Near Sensory Overload

Nostalgia

7:00 AM - The doggies have been doing their pee-pee dance for 15 minutes. I took them outside. I even put shorts and shoes on this time (instead of barefoot in my robe). The back of our property by the pines is their preferred waste disposal area. Fine with me, except I was dizzy from allergies and sinuses.

The heavy humid air reminds me of something and it takes a few moments to figure it out: The smell of our reading books in Mrs. Warren’s 5th grade classroom. That came from nowhere, and was a welcome memory. I adore Mrs. Warren and I pray she is doing better with her cancer treatments these days. 

10:30 AM - The sun was shining so bright in the back yard of the Congregational Church. It’s not MY my church, but I spent quite a bit of time there in my childhood during VBS. The Congregational Church and the Methodist Church have been sharing a community VBS for as long as I have been alive.

I particularly like their church because it has a parsonage two steps off the back door. The church is very interesting and has all manner of nooks and crannies. The light fixtures were replaced sometime in the 1980’s— think smoky etched glass panes plus metal. And the wallpaper in the women’s room was shades of brown. And not like TODAY’S neutrals. This was like total 1980’s floral striped paper with 1980’s flounced tiered curtains in a weird mauve-y beige.

The floor squeaks. They have paintings on the walls that I have seen for my entire life… things I may not remember off the top of my head, but when I see them, I know I am somewhere I have been MANY TIMES before. The kitchen hasn’t been updated since I made my burned-match cross there at age 13. I know that’s how old I was, because at age 14 I began TEACHING VBS.

8:30 PM - Driving to my parent’s house from Branton. I had been waiting for Rob to get out of a church meeting. He said he’d be done at 8 and I waited another 30 minutes. On the way up the hill and out of town, I smell freshly tilled dirt. I was thinking it must have been someone’s garden because there were no plowed fields that I could see.

I guzzled my bottle of ice-cold water and reveled in the beauty of a momma pheasant and 8 babies crossing the road in front of my car. I breathed in deeply when I turned onto my parents’ dirt road, and smelled the mid-July smells that bring back memories of staying in the treehouse all day: Growing corn, charcoal bbq, silage (a variety of stinky cow food made from fermented corn stalks), alfalfa in various states of growth or cutting or raking or baling, as well as pine tar that reminds me of pruning Christmas trees with my grandma.

All day long I was overwhelmed by sights, smells and sounds of my life… especially the parts that I’ll leave behind come Sunday. You all have been amazing with your encouraging words, and I thank you for them.

I know that God will provide. God will take care of us, and ultimately, it will all work to good for Rob and me because we love God and are called according to His purpose.

God’s Purpose

One last tidbit on God’s Purpose. Have I yet mentioned that Rob and I haven’t moved into our new room yet? We haven’t had the money to get a new bed like we want to, and we haven’t had the money to buy the organizers for the closet. We WERE fine just waiting but recently we have been getting more anxious to spend a night in our new room.

Stupid Jayleigh Jokes

But tonight Rob said he saw a vision of our huge room being just a hallway into the area that would be the TRUE gigantic additon to our home. I told Rob that he should thank God for showing him visions… because ” young men see visions and old men dream dreams.” I told Rob that apparently, even though he’s getting up there in years, God still thinks he’s young because God sends visions, not dreams.

Har Har Har.

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