What if, when asked "Can you hold please?" while making phone call, you said, "NO! NO, I CANNOT HOLD! I REFUSE!" What would happen then?

Sometimes I look like a vagabond. A homeless person. A decrepit wreck.

The reason for this general appearance can usually be closely tied to the stress level of my week. Usually, I am understanding of other people's derision of my appearance. It is acceptable. I look awful.

But this week, as I was crossing the street, looking like a homeless vagabond wreck, I got an up-down and snort of derision from a little old, nasty lady smoking a cigarette in her massive, deteriorating automobile. Her lip actually sneered at me!

I didn't blink. I just looked right back at her and thought,

"Sure, I may be wearing an ugly sweat shirt, but my skin care is miles ahead of yours, Ms. Smoker."




This sort of petty vindictiveness means my life is too small...

If I didn't know there was God...

"I had tried to be happy by telling myself that man is an animal, like any other which sought its meat from God. But now I really was happy, for I had learnt that man is a monstrosity. I had been right in feeling all things as odd, for I myself was at once worse and better than all things. The optimist's pleasure was prosaic, for it dwelt on the naturalness of everything; the Christian pleasure was poetic, for it dwelt on the unnaturalness of everything in the light of the supernatural. The modern philosopher had told me again and again that I was in the right place, and I had still felt depressed even in acquiescence. But I had heard that I was in the WRONG place, and my soul sang for joy, like a bird in spring. The knowledge found out and illuminated forgotten chambers in the dark house of infancy. I knew now why grass had always seemed to me as queer as the green beard of a giant, and why I could feel homesick at home."

— G.K. Chesterton (Orthodoxy)

Good morning, Fall! How I love you!

I'm wearing my white scarf.

Being someone who loves white scarves, I own quite a few, but this one is my favorite. My mother purchased it for me last fall when the family went on a trip without totally-swamped-in-grad-school me. It's a thick, cable-knit, with a softness that belies its durability and practicality. I'm not good at choosing practicality over attractiveness, but my mother was able to combine them both in this scarf purchase.

I'm sipping dark, strong coffee.

I love very dark, strong, black coffee. But it must have low acidity, or else even my mouth curdles at the excess harshness. Coffee should be soothingly smooth while still aggressively caffeinated. The Papua New Guinea blend s especially rich and smooth. I'm enjoying my bottomless cup...

I spent the morning outside.

Fall foliage is reaching its most resplendent color hues. This morning David and I went to a cross country meet (Rossville did very well!), and I've decided that my children will run cross-country, if for no better reason that they're some of the most enjoyable meets that I've ever been to, and as a mom I could enjoy them with equanimity (and pack some truly amazing snacks).

Now I'm supposedly studying in a coffee shop. In all reality, I'm trying to find a way to begin my newest venture into fiction and I have have little to no interest in completing the dysphagia report that I'm supposed to be writing. But life is more than swallowing and school. This post has no goal nor a point. It only serves to portray my general contentment with the world right now.

I love Fall.

Genesis 1:1, Hebrews 2:9,10

Stars.

Space.

Infinite, unknown world, light years long, incomprehensibly trillions of billions of miles in size.

The Creator of that massive expanse is so much larger than even His unfathomably large creation. I cannot grasp even the created's size, how can I hope to grasp the expanse of the One powerful and large enough to design, orchestrate, and execute a masterpiece of such beauty and size? Falling further and further into space, the world ceases to be visible. The sun, a massive ball of power that we cannot even approach, also slips from view, showing it to be one of the palest of the heavenly bodies. Our solar system disappears into our galaxy which subsequently fades to nothing in a sea of distant stars. An expanse I cannot quantify, cannot imagine.

But above, and throughout, and intimately involved with each detail is my unmeasurable God. And that same, unbelievably infinite, massive God cares about us. About this speck in his creation. He cared so much that he made himself one of us. He made himself small. Because his love is as vast and infinite as his greatness. He came to this tiny, insignificant, undetectable speck of a planet, to save a people who are too self-absorbed and selfish to truly worship the great God who created them in his likeness.

"And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide, and high, and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God."

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth... Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array."



"O LORD, our Lord,
how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory
above the heavens.
When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,
what is man that you are mindful of him,
the son of man that you care for him?"

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.
Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it."