Tonight as I sat in a cozy home, listening to the silence of 2 sleeping little boys, outside my windows came the boom of fireworks. At first, I thought they were gun shots but they were so rapid my mind leaped with the excitement that it just might be my favorite! Yes! FIREWORKS! Beautiful ones, lighting up the sky in an array of color. Annie laid on the couch as though it's everyday someone paints the sky with these vibrant dots of color. Or that it's everyday someone interrupts your peaceful evening with booming brilliance. Well, Annie, that may be your life, but it surely isn't mine.
My life, at this point, is forecasted to have 12in. of snow with a sweet little bit of ice before hand. Blah. I'm ready for spring and summer. I'm ready for picnics and flip flops, for flowers, and outdoor concerts. I'm ready for bike rides and long walks, and the hope of a budding romance. I've enjoyed this winter for all of it's snow and mess. It's been unusually bright and cheery in the sky this year. But I'm so ready for NEW. New grass, new hopes, a clean car,and new peek-a-boo shoes.
So, to whoever you were, celebrating January 30th like it was the last day on earth, thanks for sparking a little hope in my heart for spring and summer, love, and all things beautiful.
I hope that as these last storms of winter blow through we can enjoy them with the expectation that new is just around the river bend.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Puzzled
I've recently been into puzzles. Probably because everything else in my life seems like it is in little pieces. Something to be figured out and pieced together to make sense.
Just yesterday I finished the puzzle I was working on. A sweet little country scene with a farm house, red barn, wooden fence, lots of trees, and a winding road that vanishes off the edge. As I finished this little 500 piece jigsaw I sat back, hesitating to put in that last piece. I hate looking at it incomplete. Yet couldn't bear the thought that once this piece was in, my days of figuring it out were through.
Begrudgingly I put the piece in. There it was. The reward for my hard work. Completed, so small, and yet as I was going through it there were times I just had to put the pieces down, take a step back, and reorient myself. I often thought, oh surely the puzzle maker messed up, they must have cut this piece wrong, I know it goes here. Not once though was a piece cut wrong. I would make it fit somewhere, looking slightly askew but averting my eyes so I wouldn't have to deal with it. In the end though, every piece found it's home, it's fit, and the picture was made complete and just as the puzzle maker had intended.
When I finished there was this desire in me to rip it all apart and start over, the way sometimes after I finish reading a good book I want to start back at the beginning and read it all over again right then. But ick, not with all those grassy, tree limb pieces. Then a thought occurred to me. I can't say it's the smartest thing but it was just my next thought. I could flip it over, number the pieces, break it apart and then put it together again, just using the numbers.
As I thought about that idea I realized how silly that would be. The fun of doing a puzzle isn't in simply placing pieces together in a number order. The fun of doing a puzzle is the shifting, the searching, the twisting, the matching. That's the fun!
I realize there are many things in this writing, as I look back over it, that could be compared to the spiritual journey but this is what stuck out to me most. This last thought.
Life is hard. There are pieces that seem to have no place in my picture. Pieces whose corners seem to need a bit of a trimming. Pieces that seem to be missing or scattered on the floor. But this, this is my life. Random pieces and all! God could have given me each piece numbered on the back so that it was easy to figure out but He hasn't. He has given some pieces and reserved others and asks that I would trust Him in developing a beautiful picture. And that is half the fun. No, it surely doesn't seem like fun when pieces can't be used when I want them to, when they don't fit, when I steal a piece from a friends puzzle to compensate for my seeming lack of a piece. But the fun is slowly watching this picture take shape, to begin to make a little sense, to see how all of these little pieces actually do fit together to create something meaningful and meant for His glory.
So yes, I'm often puzzled staring at these pieces He has given, but I'm also amazed as I see Him taking my pieces, placing them in spots I didn't see and creating in me something spectacular!
Just yesterday I finished the puzzle I was working on. A sweet little country scene with a farm house, red barn, wooden fence, lots of trees, and a winding road that vanishes off the edge. As I finished this little 500 piece jigsaw I sat back, hesitating to put in that last piece. I hate looking at it incomplete. Yet couldn't bear the thought that once this piece was in, my days of figuring it out were through.
Begrudgingly I put the piece in. There it was. The reward for my hard work. Completed, so small, and yet as I was going through it there were times I just had to put the pieces down, take a step back, and reorient myself. I often thought, oh surely the puzzle maker messed up, they must have cut this piece wrong, I know it goes here. Not once though was a piece cut wrong. I would make it fit somewhere, looking slightly askew but averting my eyes so I wouldn't have to deal with it. In the end though, every piece found it's home, it's fit, and the picture was made complete and just as the puzzle maker had intended.
When I finished there was this desire in me to rip it all apart and start over, the way sometimes after I finish reading a good book I want to start back at the beginning and read it all over again right then. But ick, not with all those grassy, tree limb pieces. Then a thought occurred to me. I can't say it's the smartest thing but it was just my next thought. I could flip it over, number the pieces, break it apart and then put it together again, just using the numbers.
As I thought about that idea I realized how silly that would be. The fun of doing a puzzle isn't in simply placing pieces together in a number order. The fun of doing a puzzle is the shifting, the searching, the twisting, the matching. That's the fun!
I realize there are many things in this writing, as I look back over it, that could be compared to the spiritual journey but this is what stuck out to me most. This last thought.
Life is hard. There are pieces that seem to have no place in my picture. Pieces whose corners seem to need a bit of a trimming. Pieces that seem to be missing or scattered on the floor. But this, this is my life. Random pieces and all! God could have given me each piece numbered on the back so that it was easy to figure out but He hasn't. He has given some pieces and reserved others and asks that I would trust Him in developing a beautiful picture. And that is half the fun. No, it surely doesn't seem like fun when pieces can't be used when I want them to, when they don't fit, when I steal a piece from a friends puzzle to compensate for my seeming lack of a piece. But the fun is slowly watching this picture take shape, to begin to make a little sense, to see how all of these little pieces actually do fit together to create something meaningful and meant for His glory.
So yes, I'm often puzzled staring at these pieces He has given, but I'm also amazed as I see Him taking my pieces, placing them in spots I didn't see and creating in me something spectacular!
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Post 100
So yesterday was just one of those opps days. Where all I can say to any given thing is oops!
- I called my Alderman (woman) to take care of my $1401 tickets. To find out out that indeed 789.0 and 612.0 are the ordinances I violated, not the ticket amounts. Oops!
- I called to make sure I still had a job with Special School District and because I had never called to unblock my number for them I wasn't receiving any jobs. Oops!
- I went to Clayton to register my car a year late. Oops!
- I paid to park at the wrong building. Oops.
- In getting in and out of my car I ripped my tights at the butt, which led to what you could imagine as butt-less tights. (so sad and embarrassing but true.) Oops!
- I wore ear rings that sounded like wind chimes in my ears on a night where I need to be able to hear other people speaking. Oops!
Saturday, January 22, 2011
I’m baking my cookies and eating them too.
1/20/11
Today the snow fell in droves. Not the gentle kind I’ve been used to seeing in recent years. An inch an hour. I’ll repeat it for dramatic affect, AN INCH AN HOUR! And it snowed for let’s say 9 hours. Cars covered, roads vanished, yards blinding white, and kids blissfully doing flips into 9 inch snow piles.
I personally like to let the sun do a little grunt work before I clean off what’s left on and around my car, but with 9 inches, the sun was even having a difficult time. I spent my day inside, cuddled up in my pj’s, unshowered and loving it. I prayed. I read. I worked on a puzzle. I did my nails. I watched The Doctors. I loved this day!
I’ve been convicted lately about my nonexistent daily prayer routine. I am a haphazard prayer. Things pop into my mind and I’ll pray for them, but I’m awful at setting aside daily time with my Savior to really pray. So, it has been my goal this week to get a routine going with this and I have to say it’s been great! I’ve been taking things to God that I usually try to handle on my own. I’ve been praying for others. I’ve been praying for those people of whom I’ve said I’ll pray for! WHAT! Actually doing what I’d said I’d do. Miraculous! And I really do mean miraculous!
So it was a miracle today when I finally did make it into regular clothes to go clean off my car and found a ticket nestled in the 9 inches piled on that I didn’t lose it!
Since I’ve been driving, 12 years now, I’ve parked my car in a spot in front of my parent’s house. It’s specially paved, not part of the road, but indeed part of our yard spot. Clearly marked in front of my spot is a sign that says No Parking This Side of Street. Great! I’m a law abiding citizen, good thing I’m parking on my yard spot and not the road. 12 YEARS I’ve been doing this. So today when I got a ticket in the amount of $789.00 for parking on the street during snow I was totally confused. This isn’t the street. This is my yard spot. Then reading further, I saw that I indeed had another ticket for $612.00 for parking on “unimproved surface- ‘No Parking This Side of Street’”. First I’m thinking he meant unapproved, but I digress. I know that sign. I live by that sign. I obey that sign! I PARK IN MY YARD SPOT!
If you aren’t so hot in math, or don’t care enough to count it, I’ll just tell you that is $1401 that I will refer to as $1,40 and 1 in tickets in one day for a car I wasn’t even driving!!!!!!!
1-4-0-1
That 1 dollar mocked me as I stood out in the cold reading my list of violations, snow seeping into my, not so equipped to handle 9 inches of snow, snow boots. For a woman who just quit her job and is hanging on for a paycheck just to pay her basic necessity bills, $140 and 1 is a slap in the face and would typically make one spit out some vulgarity fitting for the situation.
12 years. 12 years and not one ticket, not one warning, nothing and then BAM! $140 and 1!
So I cleaned off my car and shoveled thinking the whole time abouthow I wished I had a husband who would shovel with me and speak up for me during my COURT DATE!!!! what I would say while in front of the judge pleading my case. The tears that would inevitably come, because… well, I’m me. Did I need a lawyer? How do I go about getting a lawyer? How would I pay for that? Would I go to jail if I said all the things I really wanted to say to this police officer? Would they be able to go back in the records to see that they were indeed the ones that made us pave the yard spot so we could park there? Would I need evidence?
But in the midst of my racing, panicked mind, came that small voice. A small voice that led me to laugh, instead of cry, to shovel instead of pout, and to move my car to the deep back of our driveway instead of keeping it there in stubborn rebellion.
I was disappointed when I asked my mom what I was supposed to do and she said pray. PRAY! Well duh, but what do I DO?! I wanted to yell. The truth is she couldn’t have been more right. $1,40 and 1 is an insurmountable amount of money to me at this point in my life. Totally and completely impossible! B-U-T, through Hezekiah I have learned that He wants me to lay it all out before Him. To humble myself before Him. To show Him the odds stacked against me, so that He in His miraculous-ness could do just as huge a miracle as taking one who has no prayer life and giving her a rich and vibrant week of prayer to providing a mere $1,40 and 1.
So, instead of fretting over my court date, March 2nd @6:30, I’m laying out my tickets to God and asking Him to provide like only He can. I’m also making cookies and eating them too, cause you know, what’s a girl to do!
Today the snow fell in droves. Not the gentle kind I’ve been used to seeing in recent years. An inch an hour. I’ll repeat it for dramatic affect, AN INCH AN HOUR! And it snowed for let’s say 9 hours. Cars covered, roads vanished, yards blinding white, and kids blissfully doing flips into 9 inch snow piles.
I personally like to let the sun do a little grunt work before I clean off what’s left on and around my car, but with 9 inches, the sun was even having a difficult time. I spent my day inside, cuddled up in my pj’s, unshowered and loving it. I prayed. I read. I worked on a puzzle. I did my nails. I watched The Doctors. I loved this day!
I’ve been convicted lately about my nonexistent daily prayer routine. I am a haphazard prayer. Things pop into my mind and I’ll pray for them, but I’m awful at setting aside daily time with my Savior to really pray. So, it has been my goal this week to get a routine going with this and I have to say it’s been great! I’ve been taking things to God that I usually try to handle on my own. I’ve been praying for others. I’ve been praying for those people of whom I’ve said I’ll pray for! WHAT! Actually doing what I’d said I’d do. Miraculous! And I really do mean miraculous!
So it was a miracle today when I finally did make it into regular clothes to go clean off my car and found a ticket nestled in the 9 inches piled on that I didn’t lose it!
Since I’ve been driving, 12 years now, I’ve parked my car in a spot in front of my parent’s house. It’s specially paved, not part of the road, but indeed part of our yard spot. Clearly marked in front of my spot is a sign that says No Parking This Side of Street. Great! I’m a law abiding citizen, good thing I’m parking on my yard spot and not the road. 12 YEARS I’ve been doing this. So today when I got a ticket in the amount of $789.00 for parking on the street during snow I was totally confused. This isn’t the street. This is my yard spot. Then reading further, I saw that I indeed had another ticket for $612.00 for parking on “unimproved surface- ‘No Parking This Side of Street’”. First I’m thinking he meant unapproved, but I digress. I know that sign. I live by that sign. I obey that sign! I PARK IN MY YARD SPOT!
If you aren’t so hot in math, or don’t care enough to count it, I’ll just tell you that is $1401 that I will refer to as $1,40 and 1 in tickets in one day for a car I wasn’t even driving!!!!!!!
1-4-0-1
That 1 dollar mocked me as I stood out in the cold reading my list of violations, snow seeping into my, not so equipped to handle 9 inches of snow, snow boots. For a woman who just quit her job and is hanging on for a paycheck just to pay her basic necessity bills, $140 and 1 is a slap in the face and would typically make one spit out some vulgarity fitting for the situation.
12 years. 12 years and not one ticket, not one warning, nothing and then BAM! $140 and 1!
So I cleaned off my car and shoveled thinking the whole time about
But in the midst of my racing, panicked mind, came that small voice. A small voice that led me to laugh, instead of cry, to shovel instead of pout, and to move my car to the deep back of our driveway instead of keeping it there in stubborn rebellion.
I was disappointed when I asked my mom what I was supposed to do and she said pray. PRAY! Well duh, but what do I DO?! I wanted to yell. The truth is she couldn’t have been more right. $1,40 and 1 is an insurmountable amount of money to me at this point in my life. Totally and completely impossible! B-U-T, through Hezekiah I have learned that He wants me to lay it all out before Him. To humble myself before Him. To show Him the odds stacked against me, so that He in His miraculous-ness could do just as huge a miracle as taking one who has no prayer life and giving her a rich and vibrant week of prayer to providing a mere $1,40 and 1.
So, instead of fretting over my court date, March 2nd @6:30, I’m laying out my tickets to God and asking Him to provide like only He can. I’m also making cookies and eating them too, cause you know, what’s a girl to do!
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Catch Up
Welcome to 2011! It has made a spectacular entrance or maybe 2010 made a splendid exit. It all got pretty messy there in between. None the less. Hullo! I'm happy to tell you I'm still alive. At points in the past few weeks I've been M.I.A. from here I've felt as though I were going to die, I am here to tell you I didn't. Good news right!
I feel the need to play another quick game of catch up, both to clear things up for you of where I've been and to show me exactly what the Lord has brought me through.
So a recap of 2010 crazies:
still living with parents
lost a job
got a job
lost a job again
got a real job offer
lost the offer
got a permanent sub job
got a permanent teaching job
quit sub job
4 days later quit the teaching job
went back to subbing
met an ex-girlfriend of my ex-fiance
slightly devastated by this news because they were dating during the awkward engagement
got a message from the ex, wanting to reconcile, deleted
And moved on
Started BSF (Bible Study Fellowship)
Became a leader of BSF
Am thriving in BSF
Best friend got engaged
A thousand other friends got engaged
A million more got pregnant
Lots of highs
lots of lows
Became friends with some of the best people ever!
Enter 2011
delighting in new friendships
continuing to hope
and wait
and trust
and wait....
So that seems to be the big and small of it. I'm sure my life has been riddled with the little moments in between that make life worth living, but those I get to live with those dearest to me! So here's wishing you and yours a blessed, refreshing, and exciting new year!
I feel the need to play another quick game of catch up, both to clear things up for you of where I've been and to show me exactly what the Lord has brought me through.
So a recap of 2010 crazies:
still living with parents
lost a job
got a job
lost a job again
got a real job offer
lost the offer
got a permanent sub job
got a permanent teaching job
quit sub job
4 days later quit the teaching job
went back to subbing
met an ex-girlfriend of my ex-fiance
slightly devastated by this news because they were dating during the awkward engagement
got a message from the ex, wanting to reconcile, deleted
And moved on
Started BSF (Bible Study Fellowship)
Became a leader of BSF
Am thriving in BSF
Best friend got engaged
A thousand other friends got engaged
A million more got pregnant
Lots of highs
lots of lows
Became friends with some of the best people ever!
Enter 2011
delighting in new friendships
continuing to hope
and wait
and trust
and wait....
So that seems to be the big and small of it. I'm sure my life has been riddled with the little moments in between that make life worth living, but those I get to live with those dearest to me! So here's wishing you and yours a blessed, refreshing, and exciting new year!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)