Author: Shirleyjdietz

I'm still finding out what I'm about but I think it has something to do with writing and connecting with people and serving God. I don't believe I have to understand it all in order to do it and am pretty content with what comes my way, day by day. I believe there is a God who created all of us, the world we live in, the science we think disproves Him, well, everything. I know my natural tendency is to think I don't need God and I need to be saved from that. I know I need a savior and I'm thankful I have one. The small glimpses I get from the here and now of what my real home is going to be like when God restores it all - that's what fuels me, stirs my sense of adventure, and keeps me going. Until then, I write about what is.

The Desoto Date

June 30, 2014July 1, 2014 Shirleyjdietz4 Comments

A wonderful place to spend some together time.

We were challenged to go on a date every week for six weeks. The time is up now and we tried to remember if we had done that, done anything that was memorable, gone anywhere we could actually name. We came up with a few things.

But I decided we’d better do something quickly to add to the list. We went to a beautiful park we’d never visited before. It qualifies as a date because I walked slow and waited for the husband every time I got ahead of him. We read the historical information together. I took a picture of the husband. We connected with nature and each other.

Here are pictures of Desoto Park. It may have been the place where Hernando Desoto landed and started his trek to claim the New World for Spain. There used to be a local festival honoring him and his conquests – lots of men would dress up in conquistador armor and ride a float made to look like a sailing ship in a very noisy parade. Plastic beads and fake spanish coins would fill the air. I digress. Unfortunately the local native americans had a different version of that history and took offense at the festival being all about Desoto. Now it is simply called the Heritage Festival.

I love this park for its walking trail along the mouth of the Manatee River. Pets are allowed, boats pull up on shore while owners lounge in the water, there’s lots of shade over the path when it enters the mangroves. And if you have never seen a gumbo limbo tree, you will see one here – a very old and beautiful one. That does make it a date, doesn’t it?

I was only a little bit ahead of him... — I was only a little bit ahead of him…

lots of access to the river and intercoastal waterway

bridges take the trail through the mangroves

This too shall pass…

June 27, 2014 ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

I didn’t feel very good yesterday, not awful, just not good. In fact the last three days have been full of supposedly easy things being hard, supposedly reliable equipment being unreliable, and a mostly tolerable body feeling less tolerable than usual. And the stress and pain culminated in a headache last night that was singularly awesome. Well, actually I can think of three times when I had pain approaching that level and each time one aspect of it was that it seemed it would never end.

This morning, on the other side of the worst of it, some words of a song came to mind – “and time shall be no more.” Frankly, today I am so thankful for the passage of time that I can hardly imagine being without it. When no change of position would bring relief, when nausea nearly became overwhelming, one of my only comforting thoughts was that time would pass and so would this pain.

This is not the first time I’ve thought about time (probably not the first time I’ve blogged about it either, but I forget). The husband says I’m going off into an “alternate universe” direction when I try to imagine a timeless world. And I wonder if that’s a bad thing or a good thing. It is hard to think about seeing things that exist not sequentially as they seem to happen to us but all at once, outside of time. To me it seems like this possibility could explain some of the mystery of God. But I don’t pretend to understand – it’s just a feeling that it could be connected.

Right now, I’m thankful for cyclical things, mornings and evenings, seasons, first and last, alpha and omega, even life and death. I know that this universe with time written all over it seems to have been made for me. I’m okay with that.

Men and Tools

June 24, 2014 Shirleyjdietz1 Comment

I don’t have firmly entrenched ideas about what is men’s work and what is women’s work. I am more about getting things done than about who does them. I have tools. But nothing makes gratitude well up in me more than seeing a man use a tool to accomplish something, especially something that I’m glad I’m not having to do.

getting up there..., yeah that ought to be easy. — getting up there…, yeah that ought to be easy.

Our list of things to be done at the oneacrewoods got a bit shorter this month. We’ve known for a couple years that there was some dry rot under the siding around some second story windows – not an easy place to work and also tricky when it involves making a big hole in the wall to replace windows in a climate where it rains nearly every day and is over 90° F (and a hot metal roof). But our friends who have done quite a lot of work on our house over the years took it on, with ropes and ladders, patience and skill. The finish work, inside and out, should be completed today.

Like most projects, this one grew midway through the process. Once this bedroom had new windows, it was necessary to do some dry wall and sanding around them. And while we’re making that kind of mess, maybe we should think about painting all the walls when we’re done. And maybe since the carpet is in bad shape we should replace the flooring. Stop it, already.

The men took it in stride and added laying in a laminate flloor – in one day. As I watched them painstakingly cut the pieces to fit and deal with all that pounding and sawing I was soooo glad that the only tool I had to wield was the broom.

This Beautiful Place

June 24, 2014 ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

Good morning world, it’s Tuesday. Just after putting all my favorite sky pictures up I see this one on the way to work. And even though I was slightly late, I had to pull off the road and get the photo. I live in a place where there is something beautiful to see every day. Where do you find beauty in the place you call home?

Do Tell

June 21, 2014June 21, 2014 ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

The heavens do declare God’s glory, and I love to listen. I live in a flat land with lots of horizons, clouds, moisture in the air and water to mirror the sky. I am always seeing something that nearly takes my breath away, usually when I’m driving. I have to pull over and watch

Honor

June 14, 2014 Shirleyjdietz6 Comments

Today I will think of all the spent hours of your life that translated into food for my body, clothing to cover me and as much security as you knew how to create. Today I will consider that you started out as a teenage man with little instruction in family life, except that you grew up in a family yourself. I will think about the times you changed your path and the uncertainty you must have felt as you searched for a better way to provide. I will think about why you would fall asleep in your chair at the end of all those long days – not from laziness or drunkenness or escapism, but because you were physically exhausted.

I will realize that as a human you probably experienced sadness, frustration, anger (oh yeah), despair and doubt and yet you never bothered us children with any of it. We had little knowledge of your struggles because you were a man and we were self absorbed children. You taught us how to work alongside of you, but you always worked harder and longer. And yet I can remember that you sang in the barn, and whistled and tried to yodel. You modeled that it was possible, and desirable to enjoy work. You gave me the idea that sometimes when trouble seems overwhelming the best thing to do is just go out and work at something. Sometimes the trouble loses interest and goes away unfulfilled. And at any rate, working is better than worrying.

As you’ve grown older with so many limitations ganging up on you, your persistence to do what you can inspires me (and scares me, but, hey… how can a nearly blind man on a rider mower cause any trouble?) I see you teaching lessons of humility (when Mom is right and you are wrong), lessons of love (when you rub Mom’s feet and wash the dishes), lessons of trust (when you put those unsolvable things in God’s hands). And you still whistle now and then and have Pandora playing on your cell phone, announcing your presence as you go. I honor you for all of that.

Today I will grieve that as a society we have almost lost the concept of honoring our fathers for anything. Temptations are everywhere, expectations are high, psychology focuses on faults and there is nothing that cannot be blamed on a father. I will remember how hard it is to be the head of anything, particularly a family. I will be thankful for you – that you have not run away, that you are my dad, my father.

Sign Me Up, Please

June 12, 2014June 12, 2014 ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

I was only two steps ahead of a giant lizard who had gained entry into the dorm and was sucking up hapless students as they tried to figure out what was going on. That one had Jurassic Park written all over it.

Last night I dreamed. I probably dream every night but I rarely remember any of them. For some odd reason I remember two dreams from last night. I willed the Jurassic Park one to go away and not come back. It worked and I slept again. But the second dream was different and I hung on to it in wonder.

We, myself, my two girls and my mother, were in a large medical building waiting to be called for appointments. My youngest was only about three and I was carrying her. I was feeling kind of like a mother who has been denied custody of her children and is suddenly reunited. I asked if she wanted to get down and run around but she said no and we hugged closer and smiled at each other. We sat down since the wait was interminable, but we were still content. My oldest daughter leaning against my knee and the youngest snuggled close on the chair beside me. It was the most pleasurable situation and I remarked “this is the way it should be”.

The strangeness of the dream is that we do not have a broken home and I have never been denied custody. My children are grown and live far enough away that I do not see them often but they have moved on in very natural ways. I wanted them to grow up and have lives of their own. They have done that successfully.

It was like a little gift – to have that time back again so vividly – when arms were wrapped around my neck and a small head rested on my shoulder. I’m just sayin’ that I would like a regular subscription to that dream.

A Person of Excess

AsideJune 7, 2014June 7, 2014 Shirleyjdietz3 Comments

I am a person of excess. I think I’ve always been this way but it is more noticeable now that I have fewer people setting boundaries for me. I have only the husband and myself to please most of the time, and even he is a big boy and can manage by himself. So I […]

Things I Put Off: Episode 2

June 6, 2014 Shirleyjdietz2 Comments

Busy people (like me) are able to procrastinate in ~~pretty nearly~~ every area of life. Cutting back on my work schedule allows me the opportunity to look for these “put off” things and experience the wonderful satisfaction of getting them done after months of having them on the “to do” list. If you have never gone through this cycle you are missing out.

Having made great headway scheduling my “every 7 year” physical exam, this morning I turned to the oneacrewoods, which has been… well, neglected at best. If you don’t love nature, gardening, dirt and sweat go read somewhere else right now because you won’t understand.

It’s the compost bin. The compost bin is where you can put all your vegetable scraps, lawn clippings, leaves, etc… in the hope of making new, rich soil. Presumably you are making this soil to put somewhere else where the ground needs improvement. However, if you never do anything but put stuff in the bin, there is not much point in doing it. Ideally it should be fluffed up, turned over and watered once in a while too but I never get around to that. And because I have such a big yard I actually have two compost bins to play with. Lately they have been looking full. I can’t remember that last time I emptied them. It’s a nasty job.

Did you know that cockroaches fly? Did you know that some of them are actually white like albinos? They love, love, love compost piles and when disturbed they take off in flying, jumping swarms to find some new place to hide (up a pant leg, under a shirt collar, in hair, aaaghh!) I have absolutely no cockroaches in my house and I think it’s because I provide this much more favorable place for them to live. I think of it as pest control.

I chopped and shoveled through both my bins (after the roaches left) and there was some pretty good soil in there. I added it to my small garden area which is fallow – fancy word for nothing growing in it – because we are already in the hot season here. Lots of things do grow in this season but not many traditional vegetables. I’m preparing for September when it cools off. One more thing off my list, and truly, it was so beautiful outside this morning that I didn’t even mind the roaches, much.