COERCED INSPIRATION
August 31, 2014
With so many excellent blogs out there in the cyberspastic continuum, no one has any reason to read this one, but will that stop me from writing it? NO! Why not, you may ask? (Should there be a question mark there or not? Someone tell me!) Writing is my thing, whether or not I have a reason to do it or anything at all to say. Sometimes I have to force myself to sit down and write this monthly blog, especially when inspiration for a topic manages to hide under the brain bushes for the entire thirty or so days since the last one. That’s the way it is this month. I’ve beaten those bushes until they are nothing but pathetic twigs sticking up out of my dried up gray matter with only two leaves left to cower and whimper for mercy, and still that little varmint called **INSPIRATION** manages to escape me. My husband suggested I write on the topic, “If I were a car tire. . . .” That is not going to happen, at least not this month. No, I have decided to force something out the old fashioned way, with an Acrostic! I’m giving myself 15 seconds to start writing whatever comes into my head for each letter, one paragraph per each. This could get messy. . . .
**I**SIS–What a scary bunch of crazy people! I tend to stay away from news topics when I write because I don’t feel competent to say anything constructive or intelligent, but this is what popped into my head and this I must address. The more I hear about what this group is doing in the Middle East and elsewhere, the more I see Jesus standing at the threshold just waiting for the Father to say “GO!” I realize people have been expecting Christ’s return for centuries and have believed it to be imminent, but everything spoken by the prophets and Jesus Himself is lining up like never before. We need to be ready for Him, whether He comes pre, mid, or post tribulation. I’m personally hoping for “Pre-Trib”, but I’ll faith it through whenever it happens if I’m still here.
**N**uisances–Life is full of them, don’t you agree? From dust to dirty laundry to flat tires (we had the third one of the summer this week, and it wasn’t from our dug up driveway, since we now have concrete!) to hangnails to home projects that take half a lifetime to complete (really, four months in and still no garage doors, with flooring and more trim work still needed and the handy hubby back in school, not to mention furnishing to do whenever we have an extra several barrels of money) to parenthetical comments that really should be separate sentences, nuisances present themselves in so many variations! My record for dealing with such time-sucking blips in my otherwise well-ordered life leaves a teensy bit to be desired. Hissy fits and less than happy proclamations have burst forth from my soul over these unplanned poopydoopies over the years. (Here’s a comment that must be parenthesized: this blog spot, whatever it is that my son-in-law set me up on, evidently has no spellchecker, because I know “poopydoopies” would not be accepted anywhere else where I write. I am in heaven at this moment just knowing I can make up any word that comes into my head and I will not be criticized by some hidden know-it-all technological invention! Woopeedoopeedoodeedoot!! Do not ask why I just now noticed this.) From now on I will think of Nuisances as **NEWSANCES**, opportunities for surprises amid the plans that are oh so expected. We’ll see how that works for me. You may join me in this experiment if you wish.
**S**andpaper–Why couldn’t I have thought of swans or snow or slippery sidewalks in my allotted 15 seconds? Sandpaper seems so abrasive and boring. Hmmm. Well, “like sand through the hour glass, so are the days of our lives.” And without the nuisances to latch onto the sand to make sandpaper that clogs up the works, the sand would flow even faster and we would be older than we already are! Praise God for sandpaper!
**P**estilence–Someone asked me at church this morning to ask my biologist husband what all the huge caterpillar webs are on the trees going down toward the Falls. I told them it must be some kind of pestilence, but I would ask the expert. Excuse me a moment while I ask him. . . . Figures. Since he has not seen them, he doesn’t know. I looked up “webs on trees” and found an article [here.](http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/home_and_garden/2010/08/15/3-insects-cause-webs-in-trees.html)
Just as I predicted, a PESTilence, but maybe not one that’s all that bad, if it’s caused by the caterpillars that make them in the late summer/early fall, which I would assume it would be since that’s the time of year we’re in now.
Logic is not a pestilence.
**I**Think You Can Dance (So)–Don’t you just love that show? Me, too. We should all dance more for pure joy. Most of us probably shouldn’t do it on television.
**R**idiculous–The things I do to keep myself writing might be considered ridiculous by some, but the things I do to keep myself FROM writing definitely fit into this category. Take a half hour setting the atmosphere: Little bed tray on the bed, dictionary, thesaurus & Bible on the bed, reading glasses on the head, iPad on external keyboard on the little writing desk on the bed, paper and several pens next to me just in case I have a pen and paper thought instead of an ipad and keyboard thought, snacks of various kinds on the bed, water and Chai within reach, dog on her sheet by the bed, pillows propped at the perfect angle, door closed, lighting adjusted to keep me awake. Voila! Then I get all set up and the phone rings. I forgot to put that on the bed beside me!! Once I am set up again, I feel a sudden need to go to the bathroom. When I come back and arrange myself again, I stare at the blank screen until I nod off. Then I slump over for a nap of 30 minutes to an hour. Then I rouse myself and drink my cold Chai, but that’s not happy, so I get up to zap it in the microwave. Then I adjust myself in the bed again and I stare at the screen. I think of something to INSPIRE me to write. Once I do that I play a few games of Ruzzle, check Facebook where I find irresistible videos of cats scaring dogs, contestants performing MUST WATCH songs on reality competitions, dominoes falling in a pattern for five full minutes, and a bear saving a bird from drowning in the river. I then write a sentence and since the Chai has now kicked in, I must run to the bathroom again. When I sit back down in my comfy spot, the dog and I snack while I yell at her to quit drooling and stay on the sheet! I delete the first sentence I wrote and write another one. I get hung up on the punctuation and decide to start over again. By this time I have maybe an hour left before I need to get my hair cut, or go to bed so I can get up for work, or cook something for supper, or maybe just go insane. So I get serious and write. Ridiculous!!!
**E**vidence–“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Hebrews 11:1. I had to look in three Bibles before I found the one (King James Version) that used evidence in that verse. The New American Standard says, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” The New International states it this way: “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” I like all three! The Message version is a little funky with its philosophical addition: “The fundamental fact of existence is that this trust in God, this faith, is the firm foundation under everything that makes life worth living. It’s our handle on what we can’t see.” Anyway you look at it, though, it’s pretty cool. That’s certainly what gets me through all the scariness in the world, the nuisances, the swiftly slipping sands of time, the pestilences, the dances of joy and the ridiculousness of human nature.
**D**oodle for August a finit!