I don't know about you, but I know. As much as I'm rooted to the spot in which I find myself today in Oklahoma, this is not where I belong.
I'm not searching for a new place to live...a more lucrative income potential or better retirement vista.
I'm not unlike any other person. I bloom where I'm planted. My life produces its own fruit within the community of folks I come across each week. We all know we have a particular niche to fill that no one other than us can fill.
Me? Well, I'm grandmother to a couple of kiddos who live next door. And I do mean next door. They're within 12 feet of me. A skip and hop across our porch and they're here. Kinsey popped in yesterday to show me her brand new satchel filled with new crayons, markers and such. She is so excited that homeschool co-op classes begin next week. My "niche" with Kinsey is as a listener. I listen to every single little thought that pops into her mind and she knows I will always listen to what she has to say without interruption. Today she popped in search of bottlecaps. Yeah; I save odds and ends of everything. She's making bowls for her Barbies, and she knows where to come to find crafting stuff. I like being a supply house for scavenger hunts.
This is part of where I belong. Part.
Just as my place on this earth has meaning to someone like Kinsey, I find meaning in my role as wife to the dearest, most loyal man who's walked the face of the earth since Christ. He rises five days a week and heads out for 8 hours of work to supplement our meager annuity and Social Security benefits. He's my mighty knight. I love to cook him meals he enjoys. While others may never dine upon that fare, I know he relishes every bite of oddities I concoct. He never complains. Never.
Yes, I mean never. Never--about anything.
So when you live in a life where you're cared for so well, like I am-- with so small an expectation in return, there's little to long for. I don't dream for myself much anymore. I enjoy the moments I'm given to listen, to agree, to absorb what others enjoy, endure and how sad it is that life cannot be sweeter for all--as it is for me.
That's not to say I do not have irritable annoyances. Lands alive, who doesn't? However, my irritants are miniscule in the scheme of a 10-year-old child being beaten to death by her employer in Pakistan, or a 9-year-old girl being locked and starved in a closet in Massachusetts. Nor do I have to be concerned about being beheaded in Uganda for believing in Jesus. I have it pretty good.
I sit here and read twitter feeds and wonder why we fuss so much about a New Jersey bridge being closed by a silly bunch of political operatives when so many have so much more to battle in life. It's sad.
This life-- it's really sad.
Here...on earth, it's sad. But here on earth is not where we belong-- be it Oklahoma, Pakistan or New Jersey.
Earth is where we are but sojourners till we meet in heaven-- where we really belong. ~~hariette petersen
