Deceiving Appearances

June 18, 2022 by  
Filed under Humor, Stories

By Kim Stokely –

Have you ever had a taste surprise? You reach for the bottle of apple juice in the fridge, take a swallow, only to discover it’s actually the sun tea you made that afternoon? A friend of mine has held a grudge against pumpernickel bread ever since she took a cube off a buffet table, thinking it was a brownie bite.

I had, at a recent family reunion, not a taste surprise, but an appearance surprise. To understand the true nature of this, you have to know that some members of my husband’s family loathe mayonnaise. The sight of the gelatinous white sandwich spread makes them physically ill. My son, Ian, doesn’t hate it to that extent, but he still doesn’t like it. As we gathered at the picnic table to eat a lunch of leftovers, my niece, Allison, walked out with a huge jar of mayonnaise.

Her cousin, Justyn, stared at her in horror. “Why’d you bring that out here?”

She gave him a sweet smile. “I found out that I like it!”

My son looked around the table at the remaining hot dogs and burgers. Ian’s face paled. “What are you going to put it on?”

Allison plopped into her chair, setting the offensive jar, and a plate of crackers on the table. She slowly unscrewed the cap.

Justyn turned a shade of green. “Crackers? You eat it just with crackers?”

In answer, she dipped her spoon into the jar and spread a blob of its contents onto a cracker. She popped the morsel into her mouth. “Yep.”

My son stared. “I dare you to eat a spoonful on its own.”

Allison promptly did.

Ian made a retching noise before standing up. “That just hurt my heart.” He and Justyn ran into the house.

Allison laughed while the rest of us looked on with various expressions of confusion, curiosity and revulsion. She scooped out another blob and held it out. “Anyone else want some?” She giggled at the groans she heard. “It’s vanilla pudding!”

She’d fooled all of us with her practical joke, something she gloated over for the rest of our visit. We’d all looked at the jar and its label, and assumed that the white goo inside was mayonnaise. But, if we’d really thought about it, we would have realized Allison would never eat mayonnaise, as she’s always been the most vocal in her disgust of the stuff.

The joke reminded me of the passage in 1Samuel 16:7 when God warned Samuel not to judge a person by their appearance, as man does; but by their heart, as He does. How often do we jump to conclusions based on appearances? Has someone’s clothes, or tattoos, or hairstyle, stopped me from approaching them because I didn’t think we’d have anything in common? Just because the outside looks like something we might not like, the inside might hold a sweet treat, just like Allison’s jar of “mayonnaise.”

A Woman’s Purse, the Final Frontier

May 24, 2022 by  
Filed under Humor, Stories

By Kim Stokely –

Everyone knows a woman’s purse is a black hole in which a myriad of objects can be lost or found. If she carries a big purse, it can weigh up to thirty pounds and carry the Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. A woman who carries a small purse may fool others, but I know she’s mastered the game of Tetris and is probably carrying the same amount of stuff, just packed more economically.

Young mothers often use their purses as supplemental diaper bags. Diapers, wipes, plastic containers of Cheerios and teething rings are often stuffed next to wallets and key chains. I know women who are prepared to survive in the wild for months. Swiss Army knives, water bottles, first aid kits and granola bars; not to mention GPS devices, flares and a box of matches somehow find the room to coexist amid mundane checkbooks and pens in their handbags.

I often feel like I’m reenacting a scene from Mary Poppins when I decide to tackle cleaning out my purse. I may not have a lamp stand like the practically perfect nanny, but I’ve found some mighty strange objects of my own.

This morning, as I waded through the inevitable sea of receipts filling the bottom of my purse, I found a carrot cake muffin. Fortunately, it was still in the take-out bag I’d stuffed it in after lunch with a friend last week. Unfortunately, I could have sent it to the NHL to use as a puck in their next game. I guess I should be thankful it hadn’t exploded into tiny carrot cake pieces of sand. That could have been a real disaster.

Every time I discover something like this I promise to do better next time. I won’t horde receipts as if I want to someday create the world’s largest paper mache′ piñata. I won’t let unwrapped cough drops melt to the bottom of the bag until I have to use a chisel to remove them.

I need to periodically take a look at my soul as well to see what kind of garbage I’m carrying. Sometimes I think, because I’m not bowing under the weight of some major sin, everything must be going okay. But it just isn’t so. I often let stuff creep into my life that I need to remove- old habits, negative thoughts, judgmental attitudes and other “small” sins can clutter up my spiritual life so that I can’t find what I need; God’s grace and His mercy.

Psalm 139: 23-24 says, “Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way of everlasting”(NIV). As much as I might hate the process, I know it’s the best for me. After all, I’d rather be filled with God’s blessings than a stale carrot cake muffin any day!

What a Friend We Have in Garmin

April 22, 2022 by  
Filed under Humor, Stories

By Kim Stokely –

I have a confession. I am directionally challenged. If there’s only one way to get to a location, I’ll still manage to take a wrong turn. I’ve accidently gone to another state. Even with that handicap, I’m one of the only people I know who doesn’t have a GPS device in the car. I don’t think I ever will either.

The one time I tried using one was in a friend’s car. We were on our way to a retreat and plugged in our destination. I’d been told it would take us an hour to get to the center. An hour later, my friend and I were lost in some rural town with no name out in the middle of nowhere. Her Garmin kept telling us to turn right which would have sent us into a cornfield. The disembodied voice seemed quite put out that we wouldn’t obey her command. Every time we tried to find our way back to the main road I could hear Garmin sigh as she told us she was, “recalculating.” If she’d been a real woman, I know she would have crossed her arms and tapped her foot with impatience. We finally turned off the GPS and called someone we knew was already at the retreat center to help us find our way. I have no idea where the GPS wanted to send us, but it certainly wasn’t the place we wanted to go.

Others have had similar trials. One friend told me their GPS led them to the edge of a lake before ordering, “Find a way to the other side.” Sounds pretty much like Garmin was telling her to go “jump in the lake” to me! Another friend was trying to find an ice skating rink and instead ended up in a cemetery. Fortunately, he’s not paranoid. Me? I would have been convinced Garmin was trying to tell me something.

Give me a plain old map. I love to unfold the colorful accordion of paper and locate my destination. My fingers enjoy tracing the route. My brain likes to read the different towns along the way. And, I admit with a small amount of pride, I can usually re-fold the map into its original slim rectangle without a problem.

I feel the same way about my Bible. It is God’s map for us. It’s the same today as it was thousands of years ago. Although it never changes, it is new every time we read it. I know there are fancier ways to read scripture (apps on Smart phones and I pads) but I like to crack open the pages of my leather bound Bible. My fingers like to follow along certain passages and I love to mark out new “routes” that I discover along the way. Whether you choose an old-fashioned Bible or an electronic app, make sure to be in God’s word daily. As Psalm 119:105 says, it truly is “a lamp to my feet, and a light to my path” (ESV) and will keep you from getting lost in the rural cornfields of life.

Where’s it Hiding?

March 21, 2022 by  
Filed under Humor, Stories

By Kim Stokely –

“Mom!” My son cried from the kitchen. “Where’s the parmesan cheese?”

“Top shelf of the refrigerator,” I yelled back from the basement. Where it always is, I thought.

“It’s not there.” His voice sounded mournful. Like someone had killed his dog.

I trudged upstairs to find him staring into the open fridge, dejected. At first glance, I didn’t see the missing jar of grated parmesan cheese either, but then, feeling like Gandalf, I moved a gallon of milk and it appeared. “Voila!” I exclaimed as I handed it to my son. “Don’t say I never gave you anything.”

I like when things that are missing are so easily found.

I’ve come to believe, however, that there’s a black hole in my house sucking in odd socks and lip balm. I don’t know where they get sent, perhaps some distant planet where alien beings only have one foot and dreadfully cold, dry air. It’s amazing how quickly those items disappear from my house. I’m thinking of calling NASA in to investigate.

Some things you misplace and you know they’ll turn up eventually on their own. Things like car keys and cell phones. I’m convinced they roam the house like cats only to reappear when it suits them or they need to be recharged.

Lately, however, I’ve been losing weird things. Like spaghetti squash.

I mean really, how does one lose a spaghetti squash? I remember buying it at the store, but for the life of me, I can’t find it in my car or in the house. Unfortunately, I’m sure in another week, the smell of rotting pulp will lead me to the missing gourd.

In Psalm 139, David tells us that there is never a time we are out of God’s sight. He doesn’t misplace us on some cosmic counter in heaven. We can’t be lost amid a pile of clutter. Even if we want to disappear, there is nowhere we can hide. “If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there” (Psalm 139:8 NIV). My husband, a former Navy submariner, took great comfort in knowing that even though he was on the bottom of the ocean, God could still see and protect him.

It’s a blessing to me as well, to know that I am never out of God’s sight. At least somebody knows where I am, because most days, I’d lose my head if it wasn’t attached.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to sniff around my house to try and find that missing squash.

Just Visiting

February 20, 2022 by  
Filed under Comics, Humor

By Kim Stokely –

On a recent business trip, my husband and two co-workers wandered the streets of Old Town Albuquerque looking for a place to eat. The guide book had said this was an eclectic section of the city filled with delightful shops and restaurants, but on this Monday night, things looked dead.

An old car rattled up beside them. Like something out of a movie, the driver rolled down his window and asked, “You want to buy some turquoise?”

My husband and his friends looked at each other, shook their heads and the guy drove off. For the rest of their visit they wondered whether the dude was really selling precious stones out of his car or was “turquoise” local slang for crack?

Some behaviors, like wandering a deserted part of town, instantly point you out as a tourist. Staring up at the skyscrapers in New York City or bringing a case of bottled water with you to anywhere in South America are other examples. Here in Omaha, visitors always seem surprised that cows don’t roam the streets and every house doesn’t have a cornfield in the backyard.

Sometimes, however, it appears that just our attitude can single us out as different.

I’ll never forget visiting relatives in England when I was a teenager. My aunt brought me down to her pub for dinner one night and before I’d even spoken a word, the cook asked if I was American.

“How’d you know?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Americans have a certain way they walk.”

I thought about that a lot. How someone could tell I didn’t belong somewhere because of the way I walked.

Did I swagger obnoxiously? Or maybe I slouched in like a thief? When I asked my cousin about it later, she told me Americans walk with a certain confidence that most others don’t.

I’d like my walk with God to single me out in the same way. Not that I want people to think I’m overly confident, but I want them to sense that I don’t fit in. After all, this isn’t my home. That’s not to say I shouldn’t walk in it and help out where I can, but people shouldn’t think I belong here. If I become too comfortable with the world around me, it means I’ve stopped focusing on God. I need to be like the tourists in New York City, my eyes looking up. Not on skyscrapers, but on my heavenly home.

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