by Sharon O | Nov 13, 2015 | Uncategorized
One more time we enter into the challenge of a word prompt.
Write for five minutes then stop, with no editing and no revising.
I have to admit here, I did spend more than five minutes on this.
In order to look up what I needed, it took a bit longer to get my writing finished.
Today’s word is weary.
The verse I am going to work with is this one, from the New Testament book of the Bible,
“Come to me all, who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”
Matthew 11:28
The word come means to approach or move towards, a place or a person.
It is an active word, to move into view and appear or extend or reach.
It means we must make a decision to ‘come’ to Him who can help us.
“Come to me,” It is realizing we can enter into a place of peace if we decide to.
The word weary, means to be physically or mentally exhausted fatigue.
We have all been in this feeling at one point in time and understand the fog it leaves us in.
The word burdened means to have a difficult obligation or feelings of heavily troubled oppression.
“Come to me – walk towards me in your deepest heaviest spirit and accept my peace (my interpretation)“
The word rest means refreshing quiet, refreshing ease, relief and freedom from trouble or deep disturbance.
It is a quiet stillness that restores your unsettled spirit.
“Come to me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” Matthew 11:28
In the message Bible, this is the way it says the same verse.
Matthew 11:28-30The Message (MSG) 28-30
“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me.
Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest.
Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace.
I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”
I think this could be a life verse. I love the line ‘learn the unforced rhythms of grace.’
Shall we drop our heavy hearts and let something go today?
There is so much in this life that can weigh us down, so many worries and stresses.
Perhaps it is time to finally, once and for all, ‘come to HIM’ who is able to help us, find the true internal peace we so desperately need.
by Sharon O | Nov 8, 2015 | Uncategorized
This was our anniversary week.
We did a variety of fun things to celebrate our ‘time’ together.
The day is always a good time for us, to remember how far we have come.
When we stood at the altar of the church as young, barely out of high school teens.
We had no idea what kind of dance marriage is and would be for us.
I call it a dance because there are moves in many directions as the years come and go.
The stage of young marrieds, alone and discovering how to navigate out of your parents home.
Then the stage of new expectant parents, anticipating a new baby and what that would look like together.
Then the parenting stage of crying infants, diapers, and lack of sleep.
Then the stage of no money and little sleep again, and toddlers and no energy.
Then the stage of preschool and driving to a place who you trust, to take care of your child.
The stage of trusting and hoping all will be well when they enter into grade school.
Then the stage of junior high and then on into high school, and you wonder and you wait, to see if you did a good job or not as they grow into young adult hood.
Then the stage of them emancipating themselves and moving out, starting a new journey of their own.
Then you drive away from the college campus and you pray for safety and the money to be enough and for them to make good choices.
Then you find yourselves standing as the parents of the groom, and you are now in the role of in-laws and how proud you are in this stage of life.
Then you find yourselves sitting in a nicu room filled with tiny babies, with your daughter, and one of them is YOUR first grand baby.
Then you become the parents of the bride, and then more grand babies come into your lives, and soon you find yourselves calling each other grandma and grandpa.
The dance of marriage is ongoing. You grow old together, seasons change just like the beat of the music.
The journey is easy if you follow slowly and learn to be adaptable.
The dance of growing older and marveling at how far you have come, and knowing that forty two years is a long time to learn this dance.
I love the imagery of dancing together, because every season of life is different and we must learn new steps to get through it.
We have years ahead of us, where the dance of aging will be even more difficult, than the young parenting years.
Oh we thought that would never pass, we just could not see how it would be ‘different’, those who told us, someday you will look back and realize how far you have come.
The dance of remembering is sweet and sad at the same time.
We moved through the dance of losing our parents and letting go of that part of our lives.
The days now are quiet and sometimes lonely.
Often you find ourselves in the stage of waiting again, and wondering if they will call or come visit, just as your own parents did many years ago.
The caretaking days have ended and even though, the dance of marriage is both difficult and rewarding.
In the end, it is beauty and a story unfolding, of life and of love, and of a familiar commitment.
This was our anniversary week and I pray for many more.
{THIS is part of the five minute writing challenge on one word: the word was dance}
by Sharon O | Nov 5, 2015 | Uncategorized
Years ago my husband had this picture taken of himself, our grandson and grandpa’s dog.
It remains one of my favorite pictures of all time. The colors, the walk together, the dog just following the trail.
I always love the fall.
We chose to get married in the fall just because of the colors and the time of year we both loved.
Our wedding day was simple because we were young and didn’t have a lot of money.
Here we are saying our vows at age 18 and 19 and praying that God would bless our decision.
Forty two years later, I can say HE has blessed us far beyond we ever thought or dreamed.
The other day we went on a ‘outing’ to a winery in the fall. We love the colors and time spent together.
This anniversary we celebrated for about three days doing winetasting, then to the beach, then into the valley where I posted yesterday.
The rains have not ruined the colors of the landscape and in fact might have even made them more rich and beautiful.
Soon the leaves will disappear and we will begin to get the winter rains, our Pacific Northwest is known for.
Not sure if we will be getting snow this year.
I hope we do, but it is not that common to get snow in our area.
For now we will enjoy the fall colors and the continual theme of giving thanks, as we head into the Thanksgiving season, full of family memories gathered together.
by Sharon O | Nov 4, 2015 | Uncategorized
We decided to go on a drive just the two of us. It was our special day and we were spending it together.
We had breakfast out and then we were planning on a dinner out and in the middle of the day we were not sure where to go.
So when that happens the logical thing to do is ‘don’t plan’… just drive.
We started down the freeway from Oregon to the Washington side of the Columbia river following the old roads through tunnels and along railroad tracks.
The weather was beautiful and the colors of autumn amazing.
The Columbia River is a majestic large body of water that flows it always amazes me with it’s beauty and it’s power.
This is a little farm we saw while over looking the Columbia river. I noticed a little road that traveled up to the farm then as I looked closer I saw sheep and perhaps even a large dog or horse.
Can’t even imagine how beautiful that would be to live there.
My husband took a panoramic picture and it shows the beauty of the Pacific Northwest.
Autumn is so beautiful and so ‘ever’ changing. The landscape went from yellows, oranges, golds and from green fields to golden wheat fields.
It was amazing and so breathtaking at times.
God in all his glory painted beautiful portraits of color.
We also stopped and checked out a pioneer cemetery, we love to read the words and imagine why they died. One stone had baby infant named Lucille… the other stones had two babies from the same family who died a day apart, one was age two and the other one was age 19 days. I cannot imagine the trip out west in the pioneer days on rough terrain and in wagon trains. The Oregon Trail followed part of the road we travelled, I cannot imagine losing and then burying your little ones and then continuing on in your wagon to a new ‘place to live’.
The broken hearts of so many left behind on the trail.
At the entrance of the cemetery there was a flag blowing in the wind and not far was a mighty oak tree standing in all it’s glory.
Before we got to these we had to travel up and down the road along multi colored trees and farm lands full of vineyards and fruit trees. 
The difference from autumn colors to then wheat fields was both amazing and beautiful.
On our way home we headed from the wheat fields of almost Central Oregon, to the road near Mt Hood.
We even drove through a blustery light dusting of ice and snow mix.
It was a bit scary driving through the very empty roads and when the sky got darker, it was a bit unsettling as the heavy rain mist came down on our car window, we did end up seeing a road crew and that made me feel not so ‘alone’ on the road heading home.
We covered over 300 miles and saw lots of beautiful country.
It was all in a days drive on our fall anniversary.
Our 42nd wedding anniversary ended up at a restaurant named PF Changs and we shared our ‘final’ part of our day together before heading home.
by Sharon O | Oct 27, 2015 | Uncategorized
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