I lost my glasses on Monday, the cute ones, the ones a little bolder than my typical tortoise or black. Like most people my age, there are spare pairs everywhere. But, not on Monday.
We drove down the pretty road bordered with deeply rooted trees. Her mama had left a forgotten treat in the mailbox.
So early in the day, my readers must have slipped from my pocket or fell from my lap.
It’s an interesting dependence I now have on them, like a security blanket for a baby.
I catch myself thinking I have a pair like a headband only to pat the top of my head to be sure they’re there and find only hair.
On Monday, I was without them. I warned people I responded to in texts. They were unbothered by my typos.
By the end of the day I was managing just fine. My daughter didn’t find them on the road and I decided, oh well they’re just gone.
I gathered my things in the passenger seat once I was at home. Glanced down in the space between seat and console and saw a strange sight. I decided my husband had left some stuff in my car.
A little glass case, black with faux fancy logo with a pair of readers in the color peridot. I lost them so long ago.
Not as fancy as the blue, but I loved them and missed them.
Why am I writing about finding reading glasses?
It’s the thought that came after, the clarity in a sweet message from God.
About good in God’s time and God’s way, about the way answers come when we accept we don’t know, can’t be in control of everything.
The way God is the very best at the “art of surprising”.
On Tuesday, my granddaughter wanted another treat. It was close to lunchtime and she had a slight runny nose, but would never tell her grandma she was feeling bad.
(Memories of her strong mama here, rarely voicing a need or trouble.)
I let her lay on the floor, not flailing but fussing. Let her let her mood play out, allowed her to reconcile what she wanted with what her person in charge decided was best.
From the kitchen, I heard her whine change to elation.
“I found Gamma’s cross! Grandma, I found Gamma’s cross!”
She ran over and handed me the tiny gold cross, the one Gamma lost months ago and we all searched until we settled on not finding and stopped searching.
I called Gamma. Told her “Guess what?” and quoted our precious granddaughter.
She found the cross.
Under the couch, found when a little toddler tantrum decided to get quiet and lift the fabric of the couch to hide underneath. How she spotted it is really nothing short of a miracle.
No one else would’ve looked there.
Yesterday, we had a sweet day together. The back seat of my car strewn with a used pull-up, tiny books, little cards and juicy cups, and “guess what?”
My fancy blue glasses.
Hmmm, a surprise.
I had a thought yesterday as I listened to the words of a popular song “My Jesus”.
I thought “I don’t feel the nearness of Jesus now.”
I told God that very thing, asked Him to help me see what’s blocking my view or maybe, just to show me it’s okay to not always be searching, rather to wait for his revealing.
Gamma and Grandma both wear crosses, I suppose it’s one of our granddaughter, Elizabeth’s favorite things, our necklaces.
And our bracelets.
Yesterday, she sat in my lap and asked about every charm on my bracelet, the tiny artist palette, the little girl and boy silhouettes, her mommy and her uncle. She spotted the tiny angel, a gift from my husband prior to her birth. She said “That’s like my angel”, an angel her mama’s grandma gave her when she was just a baby.
One charm she skipped over is the circle with the missing charm, a tiny mustard seed enclosed in glass. Lost so long ago, I stopped searching.
When I called Gamma, teary with excitement, she called our granddaughter “my angel” and I agreed.
She added, “Now, let’s wait for her to find your mustard seed!”
“That would be something!” I said.
The sketches on the thin pages of my Bible often overlap with faded color, the Psalms especially.
Lisa Anne Tindal 