WISDOM FROM MY KITCHEN TIMER

My chiropractor set me up: “Sitting too long at the computer stresses your back and legs and irritates all the nerves connected with them.”

I already know that. But I’m a writer. When I become immersed in the creative process of words and thoughts, I ignore time. Before I realize it, hours have slipped by. And yes, my body shouts about it. It hurts!

“Set your kitchen timer and get up and move every hour. The you can return to your writing renewed,” he advised.

“Okay, I’ll give it a try.” It took awhile to establish that good habit because often I continued to ignore the irritating jangle-buzz of the timer that startled me and I kept right on writing. I'm learning, but I haven’t totally succeeded yet. Eventually I do head for the door with my sunglasses and cell phone, the latter at the insistence of my sons who always warn me about falling and breaking a hip!

It really isn't a forced march; it's an escape from my own chosen confinement. When summertime elbows spring aside, I give in to the siren call of the warm, affectionate sun kissing my cheek, the gentle breeze ruffling my hair, the intoxicating fragrance first of honeysuckle, then the scent of sprouting pine, then peonies, then lilacs, then roses—overwhelming my senses. 

Lord, I notice! I notice and appreciate Your seasonal cycle established from the beginning of creation and continuing to nurture me in my vintage season of life.

As a teenager I had to memorize the poem by James Russell Lowell, “What is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days. Then heaven tries earth if it be in tune and over it softly her warm ear lays....” What a sensory expression! The words moved me in my youth, and I can embrace and encore the feeling even now as a great-grandmother. 

 

As a child I soaked myself deliciously in the release and relief of summer vacation from school. Those were lazy, hazy, days when I enjoyed doing nothing and going nowhere special. I understood the true meaning of leisure. Bored was not in my vocabulary. With neighborhood kids I always found more than enough to occupy each day. In that long ago era, we even hiked in the woods and brought along sandwiches and a bottle of pop for an impromptu picnic by a bubbling stream. It was parent-permitted and considered safe. We brought home tadpoles in the empty pop bottle filled with pond water to monitor the progress of the frog cycle. At night there were lightning bugs to catch on the lawn and capture into jars while grownups gathered on porches with neighbors for small talk and to cool off in a captured breeze. 

 

I can experience that feeling again in bite-size pieces when my kitchen timer goes off. I wear a pedometer and in a measured mile I can condense some of the sensory delights of my childhood. I am still alive and my Creator, Savior, Redeemer, Provider, Sustainer, who holds my breath in His hands, is within me, beside me, going before me, drawing me ever closer to Himself. Moreover, He has my back. 

 

THERE GOES THE BUZZER! It's my signal to get up and go. Won't you come walk with me? After the rarity of June comes the sweltering heat of high July and with it even more of God's creation variety to revel in as summer morphs into amazing autumn with its splendid splashes of colors and the thoughts of first flakes of snow not far behind. Always more for which to bless God!