amazing grace

the baubles come off the tree. when i muster sufficient energy the tree comes off too. time flees. lives change. but this one thing i know. through many dangers toils and snares we have already come; 'tis grace hath brought us safe thus far, and grace will lead us home.

i dwell in the shelter of the Almighty.

home improvement

Dog's sleeping quarters now include artwork.

cornucopia

HOM is on annual vacation this week. he spends most of his time recording and editing J1's music videos and the rest of it chauffeuring J2 to the shops and researching his next laptop. Dog is a little bit under the weather these couple of days but appears to be improving. our house guest stays on but is largely out of our way due to her widely fluctuating circadian rhythm. we have a new year countdown to go to tomorrow that promises conversation and repast. all in all this is our most sedentary most peaceful and most enjoyable winter break in years. keep your airplane flights your hotel stays and your itineraries, i say. give me hearth table book and family, and i am richly kept.

getting older

the thing about looking sweetly youthful is you lose out on credibility. so, oftentimes i say when the question arises, with a twinge of conscience but a straight face nevertheless, i'm 45. after a half decade of subterfuge i am finally ready to move on to, and with perfect truthfulness this time, i'm in my late forties.

word of experience

the line between freeloading presumptuousness and genuine need is blurred by affection prejudice judgment bias and guilt. toxic encounters aside, it is humbling to realize one often shuttles blithely between one and the other.

taking stock

my lesson for this year is this: a chattering fool comes to ruin. (prov 10:8). the amazing thing is that one can wholeheartedly agree with this statement at all times and still happily and obliviously chatter away when push comes to shove. my tongue, i say, is the final frontier.

precious mem'ries 2010

making friends with little M
re-connecting with old friends online
letting J2 drive me around
d.c. museum visits with J1
girls' lunch with J2 at the panera bread
J2 and HOM commandeering my kitchen
baltimore with HOM
singing choir with J2 and J1
morimoto!
J1 and HOM making their music videos together

treasure box

there are two beloved gifts in mine:

one prayer denied. J1 and the military.
one prayer answered. J2 and me.

whew!

walmart closes for christmas, which of course is as it should be, because if you open for business on christmas day it rather smacks of crass commercialism and shameless opportunism. fortunately for me my local safeway tilts towards barefaced greed and i am able to do an emergency grocery run in the quiet of christmas morn.

magnificat

near the cross, a trembling soul, love and mercy found me;

Christ... regarded my helpless estate and... shed his own blood for my soul;

... blessings all mine, with ten thousand besides!

the hope and wonder of the birth of Christ make sense to my crippled trembling soul only when i look at the ugliness and rejection of his death, and realize that he shed his blood because i am helpless to yield mine. when i remember this, i want to burst out and say, my soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant.