hodge podge

It's a long, hot summer, and I've been jumping with my students.
Phew!

I've injured every almost every part of my body below the knee due to lots of outdoor time---------and the illusion that I can still take on a team of 9 year olds in a relay race.

Silly me.

However, it was still time well spent.
I shall miss them, now that summer school is officially over, and it's time to take a brief rest and get ready for real back-to-school.

On the upside, I have been reading a wonderful book by Barbara Kingsolver called "The Prodigal Summer".

Beautiful story. It's full of sex, ghosts, legacy and nature. I couldn't have picked a better summer read.

Next on the list is "Three Cups of Tea". It is getting positive reviews, so I'm looking forward to it.

Having been a difficult summer, with the death of my mother and the assumption of a few new work responsibilities, I have looked for positive things to cling to that will give me reasons to be happy.

I find my mind too often strays to thoughts of her death, and even to what my own death will be like as well.
It is a trait of my family-------that when they realize their bodies are slowing down, they focus entirely too much on their end, instead of where they currently ARE.

Perhaps that is only a characteristic of these "planners". My family is filled with planners. They are always looking toward the next thing-------and death is a very big and final next thing. They don't know what comes beyond that----so they get stuck on death.

I don't want to be that way. So, what do I do to live more fully now?

Read a book, love my husband, throw myself into my work, join a gym to make my body
stronger, goal to walk a marathon, blog or write more regularly, and pray. I've gotten so far away from my spiritual life.

When everything is working out well, I still feel an absence------and often it is because God and I aren't talking like we used to.

Of course, this experience with dealing with mom's final affairs has made me very aware that I need to set my own affairs in order. I am young---in the full summer of my life----but I should have all of my papers set up so that my husband is well taken care of should anything happen to me.

Plan, yes. But don't live as if the plan were the only thing.

Love my family. Live in the now.

This is what I need.

If you read this, ( and I doubt that anyone does anymore since it's been ages since I posted regularly), pray for me.

Much love to the universe.