This year has been the year of patience.  Last year, as 2019 was approaching I decided to participate in the DaySpring Word of the Year just to see what word I would be given. My word was courage. When I first read that my word was courage my mind immediately went to the Wizard of Oz and the cowardly lion.

(Image Credit:  Flickr)

Yeah, that guy.  I honestly, didn’t give it much thought until the year started to roll in and Jason and I wrote down our goals for the year.  I was curious about the actual definition of courage and decided to look it up. Merriam-Webster defines courage as:

“mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty”

Never would I have thought this word and this action would be the encouragement and reminder to get through the sudden curve balls that were coming at me during the 1st half of the year.

On April 24th, I received a phone call that my mother had suddenly passed away.  I remember the morning clearly as I was starting to plant herbs in my barrel planter and taking photos for a review I had to write up.

It went from a normal day with a normal routine to suddenly sitting on the ground crying that my mom was gone. A part of what created me was gone. So many thoughts ran through my mind as I walked out to the bottom field and had flashes of memories of her and me when we spent time together as a child.

The thoughts of us playing pinball at the local arcade, riding go-carts, laser tag, eating cinnamon pretzels from Auntie Anne’s, and stopping by an 7-11 for Pepsi and Slim Jims. It all just hit me like a ton of bricks. My phone started going off as soon as word spread about the news. I was in shock and I couldn’t grasp all the emotions that were happening so suddenly. All I could do was just stop, breathe, and listen to the birds that were around me and the wind blowing the hay in the field. For several days, I couldn’t sleep but would wait for the sunrise looking out my window in the dining room. There were moments when I couldn’t even stand up from sitting on the edge of my bed, fighting thoughts of “should’ve” and “would’ve”.  Jason would come in and give me his hand to help me stand up and keep going.

Have you ever been there? So numb, overwhelmed to the point where you find yourself lost in a memory and then you realize you’ve been staring at something for nearly an hour but it felt like it was only five minutes that passed. I remember this feeling a few times before in my life, but I suppose this one hit so hard because it was my mother. So many loose strings remain and getting up to even have the energy to face it was a battle. It took months before I started laughing again.

Fast forward, a few months later I received another morning phone call and I could tell something was wrong right away. Jason called me with a shaky voice that he had just been rear-ended by someone who wasn’t paying attention.  It ended up totaling the car we refer to as ‘Old-Red’ while he was sitting still in traffic. This was another one of those “Are you kidding me, what else?” moments. Thankfully, Jason was not hurt but had a stiff neck for the next few days. After the shock wore off from Jason being in a wreck and having the car totaled, we felt the frustration of having to go and search for another car.

With being a busy Summertime, we both did not want to deal with this mess that was caused by an irresponsible driver. We both honestly just wanted to make all of this go away with the headache with the insurance and finding another car.  It was just another thing we didn’t want to deal with.  Old Red was a car that had been with me since High School and I wasn’t ready for another goodbye. Though it was just a car there were as many memories with that car as there were miles. That hurt and then seeing the frustration in Jason with the injustice of it all made for some emotional evenings.

Just a few days ago I woke up early to go outside and walk around the garden and just spend some time to myself and watch the sunrise. As I walked around I noticed the 4 rows of beans ( two filled with beans the other two just starting to come up) had been eaten off by the deer.  I came in and told Jason what had happened as he got out of bed upset. We walked up to the garden and saw there were a few beans left but the plants wouldn’t grow back. We decided to get the wheel barrel and pull out the plants, save what beans we could, and re-plant all over again. Talk about testing your patience!

Keep Going

What do we do when trials come our way? I know for us our lesson this year thus far has been to get the courage to stand up and keep going. In the past few months, we’ve been taking little road trips to go up a mountain to explore and take photos. It’s been peaceful but also it’s been a reminder that to see the mountains we must go through the valleys to get there. Just like the seeds planted in the garden, it’s a reminder that life goes on.  It may not turn out the way we thought just like with our beans but we can’t give up but keep trying and learn from the lesson unfolding in front of us.

Here are some pictures of God’s beauty this year from the garden, from seed to almost harvest time.