Five Things

I'm stopping to savor the goodness, the progress, and the hope on this chilly Winter morning. Here are five quick things (or maybe "thinks") on my mind.

Devos.* My Jesus time in the morning felt initially (after Jim's illness began) like Fruit Basket Upset--the game we played back in grade school—when we tried on this new life of being home, differently. It was all scrambley and urgent and upsidedown, and I would awake with panic and worry about everything and reach for Jesus with urgency, my claws out. Now I sometimes sleep until my alarm goes off and settle into my favorite chair to journal and pray and seek His face, listen for His voice. To be sure, my voice is still louder, pouring out my cares and worries, seeking adjustments to my interior world. Should I work harder, aim higher, fix more things? Or relax into joy, slow down to meet Jim’s pace, and laugh more? We, Jesus and I, settle into Grandpa’s chair and have a good snuggle and a soul-cleanse each morning. This is the foundation that steadies me. I’m grateful for the additional hours in my new retired life that let me journal a little longer and sort out the tangle in my head. This is luxury.

(*Devos: Short for “Devotions”, sometimes called Quiet Time. It’s simply a time for you to be you in the presence of God. Mine is accompanied by journaling, which you and I will talk about sometime soon!)
Tree. As I write, my eyes keep diverting to the Christmas tree that almost wasn’t. Each year (except, of course, for That One Year) my tree seems like the best one ever, but this one truly is, and I smile whenever I glance over at it. Last year Jim took down our tree for the first time in 40 years of marriage. “Is it okay if we just burn it with the lights on?” he asked over the phone while I was away in Canada. I was pretty sure I was done wrestling with live trees, so I said yes. But it seemed right to have one last live tree in this last Christmas in this house this year, so I found myself at our usual tree lot, the one where you drink hot cider and ride in a four-wheeler out to choose a live, growing tree. For the first time in 41 years of marriage I was doing this alone, and I might have cried just a little, missing Jim and feeling inept and alone. But I found the perfect 10-footer, hauled it home, and engineered how to move, lift, prune, level, and raise a 10-foot tree in my living room all by my own self, in record time. “Lights only this year,” I said. But then I found a bag of birds, and they wanted to sit on the branches. The simplicity brings me delight, as does the warm, comforting pleasure of finding
my Strong.
Frost. We are seeing everything with new eyes this Christmas season, because everything IS new—the way we work, extra hours in our day, aches and pains, opportunities and limitations. And also because our eyes are, well, aging. “Is that smoke?” Jim asked as we headed north up the Willamette Valley for an explore. When this house sells, we need a place to live, so we were gathering data, heading to paths less travelled. “It’s fog,” I explained, swiveling to see what he was looking at. Usually I have the luxury of ogling from the shotgun seat, but now I’m driving and must keep my eyes on the road. The fog felt soft and mysterious and lovely, and nothing looked the same. (Hmmm... a little like life!) Then all at once it parted, revealing layers and layers of trees and vineyards transformed to twinkling white—every single twig covered in white by the freezing fog, as though we had just entered Narnia! It was magical. As was the adventure of small towns and new landscapes and a soft, pink sky later that evening as we wound our way back. My sciatica protested and my new old body ached when we arrived home, but it was a small price to pay for a look at the world through new eyes.
Cooking. I stumbled across a podcast the other day: Making Healthy Meal Prep Easy with Danielle Walker- Episode 930 - Annie F. Downs (linked here). Danielle suffers from ulcerative colitis, a disease that requires her to cook creatively, avoiding foods that trigger colitis. My migraines had increased, and my doctor confirmed that wheat, dairy and sugar were not doing me any favors, so I perked up at the sound of this conversation, and later ordered Danielle’s 5th cookbook, Against All Grain: Meals Made Simple, which includes gluten-free, dairy-free and paleo recipes. Cooking has changed entirely anyway in our home, with one less cook in the kitchen and three meals a day marking the hours of my hungry, healing, hopeful man. The magic that is Amazon delivered this gem of a cookbook to me the next morning, and voila! The old job of cooking is born again. That deer venison has now become Meatloaf Meatballs, and Danielle's Thyme-roasted Fennel and Carrots landed on my Thanksgiving menu. More recipes are flagged for this week, and I can’t wait to try her wheat-and-dairy-free desserts!
Sunrise. Excuse me, but the sunrise through my front window is distracting my writing. Each day it is new, today with streaks of quiet pink and soft gold growing brighter by the minute, our trees silhouetted black against the ever-changing sky. Other days it can be a riotous, bold salmon color, or red-orange with joy. “New every morning! New every morning…” the chorus runs through my mind. “Great is your faithfulness, oh Lord! Great is your faithfulness.” Ever-changing. Ever-new. Always faithful. I wonder what this day holds, to have earned such a splendid entrance? “May my work bring you delight, Lord. May my arms be strong for my work. May my eyes be open to beauty. May I find joy in being faithful, too.”