Creation Need Not Play to An Empty House

Life has been fairly calm as of late, which I'm certainly not complaining about.  In the quiet, though, it's made the little things stand out more so than usual.  Small moments that may seem insignificant or trivial, but ones I am grateful for nonetheless.  May I not be guilty of "despis[ing] the day of small things" (Zechariah 4:10).  I've been taking mental notes of some things here lately for which I am very grateful:

• Matching curtains! Finally! Back when I first moved into my apartment, I purchased some red curtains.  I failed to do the math and didn't buy enough panels.  When I went back to find more of what I bought, they were out.  In light of the shortage, I had been hanging this random strip of black fabric to fill the gap.  I kept checking the store every so often to see if more would come in - and lo and behold!  They got more!  Only took me about two years, but hey, I've finally got matching curtains.
• Purchasing an external hard drive - So, my personal laptop is going to officially turn 14 years old this summer.  Yes, it probably belongs in a museum, and yes, I still use it, and yes, it still works.  Buuuuuuuuut that probably won't always be true.  Figured I should probably be proactive and back everything up onto an external hard drive. It's only been on my to do list for practically 12 months.  
• Solving a problem  - My parents have a Honda Odyssey, which they have a love/hate relationship with.  Most days here lately it leans more toward the hate side.  They get rather frustrated when they find there are seemingly a dozen other Honda Odysseys in the parking lot, all of them looking exactly alike.  It makes finding theirs a bit more difficult.  I decided to solve their problem.  I bought a cheap taxi-like car topper and hand-wrote a sign on it that said, "HEY! This one is yours!" on one side.  I don't think my mom is going to be caught dead putting that thing on top of her van, even if she is annoyed that she can never find it in the seas of Hondas.  But either way, I thought it was a pretty ingenious solution.  I also bought some Ford magnets (we are a Ford family through and through - right up until my parents bought a Honda) to go over the Honda logos.

                                   

• A job I enjoy - I happen to really enjoy my job.  That hasn't always been true with this particular job I've been in now for over four years, but I genuinely enjoy getting up and going to work these days.
• Cheap gas! I was excited to see that gas was as low as $1.69, but then it got even better when I pulled up to the pump and it was listed at $1.63.  Somebody wasn't doing their job, but I wasn't going to complain.
• Just Pies - any time Just Pies is involved, it's always a good thing.  My sweet friend Jill surprised me with a strawberry rhubarb pie the other day.  So much amazingness packed inside a pie crust. 
• Dinner with Myrt - I have a dear friend from church, a woman I adore, who will turn 84-years old this May.  I had dinner with her the other night, and as I sat across the table from her, I just wanted to burst into tears, I got so overwhelmed with how grateful I am for her and how much I love her.
• Cable TV - I don't have cable at my own apartment, but I'm currently house/pet-sitting for some friends.  They have cable.  And I'm reminded of why I don't have cable at my apartment.  BECAUSE I AM AN UNPRODUCTIVE CITIZEN OF SOCIETY WHEN I HAVE CABLE. Seriously, I watch more movies on Hallmark Channel than what is deemed healthy. I turn into a lazy bum because all I do is sit around and watch TV.
• Scrapbooking - I finally got around to finishing my scrapbook of my September Wyoming trip. 
• I got crafty - I had a stash of old, empty wine bottles I had been wanting to paint and do something crafty with.  I dug through my paint drawer, discovered I had some enamel paint, which is the kind you can paint on and then bake the item in order to seal it.  So I painted my wine bottles all black, stuck them in the oven and waited for the magic to happen.  I honestly thought I would take them out of the oven and angels would descend from on high and shine a light on their awesomeness.  But they looked exactly the same as when I put them in the oven.  So, no angels, but they do make for nice racks for my bracelets. 

• Regular TV - You know, that thing people watch when they don't have cable.  I'm enamored with two shows: Victoria and This Is Us. I now plan my entire Sunday and Tuesday evenings around these shows.  Seriously, get on the Victoria and This Is Us train if you haven't already.
• Good books - I recently read The Perfect Horse, The Eighty-Dollar Champion and The Martian.  The first two are exceptional non-fiction stories.  Truly gifted story-telling.  And The Martian? Quite possibly one of the funniest books I have ever read.  It now sits on my all-time favorites list.  I had read it a year or two ago and decided to re-read it last month.  Still just as funny.
• Absent neighbors - Neighbors come and go in my apartment complex.  There was one set of neighbors who lived above me - how shall I put it? - let's just say I was very aware of their love life.  Very.  They have since been evicted, I'm assuming for reasons other than their crazy loud love life.  The people who now live there are in a band.  Yes.  Guitar- and bongo-playing kind of band.  I've heard enough "Proud Mary" and other classic rock songs to last me a lifetime.  They've been gone for the last two weeks.  Can't say that I'm the least bit bothered by this fact.
• My niece and her birthday party - One of my nieces recently turned five.  She insisted on a Star Wars theme.  She was decked out in a Princess Leia costume and went running around yielding a light-saber.  But the best part?  Her birthday cake.  Which was Tinker Bell.  May the fairy dust be with you.  

• Tears spilled over a friend I still miss - As hard as it is for me to believe, it will be five years tomorrow since Jonathan died. A couple of weeks back, our worship band at church sang the song "Never Once" by Matt Redman, which also happened to be a song that was played at Jonathan's funeral.  I cried through most of it.  I still miss him.  One of my most profound regrets in life is that I have no pictures of Jonathan and I together.  I don't know why that bothers me so much, but I just wish I had a picture of the two of us together.  It wouldn't make the reality of him being gone any less real - and it doesn't make the memories of him any less real by not having a tangible photo - but I still wish.  But regardless, I'm thankful for my friend and the tender memories of him.  

It's the little things that add up over time, that make a dent, that remind us of the small things that make up the big things. I'm grateful for the small things.

“We are here to abet creation and to witness it, to notice each thing so each thing gets noticed. Together we notice not only each mountain shadow and each stone on the beach but we notice each other's beautiful face and complex nature so that creation need not play to an empty house.” - Anne Dillard