There has been so much going on with us. We keep busy you know with school and kids, family and all of those things just like everyone else. We don't look at ourselves as anything overly special. Mostly we are thankful for the life that we have.
Each of us knows that things could be worse or better. We just got back from our much needed vacation to Washington. It was good times. The boys enjoyed meeting and seeing relatives that they had never met or hadn't seen in years. You know how kids can be, they may not admit to themselves right now that they genuinely had a great time per se but they did.
The most inspirational part of our trip was meeting Uncle Simon and Aunt Bonnie. They along with everyone else showed us such a wonderful time. Grandma Barret was so very kind to us to let us stay with her. We all felt more blessed from the trip than anything else. It was nice on the one hand to be away from our busy lives and doing something as a family but it was also nice to be a part of the lives of others.
So often all of us get so wrapped up in what we are doing that we forget about others on some level. We forget about what it is like to relish in the richness that being around kind and generous people can do to the human soul. Kindness is more refreshing than anything in life. It's love really. We call it kindness because we do not know its real name. Simply put it's love.
Jesus said to love one another the way that He's loved us. Those words have meaning to me more this week. So do all of those other cheesy sayings like love conquers all. It's true though. Evaluate your life for a minute. Think about how your kindness (aka love) has changed others in some small or large way. Are you getting the picture? I hope so. Life goes beyond our day to day titles of wife, mother, sister, husband, brother, father, child, niece, nephew, uncle, aunt, co-worker, friend, etc. We experience life in sections of relationships. Each with its own set of norms and boundaries. But with another cheesy statement, love has no bounds.
Love moves freely in each relationship that we allow it to. To put us next to one another in special kinds of ways. It captures things that we can't see on the surface and draws it to a place so near to us that we feel and experience it in a way that produces things like thoughtful stares and radiant smiles. It takes the human spirit and refreshes us more than I can describe.
Love has been given a bad wrap; Lovesick puppy...and a ton of other things I can't get to come to mind right now. Don't be tripped up by these uniformed sayings that are just cliche's in the end. They are just goofy ways to say more nonsense than anything.
Love and kindness are not interchangeable really. kindness is something we might do out of obligation. Love is something we do for no other reason but for the sake of love itself. Nobody seems to have a definitive answer on love. It is because it is. I sound like an overly sappy fool but I'm not. I just arrived back from a journey, a vacation that changed my life is all. I have a deeper understanding of why each and every one of us is here. We are here to get by and do the everyday mundane. We are here to hold jobs and be too busy to call someone or write them a letter. We are here to make friends and stab them in the back as soon as they turn on you. We are here to build people up and them shatter them like glass hitting the floor. OF COURSE NOT!
Maybe you are a person who has stumbled on my BLOG and are thinking this girl is absolutely crazy. Not any crazier than everyone else. We all do things that other people think is wired and wacky. No worries. The real question though is who do you love? Do you love your family, do you have that feeling inside that you can't describe either when you think of people that you love and they love you back? Have you been touched by their suedo kindness which is only love in hiding? I bet you have.
It feels pretty darn good doesn't it? To think of the peace and comfort that one of those loving relationships you have and share with at least one other person. Pass it on. Don't bottle it up inside and hold it so tightly that you fear if some of it oozes out that it can't be replaced. Love is the strangest thing on the planet because the more of it you give away, the more you get back.
I've taken it a bit too far but it's fun to let yourself go for a minute or two. We had a super vacation. I love more people in my life. I got an opportunity to add to my love list. It felt good for us all to recharge and replenish, to refresh ourselves outside of our daily, weekly, monthly, same ole same ole. Even if I barely have time to sleep these days I feel better for who I am because I've had an experience with husband, children....all of those other people that are a part of our interconnected fabric of family.
Pick up a phone, write a letter, an email, or simply say a loving pray to the one who listens about the one(s) you love today. Get refreshed in yet another day of So Much Goin' On.
Dawn E Pooh
