For my entire life, I have had a prayer habit. For my entire life, I have also been afraid of God. Not the fear full of awe. The distrustful fear of a person who has been hurt.
The God I was introduced to was never satisfied with me just the way I was. I assumed if I prayed for guidance, that when God answered, it would be with a demand for change on my part. Never mind that when I’ve actually asked for and received guidance, the most clear and meaningful messages I got were those of reassurance and acceptance.
I’m tired of having to choose what to do with my limited resources. I’m spending a lot of time cleaning and fixing things, because it’s satisfying and doesn’t require me to be very creative.
A hole mended, a hinge repaired, a pile of crumbs vacuumed, does not a blog post make. I didn’t even realize I hadn’t posted for all of February until the month was over.
I’m thinking of a woman I passed on my way into the grocery store with an aggressively bad side shave – I’ve seen the look before, it’s usually a kind of buzzed or shaved rectangle over one ear with the rest of the hair left long.
When you think about sorting your belongings before your death to ease the burden on those who come after you…
Does it make you feel uncomfortable? Or do you think, hmm, that’s a good idea? Or are you like those people who are finish Christmas shopping by November and you’re thinking, I’ve already done that?
I read The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning by Margareta Magnusson because I’m curious about the concept. I felt that having the death cleaning framework in my mind might inform the way I keep house right now.
A few years ago, I wrote a post about a high school classmate of mine and what our friendship had meant to me.
This fall, that classmate passed away.
He wasn’t the first of my graduating class to cross over, but he was the first that I knew well enough to feel the loss.
He had married outside of our friend circle and most of us didn’t hear about the ceremony that was held in his honor until after it had taken place. Grief circled around me with no place to land.
