Spacers Between Kingdom Tiles

A little over a week ago Megan, on a Sunday's whim, scribbled down a few of the small, fleeting things that are the delicate pattern of beauty in her life. Little things: little things that somehow matter. Indi, the main character of my published work The Shadow Things, reflects on the problem of the little things:

"Surely there is something that brings the rain and the dry," he said to a little ant toiling by his foot. "Look, even you find food to eat. Who watches over you? Surely not the gods. They are almost too busy and unfeeling to care for us, and when they touch us, it is to kill us."

Who cares about the little things? Who makes the little things that are the exquisite backdrop of our lives? God does, whose power keeps the paradox of the atom from flying all to pieces, whose finger inscribes the invisible lines between the stars. God does, and Megan took the time on a Sunday's whim to chart out some of the little things in her life. It was a treat to read, as I am sure it was a treat to write; she invited others to scribble down a list of their own little things as well. I thought...well, perhaps I might.

Perhaps I might. I felt uneasy, as though I were borrowing her thunder. But I kept thinking about it, dutiful, ever anxious to enjoy myself since I thought this would be an enjoyable exercise of the mind. And then a strange revelation broke slowly over me. Do you remember, as a child, how large everything seemed to you? A single turkey seemed to me a positive ostrich, towering and grotesque, intent on running me off the dirty tract of farm and pecking my hair out. Dogs were like ponies. Ponies were like elephants (I remember the horrified twist in my gut when I was made to trot in my first horse-back riding lesson). When you are a child, everything breaks on your vision as enormous.

And it still does that to me.

I almost hate to do this exercise because it will peel back all my cool, demure layers (which really are a part of me) and get down to that inner core where, let's face it, I'm still just a child. Andrew Peterson sings about the window in the world: have you ever wondered what the window itself feels? Maybe like being run through, run through and broken up on and rattled and overwhelmed and at the same time trying to channel all that goodness... I look at autumn like a man newly stepped onto an undiscovered planet. Every autumn. Every autumn a new planet. Nothing is little. Every cup of tea is a fresh cup of amber. Everything is like living stained glass through which the genius of Christ's light is shining around me. Nothing is little. So how do I remember the little things? Every sharp detail, every piece of mosaic, every thread I can pinch between my fingers that is woven into my life, is enormous. I'm such a child. Here are some of my enormous little things.

catching a fresh breeze in my facethe Kingdomseeing the sunset rays streaming over the cloudsmy sister telling me "I love you" when I am upsetthe hello-goodbye kisses from my mother and fathermy husband kissing my hand, or ruffling my hairwriting a passage so that it rings truediscovering the narratives of the Scriptures coming to life before my mind's eyemy father's teachingholding a conversation in quotes from books and movies with my familymy mother's cookingmy sister-in-law's dessertswearing my husband's sweatersfinding letters in the mailbox from my friendsUncle Raymond laughing at methe worlds inside my head - fells and dales, downs, river valleys, seashores, farms and quiet streets...Rhodricandle-flamethe colour of a blue jay's coatthe autumn cry of Canadian geesethe little red light that lives far down in a glass of winethe surf-sound of the wind in the treesthe giddiness and sudden seriousness of the Tenth Doctorthe sound of waves falling, lulling me to sleepSundaygoing to cut down and put up my parents' Christmas treeapple-pickingwhen only my husband 'gets' what I mean (fiery horses)the pile of coats on my parent's coat-rack Saturday evenings when we all visitfeeling the living throb of my church through my spiritopening Christmas presents with my throwing-knifelying awake Christmas morning, as much a child as ever with excitementseeing a constellation I knowsmelling woodsmokeWednesday afternoon walksmy morning cup of tea
These are the colours and brush-strokes that make up my world.