You never can tell what direction a day will take when you first open your eyes and greet the morning, with or without enthusiasm. This past week I have added prayer to my morning routine. As soon as Dave heads for the shower, I turn on my bedside light and reach for my little book of daily centering prayers. They are short, simple and direct; gently guiding me to tune my mind into the right station before my feet hit the floor. My goal is to acheive the opposite of “garbage in; garbage out” focusing on “good in; good out” instead. With five days under my belt, I think I’m on to something.
My first project of the day was to go to the post office to mail off the pile of invitations I’ve been working on for a local dinner sponsored by Habitat for Humanity to rally community support. I’ve spent some long hours at my laptop, burrowing into local websites and Googling to amass my list. I spent hours designing and finally printing out the invitations and matching evelopes so by the time I was sliding them into the local and out of town slots at the post office, I felt I’d really accomplished something and was ready for the next task.
Today, that task was going to be in the form of addressing some housework that had been sorely neglected while I was doing my volunteer job. I’d planned on finally mopping the floors and clearing some clutter. But, as the saying goes, ” the best laid plans….”
Soon after I returned from the post office, my friend Vanya called to chat. We usally FaceTime on Tuesday and Thursday mornings but our routine has been compromised lately for a variety of reasons. We were due for a talk.
I went into the family room to sit and relax while we talked when I noticed the sound of running water coming from my upstairs bathroom. Hmmmm. I knew the load in the washer had ended. There shouldn’t have been any water running anywhere up there, or down here for that matter. I decided to investigate.
As I drew closer to my bathroom, I could hear the faucet in the garden tub running. What I found was something I never expected to see; the tub almost full to the point of over-flowing and all the plants I’d lovingly placed on the bottom of the tub to save them from the kittens, were floating in a pool of emusified potting soil, liberated leaves, a Longerberger basket and a purpleTopsy Turvy hair towel thrown in for a little color. It was a good thing I got there when I did, because even though the drain stopper was up, the drain itself was clogged from the debris. I turned off the water, removed the plants to a drier place and opened the drain with the aid of my trusty plunger. How did this come to pass? My only guess is KITTENS!
My mother keeps telling me how lucky I am to have to opportunity to see the two of them at play and for the most part, I have to agree. There are other times however, when they are prowling the house that they remind me of the evil velosoraptures in the first Jurassic Park movie; their sleek dark bodies and bright, intellegent eyes, drinking in everything and learning from every experience. But, more times than not, they will end a tear through the house by running up my chest and rubbing their little heads against my chin. What’s a mother to do?
Tomorrow I will finally take them back to the shelter to go off on an “adoption event” this weekend. I may never see them again. It hurts to see them go, but it is time.
The second part of my day that was unexpected was the call from my daughter Maggie telling me that her father-in-law, Arwed, was killed this morning in an accident. She had little information other than that and was on her way home to meet up with Jan. I was in shock. How could it be? How horrible for his wife Teresa, his children, Jan and Isolde, Maggie and for all of us who knew and loved him. How could it be?
My filthy tub moved way down on the priority list, I began my calls. I called Andy first, so he could comfort Maggie and then I called Teresa.
At first I wasn’t sure I should. Would she want to hear from me? After a few moments of wrestling with myself, I picked up my cell and pushed “call” by her name. I’d figured I’d probably get a machine and leave a comforting message so when she picked up right away, I was a bit shakey but that was okey; she was very shakey too. I let her tell me the story of what had happened to Arwed and how unexpected his death was. They were going to celebrate their 30th wedding anniversary this year with a big party. “So many plans”, she said.
For the remainder of the day I have made calls to other family members to pass along the news but in the inbetween times, I’ve been very quiet. My whole body feels like I’m weeping and my eyes feel heavy and wet. A voice in my head told me to go back to the prayer that started my day. When I re-read it, the words took on new meaning:
God is love.
We come from God.
We return to God and in between we become love.
All things come and go. Love endures forever.
Amen.