Just a few

There are a few minutes from the end of this class to the start of the next. I am bone tired and I wish I had something to show for the flurry of activity. I could not sleep last night or maybe I did sleep but it was so interrupted that it seemed like I didn't. Mijo was up and out early and then there was this and then that and then some more of this. I will not complain, for I truly am grateful for the opportunity I am just plain ole tired. If I keep things in order at school then everything seems to fall apart at home.
I just need a few minutes to get it all in order...home, school and personal. Just a few...

me and my garden

There are some things I wish I would do well all the time. It is the echo of my mother's talent that motivates me every year to plant a garden and to walk in the garden in the cool of the day. There are very few memories as clear as my mother and her gardens. She was amazingly good. So is my Dad and Elfrieda...they are amazingly good at not only preparing the soil, planting but harvesting as well. You would think that harvesting would be a given with gardening, that is the whole reason why you garden in the first place...well, you would think so except in my case. To the left is a beautiful picture of a artichoke which was grown in my garden but as you can see, it was not harvested. It has quite a beautiful crown of purple which I did not even know artichokes grew...but needless to say I think you are supposed to pick it before this happens.
This year I have so many tomatoes coming that I am sure we could participate in a tomato throwing contest and I still would have left overs for BLT's for the rest of the year. I have tomatoes growing where I did not even plant. The mystery of their growing in the other garden still makes me pause. I also grew HUGE sunflower in the same garden that I also did not plant. This gardening thing is becoming a bit of a conundrum.
The sad thing is that I start off with such good intentions. I was going to water...this I did not do too well last year. Our weather took care of most of that this year, though I think I could have helped more. Harvest...that was a fail...but the weeding that wasn't too bad.
Dad and Elfrieda tell me every time I talk to them and I have seen with my very own eyes...they could feed their whole neighborhood with the veges from their garden. I can have a tomato fight...that's about it. Sad...BUT maybe next year...hope springs eternal.

Not so much a hurricane...

Someone gave me such a wonderful compliment yesterday...she said as I was explaining the hub bub of the week," well, you looked very calm". YES YES YES...I want to look calm and that I know exactly what I am doing even if the opposite is true. Saturday morning and all is well...most students have the schedule they want. My Psychology class is off to a great start and ESL will gather momentum . No major problems with any host families or students AND the directorship of the International program is quite confusing but I see the loose ends tying themselves soon enough. I really enjoy being active but this week was just a bit much...but it won't be that forever and I knew that it was going to be just as it was.
Finding joy in the middle of it all was very easy and each of the students at times unaware to each other gave me pieces of pure delight....it is all good. I miss my husband, his company and steady hand would have lightened the load on the home front but the kids stepped up as much as their schedules allowed. The dogs are a bit confused why we aren't home anymore...oh well. There is only so much attention we can spread around.
Coming soon to my 48th birthday...wow, that is realllllly close to 50...I have to work a bit , no a lot harder at keeping healthy and there is a grief at the endless fight for everything that wants to sag, bulge, wrinkle, get grey, tighten, loosen and generally not be what it was. I don't think it's that I want to be young I really just want it all to work as it did. :)
We will all begin to settle into a football, drama, school routine and we will be swept into the stream of schedules, days and small square calendars telling us what to do and when. It is still all good !

Just like that....Irene comes rolling in...

Intentions are wonderful because they are usually made with no opposition. At New Years we make resolutions to eat less with full belly's and at the start of the new school year, intentions to be positive and joyful are made when summer still has a residual hold. We really haven't even started school , just meetings, and I am already frustrated and disappointed and that chossing joy I was talking about...right out the proverbial window. Just like that...I haven't given up ...just realized that it will be much harder then I polly-anna thought.
The thing is if you are positive you get taken advantage of. If you have a BA kind of attitude you get what you want. What is the balance of standing up for yourself and still be good company?
Good intentions are just that...great ideas in good weather making plans for how to behave in bad. What I need to do, now the storm is rolling in, is figure out a way to stay the course. Irene has got nothing on school politics!

Choosing

"As sick as it sounds, cancer has significantly improved my life in many ways." This is a young man with brain cancer and not a very good prognosis. Read his blog...it's on my list, the one called It's OK ...
To be honest I really don't want to be that thankful. Having seen the ravages of cancer on so many lives I wonder what my attitude would be...
It is about attitude though...and though this man has struggled as any one should he has chosen a perspective that is not of this world. Should I not do the same in the circumstance I am living? I am healthy, my children are healthy, my husband is healthy...even our dogs are healthy. We have enough to pay the bills. We have people who love us. We have a roof over our heads jam packed with too much stuff. We have cars to drive, school to attend, clothes to wear, places we can go and church. We have a country we can complain about and not get imprisoned. We have so many choices in our stores that I can't go shopping for too long before I am overwhelmed. This is just scratching the surface...I haven't even started with my history and legacy or even begun to broach salvation and a divine relationship...

It is easy to complain. It is easy to be negative...it seems the default setting in most of our conversations. At the start of this year I am a bit overwhelmed with all the new responsibilities of my job...but I am grateful for the opportunity. I miss my husband as he works in Montana..but I am grateful he has work. I want to choose a different default setting...it isn't cool or edgy but it is refreshing. Each day...This day...I will ...I choose...to rejoice.
Thank you Phil for the reminder and the example.

If cats can change...

You may not have known but we also have a cat. She was given to us right after Curtiss died and she has endured a lot in her nine lives. We have moved. She has endured a near fatal attack from a dog. She lived in a barn the year we were in Papua. She has had to welcome stray cats who have attacked her and for the last 8 years...dogs. She has stayed in the basement since we moved here and has stayed as far away from the hub bub of upstairs. About 6 months ago everything changed, she started coming upstairs and sitting on the fringe.
Then she started sleeping on our table...high enough away from the dogs. Then she walked right in the living room and took over the couch which has always been Mocha's territory. Chino has a little bit of a crush on this cat but she keeps him at a distance, though I have seen him come pretty darn close. He thinks when she hisses she is just inviting him to play.
This cat is on the old side of life...what made her suddenly decide that life was worth the effort to face her fears and dive right into company? She makes me smile every day because we find in her in the oddest places all over the upstairs. It is as if she is making up for all the previous years of hiding. This can't be normal cat behavior to change so drastically but what a metaphor for me.

Love enough to be unafraid...to speak the truth and be unafraid, to grow old unafraid, to let these children go unafraid. Love casts out fear.
I don't think our cat loves anything...but she is now unafraid and is living much more free. If she can...I can.

Looking down or Looking ahead

I try and wand walk the dogs every day through some farm land and inevitable I find myself doing this...looking at my feet while I am walking. I literally tell myself to look up.
Do we live a day at at time or do we live with the future in mind?

Thy Word is lamp unto my feet...
Give us This day our daily bread...
This is the day that the Lord has made...
Do not be anxious about tomorrow...

Looking ahead gives us the impression that we are in control. Planning ahead frames what we should do today or how we should feel today. My daughter is entering her last year of high school and I can't help but try and prepare for the inevitable absence. But the more I do that, the more emotional pain I begin to experience today when she is very much present.
Having been raised going to boarding school, starting in first grade, so much of my formative years were divided into good times to relish, absences to endure but each time tinged with the next. So Summer breaks were GREAT because we were home but they were gong to end too soon and school marked with such loneliness and longing was just around the corner. Parents coming to visit while in school was so much to look forward too but as soon as they came the counting of the days till they left ensued. Every time was marked with the days ahead and that marking was emotional. In the tropics we didn't have seasons to mark the time but the calendar was marked with parents and times without. So much of my life if the times are good I'm worrying about how it is going to end, awful way to live BTW.
So...back to my walk and looking at my feet. I do most of my praying when I am walking the dogs and because I am thinking and listening, I am unaware of what I am looking at. It is only when I stop and pause that I realize I have been looking at my feet. This is it...though... God gives us daily what we need. We want to be able to have what we need for what lies ahead...BUT He doesn't work like that. IT is as if He wants us to take in the day, THAT day, THAT particular specific day and trust Him in THAT day for all that we may need. Enjoy THAT day for what it is.
I can live a day at a time to enjoy OR to endure. My inclination isn't daily as if I can prepare for what lies ahead. I have no idea what lies ahead.
Looking at my feet , while I am praying is exactly how I should live. This Day...This very, never to be repeated, day is the day the Lord has made.