Age Spots and Ecclesiastes

Posted on June 25, 2018 by Donna Coulson

Hilarious or an addition of insult to injury? I’m not sure, but I’m glad this age spot (which looks like an old woman) is on my leg and not the one on my face!

Maybe you noticed that I didn’t blog last week.  Hmm.  Here’s why: sometimes I come to the humbling notion that I have nothing of value to say.  Often that concept is accompanied by a long look in the mirror in horror at the grey in my hair, the pruney wrinkles around my mouth, and that darned age spot on my left cheek.  What starts as brushing my teeth and combing my hair some mornings becomes a full blown indictment that I’m aging and on my way out and irrelevant. There are other catalysts to my occasional bouts of no-confidence: a slight from someone I care about, reading the news, being tired.  Whatever the reason, sometimes the voice inside me turns from normal excitement about life to questioning my own worth.

Okay – change the subject, sort of.  I don’t think that I’ve never read the book of Ecclesiastes before in its entirety.  Sure, I know the words to “Turn, Turn, Turn” but that’s probably it. In the past few weeks as part of my devotions, I have been reading one chapter a day from this not so popular book of the Bible. I’ve thought most of the time it was pretty depressing, with all the ‘meaningless, meaningless, everything is meaningless’ theme.  Maybe that’s added to my overall funk and feeling I myself am somewhat passé and beyond my expiration date.

But today. Today I heard something different.  Today I read chapter 11. Let’s see, what made it resonate with me?  It all started with verse 6.  “Sow your seed in the morning, and at evening let not your hands be idle, for you do not know which will succeed, whether this or that, or whether both will do equally well.”  At first, I blew through that verse and continued. (Don’t I often crochet or do some little hand craft project while I watch TV at night?) It wasn’t until I got to verse 10 that a light dawned… “So then, banish anxiety from your heart and cast off the troubles of your body for youth and vigor are meaningless.”

What?  Oh, now I see! Verse 6 can be read literally or it can be taken as a metaphor. (Maybe my master’s in English has some worth. 😊) We are told to do our work in the morning, and then find something else to do in the evening with the hope that at least one of those efforts will do well.  I did that!  I’m doing that!  I’ve been a mom and a teacher and I worked hard at both.  Now that its evening, my kids are gone and I’m retired but I feel this irresistible urge to write. Hey, who knows which endeavor will be the most successful?  Verse ten reassures me that youth, and smooth skin, and a hip that doesn’t ache are not requisites for being productive and useful.  Both are, in fact, meaningless when you look at the job and its outcome instead of the collagen in the skin of the doer.   Yay!  Hope! Encouragement!

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Legacy or lunacy?

Posted on June 11, 2018 by Donna Coulson

My sister Nancy gave this to me, filled with carnations, when she got married. I was about ten and it was the first time anyone gave me flowers.

I’ve always, always been conscious of legacy.  I don’t hail from a family with riches and trust funds, no. I never expected a financial inheritance.  My storyteller heart has always claimed its birthright in the tales of my ancestors and of the people who have entered my life and changed me. I’ve collected stories like doubloons and kept them safe and secure. Often, there’s a trinket or physical object that goes along with the story, and those random objects remain important artifacts of my life.  I’m certainly not a hoarder, and in recent years I have been willing to part with some of those ‘trinket-memories’, but if you look at my shelves without having the backstory on the stuff, you might wonder if there’s not a tendency towards unhealthy collecting.

For example: my office bookshelves house books along with dozens of turtles.  Ceramic, crystal, wood, stone, wax, hand carved, realistic, artful, plain, colorful, old, or off the Hallmark store shelf. (I culled many out recently and threw a bunch away, but a substantial herd remains.) Every one has a story.  This one was a gift from a first grader named Jessie, that one from a naughty fifth grader. This one that looks like a troll came from Santa Claus when I was very young. Beside turtles I have a collection of little boxes.  This  glazed pottery one that says “Someone like you comes along…once in a blue moon” was a gift from my friend Lynn.

In our junior year, we had a habit of skipping school on Fridays – we were both straight A students and had we had our mothers’ permission. In fact, often one mom or the other joined us on shopping trips or while hanging out baking cookies.  Oh yeah – I also have a little candle held by a cast iron bear that I bought one Friday on an excursion to Greeley shopping with Lynn and my mom…

I could go on for days about the cache of precious memories that my dusty gewgaws contain. I get so much joy from them and the stories they keep alive. They are my memories, my legacy.  However, unlike trust funds or mansions or a stock portfolio, this accumulation of what I consider the wealth of my life probably won’t be embraced as precious gifts by those who remain when I’m gone.  When I die, chances are they will mostly go in the garbage or to the thrift store, their intense value unrecognized.  And, that’s okay. I remember shaking my head and wondering at the contents of my dad’s dresser drawers after he died.  My children and grandchildren are building their own cadre of treasures that make up the wealth of their lives.  I’ve already taken steps to safeguard the things I count as really important things by making sure those who remain know the stories behind them. I’ve incorporated my favorite memories in a family story book I wrote and in the pages of my novels and blogs.

For my daily devotions, I started last week reading Ecclesiastes in the Old Testament.  I’m sure that these ramblings in today’s blog are a result of Solomon’s claim that everything is meaningless and nothing but God’s love lasts. I see the wisdom in his assertion and I don’t disagree.  The mockingjay pin that lives on the lampshade on my desk (given to me by a fifth grader named Bayley) doesn’t matter to eternity. Yet, I’m healthy and I’m not planning on leaving this world any time soon, so I’m going to close this blog now and do some cleaning.  You know, to everything there is a season…a time to write and a time to dust!

 

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Pancake Love

Posted on June 4, 2018 by Donna Coulson

This morning’s breakfast.

I love pancakes. Two circles of doughy, warmness fill my belly and satisfy me like no other breakfast.  I like them slathered with melted butter and sprinkled generously with white sugar. (Syrup makes them soggy and, well, the taste of maple – yuck.)  When we go out for breakfast, I order crepes or omelets or eggs benedict, but here in our home, nearly every morning around 10 o’clock, Karl says to me “What would you like for breakfast?”  It’s a game we play.  He asks, then I stammer and pretend to consider before I answer, “Pancakes!”

I truly do love the taste of pancakes. I appreciate how they ‘stick to my ribs’ and carry me through the next hours. But more than anything, I love what they say.  HUH? Yes, pancakes at this house speak loudly.  They impart Truth. In reality, Karl likes pancakes, but he likes fried potatoes and bacon or sausage with fried eggs more.  Much more.  Despite this, on an average of four mornings a week, he asks what I want, I say pancakes, and he makes them.  Every morning when I sit down at the table and inhale the sweet aroma of those pancakes, I also listen to the sweet message they croon to me.  That message, of course, is that Karl loves me.

I say the magic three words to Karl quite regularly. In contrast, he doesn’t say them nearly as often (except a kind “I love you, too” in response to my frequent declarations – which really doesn’t count as him actually saying it!).  In fact, we’ve had serious discussions about that very marital issue.  I even went so far once as to set a goal for him to actually say the three magic words, unprompted, three different times each day.  I’ll give him credit, he did try to meet his goal. But that was before I began listening to the pancakes.

Now, I understand the language of pancakes, and understand what he means when he doesn’t fry potatoes each morning.  I also have learned to understand sweat (like when he is hot and tired from doing some project I’ve asked him to help me with – usually after interrupting something he was doing), and patience (when he doesn’t just bean me for being bossy or duct tape my mouth when I don’t shut up when he’s watching a movie). I will admit it, though: while I am fluent in English and tell him often that I love him, I am not as eloquent in the language of actions as he is.  But I’m learning.  In fact, I’ve set myself a goal to actually show Karl how much he means to me three times every day without using words!

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Hope

Posted on May 21, 2018 by Donna Coulson

Gardening is a lesson in hope.  What we had on our property, before the hurricanes precipitated our horrid landslide, was a verdant green slope of rainforest.  Thanks to Maria and what we had to do afterwards, much of that expanse of property was converted into an ugly slash of rock, debris, and concrete. It has been an unsightly and stark reminder of woe. A vivid image of our worry and discouragement.  Now that the construction on the retaining walls is complete, we’ve embarked on a mission to reclaim the area for beauty.  Easily said, lots of sweat and blisters to attain.  But.  On Friday and Saturday, Karl and I toiled – and it was a lot of toil – to smooth out one of the terraces that was created between two of our three new retaining walls. The first job was to remove the construction detritus – used nails, pieces of concrete forms, slags of concrete as well as dead wood and branches.  Next up was working with rake and shovel and hoe to smooth the area out and jettison or move the biggest rocks. (The whole area is mostly rock, but the biggest ones had to be dealt with!)  Then began the fun part: a trip to the plant store to buy plants, then back to the terrace to get them in the ground.

I wasn’t kidding about the rocky soil!

Since the terrace faces the west and is subject to intense heat and sun, we decided to plant agave.  We got variegated ones and also a type of agave called a century plant – which flowers once every twenty five years and then promptly dies (however, they leave behind progeny to continue their legacy so all will be well even then!).  Their hearty souls will fill in the terrace with green, and with any luck they will thrive and grow to their expected 5-7 feet tall (and equal width) expectations.  If all goes according to plan, they will accomplish this with very little attention or direction from us.  Yay!  For now, they are little, under a foot tall and wide, but we have high hopes for them.  Okay, I’ll admit that I have prayed for them.  I’m pretty sure God shakes his head a little when He hears my whispered prayers for safety, protection and blessing on a plant, but I also have no doubt that His love extends to his herbal creations and that He loves gardens at least as much as I do.

My new century plant.

As sort of an afterthought, because I had a little room left on that terrace, I also planted two frangipani cuttings that my friend Barb gave me. To call them cuttings is generous. They are just bare sticks with a few funny looking points at the top.  I have high hopes for these little guys though, because, if they grow, they will become trees that produce amazing, sweet smelling flowers.  The coolest part about frangipanis, though, is that I won’t have to wait for the entire tree before I can enjoy the flowers, because they bloom quickly.  I know this for a fact because last year about this time, I planted two other cuttings.  In just a year, one has grown to about four feet high and is currently topped with a hat of white flowers with happy yellow centers.  The other, which I stuck in the ground by our driveway and I don’t give as much care to, has only grown about six inches, but it is adorned right now with gorgeous pink flowers.  So.  Hope abounds.  The danger of our house sliding down off this hill has been (we hope!) averted, and a blank canvas awaits our labor and vision.  One terrace is done, two more need our attention.  I’ll keep you posted.

How can something so not pretty makes such pretty flowers?

Categories: Living on St Croix, Random thoughts on being me | 2 Comments

Mother’s Gifts

Posted on May 14, 2018 by Donna Coulson

 

My mother and her three daughters. I’m the little one in the middle.

Yesterday was Mother’s Day.  I love Mother’s Day, well, really, I love May.  May is a little like my own personal Christmas – one that’s all about me  – since this sweet month brings blooming flowers, Mother’s Day and my birthday.  I get awakening gardens, presents and flowers, cards and calls and texts. I am reminded that the world is a beautiful place and that I am loved.  It’s all good.

Mom came to visit me in Monterey when I was in the Navy.

On Mother’s Day, of course, I think about my own mom, and the good things she taught me.  Most importantly, she taught me to love the Lord.  Certainly, that’s the most vital legacy I have from her, but there are some other things as well.  She taught me how to clean and scrub and how to appreciate the smell of Pine Sol.   She taught me to sew and crochet.  I can’t imagine not knowing the joy these skills bring me. (Even the cleaning one, I really do like to clean!)  But I’ve had other ‘moms’ – the moms of friends, who have shared knowledge, skills and outlooks with me as well.  Let’s see… my friend Terrie Ann’s mom (I called her Ma) invited me along with her family on a vacation.  She gave me my first encounter with an ocean- the Pacific – an unbelievably generous beginning to a lifelong love.  She also helped me understand freedom and beauty by welcoming me for days on end to their ranch.  My friend Lynn’s mom (always Mrs. Cole) was different from my own mother.  She was younger and less serious.  She taught me that moms could laugh and play and be funny and also be friends with their daughters.  I haven’t seen her in years, but the pictures on FaceBook that Lynn posts of her mom assure me that she still does and is.  I’m thankful for these moms and how I am a better person because of them.

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Defining Joy

Posted on May 7, 2018 by Donna Coulson

Joy is an interesting hmmm…not sure what noun to use here…endeavor? gift? emotion?  Really, maybe I should scrap this topic and choose something else, because now that I’m thinking about it, I’m not at all sure what joy is.  My Merriam-Webster says it is “happiness that comes from success, good fortune, or a sense of well-being” and it adds, bliss, delight, pleasure.  When I admit it, that has been my personal definition of joy for quite some time:  happy, smiling, laughing, easy-not worried.  This has created trouble for me internally lately because the fruits of the spirit include joy.  So, if I’m not feeling it, does that mean I am not producing those fruits?  Is the Holy Spirit silent within me? If so, why?

Our pastor’s sermon yesterday was about “understanding God’s love”. His main point was that sometimes God disciplines us (Hebrews 12:7-11), and that when that happens, it’s a hard time.  He described that time of discipline as ‘grievous’, a time that doesn’t include happiness or joy. It’s taken me the time since the service ended to ponder this question of discipline and joy, and I’ve had a couple of aha! thoughts.

When our daughter was in high school, her creative, fiery, ebullient, beautiful, independence sometimes got her in trouble with her mom.  The end result would be grounding.  Now grounding is a funny punishment, because it confines the angry miscreant to close quarters with the exasperated judge/ jury.  At first, she’d be silent and angry, but something really interesting always happened soon after she’d begun serving her sentence: she’d relax and begin to enjoy the time she was forced to spend with me, with us.  We’d watch a movie together, play monopoly, talk, make meals. I spent time wondering about this phenomenon and finally concluded that as a teen, the choices and pressures of the world were probably pretty overwhelming for her.  By grounding her, she was forced away from those pressures and for a moment tucked safely out of their reach.  She was always happy to rejoin the outside world after her time was up, but the duration was a respite, a reminder that she was loved and protected (even from herself) by the arms and love of her parents.

So, back to God’s discipline.  I’m not convinced that God makes bad things happen to us in order to teach us something.  But, I am certain that when life deals out hard times, God is there to help us learn from our mistakes, grow as a result of the pain, and simply endure the trials of this world.  It’s easy to get caught up in those trials and see only the trouble, feel the pain, walk the floor on sleepless nights, struggle through the worry and uncertainty.  It’s easy to lose our happiness, misplace our delight, forget what it feels like to relax.

Something I read recently in the context of the fruits of the spirit defined joy as “the exuberance for life”.  This impressed me when I read it because there was no mention of smiling, or laughter, or happiness as we usually think of it.  What if joy isn’t simply the presence of merriment and frivolity?  What if the definition of true joy includes a deep enthusiasm and passion for life itself?  Lots of things then can become clear and much easier.  Philippians 4 tells us to rejoice in the Lord always.  James 1 claims that we should consider trials and trouble as pure joy.  Before, I’ve struggled with those two admonitions because I just don’t feel like dancing with all my might when my stomach is tied in knots or I’m not sure how to resolve the worries I’m facing.  But I can (and do!) maintain my zeal for life.  I can enjoy the safety and security of knowing that even in hard times, through pain and sadness, God is there with me, just like I shared in being grounded with my daughter.  Okay.  Yes. I can see this new definition of joy behind the pain and sorrow.  And, I can rejoice in that.  Always.

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Anoles and the Art of House Painting

Posted on April 30, 2018 by Donna Coulson

Hanging out on my ladder

Anoles, the tiny lizards who live at my house, are small little guys.  The largest, most formidable ones are maybe five inches long nose to tail-tip.  The fattest one I’ve ever seen was less stout than my index finger.  I’ve talked about these creatures before, and I hope you aren’t tired of them, but they really are so lovable and funny that I end up spending time each day noticing them.

They enjoy our front patio as much as we do.  Often I have to scoot one off a chair before I sit down, they scurry off though they aren’t very afraid of us and don’t go far. They run up and down the chair legs, stopping to gobble a passing ant. They seem to especially enjoy evenings when we have the lights on outside.  Then, a contingent climbs the wall to hang out near the light so they can snack on the moths and other bugs that the light attracts. The males have this little fold of skin on their necks that they puff out into a kind of oblong, yellow balloon when they are trying to impress the ladies.  It must work, because that was a common behavior a month or so back, and now we have a ton of little tiny lizards playing tag on our front patio. I hadn’t spent much time wondering about where anole babies come from, but I made a cool discovery last week.  I was working on painting the outside of our house (a project that I’m proud to say I did by myself and is now finished!). I took down a light fixture and noticed that leaves and other debris had accumulated around the socket. (Thanks Hurricane Maria!)  I turned the fixture over and bumped it to get the detritus out, and in addition to leaves, a host of egg shells fell out.  Tiny, fragile, pea-sized, cracked and empty egg shells.  What a discovery!  I knew they couldn’t be from birds, the only possibility that makes sense is anoles.  Clearly, the fixture had been a great place for an anole to lay her eggs.  It’s a marvel to me how something could fit into an egg that size.

Teeny tiny egg shells

On Saturday, I wasn’t thinking about anoles.  I was doing the last day of painting on the house.  Overall, the job was an easy one except for two places.  We live in an A-frame house, and the “A” on each end needed both white and yellow paint.  That meant taping off the trim (which I did not paint), and then painting.  For the apex of the “A”, that action occurred at the very top of the thirty foot ladder. Facing outward.  Yes, as if it wasn’t scary enough being that high, I also needed to face outward and then lean out away from the ladder to tape and paint underneath the eve.  Yikes.  Dressed fashionably in a fall harness and sporting somewhat shaky legs, I climbed up and took several deep breaths, then slowly turned myself around on the ladder to start taping.  Learning from having completed the other “A” already, I kept my eyes local, not letting myself glance toward the ground, took another breath, got the tape ready, then looked up at where I needed to put it.  And.  There was an anole. Just hanging out right there at the top, watching me.  His presence unnerved me at first because I didn’t expect it, but it also made me smile and broke a little bit of the stranglehold my fear had on me.  If I could have heard his thoughts, I image he’d have been questioning why I was there, so out of my realm.  I also think I might have heard him invite me to play with him….(not a good idea since I’m not endowed with suckers on my feet).   Anyway, I smiled and shooed him away, I just didn’t think I needed his company right then, and went on with my work.

I’m not at the top here, but you can see how high it is…

This picture isn’t at all flattering, but fear never is!

Now that I’m safely back on the ground, the ladder is put away and I like the paint job on the house, I’m thankful that the job is done, that I didn’t fall off the ladder, and that God created anoles. I realize that their brains are miniscule, and that experts probably would say they are incapable of emotions or rational thought. I’m sure a biologist would claim that they are simply following instinct.  That may be true, but from my perspective, anoles are fun lovers. In their quick movements and fearless antics, they exhibit an excitement about life that somehow telegraphs joy and frivolity. Hmmm, now that my work is done, I think I’ll act more like an anole than a human, and go play!

Hi! Want to play?

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Sufficient Grace

Posted on April 23, 2018 by Donna Coulson

I’ve been thinking this week a lot about the verse in 2 Corinthians 12:9 where God says to Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” It seems to me that there are a lot of ways to absorb this verse, and from where I’m sitting this moment, none of them are easy.  The context of the passage is that Paul is telling about some sort of ‘thorn’ in his flesh that he’s asked God to take away, and God has chosen not to.  We’ve all been there, I’m guessing.  I’m there now.  I’ve been asking God to intervene on a couple things, and so far, He has chosen not to, or at least the intervention isn’t what I’ve asked for and I’m not seeing progress…  So.  The question is, what am I supposed to do with the words, “My grace is sufficient for you.” ?

I don’t know the answer to this question.  I know how I’m trying to walk this, but honestly, I have doubts.  I don’t doubt God.  I don’t doubt that His view of the larger picture makes Him more able to make the better decisions, but I do doubt my part in the whole shebang.  So, what am I doing?  Well…

First, I am concentrating on being thankful.  I’m making more of an effort to actually see the blessings around me.  Every day that I wake up next to Karl, in a safe and comfortable home, is a gift.  Every sunset, view of the big dipper, flower bloom, text from a friend – they are all gifts I can’t take lightly.

Second, I am looking for how this experience is growing and changing me.  I do feel a bit different.  I’ve never been very patient before, and now I know I am much more capable of and willing to ‘wait upon the Lord’.  For someone who loves being in control and taking charge, that’s a huge step.

Third, I am more able to live in the moment, concentrating on just today.  I’ve spent my life with my head in tomorrow. I’ve lived looking forward, planning, working towards goals.  Since I’m not exactly sure what the future holds anymore, I am becoming more and more able to just be here today.

James 1 says we are to ‘consider it pure joy’ when trials and troubles come our way.  Apparently, according to James, these trials perfect us, teach us, help us to become mature.  There’s this little donna in my head that would rather throw a temper tantrum, and she’s having nothing at all to do with counting her problems as joyful.  However, the other donna, the one with the grey hairs and achy hip, recognizes the wisdom in the advice. 

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Froggy Friends

Posted on April 16, 2018 by Donna Coulson

I found a new painting project last week, and I’m happy (and proud) to say that I got started on Monday and finished on Friday.  Karl was a bit worried about this project, I think he had doubts about whether I had the patience and skills to do it well (that isn’t unfair, my track record for painting isn’t the best!), This time, I painted all the metal slats of our jalousie windows.  We have sixteen windows with seven slats each – inside and out.  Tedious.  But now that they are done, they look so good, no more peeling paint or tiny rust spots.  Pretty.

Now the Caribbean has a variety of creatures, and I’ve blogged about many of them in the past, but since the hurricanes, I’ve been seeing a new (to me) frog once in a while.  They are grey and the perfect size to fit in the palm of my hand.  I know that for sure because I had an encounter with one that began when I carried a dish that had been on the front patio inside and dumped it into my dish water.  Unbeknownst to me, a frog was hiding in the bottom of that dish.  When the warm, soapy water and the frog met, a short episode of chaos ensued.  The frog, understandably, didn’t like it.  He did what he needed to do, and made a mighty leap to get clear.  He ended up on my chest.  Oblivious to the frog’s existence until he landed close to my heart, a small amount of screaming resulted (mine, of course). It didn’t take the frog long to decide he still wasn’t in a good place, so he took a second mighty leap, ending up on the inside of one of my open cupboard doors.  It took me a heartbeat (they were fast at this point), to realize that I wasn’t in mortal danger or under malevolent attack, but when I saw that the frog was eyeing a third leap into the interior of my cupboard, and not wanting frog slime on my dishes,  I reacted by trying to capture him.  He escaped briefly, but (I think there may have been a little more screaming) I finally captured him, cupped in my hands, and escorted him outside. I think Karl may have been more traumatized than either the frog or me, what with all the screaming and jumping around, but at the end of it all, we had a good laugh and (I hope) the frog went on to live happily ever after.

Anyway, back to my window painting project this week… I discovered something as I was painting.  We have housemates that I never knew about. It seems that an entire colony of those small grey frogs has moved into the nooks and crannies around my windows.  The first one I saw was in a tiny space above one of the living room windows.  Just two little froggy eyes watching me as I cleaned and then painted the area. He wasn’t bothering me, and while I hope the fumes of the paint weren’t toxic, I don’t think I bothered him.  As I worked through the rooms, I noticed a couple of other visitors. Again, they didn’t bother me, they were living in little spaces outside the window screen, and my rationale is that they eat bugs and stay to themselves, so I really don’t mind the knowledge of their presence.

It was a little different when I got to the upstairs window that is right above the bed where I sleep.  I moved the bed and took down the curtain.  I reached to take down the screen, and there, watching me was a frog.  Out in the open on the window sill outside the screen.  No problem.  I told him to be gone, then unlatched the screen, confident that as soon as I did, he’d jump away.  Not so.  He watched me until the screen was out of sight, then slowly moved on his little suction cup toes, towards me.  Again, I told him to go away, but he paid no attention, so I added a hand motion or two.  He just watched. Well, I had to get a little more forceful, and eventually, I herded him back outside and to the edge of the windowsill.  Since I really didn’t want him coming back in, specifically I didn’t want him tracking through my paint, I nudged him with my hand and made him jump off the windowsill.  At this point, Karl got involved, because he was just outside that window on a ladder, working on the roof.  He watched as the frog began climbing back toward the window.  Using a glove, he enticed the little guy back down, and for the rest of the afternoon, the frog hunkered down about five feet below our bedroom window tucked into one of the valleys in our new corrugated aluminum roofing.

A few hours later, paint dry, screens and curtains reinstalled, I checked that window.  Yes indeed, my friend was back.  Clearly that window is his home, and he’s not willing to move. I’m okay with that.

 

It’s funny.  Earlier this year, when the temperature got all the way down to 71 degrees a couple of nights, we had a mouse decide to come in from the cold.  I wasn’t sad to see the little dead mousy in the trap, and set a couple more to make sure we got them all.  I hate mice and I’m not willing to share any space with them.  Here’s a ponderable: frogs are slimy and not as cute and furry as mice, but I don’t mind them.  Huh.  Go figure.

 

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Signs of Progress

Posted on April 9, 2018 by Donna Coulson

There’s something so satisfying about weeding the garden.  When you start, there’s a problem.  When you finish, everything is neat, tidy and pristine.  It’s the same with cleaning.  Start – dirt and mess. Finish- shiny and smelling good.  Painting is a joyous task.  Start with ugly, end with glossy.  Being able to see the fruit of the labor is such a gift. Progress is evident when beauty reigns. I yearn for the shiny, new, polished, and complete in order to be satisfied.

Instead of pretty and perfect, what I got this week was a floppy, detached, cracked and sad sole.  Literally.  My tennies, my work tennies, decided to poop out on me.  Oh, I’ve known for several weeks that there were spots where the sole was pulling away from the top, but that wasn’t a major issue.  I’ve known that they were scuffed and ugly, but each morning I slipped my feet into them, laced them up, and went on my way.  Until Friday.  On Friday, I was on the ladder, helping Karl lift a piece of galvanized aluminum up to its final resting place on the roof (Morgan, Karl’s strong and strapping helper, needed to be away for a few days and I was elected to help!). As I stepped down, the unthinkable happened.  My errant sole got caught on something and nearly the whole darn thing peeled away.  Drat.  I considered duct taping my shoe together, but honestly, I had to admit we’d gone past that point.  With reticence and reluctance, I untied my faithful work shoes and removed them.  I threw them in the trash.  After a respectable and respectful mourning period (okay, it was about three minutes), I went upstairs to find the only other pair of tennies I currently own. Now I’m wearing my ‘good’ ones to work in.  Bummer.

As I went back to work, I had a thought.  Those shoes are a measurement of progress.  I actually gleaned every bit of usefulness from them.  They partnered with me and gave their all.  Later in the afternoon, I noticed another evidence of hard work accomplished.  Karl’s gloves. Holes in the fingers. Sweat stains. All of a sudden my perspective changed.  Instead of seeing nasty, smelly shoes or worn out gloves, now I could appreciate their ugliness and tattered condition as a testimony of their effort and faithfulness.

Hmmm.  I’m sure that my aha moment won’t change my love for the shiny clean and glossy new, or take away my goal of seeing progress evidenced in new beauty, but just maybe, when I see the smooth, worn edges on a wooden bench, or the nicks and mars on the dining room table, or maybe even when look in the mirror and see the wrinkles around my eyes, or survey the age spots on my hands, just maybe I can appreciate those as good progress made. And I’m hoping God does, too!

 

Categories: Living on St Croix, Random thoughts on being me | Leave a comment