Quiet Morning

My mornings are usually full of sounds.  Usually, the radio is playing, the Weatherman is reporting the forecast and the Newswoman is reporting the latest headlines.  But this morning, I catch a quiet morning.  I listen to the coffee pot dripping, the low whirr of the ceiling fans, and the quiet crackle of the fire in the stove.  The house is quiet for a few minutes and I settle in to listen.

The sound of a household waking up, is a familiar one to many of us.  They may all sound different, but there are the typical wake up sounds of showers, feet on the floor, and doors opening and shutting.  I wonder what it would sound like to listen to a community wake up.  I’m sure there are those daily familiar sounds of cars starting, trash going to the curb, and garage doors opening.  Inside my house, I don’t really hear those things; insulation is a very handy invention. 

I’ve been reading through the Old Testament lately, revisiting the places of Jacob, Moses, and Abraham.  So I find myself wondering this morning, what were the sounds of the people who had fled Egypt – what did the camp sound like waking up?  There were so many of them, estimates around 2 million.  To put that in perspective, it’s a bit under the population of the estimated state population of Iowa.  Without the insulation that lets me sleep late on occasion and also keeps me unaware of those many sounds, I would hear so much more.  In a tent city, as this would have been for this great population, it would have been even noisier.  Babies hungry for an early morning feeding, neighbor dogs barking, the early risers up stirring and preparing for the work of the day, they would have been just a few of the sounds heard every day by these people.  I wonder what they thought as they lay on the edge of sleep and wakefulness, listening to the sounds of waking up.  

The Countdown – Is It Too Early?

With less than fifty days till Christmas, I am hearing a variety of complaints that it is just too early with the Thanksgiving holiday coming and going in the ‘tween of now and the evergreen decked holiday.  Personally, I love fall and have no wish to hurry though the changing colors and the songs of the leaves scattering through the yard.  At the same time, I love Christmas.  The sounds, and smells, and the beautiful decorations!  So, what about that “rule” of when the decorations should go up?  Is there really any truth to it or is it just a bit of grumpy bunk of some people who just need some extra turkey?

So, with a chuckle and a scent of turkey, evergreen, and a wood fire I think of the concept of the Thanksgiving to Christmas timeline.  Skipping the whole shopping center décor (which is a matter of marketing, product movement, and economic studies), my own home will soon be the subject of a vigorous pre-Christmas cleaning before decorating.  That’s right folks – the trees (yes, there are quite a few more than one), will be up before the Thanksgiving turkey is thawed. 

That doesn’t mean I will be skipping the holiday of remembering the action of giving thanks.  Rather, it is that the attitude of giving thanks should be a daily one, not dependent upon the calendar.  I challenge those who are taking it upon themselves to be thankful daily during November to make it an opportunity instead of forming a habit of gratitude.  God is good, each day, every moment.  Now, I am a great grumbler, I think I would have fit right in with the Israelites.  So, this is a habit I am also working on.  Instead, let me give thanks for each day, each breath. 

Psalm 92:1-2 “It is good to praise the Lord and make music to your name, O Most High, proclaiming your love in the morning and your faithfulness at night…”

So while not skipping Thanksgiving, and taking my time to love Christmas, I also am thinking of Mary and preparing for the birth of Christ.  Nine months of preparation… yeah, she definitely started her preparation before Thanksgiving.  (Yes, I know that there was no Thanksgiving holiday in her lifetime).  But, truly think about it – her preparation did start a long time before the month before birth.  What about a nine month celebration?  Or at least a two month celebration?  After all, the stars that the shepherds saw in the sky were planned far before Thanksgiving. 

Regardless of when you start celebrating, let’s just start celebrating.  Giving thanks for the many blessings, the many mercies of our Great God.  

Down the Side Streets

Driving through small towns, I think side streets are so interesting.  Main Street gets the focus, the chamber attention, and little groups of community involved spirit.  Beyond that main focal point, there are side streets.  They don’t get the same drive through focus, but have many other little indicators of town flavor.  Potted plants, picket fences, wreathes, and the last of the fall flowers are arranged around mailboxes and cars parked in driveways.  Even though the focal attention is on main street, the town’s story is played out on the side streets and alley ways.

Back in town, I drive past alley ways and side streets to get to work.  In the last few days of misty fall rain, as the leaves have been pasted to streets and miscellaneous objects, the roadways have taken on a special kind of painted appeal.  Driving to work yesterday, I thought about how the side streets of a little town are kind of like the stories in life.  Main Street is the public view, the part that is carefully arranged for the view of the world.  My make-up is on, hair is done, the right shoes, etc…   But, the side streets are where the stories are that make up the interest.  Some of them are full of the scent of sweet memories, the sounds of laughter, and the lights of many candles, wood fires, and Christmas tree lights.  There are a few of the side streets that are darker, tattered and have tissues instead of the bright leaves.  But, I am relentlessly cleaning those out, steadily and slowly installing lamp posts along the way.  There are side streets with music, singing and instruments.  Don’t enter that one unless you are prepared for song to be interrupting your conversation at any moment, and in public.

 

No matter whether it is Main Street or on the side street, it is good to know that I don’t travel them alone.  

Crashing Rhythms

   I once had a percussion instructor who believed that just about everything in our planet, and our lives had a rhythm.   The speed of the wind blowing….

I started writing this a few days ago, and since then the rhythm that has picked up in our lives hit an unexpected and new fast paced rhythm.  It hardly seems possible that just over a week ago; I was standing in a field with prairie dogs all around, barking and chirping to each other.  Then, we received a phone call that caused heart rates to pick up, and the relaxed rhythm of a vacation to swing into a staccato roll of forward movement.

Hospital… Stroke… Stable… Doctor… 

My grandfather had suffered from a stroke and was on his way to the large regional hospital for care.  Plans changed, we packed our bags, and headed home immediately.

The week to follow has been a blur, fast moving combinations have accompanied us.  Hospital, the tat-a-tat fast paced rhythm has moved to a steady and sweet pulse of caregivers who are seeking to bring healing and renewed strength to my grandfather.  Encouragement has changed the staccato to a steady heart beat, familiar and encouraging. 

Stroke, a new rhythm that is unfamiliar and moves at a speed that is hard to keep up with.  New vocabulary, new tests to understand, research; adrenaline rushed rhythms move into ones that are lagging with tired steps.   Yet, slowly a normalcy of pace resumes, with a few helpful naps allowed for.  The information comes, dropping in place slowly and filling in the syncopated feeling into more of a swing beat.

So many rhythms and changes in tempo have occurred.  In the midst of this, with rhythms that have felt more impacting than ones to be walked along with, I have been having a different rhythm in my head.  It is from a song that I love, “Never Going to Steal My Joy” by Mandisa.  If you aren’t familiar with it, I would highly suggest a quick Google look-up.  It is the strength in the words that I love, the staunch stance that though the rhythms may change or be those which crash in on us quickly and seem overpowering.  And while I think of those songs, I remember standing on the mountain, at a beautiful and quiet peaceful lake, with gentle sweet rhythms. 

In the peaceful movement of God’s rhythm of the crashing waves of life, I am reminded of someone who experienced crashing rhythms of his own.  David, as he penned what we call Psalm 121, was making his own declaration that amidst the rhythms that come at us syncopated, staccato, rushing, and tumbling, that there is Someone who is not thrown by the tympanic changes.

    Psalm 121

    I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.

    My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth.

    He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber.

    Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.

    The LORD is thy keeper: the LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand.

    The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.

    The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul.

    The LORD shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for     

    evermore.

A Dragon’s Breath and Small Towns

The last few days have gone much too quickly, as the scenes have passed the car window.  Fumaroles and steep snow covered mountains have given way to rolling pine covered hills and a new town.  The parks are overwhelming in their grandeur.  The vast sizes of the landscape, where the next turn shows something new and then the next and the next, quickly has become overwhelming for me.  Sitting at Jenny Lake, watching the clear water lap against the rocky shore, and listening to the quiet of the place, I have felt completely overwhelmed as the thought occurs to me, if this is earth – what must heaven be like?

 

From the quiet of a lake shore to the fumaroles area of a Dragon’s Breath, I was fascinated by the steam moving against the cavern walls with such power that it created powerful waves.  An eco-system in a microcosm exists as the water is pushed out and then is distributed through a series of small chambers and caverns, filling small pools and then draining them.  They are left steaming from the scalding liquids and receiving another layer of mineral wash.  The sound of the water and steam sounds like a heart-beat.  It is as if the earth itself is opening a portal to hear her heart beat, slow and steady.

Leaving the caldera of Yellowstone, we moved through a series of small towns across Wyoming.  It was great to see towns, ranging from a population of around twenty five to nearly thirty thousand, spring up against the cattle dotted landscape.  So many little towns, remaining unknown to the majority of us, are scattered across the country.  They are a back bone of the country, in providing a variety of crops and products.  We saw production areas of benzonite and coal mines.  Cattle grazed among petroleum pumps with herds of antelope.  Beautiful horses ran down a sage covered slope, tossing their heads in the wind.  Post Offices, a restaurant, and  a city hall become the main features in the small areas.  Sometimes, they are all combined into one spot.  A really inventive entrepreneur combined a coffee shop and auto place.  I thought that was pretty well thought out, enjoy your coffee while you wait for an oil change.  Rivers and streams cut through land, helping to feed fields of potatoes and other crops. 

Oh beautiful land, I cannot wait to see what is along the next corner.

A Couch in a Field

Yesterday took us from the train yards of Cheyenne, Wyoming to the Tetons of Jackson Hole, Wyoming.  The scenery along the way was beautiful, changing from hills dotted with blue tinged sage bushes to mountains trimmed in pristine white.  Cattle poked along through the sage, munching and walking.  Except one white faced bull, he found a good spot to rub its chin on the fence and looked very content.  The trees slowly became more populous, and the pines stood higher, flecked with tiny cones. 

Among all of the sights, smells, and views, there was a couch in one of the fields.  Out with the cows, in the middle of a ranch, with no buildings around, sat a couch.  I didn’t give it much thought during the day, just that it seemed kind of a different place to put a couch.  But, then evening came. 

When I was last in the Teton area, we were camping.  I walked out of the laundry house and looked up at the night sky.  It was a sky I had never seen before – the Milky Way was spilled across the sky in brilliant color.  I couldn’t keep from staring, mouth agape, doing some sort of a happy dance there in the dusty drive. 

Knowing that we were coming back to this area, I have been dreaming of that sky.  So, last night, Dad and I headed out to the National Elk Refuge.  Driving out past the lights of town, we kept out an eye for elk, and kept moving away from the lights.  Then, sitting in the van, heater running, we waited.  Slowly the sun went down.  A moth came to visit a few times, fluttering against my window (and causing me to jump at the unexpected movement).  Eventually, the sky darkened, the stars came out.  Hello to the sky that I had missed seeing.  Oh, the stars – I never knew there were so many! 

Now I have a different idea about the couch in the field.  What a perfect spot to star gaze.

Misleading Distances

Yesterday was the first day of vacation, and after putting some loose ends behind us, we headed out on a long drive to Cheyenne, Wyoming.  As we traveled, I thought of the pioneers who moved across the west in wagon trains.  As they were full of hope and tired feet, I kept looking out and wondering what they thought of this land.  While creeks are still prominent and the land was rich for growing crops, I can see them looking at this with a sense of future potential.  Then, farther west, as the cliffs starting cropping out of the lands, maybe it was those who dreamed of raising cattle who saw the land as a place of opportunity. 

I did wonder, as the lands flatten out and distances are misleading, how that struck these travelers.  As they crossed the flat stretches, they would have seen for days in front of them what was next to travel.  But, I wondered if that was a comfort of knowing what was ahead, or a discouragement of perhaps not seeing the hills grow any closer. 

Distance can be misleading.  It can seem that the next turn, (metaphorically now), in life should be right now.   But, there it is way off in the shadowy haze of the horizon.  “How long Lord?” is a question I’m sure many lips have asked crossing through this land, and through life. 

But, the hills are growing closer and last night we even spotted mountains in the distance, rising up out of the plains.  I think I found my song to fit them, “Angels we have heard on high, sweetly singing o’er the plains.  And the mountains in reply, echo back their glorious strain.  Gloria!”  Gloria indeed for a beautiful land, so diverse as we move through it.  What a beautiful way to kick off vacation, with realizing the diversity our earth has within it.