The Gift I Gave Myself

Friday afternoon.

It's an unfamiliar familiarity after spending 5 weeks with no work-related schedules - no anything-related schedules - to give you any sense of the beginnings and endings of work weeks or the onset of ...ahhhh....the weekend.

But here I am. Friday afternoon of the first week back, and feeling almost the same as if I was still at the cottage. Well, no. Just sat outside for a bit with my journal and....well....even with my chair turned toward the farmer's field.....being as close as we are to the roundabout isn't ANYTHING like being on the deck. Especially when there's a fender bender and somebody really loses their temper. Hoooo!

Even so, it's this thing, this understanding or something, that I am ending off the first week back in as UNpressurized a state as I can remember ending a work week in......well, forever. And I'm pretty sure it's because of the gift I gave myself.

I had determined, when I still was on the deck, that this first week back I would do nothing but that which served my soul's need for order and clarity and respect. I respected myself this week. What that meant was that I had NO meetings. I did celebrate a friend's birthday. I did reconnect with another friend over coffee. And I enjoyed a breakfast with the Elders of Highview, just to be glad to be with them again and show them my tan as proof of the last 5 weeks of resting. But I held back on anything that would pull or push or clutter or twist or muddy....or put anything new on my list. Just this week.

And what a great gift that has been. Without rushing, I have cleaned out files, set up new binders, prayed over and researched sermons for dates far away. I have reordered books on shelves, read and journalled outside, and pondered my academic goals online. Without rushing...did I mention that?

At home I sat and watched small children play in the pool, read stories, purged my closet AND took it all away to the Salvation Army. I cleaned out some cluttered spaces and bought a new swim bag and watched TV. Had a lovely, long conversation with my remarkable daughter. Played a game of Super Scrabble with my ferociously competitive husband (who is also remarkable in many ways, just ferociously competitive). Ate ice cream. Yeah...like that.

And coming to the end of this week, I'm thinking, I ought to give myself this gift every once in a while. A no meeting week. A week devoted to only that which serves my soul's need for order and clarity and respect. Because, as insignificant as all that may sound (Boring!!!! as one of my friends complains loudly), it's exactly what I need to keep me grounded.

It certainly was a fabulous way to end my time of resting at the cottage and prepare for a more energized re-engagement in life. Which I am looking forward to, by the way......after the long holiday weekend :).

Hope your summer is providing LOTS of opportunities to respect your own soul, whatever that might look like.

Safe weekend, everyone.

Best For Last

I am out on the deck finishing up a supper of grilled chicken and tomato. Softly, Steve Bell's "On the Wings of an Eagle" plays into the breeze, and obligingly, as if to provide me with a real live multimedia show, an osprey floats on a current above. A chipmunk has joined me, curious to know if anything on my plate might suit his tastes. On the counter inside is about three cups of blueberries gathered this afternoon, and I'm trying to decide if I'll be taking them all home with me, or I'll sneak some for dessert tonight.

The sun keeps coming out from behind some rather dubious clouds, leaving vibrant streaks of late sun touching the tree tops across the channel, then shooting out across the top, back and forth like that.

That same breeze the osprey is floating on is delicious on my skin against the heat of this day. I breathe in slowly, deeply, and can feel the fresh oxygen rushing, it seems, to every gentle cell in my body. The stillness of my soul is profound.

I would say that all this is happening for me so vividly in these moments because they are among the last of my time here at the cottage this summer, and I am trying to grab as much of them as I can. Well....yes. But the truth is that all these moments register as vivid and wonderful the whole time I'm here - all of them. I am fully present in them all, grateful for their real time reality against the thousand thoughts of wishing for them all winter long. In some parts of me, I am most alive, most in touch with the me of me, when I am here.

And this last week has been the best of it. This does not mean that the weekend with my daughter and two of our grandkids wasn't sensational. It was! And Abby catching frogs, and Zachary's glee-intensity over the chipmunks were so much fun!

I also thoroughly enjoyed having our Staff Team up for those few days, and the truly memorable sunset baptism for Paula.

And I have to say that in 33 years of marriage, plus 5 summers coming to Georgian Bay before that, this year, the time Ken and I had alone? Beautiful!

But it seems that God has left the best for last. It hasn't really been until these past five days alone that I've been able to really hunker down and listen to all He had in mind to chat with me about. Five weeks, and it took until now to quiet down enough. But we did get to it, eventually.

First, I don't do conflict very well. Hardly news to most who know my passion for peace, and the mother-part of me that "just wants everyone to get along!". But this last week on my own, I've been able to listen, and see how this could be hindering some decision making processes and the team dynamics of the people I lead.

Second, my neglect of self care is becoming more of a threat to myself, my life's work, and all those I love and lead, as I get older. Hard fact, but there it is. I'm 54 and I just can't "do" as much dysfunction as I used to and get away with it. My sin of pushing too hard is producing increasingly damaging consequences for myself and others, and it needs to stop. And my pride has been blinding me to this.

Third, I've been worrying again, big time. Letting life's challenges threaten me, forgetting that I have an ENORMOUS God! The engery waste of this is criminal.

And lastly, (at least of the things I'm willing to blog about), I've been told to WAIT and LISTEN. Don't even really know exactly what that means yet. But everytime I would even begin to approach God with questions of direction and guidance, where the church, or my own minisrty needs to go from here, those two words would crowd right into my brain. They're all over my journal. WAIT. LISTEN.

So tomorrow I head home with all of that packed lovingly into my soul.

And tonight I sit on the deck,
resting in the vividness of it all,
revelling in God's breathy nearness.
And deeply, deeply grateful.
He's saved the best for last this year.
And I thank Him.

There are only two places on this planet for which my heart aches when I am not there.

This is one of them.
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Breathless

Breathless I am beside the water in the quiet so holy I barely know where I end and the everything of it begins.

Silent I am within the evening in the hot so still I barely can stand the sunset on my face it burns.

And then it's gone.
But not.
And the bullfrog breaks the spell, and a boat going by.

But for a moment there, I caught You, Holy Hush Almighty, and kept myself as still as I could.....

To let You fill me with it, again.
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Turtle Breaths

Her name is Tamu.

She's a snapping turtle, about 10 years old if I'm reading the nature books right. She's probably about the size of a large dinner plate across her shell, but I'm only guessing that by the size of her head.

Tamu hangs with me in the evenings, between the dock and the shoal. She's a shy gal, keeping her distance mostly. But I'm thinking that my reputation on the dock of being quiet and still is helping her trust me more. She's popping her head up just a little closer each time.

Tonight I can hear her breathing.

You know it's quiet when you can hear a turtle breathing.

When I'm here on the dock, I realize how noisy my life is at home. Not just the city stuff, but my soul. Sometimes there's so much going on, I'm not even sure I'm breathing, spiritually. I can't hear the breaths of my soul.

So I'm glad for Tamu, and for being so quiet and still on the dock. And how lovely to the ears of my soul are the breaths of a turtle.
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First Ripe Blueberry Sighted!!

Well, that just about decided what I'm doing for the rest of my holidays :)!!
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Heaven Too?

Hard to imagine a more perfect holiday weekend.

Despite brutal traffic on Friday, Kristyn and the kids arrived with smiles, eager for the boat ride that would blow all the driving and city tensions away. They must have brought summer with them, because the coolish temperatures we'd been having up here so far, surrendered to the sun's brilliance through an impossibly blue sky.

And it was summer all weekend. We even finally got in the water, although I admit, it was Abby who led that campaign. Such a cottage natural, that girl! She was in the water as much as possible, with an unfortunate problem -- how to keep from choking when you can't stop smiling and laughing just from the sheer joy of it.

Zachary loved the chipmunks, and was remarkably still and quiet, once he realized that a toddler's wild dance and shrieks of delight are somewhat counterproductive. Of course he was so happy to see his Grandad!! Especially because Grandad has really fun kinds of cereals and other breakfast treats that Mommy, who's getting a chance to sleep in, doesn't.

Loved having my daughter here. Wish it could be longer. Someday, maybe next year, it can be. And that way, after the kids are in bed, we can have even more games of Scrabble, and cups of tea, and long talks about deeply important things, and side clutching laughing fits about random, "you had to be there" silly things. And she would get the kind of holiday she so definitely deserves, but really hasn't been able to have for some time now.

The weather was still perfect Sunday morning, for the opening service of Cognashene Community Church, a hearty congregation of cottagers that have been meeting together for over 100 years. Well, us and our ancestors. I have the enormous privilege of leading the first service of each season; always a meaningful time, but this year there was an extra sense of God's Spirit. This was particularly felt as we met over in the Tranquility Garden to dedicate the plaques of four individuals who have left us since last year. The love and comfort that was so freely expressed to the grieving families was a beauty to match the place.

For the whole of it then, the canoe rides and birthday cake and frogs and "fishing" and BBQ meals and happy chaos of small children about....yes, a perfect weekend.

Except...Ken's vacation time is done, and he went home with the crew today. What a easy, joyful time we had together for our time alone this year. In 33 years of marriage there are certainly going to be times of stress and challenge and difficulty. This was not one of them. I started missing him the moment the boat disappeared down the channel.

So, a perfect weekend. Almost. The only better way it could be, a better way I am asking God for, in His time and His plan, is to have everyone, our whole family, here together at one time. It's a common desire of those of us with grown children and grandchildren. But it's a tall order for us. There are lots of hoops to jump through yet, and some significant changes required on various fronts. I'd say it was impossible even...if God wasn't involved. But He is, and I watch Him do impossible things, everyday. So, we'll see.

And now....I eagerly step into that holy place my Loving Shepherd has prepared for me. Solitude, for the next five days.

There's that saying, that exclamation of gratitude and amazement, do you know it? "All this, and Heaven too?!!!"

Yeah, that's me, right now.
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Ten Minutes Two Frogs

It is fabulous to have Kristyn and the kids up for Canada Day weekend! And Abby, true to her naturalist's heart, was on our little beach right away. With nothing but a plastic container and her bare hands, this five year old nature girl has caught two frogs! This talent she does NOT get from her Mother :).
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