Dear Reader:

I have always been an “asker” as far back as elementary school…much to the annoyance of one particular fourth grade teacher-Mrs. Persons. (As a nine-year old child I figured she had an “s“on her name because it looked like two people had squeezed inside one body.)

One day she was showing a map of the world to the class and telling us about different places that had been “discovered” by exciting explorers around the world.

I remember my hand shot up and continued waving until, with a quite audible sigh, Mrs. Persons glared at me and said, “Now what Becky?”

  “Mrs. Persons, I exclaimed excitedly, would you show us now all the places in the world that haven’t been discovered yet?”  (In my imagination…I already had my safari hat on and was wacking my way through the darkest jungles of Africa.)

“There are no places left to discover….no frontiers….everything has already been discovered!”

With that Mrs. Persons pulled the map down so hard that it flew up against the back wall as it wound around and around. I can still hear that loud, flapping, banging sound in my mind.

“No more frontiers, no unknown…?” I sank back in my desk, literally crushed at the prospect that there was nothing new to discover…no unknown territory left for me.

Today, of course, I know differently. I am living my life, every day, in the frontier…the unknown land of breast cancer. My medical “weapons”  (into this new frontier for me) are treatments and medications. My personal “weapons” are fortitude, gratitude, and a “multitude” of people and supporters, helping me fight the good fight with God leading the way through the darkest jungles of the unknown.

Inside…I am still that nine-year-old girl asking questions about everything, everyday. I have never met a stranger when it comes to asking questions. If I need a question answered it doesn’t bother me a bit to go right up to a stranger and ask….and nine times out of ten… I end up meeting a wonderful “friend” for the moment.

When Mandy was younger…she was horrified and mortified at me doing this…she would walk down the mall- leaving me behind (disassociating herself from that crazy woman talking to everyone) if I stopped to ask directions. Mandy did not and still doesn’t like asking anybody for anything if she can avoid it.

I think most people (particularly men) are more like Mandy than me. I, however, never think twice about asking a question. Isn’t the first thing we learn in school… is how to raise our hand before asking a question? Sometimes in church if the minister asks a rhetorical question…I literally have to grab my hand from going up in the air to answer it.

I confess. I am a perpetual “asker” and still have trouble understanding why so many people are uncomfortable asking for something they want or need from someone else.

I find myself talking to someone on the phone and saying “Didn’t you ask about this or that…or why didn’t you ask this person that question?” (I am sure to non-“askers” I am extremely annoying!)

Poet, Antonio Porchia, is quoted as saying:

“ It is a long time since I have asked heaven for anything, but still my arms will not come down.” 

Earthly and spiritual asking is certainly a paradox. We are so scared of being denied our request for whatever it is we yearn so for… in life… that most of us never lay it on the line. Instead we fall back on wishful thinking..chained to an unknown fear that never manifests itself because it doesn’t exist.

How easily that chain would break…if we just had the courage to ask? Of course…there are no guarantees we will get the answer we want when it comes to asking but if we never ask…we haven’t got a prayer of a chance to getting what we long for in our lives.

If we enter prayer (Madeleine L’Engle’s definition) treating it as  an “act of love” then we  understand that no matter the outcome, the other Person making the ‘call on the request’ is approving or rejecting the “asking” in our overall best interests.

Just like parents accepting and rejecting their child’s requests while growing up…God understands where we are in our own journey and what “tools” we need or don’t need at the stage of life we are in. But the one thing God doesn’t want us to do…is to stop asking. Because one day He will say “YES” and your life will change accordingly.

“Ask, and it shall be given to you, seek, and ye shall find, knock, and it shall be opened to you.” ( Matthew 7:7)

So until tomorrow….never fear asking…”no” is not a dead-end response…just a detour to finding the right “yes.”

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

* Yesterday my brother, Ben, and I attended the Unity of Charleston church to witness Lee and Vikki join it. Vikki’s mother and grandmother were also there (from Florida) and we had a wonderful time reuniting and spending time together.

After the service we went to Cannon Green (beautiful restaurant on Spring street where Lee was playing for their Sunday brunch).. the food was was delicious. While waiting to be served…we explored the courtyard behind the building and it was exquisitely gorgeous. All the plants inside were alive and breath-taking.

Ben and I stopped by John and Mandy’s on the way home…to show Ben the pool and for me to love up on those precious grandchildren…Uncle Ben did too!

These days Jakie is into bouncing and Eva Cate-art. I believe she has inherited the art from her mother and grandmother Joan (BeBe)…Jake got the bouncing from me.

Using foam rubber shapes…Eva Cate made (L to R) Tigger, daddy, mommy, herself, and Jakie!