Yesterday afternoon i had plans. (i will pause a minute or two for you to get up off the floor.) no, sadly, they weren't any really EXCITING plans...i don't have those kinds of plans here lately. most days my plans consist of, i'm either cooking or grocery shopping, or washing and folding mountains of laundry or taking mama and daddy to dr. appointments. OR, i get to mop the wood floors, or bathe dogs, or mix up puppy food (since the 11 puppies' mama has decided she no longer wants to feed her babies.) can't say as i blame her. everytime she gets anywhere near them, this is what happens...
so, i now have to use canned puppy food, mixed with water and feed it to them, because they have decided to rebel against me and not eat the dry food softened with water that the vet TOLD me to feed them. nope. nothing ever goes easy for me. i can't just dump a few cups of the dry stuff into a bowl and let it soak for awhile and be done with it. i have to pull out the can opener and open cans, which i know doesn't sound that difficult, but when you have to do it 4 times a day, every day, you start having achy wrists and fingers. i absolutely detest the sight of a can opener now. then, after i have stirred the heck out of it (i use an old tea pitcher to mix it in) i have to drag myself out to the garage and climb over this...
and have 11 puppies, each having 16 razor sharp toenails, (that's a total of 176) clamoring to get to the food bowl first, therefore raking those nails down my legs as they attempt to crawl up my body to get to the bowl before i can get it to the ground.
anyway, i digressed a little. so, i had these plans. to go to one of my most favorite Japanese Steak House's for dinner with my family. since this kind of restaurant is one where they cook your food on one of those grills that are built into the tables, it usually ends up taking up about 2 hours of your time. which i have plenty of since the middle-aged man who left me for greener pastures, left me. for a greener pasture. we were to meet at the restaurant at 4:00, so i decided that while we were gone, it would be a really good time to set off some FLEA BOMBS in my house. (you have to expect that with 15 dogs and a cat to boot, living with you, there are going to be some fleas.) so i told micajah to grab some bombs from the cabinet, (and don't let the fact that i had these flea bombs on hand, lead you into thinking that my house is flea infested. it's not. it's just that i don't want it to be. infested) and help me place them around the house. so he did. the cans i had always used before instructed you to turn everything off, remove pets and open food containers and wait at LEAST two hours before returning to your house and opening windows and doors to air the place out. so the timing thing would work out perfect.
we left for the restaurant at 3:45, with the sound of spray being shot into every crack and crevice of our living space. we had a great meal, but they give you so doggone much food that we had to get carryout boxes for the leftovers. we had decided on the way into town that we would stop off at wally world on the way home to get some more of this...
then, as were leaving, micajah decides that he wants to go to the fair instead, with his friends (what kid in their right mind would give up going to wally world with his mother on a saturday night to go with his FRIENDS to the fair), and that since we had come in the same car i would have to take him all the way back home so he could get his truck. so, the plan changed. i would take him home, drop him off and then just run back to wally world and shop a little while to make sure the FLEA BOMBS had had time to do their job. that was the plan. but when you are ME, plans don't always go in the direction in which you planned for it to go. halfway home i thought to ask micajah, "micajah, by any chance, you didn't let blackie (the cat)
back INTO the house, after i had let him OUT earlier, did you?" and what do you think his answer was? remember, nothing ever goes right for me. he said, "yes, i did. he ran in and i thought that you knew that and had put him back out before we left." he said that because, he thinks i can read minds and that i just should just KNOW things like this. afterall, i heard my dead grandfather talk to me in the middle of the night. (see previous post) so, we both realized at that moment, that blackie was more than likely not with us anymore. dead. in cat heaven. or at the very least, in a comatose state. then we knew that at least one of us (him) would have to enter the house before the two hours was up. we were a little upset at the prospect of losing another animal and i guess being upset about that caused our stomachs to get a little upset as well. and we realized at THAT point that BOTH of us would have to enter the house. for a few minutes at best. so we decided that micajah would go unlock the door, put the leftover food in the fridge, check on the cat and remove it's body for burial before i had to witness it. i would run to the bathroom, and go, and then run back out, all the while holding my breath, so as not to breathe in the fumes. of the FLEA BOMBS. (i know what you were thinking, that's why i made that statement.) and after disposing of the cat he would then run to the bathroom, go, and then run back out. and we would get in our seperate vehicles and continue with our previous plans. the fair for him. wally world for me.
we pulled into the driveway and walked up the steps of the front porch and we could smell the fumes before the door was even opened. when he unlocked it and swung the door back for us to run in, it was like walking into a thick fog. ooooohhhh...the fumes were soooooo strong. i put my hands over my mouth and nose and ran to the bathroom trying not to breathe. but at some point the need to breathe just took over and i sucked those fumes into my windpipe and became violently ill. i coughed and i coughed and i coughed until micajah finally thought to ask me if i was dying. i was. (nice of him to inquire anyway) i ran outside to get some fresh air into my lungs but my old body wasn't co-operating. i literally thought i was going to die right there in my azeala hedges. right there in the dirt where my two yorkies do their business every day. i DID NOT want to go THAT way! i managed to finally stand up straight and make it to the car where i just sat with the windows down and the ac blowing full force into my face. micajah came out and said that blackie had survived with no effects. (darn. i mean, Thank God) i thought for several minutes that I was the one that was going to be having a burial.
i left for wally world and spent two of the longest hours of my life, killing time. (no pun intended) i was not looking forward to going back home to lay in the bed and have insecticide fumes lull me to sleep. or into a stupor. but i couldn't stay there forever. my buggy was already filled to capacity with every kind of junk food and chocolate they had to offer. when i got home for the second time, the fumes had dissipated a tiny bit. i put away the junk food and pulled out the despised can opener and whipped up a gourmet puppy mush. fed the dogs, mopped the wood floors which were wet with the spray and picked up all the empty cans to dispose of. properly. right into my kitchen trashcan. then i noticed something. yep. i bet you already know what's coming next, don't you? i noticed that these cans were NOT the usual SMALL FLEA BOMBS that i used. they were big cans. really, really big cans.
and we had set off 8 of them! and you were supposed to wait at least 4 hours before entering the house! by then i went to lay down. my head was splitting. my throat was sore. my chest was hurting from all the coughing. and dang it, i had missed the first half of the TIM TEBOW (oops, i mean Gators) vs Vanderbilt football game!!! i was not a happy camper. i got on facebook and was trying to get someone, anyone, to get a message to TIM TEBOW to come rescue me after he (i mean the Gators) won the game. but he didn't come. i don't think anyone gave him the message at all!!
while trying to drift off to sleep, amidst the still smelly fumes, i began to think about where my life was going and what God wanted me to be doing. for awhile now, since i started this Blog really, i have been feeling like He was leading me in a direction i had never ventured into. a ministry of sorts. my best friend, pam, is living a life that runs exactly parallel with mine. and we have been playing around with this idea for quite some time now. others have made statements to us both, that have seemed like maybe God was forming a plan. a plan which included the two of us working together, for His Glory. i must have laid there for hours, with all these thoughts just running through my head. (i think the fumes were depleting my brain cells at a rapid speed and it was trying to compensate by regenerating them at an even faster speed.) i finally fell asleep.
this morning, as i was driving to church, i began praying. and i prayed that God would speak through the Pastor and give me some wisdom to know what His will was for me. when i got to church and the Pastor got up to speak, you won't believe what his sermon was on! you guessed it! it was on how every member of the church has a ministry, whether they know what it is or not. it could be singing, or teaching or preaching or being involved in any of the various ministries of the church. and he was talking about how even in the Bible, God's disciples, while going out and spreading God's words, would sometimes be up high on the mountain, and sometimes, deep in the valley. and he told how when you are high on that mountaintop, it is because God is preparing you for those times when you will walk in one of those valleys. GOD was talking directly to me. He was telling me that He was preparing me now to be strong and faithful and to ALWAYS, ALWAYS rely on HIM, because very soon i will be in a valley with my divorce looming just ahead. i have already been through some valleys that i never thought i would come out of alive. on this side of Heaven. and all these past months God has been preparing me for another one. I prayed shortly after my separation from the middle-aged man who left me for greener pastures, that God would bring good, faithful friends into my life. and through the power of the internet and facebook, in particular, he has connected me to some of the finest people i've ever known, and some that i only know as a "virtual" friend. my "friends" list grows higher each and every day.
after the sermon was over i was just in awe, once again, that God had just answered another prayer. i went up to the front of that church and i got down on my knees to thank Him for speaking to me, as i had, just an hour before, requested, and for confirming to me what i am to be doing in these next few months. and then another little gift from God. the icing on the cupcake, if you will. a very dear woman in the church, whom i really have not had the chance to get to know that well, yet, came up and knelt beside me to pray with me, and for me. and she put her arms around me and very softly said these words. "God, help her as she embarks on this new endeavor." WOW. WOW. WOW. God had just whispered in my ear. and as soft as it was...i heard Him.
some of you may be thinking that it was just the fumes from the FLEA BOMBS that rendered me speechless. for a moment. but it is in these very small ways sometimes, that GOD speaks to us the LOUDEST in the softest of voices. the FLEA BOMBS had nothing to do with it at all.
postnote: on the way home from church i tuned in to HISradio 91.9 and THIS SONG was playing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJwlmb4V-0Y
tell me again that we don't serve an AWESOME GOD!!!! you would be wrong.
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1 comment:
Love your blog! I'm now following you here & on Facebook! Look forward to hearing more.
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