The Miracle Day

Yesterday we had bright sunshine from moment one and I sat out on the (window-enclosed) front porch with my coffee and books extra early and let the sunshine sweep away, finally, the harshness of these past two months.

And later I hung laundry outside upon my prayed-for clothesline and raked and raked dead leaves, pine needles and the gravel rocks which our neighbor's snow blower swooped upon the lawn. I carried our vegetable clippings out to the compost pile, swept the patio and barn sidewalk and the song "Happy Days Are Here Again!" kept spinning inside my head.

Then in later afternoon while the frogs in our gleaming winter lake croaked, clicked and creaked, I, with my wheelbarrow, sat beside the flower bed on the sunny side of the house and picked amongst the dead stems and grasses, clearing the way for new growth to catch the sun and grow, grow, grow.

That's when it happened.

That's when I stared up at the living room window and remembered all those months behind the glass, gazing upon fields of snow, longing to sit outside, sun upon my back, weeding the flower beds, below.

That's when I realized, at that very moment, this was a dream-come-true! And I gasped with the wonder of it. How many days do any of us, really, experience the fruition of something so longed for? What percentage of Life reflects that?

Amazing, amazing day, so stuffed with Grace, that she was everywhere--inside, outside, upside-down. She matched my steps and made everything enchanted. Easier, too.

Always, I've been healthy, physically, except for the occasional virus, and have never needed to say, "I must do such-and-such for my health." But now? Now more than ever I know that, for my health--physical, mental and otherwise--I need to move away to a milder climate.

One must know herself. And both Tom and I must--next year at the latest--move to a place where, come winter, we do not hibernate in our small rooms lest Tom slip on the ice, he with his polio'ed leg. To a place where we can get out and walk year-around, lest we turn into the roly-poly old things which we are this morning. We need to move to a land where winter does not drive us inside the house and therefore drive us crazy.

Yesterday healed me. The sun and the 58 degrees, and now I am back to the Debra I recognize, the happy one you've seen in this blog for 6 years. And on the day of Suzy Homemaker's funeral, of all days! (God's ways are so like that, so opposite of what I'd suppose.)

Now I know myself better. Now I know what I--what we--must do. And now there is great peace.




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"Know thyself." ... copied