Stir and Enjoy...My Life

"Just stir and enjoy."

Those are the words I saw this morning on the peanut butter lid as I was making my toast. It's the all natural kind of peanut butter that comes with an inch of oil on top that you need a concrete mixer to mix. When I use it I usually sprinkle a teaspoon of sugar on my toast just to "help the medicine go down."

But when I saw those words, I got tickled and had a little laugh to myself, as I'm prone to doing more and more lately, because I thought of how true the words seem to be for my life. I envision myself as a little pot of pudding and God as Himself, with a spoon. And every time the pudding seems to be settling and thickening up, he sticks His spoon in, stirs, scrapes the goo up off the bottom, takes a good lick, and...smiles.

I, to throw in a very different comparison, feel like a wet cat at the stirring, but the thought that God loves me enough not to let me settle into globby old pudding is really a relief. And I feel His enjoyment of me. I am glad because He is glad.

Stir and enjoy.

So, finals are over and I'm very satisfied with them. I'm done with Kilgore college, presumably forever, since I plan to transfer in the fall to Berea. Today was my first unschool day of the summer, and I spent it running, reading, and housecleaning, in that order.

And I thought a lot. Not about what I was doing, unfortunately. I realized that taste-testing is not the brightest way to find out whether the liquid in a spray bottle is water or not. I was 99% sure it was either peroxide or water, and since Mom sometimes uses peroxide as mouth wash, I knew it wouldn't kill me.

After a hasty thoughtless squirt in the mouth, I remembered the 1% possibility of it being some extremely toxic chemical. But of course it was too late and I'm not dead yet. The strange taste, I decided, must be that of stale peroxide. And with an optimistic laugh I applied it liberally to the sink, the toilet, and the tub, and scrubbed away. Just wait. It'll end up being some kind of liquid super-glue, and tomorrow my mouth will be stuck shut and someone will be stranded on the toilet. Ha.

Today I ran for thirty minutes and came home flaming red, having worked up an admirable sweat and stench. The sweat and stench I was proud of. The redness of face I was not. Too much like embarrassment.

Running is stretching me. Not just my legs, but my mind, my heart, my faith, my will. I began sneaking out of the house to run because I was ashamed to let even my family members see me attempt something I've failed at consistently, mostly in the willpower department. And I didn't want them to see me all red and soaked. And I wanted it to be just between me and God at first. Him stirring the pudding and smiling. Me running. And smiling.

I am half way through a seven week plan which, if all continues to go well and I don't get heat stroke, will have me running a modest three miles in somewhere under a modest 30 minutes and, more importantly, confidently grinning at passersby from an unashamed, crimson-hued face.

For the first time I'm liking running, because it seems to be an allegory of life, that I do over and over. I practice living. Practice fighting the good fight. Practice grinning instead of flinching when people drive by. I know they don't care if I'm red or not; it's me learning not to
care.

That guy who just went by in a black PT Cruiser, he doesn't know my story. And you don't know his, a voice whispers. He has no idea how far I've come or how far I'm going, and I don't know anything about him except that he looks middle-aged-ish and I think he's wearing a black suit. And I will never see him again. Phew.

Stir and enjoy, folks, stir and enjoy.