It's just a number.

 Today is my 36th birthday. I have already been texted and called and face booked and loved on with well wishes from sweet friends and family. Since the kids are insisting that I stay in my bedroom while they fix my "surprise", I have time on my hands and plenty of thoughts to keep me company.
     I read a quote some time ago, " I write because I don't know what I think until I read what I Say."
And I have found that to be true of myself  in some ways. Blogging helps me focus and clarify my thoughts. So I'm taking I-phone in hand and figuring just what I think about this day. This year. This life.
 One thing I am realizing is that your age is really just another number. It can define you or you can define it. I'd like to choose to be the definer this year.
 One of the biggest factors for me, and the thing that catches me off guard, is the realization of the passing of time. It's preciousness and it's fleeting nature. We all lost two very precious people in my grandparents this past year. They were anchors in ways I hadn't realized until they were gone. I also just said goodbye to my parents and younger sisters as we saw them on their way to their newest missionary adventure. Once again time seems almost mocking in its power. I find myself struggling to gain a foothold in uncharted territory.
 And why this seems so hard right now I don't know? Goodbyes are not new to us.
  The one thing that is certain, I do " ...know Whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day. " I can't claim to understand. But  He desires us to trust Him, not necessarily to understand Him.
   As I write this, it all seems so much simpler than the actuality of it. The what-ifs hover at the edges of my mind. It has to be an hourly excercise of committing the future to a loving Lord.
    You know when you read a devotional or self help book, how it seems like the author has all the answers and you just wonder how they got to that point? Well, it's my belief that authors struggle to practice what they preach just as much as the rest of us do.   I know Meemaw was always speaking of what she was struggling with and or still learning until The Lord took her home at 84.
  It would seem that no matter your age, all of life is a crazy trust excercise. And you should never stop learning.