After a month of dark, wet days we finally had some blue sky. I decided to leave my self-inflicted hibernation and head out into the garden to do a bit of weeding.
It was still cold and wet, but I sat on the ground anyway and pulled up weeds and the odd carrot. When it was time to move to another spot, I leaned on the edge of the raised bed for momentum. My hand slipped on the slimy wood, I smashed my forearms and hip on the next raised bed and landed with my face planted in the dirt.
My hip was on fire and my arms ached, but somehow the fact that I face-planted in the mud (and a rosemary plant) hit me as being hilarious and I laid there and laughed. I pictured what I must have looked like, a chubby older lady basically doing a somersault into the dirt.
The next few days were painful. My hip kept me awake at night and the resulting bruise was a rainbow of weird colors. My forearms turned yellow, and I could see them whenever I brushed my hair. But every reminder of my garden “trip” caused me to giggle again.
I wish I could say that I treat all of life’s calamities the same way, but I do not. I whine and sulk with the best of them and I question God’s plans time and time again.
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11
The thing is that I know God’s work in my life is beautiful and perfect. I want it and I crave it. I would be bereft without it. So, why would I ever throw a fit when things don’t go my way? Hmm, maybe because I’m human and quite flawed.
“But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.” 1 Corinthians 15:10
The times when God gets through to me (and I actually listen) are the best moments in life. Some people call them “God-winks”. A girl in my high school used to call them “Christmas Moments”.
She would dance in happiness when she felt them. I didn’t dance this time, I just laid in the garden and laughed. But the joy was the same.
It wasn’t God’s plan that I face-planted in the dirt, but it was His plan to be with me when I did and to remind me that I was free to laugh knowing He was. Seriously, could anything be more joyous than sharing an experience (or even a joke) with my Father?
I’d like to find more of those times. I want to lay back (or in the dirt) and trust God with all of my heart. I want to remind myself that He has my back, and my hips and my arms.
“He will yet fill your mouth with laughter
and your lips with shouts of joy.” Job 8:21
I went back outside a few days after my acrobatic performance and laughed again. There in the mushy dirt was a hand and knee print still imbedded perfectly in the mud. I’m keeping them there as reminders of that time God and I shared a laugh on a soggy winter day.
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Read more of Ann’s contributions to AllMomDoes here.
