A pressure gage for life? I’ll take two.

I’m just going to say it.  I want to be a perfect mom.  perfect wife.  perfect employee.  I want to be the perfect church attender.  The perfect friend who always knows what to say at just the right time and when to drop off a little gift just because.  And to show you just how far my desire for perfection goes, I even want to be the perfect facebook commenter, not too much and not too little.  There.  I said it.

I don’t think it’s wrong to want these things.  To strive for them.  To set goals and aim to achieve them in areas of life.  It’s not like people set about to be the worst mom they can possibly be or long to win the award for nagging wife of the year.  That would be silly.  But, isn’t wanting to be perfect at all of these things equally as silly?  I venture to say so.

I’m finding that in my desire for these things I’m placing so much pressure on my one little self that I get lost and confused.  So while it’s noble for me to want to be the perfect mom I’m leading myself on a tangent of making sure they eat healthy organic goodness, homecooked meals and never store bought cookies.  But is that the perfect mom, I question?  She sounds dull.  So I pick up mini marshmellows at the store as a super duper treat for their hot chocolate on a snow day and they throw their arms around me and proclaim me the best mom ever.  But then after 3 days in a row of hot chocolate with mini marshmellows my heart starts to get panicky and I think I’m killing them one sugar molecule at a time and I get all, “not one more marshmellow until you eat an entire head of broccoli young man!”  Which of course they don’t see as me being perfect at all but makes me feel more perfect for taking care of their bodies.

It may be that I’m an overanalyzer.  I’m not sure.  I always thought that my brain  worked the same as everyone else’s but apparently there are people out there who don’t think quite so much about this as I do.  I think about whether giving them an allowance is teaching them to manage money or like giving cash to a junkie, just supporting their video game habits.  I think about whether living in a house that is not ours is making them think that this is my style, the wallpaper I would choose, and what effect that will have on their decorating skills as they age.  I think about whether I should tell them not to where a button down shirt with swim trunks in the summer or if I should just let them be unknowing and uncaring for as long as possible.  I think about these things and how they are molding and shaping them into the little humans they are and I panic.

I, of all people, should not be molding others!  I am a mess myself!  And I still feel like I’m 13 and I want that certain pair of new jeans so that I can be like all the other cool girls.  How on earth have I been given responsibility over 3 bambinos who are nearing my height.  Shouldn’t I have these things figured out by now?  It’s been 12 years.  I should have some solid answers.

But I don’t.

I have boys who I love one moment and want to lock in their rooms the next.  Kids who make me laugh and bring me joy and in a moment can make me want to tear out my hair and scream at the top of my lungs, “Just stop!!!!!!”  I want to bake them cookies to munch on when they come in from the cold and I never want to pack another lunch bag again.  I want them to want to be near me and I just want them off, no more breathing on me or icky hands on my face.  I want to hear them share their days with me and I really just want to tell them to stop talking.  I want them home and I want nothing more than to send them back to school, or tuck them into bed.

It’s hard, this parenting road, but really this road of life on earth.  For I long to be what I cannot be and I try and force myself to be it anyways or at least die trying.

But I’ve found comfort this morning.  Comfort from brothers who steal birthrights and from parents who show favourtism.  Comfort from old ladies who laugh at the promises of God and from righteous men who are found passed out drunk in their tent.  I find comfort from God-fearing women who want to change their name to mean bitter and from noble men who killed with their own bare hands.  I’ve found comfort among liars and cheaters and deniers.  Among the sexually immoral, the scoffers and those not bold enough to listen.

I don’t know when I started to feel this pressure to be perfect because the bible assures me that even those who are faithful, those who God calls righteous and whom he uses to carry out his will, they weren’t.   They were all of those things listed above.  They weren’t perfect, but they feared God.  They didn’t raise their children to be saints, and yet they passed on a legacy of loving Christ.  Surely, they must have longed to do better too, yet this was their journey.  Their sins laid out in scripture for the world to see.  I’d be willing to bet that Lot’s daughters didn’t ever fathom that their stories would be published.  Yet, how thankful I am for the truth.  That I may learn that perfection isn’t required or even a possibility.  That I may know that I need not be ashamed for my mistakes or try to hide them.  That I may know and learn that even more so the sharing of these mistakes, my sins, can make for a precedence of truth instead of facade.  That others will know that they need not hide either for we are all a big broken mess.  A big broken mess with stories.  Stories that need to be shared in order to bring us together.

Believe me, I don’t want a book published outlining the events on the worst day of my life but I do want you to know that I’ve had a worst day and each day since , though I’ve grown and changed is not even close to perfect.  Not.  Even.  Close.

If only there were a gage that could measure the pressure we place upon ourselves, a tool that could tell us when we need to fill up a bit or let a little out.  I’d get the slap-chop guy to do the infomercial if there was.  And if it came in regular or travel size?  I think it’d be a hit.

I assure you my heart is fond enough.

There are a lot of things I take for granted in my life.  I know, shock, right?  It’s true.  I rarely think about how great it is that I can blink until I get something in my eye that hurts.  Suddenly then I’m aware of how things aren’t suppose to be and I have a moment of joy that most of the time my blinking just comes au natural.  Hot water is another one.  It never fails, day in and day out I just assume that it will be there.  There are a lot more.  My body parts.  I never wake up and frantically check that my baby toe is still attached.  My children. I just expect them to be snuggled in their beds when I go to wake them in the morning.  Food in the fridge.  Lights that click on when I clap my hands  (kidding!!), toilets that flush, knees that bend, and that my vehicle will be in my driveway when I go to work each morning.

So I get that when these things fail, when there’s no hot water, when the plumbing fails, when the power goes out or if someone were to steal my truck I get that those things make us look back on every time these things simply were there and be so happy for them.  I fully get that through trials we learn, grow and come to appreciate all that we have.  I do.  Believe me!

But I’ll be the first to admit that I am a huge fan of boring.  When there’s nothing major to proclaim and no great tale to tell I am a happy camper.  It means that things were as they should be.  Nobody was rushed to the ER and there was no rain leaking in through the roof.  There was no theft, no shock, really nothing exciting at all.  It makes me the happiest camper on the block.

This week, however, I was not the happiest camper on the block because a something that was just suppose to be there as normal, wasn’t.  No, my baby toe didn’t fall off but my husband whose VW sound I hear from over a block away each night at 7:13 (give or take), who arrives home from work every single day, this normal, this expected, well, this didn’t happen.  The driving conditions around these parts have been less than stellar.  Couple this with over an hour commute each night plus those drivers who think their cars can make it no problem and we made the joint decision that he should probably not come home this week and just stay in the city.

I know this decision was a good one.  It was wise and responsible.  But that whole, ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder’ thing that you may have heard a time or two?  Nonsense.   Rubbish.  Purely wrong.

See, my heart was already fond enough.  There was no space for growing fonder because it was bubbling over with fondness already.  Did I mention, I’m quite fond of him?  Yeah.  I am.

 My heart quickens just a touch each time I hear his car pull in the driveway.  A grin comes over my lips when he walks in the door and I see him carrying faceplate and travel mug and the Ben Sherman bag that I  bought him years ago.  There’s a feeling of joy when I see how the kids faces light up when he walks in the room and I sit back and listen as they unload their days events on him all the while he’s unloading his things and heading towards the fridge.  He’s not ignoring them, no, not at all.  This is the routine and they just follow right close behind him nattering on and he fills in the gaps with, “really?  that’s so cool,”  as he fills his plate.  Then he starts to fire back questions about whether they got his email and did they see the youtube video he sent them that day.  For there is nearly one per day.  Once he’s heard all of the days tales and his dinner is reheated come the questions from them.  ”Dad, can you…..”  Fill in the blank.  It’s always something they need from him, a role that I have been unable to fulfill.  Listen to me play The Scientist on the piano, put more sermons on my iPod, help me tighten up the trucks on my skateboard or change the light bulb in my room.  This is where I speak up nearly every. single.  night.

“Boys,”  I say, in my most motherly tone, “Give daddy time.  He’s just gotten home from working all day and he’s hungry.  Can we wait a few minutes and let him breathe a bit?”

And once he’s fulfilled all of their requests he meets them up in the little’s bedroom.  ”Can we do bible, dad?”  I hear and I smile.  When has he ever not done bible?  For he does it every night and yet still they ask because they love it so much.  I don’t join in.  I putter upstairs and listen.  This daddy time is what they need, what they crave, what they wait all day long for.

I wait for him in anticipation.  For my turn with him in the precious little time we have together each evening.  He walks in slightly dazed after praying with the boys and becoming so rested and relaxed on their floor.  My turn.  I love my turn.  ”How was your day?”  He asks and I’m happy to report the details that are mostly the same as the day before.  I ask him the same and I get a run down on his shots.  Or the inside scoop on some of the antics from the characters he works alongside.  I shake my head and my heart is happy for he loves his co-workers even though they operate so differently than we do.  They are his friends, comrades, sharers of his day and quite often make for good stories.

Then my favorite part.  The part where I know that all is as it should be.  That my world is right and good.  He crawls into bed beside me, grabs hold of my hand and prays me asleep.  This is my perfect.  My safe place.  My stability.  My home.  My love.

So my heart has not grown fonder in his absence for it was already bursting with fondness.  This is not one of those things where you aren’t thankful until things are different or wrong, I am thankful for him every day.  We miss him.  We miss these daily routines.  We miss his presence.  We miss hearing his stories.  We miss hearing him pray for us.  This place is not the same without him and we anxiously await his return tonight so we can get back to normal.  And uneventful.  And exactly as we should be.

Recipe: Banana Oatmeal Muffins

I made these earlier in the week and they were delish!

After a few requests for the recipe I thought it might just be easier to post it here.

Banana Oatmeal Muffins

1 1/2 cups flour

1 cup rolled oats (I use a 9 grain mixture instead of just plain ol’ oats and it makes it way yummier!)

1/2 cup sugar

2 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

2 eggs

1/4 cup cooking oil

1/4 cup  milk

1 cup mashed bananas (about 3)

Because it was a snow day and it felt like a treat was in order I also added a handful of chocolate chips!

In large bowl, measure first 6 dry ingredients.  Stir to mix.  Make a well in the center.  In small bowl beat eggs until frothy.  Mix in oil, milk and bananas.  Pour into well.  Stir just to moisten.  Batter will be lumpy. Put into muffin tin and bake in 400 degree oven for 20-25 minutes.

Enjoy!

One Thousand Gifts

Counting the gifts that God has blessed me with.  every day.  all around.  (180 – 200).

180. community.

181.  crisp mornings.

182. warm boots.

183.  awaking to white.

184.  reading in bed beside my biggest boy.

185.  quiet (near silence, even)

186.  nightly prayers

187.  texts from hubs.

188.  a snowy walk, full of conversation with a friend.

189.  dreams.

190.  the age of information.

191.  pencils.  this morning, pretty ones.

192.  dark toast with peanut butter and raspberry jam.

193.  watching little birds so determined.

194.  stability.

195.  hearing, “i love you mom”  as the boys hop out of the car and run into school.

196.  the deep belly laughs that are ignited by O’s kazooing to Coldplay

197.  clean.  really really clean.

198.  help from above.

199.  nutritious dinners that everyone likes.

200.  the beautiful hearts of beautiful friends.

 

What We’re Reading

I’m constantly asking my boys to ask their friends what they’re reading or what series of books they’ve read and loved.  ’Cause here’s the thing, I have three boys.  And I’m a girl.  So it turns out that while some of our reading genres overlap, many don’t.

I think back to my glory days of Babysitters Club and Sweet Valley Twins,  to Nancy Drew, and to Margaret writing letters to God.  Turns out the boys aren’t into these so much.  Go figure.

I’m happy to report that we can agree on all things Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, on Charlotte and her web, on Tales of Desperaux, on chronicles in Narnia and on a certain boy with a lightning bolt scar on his forehead.

It’s only happened in the past few years that we enjoy reading many of the same books.  Sometimes my oldest munchkin and I battle it out over who gets a book and when.  I tried to make a deal with him,  he could have it in bed first and then I get to steal when I go to bed but it turns out that when he’s in a good book he can stay awake longer than I can so I got the short end of the deal on The Hobbit.  He’s getting his reading on while I wait.

All of that to say, I don’t always know what new books to read with and to my children and which to suggest they read on their own.  I don’t know some of the new series that exist and I’ve found that many of the popular ones that grades 2-5′s are reading I don’t really like.  Like, at all.  (Geronimo Stilton  and that Wimpy Kid drive me bonkers!  They’re currently banned reading in our home.)  So I thought it would be nice to have a place to share what we’re all reading in case you ever find yourself in the same sorta pickle that I’m in and  you need some suggestions, but also to open it up for you, lovely readers, to share with me some things that my fam simply must read!

So here it is – this is what The Fasts are currently reading:

Papa Fast:  

Know Why You Believe by Paul Little

Mama Fast:  (that’s me!)

My first book of 2012 was Small Town, Big Miracle by Bishop W.C. Martin.  An amazing story of adoption, if you have a heart for adopting read this.  It will open your heart in a new way and inspire you beyond what you may ever have fathomed.

So I’m onto my second book which I’m cracking tonight (oh sweet bliss!)  The Meaning of Marriage – Facing the Complexities of Commitment with the Wisdom of God by Timothy Keller. Can. Not. Wait!!

12 year old Fast:

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien   

This is his first foray into the realm that is Tolkien and so far he is loving it.  I think he’ll have his reading cut out for him for the next while with the Lord of the Rings Series after this one.

10 year old Fast:

The 39 Clues Series by Rick Riordan.

Not my cuppa tea (at all!) but he loves ‘em so I’m letting him go for it.

8 year old Fast:

 Will, God’s Might Warrior and part 2 The Mystery of Macgillicudy’s Gold by Sheila Walsh are current story book faves.  These are great bedtime read aloud books for little boys!

In novel form, he just  discovered the “My Life as a…” series so he’s in the middle of his first one.  My Life as a Skysurfing Skateboarder by Bill Myers.  (I would have picked the “My Life as a Smashed Burrito with extra hot sauce” one if it was up to me, but alas, it wasn’t.)

What are the people in your house currently reading?  I’d love to know…

two-o-one-two

It’s funny to think that we think we’ve come so far.  Technology and parenting practices, organizations to help others, programs for children, every sort of ‘day’ one can think of.  We anti-bully, we grandparents day, we bike to work week, we fight a myriad of diseases on specific days throughout the year all with good intention.

We think we’re different.  New. Fresh. Innovative.  We believe we know better than generations past, we’re smarter, more advanced and clearly our cynicism and sarcasm will take us further.

We long to dig deeper in everything.  We use to have to wait for  60 minutes to ‘uncover’ something for us now we simply look on youtube to see what someone, anyone, has to say – and say they do!  We long for information, critical, unbiased, hard hitting and true.  Yet we find our answers on Wikipedia and we follow truth on our RSS feeds written by bloggers near and far.

It’s interesting to me that the more I read of history, the more biographies, the more tales of days gone past  I realize that there is something that hasn’t changed – human nature.  The drive for power, for pleasing people, for coming out on top.  The desire to manipulate things to go our way, to sound smart, to be better than those who went before us.  Our parents desired to raise us better than their parents raised them and their parents the same before them.  We aren’t different.  Sure, the world around us has changed and we have a new set of tools to operate with but the hearts of humanity – same.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s good to strive, to learn, to grow.  It’s good if we don’t make the same mistakes that our parents made but rest assured we are making our own set of mistakes that our children will stomp their feet and refuse to make and that’s good.  We need to learn from the past but heaven forbid we think we’re better than it.  We just haven’t had the next generation pointing out all the places we went wrong.  Yet.

So New Year’s Day I sit here and I wonder what I should hope, try, challenge myself with, gain, lose, push myself in, give up or take on this new year.  My heart sits here like years past wanting things but knowing that I’m fickle and I won’t last.  My mind wants to take things on in leaps and bounds and create change and advocate stuff but for why?  So I can be that person?

This day is not much different than any other.  It’s just the next day after the last one and God willing another one much like this will come tomorrow.  So what do we do with that?

I read this Psalm this morning as part of my devotions.  I’m pretty sure it spawned the tone for this post but not because it was new, but because it sums up all of what I was already thinking.  We are human, finite creatures living in an imperfect world and so – there will always be women working on the streets, and children hungry somewhere in the world, there will be manipulation through power, an upper class and lower class and division amongst them.  There will be wanderers on street corners asking for change and there will be people that pass them by thinking they should get a job.  There will be arrogance, pride, deceit, fear, self-pity, discontentment, anger and selfishness.  These are in our hearts.  They have been for a very long time now and I’m quite certain 2012 isn’t the year they cease to exist.

Does this mean we don’t strive?  We don’t aim to overcome?  Of course not.  In fact we must.  It is our goal, our call if you are a follower of God, and just a good idea if you aren’t.  I mean, what average white middle class person doesn’t want world peace?  We do.  But this Psalm gives us hope in that it’s not just our generation who has gone so wrong and a reality check in that it won’t be our generation who saves it all.  We are human.  God is God.  Nothing much has changed.  The end.

Psalm 12

“Save, O Lord, for the godly one is gone;

for the faithful have vanished from among the children of man.

Everyone utters lies to his neighbor;

with flattering lips and a double heart they speak.

May the Lord cut off all the flattering lips,

the tongue that makes great boasts,

those who say, “With our tongue we will prevail,

our lips are with us; who is master over us?”

“Because the poor are plundered, because the needy groan,

I will now arise,”  says the Lord;

“I will place him in the safety for which he longs.”

The words of the Lord are pure words,

like silver refined in a furnace on the ground, purified seven times.

You, O Lord, will keep them;

you will guard us from this generation forever.

On every side the wicked prowl,

as vileness is exalted among the children of man.

 

 

Merry Christmas!

2011 summarized:

disneyland, home, back to school, work, packing lunches, driving kids, working, working working, contract extensions, middle school volleyball, baseball practices, spring break!, more baseball practices, games, games, games, winning, winning, losing , science fairs, track meets, skateboard parks, canucks, summer!  skim boarding, beaches, hikes, berry picking, playing playing playing, losing teeth, scraping knees, freckles, roasting marshmellows, the glen, swimming, sleeping in, back to school, grades 7, 5 and 3, more volleyball, basketball, skittleball, drum line, homework homework homework, youth group, skate club, core groups, friends, Seattle, more skateparks, thanksgiving turkey, snow (!), shopping, report cards, christmas trees, baking, school concerts, parties, candy canes, schools out, sleeping in, video games, wrapping and ribboning, excitement, movies, mommy’s done work, daddy’s done work, it’s Christmas Eve!!!

We wish you and your families times of laughter and joy, quiet times of peace and comfort, cozy moments, ridiculous moments, memories made and love abounding.  Jesus Christ is born!

Clarity and Light

Clarity comes in many forms.  For some it’s early in the morning, others its late at night.  Some may find it through robust dialogue, others through silence.  Some clear spots for me often shine through in the early early morning, while it’s still dark and my family (save for the ridiculously early leaving husband) is all still snug in their beds.  It comes in quiet, alone moments.  As a mom I treasure these two things to start my mornings – quiet and alone.  It’s why my  alarm busts out some owl city for me at 5:30 am each weekday morning.  It means I can start my day with Jesus before the hustle, the bustle and the downright chaos that comes with living with 3 boys a  husband and grandma!  (the last part of that sentence makes me laugh and love my life!)

But today clarity came a bit differently.  It came through dirty windows in the midst of enormous scoops of pancake batter seeping over the edge of the griddler and amidst conversations of freezing the street in front of our home into a giant ice rink.  (yeah, the neighbours LOVE us!)

This morning I read in John 12.  Verse 35 says, “The light is among you for a little while longer.  Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you.  The one who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going.  While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.”

This led me to look up some verses in Ephesians that say, “But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible, for anything that becomes visible is light.”

So there I am in the midst of our morning madness and it becomes clear.  My windows are filthy!  There are food splatters and drippy streaks, there are fingerprints and puppy nose smears.  There is some other gunk that will just choose to call ‘foreign’ and leave it at that.  I tell you this not because I’m proud to have icky windows but because yesterday evening at dinner I didn’t see it.   As I sat at the table I looked into the backyard through the panes and they looked fine to me.  They were in darkness.  In the darkness you cannot see the ick and the filth.  You can look right past it for the darkness overtakes.

But this morning there was light!  There was beautiful gleaming sunlight shining rays of deliciousness into my kitchen.  I looked up  to inhale it’s glow and take a minute to thank Jesus for the light and that’s when I saw my windows.  This is  when it came together.

“But when anything is exposed by the light it becomes visible.”

We cannot see our own sin if we are walking through this world without light.  We can move about in the darkness and not know where we are going.  Sure, we can get caught in the darkness and it may even seem good, for without the light we can’t see.  We can’t see our sin, our filth, our inside ickiness.  We stumble around thinking we’re fine but really we’re not seeing. Just as last night my windows were ‘fine’.

But light!  Add some light to us, let it shine on us, let the word of God permeate through us and soon it exposes.  It shows what was once hidden in the dark.  This can be a scary place, a vulnerable place, a sobering place to let the light show you what you are.  But as we walk in the light, as He is in the light, he refines, scrubs clean, chips away at the foreign objects that don’t belong until we are sparkling glass.  A window that the light shines through.  No longer with muck to hinder the light but a surface clean and bright that he can shine through and spread his light to others with.

I love that Jesus used these words, examples that through the decades we can learn from and that could bring clarity in a dirty kitchen.

Deckin’ the halls and Fa-la-la-la-la’in

I love Christmas.  So much that it makes my heart kind of sigh to even say the word and I have to pause after for effect.  I just love. it.

I’ve talked to many over the past few weeks who have said they dislike the commercialism, they can’t stand the decorations and lights and all the money and work that goes in.  I’ve heard moans and groans when I ask the question, “All ready for Christmas?” and one person even replied, “Don’t swear at me like that.  It’s rude!”

But I love it all!  The twinkling lights, the smell of the real tree, the decorations both bought and made from school days gone by, the candy canes stirring hot chocolate, the music, the cookies and the thought of turkey so near I can almost smell it!

I love the list making.  Grocery list, who to buy for list, what to buy them list, what still needs to be done and what’s already been done lists.  Christmas card list, what to bake list and the list of places, events and parties that we are set to attend.

I don’t view these things as many seem to, as commercialism or as have to’s or things that bog me down and cause me to forget the real meaning of Christmas!  No way, baby!  These things are BECAUSE of the real meaning of Christmas.

Jesus Christ, come to earth as a precious, sweet-smelling baby.  Born to a young and frightened mother (weren’t we all?).  This deserves to be celebrated!  Celebrated with twinkling lights and decorations for the party.  Celebrated with events leading up to this special day and with the very best sweets and treats for this is truly a glorious celebration, people!  And this party makes my heart want to sing, to jump, to deck every hall and cozy up our home and to dance around the living room to old carols and have quiet moments of reading scripture together by the fire.  This is an event worth celebrating!

More than just any old birthday party this is a party for a King and so we go all out!  So when the cookies are baked we talk of taste buds and how fantastic God is for giving us flavours.  When we decorate the tree we talk of what the stars represent and we bask in memories of Christmas seasons now past.  We laugh because their is joy in this season!  We don’t bemoan the work of it, no, not us.  The candles get lit more often these nights and we find ourselves just sitting, together, chit-chatting or sharing an orange.

This is Christmas!  This is what we celebrate!

I get that it may seem lame to trudge around the mall shopping for gifts that you don’t get any credit for.  But to shop for my family, my mom, my boys and my husband, my friends whom I love so much and want to give so much to (more than I am able, always!) because I know that God has given me this baby that we celebrate this season.  He has given me Jesus.  More than I can fathom, more grace than I deserve, more life, more joy and more MORE than I can even describe.  So giving becomes not a task but an outflowing of what I have been given.

“For unto you is born this day in the city of David, a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord!”

Celebrate it, people!

On dancing and snakes and lovely gardens just out of reach

My words have been scarce as of late and I’ve tried to determine why.  Life is full, full, full and yet I open this page and I sit and my mind whirls and twists and I feel like my thoughts are dancing in the most exciting moment of the ballet.  twirling.  spinning.  unable to stop.  unable to look in one spot and focus and get out what needs to get out.  instead my head whips around  like a dancer, circling quickly, but always coming back to that one point so as to stay on my feet and not fall dizzy in a heap.

and so I wait.

But here we are weeks later and still I sit and stare and I don’t know where to begin.  Where does one start when there are four thousand six hundred and thirty seven things I want to say?

At the beginning, of course.  And so I begin at the beginning, the only place it all leads back to.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (Gen. 1:1)  And it was all so very good.  The light and the water and the fish and the stars in the sky it was all so deliciously good.  And man and woman and so, so good.

And then there was a garden.  Even at the typing of the word garden I feel my heart turn in some sort of resentment for the very thought.  I have a hard time convincing my mind that this garden was good.  Don’t get me wrong, I know that it was because scripture says it was a most lovely place.  A beautiful perfect garden.  But I can’t see it because I think garden and I think snake and I shudder.  I shudder not at the man or the woman there in the garden who were so enticed but at the things I see around me.  My heart feels weighted in my chest as I think about relationships in conflict, bodies that are failing, little white lies.  I look around me and I see it.  I see the effects of the snake and I want to scream and yell and tell him that there is no room for him here.

My mind can’t fathom a beautiful garden because I know the rest of the story.  I know the parts where we do not do the things we want to do but do the very things we don’t want to do.  I see the people around me who ache, who carry loads too heavy, who look to everything but the One True Thing to satisfy.  I’m trapped here, in this messy jungle thick with tangled branches and I long to breathe the air of a wide open space.

I long for the garden, to feel it the way it was.