Lichen’ it!

Just had to grab a sunny afternoon and turn it into an exercise for body, mind and soul,

A trek up Scout, naturally.

The old gray mare just ain’t what she used to be, but slowly and surely ‘we’ (me, myself, and my Comforter) gained the top for a quiet sit to read, pray and ponder…Nothing conspicuously photo-worthy… but the lichen is bright and fresh.

 

 

And the undergrowth is conspiring to put on Christmas cheer, already!

This ‘shroom I espied on my careful-not-to-slip descent begged to be noticed  ( :

The pines are healthy and vibrant, bearing abundant little ‘boy’ cones…

But home and fireside beckon far below. It may be bright but it is also cold! Time to head home. 

[Our golden willow marks the spot. Do you see it?]

Wind and rain are lashing the house tonight.  Glad to have gotten out while I could!

--LS

See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Eph.5:15,16

Another ordinary day…

Another morning dawns—it’s picture post day.

What do I picture being photo-worthy?  It’s typical November weather-wise.  High cloud cover.  No rain at the moment, still wet from yesterday’s windy tantrums. Most of the color of fall has faded to decay.  Smoke rises lazily from neighbor’s chimneys…Breakfast is over. The dishes wait their morning ablutions.

We eat off china now that the kids are grown and mostly flown.

Fire flickers steadily in the woodstove.  Ahh…blessed radiant warmth chasing the chill of night away…

A load of laundry tumbles in the drier.  It’s laundry day. The loads are little these days.

My right-hand Aid kneads a batch of bread so there’ll be homemade stuffing tomorrow…

My lone student applies herself with her regular good cheer to another numbered day of school.
She’s counting down now.

And I’m loathe to tromp around out doors here and now.  So I offer you the view of November from my windows—noteworthy?  Not really.  But aren’t most days begun with such mundane mornings?

And I’m glad of them.  Glad to be here all cozy and quiet in my ‘pumpkin shell’ commencing another ordinary day that God has made for me to inhabit empowered by His Spirit.

--LS

“This is the day that the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Ps.118:24

Plants yielding seed

The evenings are longer now.  Sweet opportunity to sit by the fire listening to  books on tape and shelling beans for next spring’s planting…I love the finished product—this year mixed varieties, but each with its characteristic shape and color.  And I’ve been reflecting on this idea of bearing fruit—not just summer’s ripe off-the-tree or vine edible product, but the latent seed for future generations of fruit.  Latent fruitfulness, each after its kind…This is a wonderful design.

Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed,

and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed,

each according to its kind, on the earth.  And it was so.

The outer blemish and imperfection of this forgotten last-apple-of-summer matters not to the seed which has every potential to grow to be an outstanding tree bearing a bounty of beautiful apples…

You shall have them for food.

And God saw that it was good.

 

And there was evening and there was morning, the third day.

Unless a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abides alone…

but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Jn.12:24

 

Take up your cross and follow me…

At this time of year, as living things give away their life energies to nourish the next generation of growing things, I am reminded that what looks like death, or a fading finish, or an insignificant old pod, bears the seeds of a new creation.  All is not lost.

What you sow does not come to life unless it dies.I Cor.15:36

Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.

For we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. II Cor.4:10,11

May the One who ‘supplies seed to the sower and bread for food… supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.’  (II Cor.9:10)

Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. I Cor.15:58

--LS

We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us…II Cor.4:7

“Home again. Home again.”

 

That's what we've always said as we've pulled up with relief to our ‘home sweet home’ at the end of a trip. It is good to travel and very good to be home.

We take for granted the easy travels we make these days, from Pacific rainforest in the golden fling of autumn to snow swept prairies hunkering down for the winter, all in a day's drive. Our greatest hardship is the price of gas at $1.33/liter (that's $4.43/US gallon) in the west and $1.12/liter on the prairies. Oh, and the potholes and occasional road debris that beget flat tires. And the having to lose precious hours waiting to get a tire fixed… Then there is the hardship of getting sleepy while driving all this way and the weariness of sitting still so long. Ahhh the hardships of travel in our times.

But storytelling made the miles slip away as we traveled vicarioiusly by horseback and stagecoach with Spanish vaqueros and settlers moving west, establishing wild little cowtowns like Los Angelos. Louis L'amour weaves a fine tale.* We are caught in so many gun fights we lose count. We imagine the austere grandeur of the California deserts, and their unrelenting heat. We assuage our imagined thirst with our handy Gatorade bottles. And the miles pass as the Lexus rolls on…

…till we are safely home once again to our home sweet home at Willow’s End.

I slip out back after breakfast to see the morning mists rising as the sun strikes the chill wetness…

New catkins hang from the hazelnut tree.  Had they been there all along?  I hadn’t noticed.

Love notes have fallen again.

Long shadows mark the rising sun as misty corners give way to light

 

Shaggy ‘Ink Caps’ rise from nowhere.

Maple leaves fall in profusion on our acre now, thanks to this little sapling we rescued years back from a clear cut forest.  He has grown to make quite a display and what a lot of fine compost these will yield…But the raking will be for another day.  My fingers and toes are freezing.  The fireside beckons.  I have seen the morning.

It is good to be home.  All is well under God’s blue heaven

“For I know that the LORD is great, and that our Lord is above all gods.
Whatever the LORD pleases, he does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps.” Ps.135:5,6

--LS

*Need a cozy read for the long evenings?  I commend to you the audio version of: The Lonesome Gods by Louis L’Amour.  Read by David Strathairn.