WhiteClover23
- Location: Essex UK
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Recently Updated
- WhiteClover23 on Keep Sunday Special
- WhiteClover23 on It's Good to Talk
- WhiteClover23 on Life Going Backwards
- spherical on Re: Life in a Circle
- AngelBearTheFirst on Re: Life in a Circle
- Zandranna on Re: Life in a Circle
- WhiteClover23 on Life in a Circle
- spherical on Re: Life feeling old
- spherical on Re: Life Catching Up
- WhiteClover23 on Life In The Slow Lane
Fields of Clover
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Keep Sunday Special
11/22/09 02:01:11 | 0 Comments
Sitting here this morning, reflecting on the week gone by, it came to mind how much I've got lined up to do today. Yes, I know, it's Sunday ... but having worked all week, spent much of yesterday Christmas shopping and wrapping presents, I didn't get the housework done. So today I really need to do the ironing, put some more washing in and clean the kitchen. It's the one room in the house that I can't bear to be untidy or dirty. There'll be a roast dinner to cook later and I also should pop out as I have the rest of one of my husband's prescriptions to collect from the chemist - I took it there two weeks ago and they filled part of it before telling me they had to order the balance of one of the items. That's left me needing to go back to pick that up and I haven't done it yet as it's not on my way to anywhere that I usually go to!
So Sunday, then. And the Bible says ...
By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done. (Genesis 2: 2-3)
Why do we live life in such a way now that we can't leave ourselves one day that is different from all the rest?
So many of us suffer from stress in our lives, yet we don't give ourselves this one day of rest, to stop everything and focus on our own needs and wellbeing. When I was a child the shops weren't open on Sunday. If you went anywhere other than church, it was usually to visit relatives. I don't quite know how anyone knew to expect us given we didn't even have a phone until I was about seven. I suppose my mum and my aunts wrote to each other, letters were delivered promptly without all the postal strikes we've been having, and so we turned up, spent the afternoon with them and had a meal before returning home.
One family lived a walk across the park away from where I grew up, another was two buses away. We didn't have a car, neither mum nor dad drove ... but it didn't matter how long it took to get there and back because we had nothing else to do. It was Sunday.
There has long been a campaign in this country to keep Sunday special ... here's their website.
http://www.keepsundayspecial.org.uk/
I just think it's such a shame that Sunday has become almost like any other day of the week. Of course people in essential services have always had to work, to provide coverage through the weekend. And I know that on occasion I make use of the fact that the shops are open. Sadly financial pressures mean that many people will work because they need the money, especially if Sunday working is paid at an enhanced rate, which it is in some places, depending on your contract.
Keep Sunday Special ... would you sign up to that? -
It's Good to Talk
11/01/09 01:38:59 | 0 Comments
As I sit here this morning, 1st November, a new day, a new month, a lazy Sunday morning with the rain pouring down outside and the leaves all scattered, carpeting the lawn as they are blown from the trees, I looked through some old documents and found this little quote.
Experience is not what happens to you - it is what you do with what happens to you.
It was written by Aldous Huxley - have you read any of his books? I seem to recall I read Brave New World many years ago but I don't really remember the detail. Looking on Wikipedia I read something of his life this morning to see what he did with the things that happened to him. Born in England in the late 18th century, he was one of several children and his father was a school-master. His mother also founded a school and taught him at one point when he had an illness that left him almost blind for a few years. This changed the course his life took ... and eventually he ended up living in America though he didn't take up citizenship because as a pacifist he refused to say that he would take up arms to defend the USA. I've skipped a whole chunk of years there but you can read the full article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldous_Huxley
So what have I done with my life that is not what happened to me but how I took that and used it? Difficult question, even over a mug of coffee! Well I consider I have led a very unremarkable life. My father died when I was a teenager and in some ways looking back I think that was why I married relatively young. I needed a man in my life who would look after me. We had children and my role for many years was firstly as a mother and wife. It always will be but now with an elderly mother who is on her own, I am having to be more of a daughter again - not that I ever stopped being one, but it's had to take a higher priority.
My husband and I (makes me sound like the Queen!) have been taking stock of where we are - mothers, children, houses, jobs - and we're at another of those points in our life where we're planning for our future. We've always done that and mostly it's worked out as we hoped and as we expected. Maybe that's the way in which together we've taken what we have and used it, made the best we can of our lives.
And if you're ever in doubt as to what to do with what happens to you, just remember that God is there waiting to hear your prayer - in the words of a phrase from a tv advert for British Telecom "It's good to talk!". :) -
Life Going Backwards
10/24/09 07:39:34 | 0 Comments
Here we are then, that annual event when in late October we put our clocks back an hour and the dark mornings get a little lighter while the light evenings get suddenly darker. Here the grey drizzly skies have cleared into late afternoon sunshine ... and the leaves on the ground mark the passing of summer into autumn despite the still respectable temperatures of late October here in the southeast of England.
A casserole is simmering in the oven for dinner, the washing's hung on the airer to dry, the carpet is crumb-free and hoovered ... and I'm listening to Radio 2 ... as I do for much of the weekend these days.
The day started with a quiet breakfast until the peace was broken by the sound of workmen who had decided it was necessary to disturb our Saturday morning. They've been re-laying kerbstones and pavements and slabs of road in our street since late July! I have to admit I shall be glad when they have finished.
The street will look better when they've finished ... but sometimes I sit and imagine the countryside before the roads were laid and houses built on green fields. How many trees might have grown, how many crops been harvested and animals reared on farmland that has been and continues to be built on.
I've lived in this town for 24 years and it has certainly changed in that time. The boundaries have been pushed back and many hundreds of houses built ... and it's not the same town it was when I came here.
Things change but I'm not always sure it's for the best. And the changes technology bring make me feel as if I either have to move with them or accept that I belong in the Ark!
Genesis 8: 9But the dove could find no place to set its feet because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark
I think in some ways I am like that dove ... I like the warmth and shelter of the Ark ... but maybe when the waters have receded I will have to spread my wings, be brave and explore. -
Life in a Circle
08/09/09 05:40:49 | 3 Comments
I was sitting wondering what to share today. And very often I have an idea, I have a thought and if I search the Bible for that thought then God leads me to something that inspires me to write. Today is no different.
I looked up the word "idea" itself and found myself led to 1 Timothy 6. How totally apt for the economic crisis in which much of the world finds itself gripped right now. I won't post the full text here but would urge you to take a look and be reminded.
I am fortunate because after almost 27 years of marriage, my husband and I have built a life that is cushioning us from the hardship facing many. Decisions we have made, plans we have followed, have come to fruition and although neither of us is completely happy with our jobs we both give thanks that we are in employment. There have been more redundancies where I work .. and many people who I started with at this company two years ago are now looking for new positions. It wasn't long after I arrived there that I knew the job I'd taken wasn't working out. I was all set to leave when a vacancy more suited to me came up and the management were keen for me to take it. It has its ups and downs but it's work. And that work helps me to provide some help for my son and daughter as they make their way through uni to start on their own ladder.
The circle of life - a phrase so familiar after that wonderful song that opens the Disney film The Lion King. I always loved that mix of music and humour and good triumphing over evil in the end. So we all move through phases, childhood, adolescence, young adulthood, maybe marriage, maybe parenting and then our circle links with those of our children below us and our elderly parents above us.
Economies move in cycles too and right now we've dipped into recession and our savings are dwindling, people have lost confidence in banks that have lost confidence in each other ... and so it goes on with the financial world seeming to dominate the news and be steering their own course across all our lives.
Here then a few verses that I found particularly relevant today
1 Timothy 6 : 7-10 & 17-19
7For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. 8But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. 9People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. 10For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.
17Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. 18Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. 19In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life. -
Life In The Slow Lane
05/23/09 06:17:49 | 0 Comments
Been quite a day so far. Went to visit my mum this morning and as there is no footie to go to this weekend, my husband came with me. I was so glad he had.
Coming back we were headed out of London towards the motorway when the travel news cut in on the radio. Serious accident, M25 closed at the junction where we usually join it. Oh my goodness, very quick rethink, a quick fortuitous right hand turn approaching and we were headed in a different direction. Slow roads, heavy traffic, chaotic town centres and so many sets of traffic lights. But we were so lucky that we heard about it in time to divert before reaching the motorway and getting stuck in the inevitable jams as everything got taken off onto the roundabout there and left to find another way.
I used to live in that area and I knew where we needed to go even without the satnav. Although we did reset it and used it to be sure we negotiated a couple of places correctly that we haven't visited in years.
On the journey over I could see that with the fine weather and bank holiday weekend the traffic was very heavy anyway - an accident waiting to happen then. Always happens somewhere.
Usually takes about 1 1/4 hours to get home - today it took 2 1/2 hours to travel the 40 mile route we came on - reckon that makes an average speed of 15 mph ... in other words, slow slow slow!
But right now I am praising God that I wasn't in the accident and also that I wasn't stuck in the traffic trapped behind it for several hours. It might have taken me twice as long as usual to get home ... but I got home ... safely. And I had company as my husband was with me and also he was driving. How lucky was I ?
