the future is not what it used to be

The Cleft of the Rock
Annie W. Brigman, (1869-1950)

The boyfriend's in Paris.
The boss is in B.C.
("Are the weans in their bed, for it's noo ten o'clock?")*

I move on Saturday. I might even know where to.
(Dangling preposition. Watch it dangle.)*

I ran into an elderly couple, friends of the family, last Wednesday at a Tim Horton's in Whitby (minutes after my boss had quipped that I have a knack for knowing someone nearly everywhere I go). They're in their...70's? 80's? (hopefully they're of a generation old enough not to know much about blogging so they won't read this and be offended) and have raised a family, those family members have started families of their own, and, I'm not entirely sure, but there may even be great grandkids in the picture as well.

Bob White (he) asked me how things were with me and I responded without much thought: "Busy". Then, after a little thought: "Does it get less busy?" "No," they replied. "Things are just as busy now as they have ever been."

I had been looking forward to a rocking chair, slippers and a set of knitting needles in my 80's. Has that idyllic image already faded into a era we can't access anymore? My grandfather is in his 80's and was the first to introduce me to Skype. Colleagues of my parents have found me on Facebook. I was laughing with the girls from my cell about how our kids will be rolling their eyes when we tell them that "when we were growing up, there was no internet...we would send things in the mail."

Careers are paramount. Marriages are unnecessary. A university education is the norm. Commuting is a necessary evil. Children move out of their parents' homes. Television fills deadair. I've moved four times and have held five jobs in a year. I, even I, own a cell phone.

Am I the only one that feels that the harder we try to make our lives "efficient", the more complex things become? What ever happened to the mail, to silence, to "making calls", to taking a wife, to waiting, to hopscotch, to milking a cow, to penny candy, to walking?

I’m so tired but I can’t sleep
Standin’ on the edge of something much too deep
It’s funny how we feel so much but we cannot say a word
We are screaming inside, but we can’t be heard
- Sarah McLachlan, "I Will Remember"

the bends

In moments of unease, it will come as no surprise to most, I turn to God. And, to the surprise of some, to Anne. I found this quote today and it warmed me:

"When I left Queen's my future seemed to stretch out before me like a straight road. I thought I could see along it for many a milestone. Now there is a bend in it. I don't know what lies around the bend, but I'm going to believe that the best does. It has a fascination of its own, that bend, Marilla."

In other, and not entirely unrelated news, a song came back to me last night - one that has been archived deep in my memory of livingroom Bible studies in the early 80's where my mother (with Farah Fawcett hair) and my father (with Tom Selleck moustache) would lead a small clan of neo-Jesus Freaks, sitting cross-legged on shag carpeting, in worship on acoustic guitar.

In Your time, in Your time,
You make all things beautiful in Your time.
Lord, my life to You I bring,
May each song I have to sing,
Be to You a lovely thing, in Your time.

Funny, I never knew what Biblical reference that song came from until yesterday.

how do you catch a cloud and pin it down?

Woke up in the middle of the night with a busy head and a muddled heart - and the very random thought: "Ecclesiastes 3:9". I didn't have the reference memorized so, intrigued, I looked it up:

What does the worker gain from his toil?

Then verse 10 and 11:

I have seen the burden God has laid on men.
He has made everything beautiful in its time.
He has also set eternity in the hearts of men;
yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.

Is God cruel? I don't believe so. At first these verses weighed me down even more than I had been but then I noticed: "He has made everything beautiful in its time." Everything. It reminded me of a quote that I heard once - "Everything is OK in the end. If it's not OK, it's not the end."

I don't pretend to understand the mysteries of God and this scripture seems to tell me that he doesn't expect me to. I cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end but, if I am content to ponder the portion of eternity that my finite heart can handle, if I am content to gain from it instead of my own toil, then will I be content to know:

Everything will be made beautiful in its time.
Everything.

She carries a pearl
In perfect condition
What once was hurt
What once was friction
What left a mark
No longer stings
Because grace makes beauty
Out of ugly things

Grace finds beauty
In everything

- Grace, U2