Brevity of LIfe

It's Cherry Blossom Season again - a short 3-4 weeks in the spring here in Japan. The weather has felt especially cold and bitter somedays and other days it feels warm and full of promise. I know this happens every spring, but somehow it reminds me of the shortness of life.

The buds are just beginning to open up and become flowers. Soon, they will be gone and replaced by fully mature green leaves.

It reminds me of the shortness of this parenting season. My children are tiny and ready to grow, but they will soon be grown, not in need of constant care. I need to learn to appreciate where they are at, but sometimes I mourn that its hard or that its not an easy path to maturity.

Rather, I should sense the time is fleeting, my time will not be forever, they will move onto other places, have other loves, other desires. They will not always cling to me, or demand my attention, or seek me out as if I'm lost and they found me.

Someday, they will want me but not as desperately as they do now when they are scared or overwhelmed or just bored.

So like the cherry blossoms, I should learn to cherish the time.  It is short. It is fleeting. And the life they have is precious.

Work

The holidays are over. The parties are done.

Why am I having such a hard time working again? Why am I not motivated to dive back in?

What's the hang up?

Why should we work?

There's a moment when rest is over and work must begin. For a parent there's never really an off time, you must always be ready to work or you are being a lazy parent and allowing your kids to fend for themselves.

Work is choosing to do what needs to be done when you would rather be on the couch being lazy.

When its time to work, I'm learning how to keep at it. Sometimes, I tend to be lazy, part of which is probably is probably because I had a fairly lax schedule as a homeschooler. Every day as long as my chores and school work was done, I could schedule life however I wished mostly alone. which made my introverted heart happy.
But when its time to work, I should view it as a good thing. Our church did a series on work and the theology of worka year or so ago. It was good to hear because sometimes I forget that God is the one who created work for good. Sin mares all of life including work, but its actually a good thing for both our bodies and our minds.

So I should rejoice in work instead of dreading it. I want to be able to see how God has created it for good and not dread the time to work.

Nor do I want to be a work-aholic and forget about all the other things and people God has also called me to.

Hair

Every part of my hair has defined me throughout my life. I have red hair. It s a defining characteristic. I also have thick curly hair. And I live in one of the most humid places on earth. 

Needless to say, it has been an integral part of my life since birth. 

When our family moved here to Okinawa, I had a hard time finding a good solution for a hair stylist as I didn't know where to go or what to do. 

It has taken me on a long journey, from the worst hair cut of my life, resulting in wearing super short hair for a very long time, to a hair cut at a missionary retreat, to a stylist in the states, to here finding a lady who is cutting hair on base. 

It was quite literally a spiritual experience for me. I was scared that it would go really badly and then I would be forced to live with it for awhile. 

But it didn't go badly. The hair stylist was a master curly hair lady and actually had curly hair herself. It was a life giving moment for me!