Last night someone asked me a question about a past event in our lives, when did it happen, what year?  I’m not good at answering those questions.  Time goes by too fast for me.  I’m always thinking some great memorable time was just last year until I realize that two or three years have really gone by since it happened.  So I try to journal, keep calendars, write letters… anything to rehearse events and the dates that they happened.  I still don’t remember them very well but I have the written record in most cases.  I looked in all those places last night and didn’t get the answer to the question, which was, “what year did the horse, Ghost, come down to Florida from Wisconsin”? I had to message my daughter and get the answer from her.

But, oh the fun I had looking for it! I have one journal in particular that I wrote in, off and on, for over ten years while my children were young.  There are so many descriptions of them, and life with them from my perspective.  Having such a poor memory I really value those writings.  I suppose the memories are in my head somewhere but reading about what happened kind of drags the thoughts out where I can think them again. I guess that’s what memory is.  I’ve also been looking at a lot of old pictures of family and our lives in various places since my “barn window project” and that has been a similar experience down memory interstate (it’s not a lane anymore). 

The most remarkable thing for me was to see how my feelings about some things have changed over the years. Specifically, I see how hanging in there has paid off for me in so many ways (my work, my marriage, my faith).  I am glad that in those moments of temptation, despair, trouble of one kind or another, that I had a reason to persist and a purpose to fulfill.  Faithfullness is one of my favorite words and to me, it is a description of God’s character much more than my own. Given time, he is always proven to be faithful.  I think he gives us the past to prove that.

Thinking about Cambodia again today.  We’ve got word that quite a few of the children, including my friend Chanra, are ill with unexplainable high fevers.  They will be going for blood tests tomorrow.  I remember when Julia was only about 4 years old and had recurring high fevers and we couldn’t find any cause for it.  It was a scary time.  Imagine having 20 + children and five or six of them sick like that… Please join us in praying for their quick return to health.  And let me know if you enjoy the slide presentation that my friend Trish put together for our talks this weekend.  Click the link below for a quick visit to Prek Eng, Cambodia, orphanage houses Jeremiah’s Hope and Joshua’s Hope.

Cornerstone Cambodia Summer 2012 

I tried a new thing today. Trying new things is good in that it gives me exercise in facing fear and helps me know that I am  not yet an old dog, because old dogs cannot learn new tricks. Today I face painted.

This was a volunteer job – I could have chosen other activities to oversee but there is just something in me that never quits wanting to be artistic. So I volunteered to do a shift at the face painting table and gave myself a week to figure out how to do it. Thank God for the internet. There is a nice lady who has done quite a few videos on face painting and I spent an hour watching her talk about it. It helped even though I would rather have watched her DO it on faces. There are people who make their living painting on people, which is really kind of unbelievable when you consider that the paint always gets washed off relatively soon.

It’s kind of a big deal when you know you’re going to hold someone’s face in your hand and attempt to paint a picture on it. You have to get really close to this person (this is where the phrase “in your face” actually has some meaning). No one likes to sit still for very long so it’s got to look like whatever it’s supposed to be on the first try. And you must deal with the person as well as deal with the paint. Both can be challenging. Often I was able to talk children into the picture I knew I could paint – say a star, or a flower.

The boys were the hardest since not many of them ask for stars or flowers.  “I want to be Spider Man” he said.  I looked at him for a long, awkward time and then referred him to a book of faces on the table.  I have to confess I do not know what Spider Man’s face looks like – at all. He found a picture of a red face with web-like lines and evil eyes that really looked more like a devil than a spider but I decided if he liked it I could do some modifications.  I’m not one for making small children into devils. He ended up being very red and webby and evidently it bore some resemblance to the arachnid hero because he was quite pleased. Boys like dolphins too. I was also asked to do a snake on an arm which I did in a beautiful periwinkle blue with black stripes. Boys will be boys.

Mommies get their faces painted too. They sometimes have to show their children that it doesn’t hurt and that it is cool.  One Dad had his bald head painted. It was a pumpkin. I couldn’t help thinking what a wonderful canvas he made. I’m not sure this would be my choice for a profession, but I did get an inquiry as to whether I could do a birthday party next week. That at least makes face painting an easier job than selling Mary Kay. I’m just sayin’ maybe I will order some paints of my own….

Since our staff turnover seems to be continuous, I thought it would be good to clarify my request for time off during Thanksgiving week when Jonathan and Esther plan to visit Florida. I usually get the weekend off but had asked for Friday as well.  I planned to work on Thanksgiving itself, get off as early as possible and have a quick turkey meal before heading to the airport to pick up the visitors. I am excited to say my plans have changed. 

Today, I heard that there is a Bluegrass Festival in Myrtle Beach, S.C. over Thanksgiving week and if all goes well my employer intends to be there. I, on the other hand, will be in Bradenton and off work from the Tuesday before Thanksgiving until the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. Imagine my surprise and delight.  I had to keep from doing a dance in her presence.  Instead I calmly remarked that the schedule would work well with me and I would do whatever I could to assist her and the new nurse to get ready for the trip. It does sound like a fun trip for her and I’m glad that she may get to go – for my reasons as well as hers.

Really it was a good day – I don’t regret anything about it. I did start out with a prayer that it would be time well spent so I’m going on faith here and feeling free to enjoy it as it was. But it was strange.

My thinking was that I would change what was happening in the lanai (closed in screen room, for you northerners). It has become a storage room of sorts which would be okay if it didn’t have glass walls that leave all my stuff in view from outside and from the living room. Typically people sit in their lanai and have morning coffee, looking out at palm trees and outdoor critters and birds and enjoying nature. When it’s cool enough, you open the sliding glass doors and let the breeze blow in. This is typical of most everyone except me, because my windows are so dirty and water spotted from my irrigation system that I can’t see out of them. And I don’t often open my glass doors because my screens fall off.  The project was going to be washing those windows and storing stuff elsewhere and having a beautiful, inviting room at the end of the day.

I moved all my outdoor plants away from the windows to begin washing. I had to get the leaf blower out to clean off the sidewalk. I had to rearrange the shelf to find a cord for the leaf blower. Actually I spent about an hour in the garage cleaning off several shelves and boxing up my canning jars. A reality check revealed that I was not out washing windows like I was supposed to be so after a second cup of coffee I re-focused. All my plants that I had pulled out on the yard looked so bedraggled and in need of care that it overwhelmed me. I went inside to work from the other direction. I took a few things off the lanai floor to store in the garage. One of the things reminded me of an email that I needed to answer so I did that for an hour and kind of forgot about the lanai. Then I remembered and went out once again with my third cup of coffee to decide what I could do.  My pantry is in the lanai so I decided to clean, consolidate and weed out old food products. I made an overwhelming mess taking things off the shelves.  Some of the items needed to go into the kitchen storage so I went there and ended up cleaning several cupboards in the kitchen.  I found two huge, opened containers of Hershey’s cocoa and couldn’t get it all into one so I had to make brownies and use up the leftover cocoa. I found lots of stuff I didn’t know I had. And evidently I had it for a long time because there were lots of “best used by 2007” and similar messages on the cans and boxes.  I got overwhelmed and decided to play the piano and regain my sanity.

This was basically the pattern of my day and in case you’re wondering how I got from washing windows to baking brownies – well, you had to be there. It was a perfectly clear progression. Fortunately it ended with an up-to-date pantry,  a new sense of organization, and a list of new “to dos”. I still didn’t get the windows washed.