Pretty Things

Straight, smooth, healthy hair

The perfect fitting jeans

Smooth, moisturized, full-of-life skin

Jewelry

That purse

Polished, healthy, full fingernails

The Wow-I look-Good, power outfit

New-Car-Smell, leather, sporty, shiny ride

…

Pretty Things

Who. Are. We?

Some of us

Born into warm, loving, nurturing, wealthy families

Some of us

Born into broken, scattered, scraping by, living day-to-day families

All born…

We can’t help where we’re born, or what kind of family we’re born into.

But can’t we all believe in, cling to the same hope?

Weather we’re dressed in $100 jeans and wear fancy jewelry, or are covered in dust and lucky to have a shirt to protect us from the sun … What does that all mean?  Does a nice ring mean we’re better than someone?  Does that degree hanging on the wall mean we’re better than someone?  That we deserve more than someone?

If we define ourselves by a Tiffany necklace, a Porsche sports car, or a Banana Republic wardrobe … think how easily our identity can be lost. 

Pretty Things  … fun to enjoy, fun to cherish. 

But oh so temporary.  Oh so easy to loose.

But not something to define ourselves by.  

Our lives… kind of like plates at Thanksgiving.  Some are perfect, separated, food not touching.  Some more messed up, scattered around, all mixed up. 

But in the end, we can all end up in the same place. 

If we all believe in eternal life, we are all offered the same, eternal life, together, in the same place, under the same love.  Just like those calc problems… always more than one way to get to the final solution J

~~~

I feel I can hardly even begin to relate to suffering.  This child and his mother in Ethiopia live in a totally different world than I know.  Tsegaye and his mom speak a language I don’t know.  I speak a language they don’t know. 

Very different roads …. But all the same hope and the same destination <3