Friday Thankfulness

The ground was wet, melting frost in the morning sun, still glistening, still cold as it soaked up the hem of my skirt, hitting the bare spot of skin just above my socks. The sun, spreading fractured rays across the land, gold. Richness beyond words. There is silence all around me, save the happy chirping of a house wren nearby. The wood shed is dark in this early morning, my breath escaping in little white puffs against the darkness. I fill the wooden bucket with kindling, stopping to soak in the view from the doorway. Neat rows of fall garden planting. Ripe figs hanging like natures ornaments on a nearly leafless tree. Kittens snuggling up together to stay warm on a log pile. Lillie's blooming one more time. Green tomatoes trying to ripen in the weakened sun. I am rich, rich indeed. I smiled thinking, I learned this early on...
I saw the lecture of a young professor at CMU that is dying of cancer. http://cmu.edu/uls/journeys/ "The last lecture"....what we would impart as wisdom as our last lecture. The last lecture is never about how to get rich, or what we own, what we drive, or even if we have fluffy towels : ) It's not about the size of our home, or how new our appliances are....its always about relationships, living dreams, and not passing by the important things in life. Its usually about living a true RICH LIFE and that word RICH, has nothing to do with money. If you have not read "Tuesdays with Morey" you should. Same thing, dying man, imparting wisdom and this wisdom has nothing to do with what we own for possessions or what our title is in the corporate world or what the name is on our dress. Both dying men seem to know, those are the things that waste our time and steal away from the truly important things. Why is it that it takes a death sentence for so many people to understand that ? Why are so many people running around using up energy on "sweating the small stuff". Looking for things to worry about, being compulsive about, looking for conflicts and loosing out on the richness of life in its simplest forms ?
So often people look back in time and say, "oh if it were only like that now ?" "I was born in the wrong century". No, you were born right when you were meant to be born, born where you were meant to be born and given the opportunity to discover the richness of life in the simple beauty that God has set for you to find. I believe God is able to break all chains of heredity, generations of dysfunction and cultivated tendencies to do wrong. If I didn't believe that, then I am putting a limit on His abilities. So it doesn't matter what sort of beginning you have in life, God has always provided a way to get beyond it, otherwise the whole plan of salvation seems a bit faulty. Salvation is for all, and all means ALL. If you can't change, then what is this new birth all about ? Is it only for some and not for all ? No where are we told in scriptures that, "your family was all nuts so you can't change, its in your genes, you are sunk." There is no excuses that allows us to miss out on getting it right and seeing that life is about LOVE, about so much more than chasing after things and working so hard, maybe even two or three jobs just to have what the world has labeled, "The Finer Things". Something is always lost in the chase of things and the two men I mentioned, Morey, sharing on Tuesdays his wisdom before his death and now Randy Pausch's Last Lecture, they got that part. Live your dreams, but don't live them at the expense of relationships with people in your life. Don't "loose it" if someone messes up your car, or spills something on your dress. Those things are just that, things....but the person is just that, a person with feelings.
Live simply, live with eyes open for the beauty all around you. Love those near to you, forgive even the weirdo's. You may not want them in your life, but forgive them so you can move on.
Look for what is important in life and don't wait until you are standing at the Pearly Gates to say, "oh no, I missed out on what counts in life!"
Believe in something bigger than yourself, and let compassion be real to you.