the frame

It was a day that crept in so quietly that I hardly knew it was there until I awoke. Arising sore and achy as has been all too often the case, I slowly made my way to the kitchen, mainly because that was where the food is kept. The breaking of the fast was to take place with cream of wheat, even though I didn’t feel like cooking at all. I’m somewhat flummoxed as to my total change of appetite, particularly for breakfast, the cereal that I have eaten in excess of 20 years can hardly be stomached anymore.

The cream of wheat was cooked, a dollop of peach preserves was placed in the middle, hot tea was steeped – English Breakfast by Twinings – and then the fast was broken. This took place as per usual on the far end of the bar next to the wall, at the same place my laptop resides. This machine contains multitudinous amounts of Bible software – thanks to BIL, who just happens to be our local computer guru and also happens to live across the street. As I eat, I also read scripture on the laptop, feeding both the physical and the spiritual.

The previous day’s activity of getting the grass out of the blueberry bed down the driveway had brought home to me that I just couldn’t stay on my knees very long – at least if I expected to get back up. It is a good thing that I can pray standing up, also sitting down and even lying down – it is a multi-positional activity, and it does much good in all areas of life. Putting some thought into the grass removal problem, I determined to build a frame with a wire screen that could be placed over my garden cart and as the grass chunks were rolled around the dirt would fall through the wire into the cart and the mostly dirt-less grass could be discarded.

While I had plenty of scrap pieces of wood with which to build the frame of the screen, I didn’t have any wire screening. To my surprise, when I pulled up the local hardware store, I found it to be closed and vacant and I didn’t even know how long. There was another up the highway but they didn’t have the proper wire. They did recommend another, older hardware place several miles away in what is affectionately known as ‘the valley’. This establishment is one of the “old fashioned” kind of places that pretty much has everything if a person can find it. Usually there is one older person that knows the stack or pile that something is in.

Upon asking for what I wanted, an older man directed me outside to what used to be a tent affair that the top is now torn from. After a freelance search that lasted several minutes, I found exactly the wire I wanted. I then rounded up a younger man and he came and cut me the size piece of wire I desired. Small staples were also purchased to hold the screening onto the bottom of the frame I was to build. The wire was a type of ‘hardware cloth’ that is usually put on the bottom of rabbit cages, except the squares were smaller.

After a bite to eat, I went down to the shop and proceeded to build the wooden frame on which to place the wire. Some scrap 2 by 4s worked quite well and they were cut and screwed together. The wire was then stapled on to the back side of the frame and my ‘invention’ was ready to try out. The only problem with this was that by the time I finished the frame, it was almost too dark to check it out. But check it out I did and it worked as I had hoped and it got me off my aching knees.

It is very enjoyable for me to set out to make something and it works just like I thought it would. God is good. ec