Take A Breath.....Turn Around

August 28, 2022

As I stand on the road of August 28, 2022 and look back at the miles I’ve just walked through this life......past the pain of watching someone I love dwindle.....past the Grief of Death....and past the near drowning from a flood....and stop, take a breath, turn around....and see the road behind me and all the life experiences that are now in my rearview mirror, its only then I can see my Rescue....my Redemption....and the Miracles that have been placed on my path.  

It’s this “looking back” that allows me to see with clarity my actual life and the beauty of the miles I have traveled.

Because the book of my life journey didn’t end with the pain, grief and near drowning.  These were mere chapters in a thick book...chapters that had a beginning and an ending.  Chapters that made me stronger....that built up my endurance muscles ......and brought me out of the dark woods and into the Light of a new chapter.

And I discover I’m still breathing....I still have more miles to travel...and I’m going to be okay.....because I’ve sneaked a peak at the last page and know how this story ends.

It’s only by traveling through these difficult chapters in our life that we now see with clarity where we once were blind....but now we see.

“Amazing grace!  How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me!  I once was lost, but now am found; was blind, but now I see.”

The Mystery of Grace

 

THE MYSTERY OF GRACE

liz etheridge

A few years ago, my brother, sister and I made a trip to our grandparent's old home place in a tiny town in the center of Alabama. It had been years since any of us had been back to this place we used to visit every summer....and in all honesty, it was never a place I loved going. The crickets were huge, there was no running water, baths were taken in the river and an outhouse was not a place you wanted to visit in the middle of the night.

My grandparents owned 200 acres of pine trees.....oh ya....and a creek that ran right through the middle. For as long as I can remember, my grandfather in his striped overalls and his train engineer cap, along with my grandmother in her long dress with an apron....yes...always with an apron....would drive the old pickup truck down to Blue Creek and pan for gold with their grandchildren hanging out the bed of the truck. For my siblings and cousins, this was like going to Disneyland. For Liz, it was pure torture.

 

But along the orange-clay dirt road to the creek, we would always pass an old Methodist church with a cemetery next to it. My grandparents would eventually be buried in that very cemetery and the memory of a bee flying up my niece's skirt during my grandmother's graveside service will always be with me. But the thing about that old Methodist church I will remember the most is driving by it on Sundays and hearing the black people singing from the top of their lungs. Not a shy or embarrassed bone in their bodies......they loved the Lord and they wanted everyone to know it.

And as we drove up that old orange-clay dirt road a few years ago, I SWEAR..I could still hear them singing. The church has long been abandoned, the windows broken out, the grass is taller than the tombstones and a mild wind could blow the walls down. But as I walked into this room full of memories, I found this old Methodist hymnal laying open on the floor, partially eaten by rats and among piles of old bulletins from 1979....opened to Page 285, "The Mystery of Grace".

I smile as I think about that person who, so many years ago, set that hymnal down on the wood plank floor, just for me to find.

Aww....the Mystery of Grace.

Couples Adventure Challenge #5

Ready for another Couples Adventure Challenge??

Get Ready.....Here We Go!!

 

For those of you who don't know what the Couples Adventure Challenge is, its a book that challenges us to disconnect to reconnect as a couple. To unplug from the norm and have fun scratching off challenges (dates) that, if you scratch off a date, you HAVE to do it. You agree to commit to what ever the challenge behind the scratch off says.

 

As we scratched off the new Adventure Challenge #5, we discovered we were being challenged on something we are very bad, awful, dreadful and plain old SUCK at. COOKING.

It said, "Go to a bookstore and pick out a cookbook. Ask a STRANGER to open the book and pick out a recipe of THEIR choosing. This is your meal for the night!"

I remember Wayne and I just looking at each other in horror after reading this. We headed to the Allen Library....asked a Librarian where the Cooking section was, and located a book by Joanna Gaines of Fixer Upper. We headed back to the Librarian, explained what we were doing, and let her pick out her selection for us to complete.

She smiled a coy smile, rubbed her hands together, and got to looking through the cookbook. She was a mercifully kind lady named Cindy and picked out a Lemon Pie. WHEW! My perfect dinner meal! 

 

 

So yesterday, we completed Couples Adventure Challenge #5!! This was a lemon pie FROM SCRATCH.....crust and all....a favorite of Joanna Gaines and we SLAYED the pie!!! Perfection!....well, with the exception of Liz forgetting to take the seeds out of the lemons before putting them in the mixer, but other than that, it was PERFECT and more importantly, FUN!

 

 Check it out.....

 

 

And look who got a BIG OL' piece of Joanna Gaines' homemade lemon pie made with our very own hands for Adventure Challenge #5!??! The Librarian, Cindy, at the Allen Library who chose it for us to make....thats who!!

 

 

A New Chapter

 

 

Yesterday....I closed a chapter in my life.  A 27-year chapter.  Bittersweet in a way....exciting in another.  

 

 Today is Day 1 of Retirement.   

I was BLESSED in so many ways to have worked for my late-husband Chuck's company he founded in 1986 for those 27 years.  Chuck was a visionary.....could see how to do something in his mind and could build it precisely how he envisioned it.  He saw a "need" for specialty computer room air conditioning in the Dallas area....one of the first to specialize in doing so.....and without a costly college degree, he created and grew a small 2-man company to a major success, placing high dollar computer room air conditioning on the roofs of many of the downtown Dallas hi-rise office buildings.  

 

After 14 years of building the company, his only son Troy moved back to Texas from California to help his Dad who was starting to feel the effects of Multiple Sclerosis and took over the business a few years later.  It was an absolute dream come true for Chuck....his son picking up where he left off.  His legacy lived on.

And after 17 wonderful years of working with Troy, I handed the boxes of files over to him yesterday.  I felt the breeze of the page turning as I walked away. 

 

I needed you to know how GRATEFUL I was to Chuck for asking me to work for him 27 years ago.  It's not always easy for husbands and wives to work side by side.....but working with Chuck, and then Troy, has been the easiest and most wonderful job I have ever had.  They both allowed me freedom to do the things I love; coffee with the girls, volunteering and taking care of the people I love when they needed me, all while doing Sales Tax and Payroll Reports and keeping the books balanced. 

 

And today, the page has been turned and a new chapter is staring back at me.  I see only white space waiting for me to fill with souvenir memories and hair-raising experiences.  

 

And BTW, if you need HVAC (air conditioning) for your Home or Business, please consider calling Troy Etheridge at C & E Air Conditioning Service, Inc. for a quote.  You won't be sorry....he'll give you the "Friend-Of-Liz" Discount!!

 

http://www.computerair.com/