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Gindi Vincent

The Dish on Career, Fashion, Faith, and Family

28 days

28 Days: Day 22, Next To

February 22, 2020 by Gindi 1 Comment

At a retreat I attended yesterday, one of the leaders opened with a devotional from Nehemiah 1.

Nehemiah is a book in the Old Testament of the Bible that I’ve been fascinated with for years. He’s this classic example in Christian literature of the spiritual gift of leadership.

But as much as I’ve dug into portions of the book of Nehemiah, there’s always been some of it I’ve skipped over.

The devotional renewed my interest in this book. So last night, I started reading further in.

I was stopped cold by Chapter 3.

I couldn’t stop reading it.

If you’re not familiar with the story, Nehemiah is this Jewish guy in exile from Jerusalem who has made it all the way up in the Gentile king’s senior leadership. He hears Jerusalem is totally broken and burned, so he bravely asks the king if he can go back to his city and his people and rebuild (and amazingly the king lets him).

That’s where the story picks up in Chapter 3.

This is what struck me:
v. 2 – The men of Jericho built the adjoining section, and Zakkur son of Imri built next to them.
v. 4 – Meremoth son of Uriah… repaired the next section. Next to him Meshullam son of Berekiah… made repairs, and next to him Zadok …also made repairs. 
v. 11 – Malkijah and Hasshub… repaired another section and the Tower of the Ovens. Shallum son of Hallohesh, ruler of a half-district of Jerusalem, repaired the next section with the help of his daughters.
v. 17 – Next to him, the repairs were made by the Levites … Beside him, Hashabiah, ruler of half the district of Keilah, carried out repairs for his district.  Next to him, the repairs were made…

Do you see it?

Does that knock you over?

And that’s not the whole chapter! “Next to” is said OVER TWENTY TIMES!

All these different people from different tribes and people came together to rebuild. Group A? RIGHT NEXT TO Group R! Team 12? BESIDE Team 423!

Working right next to each other to rebuild God’s city.

What if modern Christianity looked like this?

What if we were writing about Modern-Day Prophet X’s call for rebuilding crumbling cities and people and families and faith?
v. 1 – Next to her, the repairs were made by the Catholics…
v. 2 – Beside him, the Protestants carried out repairs for his district…
v. 3 – The Democrats carried out the repairs on the next section, and next to them the Republicans also made repairs.
v. 4 – The Fountain Gate was repaired by those from Mexico, and next to them the Egyptians also repaired the wall by the King’s Garden, and beyond them, the Russians made repairs up to a point opposite the tombs. Beside them the Nigerians worked on the point facing the armory and next to them the Californians and Texans zealously repaired another section.

Wow.

Can you see it?

I can envision it. I want so deeply.

It doesn’t say everyone came together and agreed on everything forever after. PLUS, it says people wanted to kill them for doing it. So much so that the rebuilders had to split so that half of them could guard those doing the building and then they could swap. (Chapter 4’s premise is “Opposition to Rebuilding!” And Chapter 6? “Further Opposition!”)

The act of restoration and rebuilding does not come easily. Or cheaply. It most certainly does not come without significant opposition. But there’s a blueprint in the book of Nehemiah that it can come.

And y’all, I can barely type it without crying, in Chapter 7, “after the wall had been rebuilt,” there is a LIST of the exiles who returned. Read it. “These are the people of the province who came up from the captivity of the exiles whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had taken captive…” and then there is an actual list with actual numbers of the people from the different families who returned along with the priests and temple servants.

After the hard and painful and severely opposed work of rebuilding was done, the exiles returned from captivity.

If this is not the picture the church universal should be working their fingers to the bone to achieve, then I don’t know what is.

This is the example of rebuilding we must follow. They came home. They confessed. They sealed a covenant.
Stand up and praise the Lord your God, who is from everlasting to everlasting. Blessed be your glorious name, and may it be exalted above all blessing and praise. You alone are the Lord.

Filed Under: Faith Tagged With: 28 days

28 Days: Day 21, Fashion Friday, Icons

February 21, 2020 by Gindi Leave a Comment

As I pulled open the door to the ladies room this morning, I saw a stunning woman step out.  Tall, slim, dark hair, and a beautiful high collared camel-colored blazer paired with her Friday dark wash trouser jeans and boots. 

It made me want to go buy a camel-colored blazer, even though that is far from my best color. 

It also got me to thinking about style icons.  More specifically, images from movies that shaped what I love most about fashion.  As I still have no idea what I’m doing with Fashion Fridays, or if I’m going to even do them anymore, I decided to write about iconic fashions for today’s Fashion Friday.

That woman’s jacket from this morning jump started my first iconic style movie. The Thomas Crown Affair (remake). Every single outfit Rene Russo wore. She even made bathrobes look glamorous. I even tried to recreate her haircut so I could BE her (it did not work out).

Audrey Hepburn in every movie she plays in. Classic. Simple lines. And lots of black. I don’t channel her often, given my draw to color, but she’s matchless.

Julia Roberts, in and out of movies, has long been a style icon of mine, although her fashion out of movies is arguably better than her fashion in movies.  However, while I know it is utterly 1990s period, her post-shopping style in Pretty Woman made a pretty big impact on me.

Julia Roberts at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, California (Photo by Jim Smeal/WireImage)

And even better, which is saying something, in and out of movies is Cate Blanchett.  Seriously, she is magnificent.  Movies from The Aviator to Monuments Men create Cate-only styles to make you want to makeover your closet.

There are so many other formative fashion movies – The English Patient, Reality Bites, Pretty in Pink, The Royal Tenenbaums, Sabrina, Clueless – and icons from Grace to Gwyeth.

I love movies and I love fashion.  Who are your fashion icons or what’s your most memorable movie fashion moments?

Filed Under: Fashion Fridays Tagged With: 28 days, fashion fridays

28 Days: Day 20, The Difference

February 20, 2020 by Gindi 1 Comment

We’re reading Harry Potter. That is, the boys and I. Little bit doesn’t seem to have taken much of an interest, though she’ll listen occasionally.

As I’ve written before, I wanted to screen the content and what better way to read it together. We started last summer and we’re just about to wrap up, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince.

A couple of nights ago, there is this scene between Dumbledore (the headmaster) and Harry about his eventual fight to the death that will have to occur with Voldemort (the super evil bad guy, if there’s anyone out there who is more behind than us on reading these books).

Harry’s fighting and fighting, basically taking this bleak outlook that he HAS to go into this fight-to-the-death match and what a horrible burden this is for a kid, against Dumbledore who is taking the position that he is CHOOSING to take Voldemort on. Because Harry knows how to love and Voldemort doesn’t and that is the most powerful thing. Harry has the choice to make, regardless of what others have said about this penultimate battle, and it is his choice to take on this most dangerous of challenges.

Something clicks.

He gets it.

He gets that it is his choice and he wants to take it because he wants to end the evil and avenge his parents death.

I realize this is a lot of Harry Potter in one post, but it’s all to get you to this quote which I’ve now sat with four 48 hours:

It was, he thought, the difference between being dragged into the arena to face a battle to the death and walking into the arena with your head held high. Some people, perhaps, would say that there was little to choose between the two ways, but Dumbledore knew – and so do I, thought Harry, with a rush of fierce pride, and so did my parents – that there was all the difference in the world. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, JK Rowling.

What if, I changed my perspective on the challenge in front of me?

What if, instead of feeling sorry for myself for being dragged into the ring, I squared my shoulders and felt a surge of pride that I was chosen (or chose) to fight this most important battle?

Sit with that.

Or better yet, stand with that.

There is a reason it is you inside that ring.

There is a reason that only you can fight this particular battle.

So head up, warrior. Shoulders back. Let’s walk into the arena ready to take this on.

Filed Under: Random Tagged With: 28 days

28 Days: Day 18, Sick

February 18, 2020 by Gindi Leave a Comment

I am sick.

I woke up at 3 am and proceeded to lose every remaining ounce of fluid in my body over the next three hours. About every five minutes.

I don’t remember the last time I felt so steam-rollered.

So I took work calls from home on the sofa under a blanket shivering and trying to sip water.

I slept when I wasn’t working.

And now that the family is eating dinner, I’m going to bed.

I’m writing, but not much. More tomorrow.

Filed Under: Random Tagged With: 28 days

28 Days: Day 16, Sunday

February 16, 2020 by Gindi Leave a Comment

It is Sunday.

The 16th of February.

We are in Louisiana with fields and cattle and tractors moving hay bales.

The sun came out, apropos on Sun-day. A nice change from the gray gloom that sat on the land yesterday.

I did very little. I ran an errand into town and baked and set out appetizers and s’more fixins at dusk around the fire.

The dog smells and is in his element. Barking at everything with a motor or on four legs.

The kids caught crawfish and set out bait traps and fed the cows out of the back of the pick up while I cringed because I just knew they’d fall out. City girl, they’d mutter.

The sky changed colors and everyone told stories until it was black out. Between the s’mores and the cheeses, we barely had an appetite left for dinner so we just grilled salmon (this time not setting anything on fire) and called it done.

I am writing about the small and remembering how gorgeous these small spaces and moments are.

Filed Under: Random Tagged With: 28 days

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