Life is Beautiful

I apologize to everyone who comes to my house after dark, but we are without a porch light. 

Early this spring, I noticed bits of glass accumulating on my porch.  The glass fixture covering our porch light had a panel broken out of it months previously.  I'd cleaned it up when it first broke so found it odd to suddenly see more glass. 

A few days later I understood where the glass was coming from.  Apparently some of the glass had landed inside the light fixture when the panel broke, and a swallow couple had cleared the objectionably sharp debris from the location they had chosen to build their nest.  Sweet as it was to see a nest in my porch light fixture, I didn't think it belonged there so I pulled the nest out. 

My heart melted to see and feel the tender nest.  It was built out of the softest twigs money can't buy and padded with downy dryer lint.  I set the nest in my flower bed and watched.  Within a short time, the nest was rebuilt in my porch light.  I removed the bulb to make more room for its occupants.  Today I noticed four tiny eggs in the center of the nest. 

I love life.

Happy Easter.

The re-birth of spring is a beautiful time to celebrate the rebirth of Christ's resurrection.  Every day is a brand new start; every bad moment can be made right thanks to God's healing power.  Life is beautiful.

 Sputnik

The darling kits came and went while No-name grew to his full size.  People stopped and watched No-name and his buddies pile in a heap to sleep, or bound about the cage in a frolic.  Once in a while, someone would ask to hold the critters who populated his cage.  No-name watched with his probing, red eyes as his companions were lovingly toted away.  He could barely remember his life outside this tiny compartment, but he'd come across the country from the Marshall Ferret Farm.

Months passed and a mother and son came to pick out a ferret.  They held him a moment and then they chose his sable-colored cousin with the irresistible bandit-masked face, even though he heard the clerk offer to sell him at a discount.  He heard himself described as a hard-to-sell albino.  As the mother and son turned their back on him, he flopped himself on the floor of his cage, peering out of dejected eyes, his body and spirit sinking low. 

The next day, the mother and son returned; something about him called to them.  No-name was lifted out of the cage and put into a cardboard box.  He scratched like crazy to get out and after a nauseating ride he was released into a strange new world.  There was his masked cousin, now named Snickers.  He heard himself being called Sputnik, which means "Companion." 

Sputnik was determined to solve the puzzle of how to free himself from his new cage.  He clamped down on the bars and used his strong jaws to rattle them lose.  The cage could no longer retain his free spirit. 

Sputnik's exuberance quickly overpowered Snickers, so he looked to the people who shared his abode.  Whenever someone entered the room, he'd enthusiastically take up a fighting stance, challenging the person towering above him:  his playful gaze effectively saying, "Put up your dukes!"  The mother could never resist this challenge.  She'd drop down on all fours and laugh delightedly, ruffling up his white fur.  Sputnik would back away just out of reach, then lunge forward getting a belly rub, and then dive into a hiding place. 

He had so much life packed in his perky little body.  Playful as an otter, handsome as a miniature polar bear, he charmed the household.  But sometimes the people were too busy to play and he would sink onto the floor, looking up at them with a mysterious combination of bright, disappointed eyes.  

He LOVED the outdoors.  He could slide right out of the harness which seemed to be his essential outdoor gear.  His favorite time was when there was a foot of snow to play in.  He bounded over it, then he burrowed under it.  He explored the white-blanketed yard but didn't lose his harness until he hid under the shed.  At length he came out and was promptly taken back inside.  That was the last time he ever wandered freely out-of-doors.

The people seemed to be bothered by the fact he had stopped eating.  Sputnik was taken in and out of clinics; vets prodded and probed and eventually determined he had cancer.  In only a few days his body became too frail to sustain his spirit. He bounded joyfully into ferret heaven.  He watched the mother and son cry their eyes out for him.  He watched as they picked out another ferret to try to fill the huge hole in their hearts he'd left behind.  He heard the mother saying a prayer of gratitude, thanking God for letting him share his short life with them.  Funny how you can grow to love someone so much in such a short time.

"Don't cry, Mother;  don't feel sad, Son.  I just found another way to free my spirit.  Life is beautiful in every sphere. With all my love, Sputnik."

Dickens' Traditions

• Illuminated icicles dangle from our rooftop, but it has hardly snowed a flake.
• Carolers who never ventured to our household fill our home with their yuletide melodies wafting over the airwaves. 
• A tree never nourished by sunlight nor rainshower stands adorned with trinkets in our living room. 

Yet we welcome these artificial evolutions of Dickens’ holiday traditions, perhaps because of the genuine warmth of spirit this season brings.  The same joy that prompted hosts of angels to sing Hallelujah still radiates in our homes when we celebrate that first Christmas day.  Peter spoke to us when he wrote:

Jesus Christ:  Whom having not seen, ye love;

 . . . believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory (1 Peter 1: 7 – 8)

With each passing year, I gain a little deeper appreciation for the gift of the Savior’s life.  His gift is seen in His loving bestowal of faith, hope, and charity.  He joyfully gives inspiration so we can enjoy creations, which are especially sweet when they are produced by our own hands. His gift which I treasure for its peace is forgiveness and repentance.   Though each of these is manifested in the little things that help us through the struggles of daily life, they all witness His Divine Power and Love.

“Grinchy Claus”

The spirit of holiday giving is encapsulated in two Christmas classics. The Grinch and Scrooge are synonymous with generosity and laughter. 

I’m not kidding. 

Every year we tell their stories, starting at point A (their ugly era).  Their histories climax at point B (their transformations).  But point C is the beginning of the rest of their transformed lives. 

Of course, blissful giving is not good story-making material.  Conflict is what drives a plot so that is why their stories promptly end with barely a mention of the fruits of their transformation. 

Allow me to pick up where Dickens leaves off.  He finished A Christmas Carol with these closing paragraphs:

“A merry Christmas, Bob!'' said Scrooge, with an earnestness that could not be mistaken, as he clapped him on the back. ``A merrier Christmas, Bob, my good fellow, than I have given you for many a year! I'll raise your salary, and endeavour to assist your struggling family, . . . ''

Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did not die, he was a second father. He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for him.

He had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the Total Abstinence Principle, ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God Bless Us, Every One!

Dickens makes it pretty clear that Scrooge became a new man and the change in him stuck.  Dr. Seuss, however, leaves a little more to our imagination. (How like him.)  What we DO know, quoting the final lines of How the Grinch Stole Christmas!:

Well . . . in Who-ville they say

That the Grinch’s small heart

Grew three sizes that day!

And the minute his heart didn’t feel quite so tight,

He whizzed with his load through the bright morning light

And he brought back the toys! And the food for the feast!

And he . . .

. . . HE HIMSELF . . . !

The Grinch carved the roast beast!

The assumption is that with his expanded heart, he is changed for good.  Maybe he treats his faithful dog, Max, better.  Maybe he moves closer to town.  Maybe he becomes chief of police with a push for better home security.  Or better yet, maybe he becomes Who-ville’s saintly Santa who is only seen at Christmastime, but whose existence prompts the children’s good behavior all year long.  I’m thinking it would be easier for him to maintain his transformed heart in the latter version.  (My dad once observed something to the effect, “I’m a really nice person when I’m by myself.”)

We have enough life experience to know that the perfected point “C” is hard to maintain.  It is far too easy to slide back into ugly point A.  But this is the beauty of the Cycle of Life I posted about on August 28, 2011 (CreationàFallàRestoration—which equates to points CàAà B) .  Christ’s role in righting our position is so vital to our happiness and why we celebrate His life.

Here’s wishing you joy at whichever point (A, B, or C) you may be.

Emerald Gems

Kitchen chairs turned upside down, cereal in the fridge and milk in the cupboard, a remnant of green fabric caught in a crack, a trail of glitter leading to a pot o’ gold.  Have you ever spotted any of these tell-tale signs of a leprechaun intrusion?  They’ve been known to drop into households in the wee hours of St. Patrick’s Day.

Though I’ve never had a leprechaun come to my house, I’m quite familiar with their distant cousins, the brownies.  When I was a young child, I loved brownie visits because I’d wake up to find a nice clean house.  When I was in second grade, I joined the Girl Scout Brownies and learned the secret of WHOO the brownies were.  I delighted in taking my turn to play “brownie.” I got up in the night, crept around as stealthily as a bulldozer and picked up the house.  It was the only time cleaning was any fun.  Happily, the tradition carries on with my daughter.

The magical thinking of childhood creates a magic all its own.  The willingness to believe that good things will happen is more than just charming.  It casts a vision for little miracles to occur.  My dad grew up in the depression and he noticed that as soon as his older brothers stopped believing in Santa, Santa stopped leaving presents for them.  So he was determined to keep believing and he kept receiving.  The irony of children believing in the magic of holidays is their belief creates the magic.

Too bad my kids didn’t have the expectation of delightful leprechaun pranks pulled on St. Patty’s day.  Maybe it’s not too late. J

Maewyn Succat

(385 – 461 A.D.)

Maewyn was born and raised on a windswept British Isle.  When he was 16 years old, he was kidnapped by pirates and carried away to a distant island where he was sold as a slave.  He worked night and day as a shepherd.  His long hours tending the sheep gave him lots of time to think.  He found comfort in contemplating the life of the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ. 

After six years of slavery, he found an opportunity to escape and he took it. He traveled by ship to Gaul (now France).  There he devoted himself to the ministry of the Roman Catholic Church and eventually became a Priest.

And then the dreams came.

Maewyn dreamed that the people of the island where he had been enslaved were reaching out to him for help.  He knew in his heart what help they needed and he knew that he must return and teach them about Jesus.  So he found himself en route to the island where he would, once again, be a servant.  Only this time his master was One he felt privileged to serve. 

Although Maewyn wasn’t the first Christian missionary on the emerald isle, he was the most successful.  He converted nobles who were influential in spreading the gospel message to all the people. 

Many years later, Maewyn Succat was sainted, becoming Saint Patrick.  Irish people still celebrate his gift to the Emerald Isle—the Christian faith. 

Source: familyfunshop.com/saintpatricksday.htm