Contentment

This morning in Church we sang a song that alluded to heaven where there will be no sorrow, but only joy. It's hard to imagine such a place. Inside us all there's something that can conceive of it, but cannot fully understand it. Having an imagination that works overtime, I find it very easy to envision--in that I can tell you aspects of what it must be like, but try as I might I cannot explain it in all its ramifications: It will be a place where there is no pain, is no sorrow, is no war or contention. It will be a place of ongoing peace and harmony. But I am immediately aware that as I use those terms I'm describing it in terms of my reality now--how it's not like earth, how it is like earth--I cannot use the terminology of heaven until I get there, I guess.

In spite of that inward yearning that somehow most of us can relate to, I sit here writing my blog. Karisse is doing machine embroidery while she fiddles with supplies for a bobbin lace project I'm on the laptop in the sewing room so that we can be close (laptops are easier to transport than embroidery machines.) That yearning is not tugging at my heart destorying my sense of present calm, in fact, I can't say I am much aware of it at all except intellectually as I write about it. It's just nice to sit here in this room with my love not far from me, each of us doing our own thing, and yet physically close to one another, where conversation can happen when it's natural, and a simple silence fills the room with peace otherwise. I know I'll take my hawks out later on this afternoon. In the evening we will go to extended family and eat with people we've grown to love, and then share songs and prayer. This week is Spring Break, so Karisse will be home every day, and tomorrow we go to Dallas to celebrate my father's 80th birthday. Nothing about my day is anything I can't handle. I am content.

Perhaps this is closer to heaven than the yearning that sometimes I feel.