Twenty Minutes

Twenty minutes can be a long span of time...or a short span of time. It depends on what you're doing. If I'm reading a really good book and have only twenty minutes to sit down and enjoy it, it's a very short period of time. But if I decide to jump rope for twenty minutes straight, well, it's amazing how long that can be.

Somedays I can wash a small load of laundry in twenty minutes. Other days the washer doesn't want to cooperate and the paint can doesn't weigh enough so twenty minutes doesn't cut it (unless you have a good book to read and want to sit on top of the washer). Other days I could weed-eat the entire inside of the fence in twenty minutes. But some days it takes me twenty minutes of attempting to start the stupid weed-eater before I give up and stomp away from twenty wasted minutes.

There are evenings where it takes me twenty minutes to make myself dinner. But most evenings it only takes five. (A salad isn't that complicated - oatmeal even less.) If I'm missing a penny as I balance my checkboook, it could take twenty minutes to find it. If everything balances, I can have it done in three.

Yesterday I ran 2.2 miles in twenty minutes. Then I went to the post office and moved ten feet in twenty minutes.

I should have brought a good book to read...

My New Morning Exercise Regime

It may be an unforgivable sin to post here that Amy Carmichael is not my all-time, world-renowned, cannot-get-enough-of-her hero. In fact, when I think of "hero" her name doesn't even make my list. It's not that I don't admire her...I just think if I'm going to have a human idol I'll go with Stonewall Jackson or Jefferson Davis.

It may also be an unforgivable sin to then add I've read hardly anything about her or by her. And the one thing that sticks out in my head that I did read has nothing to do with her spirituality, or poetry, or sacrificial service in India. What I always remember is she told the children under her care it was okay to kill an insect inside the house. For that is not where insects belong. Since then I have never blinked twice about killing an insect inside my house.

And since I'm confessing, I will add that I am prejudiced. For if I find a ladybug inside my house, I usually catch it and let it back outside. Moths I don't bother at all (as long a they're not an inch or more large) and roly-polys I ignore. But if the said insect has a sting attached to one side of its body or is a near cousin even without the stinger...well, that insect is history.

This morning such an insect was in my bedroom. I don't think it had a stinger, but it was certainly a member of the wasp family. And, remembering Amy Carmichael's wise words, I promptly found something to kill it with and commenced with the chase. My prey liked to hide up my lamp shade, so I spent quite a bit of time trying to get it to come out. When it finally did, I lost it for a moment. But I rediscovered it on the wall and extinguished it. Thus ended my five-minute morning exercise.

Morning exercise is a good thing. Perhaps tomorrow I'll kill a hornet.

Can't Remember

I thought at one point of time this weekend I had something I really wanted to blog about this week but now....well, my usually sharp memory has flown north for the winter. The rest of me wants to follow. A good psychiatrist would tell me I NEED to follow it.

Twice in the last four days I have dated something as if it is August. That's simply because it is hot enough to be August. Nearly 90 this weekend. I know long winters of grey skies can cause clinical depression. I am a case in point that long summers of a beating sun can cause the same thing. I am so tired of this heat I could scream. I have cried...and cried...and cried...I want out of Texas so bad it hurts.

You may have heard that Texas lost an icon this past weekend: "Big Tex". (As if there is a "Little Tex" somewhere, which there isn't because nothing in Texas is little - right?) It's the huge cowboy that has greeted guests at the Texas State Fair for the last 60 years. It caught fire on Friday morning and went up in flames in a matter of minutes. I don't doubt that for many this was truly a sad thing. He had been the icon of a lifetime. But I heard from a Texan herself who went to the fair on Saturday that all the flowers and signs of "RIP" and "Get Well Soon, Tex" were a little over the top. "Big Tex" will be back next year - bigger and better for the 21st Century. I heard that online there's a picture of next year's: a huge cowboy holding up an even bigger plasma screen TV with Jerry Jones's face flashing on it. Not only is that hilariously funny, I nearly believe it could be.

Well, my lunch break is nearly over. I've got to run to Sam's (they expect me like clockwork every other Tuesday...I'm nearly serious about that for I went to pick up something once on another day and the cashier remarked about it). Then it's back to work where I have a project going that would only take an hour if I didn't keep getting interrupted...like that's going to happen!

Cookies, Soldiers and Boys

Last night we studied Jehovah Sabaoth in my Wednesday night class. The Lord of Hosts. Perfect topic for two eleven-year-old boys who were already talking about war, and guns, and fighting the moment they walked through the classroom door. As we discussed how God is the Lord of Hosts, the different ways He can be so, and how He fought different wars in Scripture...well, I'm not sure either Frankie or Matt could tell me who Ruth married and why that is important but they could give me the battle plan of half the battles in Scripture:

• Gideon's small and carefully chosen army with lamps, pots and trumpets...and the enemy army that turned on each other.
• Jericho's walls coming down with walking and a shout.
• A whole battle won by singing hymns to God.
• The Egyptian army defeated by the Red Sea, after Israel walked through on dry land.
• The sun standing still for Joshua.

If you want to know how God defeated His enemies in battle, ask little boys. They're better than theologians.

For the craft that evening, I had baked gingerbread men and brought tubes of frosting to decorate them into soldiers. My little soldier had his sword, and helmet, and belt, and shoes. It never crossed my mind to add bullet wounds, stitches, eye patches, crushed legs or arrows sticking out of the shoulder. But, of course, that was all Frankie and Matt could think of. For the more battle wounds one has, the better a soldier. And when I thought about it later that night, perhaps they are more accurate. After all, as soldiers of our Jehovah Sabaoth, battling the evil of this world, we are wounded, and sore pressed, and in need of stitches and bandages. And yet, God still uses us. We march on...for we know the victory will be ours.

Matt and his soldiers - including one with an arrow in his shoulder and one with a cannon ball wound.

Frankie and his soldiers - including eye patches, stitches...and, generally, the more wounds the better!

Part of the army.

Random Thoughts

Average week last week....average week this one. Which is just as well. Unless, of course, I could choose how to change average.

Got to thinking last week of how great God's creation is, even if it can be kind of gross. I hit a skunk Wednesday night on our dirt road. Didn't mean to. I thought it was clear, but when I found it lying dead in the middle of the road Thursday, well...I guess I'm a murderer. (But I can't say either Haley or I are sorry - not if it ridded us of the skunk that digs up our yard. We're just hoping it doesn't have a family.) Anyhow, I figured we'd have to discuss animal control when I got home from work. Haley's plan, I learned, was to go out with a stick and flip it into the brush. (She's braver than I.) Thankfully, we didn't have to do either. The vultures got it. Disgusting to think about, but a much better solution than a stick or animal control.

Have a new tennis coach on Mondays and Saturdays. The first week he said he had moved there from Nevada. I've met one person born and raised in Nevada who did have an accent I'd never heard. I thought this guy had a rather strong one. I was right, but it wasn't Nevada-ish. He's Canadian - Ontario somewhere. He remarked he thinks Texas is rather nice. Crazy Canadian.

Math tutoring right now. Got throught the word problems easy. Graphing always did give me a headache...but we'll get it. Just not sure how much my student will retain!

Floors!

Several people have asked if I'm still working on my dollhouse. The answer is yes, but the process is slow. That's simply because everything I have to do on it has to be purchased before I can do it...and let me just tell you how expensive that's going to be! But I've got a lamp to put in as soon as I sit down to give it my undivided attention (otherwise, it's far too easy to cut a cord). And I am working on the floors of the kitchen and library. Those floors are much bigger than my naked eye thinks! I thought I had enough flooring...but I'm going to have to purchase more. The kitchen is only half done. As you can see from the picture, all if have left of the library is the edges:

Then it will need to be finished with some polyurethane. I like doing floors! Pieces put in geometrically, making all kinds of patterns depending on which way you turn them. I could do floors all day long.

Doing floors got me to thinking about my options and how I want to do the other floors. One night this week I started thinking about the living room. I thought about a piece of furniture I might like but then told myself, "Well, maybe not. After all, when they move that piece will be awful to move and might not fit in their next living room."

As if my dollhouse family is going to move from house to house every two years...

As if you always purchase furniture that will move easy and not get destroyed by movers...

As if furniture is purchased solely on its ability to work in just about any house...

You don't think I've moved too often, do you?

Guess I'm going to need to build another dollhouse...or two or three. And keep one with me, one at my parents' house and maybe one at my sister's. That way when my dollhouse family needs to move in two years, they will have somewhere to go. I wonder if there are dollhouse size moving boxes?

The Touch of a Life

There are many people in this world who will touch our lives in one way or another as we journey on this pilgrimage to our Home. Some we know well. Some we know very little. And some, in their own quiet way, make an impression that will last, perhaps, a lifetime.

My fondest memory was in February, probably in 2006 or 2007. Although eight years younger than me, his birthday was around the same time as mine. I met him in the crowded hall at church as I put my coat on, a face I saw every week with an almost shy smile that never seemed to disappear. He had a glass jar full of Starbursts in his hands.

"Happy Birthday, Jesse," I told him.

"Thanks. Would you like one? Or two?"

He held the jar out to me and I took a couple of my favorites with a thank-you.

In all honesty, that was probably the longest conversation I ever held with Jesse Amador, although I would greet him if we crossed paths or ask him how work was going now and then. But he was always at church. He was always with his friends. He always wore a smile. He had a sweet, gentle spirit. A young man who the Lord could truly use here on this earth.

But very early this morning as Jesse Amador drove to work, he swerved to miss a dead bear in the road. Swerving back, he lost control of his car, passed over the median and down a hill into the forests of New Hampshire...and met his Savior.

It is hard to understand how the Lord works. Why He would take a promising 24-year-old young man to be with Him when we could think of a hundred reasons for that young man to stay with us. And yet is not Jesse most blessed to be with our Lord?

If you read this, pray for the Amador family: Jesse's parents, his five siblings and his church family who loved him dearly. The days ahead will be hard, but we know there is a Comforter and He will comfort.

A Token

Show me a token for good...  Psalm 86:17a

This is a verse our pastor in New Hampshire would often pray, for as God's children we long that our Heavenly Father will give us just a small token of His graciousness - a reminder that He does love and care for us. I find myself praying this often as late.

In truth, every day we live on this earth is a token of God's goodness. Every breath we take. Every gulp of water we swallow. Every step, every heartbeat, every ounce of sunshine or drop of rain. As a child of God, the fact that my eternity is set in heaven, never to be shaken, is well more than a mere "token" of good. But when life plods on with no reprieve to the dark valley in sight, those tokens are often lost to us. Not absent - never. But, perhaps, stuffed into a pocket...and forgotten.

This weekend God gave me a token for good. I imagine most people down here would protest that there was anything good in it, but for a young woman who longs for autumn and a true winter after years in this endless summer of barrenness, I nearly cried for joy. For two whole days, the sun disappeared. Dark clouds brought not rain but temperatures so chilly I could wear a sweatshirt, sweaters and boots. We put a fire in the fireplace, where I curled up last night to read a good mystery. And last night I huddled under my blankets as temperatures dropped into the 30s...and hated to burrow out this morning.

For some, seeing one's breath in the morning is nothing. The thought that it truly is autumn is just part of the calendar reading "October". But for me, none of that is so. I so rarely see my breath in the morning, even in the middle of winter, I sometimes ache to see it. The season of autumn doesn't truly exist in Texas: nothing changes color and the natives think temps in the 80s qualify as a cold spell...while I feel disheartened that the sun beats down upon me yet one more endless day.

Two days of true autumn weather is a mere token...when there are 365 days in a year and at least half of those should be cooler if not downright cold. But the token reminded me that God has not forgotten me down here. He knows where I am. He knows the longings of my heart. And, truly, He does love me. I know He does.

It's 4:40 in the afternoon on Friday...

...and as it flew by with this and that, I nearly forgot I had not posted a second time this week. And this is what you get when I've twenty minutes to do it in and hope the phone doesn't ring!

It's been another week in Texas...little to say about that. I caught up at work! My to-do list for next week is about 12 items long, some of which are just reminders to do something later in the month. All my charting is done, I think the Medicare claims are in the system for September, and next week looks like it could be incredibly dull. But that's my life. I saw a question on a work assessment this week that asked to rate the sentence "I like to work on my own slow, deliberate pace". The option "I don't have a slow, deliberate pace" wasn't a choice...but it's how I work.

Nothing planned for the weekend, but I have hopeful news: it's supposed to be in the 50s tomorrow. In Texas!!!! Real autumn weather!!!! I'm not sure I truly believe it. We'll see tomorrow. But if it is true, then I plan on wearing jeans and a sweatshirt...and then having a party to celebrate the fact I can do that in October in Texas.

The car is washed and waxed - just as my dad always taught me to do. It looks lovely, but it won't for long. That's what happens when you live down a dirt road.

Got to finish reading a mystery tonight. Just a few chapters left and who committed the murder is down to just a few people now...I'm betting on the husband of the woman who supposedly died when the Titanic sank, only I'm not convinced she was on the ship. Which is why the priest had to be killed...he knew that. But we'll see if I'm right. Sherlock Holmes I'm not.

Randomness...it's the only thing that makes my life very interesting right now.

Peaks and Troughs, Part 2

It has been eighteen months since I posted on "peaks and troughs" and C.S. Lewis calls the ups and downs, mountains and valleys of our lives in his The Screwtape Letters. I read back over that post, and was glad for the reminder of how the conversation between Screwtape and his nephew Wormwood goes when Screwtape suggests a "peak" is more successful:

“You mean bring him to a peak?” Wormwood asks.  “But why?  Isn’t it more useful to us when he is in a trough?” 

“No!” Screwtape thunders. “When the patient is in a trough is when the Enemy does His greatest work. It is then the patient will turn to the Enemy and cleave to Him for help.  This makes the patient’s dependence and love for the Enemy even greater.  You must bring the patient to a peak.”

 

When the "Enemy" does His greatest work...I surely hope so.

 

For just as life always is, the peak has disappeared and my trough often seems so deep I can't see over the edge. The view is as dismal as Texas.

 

Which seems like half the problem, at least: Texas. I just want to go north. Cooler weather, beautiful foliage, the promise of winter.

 

And it never rains but it pours. Work, personal things...it all piles up. I feel exhausted by the end of the day, don't want to do anything on the weekends or really care to see anyone. I don't write much because I can't seem to get my thoughts together. I still read - it's ever an escape. And wonder if this trough will ever come to an end.

 

Hope is a brutal word. We hope...and nothing comes of it. So, we despair...and then hope again. Yet where would we be without hope? Always in despair? As much as it can hurt, the thought of no hope is worse.

 

I am grateful that my God doesn't change. He knows. He always knew these things would happen. And I must trust it is for the best. Even though He doesn't seem to be listening, I'm not sure which direction is right and the answer to every prayer is "no". I just keep reminding myself He is my Father. He wouldn't hurt me out of spite anymore than my earthly father would. He holds me in the hollow of His hand. And He does hear...even when He is silent. Trust. I have to trust.