Tag Archives: wisdom

The days grow short

2 Mi Familia, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, 5 Songs I am Singing, 9 TV & Movies/Books & Entertainment, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , ,

A meandering post…

grands-14
The grandbebes.

Oh, it’s a long long while
From May to December
But the days grow short
When you reach September

I refused to loosen my grasp on summer, as if it would cause it to remain. And we have had an unusually warm and dry Autumn, temperatures soaring daily in bright sunshiny days regularly, so it has been easy to pretend.

12004929_1043257495697958_3908971442852459840_n
Hunter catches and runs in the touchdown!

But the colorful-Colorado drive to the mountains a couple of weeks ago, yellow and orang-ish Aspen leaves tumbling and floating down the higher in elevation we got, the season changed for me. *snap* Just like that. I guess it really is fall.

When the autumn weather
Turns leaves to flame
One hasn’t got time
For the waiting game

sept 30 near allenspark, co
On our way to the top. Near Allenspark.

Oh, the days dwindle down
To a precious few…

006-768x1024
Our niece Lori”s place in Estes Park. She always has a room for us.

This Season

The days are shorter, the evenings are cooler. The grass is greener, enjoying the break from relentless summer heat. The garden has gone wild, producing madly, somehow knowing the end is in sight. Cool-season crops, planted in August’s warmth, are deliriously happy this year. Radishes, lettuce, kale and arugula can be seen dancing in the moonlight.  With a little love and occasional cover, who knows? Maybe we’ll harvest for the Thanksgiving table? It doesn’t have to be the end {yet} of the gardening year. But it’s close.

I brought in a shopping bag full of tomatoes, zucchini and peppers three days ago…

September…November…

Guess what?

If I were a garden vegetable, I would be a tomato plant. Of course I would. Search this blog for the word, “tomato” and you’ll see why.  The homegrown tomato is my all-time favorite, for no flavor like them can be purchased anywhere. They arrive all spring green and exciting on bushy-leafed plants and then become blood-red and juicier over time. Like we do.

Aging actually defines and colors who we are, what we bring to the proverbial table.

But the September and October tomato isn’t as flashy as the summer tomato.  The fruit is smaller, even as the numbers increase. Nearing the end, the tomato creates a veritable flurry of flowers-to-fruit, propagating itself for posterity. It’s like it is saying, “I won’t be around forever, these days are getting awfully short and I’m losing sunlight, but I’ll make sure to leave you with plenty to enjoy and seed for the future.”

It isn’t about being maudlin or morose, but I know things now I didn’t know 20 years ago. I know “the days dwindle down.” I recall my irrepressible youth. I couldn’t see the end of the blue-sky, sunny-summer days ahead and even though we always heard “We’re never promised tomorrow,” being young also makes you certain tomorrow will always be there.

Like my annual tomato plants, we have a certain number of days, the seasons set and measurable with some variations.  We have a limited supply of sunshine and rain. And then our days are gone. And we hope we will have produced life-giving, good fruit and plenty of it and have left extraordinary children and grandchildren to make the world better for the future.

I’m somewhere past the middle

Where am I now, September? October? I’m somewhere in the middle, over half my days are gone. I need to kick it into high gear, for goodness’ sake! :)

It has taken me the wisdom of the years I have lived to understand so many things and, wow, I have much left to learn. But so many seasons have come and gone and the people planted in my life’s garden to begin with are the ones still to tend, you know? Many wonderful friends and acquaintances pass by and we enjoy the love, the meals, but my people remain for me. Along the way, every possible distraction, possible (probable) offenses and seductive “once-in-a-lifetime” opportunities beckon. New things and flashy adventure present and they are wonderful, but the home garden is where the best nourishment remains even as, and especially as, the days grow shorter.

Over half my days are gone, but the ones that remain are bushel-baskets full of sage advice, wisdom, love (oh the love), nurture, insight into the future (I’m further along – I can see things ahead you may not yet have seen, my sweets); there’s discernment I can share and prophetic words I am anointed to speak and though the fruit on my vines is not the flashy, all-knowing fruit of my youth, I bear prolifically now, enough for my household and those who need refuge. Come one, come all…

So spend your days wisely, the endless supply you seem to have now.  And feast on the days your most important people have to spend on you, receiving the grace of years humbly and gratefully.

And these few precious days
I’ll spend with you
These precious days
I’ll spend with you

My favorite version of September Song

(lyrics above) by Willie Nelson. Naturally!

Five Hundred

1 Christ is All, 2 Mi Familia, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Think, , , , , , , ,

blogging

This is my 500th blog post!  Very cautiously and nervously entering the blog world in November of 2006, I find I can now blather endlessly about the minutia of my life, even sharing my most embarrassing moments in the mix.

blogging  blogging1

But still, I write it for my children and family.  That has always been the point.  And because my mom likes it.  But mostly for my children.

Because between the silly and the mundane, I have also exposed and cast down sin as it has been revealed to me.  I have spoken truths almost too unbearable to reveal in the light of day and I have written the things that someday they will look back on and read and see as an altar, a guidepost and landmark – the place where the truth of heaven was spoken and remembered in my life.  And it will become for them, eventually, if not now, the wisdom that will keep them on the right path.

“Do not remove the ancient landmark which your fathers have set.”  Proverbs 22.28 NKJV

The coolest thing now, though, is realizing a promise of God to me in my lowest hour – that there would also be spiritual children, that I would be increased and multiplied, that I will continue to be vigorous and bear fruit in old age.  And true to His promise, my family enlarges (it has even happened through this blog!).  My capacity to love is increased.

So, for the children I know and the ones I have yet to meet, I write.  And I write. 

And I write what I have heard, what I have seen with my own eyes, what I have observed, and what I have touched with my own hands in the hopes that these things will be received in the spirit with which they are given and that they will, in some measure increase your joy (1 John 1.1-4).  May your joy be ever full!

Graphomaniacally yours…Jeanie/mom

NOTE TO SELF: “It is written…” was even for Jesus, a touchstone of proof, a declaration of the “fixedness of the divine record” to the faithfulness of God.  Make my written words nothing less, Lord…

I’ve Been Around the Block a Few Times

2 Mi Familia, Stuff I Actually Think, , ,

 

I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck yesterday.   I’ve been, as they say, around the block a few times and here are a  some things I know:

  • If it is going to rain only one day this week-it will be the day they throw the Penny Saver in the driveway.
  • You spend a lot of years pursuing the Presence, thinking God is elusive and even at times withholding Himself because you’re in some kind of unconfessed sin or that you just are not measuring up.   Then you find out you had it all wrong: He has been pursuing YOU!
  • “One of the most time-consuming things is to have an enemy.”   So said E. B. White.
  • A scoured and polished kitchen sink will go looking for dirty dishes.
  • If some one says, “Smell this,”   don’t.
  • If some one begins a sentence with, “No offense, but…”, brace yourself,  they are about to offend.
  • If that boy is right for my daughter, God will tell me.   Believe it, girls.
  • People are way less enthusiastic about receiving my advice than I am  in giving  it.
  • The life you lead is the life you’ll someday leave – with your friends and family and specifically your children.   So make it a good one.   Live with the end in mind – leave the right legacy.
  • “From the cradle to the grave – clean underwear comes first.”   I read that in the comics once and it rings true.
  • There IS a peace that passes understanding!   That always surprises me.
  • And – there IS a right way to place the toilet paper roll – my way.

This is gold, people, pure gold!   Most of it is really, truly and actually stuff I think and say.   Ha!   I won’t  claim any of it is original, though, because everytime I think I am posting some super-original thing, I google it and find out some one else had it before me.   Bother.

Just wanting to share the wealth…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:   Devote time to learning the secret to marrying fabulous shoes (think high-high heels)  AND pain-free feet.   This may be my ticket to wealth!

pictured: me in my cousin’s tree, age 4  – at their house where there was no indoor plumbing – YES!   I am that old; me more recently, a bit worn out from having circled the block so many times – with the 5 amazings; google image of proper toilet paper installation.