2018 March 20 Tuesday

2018 March 20 Tuesday in Liberty Hill Texas

I’m gonna warn you up front … this a long post. I followed a couple bunny trails.

45° at 5:45 so I closed the bedroom window. Yeah I like it cool to sleep – but, let’s be real, there’s a limit, okay? Burrowed back under the covers and threw my cold arm across my sleeping wife. Yeah I’m that kinda guy.

Checking my news feeds this morning, I found this, “Package bound for Austin blows up at FedEx building near San Antonio.” My family and friends live and work in this city, so I “Thank the LORD! He has shown me the miracle of his mercy in a city under attack.”*

Sunday we got the new book that our class is going to be studying. “Unafraid” by Adam Hamilton.

Considering the fear in our Texas community over these bombs, it seems like an appropriate and timely study

I was ready for some good news so then I read that our church’s Lenten Clothing Drive had concluded with so much clothing donated that we had to rent a truck to haul it.

Speaking of clothing, this was once again laundry day at the Williams household (RVhold?).

Now there’s another rabbit hole to go down. When talking to people I often use words such as household and housekeeping. Those words convey the proper message but not the proper image. We have no house. We have a home but it is on wheels. We need to add some new terminology to the language. Otherwise we will continue to use outdated words for a new situation. Take the word threshold. It means a strip of wood, metal, or stone forming the bottom of a doorway. However it originally meant to hold the thresh (straw) that was scattered on the dirt floors of homes. Nowadays most of us have a phone in our pocket. But calling it a phone is to limit it to only one of the myriad of uses to which we put these devices. I like the term from Star Trek, “communicator” or com for short. Yeah I can get behind that. “Com me.”

 

The groundskeeper was mowing this morning. I hoped that he would get to our site while we we’re doing laundry. But he didn’t.

 

I remember helping my mother do laundry. Back then laundry day started with me bringing the big galvanized washtub in from where it hung on the back porch. The tub would go on the stove to heat water for the wringer washing machine. The first load of water went into the washing machine. 

Then a second tub was moved to a stand next to the machine under the wringer. Bluing went into the second tub which was for rinsing the laundry. While the machine ran Mom would stand there with her “laundry stick” and keep pushing the clothes further down into the washer.

Eventually the washed clothes were run through the wringer into the rinse water. The laundry stick was them deployed to agitate the clothes in the rinse water.

When she was satisfied, the clothes were run through the ringer once or twice and into the laundry basket (which originally held a bushel of peaches).

Being young and strong I carried the basket out to the clothesline. I couldn’t reach the lines so I would hand Mom a piece of clothing while she grabbed clothes pins from the bag hanging on the line.

Once everything was on the line, she would go in and fix it lunch.

After a day in the sunshine and wind the clothes were taken down, brought inside and folded.

By contrast, today Ella put clothes into the front loading machines while I added soap. We then dropped $3 in quarters in each. We then sat and played games. Less than thirty minutes later the clothes were moved to the dryers. More quarters were added and the drying began. More games were played. A short time later, clothes were out of the dryer, were folded, and in the laundry bag, ready for the trip home

But first a stop for lunch

*Psalms 31:21

MUSINGS – March 20 2018 GO OR STAY

Genesis 26:1-3
There was a famine in the land in addition to the earlier one during Abraham’s time. So Isaac went to King Abimelech of the Philistines in Gerar.  The LORD appeared to Isaac and said, “Don’t go to Egypt. Stay where I tell you. Live here in this land for a while, and I will be with you and bless you. I will give all these lands to you and your descendants. I will keep the oath that I swore to your father Abraham.

 

Many times in my life I’ve ask God where he wants me. I actually pray,”Lord, push me, pull me, place me where you want me. I give you my permission to override my self will not my will but yours.”

Sometimes I’m expecting a “Go to Nineveh!*” But more often than not I’ve gotten, “Stay where I tell you.”

*Genesis 10:10

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