Multitude Monday - 1000 Gifts: Of Silliness and Impossibities

Yep, it is cliché to say, but laughter really is good medicine.

The Lord must think we need lots of that particular drug around this house, because our tribe says the funniest things sometimes, and we are laughing a good chunk of the time... especially when we hear comments like:

I was making a chocolate raspberry mousse for the 4th... as the crust was baking and the lovely chocolate odor began to permeate the apartment, M&M comes running from the other end of the apartement and asks, "Ok... who's making something chocolate? It smells yummy and I want some!"

When M&M needs to use the bathroom during the night, she doesn't usually wake up, but she begins to toss and turn and talk in her sleep. When this started the other night, I whispered in her ear, asking if she wanted me to take her to the bathroom. Her eyes popped open and she says emphatically, "Mama, just let me sleep! I don't need to pee all the time I move at night." And so I did... and then she woke me up about 25 minutes later to take her to the bathroom, saying, "Now I let you take me and then I pinch your face." (She likes to touch my face to fall asleep... and she calls that pinching my face.)

I was getting ready to leave just as Elsie Mae was waking up, so I leaned down to give her a kiss. Before her eyes ever open, she grins and says, "I MUST be a princess if you wake me up with a kiss, Mama!"

If you have the answer to this question, we're all ears! Jonathan is our early bird and often joins his mom, dad or both of us on the terrace during the early morning hours. He recently wanted to know, with a very sad and serious face: "Do hippos get electro'p'uted when the lightening hits the river?" I had to say I had (and still have) no clue... that it probably depended on how close the lightening strike was to the hippo's location. Anyone care to answer that one for me? Without missing a beat, he then asked, "Mama, can you get rabies from a hippo bite?" Huh? What in the world is our little worrier/planner thinking about these days anyway?

And then Tori informed me the other day that she slept so much better on the floor than on her bed, because "I don't think so well when I'm sleeping and so I escape more easily from [one of her sisters] than when we share a bed..." :-/ Hmmmm... wonder what's going on at night?

Or... a bigger who emphatically responded: "I'm NOT an adult yet? Why do I have to be responsible at all?" Although the comment makes me smile now, I must admit my first thought upon hearing it was NOT laughter.

We carefully monitor air conditioner usage, only using it very occasionally, when it is miserably hot and/or someone is sick, and thus we would carefully keep the remote out of reach of little hands. We didn't expect big hands to be an issue until one of the biggers informed us the other day that while asking first was clearly the rule in the old house, said child "...really didn't think that awful rule would follow us on vacation or to the new house."

Laughter truly is good medicine for lots of things...

...especially when you start feeling overwhelmed by all the responsibilities facing you... or even just get tired of all the stuff (both big and little) you know you've got to do, because if you don't, it won't get done and it needs to get done. I'm not writng those words with any sort of air of overinflated self-importance or grandiosity - however, when you're "the mama" or "the papa" or "the boss," sometimes you have to "buck up" and keep on keeping on simply because it is the right thing to do and it has to be done. So what to do when all of the stores are used up, you are discouraged, and hanging up one more towel on the line, planning one more reading lesson, editing one more radio program... it seems to continue on far and beyond the remaining oomph you have in reserve? What is there to do when faced with your very own "mission impossible?"

Lately, I've been remembering that 1) I serve a God who specializes in the impossible... and 2) when I'm walking in His will, ALL things are possible with Him.

As all of those have-to-be-done-but-seemingly-impossibles begin to be accomplished - another towel dry, folded and put away even though the heat has been relentless, another weekly grocery budget finagled and met, another lesson taught, another meal for visitors prepared, served and cleaned up, another test graded, enough gas in the tank to make it to the next payday, time uncovered to spend praying with a friend or visit a mama and her new baby... accomplished because by God's grace, I simply keep doing just the next thing. In those moments I am so very consciously aware, continually remembering that it is only in His strength and by His grace that I can continue to do. On my own, I would've given up minutes ago... or weeks ago... So I begin giving thanks - for tiny and not so tiny miracles that light up my life, day in and day out, miracles I miss when I'm feeling energetic because then I live under this foolish illusion that it is me getting the work done... not the Almighty working in me...

this week's gratitude list:

(#s 1285 - 1312)

that my mission truly is an impossible one when it remains mine; when I'm doing God's mission, I'm free to see and watch Him accomplish the amazing possibilities...

father and son hanging, playing. together... not always the norm in this culture

 fun memories

confidence to be silly

snap towel fights while doing dishes with Nadia

funny little things said in this house that make me laugh

remembering that when I am weak, then I am strong, in the strength of the Lord

early morning conversations with the little man

breakfast @ Amandines with Tori and Miss Mary

laughing over french fries for breakfast (They were yummy, too! Just ask Tori!)

finally finding pita bread again

eating pizza with new friends twice recently

little girl excited at the smell of a chocolate pie crust baking

raspberry chocolate mousse shared with Niger famiy

quietness

the flash of lightening and the boom of thunder

lost test results located

less than two weeks now... and counting...

shrinking pile of books to read by the side of the bed

being challenged to consider the role of liturgy

clean, dry, folded and put away laundry

new babies, new life

installed door frames and electrical wiring pulled

having a plan and knowing what decisions need to be made

being given the opportunity to practice contentment with what would not have been my first choice

knowing I have friends who cover me in prayer during those weak times... and other times, too

dreaming of possibilities...

praying that God soon reveals if those possibilities might just be His will

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Photos taken by assorted friends and stolen off of fb from Sahel's annual game of "Mission Impossible."