I Had A Spa Day

Thankful Notes (#202)

In our family, we use the term “spa day” generously. Rarely does anyone go to a spa. I think the use of “spa day” came about because, when Ashah was younger, she protested when Shari would use the word sabbath. I don’t even know why she didn’t like that word, but Shari just accommodated Ashah and substituted spa for sabbath in conversation.

Our use of “spa day” means something quiet or personally refreshing and enjoyable. It’s a day without pressure or expectation. It’s a day to recharge and just be.

Shari is staying with her our nieces Mila and Elle while their parents are away for a couple of days, so I have the house to myself. And since it’s Saturday, I don’t have work or appointments or any other demands.

The contractor was working next door at my dad’s new place—installing a new water heater and a new faucet with a wand in the bathtub and some exterior lights.

Camper and I went to the grocery store for a few items… kitchen garbage bags, toothpaste, eye drops, celery hearts, chicken thighs, sirloin steaks, and Hempler’s double-smoked sausages.

Back at home, I spent some time doing “cord management” – with my new Eero mesh Wi-Fi system, I wanted to clean up the corner of the bedroom where our modem is.

Taming the jungle of cables and power cords was therapeutic and calming and felt like a happy victory.

My black pepper and cedar candle has been burning all day and the house smells like it. I think this one and the cardamom candle I got at Christmastime are my current favorites.

The weather has been back and forth throughout the day… see-your-breath cold, then sundrenched, then dark clouds and pouring rain on repeat. Sitting at my chair by the window, I looked out at the lake and saw a vivid rainbow as the transition between dark clouds and rain and bright sunshine all seemed to overlap for a few brief moments. I ran to get my phone and managed to take a few pictures before the scene disappeared as the sun took over.

Thank you, God, for seasons and beauty and wonder. I love it all.

“We… discover that God found the world, as He made it, to be good, that He made it for His pleasure, and that He continues to love it and to find it worthy, despite its reduction and corruption by us. People who quote John 3.16 as an easy formula for getting to Heaven neglect to see the great difficulty implied in the statement that the advent of Christ was made possible by God’s love for the world‚ not God’s love for Heaven or for the world as it might be but for the world as it was and is. Belief in Christ is thus dependent on prior belief in the inherent goodness—the lovability—of the world.” —Wendell Berry, from his essay Christianity and the Survival of Creation