Time Flies

I know it’s an old saying that “time flies.” As I dated this blog for the 30th of January, I really don’t know where the time went. Monday will be the first day of February and then Punxsutawney Phil will make his yearly prediction of the length of winter. That sacred day is known in the Christian world as the Presentation of Christ. Jewish law mandates that an offering be made on the 40th day after birth, and that the child and mother are to go to temple and make the offering. It is a touching feast day and I look forward to celebrating it each year. It means more to me than the groundhog thing. This offering made by the child and mother goes back much further to the time when child sacrifice was a “thing.” The offering presented was a substitute for the child himself (it was a first-born male child that was the sacrifice). Remember that Abraham did not seem to bat much of an eye when asked to take his son and sacrifice him. It seems that we have come a long way since then, but remember that children are sacrificed everyday by malnutrition, abuse, homelessness, inadequate education, and prejudice. I just returned from walk number two for the day. We’ve had mostly cloudy weather for the last week and it wears on me. The combination of winter and clouds makes me less than happy. It does help to get out and walk even though the temperature requires a good deal of bundling up. I can do it, and most days I do. It is a struggle, nevertheless, and one must be cautious of the ice. I moved into this neighborhood over 35 years ago. Quite a few of the lots were empty at that time. Since then the area is “all built up.” Much of the building is rental property. I receive several offers to buy my house every month. I am sure that it will become a “rental” property when it is sold. As I walk along the sidewalk the number of houses being moved out of or into is pretty surprising. There was another today. I’m not sure the neighbors will be sad to see this one being vacated. A few days ago a woman stood in the middle of the street screaming at one of the occupants using more expletives than I can count on fingers and toes. She was, perhaps, the one standing outside the garage with her worldly belongings waiting for a ride when I passed by this morning. This afternoon the moving truck was in the driveway and being loaded. My personal belief is that the occupant was running a used car dealership with some interesting specimens with temporary licenses parked in the driveway, over the sidewalk and in the street. They seemed to be of the high-end variety–Jaguar, Mercedes, Lincoln, etc. but they were all missing something, like a fender, a door, a window. Surely they were real bargains if one was in need of a fixer-upper.

The great good news of the week was the phone call on Tuesday telling me that I had an appointment for the first injection of COVID vaccine this coming Thursday at 7:20 AM. The second piece of good news is that the massive storm headed toward the east coast is supposed to miss us. Our temps have not been that bad. One of the memories that came up on Facebook was of this date a couple of years ago when the temperature was -27º! Today the high was 30º. I shan’t complain. Sophia spent a good deal of the morning going through her massive toy box looking for a worthy replacement for the object affectionately known as “Miss Purple.” She has misplaced it. It is her favorite and she is bereft without such. After hauling out several prospects and giving them a tryout she evidently decided the lost is irreplaceable. Did she return the items to her toy box? The answer is so obvious that I won’t presume to say yea or nay. We all know about impulse shopping. When one does not have the capability to roam the aisles of the closest Target and pick up items one never realized one needed until it had been seen, then one is attracted by the adds that pop up while watching YouTube educational offerings. My latest

purchases arrived Thursday. These are wooden puzzles, which incidentally do not “click” together like normal jigsaw puzzles. The shapes are sometimes flowers, fish, animals, other recognizable objects. Because the shapes are recognizable that does not mean they are easy to place! Anyway, I’m working on the first of two. I’ll not make a prediction as to the completion date. It’s been a good and relatively quiet week. Praying for friends who are desperately ill has taken a good bit of time. When I consider them, I feel especially blessed to be as well as I am. Thanks for reading. Thanks for thoughts. Thanks for praying.