Totally inappropriate, I know, I know.

But I still had to post it.

It was a comment made by someone who had read a blurb about Kris Humphries, the soon-to-be-ex-husband of Kim Kardashian, and how he has now hired his own lawyer to take care of the dealings of the divorce.

"He [Humphries] really should get tested for STD's.  That women has been passed around more than an offering plate at a tent revival."

[The content of the comment bears no direct reflection of the opinion of the blogger;-).]

A bit of a revelation...maybe.

My mother is a very gifted woman.  She can set a table, host a party, decorate a house, plan a wedding, cook a meal that rivals the very best of 'em.  I grew up with our home being the home to go to for baptism's, cookout's, bon voyage's, birthday parties, etc..  But while party hosting, be it small or large, is a great talent for my mother, I wonder if she didn't feel a little pressure in this.  I say this because I was thinking of how I can set a table, host a party, decorate a house, plan a wedding, maybe not cook a meal, but I can pull the rest off with relative success, but not without some pressure.  I can do it, I've got skills and the eye and the creativity, but I know some of the pressure I feel is comparing it to my mother's abilities.  Now, I know I shouldn't compare, so I'll move on from that.  I just know that I have never asked my mother how she felt about doing allllllllll of that.  I always think she's not phased, smooth as a cucumber, no big deal, but I wonder if she doesn't feel a little of what I feel when I throw or host something.  Maybe she too gets a little nervous or wants it to be just right or feels a little perfectionism in it, too.  I don't know.  Maybe she is fine.  But I've always assumed one thing, when maybe she's a little more like me than I realize.  I know we both enjoy doing these things.  I just know I have a little trepidation:-).  I guess I'm just gonna have to ask her.

Free+Road Trip+Memory Lane=Happy

Groupon and I are going on a 20 minute road trip today to a place called Northern Raleigh:-).  I was able to fandangle a 30.00 gift certificate to a place called Red Mill General Store (never heard of it until today on Groupon.com) for FREE!  30.00 for free!  While I have never been to this General Store, I must admit I have a thing for them.  It very well could be by Michigan upbringing, because not far down the road from the house I grew up in, was a general store.  I lived on a pig farm.  My father wasn't a farmer, we just rented the house from one. So this general store had the sweetest smell of grains and a reasonable stock of feed equipment, BUT it also had pop and gum:-).  And while I do forsee myself visiting the Red Mill General Store today and picking up an outdoor thermometer, along with some bird seed, I might just have to pick up some pop and gum, too, for old-times sake!  Yeah (!) for the simple things!!

Rest is kickin' my butt!

I'm loving it.
  Last night I was sharing with a group of women about my past week of real, deep, hearty rest.  And what I have noticed is because I am giving myself this time to think, pray, do nothing, relax, go for walks, visit friend's on occasion, watch movies it really is helping to strengthen a muscle I do not typically, naturally use:-).  The muscle of preparing for my future.  My natural line of thinking into the future is maybe 6 months out.  My husband on the other hand is preparing for retirement, thinks about it, talks about it, plans for it.  I am sincerely just working on my day, my week and then I'm done.  BUT in this rest, I find myself caring for the person inside of me, the one that God has designed to look like Him, and I find myself wanting to take care of that woman.  I want to care for that woman down the road, like one a year out and more:-).  I have to live with her.  I want to have listened to her.  It's too important not to.  So I am learning to. 

I had forgotten!!!

I know this is going to sound crazy, considering I am a completely healthy, capable, competent woman of 36 who lives in the United States of America and has been brought up here all my life.  But my worth ethic is all about the part-time.  As is my work ethic.  I can do "nose-to-the-grindstone" 9-to-5, but only three days a week.  It's not that I don't like to work, I LOVE to work, but I also love rest and all the things that rest helps produce in my life.  Rest helps me be available for a more completed me--the me that I want to be.  I'm all about hard work.  I welcome it.  But when it comes to the conventional j-o-b, it's part-time for me.  I completely get that this is a luxury, but let me say, even when I was single, I only worked part time.  I've come close to 40 hours a week, for a few years, with 35 hours or something like that, but it has never been 40.  26 hours, yes.  18, yes.  15 even, yes.  But then again, I have never had so much debt or so many expenses that I have had to work full-time.  I have made choices in my life that have given me room to keep rest as my second part-time job, if you will:-).  (I completely admit also that I have had the blessing of many, many cheap and gracious rides when it comes to my living arrangements!  Not everyone would choose to live the way I have lived, but it worked for me.)  Granted because I have chosen to work only part-time I haven't been able to travel Europe extensively or get massages every week like I would like to:-), but I wouldn't by any means say that I have been deprived.
  I write any of this because as of the past few days I have had the immense blessing of rest.  And because of my life's circumstances as of late, this kind of rest has been long overdue.  But having this rest reminded me of why I LOVE IT SO MUCH and why I am grateful to work only part-time.  I have been operating on overhaul mode for the past month because we have been out an aide at work.  So it has just been me.  But now we have a new aide...aaah!  And I have been given a break that I haven't seen in awhile.  And yesterday when I was at the post office, I was standing there in front of a line that was starting to get really long when another customer who had just been assisted at the counter needed help bringing a heavy package to her car.  The clerk tried to find her a Dolley so she could use that to wheel her package to the car, but the Dolley was already in use.  So without even thinking, I got out of line and told her I would help her carry the package to her car.  And I did.  Afterwards I came back inside the post office, got in the back of the line and went along as usual.  Rest did that for me.  Having the time did that to me.  I was thinking like how I want to think!!!  (In a way, I wasn't!!!)  I'm not writing this to say I'm great.  I am writing this because I know because I have rested, I have the energy, the strength, the space to do things I love--AND I LOVE SPONTANEOUSLY helping someone out.  And I had forgotten that!!!!  Because I have been soooo busy, I completely had forgotten that I love to just meet people where they are, in that moment, and do something small to make their life a little easier.  Rest helped me remember!!!  And yesterday I was at a friend's house, and this friend has a new dog, and this new dog is stressing her out.  She works a half an hour away from home, but has been coming home during her hour and twenty minute lunch breaks to walk her dog!  She has lost five pounds since owning the dog because she hasn't been eating!  She is aiming to give the dog to another family, but in the interim, I told her that I would walk her dog for her today, and she and I could work out a schedule for next week that I can walk her dog and she wouldn't have to come home during her lunch break every work day.  She looked at me like I had just walked on water:-).  Well, maybe not so much that, but something close.  I love being able to do that for her.  I remembered.  I remembered many years ago when I didn't have a job at all---for months.  I literally would wake up in the mornings and say, "What kind of mischief can we get into God?  Who can we maybe help today?  Who can we bless?"  And I asked that of God yesterday.  And I LOVED praying that. 
  Side note: I am fully aware that LOTS of people are able to pray that prayer while still having a full-time job and/or a family, pets, lawn work.  I totally get it, but my wiring, how I'm made up is not that way.  God is very accommodating to that:-).  As I am sure he is to anyone willing.