Sometimes you just need....

A menu plan.
Nothing was going right today.  I was fuzzy-headed and tired, over-thinking and un-directed.  The second cup of coffee didn't help as I kept trying to move in a more straight path through my day.  But it wasn't working.  A friend found me.  I tried to explain the myriad of thoughts whirling in my brain, none of which added up to anything.  None were solid; all were the fuzzy sneers of Satan.  She listened, she was patient.  I ended by explaining the one clear example of my foggy day: "And when I went to plan meals for the family coming to visit us...I tried for all of nap time, with nothing."  So she pulled out the legal pad and pen and went to work.  And now I feel so much better.  I feel so loved.  And so ready for my friends to visit.  Thank God for the body of Christ, for friends that can practically love you when they know you don't make a lick of sense.

A Good Run

A dear friend just moved to Rotterdam.  I am sad, though I haven't seen Linnea in almost a year.  But my eyes burn when I think of her being so far away.  I think of her each time I take my first tentative steps out the door in the morning to go for a run.  You see, she is my running friend.  So I step out and wonder if she would be running in this heat, this rain, this....We did not live near each other or go to the same church or work together when we began running.  I was hesitant to join her for our first run.   She is lively and tall and beautiful while I am short and shy, but we had shared the same excitement for long runs while talking on the kindergarten playground.  And with children wrapped around us as if we were maypoles, she convinced me to join her, promising she could maintain my slower pace.  She slowed down; I tried my darn-dest to keep up.  Three years later, I have run miles and miles with Linnea and they were some of the brightest spots of life in Williamsburg.  We talked about the environment and politics;  we covered topics of faith and prayer. We talked about the books we loved, the food we were eating, our marriages and our children.  I can remember where we were running when she shared with me her prayers as a child;  I know the gravel path we were on when I told her I was unexpectedly pregnant.  But we could just as easily debate the value of a bikini wax or laugh about our floppy bellies as we ran with tight legs.  And we were never interrupted by phone calls or children, just stopped by our own physical limits of exhaustion and heat intolerance. Coffee was our reward;  well, until she quit coffee on me.  Then my reward was talking to her while drinking coffee and not running.

     I don't know when I will see Linnea again.  I do know that it will be great fun though;  I know that we will run and talk as if we have not missed a day, or a year, or been divided by an ocean.  Until then, I hold it as a picture in my mind as I step out each morning...talking to myself.  How much is a ticket to Rotterdam anyway?

Cello

John Mac just started taking cello lessons this summer.  So far, we love Miss Sarah and are pleased to do "bow holds" and clap out rhythms together.  He is learning how to take a bow and how to sit with a cello.  John Mac is a sincere kid; he is often like a clear pond of calm in our family and to see real ripples of excitement in him as he learns music has been delightful.  The picture above is of his "practice cello;  it is bright blue and made from styrofoam and a paint stirring stick, but he couldn't be more proud of it.
We take classes at the university down in the city, and so we pay parking meters and rush into the building for our lesson.  I thought he would enjoy putting in the dimes and quarters, so I have let John Mac feed the meter the past few weeks.  The other day after class though, he told me he didn't like having to park at the meters.  Why John Mac?  "Well, I don't like that we have to put our money in the meter.  We don't want to use up all our money going to class."  My five year old sees the coins we place in the meter, but not the monthly check I write Miss Sarah.  He knows money matters, but for him it is the quarters he sees disappear in the slot.  Next week we're going to let Daddy drop us off for the lesson, so John Mac won't need to worry about a thing....until he's in his thirties paying for cello lessons.