Yesterday was shorts weather.
Today…
Category Archives: Day to Day
Easter
Christ passed through death and came out the victor. That is one of the realities of my faith that I have been thinking about today. He did this to redeem all the broken parts of our lives and of the whole creation. We have reason to celebrate.
The day has been full of such a variety of human experience – from worship of the risen Christ and the provision of hospitality to friends and family to egg hunts and too much food and chocolate eaten to quarrels and the sadness of hurt relationships. I guess we had the whole gamut of highs and lows around here. But mostly it was a good day.
I love the early sunrise service on the river bank. It seems appropriate,as the sun rises, to remember the new life we have available because of the resurrection. Marc did a great job of leading us. We even tried to light the Paschal candle but the wind put a stop to that!
The rest of the day has been so full. Being the matriarch means being hostess and seeing that there was food on the table from sunlight to sundown today. The last of my children left a short while ago with a good portion of the leftovers. All those foods forbidden on my diet and eaten today anyway have to leave this house. Unfortunately, they left the pies and too much bread around and took the ham and turkey. But I will have to get back on my diet in a serious way starting tomorrow.
And now I need to sleep.
Filed under church, Day to Day, Family
For Spring
Just a bit of a new look.
The geese are back. The river ice is beginning to look mushy.
Sunrise service is planned on the riverbank by our house. It is suposed to be +8 tomorrow and if it actually is, we will be able to have it without shoveling snow.
Filed under church, Day to Day
This does seem a little silly
– to be helping Leo set up his new computer. He just bought himself a Toshiba Satellite. Nice. Just finished installing the XP downgrade. Installing Firefox right now. Then a free antivirus. Then we’ll put works in. I’ve installed open office on mine but we had too many problems with existing files from work that did not transfer over well. So we broke down and bought the Works and office suites. Oh, well, business expenses I guess.
I just do not think of myself as knowing much about computers.
Filed under Day to Day
Kids – Blessings Eventually
There is no doubt that every one of my kids is a blessing from God. Of course, a few years ago I would not have said that. It takes time to get some distance from them in order to appreciate their individuality.
But, tonight, I spent almost 90 minutes talking to one of those kids. He commented on my sermon last Sunday. He listened! And then we talked about how God has been present in his life over the past ten or so years and what his personal struggles have taught him about himself, about God and about life.
I just about told him I had to study. The evening was well spent in conversation. Much better than an extra hour on Greek contract verbs!
Filed under Day to Day, Family
There was a time
when it seemed terribly important to post all sorts of events here in this space.
Somehow it does not seem so urgent anymore. Maybe that means it is time to give this a rest, but I don’t know. Maybe it just means that I need more time to think through the events of the day and reflect on them. It is hard to do that when I am tired or when there are a billion other things I should be doing.
Today was good.
It didn’t start out feeling very good. This was my Sunday to speak and I felt a bit at loose ends with what I had to say. Quite frankly I didn’t feel terribly inspired and, although I know this whole preaching thing involves more than just me being inspired, I felt rather ill prepared and ill fit to speak about anything. Today’s scripture passages were great, not obscure or unrelated so I don’t think it was about not having good resources to draw from. Maybe what I most felt was just plain old inadequate; inadequate to tie things together as I would have liked to and certainly inadequate to say anything challenging or deeply spiritual.
So I guess it was not about me. Which it should not be anyway. The fact that God could use me on a rather mediocre day is frankly a miracle enough for me. I probably ended up being more encouraged than my audience by the end of the morning when Y came up to me and thanked me. He said that what I said was clear – and his English is limited.
Then E and M invited us up for lunch. I brought the yams and green beans and they supplied the deer sausage and wine and did the cooking. It is always fun to get together at their place and a chance to be gifted with one of Kimia’s carefully guarded little smiles.
This afternoon I completed another quiz in Greek so that made me feel good. And tonight I met with my women friends to read another chapter in Scot McKnight’s book.
Today was good.
Now I guess we’ll see what the freezing rain does to my day tomorrow.
Filed under church, Day to Day, Family, grandchildren
The Wind
is blowing like crazy outside this morning.
Wonder if it is blowing spring in?
Filed under Day to Day
Challenges of these days
I know I haven’t posted much here this week. I have been incredibly tired, and then in the middle of the night seem to wake and lie there sleepless even when I know that sleep is what I need most.
Last night I did a good workout on the exercise bike and slept like a baby. So, maybe more exercise is what I need most.
There are other things that occupy my mind too. Like retirement and when and how it will happen – soon I hope. This is the downside of owning part of a business I guess. It is not something I can just walk away from. I can’t just quit. Too many staff and patients need me to make a smooth and responsible transition.
So, life goes on. It is good and I still love what I do. But I know that I need to move on to a new phase and this transition is more complicated than just stuff related to the job. It also involves some shifts inside me, I am learning more about myself and who I am and want to become over the last couple of decades of life here on earth. Life never stops being challenging I guess. Actually I hope it will not stop challenging me to grow and change.
Filed under Day to Day, Reflections
Leftovers and hanging around
Today was like the birthday party hangover around. The kids showed up at church – for the most part. (Except for P and A. And there was much speculation as to what kept them in bed on a Sunday morning by their siblings.) So, everyone headed over to our house for spaghetti and fixings and left overs for lunch.
It is good to have the kids around, the grandkids crawling all over and wanting to play with each other and with me. I love it that the boys are old enough to just crawl up on my lap and ask if they can cuddle. I missed Ronin today because I expect he would have been right in there like the proverbial dirty shirt.
Last night, one of our invited guests gave me a huge compliment. He said that some houses he has gone into are cold and uninviting and others are warm. “You can tell there is a lot of love in this home,” he said.
That is the sort of remark that makes giving and giving and giving love again and again to a family worth all the work and self sacrifice that being a mother calls for.
I think love tends to expand and grow as it is practiced and given away. My children have given me lots of opportunities to practice. Those bumps and difficult times of family life are sometimes where love grows especially strong.
Interesting how God grows love in me at times – both towards himself as I’ve learned to see his goodness through the hard times life sent and towards my children who often took me to those hard places of life.
Filed under Day to Day, Family, Reflections
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