Focus

Without the daily distractions of Grandpa we now have more focus. The days are long, just getting caught up. We've been reorganizing the house for months. It started before he died in a major renovation of the master suite--to make it more comfortable for our children. We took the big bookshelves out. Moved them back in when we set out to paint after Grandpa died. (The photo above shows the room last week while the rest of the house was getting carpeted. ALL of the kids' stuff was stuffed in my room. Pam DiPrima could only comment as she saw the mess of the house: "Cal is SO lucky" [to be out of town]. I spent the day today purging and reorganizing books before we re-move the shelves in another couple of days back in to the boys' room and perhaps the hallway. One by one, the little details are getting picked off. Soon I hope to be appreciating all of our work by sitting for a couple hours in an afternoon reading one of the puritans on the nice couch Penny sold us. Or sewing Susan's new quilt. Or getting back to our home education--the academic part. This morning Cal and I went to swim laps while the children were all still asleep. We only got in a quarter mile when the rain began in earnest, followed by thunder. After getting home I fixed us a breakfast of yesterday's deviled eggs, watermelon, and iced tea with lemon, brought it up on a tray, put the tray on the leather ottoman, and we read a piece from Bridges' exposition on Psalm 119. Just us up here in our yellow bedroom having a romantic little breakfast.

We're tired by the end of the day, and we still don't seem to get to bed on time, nor have we been able to sleep in terribly long, now that Grandpa isn't with us. But the days feel full and I feel the satisfaction of hard work leading somewhere. God is faithful. It is He Who made us faithful in taking care of Grandpa. And it is He Who makes us faithful to keep on with the next thing. And the next thing is becoming sweeter and sweeter. Bless His Name.

In pain you will bring forth children

Peter, AJ, and Grace are watching a Yankees game on Grandpa's tv which has been set up on the organ bench for the occasion. Susan, Kilby, and Becky are up at the seminary with Cal and will be fetching Nonnie from the airport on their way home. David is still at Cintas working. I am desperately tired, sleepy, eyes stinging, unable to focus tired. But I keep putting one foot in front of the other, a load of laundry here, helping Grace stain her new stool there, and now a few minutes of blog before I straighten Nonnie's bed where Becky slept a week ago when the house was all torn up for carpeting. All the while, all day I've thought: just take a day off. Just get in to bed and read till you sleep and then sleep again. When was the last time I did that? I don't think it would be physically possible, not to mention logistics. I wonder if God will grant me rest by putting me up for awhile. Last time I had thoughts like that I had the perimenopausal bleed that put my anemic body in bed to be waited upon for two weeks. I'd like the rest. I just don't want something that drastic to give it me. I think part of what I need rest from is all the unfinished stuff. The niche in Susan's room that I don't know how to tile, the bookshelves in my room that need to get out, the going to the upholsterer with Penny to pick out fabric for a chair, the stuff, the stuff, the stuff that needs to be reshuffled and reorganized. All of that in addition to the normal everyday life. And then there is the garage. I wonder why no one else can do this stuff. Well, plenty COULD. No one DOES. That's MY job. Not to DO it but to GET IT DONE. Driving home from Sam's Club this a.m. listening to another wonderful, excellent sermon by Pastor Skogen on Christ's service to the disciples I thought on why I need to tell my kids to serve at all. Why don't I just DO it and they'll wonderfully follow my humble example? Does it work that way? Well, I was taught to serve by precept as well as example. So I think I need to teach by precept and command as well as by example. And driving home ruminating about all this I believe I had an insight which I hope is holy: It is my God-given and holy JOB to train these kids. It is not EASY. It makes me feel like a nag. It leaves me tired. But it is my JOB. May I do it faithfully, even when I don't think I'm doing it well. God did help me just moments later. I came in to find the work I'd hoped finished not quite done, and the worker moving too slowly. Employing several others we got lunch on only 25 minutes late. Bell rang while I was whirling around the kitchen to clean it up. And while I was sweeping the floor, the kids were taking their places at the table, waiting for Cal. God gave me grace not to whine at them; but to call one child to come and clear the dish rack, then another child to wipe off a counter, yet another child to clean the spots off the floor. Soon there were four of them at work alongside me, and we had the kitchen clean before Cal came in. God help me not to whine and complain, but to act. SDG.