Share Four Somethings: April 2021

Last week at this time, there was snow in the forecast. Today, we’re expecting a high of 86 degrees. It’s April in Kansas, after all.

I’m not a fan of waiting until the last minute. I would have preferred to have finished this post last week, not one day before it gets published. But real life takes precedent, and lately, that has included (among many other things) night-time driving practice with Molly and talking to my sister on the phone and helping Randy install a little concrete slab for our city issued recycling and yard waste carts.

Now it’s Monday, the house is quiet, and it’s time to wrap up the month by pulling together a few thoughts for Heather Gerwing’s Share Four Somethings linkup.

• Something loved

My spring garden gets the nod this month. I held my breath as the snow came and went, but everything seems to have survived the late-season coating of icy wetness.

The creeping phlox are in full bloom. The New Dawn rose is climbing up the trellis, despite—rather than because of—my clumsy attempts to train it. The hostas are stretching out their leaves, and the peonies are craning their burgundy spring foliage toward the sun.

Is it any wonder I love it out here this time of year?

• Something read

I love a good house metaphor, and the one I’m about to share with you really resonated with me. I happened across it in an article about whether thinking or feeling is more necessary when sharing Christ with people in our collapsing and increasingly confused culture (hint: it’s both).

The author shared a quote from “the old apologist Richard Cecil” about the process he went through when dealing with doubt. Perhaps you will find the analogy as helpful as I did.

“Like a man who is told that the foundation of his house is in danger, I call for the key of the vaults on which my dwelling stands,” Cecil wrote. “I light a candle, walk down stairs, and pass very deliberately through the arches: I examine very particularly the arch suspected; and, after having satisfied myself that the foundation remains perfectly safe, I walk up again, lock the door, hang up the key, put out the candle, and quietly go about my business, saying as I go, ‘They may raise an alarm, but I find ALL IS SAFE.’ ” (Original source: The Works of Richard Cecil: With a Memoir of His Life, Vol. 3, published in 1825)

• Something treasured

Every woman’s passage to motherhood is uniquely her own; mine was no exception.

It involved more surgeries than I care to remember. It took much longer than I thought was necessary. It also brought us two daughters whose lives have enriched ours in every conceivable way—and plenty of ways we never would have thought to imagine.

I treasure the memories. I treasure our family. I treasure the journey—past, present and future.

• Something ahead

Immediately ahead, Molly gets her braces off, and—once she completes the state-required 50 hours of practice driving—goes to the DMV for her driver’s license. We get Lilly from college, and both girls start working summer jobs they don’t have yet.

I finish the first phase of a rather open-ended, still-not-completely defined writing project and start working on what might be a much more grueling phase.

Those are the plans, anyway. Hopefully they’ll come to fruition.

A bit further down the road, Randy and I are starting to think about our empty nest, of a new nest, perhaps—one with a little more land and some sort of out building for a workshop.

He talks about moving to Arkansas or Texas, where it’s warmer. I dream of moving somewhere cooler. And then we take a Sunday afternoon drive a little ways out in the country and find a rural subdivision we’ve never seen before. Who knows? Maybe we’ll stick a little closer to home.

• • •

Now it’s your turn. Feel free to share your favorite springtime flower, a meaty quote you’ve read recently, or some future plans you’re looking forward to (but also holding loosely). If none of that applies, any other variation of something loved, read, treasured and ahead is welcome too.

♥ Lois

P.S. I’m linking up this week with Share Four Somethings, #tellhisstory, InstaEncouragements, Recharge Wednesday, Let’s Have Coffee, #HeartEncouragement and Grace & Truth.