That bathroom is painted ... and fresh paint practically begs for fresh wall paper!  It's on my mind now, snappy wall paper.  I sanded the floor yesterday because we are installing a new toilet up there and it is the perfect time to do all that sort of thing.  Keeping a house straight is a full time job!

L fixed a drawer in the kitchen last night.  It took him about ten minutes to do his magic ... I don't think I will miss that drawer sliding itself open c o n t i n u o u s l y.  It was the main idiosyncrasy of the kitchen, the girls said it was a ghost sous chef.  I've tried to "fix" it before ... several times I've tried.  A screw on the newish drawer slide rail was striped effectively thwarting  my efforts..  "They just don't make screws like they used to." my husband said.  That's really what I'm thinking about today.  It's the truth.  Stuff changes.  I pulled nails out of some trim wood, fascia board I think it's called,  which was replaced this summer.  The quality of the metal was impressive.  Same thing on all this old furniture I work with.  The metal fasteners, nails, screws, staples, tacks ... all of, any of the metal ... it's just a better quality.  If I have to pull a new staple out, one I just put in wrong, it invariably snaps in two no matter how  very carefully I pry it up, the task must be completed with pliers.  Not so with the old staples, and they are usually compression driven, so they're really in there, but they come out in one strong piece as though ready to go again.
I'm thinking about how relationships seem to be like that.
Poorly constructed out of inferior pieces ... . They look pretty good.  Pretty good for now.  Things aren't truly expected to "last".  The stuff we put in our lives tends to be flimsy.  Jeans with holes already in them!  Relationships like that don't offer or expect quality.  Everything seems to be "diluted" these days. Slipshod hovel like shelters.  I think we could do better ... expect, accept ... extend better.

I'm just wondering where the really good fasteners are ... they are not on the screw aisle at the local DIY store.  And ... I'm wondering how, in a world where nothing is built to withstand, where even the most basic building blocks are weak, particleboard-like components, rather then densely grained wood, where boredom demands constant flipping through quantities of inconsequential junk,  where "food" is pre-chewed, pre-digested, sugar coated, where  ... everything is superficial, not quite the real deal ... almost ... where almost sorta-like is the standard ... where's the model for built to last, for dependability, for trust.

How can one acquire the ability to trust when all the walls in their home are constructed of paper?  I'm going to go find a copy of the Three Little Pigs.  And, I'm not talking about houses or stuff one might buy, or use. I'm thinking about how to teach my little girl about the shelter of enduring love.  Commitment.

My Dad's twin wore a necklace.  It had three heavy charms on a long silver chain.  A cross, an anchor, and what?  A heart.  I was a little girl sitting on his lap when I first felt it and I remember him quietly explaining it to me.  He said it was about a love story.  The cross was mostly about Christ's cross, but in order for us to understand His cross we would be expected to carry a few of our own.  The anchor ... about hope which anchors a soul ... anchors are about choices; where to port or drop anchor, when and where to sail on.  And a heart.  I was sitting in his lap specifically to hear his heart beat.  He knew that.  We had been talking about that because I loved to sit very still in my dad's lap and listen to his heart beat and my uncle said his was exactly the same as Daddy's, so we were doing an experiment.  He smelled exactly like my dad ... and he sounded exactly like my dad ... same lap ... and leaning my little ear on to his heart was  ... not the same because of that necklace.  And he laughed about little serious grey eyes and whispered nuh-uh, not the same, my Daddy doesn't wear a necklace.  He told me the story of his necklace that day and I guess I'm starting to understand it now ... back then I was mostly just distressed about having a soul.  I didn't know about that and he explained it as like a ghost, like Casper the Friendly Ghost ... and it sort of scared me to think of myself as a holder of a spirit.  It's funny remembering.  Isn't it Lewis who observed ... now I have to go find it ... :

“You don't have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.”

 ~C.S. LEWIS

And that is what I'm talking about.  How do we teach our souls about quality?  Heart matters. How does one anchor to the concept of eternal when all the little building blocks are shoddy?  Our bodies move around collecting substance for our souls.  Life shapes souls. As the physical heart pumps blood for the body, there is a heart of our soul which also supports "life".

Well ... busy time.  I gotta get to it.

We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. ~Hebrews6:19a ... talking about the Hope made possible through Jesus Christ.  When I saw this photo I remembered that time with my uncle, I remembered his necklace and what he was trying to tell me.  He is in my heart.