Shadows

As the birds flew over her head on this sunny day,  Bella, my 4-month-old puppy, started chasing their shadows as if they were bunnies, ears flopping in delight, excitement in her bounce.

It seems I’m chasing shadows these days, as well, only there’s very little bounce in my steps.

Today there are the shadows of a broken refrigerator freezer and a car that needs a jump to add to an already burdensome list.

There’s always something more isn’t there? A series of unfortunate events casting shadows on our well laid plans. 

And there’s the shadow of Philip, as usual. 

One of his favorite days of the year went by without notice, for a week. Opening day of dove season: an event in the Braudt household. The day he would take his sons out of school every year. Highly anticipated, intricately planned, every year for 26 years and it passed by without even a glimmer of a thought until today…And it bothers me that I could be distracted so easily from what was so dear to him. 

The first year after a death is supposed to be the hardest because of all the firsts you do without him. I know that but nobody ever mentions the firsts that come and go without a thought. Those are proving to be insidiously more dangerous to my lengthening series of unfortunate events.

I’m tired. The weather with all it’s brilliance lays like a heavy blanket of oppression. 

Some days I just want to be a shadow myself, blotted out by the cloudy sky for the time it takes for the sun to shine again.

Thank God  for the delight of a puppy breaking through my funk, if only for a moment, to remind me that His grace is sufficient for me even when it doesn’t feel like it.

Anne

September 12, 2021

He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. [1]

Psalms 91:1