when it rains

When it rains, and when it thunders, we have a wonderful front porch from which to safely survey the action.  Mid-afternoon thunderstorms beckoned us outside earlier this week, and Tyler and I stood for a while in the soft rain, watching the peonies that had just begun to open, listening to the thunder echo around, watching the rain bend the heads yet again of the June blooming perennials.

My newly planted shrubs are gleefully taking it in.  I can feel their roots gathering the refreshing rain and getting limbs ready to burst outward.

My lilac fills the whole house with its fragrance if I keep the front screen open ... and its invitation was irresistable this morning.
So I have moved my computer outside; together with a willow chair that I built with a friend in Alberta, a quilt that my daughter outgrew a few years ago, and a three legged stool made for me when I turned 16 on which to set my coffee and children's ministry books for a fall class.   Took me a while to cart everything out, and settle in, and just as I had everything in place, my son drove up with some friends to take the chocolate cookies that I baked late last night for an end of the year, home room potluck.  "Isn't this rain great?" said his friend as he walked up to the house...
yes. 
This is a good place to sit this morning, to think about teaching.  and children. and grandparenting.  and marriage.  and legacies.  and friendships. and the color yellow. 

I decided after a ridiculously difficult season of life, to choose the spiritual discipline of yellow.  Doesn't count, you may say.  A color is not a discipline. 
No? 
What is a spiritual discipline? 
How do I live my life, to try to align it with what I believe, to express in my own particular way, a life that follows a Creator who is really beyond my understanding,
who defies logic yet created it,
who continues to shape and create despite the determined or haphazard habits of those of us who call ourselves by his name.

How in the world do I respond to that?      
i will pray.  i will read his words.  i will journal.  i will get together with his people. 
and yellow.  bright yellow

I surveyed my closet a few weeks ago, and realized that it has become increasingly dark.
Blacks and dark browns dominate the hangers. 
My good friend has a bright yellow sweater.  She stood beside me as we sang in choir last December ... the best I could do was purple. 
really Darlene?  Purple.
I couldn't do bright.  Felt as though I was yelling at someone when I really wanted to be hiding.   

But this spring I have chosen yellow.  I wear it when I can.  I planted it. 
and God has on occasion chosen yellow for me too. 
yellow finches sing in the shorn poplar branches. 
the yellow peony blooms in the front yard. 
meadow larks with their yellow singing with abandon on Bethany Players' tour
... in gretna, and in niverville, and in steinbach
the yellow day lilies shine like stars in the back corner of the yard beside the fountain. 

I choose yellow.
It's a defiant, bright shade of yellow. 
I'm not yelling
 just declaring a different reality.