It’s no secret that I love to decorate with toiles and plaids. I thought I would post a few pictures of the newest plaid items in our household.

Sara recently bought this throw for me, and Mildred thinks the back of the couch is the perfect place for it.

I also like buffalo plaid, even though I’m not a fan of the name. I have a set of summer sheets for our bed and now a set of winter, flannel sheets. How did this black and red check/plaid get its name, I wonder?

And we normally have plain white shades on our dining room chandelier (maybe it’s more like a hanging light — chandelier sounds fancier than it really is…), but for a richer, darker touch, we now have these:

And I love to put a buttery piece of Scottish shortbread on one of these small plates and sit down to enjoy it with a hot cup of tea:

There’s more. But I don’t think I’ll line up all my long, flannel nightgowns and take a picture of those just yet. I will someday though. It’s inevitable…when you’re mad about plaid.

I hope you all had a nice Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful day. I did the turkey and stuffing and rolls, and my three daughters did the rest, and the food was delish. We had a fresh turkey (which I may have cooked 30 minutes too long), sage and onion stuffing, French, dense rolls and butter, mashed potatoes and gravy, baked yams, roasted asparagus, cranberry sauce, a relish tray with dip, apple pie a la mode, pumpkin pie with fresh whipped cream, French silk pie, wine and coffee.

Right after breakfast I drove up the North Shore to pick up Michael. I pulled into the garage when we got home, helped him up the basement stairs and got him situated in his living room recliner, I let the whining, tap-dancing Schnauzers out of their kennels. They rushed at Daddy, jumping in unison up on his lap and chest with such excited energy they knocked him back in the recliner and his glasses came off. Edith and Millie squealed and licked and showed all their doggy joy at having their daddy home. I will never forget that scene and how hard Michael was laughing.

Michael wanted to lay down for a while after that so I helped him to our bedroom. Another memory I will always cherish happened a few minutes later. Jeremy and Carolyn and their children arrived, and filled the small entry with the Minnesota Family Holiday Look, with multicolored winter jackets, boots and other winter outerwear placed wherever possible. Jeremy came back to our bedroom right away and climbed in bed right beside Michael and cuddled him. I have tears to recall it now. Then Carolyn came in with beautiful baby Miriam, and held her close so Michael could see our newest grandchild. I haven’t written in my gratitude journal in a few days but these scenes will be written down when I open it next, and I will sit and ponder how lavish and kind God has been to me, to our family, and how much He has brought us through.

After our huge meal we went around the table as we always do, one by one sharing the things for which we’re thankful this year. I think that is the best part of the day, and I can still remember what each person said. And later in the evening two-year old Louisa climbed up into the recliner with Grandpa and just snuggled with him for the longest time. So priceless to me.

That night after everyone went home, Michael wanted to go to bed. He was happily exhausted and slept like a rock for about eleven hours, barely moving. The next morning he wanted a piece of pumpkin pie and some coffee, and then later I helped him dress in a new pullover sweater I bought for him. He is sixty five years old and I still think he’s the finest looking man. I tell him that and he smiles sheepishly and acts like it couldn’t possibly be true, but it is. Actually, Michael could probably look like Henry Kissinger and I’d think he was hot. His kindness and love and faithfulness has made him the most beautiful man to me.

After watching an episode of one of our favorite shows, “Doc Martin,” we started to prepare to leave for the veterans home. It had begun to snow and I knew I wanted to be home before dark, so we left around noon. It was very hard, I don’t know how else to say it. I question and second-guess the things I have decided for Michael, and no one truly knows my heartbreak, except maybe God. I have three or four different scenarios I work on in my mind, ways to do things differently with Michael, and there’s hardly an hour that goes by that I’m not trying to figure out what to do. It’s exhausting.

On the drive up the shore we listened to Robin Mark sing songs that helped us focus on the trustworthiness and goodness of God, and Michael pretty much massaged my right hand for an hour as I drove. Every once in a while he would lift my hand to his lips and kiss the back of it tenderly, and I would silently sob, trying to wipe tears so I could see the snowy road ahead. We stopped at Culver’s in Two Harbors and had ButterBurgers, which Michael was happy about.

Once we arrived at the veterans home and I wheeled him to his Birch residence, it was heartwarming to see so many people greet Michael. He is known and loved in this facility, even by employees who work in other parts of the building and don’t help care for him. “Hi Michael! How was your Thanksgiving with your family?” so many asked. I don’t have pictures yet, but the whole place was decked out in Christmas decorations. There are eight Christmas trees beautifully trimmed in the four different residences and all common areas. There are wreaths, lights, and every kind of Christmas display you can imagine on coffee tables, in bookcases, on table tops. Snow globes, glittering sleds filled with shiny glass ornaments, garlands entwined with lights and ribbons. To say they go all out is putting it mildly.

Here are a few photos of the facility that I took a couple of months ago.

This is the main living room or lobby. The real moose head which hangs over this fireplace now has a Santa hat on it.

Michael and I often sit together on the couches or recliners in front of this fireplace and share a snack or read something.

This view below is the main hall you see when you step into the lobby/living room. It’s made to look like a Main Street, and there’s a barber shop and bank on the left, a computer/phone booth, several family areas and public bathrooms to the right.

There’s a little cafe of sorts near the living room too. Hot coffee and tea is always available, and there are tables nearby set up with cribbage boards and magazines and newspapers. The four neighborhoods (or residences) are listed below. The whiteboard you see listed the results of a fishing contest they held for their residents. They take the men fishing on a local lake, on a pontoon boat, almost weekly during the summer months.

The room below is the sun room, at the back of the facility. Michael and I spend a lot of time here. Just to the right of the door is a very large aviary filled with many finches, a canary, a weaver, and for a while, there were tiny little doves. He and I sit quietly together and get so much enjoyment out of watching these beautiful little birds. Many of them build nests and actually hatch eggs — seeing tiny, almost featherless babies emerge from the nests and open their mouths wide for their patient parents to feed them is pretty thrilling.

I love these two little turquoise-colored finches, who are so devoted to each other.

You can click to enlarge these photos. The orange and black bird is called a weaver, and the one clinging to the nest at the upper right is called an owl-faced finch.

You can see the doves below, some of the nests up high, and the materials provided in that long wire column, so the birds can fluff and build their nests. Michael and I love it when it’s bath time and one of the employees puts in a large flat pan of water. The birds bathe immediately, fluttering and putting their little heads down in the water, splashing everywhere. Then they return to the many branches above and preen for the longest time. Then they all go to sleep, tucking their heads under a wing, and we can see their little chests rise and fall as they do their little birdy breathing.

Below, this is a not very good photo of the game room. There’s a pool table, some computers, several computer games, a shuffleboard/bowling table, children’s games and toys, a television which is always playing some sort of sports, and a jukebox. Michael likes the TV show “Duck Dynasty” (that hunting mentality is a huge part of Minnesota culture), so I play the theme song (“Sharp-Dressed Man” by ZZ Top) each time we pass the juke box, and he and I actually do a silly little jive dance to it, him sitting, me standing, holding hands and smiling. Our grandchildren like this room when they visit.

This is one of the living areas in the Birch residence. That is not Michael’s foot on the left, but believe it or not, that older man (very kind, very quiet, very impaired) used to be a most accomplished ballet dancer in the Minnesota Ballet. Usually this room has several residents and employees in it. There’s a huge dining room and kitchen to the left, with a high wall of windows and a small porch with tables and chairs where people can eat outside in the summer, and have bonfires for s’mores.

This photo of Michael was taken in August. He has had some kind of a beard for most of our married life, but they began to shave him every morning and he prefers it that way now.

Part of the front entry:

Michael’s visit home was such a blessing, but unfortunately the three days and nights following did not go well with him at all. I won’t even go into the details because they’re just too sad.

If any of you know of a Mary Poppins/Julia Child/Maria von Trapp/Mother Teresa kind of person or two who is available for full time employment, please let me know. If a couple of unattached, competent, kind, strong, compassionate, culinary, selfless, patient, cheerful, singing, gentle, godly people were to come along, I might have my answer.

And I know that sounds a bit lighthearted and flippant, but my intention is not that at all.

It has been 149 days since Michael and I have lived apart, and neither one of us wants it this way.

I will drive up to spend the day with him tomorrow, and my heart has already flown ahead…

It’s six a.m. and I’ve been awake for a little over an hour. Since today is the last day before Thanksgiving, I have a few things to do, but I have a personal code which dictates that I don’t get to work until the sun does. So even though I’ve been up already, preparing breakfast for one of our Fosters, feeding the dogs and letting them out, making myself a Cappuccino Cooler, turning on the humidifier, putting on some soft music (we’re still listening to the soundtrack from Little Women — in fact, click here and while you read you can enjoy the same music that’s been wafting through our house for many days now — it’s utterly transporting) and putting eyedrops in my desert-like eyes, I’m in wait mode. I’m waiting until the first glow of light comes through these bedroom windows, signaling that I can officially start the day. I don’t remember when it was that I started turning into a pumpkin as soon as the sun went down, but it’s a real phenomenon in my life: no sunlight, no nothing.

And speaking of humidifiers, having a forced air furnace for the first time in my life has been interesting. Ever since I moved to Minnesota in 1981, the houses we’ve lived in had gas hot water heat. A boiler heats water, and that hot water is pumped through pipes that then warm radiators, and a nice, even heat fills the rooms and gives you hardly any cause for thinking about the heat in the first place, except to be grateful for it in such a cold climate. Well, in this new house, the forced air furnace works a little differently. It doesn’t heat water, it scorches the air. So instead of a nice even, quiet heat, we have a quiet roar of hot air blowing out of the finned registers in the walls, then it stops and the air cools, then more hot air blows again, then stops, etc. The house stays warm and I’m so thankful for that, but I’m learning some things about drier dry skin than ever before, and how important it is for health in general to keep the air in our home at the right humidity level.

So to clarify: in the summer when we have a lot of Midwestern humidity in the air, it creeps into the house and if you don’t use a dehumidifier (especially in your basement), your books can turn moldy and spores can float around in the air willy-nilly and land and bloom where they may. So we run a dehumidifier pretty much all the time, to keep the humidity down. Then in the fall when all the moisture in the air goes on vacation to Australia, we have to bring in a humidifier so the living beings in the house don’t get lizard skin and nosebleeds.

The little tabletop humidifier we used wasn’t really making much difference, so I did some research and learned we need a Whole House Humidifier. I read reviews and decided on a unit on wheels called QuietCare by Honeywell. I placed it near the air exchange vent in our hallway, out of the way of the most frequented rooms in our house, but in a place where the moister air could be drawn through the ducts and keep things comfortable everywhere. Well. QuietCare is a misnomer if I’ve ever heard one. This humidifier does the job, but its decibel level is more like an industrial fan. I’m sensitive to sounds and I’m not sure I can stand it. So I ordered another humidifier and will compare that to the QuietCare. Whichever one is best stays, and the other will go to a deserving family, because who wants to pack up an appliance the size of a small dishwasher and mail it back?

And, as if this weren’t enough excitement, I learned that it’s a good idea to have a hygrometer in the house when you’re running a humidifier. So I bought one to be able to keep the humidity at optimum levels…not high enough to produce mold in the rafters or low enough to cause my lips to crack and bleed. But then I learned something about hygrometers that was a bit of a surprise: they are all possibly a teensy bit inaccurate and need to be calibrated by putting them in a sealed plastic freezer bag with a shallow dish of wet salt.

Huh? Is this some sort of a practical joke? I have to pay for a brand new hygrometer but need to immediately do a quality control check on it? Yes, it’s true. Did you know that if you place a hygrometer in a sealed bag of wet salt it should always read 75% humidity? Well I never knew that until just this week. And think about all this time you’ve spent reading this blog post and this is all you get for it. I’m really sorry.

So the hygrometer read 74% after 24 hours in the salt bag, which means that I will mentally add one degree to its reading from now on, wherever it’s placed in the house. All I can say is my lips had better appreciate this.

On a much more serious and hopefully happy note, Michael will be coming home for Thanksgiving and will spend the night before returning to the veterans home on Friday. Some of the nursing staff thought bringing him home wasn’t the greatest idea, some of them said, “Go for it!” so I’m going for it. He wants to be here and I can’t imagine sitting at the table without him, so early tomorrow morning I’ll put the turkey in the oven and then head north to pick him up. I’m a bit apprehensive about how this will affect him, but I have to let it go and put that in God’s hands. I’m praying that it’s not confusing and upsetting to him…if you think of us will you pray too?  Thank you so much, friends.

Before I get dressed and start the day (the sun is now up and fine snowflakes are falling), I wanted to tell you about a book I’m reading. My friend Pat recommended it to me and I’m about halfway through. It’s called Destiny of the Republic by Candice Millard. Did you ever think you would like to know more about President James Garfield? No? Well let me assure you, you do! The subtitle of the book is A Tale of Madness, Medicine, and the Murder of a President, and it is masterfully written and so compelling. The writing reminds me a bit of Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken. The book fairly gallops and is absolutely brilliant. If you know someone who loves history, this would make a great Christmas gift.

What are you reading these days? I always love to ask that question and hope folks will answer.  🙂

The next thing on my reading stack after this one is My Bright Abyss by Christian Wiman. Just the title makes me feel like the author might be a kindred spirit.

Dear friends, I pray that your Thanksgiving is full of thanks. I could wish you time with family, peace, prosperity, good food, fun and festivities, but I realize more than ever that not everyone has this kind of holiday. Things are certainly different for us this year. But no matter what road we’re walking with the Lord, we can give thanks. There’s always something to look up to the heavens for, something from the hand of our good God, to be grateful for.

May He find us all being grateful this week,

I like to wear scarves now and then and have received many as beautiful gifts. I’ve tried several ways to store them over the years, from tying them on hangers like this, and folding them neatly in drawers. I knew I didn’t want something like this scarf hanger, because the scarves would lay on top of each other and wouldn’t be as easily accessible.

I searched around for a while online to find just what I wanted, and these little individual hangers are what I settled on:

They’re perfect. I like that they’re all separate and can be slid across a closet pole just like other garments. This was just a part of our closet where shirts would have been hung, and I decided it would be my scarf rack.

These aren’t the best photos — the light in the closet is high and rather dim for photography. There is absolutely no orange on any scarf, in spite of what you see. It’s really a delightful coral color. (You can click to enlarge them.)

When I glance at my scarves I see Diane, Kay, Sharon, Carolyn, Sara, and Scotland…

And here’s a really neat video about how to tie a scarf 25 ways in 4.5 minutes. It’s fun to watch. The two ties I do most often are called The European Loop and The Magic Trick.

Do you like to wear scarves? How do you store yours?

I was driving recently and an old Amy Grant song came on. It was one I’ve always loved by her, and the melancholy of it swept over me and tears overflowed these dry eyes of mine and streamed down my face as I sang along. I thought of Michael as I sang and cried, and realized that lately I’ve been having difficulty remembering how he used to be, when he was vibrant and healthy.

I have flashes of memories but they seem more like snapshots in my mind, rather than moving memories. Michael climbing a ladder to install siding three stories up, whistling his joy and so surefooted. Michael coming in the back door after a long, dirty day at work, putting his woolen plaid shirt on the back of a kitchen chair and giving me a kiss while I stirred at the stove. Michael’s deep voice singing praises to the Lord next to me on Sunday mornings. His eyes, huge and kind, fixed on me when we sat across a table together at a restaurant. Walking through the woods with him and the way he knew the names of so many plants and trees. Hiking to Carlton Peak in the fall and how he bent down to pick up a globular pod of some sort at the side of the trail, cut it open effortlessly with his Swiss army knife, and showed me the labyrinth of chambers inside, each filled with a tiny worm. Michael raving about my cooking, no matter how rave-worthy it was. The way he loved all animals, especially birds and dogs. The way it felt when I’d come into the kitchen at night after all the girls had gone to bed and see him sitting at the table with his Bible open. Michael driving. Michael laughing. Michael reassuring me. Michael kissing my cheek while we waited in the checkout line at the grocery store. Michael reading the Bible out loud during our morning devotions. Michael being able to fix anything broken in the house. Michael and I having a conversation together, me understanding him and he understanding me. Michael, full of life and spirit.

I want to write about these things because I don’t want to forget. It’s alarming to me how foggy some of my memories have become. Maybe I will have memory issues someday, who knows? I want to take these memories I have and turn them over in my mind like a jeweler inspects a fine gem, to see the perfections and the flaws beneath the facets, and let the wonder and brilliance of them blind me for a little while.

So I will share this song with you all today, because in a way that’s what listening to it does for me. It stops me right where I am and helps me reflect on the thirty three years I’ve known and loved (and fought with and despaired with and prayed with and exulted with) this man. If you have the time, I found a video with the lyrics, so if you’re not familiar with the song you can see why it touches me so deeply.

I feel like Parkinson’s and Lewy Body Dementia open the door to a very long goodbye, but I don’t want to say goodbye. Michael is still very much alive because his heart and lungs and vital systems are in good shape. But we have said goodbye to so many things, and are saying farewell to things even now.

Michael and I have lived apart for 134 days now. I have a little peace when I spend my two days a week with him and see the care and love and food and activities he is experiencing. But when I come home and I get my work done here, and the house is quiet and I wander around missing him, peace is elusive. I wonder how one weighs and sorts out the benefits of outstanding physical care and safety against the aching loneliness and emotional yearnings both of us have from this whole journey. I still can’t figure it out.

Good Tuesday morning everyone…I hope you are safe and warm and snug wherever you are. Winter walloped us yesterday and the most slippery eight inches of snow I’ve ever driven in fell all the livelong day. Tiny flakes are falling as I sit in my toile wallpapered office and type this, and the temperature on our deck is twelve degrees.

Anyone who has been in our home knows that I love toile (pronounced TWALL) and plaid. I have both everywhere in my house. They don’t exactly make the best combination in the decorating world I guess, one being French and the other Scottish. But I don’t have any professional decorators scheduled to visit, so I just keep toile-ing and plaid-ing away to my heart’s content. Actually, my heart is struggling with that contentment issue, but I’ll get to that in another post.

Here is the latest addition of toile in our home:

It’s a delightful little footstool I decided to put in front of the Glen plaid chair in our bedroom. The larger plaid chair has its own ottoman so I thought a dainty little something to rest one’s feet while sitting in the smaller chair was the next logical choice. I always think toile (or plaid) is the next logical choice.

The wreath behind the chairs was a gift from my friend Su, and it’s made from the pages of a hymnal. I love it. It’s a little too high, because a tall dresser used to sit against that wall and the wreath was right above it. I changed things around without moving the wreath. I might just leave it where it is because as I said, no professional decorators will be visiting my house in the near future (at least none to my knowledge).

You can click these photos to enlarge them if you like.

This little spot in the corner of our bedroom is where I sit and write in my gratitude journal, where I often do my CBS Bible study, and it’s where I do a lot of praying and crying.

And speaking of crying, I just learned that I have some major issues going on with my eyes. If you’re the type who doesn’t like to read endless details about middle-aged women’s maladies, here’s your warning to click away now. I’ve shared in graphic detail before about my wart-ectomy, my knee replacement surgery (with x-rays!), and now I guess it’s time to share about these faulty eyes of mine.

For about five years I’ve had exceedingly dry eyes, and the condition has only gotten worse. I’m never one to try medicines very willingly, and I know about Restasis for dry eyes but haven’t tried it. Instead I use Systane, my favorite eyedrops (I’ve tried many), and I’m very adept at quickly leaning my head back and getting one drop expertly into each eye. Days are okay, but at night when I sleep my eyes are absolutely terrible. They wake me up they’re so dry. My upper lids feel plastered to my eyeballs and I can hardly open my eyes, so about four to five times a night I wake up from the discomfort, reach to my nightstand to grab my Systane, lubricate my eyes and then go back to sleep.

Well, it has been five years since I’ve gotten new glasses. Remember them? I decided recently to have my eyes checked and pick out some new, larger, clunkier, decidedly ugly frames. I’m not even kidding. After the exam, my eye doctor wrote out the new lens prescription and then pulled his little rolling stool up close to me to have a compassionate doctor-patient chat about his findings. His findings are that I have blepharitis, Meibomian Gland Dysfunction (known as MGD), collarettes, and the beginnings of cataracts. (Are you sure you don’t want to click away now while you have the chance? No?)

Okay, here’s a picture of the Meibomian Glands each of us have on our eyelids. You can just barely see them but the arrows help. They produce the oil and mucus that help make up healthy tears (I learned there is such a thing as unhealthy, damaging tears too). Some people’s Meibomian Glands get clogged, some just malfunction and don’t keep the eyes moist for other reasons. I have an appointment now with an ophthalmologist for further assessment and perhaps he’ll tell me what the deal is with my Meibomian Glands. I didn’t even know I had Meibomian Glands until a few days ago and now I’m all Meibomian Glands this, Meibomian Glands that…

Anyway, what can happen is that icky Meibomian matter can collect cylindrically around the base of the eyelashes, and I guess my eye doctor saw some of this, and these delightful blobs are called collarettes. Here’s a photo of some. Gah. There are worse pictures but I didn’t want to ruin your day, so I linked to a mild one. Now, I can’t see my collarettes at all no matter how hard I try, so maybe (please Lord) mine are tiny. My doctor noticed them when he was peering into my eyes with a blinding light one-half inch from my face.

Here’s what should be known about this condition:

It’s incurable.

And I have to apply hot compresses to my lashes twice a day and gently scrub my lash-line with baby shampoo on a sanitized washcloth with warm water once a day, every day for the rest of my life.

What?

The hot compresses aren’t bad at all. It’s the gentle scrubbing with the supposedly non-toxic (ha) baby shampoo that isn’t working out well. I’m doing it, but it’s leaving my eyelids feeling like the Sahara desert. And I’m a little nervous that my eyelashes aren’t going to withstand even the gentlest treatments, day after day, year after year. I don’t feel like I’m particularly vain (being fifty-seven and hefty helps with this), but I have to be honest: the thought of losing some or a lot of my eyelashes makes me almost want to cry. I have never once aspired to the reptilian look.

And the reason all this is so important? It’s not just for Collarette Clearing. It’s because evidently collarettes can be tiny, wonderfully hospitable breeding grounds for staphylococcus, which likes to invade the closed eyes during sleep each night.

Many things can cause dry eyes. Menopause, immune system issues, certain eye surgeries. I hope to learn more at the upcoming appointment with the ophthalmologist. I’ve been reading online and decided I’d seen my quota there. Maybe I’ll end up trying Restasis after all, and all these conditions will go away. I can hope.

Back to the weather.

Here’s what happened yesterday as I was inching down a steep, snow-covered street not far from our house.

There were over 100 accidents in our city yesterday and I was in one of them. There was a pileup of crashed cars at the bottom of the street we were on, and I was going about three miles an hour, trying to ease down the incline as slowly as possible in order to get home. About half way down the street my car just took off and my brakes were useless. The folks standing around their already crashed cars at the bottom of the hill saw me sledding toward them and high-stepped and scampered out of the way, and BOOM, I hit the back of a Honda CR-V, which had plowed into a Toyota 4-Runner minutes before. Thank the Lord, no one was hurt! And no one was cranky, and the police were already there and saw it happen and cheerfully gave us all our accident reports to submit to our insurance companies. I was the only car that didn’t need to be towed.

I drove the half mile home going about one mile per hour and with the hood bent in half, and I didn’t care. There were still two steep streets to drive down before getting to our street, and I wanted to make it home without another collision. My grandson and one of our Fosters were in the car with me and when we finally parked the car in the garage and walked into the house we raised our hands and cheered and thanked God out loud over and over. Safe at home.

Then I turned on the soundtrack to Little Women, lit the fire in the dining room fireplace, hung up my coat and put my slippers on, poured a cup of tea, and gave thanks again.

I have more to share, but the tow truck will be here soon, and then the rental car company after that, to pick me up and take me to their office so I can rent a car while mine is being fixed.

I hope your week is blessed,

Sara took this picture when she visited Michael last Saturday, and I thought I would share. She told me that her visits with him now are much quieter, since Michael’s ability to make himself understood continues to fade. So she decided to hug him many times during the visit. Not just a hello hug and a goodbye hug, but lots of hugs all throughout the hours of her visit.

When I went up to spend the day with him on Sunday, Michael and I were sitting together in front of one of the aviaries where we love to watch the colorful birds. After a while I asked, “How was your visit with Sara yesterday?” And he nodded and smiled, indicating how much he enjoyed seeing her. Then Michael said, with great effort and the smallest amount of volume, and the sweetest look on his face, “She hugged me.”

Since waking up to twenty-eight degrees this morning reminds me that winter is coming soon to northeastern Minnesota, we might as well dream for a while about spending winter in another beautiful place.

If I had my druthers, perhaps we would spend winter in a little
Norwegian village like this…..

…and when the hustle and bustle of this maddeningly busy place started feeling like an emotional drain, then we could go stay for a while in our little cabin up the fjord…

…and of course Michael would be well again and he and I would enjoy
the hearty Norwegian fare…

…he would eat this pickled herring…

…and I would politely decline the fish, concentrate on not rudely wrinkling my nose, and would happily dine on this…

…and then Michael and I would notice that it was getting dark at 3:00 p.m. because we were so far north, and we would yawn and stretch and go to bed early, in these….

…and then after settling down in Norway, Michael would do what he loves to do, and start putting out piles of corn for these…

…and I would be so well-rested and content I would knit all the time in our little fjord cabin, would become an expert knitter within a month, and then
I would make myself one of these and wear it every day…

…and when the days lengthened and the snow melted, Michael and I would hike down to the valley and do this….

…but no matter how much Michael tried to convince me, I would never, ever do this….

…and then we would want to share the beauty and tranquility with our family, so we would send them all plane tickets to come and stay for a month in breathtaking Norway, and our only demand would be that they would have to dress like this…

…and even though they might resist wearing these clothes at first, the pickled herring and steep valley fjords and the soft sounds of trolls’ footsteps in the night and the pure water and the sheer grandeur of such a beautiful place would help them adjust, and in no time at all they would be doing this….

…but that’s only if I had my druthers…

Below is a photo taken by the Hubble Telescope, of approximately 10,000 galaxies. (Not planets, but entire, vast galaxies.) Scientists estimate that there are at least 100 billion galaxies in the observable universe. (Photo credit NASA.)

“All that I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator
for all I have not seen.”

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

*         *         *         *          *         *

I’ve been taking my gratitude journal very seriously these past months. I may not write in it every single day, but it’s always out, always at hand so I can sit down to record in black and white the gifts God bestows on me. I number the things I’m saying thank you to God for too. I’m in the four thousands now, and I know that this spiritual practice is something I will do until I die, or until for some reason, I’m no longer able.

A dear friend asked me recently if I ever gave thanks for something twice and I said yes! I’m sure there are duplicates in amongst the four thousand gifts, because a chickadee at my window feeder doesn’t thrill me once, it thrills me again and again. And if my husband has a calm day in September and I thank God for that, I’m certainly going to thank Him again in October for another good day.

Being thankful for one thing
can lead to gratitude about other things.

A simple example is the way color affects me. I might be sitting in my bedroom chair with my feet up on the ottoman, wrapped in the prayer shawl Sharon dyed and knitted for me, and I might have my gratitude journal open on my lap. I might be sitting there quietly, pondering the ways God has blessed me in that moment, and my eyes might fall on one of my favorite pillows, a decorative, deep cardinal red pillow I sometimes put on my bed when I actually make it. That deep red arrests my eyes and I stare, so happy to see such a color. I might write down in my journal, 3941) thank you for the deep, gorgeous red on that pillow.

And then another thank you comes from that: 3942) You have given me sight today, Lord. Thank you.

And then the very basic senses might come to mind and from the gift of sight I think of the gift of the sense of smell, which I lost years ago and was told by an ENT physician would most certainly never come back, and I might write 3943) thank you that I can smell Lord! Thank you for restoring that to me!

And then the next one comes easily and I might write 3944) the smell of Miriam’s head, Lord! Oh you’ve outdone yourself there! Thank you. Deep, tearful thank you.

And after I ponder the smell of Miriam’s head for a while and think about what a lavish gift she is, I might think about how much her siblings love her already, how she has smiled little smiles for her family, how God has a plan for her precious life already, and so on.

Can you see what I mean by thanks begetting thanks? I sit and I write them down, one after the other, and I believe that each one is from God’s hand, given to me that day, because He loves me and is watching over me. (see James 1:17).

These Chinese lanterns are part of a fall arrangement Sara did in a dark blue Le Creuset pitcher that sits on our dining room table. I look at them every day and give thanks for their bright, unique beauty, and that God lets me see them.

Now, I believe the opposite is true as well. Ingratitude breeds more ingratitude. I have lived this also. And it’s not like I’ve got this thanksgiving thing all nailed down. Life still stuns me with its one-after-the-other hardships and tragedies. There are many times when yet another truly desperate thing seems to be added to my plate and my first inward response is a doubting, cynical, “Really? Seriously? This too? A very ill and increasingly demented husband isn’t enough? X, Y and Z isn’t enough sorrow?” I am sorry to say I have such snarky attitudes but I do. Maybe it’s for that very thing that I am so committed to the spiritual discipline of recording things for which to be grateful. Because I’m often truly blind to God and His ways, and need new lenses put on the eyes of my heart every single day.

And here is a sobering truth and an effective motivation for directing your heart and mind to be grateful every day:

“For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.”  

The twenty-first verse in the first chapter of Romans tells me what can happen to a person who knows the Lord, but refuses to give Him thanks:

They would become futile in their thinking, and their foolish heart would be darkened.

Shall I add futile thinking and a darkened heart to my life right now? No. I will not do that.

More than the strong warning in Romans 1:21, though, is a desire I have to bring some happiness or joy to the Lord. I have certainly caused Him some disappointment with the way I’ve lived the life He’s given me. I want to bring a smile to His beautiful face. What in the world can we give the One who made and owns everything? We can’t give him a bouquet of flowers or a new puppy or a treasure of gold and jewels, because those are already His.

But we can give Him something that would bring Him pleasure that not many people are willing to do, and that is our hearts of gratitude, pouring out thanks to Him for all He does for us and gives to us each day.

Is it sometimes a difficult thing to record little blessings when huge catastrophes are all around us? Without a doubt. But we can still do it. And it makes a huge difference in our lives. And I believe it matters to God and blesses Him.

I’m also thankful for a little spot on the web to share my thoughts, struggles, dreams and joys, thankful that a few readers take time in their day to stop in and read, thankful for so many of you who have extended the beautiful hand of friendship to me and have prayed for my family.

May God bless your day with a hundred things to record in your gratitude journal,