Happy Birthday Ethan!

Facts and Facets

Heirs together of the grace of life?  God’s Word

If heirs together what are the facets that create the dynamic of inheritance.   My gift from Ben on 40 years together was a faceted mirror with goodies loaded atop them that were historically significant.  My own engagement ring got lost at Remington Street the day that I took it off to wash his mother’s hair.  I don’t remember the exact number of corners of the top of my own diamond, but I often see the tops of the buildings in Charlotte and imagine a group of women volleyball players putting their hands in the huddle and the diamonds represent the determination to defeat the world, the flesh and the devil in the eternal match!  The Eternal Match!

Mother’s in the Spiritual Israel have a calling to represent Christ to their children and focus on preserving the knowledge of God against all enemies, domestic and abroad who would seek to silence and nullify the influence of the Church in the generation they are called to protect.  Daniel wasn’t a woman, but he is the example of this because his call to preserve through an onslaught of godlessness is parallel to our own generation.  The exaltation of polytheism and the exaltation of idolization of humanism and humanity are some other enemies.  Committed relationships and women who support them are part of the eternal facets which are recognized in Scripture.   Diamonds themselves are not represented in scripture as such, but that is the symbol that has been passed down to our recognition.  Self actualization and individual rights stand as goliath against the knowledge of God passed down from generation to generation and they mimic the voice of the church, oftentimes stealing the language of redemption to validate their lies.  I will, I will says the devil.  His self actualization is our model to follow.  Eve followed ignorantly.  She thought God had some secret he was saving for those who found their own way.  All we like sheep follow her in disobedience and then God saves us.  Emulators of family project their wills and super impose their images for God upon the family.  They cannot stand. Government attempts to superimpose it’s image upon the family creating a democratic or monopoly of individual autocrats in place of parts of the body.  The image that God has given us has a head and parts that function interdependently.  The image that the devil has given us eats and drinks of itself and is self absorbed and self actualized and actualizing.  I will survive! Says the devil to God.  I will fight.  I will keep fighting against you and the family until “SHE is “saved through the child bearing” and until They inherit the grace of “LIFE”.  As long as they can be distracted from that,  I am good with That says he. 

On my Sweet 16 Grandma Ruth...

 gave me 16 Bicentennial Silver Dollars.   I was very grateful, of course, but "youth is wasted on the young" {that is one of my family cliche's} This means that I was a hungry and very needy 16 year old and many days with a subway card alone to feed me,  I bought a candybar or two to tide me over till I got home for dinner.  Not wise was this course of action, but I was 16 and really wasn't aware of the value of a dollar.  My father saw my silly use of these historical and monumental gifts and offered me money for my silver dollars.  He was a collector of all kinds of coins, mostly pennies and he would sit in his chair and look at the pennies for clues of their possible added value in the coin market.  Why pennies, dad?   A penny doesn't purchase anything by itself, was my continual question.

He gave them back to me, when I was married in a conscious commitment to create a collector of coins in me.  I still have 3 or 4 of them.  I look for them in my daily life.

As I was reading Hans Brinker,  I found Harlem in chapter 16 and the Vox Humana.   Are these clues of something?   I am still looking into my hypothesis of what God was saying to me on my Sweet 16 to guide me into my puzzle of life.   

Several days ago Julia said that she ran across my letter to her on her Sweet 16, which also happened to be Senior day for me, graduating from High School.  We cried in eachothers arms as though we were leaving eachother forever.  It was monumental that our two year trek through the subways of NY had come to a completion for me and we would part ways.

I am including her part of my 16 pieces puzzle for your perusal that perhaps, Young "Watson", you might find in it a glympse of your mother's former self and continue her quest to find "Life's Tree", or whatever your quest is in life.   I love your inquisitiveness!

16 Silver Dollars/ Hans Brinker/Hans Christian Anderson/Silver skates and golden needles? in a Haystack?

 

the challenge of parenting

The Challenge of Parenting {sundry thoughts about my appalling attempt to raise children and the joy that they gave me, in spite of myself? We always wanted to be parents, your father and I. We studied, believe it or not. We read books and went to seminars and listened to sermon after sermon about parenting and what God says it is supposed to look like. Head knowledge is alot different from the real thing. When the baby comes, the real game begins. Each child tries and strengthens your resolve and dissolves your nerves and your confidence. Unlike sports competitions where you gain confidence in the continued competitions. Each child makes you wonder about yourself and why you got involved in this, in the first place. My Ethan was the very first baby that I knew that I needed pain relief. Yes, I was stupid for all those years. Attempting to endure the unendurable. This is why now, I tolerate no pain in my body for any reason. In anticipation of a headache, I take a pill. You were a delightfully non painful delivery. Still, the body goes through all of the things it has to to get the body out, but the pain has subsided and the mental anguish of will this get any worse is out of the picture. I loved it, I loved the anesthesia and I loved you for allowing me the privilege of going through this procedure painlessly and seamlessly. I thought that could never happen. It happened when you were born. Let’s just get one thing clear, you aren’t my favorite because of what we’ve been through together, but yours is my favorite birth memory to return to and I am glad that babies don’t have a memory of the birth because they might hold that against us parents, in one way or another. What to Expect, When You're Expecting was our go to book for pre pre parenting help. I lived in it, like my bible for the whole nine months. Your father preferred to wing it and he often thought that I was making up my symptoms to coincide with what the book told me would happen. Ie. vivid dreams in the 7th month, cravings for items unusual, pre labor pains. Every pregnancy followed the book on these items, with rarely a turn out of the prescribed experience. Babies are born every day and it is amazing that so many of them are normal and healthy. You were a normal healthy baby boy and busy and curious and contagiously funny. Still are. Each child is a parenting experience all his own. I am trying to focus, just on the parenting of my Ethan. Individual and only the one of a kind slim jim of our family. I wouldn’t trade one moment of our exciting and exclusively mother and child relationship. I love everyone of my children, but this story is requested by Ethan and just about my Ethan. I hope you know that. As I compile the sundry thoughts and as I sift through the flotsam of memories that are part of the ocean of your life, please be patient with the many bits of advice and the nonsensical ramblings of a proud mama at the accomplishments and growth of the man that you’ve become. I am proud of you and I am grateful that you still give me the opportunity to contribute to your growth. I will never get over the miracle of the individual that you are and I can never take any credit for that. God is great at answering prayer and you are certainly more than I could have prayed for as a man, when the doctor said, “its a boy!” From earlier blogposts

just the beginning

Notes from an aspiring grandmother Having noted, in retrospect, my sense of calling for the position of mother of you dearest children and my voracious appetite for the tools to complete the job for the glory of God, my grandmothering journey is quite the opposite. I do not feel a calling or a sense of imminence for this providence to be cast upon me. Somehow, it makes me feel old to imagine it. I am old. I want to participate in the continuance of our Walker portion of the family, but I don’t want to be old! Nana, Granny, GIGI, etc. Not one of these terms is a flattering title. It would be an honor, for sure, but I am now in the interviewing stage from my children for my qualifications for becoming the grandmother to their children. I know that my activities will be scrutinized profusely, if I’m allowed access to these fledgelings at all. Proverbs 31 Who can find a virtuous woman? Who can be a virtuous grandma? The heart of her children will safely trust in her that she will do them good and not evil all the days. That is a tough hoe to trow. I know you guys trust me, but I am not sure our standards are the same. I commit to try and follow your convictions as closely as I can, but you guys have such diversity of eating standards and spanking standars prior to even having your children that I am not sure I can keep up. I am counting on my fingers my personal priorities for Grandmothering. I. Shame Pastor Flake preached about that this past Sunday. Early exposure to God’s Word is very important to me. Singing and saying the scripture in the infant’s hearing is so impressive to the soul, in my experience. Babies will have a world coming at them in many different ways and the earlier that they have exposure to God’s Word, the greater the ability to train their reflexes to choose good and reject evil. It is hard for mature people to navigate these times of swift exposure to evil and mature thought. Preparation and preservation must begin at birth. This is not about the anticipated grandchildren that God will send, this is about my fitness for office. I love that you commissioned this thesis and I love that my waiting for the fruition has made me question my fitness. God’s word says, “You have not because you ask not and you ask amiss that you may spend it upon your lusts” {semi paraphrased}. I don't ask, is true. But I don’t think I am one of those who is seeking to spend my grands on my lust. I do relish the thought of loving them as extensions of my children but God knows I don’t have expectations of doting on them or bragging as we know that I will. I am just saying God knows my heart!

just Because you asked, the imaginary and real visit to Aunt Jackie's House

 Two yodels and a bag of chips!

Memories flood when you enter a familiar older home.  I love that Chin was fainting, because that meant the ladies could gossip incorrigibly, in the context of joys and griefs that bind us together.  This is what is great about my life and this is what sucks is always the topic of fraternal septuplets.  If Abby were here, I would be the first to jump out of my seat, true or false is the special unspoken reference, always in our eyes, but never uttered for fear of deluge.  “Oh well, who is your favorite child this season and grandchild, if you have one?”  who is your least favorite one and sister?  You, because you don’t call or come by.  Yup? Me, too!  I hate you today, because you look so pretty and I feel so old.  Can you still spit as far?  I will beat you up the stairs today, because I wore my tapes.  I am totally crippled without them.   And, I love you today, because you are such a good example of empowering young people to grow and raise even the most special children in your home…   when moving over in the bed means sleeping on the floor for an extended season,  You are the champions of that and I am in awe of your skill in that area.   I don’t know how you do it, for sure.  You are in my prayers and you know that I don’t have to prove that to you.  You are in my silence and my words.

A very special butterfly came and yelled at me to go to Jackie’s house and that is why I went.  There is not enough time in any day to talk through the what ifs and why nots.  Just seeing your face is enough, in person.  The phone can’t tell me what I learned coming to visit you and the rest that dear butterfly gossiped in my ear.  Who knew butterflies were gossips too?

 

 Okay, bye till next time!

If you ain't MUCHU?

On the subject of Muchu:

If you ain’t Muchu, you ain’t “suchu”!

I like your attention to detail on the subject of books on Muchu.  You know that is not really my interest base, except for the fact that it interests you.  What is my interest is the investment of information, buying books and adding to your information base; both for entertainment and for employ or usefulness.   

Some people think the acquisition of info is just for the making of money.  We are those who are made in the image of God and that means that each person is desirous to reach toward infinity in their chosen field of study.  The dark ages of the internet has muddied the water of knowledge to deceive us into letting another device hold the information while we have fun.  That is not healthy, to put it mildly.  The mind must be daily sharpened by rigorous daily activity and practices.  Just like the body, the mind must be exercised.  I enjoyed learning about an artist, with whom I had no real exposure to before, although he is a major part of your life.  I love that you were jealous for him in his being accurately and thoroughly depicted.   Maybe that is your job, or your mission.   I challenge you to use my ignorance on the subject to educate me, please?

 

Happy Birthday Ethan

 

Happy Easter

 

Aunt Ann died yesterday

Aunt Ann and my Mom taught me, cousins are for kissing and cousins are for fighting with!  

I miss you already Aunt Ann.

I miss seeing how to create conflicts and how to rectify conflicts between you and my mommy.  they are at it again, I used to think quietly to myself.  The religious perspective and the human perspective were always at odds in our extended family.  Learning to let the human perspective direct the religious perspective and the religious perspective temper the passions was a lifelong study of mine watching my mommy and her first cousin always lovingly wrestling through the issues of the family and the life that we were enjoying.

People have needs, you always knew.  It was never about you.  It was always about getting the job done.  You truly got the job done.  Absolutely the most efficient woman in my life.  Mu said jump and you were in the air before any of us could hear her touch the last consonant of p.  I loved seeing that as a little child.  I loved watching you care for your children and godchild and nieces and nephews and mother with determine and focus.  You were really one of the best people we have known.  An agitator and militantly caring woman, you were.  You went out of your way to love people 

For the beauty of the Twelve Days of Christmas

Dear Ethan,

I am so grateful for your delightful gift of Vanilla scented candles depicting the 12 days of Christmas.  It is so important to number our days, but we are not so closely reminded of this except at Christmas time.  It is amazing how we think about how many days until the wonderful day that we celebrate each year.

I am 21170 days old, just about and you are only 7265 years old, give or take a few days or so.

ON my first attempt at mothering I got a girl and then a boy and then a girl and then a boy and then a girl and then YOU!  It took 6 tries to get an Ethan and I hope you remember that in your every attempt at things.  It takes a lot of tries to get to a delightful combination of things.  I am not saying you need to have 6 or 7 children, but do not despise the beauty of the large family dynamic.  Don’t despise the beauty of the things that happen when a very large group of people live under a single purpose and lifestyle.  You are a wonderful expression of the love between your father and I and I am very glad that I didn’t let the world’s idea of family guide my life.  I am grateful for having gone back to the drawing board in parenting in my late thirties and early forties.  I thought I was crazy.  But you are a wonderful love of my life, that I wouldn’t have had, if I hadn’t run that extra mile.  I am not at all sorry.  You are amazing!

I hope that you are inspired to live up to your name ETHAN and sing of the mercies of the Lord forever in Psalm 89.  I hope that you are inspired to seek out God’s journey for you, in earnest.  Go at it with gusto!  Not just money acquiring or working, but your drawing and your study and your music and your puzzles!  I love my card!  Keep up the great work and know that I am grateful to have spent the last 7000 days getting to know you!  

Jayne Camille Walker

Love MOM

"Read the book of Ezekiel and lets talk"

Thoughts from the Macy's Day Parade

Teach us, Dear Lord to number our days…

LIve like you just came back from being 10 minutes late for the Judgment.

The only thing worse than being in the judgment on the wrong side, is Knowing that all these people followed you into this awful place apart from the mercy and grace…  I knew better than to not trust in Christ, but these simple ones were beguiled and beguiled by their simple minds following me.  My love for them and sympathy for their plight makes my anguish all the more stinging.

The rich man said, please send Lazarus ( the smallest and least of your people)  to tell my brothers, don’t follow me here.  That is the thought of the eldest brother, deceived by his own devices and knowledgable that he has impressed the simple ones to tow the line behind him into the eternal ditch.  That is not just a pothole to be avoided.

Every pothole in NY seems designed to remind you that one day you will be driving down the road and the pothole of hell will rise to meet you, unless you are attached to Christ.

You are late,  The devil taunts, as his design was this all along.  He hates us and wanted us to have and share in the bounty of his deserts.

You should have been here from the first flame, as I was.  You should have known what it was to taste every mournful moment of having lost my first estate of beauty and fame.  I was beautiful, I was most beautiful, but I couldn’t be humbled in my beauty and nothing about torment is beautiful.  Every wicked memory is ugly. Every grievous lick of the flames is hideous and my only comfort is that I am not alone in my anguish, says Satan.  But as a brother and as an elder, I am tormented that my leadership has brought down an entire city into the flames.

And then I awake,  What day is it?  It is December first and Christmas is upon us, not even Christmas day, yet.  I have time to prepare my soul for the merciful advent of the only and true soul changing Savior.  

I am granted a merciful reprieve?  I am granted another moment’s borrowed breath?  Can I use it wisely, this time?  Can I keep my own soul out of that horrible pit and can I lead my brothers alike?

“O Come all ye Faithful!”

It is more truly close to midnight that we want to know.  All of the potholes are coming together to engulf us in the flames of eternity, if we are not attached to life.

Full of faith, not in self.  That would be the choice of the fool.  O come all ye who are trusting and loving a merciful and ever-present help in this earth.  There is no price to be spared to free your soul from the chains of sin.  Link yourself inextricably to Christ and His Church that your soul will have no questions, in that day.  Tell your underlings.  Show them the true and living way.  Help the trust Him also.

If they follow me, they will also be deceived.  It isn’t my help that you need, when you are facing eternity and judgment.  I haven’t paid it all for you.  I haven’t tasted death to deliver you from the eternal anguish.  JESUS alone can and does break the chains of sin.  Hold together with God’s people to build a greater city of guidance into life!

“Joyful and Triumphant!”

Not a single laurel on the head of the victor, but a triumphant part of the victorious bride of Christ who in symphonic combination link together to enjoy the joy and the triumph over the world’s real enemy.  The world’s real enemy is Death, Hell and the Grave.  God has sent a wonderful baby to show us the holy.  We couldn’t even see it without his deliverance and sacrifice to stoop so very low to bring it to us!

s

How was your day at work, mother?

Maliya said to me, Mrs. Jayne I hugged you every day this week, when I was at home.  I thought about you every day, she was saying.  I had a Grandma whose hug was so memorable that it came back to me after she had died.  If that is what she left me it is so much more important to me than the money that she scrupulously saved to give me.  I am far more grateful for the real inheritance of a memorable hug to pass on to the little ones in my care.  The knowledge that there is somebody in this world who loves you enough to give you the access to them. 

I have grown to love these children.  I assert that loving instruction is a brain development tool and that the only thing that separates our children from robots is the emotional element of the instruction of their minds and souls.  Keep hugging me remotely Maliya.  I am hugging you too!

I know you don't mind sharing your mother:})

Am I spoiled as a mother?

Spoiled Children in the South!

I wish I had a quarter for every time I hear a black woman call a child spoiled.

I was called spoiled.  Dr. Spock gave women a reason to call children spoiled in the old days.  I thought that was dead and gone.

How slavery has made us blind to the unity of a common purpose in the rearing of our children!  We spoiled many children as Nannys and Mammys and now we are reorienting our dominion to include our own children.  Can we teach our children to think of themselves as prized and precious as we have Massa’s?

I love the way we look at our children as needing to be humbled.  “She thinks too highly of herself.” “He needs to be knocked down a few pegs.”  Is that so?

I dare say, I think they need to be reminded that they are made in the image of God!  I think they need to be reminded that many of the physical parts of their bodies that they can’t get under control might be caused by ecological factors and not their gluttony.  You are beautiful and you are smart.  You can achieve and work for God’s glory.  You don’t have to follow the pack.  You can carve out your own path to follow.  You are a creator and a thinker and an amazing victor in your own spheres of activity.  You can go anywhere and do anything.

What would happen to us, if we reared our younguns to believe that?  What would our children do with a great self esteem?  What would God say about us in That Day if we gave them that heritage?

My head still hurts from coming against the mentality of the south from New York.  People still refer to people as them and us?  Heads are still bowed with the shame of having darker skin and nappy hair.  The way that we think about ourselves is laid bare so that we can deal with it and address it in our mothering and grandmothering.

God made me black!  God gave me this hair and I love God and what He made me.  My personhood is not my sin.  My mother loves me more than I know.  She had to take care of those children because she was keeping me alive.  She had to teach me to humble myself because she didn’t want to see me lynched.  It is a new day! 

Help me love myself, Mammy!  I want the mammy that raised the earlier generations of Americans to Mammy me!  I love her!  I love what she means to our country and to our heritage as Americans!

What's Up?

Our Democracy hangs or falls on the premise of coming to a consensus on any number of issues.

Consensus is not always agreement.  Consensus demands negotiation.  Sometimes the media guides us through the minefields of the development of consensus, using inflammatory language such as attack, when disagreements become escalated.  That is not attack.  That is spirited discussions.  We would be remiss to allow the loudest voices and the most masterful articulations be the only voices involved in developing consensus.

Not unlike the difference between the pressure that we must put on a pencil or a crayon and the pressure that you must put on a stylus to create an impression on a page; is the difference between the generations in negotiating tactics.  We are completely wrong if we discount the strong and loud measure of a voice like VAVOOM, just because he is loud.  Conversely the measured and thought out response of, lets say a Beto ORourke mustn’t be discounted because he is not yelling at his audience and uses the communication style of a Millenial.

I see his popularity, although sometimes the site sourcing eludes me.

I totally understand the stammering of an elder statesman like Biden and the rantings of a man like Trump.

They are clearly the attempts to test the sand that their feet are on.  Who is hearing me?  They are saying.  We would be lessened to discount their leadership styles, because we can’t relate to their communication styles.  Language has changed from a time where slurs of speech were accepted to a time where no critique of a person is allowed if you are different from that person in anyway.

Carrying the consciences of people is complicated!

Almost Twenty-Chapter One-Of Ethan's Travels to New York

Almost Twenty!

Strong and Wise?

Ethan the Ezrahite,  I will sing of the mercies of the Lord FOREVER.

I went home from carrying the sweet middle boy into the gate of manhood for our family.  Some gates of manhood are right in our own community and in the close proximity.  It is just like my wise boy to chart his own path into manhood.  Work and travel and paying his own way and paying bills and caring for others is a wonderful school for a young boy.  

So many times God has awakened me to pray for the manhood of this one as the others.  This is a hard trip for this one.

The only mention of nerves was, “I have got butterflies in my tummy now!” Even strong men will mention that they have butterflies. 

My father would have been proud of the quiet determination of the Ethan man.  He loved to think that he had raised us all to be “Men’s Men!”  Fierce and Fearless in the face of danger and able to fight the fiercest foe with no backing down.  

The only thing Bodden girls fear is their shadow.  You don’t fear your shadow and I am glad to know that.  I simply can’t wait to hear your journey’s story and how it will grow you and make you the man of God that He intends to use in this generation.

“Late in the midnight hour…” was the chant in your heart as you launched last night.  Be the light of that city as you are to this city!  Strong and Wise!  Lights don’t make a lot of noise!

Almost Twenty!

Pay attention to the details of your voting, you are going to have that privilege soon.

Obamas admin.  Changed the law about tax status of churches making them change their names to ministries.  The bathroom injunction about transvestites was successful in identifying which states still embrace their Bible Belt identification after the tremendous attack on education.  NC came out as one, so we were on the economic attack list next...they crippled us, by making sports investments contingent on throwing away our principles...

Like Isaac, as we grieved Billy Graham's passing the water wells were stuffed up By the enemies of our convictions...  We couldn't see the enemy and still the haze is with us!

Fight for our convictions or see them demolished as with a wrecking ball...

Pro lifers look simplistic in our focus as they throw anti conviction rhetoric on us.

What issue is worth dividing with our peers about?  Life of the unborn is one of the most important today...

We are angry women blinded by our importunity  and inequality... We need level headed people to guide us through the fog of confusion that has engulfed us.  We need to defend teaching conviction in our schools.  We need to defend women's right to choose the life of her baby!  We need to defend the right to care and live for Jesus.  We ought not attack the bulk of our country, which is convicted to live for Jesus and take for granted the protections that Christianity has blessed us with.  

Jesus is wedded to His church and her defender and guide.  Don't mistake that affection Christ has for His church for weakness.   They have marginalized us and taken advantage of mercy and humility.  

We need Gods protection and assistance to live for him through the reconstruction of our nation from the civil war we've been in.

The Man who bails us out of many financial squirmishes!

?Quiere vegetales?

You went to the store and bought your weekly bunch of carrots, like a rabbit. Are you a rabbit. Where are the meats? What else are you going to eat? Vegetables are good, but that woman Occasio-Cortez has the lot of you millenials hypnotized that all meats are bad and wicked and poison. Are they? really. Won't a nice and juicy cheeseburger heal all the things that ail you on a rainy day? I have seen you enjoy it. Now we are becoming like the East Indians, letting the cows die and live a fat long life, while our children starve to death.

God is in control of all and I promise that when you are starving I will feed you meat, intravenously! No joke!

Political Correctness? or educated for the causes of Hell?

Have we the right lasso on our tongues? It seems that we send our children to school to put a worldly lasso on their tongues. They come home sensitive to worldly accepted bad speech. Socially accepted talk is socially acceptedly accused. but God’s standard is put aside for this wrong lasso. Gossip and lying and tattling and angry speech is not the target of the worldly lasso. Prejudices soundings, Authoritarian, Bullying, Homophobic speech, Racial and Gender partiality replace the fruit of the Spirit as more and educationally acceptable speech for the cause of the unity of the educated “ish”. God give us grace to walk between the lassos that we have attached to our tongues, as we prepare to gather with family on the holidays. Make us sure in our knowledge that our tongues are gripped with the lasso and conviction of God’s Heart and not the pretentiousness of socially acceptable speech.

Slipping through the cracks or forging your own path?

We are grateful and proud of your chosen path of hard-working accumulation of wealth. It is hard to accumulate, when the needs are so great as our family's is. There is no individual anything and your work is manifesting itself as a roof and a large stake in the equity of that roof that is over our head. We are happy to have you doing this.

Your academic mind is at rest, while your body takes up the slack and makes the money to put food into your mouth. I don't want your mind to go into a long range hiatus. I want you to continue to pursue your mental exercises as you are reading and sketching, etc., etc. I know that you are a man of action and not many words. I am grateful for your contributions and your initiative on all of the family axises. You are an amazing man and your pursuits are seen and appreciated.

Love you!