I have already been up for several hours, even though it is Monday, because today is the beginning of VBS, or rather, as it is known in our house, BBS and sometimes PBS. Do not trouble yourselves, I am not over at church toiling away in a helping spirit. I haven’t, tragically, done anything at all to help. Every now and then I wander over to church and stand there, watching other people work, and sometimes distracting them. I’m surprised... Read more
One Looks like it’s going to be a glorious day. No rain forecasted, just heat. Lots and lots of heat. Too bad I’m going to make the kids stay in and clean up the very house, this one, that they wrecked diligently and catastrophically while I completely ignored them. Every day this week, while I sat with my nose in my screen, they took out every imaginable toy and piece of paper and book and flung it down, as a... Read more
It's pretty ridiculous that I am writing a devotional book, given my fairly deep hatred of all devotional books in general. What was it that that super famous person, whose name has escaped my memory, said? Write the kind of book you'd like to read? I basically only like reading light fluffy fiction, wherein I am guarranteed to learn absolutely nothing, and be moved in no direction towards anything, least of all spiritual or political or social action. Color me... Read more
How late I am this morning. I think I’ve been up for hours but I’m not completely sure. I can’t see the clock, so blind am I, and I didn’t really look at it on my electronic device before I restarted the long push to just read my own wretched book. I mean, it’s not wretched, it’s Wonderful. Cough. Yesterday Elphine pulled off Taco Tuesday in the most competent and delicious way imaginable while I sat in the church and... Read more
This week I'm going to do All the Work. I say that every week but this time it's for real. No more lazing around making complicated and gorgeous luncheons. No more long scrolls through Facebook. Nor more wandering out into the garden and sitting down to space out. None of that. Work. Lots and lots of work. Maybe it won't be that bad. Elphine wants to cook all the luncheons this week, and do all the laundry. That's what she's... Read more
Romulus has passed over from eight to nine yesterday. Clever boy. I always dread a birthday landing on Sunday. It's a work day, don't you know, and there are so many irons glowing in the fire, I'm liable to lose my grip on one of them. On the other hand, there's the birthday prayer in church, and being able to say to everyone you happen upon, in ringing tones, “I'm turning Nine. Today.” I'm so delighted that my children haven't... Read more
I have been stepping rather high, wide and plentiful in the matter of “having a summer holiday” or “taking the summer off” or whatever it is that a person says when they stop functioning and totally neglect all the things they have said they were going to do. I have been doing doing laundry, and toiling through my book to see how ghastly it really is, but I've also been turning a deliberate blind eye to the pile on my... Read more
I trust you all have read Elizabeth and her German Garden and understand the aptness of me wandering around in a curious fog, examining all my flowers carefully with no lasting knowledge or understanding. It's a great book. Basically she, Elizabeth, has a massive house and rambles around the outside of it, wondering what all the plants are. I should reread it myself. The thing is, about gardening, of course it would be good to have knowledge, to read and... Read more
I have a mildly ironclad rule for myself of never talking about politics here, if I can possibly help it. Sure, I will obliquely snark around the edges about whatever terrible thing might be happening in the world and on Facebook (are these two things separate one from another? I can’t tell any more) without directly referring to any actual event or issue. Just because I’m obsessed with politics and reading politics doesn’t mean that all of you are and... Read more
I lived under the mistaken impression, yesterday, that I was cleaning the house, only to discover, at the very end of the day, that actually I had been sitting in a chair reading the Internet. That actually the whole house was worse than ever. Usually there is at least one room that is sort of picked up, for the most part. But now it appears that every single room in the entire house has thrown up on itself. The only... Read more
Preventing Grace
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