a new morning

After work yesterday, I dragged my heavy legs, belly, and heart onto the front porch to find these beauties blooming outside our bedroom window. I’d chosen which room to make ours during the winter, in hopes that the spot would be a place of peace and cheer. I’m in awe that after nearly two years of our property being unoccupied, the land still remembers what to do in the springtime. He makes all things new, huh?

Similar to the day of the Sandy Hook shootings, our country was struck by yet another horrible tragedy while I worked. Everything feels a bit darker and foggier when you’re in and out of patients’ rooms, trying to piece together the news without a clear idea of what’s happening. I was encouraged to see so much selflessness and bravery spilling onto the streets of Boston within minutes of the explosions. Even in the chaos and sadness, I smiled at the themes developing on various news networks and social media sites. There was much talk of good overcoming bad, and light outshining dark. Overnight, the world fell in love with some man in a cowboy hat because he ran toward, and not away.

Before the tragic events yesterday, I posted some content that hit a sore spot with many of you, and for good reason. My supposedly catchy title and wording didn’t relay the way I intended. Perhaps my ideas were better suited for a coffeehouse or couch discussion. I took it down this morning after realizing that most of the concern revolves around a topic that I had/have no plans discussing. My post was not about male leadership, or gender roles, or marriage equality. It was about personality differences when it comes to my own marriage, as well as generalizations I’ve recently discussed with male and female friends alike. My thoughts could have just as easily applied to a friendship or work relationship, but that’s not the way it came across. It translated poorly, and I removed it for the sake of preserving my own beliefs and easing the offense taken by several of you. I kept it as a draft, along with all of your comments. I’ve re-read it all several times, to learn from it. Maybe I’ll try again in a few weeks, and rewrite it as the fun blog post for which I was aiming.

Although I do have personal opinions about hot topics such as this, I’ll never address them here in such a lighthearted tone. In fact, I may never address them here at all. Most of you have discovered by now that I don’t write about things like the big boys’ mom, or vaccines, or circumcision, or abortion, or gay marriage. Dang, that’s a lot of off-topic stuff! There are just some types of discussions I prefer to keep to email or face to face, where real discussion can take place. You should know, though, that if we ever get the chance to chat about such controversial ideas, you’d probably be surprised by my stance on most of them. Try me!

Happy Tuesday, friends.
Be encouraged today, by whatever it takes to get you there.