Jeffrey (my 19 year old brother) is playing his drums in my ballet studio nearby and I can hear them in my bedroom. Half-hour ago, my sister Emily (6) tried to simultaneously hug me to death and swindle me out of all of my birthday candy. I just walked by her room and saw her doing a very interesting shoulder stand surrounded by at least a dozen balls of yarn. Learning to knit and exercise at the same time? My Bug (brother Mark, 11) and sister Anna (16) just let out a burst of laughter from the office, where they are watching I Love Lucy. Dad and Mom are talking in their room. I have not seen Ryan (14), but I'd bet you twenty dollars he's in his room playing with his new pooch or doing something gaget-y.
Ordinary days are not really ordinary.
Ordinary days are full of ordinary things, like supper and toothpaste and hugs and inside jokes and new puppies that mess all over the floor and tigger-bounce-times on the trampoline. None of them make world news, but they're all important. None of them specifically stick with us in our memories, because they're not really exciting. But those million ordinary things blur together to make up our lives... and you know what?
They're good lives.
We aren't trying to win the lottery. We aren't trying to build an empire. We aren't trying to find a new galaxy.
But I've won the lottery - I've got a fantastic family. I feel I'm queen of the world - I have everything I want at my fingertips. I've discovered many new galaxies and feel there are many more to be discovered - flattened and pressed into pages with the stars formed into letters.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that our lives don't have to be extraordinary. They already are. They come that way.
This love and this vast array of seasons, sensations, and possibilities are not and never were stuff to be ignored. The stuff to be ignored is the passing stuff - impatience, regrets, mistakes. The stuff not to be ignored is the ordinary stuff: the gifts we forget we got.
I always feel like I need to change the world. But I think I have. I've got a gold (real gold) ring on my finger right now, a gift for my 21st birthday from my grandparents. I wonder what my love means to them? I've got the opportunity to bless 55 little sugar-bugs in at least 30 weeks of ballet classes throughout this year. I've got a family to love. I've got a grandma with Alzheimers to serve. I've got a smile to give to anyone I come across.
So I guess I'm gonna go ahead and believe Emily Freeman over at chattingatthesky.com and accept my smallness. Not as a limitation to be despised - as in, I can not feed all the children in Africa - but as a simple truth, neither good nor bad. I can not reach all the children in the world.
And what am I gonna do about it? Not a blessed thing. I'm gonna sip my cocoa, hold my sister, and love the God who's got the whole world in his hands.
What is extraordinary about your life?
Ordinary days are not really ordinary.
Ordinary days are full of ordinary things, like supper and toothpaste and hugs and inside jokes and new puppies that mess all over the floor and tigger-bounce-times on the trampoline. None of them make world news, but they're all important. None of them specifically stick with us in our memories, because they're not really exciting. But those million ordinary things blur together to make up our lives... and you know what?
They're good lives.
We aren't trying to win the lottery. We aren't trying to build an empire. We aren't trying to find a new galaxy.
But I've won the lottery - I've got a fantastic family. I feel I'm queen of the world - I have everything I want at my fingertips. I've discovered many new galaxies and feel there are many more to be discovered - flattened and pressed into pages with the stars formed into letters.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that our lives don't have to be extraordinary. They already are. They come that way.
This love and this vast array of seasons, sensations, and possibilities are not and never were stuff to be ignored. The stuff to be ignored is the passing stuff - impatience, regrets, mistakes. The stuff not to be ignored is the ordinary stuff: the gifts we forget we got.
I always feel like I need to change the world. But I think I have. I've got a gold (real gold) ring on my finger right now, a gift for my 21st birthday from my grandparents. I wonder what my love means to them? I've got the opportunity to bless 55 little sugar-bugs in at least 30 weeks of ballet classes throughout this year. I've got a family to love. I've got a grandma with Alzheimers to serve. I've got a smile to give to anyone I come across.
So I guess I'm gonna go ahead and believe Emily Freeman over at chattingatthesky.com and accept my smallness. Not as a limitation to be despised - as in, I can not feed all the children in Africa - but as a simple truth, neither good nor bad. I can not reach all the children in the world.
And what am I gonna do about it? Not a blessed thing. I'm gonna sip my cocoa, hold my sister, and love the God who's got the whole world in his hands.
What is extraordinary about your life?