Random Snippets

No I didn't get fall out of my hammock and knock myself unconscious.  In fact not sure I have been in the hammock since I shared my story.  I am not really sure what I have been doing.  Convincing myself I don't have Covid takes up a good bit of my time.  The sinus issues have continued and making sure it isn't THE VIRUS, figuring out what is causing it and how to deal with it keeps me distracted.  I am working with my naturopath and have a serious supplement regime at the moment along with using a nasal wash and trying to clean up my diet.  Symptoms are better at the moment.  I have written many blog post in my mind but they seem to take more energy to write down than to chase around in my head.  I decided today to just throw out a few snippets  of life with no real theme or cohesion.

THREE YEAR OLDS - I have the privilege to teach 3's.  I love their energy, passion and persistence.  Tomorrow begins week 6 with this year's crop of cuties.  There are many stories I could tell already.  Here is one that's just cute.  I was eating a dark purple plum I brought from home during lunch.  One little boy asked what it was.  I said it was a plum.  I think I answered that question a couple of times.  But evidently one child wasn't listening because after I took a bite revealing its pale flesh, he shouted out "Hey Ms. Linda has a chocolate peach."  

MOM - She seems to be doing really well.  She is busy with daily life, her birds and flowers in the backyard, word puzzles, books and most recently her 30 boxes of photo albums.  We have recently been working on a project that moved her 30 boxes of photo albums, school annuals and scrapbooks out of storage.  She has spent a lot of time sifting through these treasures. She is waiting on one more shelving unit to arrive as well as for me to condense some albums before it can be called done.  This week mom is going to babysit her grand-cat Penelope for a few days.   I am so grateful for Mom's restored health.

PETER - Honestly your guess is as good as mine.  Although we share a house, he stays in his room most of the time he is here and works all weekend when I am home.  I have concerns for his mental and emotional well being but other than praying at the moment, am kind of limited in being able to address it.  However I am grateful he seems to be managing his medication, car and job.  As alluded to above, I will be gone for 5 days this week so appreciate prayers for Peter, especially regarding consistency with his taking his medication while I am gone.

THE ALLUDED TO TRIP - As I have mentioned I am going out of town.  This is where some of you might smile while others will gasp in horror.  I am getting on an airplane Wednesday and flying across the country to Washington State to visit friends.  Considering the Pandemic, it may not be the most reasonable thing to do.  However as I have reminded others, in spite of my worrying, timid, cautious tendencies, I have not always made what many would call the most reasonable decisions.  Lets see there was that time I left good people and a enjoyable job to go live on an Ostrich Farm in Texas.  Then I moved to Africa on Christmas Eve with a mere 9 boxes of possessions.  And there is that time where as a single woman I adopted a 4 year old boy. Get the point? Sometimes you have to risk reason.  There is no specific event but a long standing invite and a desire to "retreat" with a friend who refreshes my soul.  So if you aren't horrified by my choice, I do appreciate prayers for my health and safety this coming week.

PETE THE CAT - He spends most of his time at school watching out for the three year olds.  However occasionally he gets board.  When he said Mask On!  (you know like Game On) while showing off his mask, our friend Helen's mind went to the famous line from the movie Karate Kid. Instead of Wax On, Wax Off, she told Pete "Mask On, Mask Off."  You know Pete, that's all the challenge he needed.  Next thing you know he has created his own meme of sorts.

Until Next time, Mask on!!

Hanging in There

Last time you heard from me I was in crisis.  That is the way it tends to go, I usually squawk when pinched!  However since given the clear that I was COVID negative, I have been busy wrapping up summer program and starting my new school year. At this moment things feel stable-ish and I am hanging in there, literally.  Meet my new happy place!

So to make a short story long, I have been enthralled with hammocks for a long time.  As a kid, we had one of those big wide flat ones you put on a frame when we went camping.  In later years my friend Tammy and I spotted someone in a purple hammock on the square in the middle of my town.  Ever since, we have been on the look out for a hammock in the trees or other unexpected places.  I even bought a blanket style woven one a few years ago however without easy straps, it was never used and eventually found its way in a yard sale.  Then a couple of months ago when social distancing at the lake with my friend Melissa, she suggested I take a nap in her hammock.  After that I was on a mission to get a hammock even knowing I would rarely use it because I didn't know where I would put it. So when a family at school gave me a thank you gift of a $30 Target gift card I knew what I wanted to do with it.  A few weeks ago I made a special trip to Target to purchase the  hammock.  Again I wondered if it would be one of those things I bought and never used.  Just a few days later, my mom and I were invited to a cabin on the lake and said hammock was tossed into the car.  While contemplating trees at the lake, Melissa pointed out that I could hang it on the porch railings of the Octagon shaped cabin.  Thus mom and I gave the hammock its inaugural swinging.  I spent 4 hours that afternoon in that hammock.  I was hooked!

I came home and was determined to find a spot for my hammock in my yard so I could use it often.  After circling the yard several times I came up with a spot on the side of my house.  I mowed a path through the Ivy to the trees so I could  hang the straps without fear of stepping on a snake.  Couple of days latter I mowed a bigger patch to make it easier to get in and out of the hammock.  My next plan is to put pots of bug repelling plants in what I now call the Hammock Garden. 

It is amazing what some lightweight canvas, hung by webbing between two trees can do for one's soul.  Hard to explain the peace and happy that swinging in my hammock brings.  I love to look at the trees.  Today though while talking with my friend Christine, I was distracted by some dead branches such that as soon as I got off the phone, I pulled out my tree shears and trimmed them.  Now it is much more peaceful staring up into the trees.

I have made this space my new "office."  I had three meaningful conversations with friends on the phone in this spot this week.  And sometimes I just like to swing and "be still and know God."  Okay so that doesn't usually last too long as being still and doing nothing doesn't come easy.  However I recall a book on prayer that I read last year about a guy whose prayer spot was a hammock.  He talked about what a sacred space it was.  I totally get it.  Currently I am reading (via an audio book) Chasing Francis by Ian Morgan Cron and in paper back Holy Noticing by Charles Stone.  Both of them in very different ways address the idea of God meeting us in the quiet, awareness, creation, and creativity.  Sometimes I have to fight the thoughts that hanging in my hammock is frivolous, lazy, selfish, etc.  But lets just say I am working on it.  And it seems to be getting easier and easier.  

I am so grateful for all my outdoor spaces.  For more than 12 years God has provided this great little  house with a fabulous yard.  There are 4 plastic Adirondack chairs, a porch rocker and swing and now a hammock.  Lots of space to meet God in his beauty and creation.  So if you are in the neighborhood, come on over and we can hang out and "be still and know God" together!