I’ve never written anything on my own birthday, as it seems somewhat pretentious to do so.  However, this year and at this moment I reflect upon all the years and moments that have brought me to this one.  The people, the joys, the trials, the friendships, the sorrows, the laughter, the tears, and the LOVE.  While I write this I am standing at my kitchen counter watching my two toddlers play ring-around-the-rosy on top of the kitchen table.  Jumping and giggling and falling down on bottoms is much more fun when it’s three feet off the ground.  That’s kind of how I feel about life at the moment – the falls hurt much worse but the fun is oh so much funner.  Yes, funner.  Before I had children I wouldn’t have left bad English in my posts.  But, I digress.

Today I count my blessings in shorthand. The LORD has been kind to me since before I can remember and that kindness has most often been showed through many of you.  So, here is my thank you to all of you who have walked with me on portion of this journey called life.  Due to the aforementioned children dancing on the table, my specific list is short and sweet.

Jason: thank you for keeping your sense of humor as well as keeping me, whether in humor or out.  You are a good strong man and you have become the sharpest iron in my life.  I am a new person in marriage, and while that feels foreign at times, I am very very blessed to be joined with you.  You’re also the most fun iron in my life.

Sophia: you are precious to me.  You are different than me in many ways and we are learning to dance a very complicated dance, you and I.  When I earn a giggle from you, it is sunshine to my soul.  I am thankful for your spirit and your stubbornness.

Augustine: you are delightful.  Though you are the most disgusting person I’ve ever seen at the supper table, your smile breaks through the smeared food and warms my heart.  I am thankful for your undaunted cheerfulness and ease with life.

Mom: I am grateful for a mother become best friend.  You have been my closest and longest advisor, admonisher, encourager, and companion.  I have no words to express the depth of gratitude I have towards God for seeing fit that you should raise me and befriend me.

The din in the background has increased and is no longer on the table but lapping at my legs.  Suffice all to say, I am blessed very blessed by God’s grace and mercy through those around me (literally and figuratively).  I pray to be as faithful to you all as you have been to me, that as I grow in age I may grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

Oh, my dear little Sophia.  Three years old today and I can still feel the knitting of our souls and futures over nine months and the feel of my nose on your newborn cheek.  When you were born, you became part of my salvation.  One day, when you are older, I will tell you how, in your 1-week-old form, you were the ray of Light that the Divine hand used to dispel bitterness and bestow hope to my cracked heart.  When the waters of your baptism washed your head, they poured grace upon grace upon the dry soil of my life.In those early weeks, I never could have known how you would try me, make every night sleepless, grow a stubborness greater than mine, show emotions as freely and changing as a rushing river, or cause me to weep for the days when I did not know how to shepherd your heart.  But, I also didn’t know then how your chattering little self would become my closest and dearest companion through the days, that your insistence on picking dandelions for me every day teaches me to slow down and find weeds precious, that your giggle is priceless because it is earned, that your changing clothes ten times a day would bring me joy because you love color and find my earth tones boring, and that watching you care for those around you would bring me delight.

My dear girl, in the past three years I have sat by your death-side and by your bedside.  God has given you strength and sustained you by His Power to be a mighty little thing.  I praise and give thanks for all the unforeseen that has been and is to come in your life.  How I pray that as you grow in age, you would grow in Grace and in the knowledge and Love of God.  You are part of my salvation and I pray to always be part of yours.  I love you, my pumpkin seed.

Where I’m from, the leaves fall in the Autumn. Colors bright, they cling to branches, adding texture to the sky.  Then the first snap of cold sucks the life out of them and they fall, browned, to the ground.  It’s predictable, it happens every year around September.

If you’d been spying in our backyard today, you would have seen two mowgli-children jumping in an enormous pile of brown leaves, making snow angels and disappearing in the glory of them as the hungry heap swallowed them whole.  It’s February, this is not when leaves should fall.  To be honest, they probably did most of their falling in January and have been napping for a few weeks untouched.  However, this does not change the oddity.  Did they have amnesia in September?  How long had they been orange and red and glorious?  Had I missed out because I hadn’t expected it, hadn’t opened my eyes to see it?

As I loaded black bags brimming, it struck me that seasons are rarely predictable.  Sometimes buds pop up through the snow, sometimes leaves fall in February.  We have been in a transitional season of life here and we keep saying, “next week should be quieter”, “next month we’ll find routine again”.  But today, today, while raking dead leaves rotting, I realized I had missed their moment of splendor.  I heard the words of an old friend, “spend the afternoon, you can’t take it with you” (A.Dillard).  No, we can’t take time with us.  How often will I need to learn this lesson?  How many days will I spend rushing through the busy-ness and miss the changing colors?  The train of my to-do list derailed, I jumped in the pile with my laughing, dirt-covered children, hands reaching for me as I stared up through the leaves at specs of light – giggles in the now.  “How we spend our days, is of course, how we spend our lives.”  (A.D.)

This, this living in the present, soaking in the waterfall of moments and noticing everything enough to give thanks for it, is not easy.  Discontent gnaws our soul and makes a whirlwind of our time.  Bitterness tamps our sin deep and hard, ready for a tiny spark to set off an explosion.  Worry steals our joy and leaves us thirsty.

God is the Divider of the firmament and He specializes in souls.  The fourth-day creation was good.  God spun light in the darkness, creating seasons and days and signs and years.  God, the Eternal Fountainhead of Wisdom, says time is good.  There is exactly the right amount of it and we are to let it mark our days, our seasons, our years, our worship.  Time is not busy, it is not rushing – I am the busy one rushing through it like a gorilla through a field of lilies.  When (or if) I stop and turn around, I wonder at the broken stems.  This is not embracing the gift of now nor being grateful at its goodness.

I confess the discontent, the bitterness, the worry that has climbed slowly like ivy up my heart, tendrils gripping their way into my soul.  And I receive the renewing streams of forgiveness that bring me to the ocean of the present.  These moments, this day bursting with life and light and color, this is the day which the Lord has made; I will rejoice and be glad in it.  In this rejoicing, I find that time is amplified, its presence sweeter, its memories deeper.  This is the right season, whatever falls or buds in it, and this life of grace is good.