Painted pigs and picnics

I entered this weekend bemoaning my fate: laundry, school work (accounting, of all things!), bills, work I didn't finish during regular work week of work. Work. Work...

I wind it down grateful that -- by some miracle -- I remembered that my life is a gift and not all work. That miracle came in the form of an almost-four-year-old needing Mommy's attention. And somehow -- the other half of the miracle -- I let the sand of work worry settle into the bottom of the glass, and filled up my time with big chunks of boy time.

Yesterday we went out for breakfast, me and my boys (the tall one and the short one), then went for a walk in the mall (too cold for outside!). While Kevin perused CDs and DVDs, Sam and I painted a pig at a ceramics shop. We picked out purple, pink, acqua, and black for colors, which could have been quite colorful if the black hadn't gotten into everything. So, it will come out mostly gray once it's fired. A gray pig with "SAM" spelled out on his bum. A masterpiece.

Today we went to church, where Sam learned about sharing and picking up. Love those folks, teaching my son values and good manners! So, we came home and practiced his Sunday School lesson on his room. Sam even helped spray Enddust. Awesome cleanliness. We then rolled out a blanket on his newly cleared and clean floor and had a picnic. We invited all the animals that we had just put away, and we ate Cheerios and Cheezits. So, it didn't stay 100% picked up. But that's ok, too.

So, here I am avoiding accounting with happy reminiscing. Back to the books. But don't forget, life is big enough to accommodate painted pigs as well as spreadsheets.

Breath

Musing on the obvious lately, I saw a question posted on twitter that caught my attention. A fellow tweeter asked, "What is the opposite of breath?"

Most obvious answer: Death. Which got me thinking about the nature of life. Without breath there is no life. I take for granted this constant in and out huffing I do without thinking. But it is this small thing that is everything in keeping the machinery of life working. It is not only the evidence of life but the sustainer of life.

Breath is also another word for spirit (or Spirit). And there is inspiration, which literally means to "fill with life" or "breathe life into."

Body and soul are connected through breath, as is evidenced by those days when I'm so busy or self-absorbed that I forget to breathe deeply. By the end of such a day, I feel a deadening weight, not merely depression, but a loss of spirit, a lessening of life.

Reminds me in an almost too obvious way of the Michael W. Smith song, Breathe:

This is the air I breathe
This is the air I breathe
Your holy presence living in me

This is my daily bread
This is my daily bread
Your very word spoken to me

And I... I'm desperate for you
And I... I'm I'm lost without you


Such simple yet vulnerable lyrics, they touch my heart every time I hear them. Desperate, lost... dead without his holy presence living in me, the one that is my air and bread. Such an awareness of my desperate state, this is what brings me to my knees in worship. And it is what lifts me to my feet to try again (after falling, after forgetting to breathe) to live a life of worship.

This is the air I breathe.