The Difference of a Year
I've been thinking a lot about this day. A year ago, I started counting my blessings (two days late) with the rest of Facebook, in the annual November "30 days of Thankfulness." When it was over on the 30th, I got an email from my friend Lynne, asking me if I would consider continuing to post. I was in kind of a strange place then, and I'd never written every single day, but the month's focus on thankfulness was already changing my heart. I decided to give it a try, and committed to a full year of daily posts. So, here I am, this last day of the year. And it finds me different, eyes opened more fully, heart trained for the unexpected blessings found in the everyday. They're...
Beautiful
We went trick-or-treating last night, with a tiny cowboy and darling cowgirl in tow. It's so fun to watch them enjoy all the fuss and hoopla, and my daughter's neighborhood really comes out for the kids, making it even better. Once the cowgirl's boots were getting a little too heavy, and her pumpkin overflowed, she stopped in front of me and said, "Mimmie, it's too early for me to walk," holding up her arms. She gets hot and cold backwards, and apparently early and late, too! I picked her up and as we walked she studied my face quietly. After a while, she said, "Mimmie, you're beautiful to me." Visibly moved, I said "Lilli, it's our love that makes us beautiful. You are very...
What are you waiting for?
From the moment my plane touched down from Europe, I've been waiting for today, when I'll be on another plane, taking off. To Florida. To my babies. It seems like F O R E V E R since I saw them. Brody's right at the same size Lilli was at a year, and he's only 7 and a half months! He's walking around the furniture already, and was just starting to push up on all fours when we were last together. I'm amazed at how Lilli's sentences are so much more maturely put together, and how long her curly hair is getting. Things change in a blink of an eye, and it's almost more than I can take. I love the moment when I first see the kids, upon arrival. Lilli is always filled with anticipation,...
New and Improved
Remember when I was on my trip and my dog died? And then he didn't? Yep, he was flatlined on the table. Gone. Arrangements were made for his little body. Lots of tears were shed, at home and abroad. Then, out of nowhere, he started breathing. His heartbeat, weak at first, became stronger and stronger, and two days later he came home. The vets said it was one for the books. It was hard for me to imagine, without seeing it for myself, that he was completely normal. I mean, he'd been dead for quite a few minutes. His little brain was deprived of oxygen, for heaven's sake. How could that not have had an effect? But I came home, and there he was, perfectly perky. Racing around like...
When the Going Gets Tough
Life is hard. Within the last 24 hours, I've heard from a person battling significant mental illness, one who's life-threatening illness has returned, a person who is having to let go of employees because of Obamacare, and another who is being forced to sign up for it because they've been priced out of their own health insurance. I met a gal who is providing full-time home health care for an elderly relative for the foreseeable future, another who is about to lose their home, and one who's marriage is hanging by one tenuous thread. 24 hours. I bet, if you think about it, you talked to some people, too, who are facing huge challenges. Maybe you ARE one of those people. And maybe you...