We are in the home stretch towards Christmas. Bob and I went to see The Nativity Story yesterday. (It was the first time he has been to the theater for 19 years - the last thing we saw together was Stakeout - the original.)
This is a wonderful movie. The only things I thought were not quite right was that they compressed the time line - the Maggi arrived the night of Jesus' birth. And the heavenly host was on vacation during the announcement to the shepherds.
Beyond the obvious portrayal of the birth of Lord Jesus, it gave me a good look into the 'smallness' of life back then. Life revolved around life. There was one thing that was important and that was getting things done in proper order since the there were no shortcuts. You had to grind the grain to make the flour to make the bread to feed the family today and tomorrow you repeated the same things. I realize this is the way life is for many even today. The contrast in my life which has much choice in it with the life where when Caesar wanted you to do something an approaching birth meant nothing is unfathomable.
What you did was evident to everyone. One of my favorite parts was when a very pregnant Mary and Joseph were leaving Nazareth everyone was looking down their long noses at them. Joseph turned to Mary and said, "They're going to miss us." I still chuckle at the obvious. It was a 'filler' line but it was true. They would miss them. And there were no phones to call home and let everyone know what happened. Their leaving was open-ended and, until they returned years later, I doubt there were many opportunities for communication.
I recommend seeing it, especially now in this short season before we celebrate this birth.
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Sunday, December 10, 2006
A Big Day After A Long Night
There are many times when I don’t get much sleep. That usually happens after an important or busy day or the night before an important or very busy day, when I have a project that needs finishing or when it is windy. Last night all of those things met and I ended up with about three hours of sleep.
Bob and I spent Saturday morning at our church preparing for today’s Christmas Potluck then headed out to Alyssa & Dan’s for Bob’s 60th Birthday Party at noon. It was a lot of fun – including, surprisingly, the gun-fight that raged around us for a while. I was looking at one of the dart-guns they were using and suddenly I was a target. I was just LOOKING! Fortunately, except for Tami's direct hit right on the spot where I broke my arm this summer, they really don’t hurt. I was surprised at what a weakling I was when I tried to cock the gun. – That right arm again….
We got home and 5 p.m. felt like 10. After a bite to eat so I could take some pills I still needed to pull some things together for today and got stuck trying to copy Christmas CDs for today’s ‘mood’ music. I didn’t want to bring originals in case I forgot them. My install of Roxio’s software wasn’t working so I tried a couple of other programs. Nothing would do what I needed. I finally got one copied but the next one didn’t work no matter what I did. I finally gave up.
I wanted to print labels and that was another struggle. If I had found the Roxio CD last night I probably would have been in bed by 10 but that didn’t happen. Finally about 1 a.m. I quit and went to bed. I had my heating pad snuggled around my arm and was quite drowsy when the South wind started up. I slept through it a couple of nights ago and it kept Bob awake but last night I wasn’t fortunate enough to get to sleep before it started. It howled so loud in the trees I was wide awake again.
I finally got up and went back to work on the CDs. I crawled under the covers around 5 and needed to be at church by 8:30. We were about 15 minutes late. I had my one copied CD and a couple more originals. I decided that I WOULD remember them.
At church, the room needed to be transformed from an adult Sunday School class to a festive place to eat. It is amazing what a bit of pre-planning and cooperation can do. What would have taken our little group an hour to do was done by a roomful of people in 20 minutes.
The dinner went well and it was all cleaned up and we were home by 3. We were both very tired but mostly resisted napping so we would sleep better tonight.
Oh, and tomorrow I need to stop by church to pick up my CDs.
Bob and I spent Saturday morning at our church preparing for today’s Christmas Potluck then headed out to Alyssa & Dan’s for Bob’s 60th Birthday Party at noon. It was a lot of fun – including, surprisingly, the gun-fight that raged around us for a while. I was looking at one of the dart-guns they were using and suddenly I was a target. I was just LOOKING! Fortunately, except for Tami's direct hit right on the spot where I broke my arm this summer, they really don’t hurt. I was surprised at what a weakling I was when I tried to cock the gun. – That right arm again….
We got home and 5 p.m. felt like 10. After a bite to eat so I could take some pills I still needed to pull some things together for today and got stuck trying to copy Christmas CDs for today’s ‘mood’ music. I didn’t want to bring originals in case I forgot them. My install of Roxio’s software wasn’t working so I tried a couple of other programs. Nothing would do what I needed. I finally got one copied but the next one didn’t work no matter what I did. I finally gave up.
I wanted to print labels and that was another struggle. If I had found the Roxio CD last night I probably would have been in bed by 10 but that didn’t happen. Finally about 1 a.m. I quit and went to bed. I had my heating pad snuggled around my arm and was quite drowsy when the South wind started up. I slept through it a couple of nights ago and it kept Bob awake but last night I wasn’t fortunate enough to get to sleep before it started. It howled so loud in the trees I was wide awake again.
I finally got up and went back to work on the CDs. I crawled under the covers around 5 and needed to be at church by 8:30. We were about 15 minutes late. I had my one copied CD and a couple more originals. I decided that I WOULD remember them.
At church, the room needed to be transformed from an adult Sunday School class to a festive place to eat. It is amazing what a bit of pre-planning and cooperation can do. What would have taken our little group an hour to do was done by a roomful of people in 20 minutes.
The dinner went well and it was all cleaned up and we were home by 3. We were both very tired but mostly resisted napping so we would sleep better tonight.
Oh, and tomorrow I need to stop by church to pick up my CDs.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)