On a Light Note

What I do today is important because I am exchanging a day of my life for it. Hugh Mulligan

I went into the garage last night before retiring for the evening to confirm the garage doors were closed and locked. In the darkness I saw the car’s interior lights were on, so I went and turned them off. I had had the car in for some repair work and the manager told me the battery wouldn’t hold a charge (they had had the car for a number of days waiting for parts), so I asked them to just put in a new one. 

I had noticed that before I took the car in for some electrical work because I’d had to charge the battery whenever the car had been sitting for a week or more. Now I am wondering if the problem was a bad battery or having interior lights switched on 24/7 – lights I (and the service folks) would not have noticed during the long daylight hours of summer. Good grief!

The car has a new battery now, so I’ll never know. I could gnash my teeth over the possibility that I’d spent money I didn’t need to (and I do need to be more frugal in retirement), but I also know they installed a top-notch battery that should last 75 months according to the paperwork I received, so I see it more as an investment in a trouble-free power source rather than a wasted expense. It won’t be the first time I’ve done something silly, and it certainly won’t be the last time.

I try not to waste time in the world of “woulda, coulda, shoulda.” I may not be the sharpest financial genius with a piggy bank, but I know better than to invest time and energy in regrets. We all have regrets, of course, but we don’t need to wallow in them. I find spending too much time regretting keeps me from investing my time and energies more productively. As a friend once said, “You can’t live in two places at once; if you live in regret, you can’t live in the present.”

The point is, there is no time to waste. Assuming a human lifespan is 142 years, I’ve finally reached middle age, so it’s time to get going and make something of myself. As Mulligan (above) says, “What I do today is important …”

When I was working, I was a list-generator. I would make a list for two reasons. First, I needed to keep track of what I was supposed to be doing, who I needed to be visiting or calling, and so on. Secondly, I gained a lot of satisfaction seeing things get checked off my daily lists. It gave me a sense of accomplishment. 

Nowadays, the only lists I make are grocery lists; they’re always on the refrigerator door where I find (when I get to the store) that I’ve usually left them. Still, there is a certain amount of satisfaction of getting home and seeing how many things I remembered to get! Every victory, no matter how small or insignificant, is STILL a victory.

There’s a lot more flexibility with my calendar in retirement, of course (and a certain amount of irony to be found in getting older: my calendar is now more flexible while I’m not).

Be that as it may, I do manage to find things to keep me busy. I enjoy pulling weeds – something I never liked doing before. Of course, I wait until they grow knee high so I don’t have to bend so far, but the daily trip around the garden to find unwanted vegetation is productive. I continue to add water to the front and back bird-baths, although my avian friends haven’t been visiting as regularly as in the past. Most likely that is due to some new cats having moved into and prowling about the neighborhood.

I don’t mind. Cats have to do what cats have to do. This is their world, too, and that’s important. The planet isn’t a sandbox humans can explore and exploit. It is a home for all of creation. Perhaps that’s why the car lamps were lit. Home is where we leave a light on for those we love.

Apparently that’s what I’ve done here in this, our valley.

Keith Axberg writes on matters concerning life and faith. Author of: Who the Blazes is Jesus? Good News for a Vulgar World (available through Amazon in Print and e-book)

 

During a Storm, Bail!

“Why do you like thunderstorms?” asked an inquiring mind. “Because it shows that even nature needs to scream sometimes.” Author Unknown

Life is full of routines. Routines are dependable, and that’s a comfort when it seems so much of life is out of control. The world is often a very scary place. It is like the story in the Bible where the disciples are striving to cross the big lake one evening after a full day of preaching and teaching. Jesus is asleep at the back of the boat and a major squall rises up. It is so severe that it threatens to swamp the boat and sink it, drowning everyone onboard.

Life is like that. We turn on the news and it seems that nothing is going on except war, pestilence, famine, domestic strife, mass shootings, and fires without end – Amen. It is truly disheartening and discouraging. One is tempted to go full turtle: covering ears, closing eyes, pulling in heads and limbs, and going to sleep until everything has just gone away. It’s tempting to turn off the news and whistle our way through the graveyard.

Some ladies were visiting a graveyard one day after one of their friends who, like a certain Alexander, had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.* They’d gone to anoint the body because his arrest, trial, conviction, and execution had been so swift they hadn’t even had a chance to prepare him for a proper burial. 

When they got there, the tomb was empty and an angel sat on the stone which had been removed from the mouth of the sepulcher. The angel asked them who they were looking for, and when they told him they were looking for Jesus, the angel (eyes atwinkle, I suspect) replied, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here. He is alive and has gone before you, as he said he would. Go …”

The fact is we can’t fix things if we don’t face them. There’s more to life than fixing things, of course. Sometimes all we can do is sit with someone who is hurting and hurt with them. We can recognize when we do something wrong and decide to do something differently next time. 

One of the driving forces behind Jesus’ life and ministry was something he called the “kingdom of God,” and while we may think the term to be quaint and/or antiquated (since we’re not all that big on kings and queens, dukes and duchesses, counts or countesses) his view is less about hierarchies and more about seeing God in the people, places, and situations that surround us.

Jesus doesn’t define the kingdom of God as much as he describes it. Jesus uses the term “like” a lot. “The kingdom of God is ‘like’ a seed, which starts small but grows a big bush. Or the kingdom of God is ‘like’ an empty net that is tossed into the sea and gathers an abundant draught of fish…” 

It isn’t much different for us, is it? The kingdom of God is like leaves that clog a storm drain and the homeowner takes her rake and clears the clog, saving her and her neighbor’s property from the stormwaters. Or the kingdom of God is like what happens when a car gets stuck. One man sits in the back of the car praying for a solution while the other gets out to push. 

In other words, yes, the kingdom of God is a mix of those who do and those who pray. This is not to denigrate prayer, but to underline that prayer isn’t about asking God to do something, but asking God what we must do (God helping). 

The kingdom of God isn’t perfect, and neither are we, but nothing will change unless something or someone changes. So Jesus invites us to open our eyes and ears, look and listen, and identify what it is we can do to help. 

Don’t worry about what those around you are or are not doing. In the midst of the storm, it’s OK to beg Jesus for relief. But while you’re begging, don’t stop bailing. The bucket may well be the answer to your prayer in this, our storm tossed valley.

* ALA Notable Children’s Book, by Judith Viorst

Keith Axberg writes on matters concerning life and faith. Author of: Who the Blazes is Jesus? Good News for a Vulgar World (available through Amazon in Print and e-book)