I’ll probably delete this in the morning.
Two black cats perch atop the lintel that leads into the dining room. One sits upright with a calm and contemplative air. The other is bent over, looking down, paws out, tail up, ready to grab whate’er may pass by. Together, they keep watch.
Christmas is coming!
Those cats are going to catch this post and delete it in the morning.
There’s a permanent cardinal outside our dining room window. It was my grandfather’s cardinal, and now it’s ours. I can look out the window on the dullest, grayest day and see that bright bird defying the narrative of the clouds.
All praise be to God.
I’ll delete this decidedly impermanent post in the morning.
I received a gift from a dear friend for my birthday, a lovely blank book with thick homemade paper, a book that says “Enter in and create!”
Note the fingerprint stain toward the bottom, my first act of creation being to get chocolate on it.
The very wordy book title – you’d expect no less from me if you’ve read my blog at all. “The Book of Small Musings, Random Ideas, Poetic Thoughts, Ink Drawings, and Humble Paintings.” A mouthful for sure. I should be careful about overpromising and underdelivering (probably too late for that).
I also got a new palette of paints for my birthday, Complexions. I tried them out on the first page of this book.
BEHOLD! A new palette of paints,
hues of complexions,
Skin tones of black, brown, red, pink, peach and yellow.
We look like a bouquet of earth colors
When we’re all together.
That’s all folks!
I’ll probably get a random idea or poetic thought about deleting this in the morning.
Christmas music plays quietly in the background as I write this. The day is still dark, the room lit up by the Christmas tree. I just read the entire book of Ephesians in one sitting and am filled with wonder at the kindness of God in making me one of His own, one of His beloved. So let’s start off with something from that book, a prayer that I would pray for you if I knew you, especially if I knew that you were still wandering in darkness.
I pray also that the eyes of your heart would be enlightened, that you may know the hope to which He has called you, the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, and His incomparably great power toward us who believe.
Ephesians 1:18-19
I remember reading through Ephesians as a new Christian and being absolutely transported by the beauty, eloquence and poetry of Paul’s prose. And the Holy Spirit gave them wings in my heart.
I promise you that joy
runs deeper than despair.
Corrie Ten Boom
Repeat those words often when you need them.
If you want to know where your heart is,
look to where your mind goes when it wanders.
Walt Whitman
Very revealing!
The best way to shorten winter is to prolong Christmas.
GK Chesterton
And now, a quote from the poet Luci Shaw, who died on December 1 of this year.
Planting seeds
inevitably
changes my feelings
about rain.
Luci Shaw
So much packed into so few words – that’s fine wordsmithy right there.
I’ll probably delete this in the morning…or will I?
It’s after bedtime, which means a short post is in order:
Luna’s warm body is next to me on the chair. My feet are cold. I wonder what she’d do if I tried to drape her over my feet for warmth? I suspect it wouldn’t end well. The purring would stop, for sure. I guess I can endure cold feet for a purring cat.
This green-eyed post will have to quit purring in the morning.
I read about a writing prompt recently. The idea is to observe or notice one thing and then write a sentence or two (or more) about it. You can go back later and add more if inspired. Then you do that four more times. The examples in the essay I read were positively lyrical and amazingly deep. I decided to try it for a while and see what percolates. Nothing lyrical or deep emerged, but it’s early days. Here’s today’s batch:
1. I’m sorting through a bin of old clothes and it’s a bit like sorting through memories. I’ve kept some of these clothes under the delusion that I’ll be able to wear some of them again in that mystical future in which I’ve lost enough weight. Others have sentimental value. I see reminders of a mission trip with our two youngest, a family camp trip (those wonderful days!), a thinner version of myself, Christmases of yore…even an ancient shirt from my youth with my initials affixed to the back, a gift from a friend.
2. Binoculars sit on a stool by the window. We use these to see if our mail has been delivered. No sense getting all our winter gear on to get the mail if it hasn’t arrived yet.
3. I wear two rings: my wedding band on the left hand and my replacement engagement ring on the right (lost the diamond out of the first one some years ago). Promises made, promises kept. The Lord has been kind to us.
4. The large bluebird cross stitch piece on the wall was a labor of love from my sister, a project she gave herself a couple months to complete and which took over a year. How does one quantify that kind of love?
5. The clock on the wall says 12:00 noon. Time to put my contacts in and go to the pool to swim 18 laps. It’s cold out. Must I go? (Yes.)
1 The post needs to be written.
2 The post is written.
3 The post needs a photo, just because.
4 Post is published!
5 It must be deleted in the morning.
Every owl
Knows how to scowl
Like every ant
Knows how to crawl
Every owl
Knows how to hunt
Like every pig
Knows how to grunt
Every owl
Knows how to fly
Like every snake
Knows how to lie
Every owl
Can twist its neck
Like every bird
Knows how to peck
Every owl
Can call out “Whoo!”
So tell me now,
What can YOU do?
Every blog post knows how to be deleted. This one is no exception.
Unwrapped gifts are stacked in a corner, while unkempt rolls of wrapping paper lounge carelessly on the couch. The two groups are destined to meet. And soon.
But you didn’t come here for my pithy observations. Let’s attend to the business of reading this week’s quotes in my book.
Christians have nothing to be smug about;
we are not righteous people trying to correct the unrighteous.
Just one beggar telling another beggar
where to find bread.
R.C. Sproul
And if you don’t know where to find the bread of life, crack open that dusty old Bible that lies forgotten on your shelf, turn to the Gospel of John chapter 6, and commence eating.
It was only a sunny smile
and little it cost in giving,
but like morning light
it scattered the night
and made the day worth living.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
The power of a sunny smile to vanquish the darkness in somebody else’s day.
We do not draw people to Christ by loudly discrediting what they believe, by telling them how wrong they are and how right we are, but by showing them a light that is so lovely that they want with all their hearts to know the source of it.
Madeleine L’Engle
Ponder that one for a minute or so with me.
Cultivate the holy habit
of seeing the hand of God
in everything that happens to you.
Arthur W. Pink
Cultivating is a work of hoes, dirt, sweat and calluses. But in the end, ah, what a garden you have.
Be thankful for the thorns and thistles
which keep you from being in love with this world.
Charles Spurgeon
I’ll probably loudly discredit this post in the morning.
The word “olio” comes up surprisingly often in crossword puzzles. It means “a miscellaneous collection of things,” or “hodgepodge.” Let that inform you as to the nature of what follows.
Sunsets, sunrises…I still run out in my slippers to capture them.
Pastels overlaid with the rough darkness of trees. Never gets old.
I thought this flower had a definite celebratory look to it. Or perhaps a head of disorganized hair. Don’t you love how it lights up the photo? I do!
I’ll tell you, old age is severe upon the plant world. These were beautiful in their prime. Still, they put on a very interesting farewell, unashamed of their desiccated state. The Lord giveth; the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the named of the Lord.
Obviously, these were all taken before the change of seasons, before frost, cold and snow scrubbed away the green and gold of autumn.
To everything there is a season
and a time to every purpose under the heaven.
A time to be born,
and a time to die,
A time to plant,
and a time to pluck up that which is planted.
Ecclesiastes 3:1-2
And a time to delete this…in the morning.
I’ve now entered the puffin phase of my artistic endeavors. Or rather, I’ve re-entered, having dabbled in some puffinry back in 2020 (Puffin Post). And then there was a poem I wrote in which a puffin played a significant part (See: The P Birds).
When I see photos of puffins, I think the Lord must have been in a whimsical mood when He created them.
Plus, and hold onto your hat for this one: their babies are called “pufflings.” I did NOT make that up, but almost wish I had. In my fertile imagination, these would be so fun to have around, adorable little pets waddling to you with their adorable orange feet, making their adorable puffin noises with their adorable orange beaks. Sadly, puffins do not inhabit my part of the world, and I’m sure not going to go to theirs, so we shall have to remain strangers. It’s better that way. It’s very unlikely that they would live up to what I’ve imagined them to be like.
Is that a memoir that you’d read? If so, I’ll hunt down Mr. Polite Puffin (who could, I admit, be Mrs. Polite Puffin. It’s hard to tell) and do an interview.
More puffins will be coming. A page of pufflings might be on the way.
I’ll have to huffin and puffin and blow this one down in the morning.
Advent season has just begun…
Leaning into the breathlessness of waiting,
Embracing silence in order to hear,
Letting the darkness look like hope instead of despair,
And resting in the promises of light to come.
That’s just me talking, though. There’s better places to go to hear about waiting, silence, darkness, hope and light.
The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
Those who dwell in the land of the shadow of death,
Upon them a light has shined.
Isaiah 9:2
Quietude, which some men cannot abide
because it reveals their inward poverty,
is as a palace of cedar to the wise,
for along its hallowed courts
the King in his beauty
deigns to walk.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
The devil has made it his business
to monopolize on three elements:
noise,
hurry,
crowds.
He will not allow quietness.
Elisabeth Elliot
Comfort, comfort ye my people
Speak ye peace, thus saith our God;
Comfort those who sit in darkness,
Bowed beneath their sorrow’s load.
Speak ye to Jerusalem
Of the peace that waits for them;
Tell her that her sins I cover,
And her warfare now is over.
Johannes Olearius
There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tower high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach.
JRR Tolkien, Lord of the Rings
Unto him who is able to keep us from falling,
and lift us from the dark to the bright mountain of hope,
from the midnight of desperation to the daybreak of joy,
to him be the power and authority forever and ever.
Martin Luther
My soul, wait silently for God alone,
For my expectation is from Him.
Psalm 62:5
Blessings on your collective heads.
I’ll probably delete this in the quiet of the morning.
Lynniebeemuseoday 