No pictures today. Today is one of my contemplative days and sometimes pictures in our mind are more poignant that any photos or drawings. So here is my little piece of thinking about life. You know, my favorite subject.

Life is a growing thing. Sometimes it grows well like new sown grass, all fresh and soft and full of promise. Sometimes it matures and get's stronger and darker green showing it's wellness and strength.
Sometimes weeds begin to grow and try to suffocate the grass and if it is not tended, the grass gets weak. If it is burnt too long in the sun, without water, it becomes brown and eventually dies.
If it is watered in time, even thin, brown grass can be resusitated and become strong again. Eventually though, even strong grass withers and dies during the winter.
Then new baby grass comes up through the cold, ground. It is protectected by the leavings of the old dead grass, which helps to hold in the moisture and hold off the heat so it can grow and prosper.
This is so much like our lives. We start off young and usually healthy, full of zest and promise. If we are nurtured as children, then we become strong, knowledgeable adults, able to withstand much of what the world can throw at us.
As long as we continue to grow and use what we have with wisdom we stay strong, even in adversity. We raise our young and teach them and protect them as we were raised.
If we get caught up in life and ignore the signs of trouble or weeds, whether financial, family matters, selfishness, or whatever, then we become strangled with our lives and our stress and we become weak.
If help arrives or we turn our minds to what is important in life and we begin to be nurtured and cared for again, many times we can become strong and prosper again.
Eventually we, each at different stages of our lives do face adversity and heavy burdens and then finally death. By then, we hope that we have left ourselves inbedded in our childrens lives so that they also can grow and prosper as they stand strong in the sun and wind and rain of life.
We have all had adversity and many have dealt with health issues for themselves or family members. I am so happy with how I have come back from the withered and brown stages of life more than once, only to grow and stand for another season.
My faith has brought me through some very tough times, even when all else seemed lost. But knowing in my mind that there is something so much stronger than I who is very interested and caring about my life, then it makes all things possible. I am not here to give up and I sure do think that being available to other's in "sickness and health" (both ways) is what keeps me keeping on and liking it!!
My son is now facing one of those brown seasons of famine as he goes through the chemotherapy for his melanoma cancer. I am hoping he will be sufficient in strength and hope, to live through this difficult time in his life.
Maybe my longivity is needed to help support my family through this time. Although I have to admit that I have thought selfishly that if things had been different, then I wouldn't have to face this too. But, that was a very fleeting thought and I am going to be busy helping my daughter and my son deal with the realities of this life we live and celebrate the joys of each day we have together.
Maybe by next spring my son will also be starting fresh with new wisdom about life. Maybe he will have a new outlook and new goals to look forward to and family to lean on and to love.
We all need a time in our lives to look at what's important and necessary and then what most makes each of us happy in life. Mine is my family, all extended and my friends that have also shared and cared through the tough times.
My goal is still to gift myself to them and to recieve the gifts they offer me of themselves as well.
Now, what's new with you??