Gathering Leaves

My shoulder is still the pain from an afternoon of raking and bagging leaves yesterday. I must admit that because I'm still a newlywed homeowner I actually enjoy doing things like that; it makes me feel good to take care of my little house. I suppose as the years go by I'll get over that and want to hire someone else to do it.  I hope not though. I hope to hold on to that feeling and find joy in the doing the grunt work. It is a lot of leaves I'll tell you that! I have to do it section by section in order to get it done. So today it continues

It was interesting how this task put me in a meditative state and opened up my mind to think about things. I felt like I was on a boat out on a lake fishing with an old friend talking about life. Mostly silence with sporadic interjections of wisdom and information. Not that I am a fisher, I have yet to worm a hook, but I suppose that's what it's like out there. I thought about how God uses the natural things all around us to explain how life works. If we would pay attention we could get some serious revelation from observing nature.  Sometimes we feel like life's answers are so hidden from us. Some are but so many things a there in front of us if we just take a moment to see them.  For example, instead of starting in the front yard (so I could show all the neighbors I wasn't slacking) I began in the back yard. Why? There are waaaay more leaves back there and it will require more work and energy to do it. I figured I would tackle the hard part first since I was feeling all inspired and what not. That made me think about how we spend so much energy dressing up our exterior selves to impress others when the real mess is hiding, secretly tucked away in our lives completely invisible to others. Had I began in the front, I would not have had suffient energy, or motivation, to do the back. There is still much work to do butt he hard part is done. My shoulder thanks me!

Now that I have tackled the hard part I'm not so intimidated by the rest. Yes, there will probably be a record number of bags used this year (last year was 32) and it won't be a perfect job but it's the best I can do. With that I am satisfied. I will be able to rest in peace knowing that next spring I won't be raking up wet, slimy, insect infected leaves with wiggly squirmy things crawling all around and about. I may have a little experience in that area...maybe that's what happened last year...it's all speculation though...I'm just saying maybe I know about that...I'm just saying...