Yesterday, while cleaning, I came upon a journal I started in the fall of 1980. There were only two entries in it. One from 10/17 and one from 10/26. I wondered why I stopped writing. Then I read the entries. The last one on 10/26 went like this:
“I never paid attention to how I was going about my days. I just went. Usually I was out with people to burn up my energy and occupy my time. Always a place to go. Always someone to see. Now it seems I just stay home. Life seems to have lost it’s challenge somehow. I’m left with reality. Pure everyday life. Just home and job, and, in essence, real life in the real world. A world I never stopped to look at before.
My life is changing. My reasons for living are changing. I’m coming out of my “playing at life world” and I feel lost. My mind feels empty. I have no next move to contemplate. No direction to go in. I’m not in control of anything. Oh God, reality just CAN’T be boring! You’ve got to pick me up and use me somehow. Teach me how to work for you. Get me busy in your world. Help me move into the world as your creation. Hey- since I’ve never stopped to think of what you would have me do in this life, I’m new and unmolded. You can make me into whatever you want me to be. I may cry and wince when you bend me, but I don’t mind it. I know you won’t break me. You’ll bend me into a position where I’ll be more durable.Then I can become the person you intended me to be. Change something! 10/26/80″
Seven days later I became pregnant with my first child and I never picked up a pen to write again until September 20, 2009, the day I started this blog.
It’s quite a revelation reading something you wrote 31 years ago. I’d say it was a defining moment. God certainly did do what I asked him to do. I never uttered the word “bored” or “empty” in a prayer again – probably because I didn’t have time to. Now, 31 years later, retired from a 35 year teaching career, two kids, 4 houses, and a 36 year marriage, I must take a moment to commend God.
God, you heard my prayer that day and did it justice. Thank you for the children that changed my life and for all the adventures they have taken me on.
It’s been a beautiful 31 years, and here we meet up again – in a blog instead of a journal, and with an iPhone instead of a pen. Let’s walk through the golden years together, lord….tweeting, blogging, and face booking beside this ocean you created. But seriously,
God,…just…thanks.
And so, as another day goes by, I’m glad I found “where all those years went”, I also found I was just as crazy back then as I am now, (some things never change), and…I have written.
Below is a verse that I used to sing with the children 40 years ago as a camp counselor at Camp Sandy Cove in Maryland. Remember, Karen? The guitar chords are: C, G, G7, C, F, C,G7,C. (I found that yesterday, too lol!)
I still find myself singing this tune in my head. We added a line to the end….”teach me lord, teach me lord to wait.”
I need it just as much today as I did then. Some things really don’t change. God is one of them.
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