Feeling Caught Up

​Beloved:

    Indoors ~ For four days a horsefly harassed me in my very own kitchen, buzzing incessantly and dive-bombing my head.  Day One I ignored him, thinking he’d die naturally soon enough.  Turns out horseflies can live up to two months!  Days Two and Three I stalked him with a swatter, but he was fast and never landed.  Finally this morning, Day Four, he was clearly tired.  He flew slower and kept landing on the window screen.  I pretended not to notice for a long time and then BAM!  He’s chicken scraps and my kitchen is peaceful again.  

    Outdoors ~ My twine plan to keep chickens out seems to be working so far, but then again no tomatoes are ripe red yet.  A butternut squash plant is completely out of control and has taken over way too much ground.  I’ve run it up a ladder and along the fence for now.  I’ve picked basil and squash already and will have cucumbers by the weekend.  Lots of green tomatoes on the vine and the blackberries are turning but not yet soft enough to harvest.  Flowers are lush all around.

    After weeks of not being home even when I am at home, I finally feel caught up indoors and out.  The last two days I’ve cleaned and cooked and shopped and sorted and settled down into this time and place called my house, and every creature living here is the better for it.  We finally have soap and shampoo and toilet paper again; loads of healthy food and popsicles and diet coke.  Nothing nasty grows in the fridge and the pantry isn’t creepy anymore.  I spent $18 on what amounts to an electric broom that sucks up dog hair like a dream.  Worth the joy at twice the price! 

    Being at home in my house does not come to me as naturally as I wish it did.  By my wishing and regrets I’m forever prone to be somewhere other than here and now ~ in all the amazing beauty, bounty and light of my house on this perfect summer day.  When I have the patience and the wisdom to do the tasks my own house requires, I cannot help but be here now.  Not only is keeping my house good for my heart and brain and soul, I wonder if everyone keeping their respective house might be good for the collective human heart and soul.  I’m remembering a book by Kathleen Norris called The Quotidian Mysteries, and the sanctifying possibilities of everyday work.  Maybe we’d all be less afraid, slightly less stressed out, if we took Matthew 6:34 to heart.  My favorite translation is from J.B. Phillips:  “Don’t worry at all then about tomorrow.  Tomorrow can take care of itself!  One day’s trouble is enough for one day.”

peace & prayers, friends, peace & prayers,
​~ pastor annette