!

My Dad – Final Chapter

In this picture I am 17 and that is my Dad. I got married at 17 and divorced at 18. My first husband was Army and couldn’t stay faithful. I will cover that topic another time. I just love this picture though. When we were together it was like no one else existed.

Back to the story…
When I was 19 he was on a trip and he ended up getting arrested on the Mexican side of the border and went to prison in Mexico. My dad wasn’t always the brightest bulb in the box. He attempted to smuggle 50 pounds of marijuana into the USA. His pick-up truck had 3 gas tanks so he hid it in 2 of the tanks. He got caught and taken to jail. In Mexico there is no such thing as a speedy trial and you have no rights. If there isn’t someone on the outside to take care of you they put you in the poor section and literally wait for you to die. There is no 3 hot meals a day or prisoners rights to have toilet paper, bedding, cigarettes, clean clothes. No matter where my dad went he made friends. This is a blessing because his cell mate’s wife took care of my dad too. She would bring them food 3 times a day, clean laundry, toiletries, etc.

He remained in prison in Mexico for a little over 2 years. In that time he had never even had a trial. The United States extradited him to a prison in Texas for tax evasion. I always thought that was ironic. His birthday is April 15th and he hated paying taxes. Owing taxes is what got him back to the USA and due to overcrowding in the prison system he was paroled and sent back to California basically a free man. I was living in Reno when he was released and I remember that he couldn’t wait to get up there to see me. He had to get permission from his parole officer to leave the state. It was great to see him. He was thinner but you could tell that he had a great appreciation for freedom.

My dad came through Reno quite a bit. I got to see him a lot. He loved my husband so we always had a good time. When I had Ryan, my dad made it to the hospital before my mom. My dad lived in southern California and he made it to the hospital to see his grandson before my mom who lived 5 miles away.

My dad was still into dealing drugs mainly marijuana. He had moved up in an organization and was now the shipment scheduler instead of the runner. He kept this lifestyle away from me and my family. Once in awhile when he came through town he would ask me to come to his room and count cash. It was usually in the tens of thousands of dollars. He said it would take him forever to count it all. I could usually do it in about 20 minutes. Thanks to the job I had when I first moved to Reno.

In October of 1994 my dad took my husband and a couple of their friend to Cabo San Lucas to go fishing. Craig and my dad caught a 600 pound sail fish. They had a great time. My marriage was falling apart at this time and my dad knew it. I always respected the fact that just because Craig and I were having problems didn’t mean that him and Craig needed to have problems.

March of 1995 I was pregnant with Hope, she was due July 4th. I received a call from my uncle telling me that my dad was sick. I got on a plane and went to him immediately. He look gaunt and weak. They had just diagnosed him with cancer of the diaphragm. I stayed with him for a week and took care of him and laughed and cried with him. Then I had to get home. He was admitted into the hospital on June 23rd. I had started dilating and my doctor would not let me make the trip. I was distraught. June 26, 1995 (exactly 1 week before Hope was born) I told my dad that it was ok to let go. That Jesus was waiting for him. I told him that I loved him and I promised to be ok. He passed away after I told him it was ok to go. I was still on the phone.

There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about him. That I don’t miss him. There are even days that I am angry that it was him that died. Nobody asked me which parent I wanted to lose. It just wasn’t fair. I think his story shows that bad people can still be good. He did yucky things but he loved with everything that he had.

I want to thank you all for your patience, encouragement and your prayers.

My Dad – Part 2

Then he pulled out a joint and lit it and handed it to me. This was how the first real meeting with my dad went…..

When we got to his house there was a girl there. She was 20 at the time. This girl turned out to be my half sister. That was a little interesting. I had heard rumors that she existed but it had never been confirmed.

My dad and I instantly were close. It was like the biggest missing piece of my puzzle had been found. He had invited my grandmother, great grandmother and my uncle to come for a BBQ. It was so interesting to see all of these people that I had known all my life in the same place as my dad. It was also evident that my sister felt like an outsider. She was still pretty much a stranger to these people and here I walk in and it is hugs and loves and normal.

My dad was a wanderer. He loved to “go for drives”. He also used drugs a lot. He smoked a lot of pot and did a lot of cocaine. When I was with him I used a lot too. I had been smoking pot since I was 13 and I had even done LSD a couple of times. My dad, sister and I would go all over and get wasted and have a blast.

There are three incidents that I remember clearly.

The first one, I was 16 and it was the last time I ever did LSD. My father, sister and I were at Disneyland. I ended up dancing down Main Street with Donald Duck in a parade. I remember looking over and seeing my dad and sister just laughing. I’m not sure how I ended up in the parade but apparently I was good.

The second was my 17th birthday. Dad had asked me what I wanted and I said I wanted to try mushrooms, the hallucination type. So we got a hotel room and dad, my sister and I did mushrooms. We laughed so hard for so long that the next day my abs hurt from all the laughing.

The third thing that I remember is this guy showed up at my dad’s door with a big brown grocery bag full of cocaine. We stayed up for 3 days straight. I was 17.

I could list many more times we partied but I really just wanted to give you a couple of examples of the lifestyle that I was exposed to when I was with my dad.

I visited my dad all the time. He lived about 3 hours away. One time there was some sexual abuse when I was at his house. I am not 100% certain what happened but just know that something did. I would have to say that the only time that I ever lost control of what was going on in my life was when I would be at his house. It was almost my escape from the constant demands of life with my mom.

When I was 18 my Dad and I went on a road trip for 6 weeks. We traveled through Texas and down into Mexico. We also headed north to Yellowstone. This was an amazing time with my dad. We were so compatible. We were so close.

When I was 19 he was on a trip and he ended up getting arrested on the Mexican side of the border and went to prison in Mexico.

To be continued…..

This part of my story is really hard for me to verbalize. I am not looking for sympathy. It feels good to get it out. I have a deep love for my father that is unexplainable. As I continue with the story of my father please don’t judge him. I think he did the best that he knew. He didn’t have a clue about being a father he only knew how to try and be a friend.

My Dad – Part 1

Since I talked about my Mom, it is only fair to cover my Dad’s story too.

As previously stated my mom and dad got divorced when I was around a year old. I personally think that as far as being a kid from a broken home I was pretty lucky. You can’t miss what you never knew. I never knew what it was like to have a mother and father at home. I never even had a stepfather. My grandfather passed away when I was a year old. So I never really had any male influence in my life until about the age of 16.

Even though my mom and dad where divorced. My mom always made sure that I knew his family. I had a pretty close relationship with my paternal grandmother. I also had a decent relationship with my uncles. They weren’t in my life daily but a couple times a year I would see them. My father wasn’t around much in those years.

When I was 5, my mom and I were visiting my grandmother and we heard that my father wanted to see me. This is the first memory of him that I have. I remember that he lived on a ranch with horses; he bought me my first pair of real Levi’s and a set of Lincoln Logs. That is about all I remember about that visit.

My mom had never received the court ordered child support of $60.00 a month. Can you imagine $60.00 a month to support a child? Then one day it started coming when I was 14. It was a check from the DA’s office. We got those checks for about 9 months and then we started getting my dad’s actual check. His check that had his address and phone number. So me being the smart butt teenager that I was decided to call him. It was 2 months before my 16th birthday. He answered the phone and I wasn’t the nicest person. I asked him if he had any clue who I was and he said yes that he knew who I was and had wanted to see me for awhile but wasn’t sure how to go about it. He said that he had a present for me and I very snottily told him that if it wasn’t a car I didn’t want it. Well imagine my surprise when it was a car. He had a 1973 Volvo that he had just put a new engine in and wanted to give it to me for my 16th birthday.

He happened to live in the same town as one of my mom’s best friends. We were going there for the 4th of July. So I told him that if he wanted to see me I would call him when I got to town. He asked me to please call him. He really wanted to see me.

The day came when we were in town so I called him. My girlfriend was with me and she was going to go with me to meet him. He came and picked us up. As we were driving to his house he asked me if I smoked. I said yes cigarettes. He then asked if I smoked anything else and I said yes pot. Then he pulled out a joint and lit it and handed it to me. This was how the first real meeting with my dad went.

I will continue with the rest of the story. It is so weird to see this stuff in writing and know that it is my life. It really is by the Grace of my Heavenly Father that I am still standing, somewhat normal.