I’d Be Over the Edge Without My Black Wedge...Thursday

Devotional for 1/8/15

It’s been a week since the New Year began and I’m still working to find the little “pleasures and treasures” that God leaves for me.  I have to admit that I’m very thankful that my dryer (of which I wrote about last week) was fixed today, and I was so pleased to tell my gracious neighbor that I will no longer need to use hers.  Unfortunately, by the time I got a load finished in the washer and put into the dryer, my husband discovered a water leak in the garage. 

Turns out, after cutting into the walls in several places where he could hear the drip drip dripping and could feel the wet sheetrock, he found a sheetrock screw that was wrongly placed 9 years ago when the house was built.  It had punctured a hot water pipe.  How it took 9 years for the leak to begin is beyond me.  I guess it has something to do with construction materials swelling and receding over time. 

Financially, it’s all covered in the 10 year warranty of the builder.  That’s something to be thankful for, but they can’t come out till sometime tomorrow afternoon.   Hot water’s turned off.  And I have a lot of nasty laundry that needs hot water to get cleaned. 

Sometimes it’s hard to find the “pleasures and treasures” when every time I turn around, something breaks.  I’m barely able to tread water trying to make sure my family has clean clothes.  I’ve still got Christmas decorations to take down.  And I just found out that I was supposed to re-register my son for the next semester at the community college…last month!?!?  Apparently, when they’re concurrently enrolled in high school and college, you have to start the whole process over again every semester.  Sure wish someone would have told me that!

I feel like everything I reflect on is a complaint.  I don’t think I’m doing a good job of finding “pleasures and treasures”.  On the other hand, I’m surprisingly keeping my cool and not emotionally exploding.  I don’t know how to explain it, but I’m definitely thankful for it.  “Keeping my cool” is not something I would consider a “pleasure” nor a “treasure”, but my kids probably consider it to be.

Looking back over the hectic holiday season that had me constantly in tears because I just wanted to enjoy my favorite time of the year and couldn’t seem to find any joy, I remember there were some moments that surprised me and put a huge smile on my face.  I didn’t see them at the time as God providing little “pleasures and treasures” in the midst of my insanity.  But I still smile when I think about them…meaning they’re still “treasures” providing “pleasures”. 

One of those moments occurred when I climbed into the attic to find the last box of Christmas decorations my kids missed when I sent them up there to retrieve it all the day before.  Climbing up the ladder gave me a vantage point I don’t normally have in my closet.  I saw on a top shelf and pushed toward the wall too far back for me to see from the floor at my 5 foot 1 inch eyesight, the single black, sling-back, open-toed, wedge heel with the little bow on the toe that had been missing for months!  I just could not bring myself to throw away the one I still had even though I looked everywhere and could not find the missing one of the pair, and here it was all along.

I don’t think I’ve ever been so excited to find a missing shoe.  And it happened just in time because a week later when my daughter gave me a pair of black heels for Christmas, they didn’t fit me so she decided to keep them.  Then a week after that, my dog ate another pair of black heels.  If it wasn’t for finding that missing shoe a week before Christmas, I would have no black heels at all.  I know that seems insignificant, and a lot of people would not understand the devastation of having no black heels, but it looks to me that God knew that being black heelless would most definitely send me over the edge!

There are a lot of things to be thankful for when it feels like everything is falling apart right before your eyes.  I really am doing my best to find those things to be thankful for like a kind neighbor, and warranties that cover the cost of broken houses.  I know I must focus on those things so as to not wallow in my sorrows day after day.  But I’m starting to understand this simple little thing called “pleasures and treasures”.  I know the benefit of spending time in praise and worship daily, and I do that very thing praising God for everything I’m supposed to praise Him for…all that He’s created, my family, my health, my salvation, and just for who He is.  But I wonder if it would be wrong for me to laugh out loud with joy and shout, “Praise God that I still have a pair of black heels!!” 

After all, He’s the one who knew I would need something to put a smile on my face in the midst of a broken dryer, a leaking pipe, a missing crown (I wrote about that last week as well), over-due paperwork, and did I mention that my DVR just gave me a message about an hour ago that it’s no longer activated and I must call customer service during business hours to fix it???  I guess it’s a good thing too, because I would’ve forgotten to write this devotional if I was watching TV. 

Oh, by the way, my daughter did promise me she would buy me another pair of shoes, but I’m in no hurry since I now have my black sling-back wedges!

Amie Spruiell 1/7/15