I had the best intentions.
Blogging was going to be a way for me to keep in touch with people. I would read their blogs, they would read my blog, and we would all be so connected.
So much for good intentions.
If you care to look at my history, you'll see that I started this blog in May 2007 and wrote a few posts. Then my life interfered, and I stopped. I didn't change addresses; I didn't start a cooler blog at another address. I just stopped writing.
Well, now I'm back. I have some interesting stories to tell. This past year has been the most eventful of my life. For now, I'll just say that I really do WANT to be connected to people, and I think blogging is a great way to do that. I'm even hoping that I'll learn how to do some cool, up-to-date things, like posting photos. Imagine that!
One thing I want to say first and foremost, though: my original thought with this blog was to use my words, via this blog or any other means, to impart grace. Hence the weird blog name: my name and the reference from scripture that I'd like to use as a guide (Ephesians 4:29).
Is anybody reading?
Monday, October 20
Wednesday, July 11
A midsummer day's dream
July? When did it get to be July?
Honestly.
The Fourth of July is now a whole week past. We are, in North Carolina, squarely in those hot, sticky days that mark midsummer. Not the dog days of August yet, but those days when it constantly feels as if a storm is brewing. Many days a storm IS brewing, and as clouds gather your heart lifts and you think "Maybe some rain will cool things off!" Funny how you think that every time, and it almost never happens. Instead, if it does rain, it merely increases the humidity to a full 100% and leaves pavement steaming after it passes.
Ugh. I am not a hot-weather kind of gal.
Still, I have to admit that this weather does make me appreciate even the thought of cool autumn days. I AM a cool-weather kind of gal. I went into a store the other day and saw lots of fall clothes--beautiful browns and olive greens, the very thing for a redhead! And I long for the weather to turn cool and crisp and energizing.
But isn't it true that if the weather were always cool and crisp and energizing--if there were never yucky hot days--we wouldn't appreciate those beautiful cool days? It's true for me, at least. Sometimes I think that, in our relatively easy lives, we lose some of the joy of the good things. Air conditioning makes hot weather bearable, so cool weather comes and we hardly notice. We have food so plentiful that we're never terribly hungry, so we derive little satisfaction from a good meal. Easy-to-obtain credit makes it possible to buy most anything we want right now; we don't have to wait and save the way our parents did--but we lose some of the elation of finally being able to have the thing we worked so hard to earn.
I wonder if we should stop to remember that, as good as this life is, the best is yet to come. Our forebears had no trouble remembering this. Take a look at an old hymnal, and you'll find lots of songs that describle life as a "vale of tears." They sang, "This world is not my home; I'm just a passing through." Small wonder: summer or winter, life was hard.
No, I don't want to go back to the harder life that our parents and grandparents lived. But I do wonder if perhaps our view of things is a bit skewed. What do you think?
Honestly.
The Fourth of July is now a whole week past. We are, in North Carolina, squarely in those hot, sticky days that mark midsummer. Not the dog days of August yet, but those days when it constantly feels as if a storm is brewing. Many days a storm IS brewing, and as clouds gather your heart lifts and you think "Maybe some rain will cool things off!" Funny how you think that every time, and it almost never happens. Instead, if it does rain, it merely increases the humidity to a full 100% and leaves pavement steaming after it passes.
Ugh. I am not a hot-weather kind of gal.
Still, I have to admit that this weather does make me appreciate even the thought of cool autumn days. I AM a cool-weather kind of gal. I went into a store the other day and saw lots of fall clothes--beautiful browns and olive greens, the very thing for a redhead! And I long for the weather to turn cool and crisp and energizing.
But isn't it true that if the weather were always cool and crisp and energizing--if there were never yucky hot days--we wouldn't appreciate those beautiful cool days? It's true for me, at least. Sometimes I think that, in our relatively easy lives, we lose some of the joy of the good things. Air conditioning makes hot weather bearable, so cool weather comes and we hardly notice. We have food so plentiful that we're never terribly hungry, so we derive little satisfaction from a good meal. Easy-to-obtain credit makes it possible to buy most anything we want right now; we don't have to wait and save the way our parents did--but we lose some of the elation of finally being able to have the thing we worked so hard to earn.
I wonder if we should stop to remember that, as good as this life is, the best is yet to come. Our forebears had no trouble remembering this. Take a look at an old hymnal, and you'll find lots of songs that describle life as a "vale of tears." They sang, "This world is not my home; I'm just a passing through." Small wonder: summer or winter, life was hard.
No, I don't want to go back to the harder life that our parents and grandparents lived. But I do wonder if perhaps our view of things is a bit skewed. What do you think?
Wednesday, June 27
Golden Occasion
I've heard that a person's "golden birthday" is the birthday of the year number that falls on the day of the same number. For instance, my birthday is on September 5th, so my golden birthday was my fifth birthday. Next year my oldest son will be 17 on May 17, so that will be his golden birthday. Kind of cool, isn't it?
Well, last Friday Jack and I celebrated our 22nd wedding anniversary on June 22nd. So I figure this was our golden anniversary. I know, I know--"Golden Anniversary" is a special term reserved for the 50th anniversary, but it seemed to me that the 22nd on the 22nd deserved special recognition, too.
So we celebrated. I have to say that I think we're better at celebrating things now than we were 22 years ago. Jack was in Manhattan working, so I joined him there. It was so exciting to fly to New York and to do very New Yorkish (or is it New Yorky?) things. One evening we went to the swanky bar at the W Hotel and then on to a very cool restaurant, Asia de Cuba. Another night we went to an early dinner at Bond 45 and then to the Lyceum Theater to see Inherit the Wind with Christopher Plummer and Brian Dennehy. (This was so exciting for me; I had never been to a New York play before. And yes, I kept hearing Christopher Plummer say, "And I am the head of the family von Trapp, am I not?") Then on the last day we went for a picnic in Central Park, went shopping, and went to another wonderful restaurant, Rosa Mexicano. Wow.
But the biggest "wow" for me, I think, was realizing that, as of this anniversary, I've been married half my life. A little more than half, actually, since I won't turn 44 for a couple more months. And while the things I did during the first half of my life seemed so significant at the time, it's really the things I've done in the second half that have been most important. It's amazing to have lived with someone for so long, to have experienced the birth of three children, the death of two parents, 10 moves (five different states!), three dogs, hundreds of friends.
There's a song from the musical RENT called "525,600 Minutes": have you heard it? It asks how one measures a year, which includes 525,600 minutes. Jack and I have now lived together more than 11,563,200 minutes. That's almost more than I can count. It reminds me of one of my favorite childhood hymns, a little song by Johann Hey.
Can you count the stars of evening
That are shining in the sky?
Can you count the clouds that daily
Over all the world go by?
God the Lord, who doth not slumber
Keepeth all the boundless number:
But He careth more for thee,
But He careth more for thee.
Can you count the birds that warble
In the sunshine all the day?
Can you count the little fishes
That in sparkling waters play?
God the Lord their number knoweth;
For each one His care He showeth.
Shall He not remember thee?
Shall He not remember thee?
Can you count the many children
In their little beds at night?
Who, without a thought of sorrow,
Rise again at morning light?
God the Lord, who dwells in heaven,
Loving care to each has given.
He has not forgotten thee;
He has not forgotten thee.
Golden, indeed.
Well, last Friday Jack and I celebrated our 22nd wedding anniversary on June 22nd. So I figure this was our golden anniversary. I know, I know--"Golden Anniversary" is a special term reserved for the 50th anniversary, but it seemed to me that the 22nd on the 22nd deserved special recognition, too.
So we celebrated. I have to say that I think we're better at celebrating things now than we were 22 years ago. Jack was in Manhattan working, so I joined him there. It was so exciting to fly to New York and to do very New Yorkish (or is it New Yorky?) things. One evening we went to the swanky bar at the W Hotel and then on to a very cool restaurant, Asia de Cuba. Another night we went to an early dinner at Bond 45 and then to the Lyceum Theater to see Inherit the Wind with Christopher Plummer and Brian Dennehy. (This was so exciting for me; I had never been to a New York play before. And yes, I kept hearing Christopher Plummer say, "And I am the head of the family von Trapp, am I not?") Then on the last day we went for a picnic in Central Park, went shopping, and went to another wonderful restaurant, Rosa Mexicano. Wow.
But the biggest "wow" for me, I think, was realizing that, as of this anniversary, I've been married half my life. A little more than half, actually, since I won't turn 44 for a couple more months. And while the things I did during the first half of my life seemed so significant at the time, it's really the things I've done in the second half that have been most important. It's amazing to have lived with someone for so long, to have experienced the birth of three children, the death of two parents, 10 moves (five different states!), three dogs, hundreds of friends.
There's a song from the musical RENT called "525,600 Minutes": have you heard it? It asks how one measures a year, which includes 525,600 minutes. Jack and I have now lived together more than 11,563,200 minutes. That's almost more than I can count. It reminds me of one of my favorite childhood hymns, a little song by Johann Hey.
Can you count the stars of evening
That are shining in the sky?
Can you count the clouds that daily
Over all the world go by?
God the Lord, who doth not slumber
Keepeth all the boundless number:
But He careth more for thee,
But He careth more for thee.
Can you count the birds that warble
In the sunshine all the day?
Can you count the little fishes
That in sparkling waters play?
God the Lord their number knoweth;
For each one His care He showeth.
Shall He not remember thee?
Shall He not remember thee?
Can you count the many children
In their little beds at night?
Who, without a thought of sorrow,
Rise again at morning light?
God the Lord, who dwells in heaven,
Loving care to each has given.
He has not forgotten thee;
He has not forgotten thee.
Golden, indeed.
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