Breezes through the window

I spent the last half hour laying on my bed, the window open, a perfect breeze coming in, staring out at this (the picture really doesn't do it justice). I am laying on my giant bed which I love, with the white waffle-y textured bedspread, just like my Grandma MacDonald used to have on her beds. It feels so much like summer. Like perfection. I feel fresh and cleaned by the breeze and happy. Momentarily. While I was staring I was also finishing up a book I've been reading by one of my favorite writers -- Anne Lamott -- called "Some Assembly Required". It's an amazing journey of her first year as a grandmother, something I really cannot relate to, and yet, I totally can. I can relate to her struggles for grace, God's timing, patience, love, understanding, and food. It is an amazing book and I feel blessed to have held it's words close this week. And now that it is done, I am happy and sad. I love that about a book. So much.

It's Tuesday morning. I shouldn't have been lazing around on my bed reading. I should have been doing a million other useful things but I let myself, really forced myself, to take it slow again today. I've been sick again, for over two weeks -- another upper respiratory infection -- and it's taken its toll on my lungs and my energy. I'm so much better now, and so thankful for that but I don't want to jinx it. Because in my mind, that's all it would take, a jinx and I'd be sick again. I'm still fighting my body over the steroids and penicillin from January and I'm finally growing wise to the fact that I have to be kind to my body. It's the only one I have. And I'm partial to it.

As I laid on my bed this morning I kept glancing out the window in the silence of the morning. Before nine a.m. the world is still asleep around here. The kids have all gone off to school, the young adults to work, and all that's left is the silence. I love that. I love that I can think and pray and read and work. Because I am working. So many stories, so many ideas, so much. But it needs to gel, to come together. And that's why I roused myself from my bed (which was made, and I was fully showered and dressed, so no one thinks I'm a terrible bum) and headed to the computer a few steps away.

I don't know what the future holds. I curse that fact every single day. I hate that I don't know what tomorrow will be or what next year will look like. I mourn the fact that I don't have some of the things I want or think I need. But then...

I look out the window, through the rusty bars, at the flowers. I look at the bright blue sky. I smell the purpleness floating in. I feel the breeze hit my legs. And I take a deep breath. And I remember that this moment is all I have. That I am alive. And that's a pretty good start...