Friday, Jun. 04, 2004 - 9:54 a.m.

Another Great Day-2

It would be so nice to use this title day after day! Yesterday was warmer, but still nice. I am geting ready to break out the fans. Had the ceiling fans in bedroom and dining area on most of the day, and it was still warm in the evening. So warm in fact that when the new pastor and wife paid a call, we visited on the deck at 2d's insistence. However, I think she has ulterior motives. The only other families in the church are her bosses and bothsets of inlaws, all of whom have lots of money and self-designed homes with all the trimmings. Yes, my precious girl is a bit of a snob. I knew this when she was still in her late teens and started going to Ladies Bible studies with boss's wife. Those were held in very upscale homes and even tho everyone was nice, it was definitely upward and onward on the social ladder.

Nothing wrong with that if that is what floats your boat. Tithes are still tithes, and you use what you got. What 2d has never sucessfully negotiated is the idea that you dance, then you pay the piper. Living from paycheck to paycheck when the paycheck is in multiple thousands is just as stressfull as when the paycheck is in the hundreds, there is just more to lose.

In any case, 2d is used to moving in more exalted circles now, and sometimes her farm roots confuse her. The area we have lived in all her life is heavily LDS and appearance is such a vital part of the culture. Even families whose income is not very large stretch to the max to make sure the home is the best and the car is the newest they can manage. In the process, a lot of valuable things get lost in the shuffle. I look around at my possesssions and feel shame at having so much, when so many have so little, even in America. I sit in a 1900 square foot house with double garage in the middle of half an acre of lawn and a shop with outbuildings and ground behind, and feel rich after spending my childhood in a 27 foot trailer on a bare rented space in a trailer park, or living in a little apartment where all three boys shared a double bed, 2 at the top and one at the bottom.

I sit at this computer and at my back is a six by 2 by four foot set of shelves packed with food items, flanked by another set of shelves 4 by 5 full of more food, with a pantry in the utility room full of more and cupboards, fridge and freezer packed with still more. I have a car that will start as soon as I turn the key, has gas in it which I will use to drive into the library this morning to so to the book sale where I will buy treasures for a dollar a bag of all the books I can stuff in it. Before I go, I can choose from 5 kinds of shoes to put on, innumerable combinations of shirts and pants---I am rich!

And beyond that, I have a magnificent inheritance awaiting the time I go to be with You, a place beyond imagining where every desire I ever had shall be fully satisfied, and where I shall live eternally. That alone would make me wealthy but to have all the other stuff here----

EE's devotional

newAutumn Leaves

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