Have you ever wanted to blog so badly because you love your blog community so much you can hardly stand it but your mind is as fried as a Louisiana catfish? Well, that’s me today. My heart is huge with affection for you right now but my brain has shrunk under the weight of my bleached blond hair and my tired tongue is tied in about ten thousand tiny knots. I had the great privilege of serving in Sioux Falls, South Dakota this weekend and used up about 500,000 words and, incidentally, got to have my picture taken with about 40 of you darling things the moment it was over. I’ve spent today researching the next lesson I’m writing for Children of the Day and serving my beloved staff at our devotional and prayer time. (We usually have it on Mondays but I got to have a day off with my handsome man yesterday.) And so, here I sit, wanting so much to say something meaningful to you and to say it well and yet girlfriend is tragically bereft of words.
Therefore, instead of staying quiet when I’m bereft of words which is the better part of wisdom, I’ll do what any good, fast-talking sanguine would do: I will just say stuff that comes to my mind. So here goes for what may be the single most pathetic post of my blogging life. And all because I love you and don’t want you to feel forgotten around here. So, actually, you’ll need to take some responsibility for the anti-profundity that is about to blow up all over you like your four year-old with a stomach bug after a big plate of spaghetti and meatballs.
Random stuff going through my head – or through my life – or anywhere in the vicinity of 100 noticeable miles from me that I have energy enough to say. I’ll go for 20 of them:
1. The main thing I love to get at a fried chicken drive-thru like Church’s is okra. I love fried okra like nobody’s business. No matter what size container of it Keith brings home, I eat it. And I am never glad I did. No, I don’t usually eat that way. I only eat that way if Keith makes me eat that way by bringing it home and setting it under my generous nose. And I like a lot of salt on it. I’m sorry this was first but we’ve fasted all day here at the ministry and I am starving. Well. Not really starving but a tad hungry.
2. I wish I did not use the word “tad” so much.
3. I wish I did not use the word “so” so much.
4. 80% of my travel so far this 2013 has involved drama. Delays. Cancelled flights. You name it. No, I’m not superstitious or anything but my luggage is and it will be happy when it’s 2014.
5. I love serving at Living Proof Live as much as ever and, in some ways, maybe more. I’m not sure what’s up. Well, Jesus is up.
6. My beloved “Miss America of Hair” is out for 3 months with the cutest new baby girl you have just about ever seen. And I could use a strong antidepressant and maybe even a nerve pill. I have told MAOH (Miss America of Hair but it is unfortunate that I had to tell you that) that I am particularly gifted at rocking babies and have no doubt that I could do it even while she is cutting and blow drying my hair.
7. I hate that I’m so selfish.
8. I hate even worse that my hair looks like it has been teased with egg beaters then baked to utter unbreakability.
9. Travis has written a new theme song for Living Proof Live and it is just fantastic. I love it so much. There I go again with a “so.” So, so, so. It’s always so. I’m never underwhelmed. It’s always overwhelmed for me. At some point he’ll record it. I’m talking about Travis now. Please stay with me. I hope it’s while we’re still actually doing the event but we’ll see. He does not seem to be in a hurry. If the song turns into a video, I’ll go ahead and bless you by doing an interpretive dance.
10. Keith has new really cool, chunky black glasses that Melissa gave him for Father’s Day and he is so handsome in them. I’ve been working with him on how to wear them because Keith has never made “cool” a big priority. I know. I can’t understand it either. But, that fact is, in order to pull off this new look, I’ve told him over and over that he’s got to own it. He’s getting better at it. And every time he practices it with me, we get tickled to no end.
11. Jackson and Annabeth are at the best ages ever. 7 and 4. I’m bonkers over them. Of late, Annabeth has been swiping her mother’s cell phone and taping videos of herself. They are so funny that Melissa and I push play over and over and over again and laugh as hard the 15th time as the first. Annabeth sings really loud on them and mostly in an unknown language. It’s like once she hits record, she knows she needs to sing but cannot for the life of her think of any words. Like me and today’s post.
12. Tomorrow (August 7th) my mom has been with the Lord for 15 years. I cannot fathom it. She was the axle on which my entire family of origin wheeled. We miss her so much and we are still in the process of sewing our family back together. We all love each other very much but we don’t really know what to do without her. She said jump. We said how high? It’s like we haven’t jumped in 15 years. The spring went right out of our family step. Sorry. That one came out of nowhere. And now I’ve got a lump in my throat which is going to force me to have to say something unfathomably stupid for #13 so I can pull out of it.
13. Queen Esther is going to the beauty shop tomorrow for a trim. Please do not tell me that you do not know that Queen Esther is my 5 year old Border Collie who goes by “Star” for short. I cannot take it. Not after what you put me through with #12.
14. After untold years of unwavering devotion, I have recently switched from Starbuck’s Breakfast Blend in my coffee maker at home to Gevalia Traditional Roast. I still love Starbuck’s Breakfast Blend but it was out of stock recently at Kroger and Keith grabbed us some Gevalia and, honestly, it almost makes me high. Oh, not really. Calm down. But it does make me really anxious and really nervous but in kind of an exhilarating way. I think it may have more caffeine. And goodness knows, all I need is more caffeine.
15. I struggle with insomnia.
(So tickled. It’s deplorably bad manners to admit to, on occasion, making your own self laugh. I wouldn’t do it if this were a better post. But it’s not.)
16. Pause. Pause. Thinking. Thinking. Oh! Here’s a good one! Keith had to put a rabid raccoon out of its misery 2 weeks ago. I was just glad he didn’t take it to the taxidermist.
17. Getting desperate now. And hungrier. Hmmmm. I left my phone charger in the hotel room in Sioux Falls. That’s not a very good one. Let me see if I can think of a better one. Ok. I mostly just use my spray tanner on my arms. My legs that used to be golden brown by sun and then by spray are now a very odd shade of corpse white.
18. Kind of a fun new study experience (translation: not in-depth like COTD but much more than just a listening guide) has just come out called “Sacred Secrets.” We hadn’t intended to do it but had so much fun with it at an LPL event that it turned into something. I took a couple of weeks off from writing COTD to develop it with my editor. I’ll tell you about it when I’m in a more coherent mood. Now’s not the time. It’s not that I’m not in the mood to tell a secret. It’s that I can’t be trusted with anything sacred in this frame of mind.
19. I’m so dang glad it’s August because we can’t get it over-with in Houston until it gets here. Understand what I’m saying? It has to come to go. A lot of things are like that. We dread it all year long around these parts. I now take the dogs for a romp in the country at 7:00 PM so the temperature can drop below 100 degrees. I’m embarrassed at what a terrible point that one was. I know we’ll both be relieved for me to finally get to the next one and put us all out of our misery.
20. The last of my staff just texted me and said, “We are heading out!” So, I better get my tail out of here pretty soon, too, before there’s a creepster in the parking lot. Anyway, I’m hungry.
And I want fried okra.
I apologize, y’all. It’s been humiliating, hasn’t it? Can it just be the thought that counted today? I love you guys like crazy. Stay tight with Jesus. He’s everything. I’ll talk to you soon and it will be like I’m a different person. Only, underneath my skin, this is pretty much me. And THAT’S why we can each be thankful we have Jesus. Or we’d just be plain-old-us.
