A Thousand Reasons: Canto VI

Last week/end I had the rare pleasure of vacationing with my family. We rented a house in Door County Wisconsin and soaked in the glorious colors of autumn. So, naturally, most the things I found to be grateful for are in the singular category that comes from the outdoors and time with my quirky, wonderful family.

{36} Thank God for retreat: the chance to pull away from the day to day anxieties and say, at least for a while, "Later. Today, God willing, shall be a day of rest."

{37} Thank you for uncontrollable amusement—the times it is all so funny we simply cannot stop laughing. That unstoppable, bubbling force reminds me of so many dear things, not least of them the days of jumping on mattresses and not wanting to go to bed, when Father's warm arms embraced children squealing with laughter. There was always a particular gleam in his eye, when he gave his own rather childish grin.

       "Uh-oh. Someone's giggle box got opened."

{38} For the curvy, criss-crossed natured of our lives—how we are doomed to not always walk alongside family and friends as we may like, but that the intersections of our life paths are so much the dearer for that: a precious chance to reminisce, re-acquaint, and swap stories of our own individual adventures.

{39} Thank You, Elyon, for a family saturated in Your Love, a church made up of kin, sharpening each other with familial love in its highest form: strengthened by Agape.

{40} For the feeling of riding on water—no matter the vessel—and how climbing into a boat and taking up an oar always feels like the start of an adventure.

{41} Thank You, God, that, in the words of Madeleine L'Engle:

             "The great artists keep us from frozenness, from smugness, from thinking that the           truth is in us, rather than in God, in Christ our Lord. They help us to know that we are         often closer to God in our doubts than in our certainties, that it is all right to be like the         small child, who constantly asks: Why? Why? Why?"*

{42} Praise God for things to look forward to—times when we can feel like children again, asking ourselves even though we already know the answer: "Is it time yet?"

*This quote is another from the delightful Madeleine L'Engle book I've been slowly savoring my way through: Walking on Water .

A Thousand Reasons: Canto V

{29} For hot showers on cold days—absolutely delightful.

{30} Thank You, God, for tastes: those preferences which can cause such immediate connections. I love the lively energy of that realizing moment: "Ah, you like _____ too?" What a God, to create a world of so many little things to bind man together.

{31} For critique—the nerve-racking but necessary sharpening of talent—the chance to grow.

{32} Thank You for re-acquainting: those precious chances to meet again with old friends, after the separation of time and years, and see, "Here are the bits of you that are just the same as I have always loved, and here is the rest which is just a bit different. But don't worry; I shall love those too, once I know them, because I love you, and we are all always changing. If you don't see my differences yet, give it a few hours, or minutes. They'll show."

{33} For cold floors, which contrast so wondrously to warm blankets and hot drinks, making them infinitely more pleasant.

{34} Thank God for the pre-sunrise. I laid under the stars this morning and experienced, perhaps for the first time—or maybe simply the first time with eyes truly grateful to see—the change from stars to dawn. That black-blue sky started to fade at the eastern edge, turning a dark, murky violet. My heart constricted in rapture at that which I can only describe as magical, watching the sky's eastern corner fade from violet to lavender, illuminating the fringes of wispy clouds in maroon, pinkish colors that put the ugly, false pinks to shame. And I could not stop watching until the stars had winked out, one by one, swallowed up by the sky's edges as they changed from lavender to the lightest of grey-blues, and from that to an only slightly tinted white.
Thank you, Elyon.

{35} For inspiration. That little muse reaches straight through the slum of day to day, mortal life and stirs the immortal soul, calling with a smile. 
"I know you are there. Now, wake up."

A Thousand Reasons: Canto IV

{22} For smiles, in all their various looks and purposes.

{23} Thank God for milestones. Not only those little laughable ones, where we grin at our mid-week existence and whisper "hump DAY"* to lighten the air of day to day. But also the dearer, one-time markers: the graduation we were not sure we would reach with our sanity intact, moments of realizing how many years you two have been blessed to be friends, and the bittersweet anniversaries of escaped addiction—"Ah, how the withdrawals of the soul hurt, but it is a sign, a dear, sweet sign that I am getting better." Thank you for this milemarker, Elyon. Please give me the grace to make it to the next one. 

{24} Thank You, Lord, for the chance to measure the world in smaller steps. There is nothing quite like holding the hands of a toddling child, thinking how far you've gone before you look behind and see the littleness of the distance. But the distance is not little; we have just grown too big, measuring miles by cars instead of our feet. Oh for the days when dogs were horses to our eyes, horses elephants, and elephants too huge to be anything but monsters.

{25} For community: the circle of friends to surround ourselves with in a reminder that these lives of ours are not a solitary existence.

{26} For lyrics—the creativity with which you have blessed men and angels. How the well-written word takes root in the human soul when carried by melody, lodging in place where it may give man's heart wings on the day he needs them most.

{27} Thank you, Elyon, for Your wondrous persistence in the pursuit of Your people—how You do not let us fall without a fight, even when we would fall to the influence of our own wicked selves.

{28} Praise God for purpose: the quickening of the blood that says, "Here and now, at least, I am doing exactly what I am supposed to."



*In case anyone doesn't know it or just needs a daily dose: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8s3C1him6Lk 
   Sorry, even after years, I still find this hilarious.