A View from my Window ~ April 25 2024

Things are starting to get green! The trees are starting to put out their buds. Some are green, while others are a very dark red. Their leaves will come out as a bright crimson until they get older and go a dark green. Then there are the forsythias, which come out with lovely yellow flowers to get us started with spring! 

The bulbs are up and starting to flower as well. Lovely yellow daffodils as well as multicoloured narcissi. The crocuses are mostly done, just a few later varieties, and the tulips are getting ready, but the only place I have seen them blooming is at Gladys Van Egmond’s stop sign. Everywhere else they are standing straight and tall, but haven’t opened up yet. 

I’m seeing dandelions with their brilliant yellow flowers starting to make their appearance in my lawn, along with the occasional “volunteer” tulip. I actually saw a few people out cutting their grass. I’m hoping to wait a little longer before I have to start that weekly chore!

It is time to clean up my garden. I leave the dead flower heads over the winter so that birds and small animals can get at the seeds that are still left in them. I also tell myself that it lends “winter interest” to the garden. As long as I get out before the new plants get up too high, they aren’t hurting anyone by being there. But if I wait too long then it is more difficult to remove the old ones with this year’s growth coming up. 

It is good to see the change of seasons. The spring flowers are always brilliant colours, to help the insects to find them. Summer flowers tend to be more pastel shades. After the long winter of whites and browns and greys, it is wonderful to see the green grass and the red, yellow and orange flowers. It lifts our spirits! Yes, some days are still grey and rainy, but we need those days to feed the plants and flowers that we hope to see in our gardens in May. Usually the rains are warm and help to encourage the growth in our gardens, and soon, also in the fields around us. 

I’m also seeing a bit more of my neighbours. Unless we happen to run into each other while shovelling snow, I don’t tend to see them as much during the winter, but with gardening, grass cutting and walking, I see a lot more people in the warm months than I do in the winter. It is good to come out of hibernation and to see my neighbours doing the same! 

Spring Is a lovely time of year!

A View from my Window February 29 2024

Happy Leap Year! I have a sibling who is either 15 or 60 today, depending on whether you count birthdays or years on the planet. We only get this day once every four years, so I guess I can cut Mother Nature a bit of slack if she’s off by one day with her beginning of March snow storm. 

To think that two days ago I went around the loop at Lion’s Park for the first time with my puppy! It was warm and sunny and I didn’t even wear my winter coat. The next morning I did wear it, but left it wide open. I knew the weather was about to change. And it did! From 15*C to -4*C in just a matter of a few hours. 

I have a picture on my Facebook Page (which is Public, because many of you who read this are not on Facebook) if you wish to see it, with Kermit the Frog saying, 

“Whoever is holding Mother Nature’s beer 
while she does all 4 seasons in a 24 hours …
pour it out. She is already drunk.”  

I saw another one today, with Kermit, saying 
“I’m ready for this week!
I have my umbrella, my flip flops,
my mittens, my suntan lotion,
my winter coat, my sunglasses,
my thermals, my iced tea, and my hot chocolate!”

Such it is to live in southern Canada! We can have all four seasons in just a matter of hours. I heard once that we were one of the first countries in the world to have a television station completely dedicated to telling us the weather. And we watched it too! And still do! Only now we keep it on our phones and get alerts sent to us when the weather is about to change. 

And it’s not just winter weather, when we need to know how many layers to put on before going out. We also need to know what is happening in the warm weather when sudden summer storms can be very dangerous. Of course, not all weather events can be predicted, as those of you who were here when we had a tornado in Goderich in 2011 remember. There was not a lot of warning for that one!

Sometimes people in the city don’t seem to realize the power of the storms. It’s not very often that a storm completely shuts a city down. When houses and buildings are so close together, you can almost always see across the street. Out here in Huron County, we remember just last year when all the roads were shut down at Christmas time. We even had to cancel the Christmas Eve Service! People were storm-stayed here and in other parts of Huron County. We know well that weather, year round, can be challenging!

So, here’s hoping that if March comes in like a lion, it goes out like a lamb so we don’t have a blizzard Easter Sunday!

View outside the church today!

A View from my Window February 15 2024

Yesterday was Valentines Day! It is our annual celebration of love. There are cards and chocolates, flowers and special songs, special meals and sometimes declarations of everlasting love. It is a very lovely greeting card holiday that makes a lot of people very happy. It is also a commercial bonanza for certain companies who sell us what we are giving to our loved ones.  Unfortunately, for those who do not have a “special someone” it can also be a difficult time, if they are alone. That everyone around them is in a frenzied celebration of “couplehood” just underlines their single status. 

Yesterday was also the first day of Lent, known as Ash Wednesday.  On Ash Wednesday it is traditional to go to church to have your hand or forehead marked with ashes in the shape of a cross. The ashes are created by burning the dried palm fronds from last year’s Palm Sunday mixed with oil that has been blessed. The words said at that time are “you are dust, and to dust you shall return”. It is a reminder of our mortality and for us to begin to prepare ourselves for the death, and ultimately the resurrection, of Jesus. 

On the surface, these two days are very, very different! One is fun and froth and love and laughter, and the other is quite serious and sober. But they have more in common than we might think. Ultimately, they are both about love and celebrating life. And of the two, the deeper, more inclusive one is Ash Wednesday. It  talks about mortality, but being mortal reminds us how important it is to take each day and to live it to the fullest. We can’t put off seeing loved ones or saying that we love someone indefinitely because tomorrow is not guaranteed, either for us or for them. Lent is our reminder of that. 

Lent also reminds us of how much God loves us and the amazing lengths that God will go to show us that love. God doesn’t care if we are a single, a double, or somewhere in between. If we’re a baby, child, teen, adult or a senior, tall or short, skinny or “sturdily” built. God cares about our hearts, and our souls, and how close we are to God, and to each other. 

So take a little time over this week to prepare yourself for your Lenten journey with God. Remind yourself that your Spirit is an important part of you that needs time and refreshment over the upcoming weeks. Remember that you are dust! (but very lovable dust!) Made of the same atoms as the sun and the stars and connected to everything that is, that was, and that will ever be created. Stardust!

A View from my Window January 25 2024

I was thinking about the reading last week about young Samuel and his teacher, Eli. I was thinking that God had a sense of humour!  Samuel is sleeping in the Temple when God calls him. Samuel thinks it is old Eli, so he gets up and goes to him, waking Eli up. Eli sends Samuel back to bed. This happens three times before it occurs to Eli that it might be God calling, trying to talk to the boy, Samuel. 

I was thinking about that interrupted sleep the other night!  Katie, my new puppy, gets me up, sometimes several times, to go out during the night. 

At first when Katie came, I would take her outside and wait for her to do her business. She would whimper and whine. I had on my jacket, jeans and my long nightie, and was glad of the jeans and boots! Katie was so cold she was trying to climb up my jeans to get under the warmth of the nightie. She didn’t understand what I wanted, just that she wanted to get back inside into the warm house! After a day or so, she figured out what I was waiting for her to do, and then we both got back inside a lot faster!

As the weather warms, and she gets bigger and more adventuresome, she has now started to want to explore and play when she goes outside. I’m glad she is getting bolder, but I’m not really interested in playing outside in the snow at 4 in the morning! She gets distracted. It is beautiful out there, with the moonlight glistening off the pristine snow in my backyard, but I’d really rather be sleeping!

Sometimes we are like Katie. We know that God wants something, but we’re really not certain exactly what it is. We can listen to what God is saying, but sometimes our own lack of understanding either gets us doing things that God doesn’t want, or we try by trial and error to figure out what God’s asking. 

When Katie does something I want her to do, I praise her and sound like I am really happy. Sometimes I even give her a treat. I wonder if God does that with us sometimes? Trying really hard to get our attention to let us know how pleased God is?  See that beautiful sunset? That is for us! The sunrise that we missed? God painted it that way just for us! Those little snowdrops that are waiting for us under the snow? The ones we’ll probably walk right past without noticing? God put them there for us! God is trying to let us know what God wants, but sometimes we just aren’t listening. 

But like when Katie figured out what I was wanting her to do, we can get God’s message, if we just keep paying attention. Then, like Samuel, when Eli told him that it was God, we can answer, “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening!”

A View from my Window January 11 2024

I am getting a puppy! Her name is Katie and she is a German Shepherd/ American Bulldog mix. She will be eight weeks old when I get her this Sunday. Her colouring is mostly Shepherd. I’m looking forward to meeting her!

I have three cats at home, Shadow, Luke and Sparta. They may not be incredibly impressed with the new member of the family. But they have had a dog before. My previous dog, Lexie was a black and chocolate lab mix, with a white lightning strike down her chest. Shadow, my oldest cat, was only two and a half weeks old when some children saw him on their lawn and picked him up. I fed him with an eye dropper every few hours and he imprinted on the dog. He fed from me and curled up with her. That cat never sat on my knee to be petted until after the dog died. Now he’s quite affectionate, but until then, I was totally ignored if the dog was available. The other two cats weren’t as close with Lexie, but there weren’t any problems.

I think some of the reason why dogs and cats usually don’t get along is that they don’t speak the same “language”. For example, when a dog makes a sound in their throat they are growling and it is a warning sound. When cats make a sound they may be growling, but they also may be purring and content. When dogs wag their tails they are pleased to see you, but when cats do it they are angry. When dogs show you their belly they are submissive and wanting to be rubbed, but when cats do it they are trusting you not to touch them and are feeling betrayed and angry if you do so. Dogs and cats communicate differently! No wonder they don’t get along!

As humans we can have those kind of communication challenges as well. Sometimes we have people that we are just “in sync” with. We can talk and get along without any unfortunate misunderstandings. While with some other people, no matter how hard we try, we just can’t seem to communicate without someone getting all upset about something they think we meant. I guess you could say that with some people we just get along like cats and dogs 😉   

But cats and dogs can learn to get along! They can even become quite friendly. Some dogs protect “their” cats just as quickly as they would protect “their” humans. It’s not always easy getting along with others, but the time and patience spent learning about each other can lead to relationships that are well worth the time and effort put into them. Remember, we are all God’s children, and God loves all of God’s creatures, both cats and dogs! 

Lexie and Shadow Katie (new puppy)

A View from my Window December 21 2023

The view out of my window is quite pretty at night! There is a little bit of snow to reflect the Christmas lights up and down the street. My Christmas tree is up and lit. As the song says, “It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas”! 

One of our customs around Christmas is to give gifts. Now there are more children in the family so I’m finding myself looking for toys, clothing and maybe a book or two for the little ones. My parents can’t get out much to shop so they tend to go with gift cards and something from a gift catalogue. The United Church of Canada has a catalogue called Gifts with Vision (available on line) that gives people the opportunity to help others who are in need at Christmas from many different parts of the world. Sometimes the suggestions are gifts of chickens and goats, other times bursaries to help with further education. There is quite a wide selection of both cost and possibilities available. 

Sometimes we can get so caught up in the consumer side of Christmas that we are overwhelmed with the work of preparing for it. Now that we are only days away from the “Big Day” maybe we can take a moment to step back and remember what it is really all about. It’s certainly not about who has the most gifts under the tree! 

The custom of gift giving started with the ones we call Wise Men, or Magi. They brought gifts to the baby Jesus. The gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh were small, but very precious gifts, suitable for those who had far to travel to reach the Child. They were also very useful for Mary and Joseph when they fled to Egypt. They could be sold so that they could buy food and the other necessities for a fleeing refugee family with a small child. 

In some traditions, the giving of gifts is separated from Christmas, and takes place either earlier, or later. Some give children gifts on St. Nicholas’ Day which is December 6th, while others give their gifts on Epiphany (the 12th day of Christmas), January 6th in honour of the Magi.  Either way, it leaves Christmas as a religious holiday, to celebrate the birth of Christ, without the gift exchange. 

For the last several years my family has scaled back on giving each other gifts, concentrating instead on enjoying each other’s company and having a meal together. It takes a lot of the pressure off to find gifts, and that helps in January, when the bills come in too!

However you choose to celebrate Christmas, I hope that you and your family enjoy the time together, and that you find true joy and peace in the coming of the Christ Child.  Merry Christmas!

A View from my Window ~ December 7 2023

As we move into December, it is starting to feel like Christmas is getting close. More people are putting up their Christmas lights. I got mine up the other day, before the snow came. I’d already put up the strings of lights. Now I have put up the two wooden cut-outs that a man at my last church made. One is of the Nativity, and the other is Joy. I put floodlights on them, one of red and the other is blue this year. I have to be sure to make the Joy, which is painted red, have the red floodlight because if you put a blue or green one on it then it turns black. No one wants a black joy! 

I’ve also put up my Christmas tree. I keep my decorations up through Advent and Christmas until Epiphany, so I prefer an artificial tree. I generally have it up for a few days so that the cats get used to the idea of having it there. They don’t try to climb it, though they sometimes try chewing the fake needles. Once they start to ignore the tree then I can start to add the decorations. They have a few I put at the bottom that they like to play with, but they leave my special ones alone. 

Some people buy decorations in batches so that they can make a fashionably decorated tree. One year may be red and gold, another year silver and blue. My tree isn’t like that. All of my decorations have stories. Some are very old ones, broken and scruffy, that my husband had as a child. Rudolf may be missing a part of one leg, but he still has a place on the tree. There’s the first one my parents gave me, and the one called “Love” that my husband gifted to me the Christmas before he proposed. There are a few “Baby’s First Christmas” and one with a chicken sitting on an egg for the baby who was born December 30th. There are the ones given by one of my choir directors who gave one to all the choir members each year, and there is the one talking about my husband’s first Christmas in heaven. They all have memories attached to them, and they are all precious to me. I’m not sure when I will have the courage to walk with those memories again this year. But in some ways it is harder to leave the tree bare. 

Christmases are full of memories. Some are wonderful! I remember my baby sister enjoying her first apple. Before that she only had pieces. She took the whole day, carrying it around and nibbling on her very own apple! Some Christmases were hard, like knowing it would be my husband’s last Christmas with us. Those memories are bittersweet! Now, as the family grows with the grandchildren, the memories we are making are happy ones again. 

As you move into your Christmas memories, and whatever triggers them for you, remember what Christmas is really all about. Emmanuel, God with us. Walking with us in good times, and in difficult times. Coming to bring light and joy into even the darkest December night. Enjoy the time with friends and family, next year is not guaranteed for anyone, ever. 

I hope you all enjoy your Christmas Season!

A View from my Window ~ November 23 2023

I’ve been thinking about the Bible story about David and Goliath. David was a young shepherd lad who took care of his family’s sheep. He protected them from lions and wolves, mostly by throwing rocks at them with his slingshot. He was a brave, hard-working lad.

One day his father asked him to take some food and clothing to his older brothers who were serving on the front line in a war with the neighbouring country. He went there, only to find that the countries were busy hurling insults and challenges at each other, the usual precursor to a battle. The other country, inhabited by the Philistines, had a very, very large man, usually referred to as a giant, named Goliath. He was yelling insults at the Israelites about them, and about their God. Because he was so large and scary, no one was willing to fight him. 

David was used to fighting with things bigger than he was, after all, he was the youngest of eight brothers! He said he would go to fight to defend his family and his God. Everyone said he was too small, but they took him to the king to get him to tell David to go home. The king tried to dissuade him, and even got him to try on the king’s own armour, just to show him how he could not fill a real warrior’s shoes (or his breastplate, or helmet, for that matter). David insisted on being allowed to fight, in his own way, in his own clothes. 

David was so small and insignificant that Goliath laughed at him. David was so accurate that he hit Goliath in the middle of his forehead, under his helmet, with one of the stones he carried in a pouch with his slingshot. Then while Goliath was stunned, he ran over and cut off Goliath’s head with Goliath’s own sword! The other Philistines were so scared of this young shepherd boy that they all ran away. 

All of us feel like David at some point, trying to fight someone who is bigger or stronger than us. We sometimes refer to it as trying to fight city hall. But David won.

He won by doing a few simple things:

1.  He knew quite clearly what it was he wanted to accomplish. He needed to defeat the giant.

2. He remained true to himself. He wouldn’t use other people’s armour or weapons but relied on the ones he knew best.

3. He trusted that God would carry him through.

So when you’re up against something that looks bigger than you and unstoppable, remember the story of David!

And if you are the Goliath, remember what happened to him!