One Handful of Quietness

Every now and then I go through a phase of restlessness, chasing after something unknown. 

It is not that God-given restlessness, longing for Him or more than this world can offer. Rather, it is discontent and ingratitude, impatience and unbelief. Something nags me from in the back of my mind. At night I lay back on my pillow feeling dissatisfaction. Longing for change, an escape, because surely then my heart with be at rest?

This restlessness provoked me to stir up a little fight with Drew.

It caused me to turn my heart slightly from my kids. I'm with them, but is my whole focus immersed in them? Satisfied in and enjoying them, listening, playing, undistracted?

These are the people who matter. People over to-do lists.

Whole mind and heart turned to them, this is rest. This is soul-filling, slow-down time satisfaction.

Not to mention savoring the same kind of quality time with the one who made me.

Drew, Ethan and I started a new diet, Bible Eater. Not food that perishes, these are life-sustaining words for the soul.

Last night, Friday night, the kids were so tired they feel asleep just after 8pm. Drew went out in the rumbling thunderstorm for a beer with a good friend. Alone in a peaceful space, air-conditioning, dim lighting, I sprawled out on the couch to eat Ecclesiastes in one sitting.  

And there it was. Ecclesiastes 4:6. 

Better is a handful of quietness

than two hands full of toil and striving after the wind.

满了一把，得享安静，强如满了两把，劳劳碌捕风。

5am on the sunporch, Saturday morning cool and still after the thunderstorm, after digesting Ecclesiastes which worked to shift my mind. Neighborhood is sleeping and quiet. I am slow-sipping tea, observing my surroundings, listening to the silence. Pause. Black bird with orange beak on a beam. Bright July greens and a flowering tree. Dawn breaking over the foggy mountain. No voices, no trucks rumbling up the hill, no lights. 

Cool, calm, still and peaceful after a storm.

counting the graces

thank you Father for

reminder to lay out any problems before you as Hezekiah did with a troublesome letter

schedule for July coming together real nicely

Auntie Wang's help today

sacred space with Drew

getting to known several kiddos at Butterfly Home

time talking with Mom, Dad, & Mandie

reservations made for our vacation at Cheung Chau in August -- beach!

Drew's support when I was sick from heat exhaustion

Mrs. Zeng will be Titus' teacher again next year, he is happy about that too