I recently mentioned my visit to my sister’s home on Chesapeake Bay. I was mostly focused on the water, because I love it, but her home is lovely, too! I could tell you all about her wonderful decorating and beautiful art pieces and collectables, the pictures, the furniture – but what I most want to share with you is in her kitchen.
Her home is right on the beach, but it’s not the ‘beachfront’ lot. That might normally not make a huge difference, but the home that was built after theirs is three stories high. Strict building codes for their neighborhood declare that they shouldn’t have built that high, but nevertheless – it dwarfs my sister’s house. It’s a constant frustration not only because it blocks their view – but the houses are built closer than inner city tenement buildings! Which means Randi’s once-lovely view of the water turned into a mass of window-glare staring down at her.
I’ll get to my point! She and her husband did this…
And what I love about it is that they took something that was a constant irritant (windows that look smack dab at the back of their neighbor’s house) and made it into something beautiful.
The stain glass in each window is not just a fabulous piece of art (each one a separate piece, but all of them together telling a personal story of their life together) it makes walking into their kitchen a joy instead of an exercise of hopeless frustration over something they can do nothing about!
It’s a great reminder to me of those obstacles we each face – the ones that we can do nothing about – that’s just ‘the way it is’ kind of problems that can frustrate us. I want to turn those ‘out of my control’ trials in my life into something as beautiful as the stain glass in my sister’s kitchen! And the place to start is with what I have – not what I don’t have.
I think that’s called “gratitude”, isn’t it?
All for Him,
Missy