They line up, empty vessels, crocks he brought home.
Those hard-working hands had set the aged pottery on the table. And every week I fill them with beauty, just with what I can find. Every week, shades and hues and color of the sky and earth meeting in petals. Every week I fill them, the ceremony of the gathering.
Because I am discovering that life, just as it is, is about looking for what can be celebrated.
These vases, they’ve become furniture, permanent furniture, these last months of sun, since spring and the peonies.
Before, I’d simply slip a vase off the shelf when a child brought in a fistful of Queen Anne’s lace, summer’s scattered doilies… or boys raced in with first profusion of wild daffodils from the ditches….
Or when he’d stop the tractor at the edge of the sideroad on the way home from the other farms, right there by the neighbor’s, and the Farmer would fill his arms with tiger lilies growing free under the maples, him feeling no shame in greased and manly hands picking the slender stems, carry flowers home for his old bride.
I’d get a vase down then, yes, then.
Have beauty.
So now must get vessel.
That’s how it went.
But when the Farmer gave me the crocks, eventually a set of four, the world spun.
I had vessels. One on the dining room table, one before the sink, one by the hearth, one in the study. Just thrifted emptiness, jugs. Mouths opened for filling.
Now they were considered furniture not occasional pieces. Why hadn’t I thought of it before: that vases can be permanent fixtures in a house wired for glory.
Have vessel.
So now must find beauty.
Just here.
Never anything purchased with paper or change… only that which can be bought with attention. A wildflower from the roadside, a branch from the woods, grasses growing long in the ditches. And when in bloom in the garden, zinnias, a happy round face from the sunflower patch, a flowering chive or two.
What if all the world stopped purchasing beauty — and began to perceive beauty?
I think of this.
And now that empty pottery awaits, I’m made the unlikely seeker, the happy gatherer… one always looking. In messy kitchens and city dumps, in struggling teens and shanty towns, in this unlikely place right here.
Life’s always about the looking, the aperture of the eyes.
I need to look, seek, find beauty to fill emptiness.
This is always the question: Where, anywhere, here, can we find grace? God?
“Can I gather the flowers this week?” a son asks, hand on the back doorknob, scissors in hand.
“Can I go too?” She’s already flash of blond light across kitchen. I smile yes. I gather up all of last week’s withered and drooping discoveries. The faded glory. Even this, in the fringed dried petals, the muted colors of the petals bleeding away, even in this, I witness a Beauty that vanquishes death…
Children fly out the door.
I would like to learn.
I set the last vase on the sink ledge.
Beside the wee explosion of praise, my gratitude journal lies open.
I remember before, when I used to do generic thanks: mumble a bit of thanks before the sleep, give thanks before the meal. Have grace. Sorta, (now and then), must give thanks.
I’d take God out of the box then… sometimes.
But when gratitude journals became my permanent life furniture, white spaces opened wide, empty pages like cups to heaven, waiting to be filled with the color of His graces… my universe shifted. It needed to.
Have space to give thanks, space to chronicle a thousand gifts.
Now must find grace.
Then, in looking for the next grace to number, I become a God hunter and discontentment slinks away in shadows and is there anything but Grace and Beauty and Truth really worth the pursuing?
I am learning.
And in the daily ceremony of the grace gathering, joy fills the emptiness and bouquets of blessings, Father-glory, never fade, and color suffuse the moments.
The God in all these moments gathered.
… a snippet of more of the endless gifts …
# 1185. new projects! things afoot! new things around the corner!
# 1886. these six kids who push me to be braver because it really matters
#1887. a husband saying yes
#1888. a dinner of just sliced tomatoes — with a dash of salt
#1889. a friend saying yes
#1990. a string of no-wheat days
#1991. 23 days left to Relevant — and my shy smile meeting yours!
#1992. a mama saying yes
#1993. tears in the pulpit and tears in the pews
#1994. more story to tell this week
#1995. that Beauty Himself never runs out
Edited post from the archives, because my vases and heart need refilling today, and I’m out hunting — and the Holy Spirit kept saying this was the post, not anything new, this one — and so He leads me back here
Want to drink the wonder of gratitude? Consider joining the Gratitude Community – just jump in with your own counting! How to begin your own 1000 Gift List ::: How Gratitude Can Change your Life
( Drop me a line if choose to begin giving intentional thanks and gather fresh joy and I will happily add either your name or a web link to the Gratitude Community I’m slowly getting caught up on meeting all you beautiful folks who have joined the Gratitude Community. Thank you for your kind grace and patience! I’m so looking forward to meeting you all soon!)
If you’d like to share your endless list of found Beauty – (please, jump in!) — just add the direct URL to your specific 1000 gift list post… and if you join us, we humbly ask that you please help us find each other by sharing the community’s graphic within your post.
Photos: gathering here
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