Olde words and old sayings

“The wind blows where it wishes” -John 3:8

This morning after I hit my head several times trying to clean out the kitchen cabinets, I told myself, “self- go sit down a spell.”

Sit down a spell? What am I saying? Bother this getting old. Now I’m using the same phrases my grandmother did. Next thing you know I’ll be saying “Awe shucks!”

Playing Frisbee with Honey is a constant motion from the moment I go out the door each and every time that we go out the door. Considering the wind is priority if I don’t want to climb a ladder and retrieve it from the roof of some building. Clocking the gales of air is also important if I don’t want her to slam into some vehicle on her focus retrieve. There have been occasions that she has slammed into trees, or bricks or tires in her dive after the prize.

This exuberance is not just felt by her though. The other evening, she greeted Lennea with one of her discs and the cellist soon found herself nursing the fist that found the open car door. Considering space and aim before throwing often makes an impatient puppy. But our safety and wellbeing must be considered. Good thing Lennea has no weddings this week.

The other morning my mind could not help but focus on the gusty breezes that changed the disc’s flight in mid-course. I have tried to watch Honey while she runs only to loose her in my barrel-view. So now I try my best to follow the rainbow’s arch and be assured that the little pot of gold will be there to meet the end of it’s curve whenever it lands in her reach. Be it the ground, or 10 feet in the air, our flying fur buddy will not miss the end of the course. Often she returns to me like the boomerang before I even take a few steps forward. She’s so fast.

The wind in the winter time is my enemy. My skin simply can’t handle being cold and feeling the driving knives of air pierce through me. But the wind in the heat of summer? It is the friend that cools the world off a smidge. I love the sound that the trees make as their leaves rustle. I love the clapping cottonwood. I love the tinkling wind chimes. it is like the wind instruments of God in their finest composition.

The wind blows where it listeth. Wow, that’s an olde English word. What does it really mean? List making and the wind listing are not the same are they?

So many words in our languauge have lost their true meanings. We have digressed in our ability to understand the full meaning of something because we choose not to know where things come from. The idea of the wind listing or having a bordering edge like broad cloth or blowing in a particularly line or row across the earth isn’t something I generally think of. However, this weekend there were several situations that showed the power of the wind in it’s own pretense.

Friday as we drove across the Springfield area both in Nebraska and in South Dakota, the temperature dropped markedly. Only on a motorcycle could one experience this incredible listing of the wind. At one moment we are baking from the hot pavement and the dry wind. The next there is this defined cool breeze that makes one wish to stay there always. It felt so cool and refreshing. Then the heat returned in it’s blast of open-oven-door force. Uff. Let’s go back there, we both commented on the cycle.

We crossed the river and snacked at the Casey stop in Springfield and were pleasantly surprised by the return of the cool “listing” on the South Dakota side. Spring fed breezes! The idea of the wind being like a sheet of broadcloth with a border line hit me much when I considered all the dictionary meanings this word had to offer.

Do I listeth? Do I set up lists and boundaries and go where I plan to go, do what I plan to do? James chapter one says “As a wave of the sea is driven and tossed by the wind, so is the one who doubts. So have faith when you ask God for wisdom because He gives generously to all who ask without doubt” (verses five and six, a paraphrase).

Friday was our 27th anniversary. Sometimes it amazes me that it’s been that long, other times it only seems like yesterday. We were not even four miles from home when I first glanced into the cycle’s rear view mirror and thought of the looking glass. Who ever uses that phrasing for a mirror anymore? “The looking glass does not lie” is an old proverbial statement that mother’s used when telling there children to go wash up after they had already done so.

Many people take time to go to serene water settings that reflect the sky like a mirror. Our view on Friday however was the muddy Missouri washing up river moss on the somewhat sandy shores. The wind came across the river strongly enough to make the boating scarce. The wind was driving water from the south to the north across the surface of the river. Though the flow of the water is west to east in that area, the turbulence kept the fun at bay.

The most serene “looking glass” view of the water I discovered was in the rear view mirror of the bike.

And later the same weekend, we would stop the bike several times for the ornery wind. Twice for a bee sting, once to retrieve my cap. And when the bee stings, you do not automatically think of your favorite things. I tried to be a distraction for my dear spouse after the initial pain was over. But when the bee stings or the dog bites, one only thinks of getting rid of the pain! Just ask Gavin.

“I was looking back to see if you were looking back at me to see I was looking back at you when you were looking back at me.”

Most people are really just concerned about their own mirror. We might have a routine “list” of how we go about our mirror time. However, as I have sat staring into my little sleeping grand-child’s face I thought of the mirror that our children become of our lives. I praise God so frequently that He was the wind that blew across our lives and drove us into the people that we have become. Looking back, there were times we felt like the rocks on the shore were too harsh for us to ever feel peace and serenity again. But God is faithful and His driving force continues to be the looking glass in which we check our lives. His boundaries and His guidelines give us the feeling that we ride on the cool breezes of spring fed air. Just beyond the listing is the world’s heat and hot, and bothered stinging bees. We will continue to return to the looking glass of God’s word to be driven by His Holy Wind.

Sometimes we just have to take a break from the everyday.

So glad my husband of 27 years and I were able to take so time to reflect on the passing years and ask God for His wisdom for the years to come. May you too find faith to ask God for His insight into your lives.