world needs…

“Christ came into the world to save sinners, not good people,
and your unworthiness is your greatest claim for His salvation.”

Hannah Whitall Smith


(a buckeye butterfly enjoys the butterfly bush / Julie Cook / 2017)

You thought I was going to say love…didn’t you…?
As in what the world needs now is love sweet love…

But that wasn’t what I was going to say.

Peace, maybe…
that must have been it…
the world needs peace….

But I wasn’t going to say that either…
However it would have been a good second guess…

Yet both love and peace would be two nice things to have said…
As the thought of joining of hands, the locking arms with our neighbors,
as we stand in one large global circle singing kum-bi-ya….

However the world needs more than just love and more than just peace.

Believe it or not,
it needs something much greater….

For both love and peace, be they each a most noble and grand need,
can be both fickled and fleeting.
For given what we know about man and how he, she, we, operate…
both peace and love soon give way to the darker sides of all things opposite…
to the opposite yang to man’s often positive ying.

What the world needs is a Savior.

Yes, you read correctly,
a Savior…
Not a hero, not a great leader, not something fleeting or shallow or even empty…

As every atheist, agnostic and every other religion that disavows Jesus of Nazareth as
anything other than either a fable or some benign profit,
just uttered a collective groan…

However we must note that there has yet to anything or anyone who has ever made the
same difference or impact in the lives of any man as the difference made by living
a life in Christ…

A real, self surrendering life…
And if you have yet to try such…
you can argue against such all day long…that is until you try doing it…

For this is not the life of the in name only lip service or of a life lived filled with
the mere fluff and stuff of overt materialism, or the angst of protest and militantism,
or the emptiness of worldly dissatisfaction…

but this is a life lived totally sacrificed of ego and self…

It seems too easy to call you “Savior”,
Not close enough to call you “God”
So as I sit and think of words I can mention
to show my devotion

“I want to fall in love with You”

Just take it all in….

Everyone will stand in awe and declare God’s deeds;
they will recognize his works…

Psalm 64:9

RSCN3198
(A gulf fritillary butterfly enjoys the butterfly bush / Julie Cook / 2016)

RSCN3193
(a pipeline swallowtail busy at work on the hollyhocks / Julie Cook / 2016)

RSCN3206
(A silver spotted skipper hanging out on the butterfly bush / Julie Cook / 2016)

DSCN3190
(a meadow fritillary stops in for a visit / Julie Cook / 2016)

Enjoy the long weekend…

I am soooo over it. . .I am done!!!!

There is only one day left, always starting over:
it is given to us at dawn and taken away from us at dusk.

Jean-Paul Sartre

DSC02525
(a southern dogface butterfly visits a freshly planted petunia / Julie Cook / 2015)

Don’t panic. . .
It’s Summer, I’m talking about Summer. . .
As in I’m done with it. . .
I’m over it. . .
As in kaput, fini, over and out!!

Actually. . .I’m talking about heat, hot, drying and dying—the tiresome end of all that was once lush, plump and thriving.

In late August, here in this deep South of mine, there is no thriving and there is barely any surviving.
Everything is leggy, yellow and very near death.
And mind you, there is many a day, during this particular time of year, that I feel very much the same.

The little flower bed, just out from our front door, had been full of snapdragons and petunias that were planted back in early Spring when the yard was overhauled.
Had any one asked me, I would not have chosen petunias—I’m just not a fan, but nobody asked me and my husband thought they looked nice. I had to go back in later, as the late frosts of Spring did a number on the petunias, so I threw in some snapdragons in order to fill the gaps. I wasn’t keen on the snapdragons either but I knew they were pretty darn hardy—

Pink snapdragons and crimson petunias.
Not my idea of color choices but again, nobody asked me.

The tiny plants did begin to thrive. . .
Filling out and covering nicely the little flower bed the landscape guys had decided to create for me.
Had I had my druthers, I would have moved the bed, enlarged it and done it a bit differently—
but again, nobody asked me.
The landscape guys had put out some very pretty pine straw all over the yard in the newly formed beds and then for some reason they added bark to the little flower bed.

We had bark once.

It washed like nobody’s business whenever it rained.
I would have a river of bark racing down the front walk requiring scooping and sweeping up after every down pour.
I was done with bark.
However the landscapers were into contrast when they were laying out the yard and again, nobody asked me.

So bark it was and bark it is.

As the Summer has worn on, like a tired old moth-eaten wool overcoat, the petunias and snapdragons have been rapidly approaching their limit. Long, tall, leggy, yellowing, more vine than leaf, shriveled and grossly unsightly. . .I could no longer stand to look at the flower bed without feeling a great sense of anxiety. . .with a touch of disgust added in.

For weeks I’ve been telling myself “not much longer. . .September is almost here. . .then you’ll be able to pull up all that crap and replant it all with some fresh wonderful crisp fall magic.”
Yes, I’ve told myself that for many weeks now.

A tiny cold front passed through the state last night–and please note I use the words cold and front with much rolling of the eyes. . .
I will admit that it did actually drop our temps to the mid 60’s this morning.
Never mind that the high was still 90ish–I’m taking that smidge of crisp and I’m running with it. . .all the way to the local the garden center.

This entire week will see me at dads, doctors, dentists so if I was going to act, it had to be today.
The only problem was that the garden center really doesn’t have in crisp fall magic yet.
They still have in hot summer same ol same ol. . .
No matter–I would make do.

I got home with my assortment of trays.
When I thought I was grabbing some pansies, I was actually grabbing trays of petunias as well as a couple of trays of snapdragons—as in been there done that, it’s too early for violas and pansies so AGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh well, no matter, they’re purple and white and they’ll do until the garden center gets in its fall crisp magic.

I chose white because I like white.
I wear a lot of black, as I like to say it hides a wealth of woe, so I suppose I like it’s opposite as in I think white looks elegant. Never mind when the white elegant blooms die, turning a sickly shade of brown and falling off–I’m sticking with elegant—
And purple because the butterflies like the purple butterfly bushes I recently put out.
I had told the landscapers I wanted some butterfly bushes—
Surprise, I didn’t get any.
Lest we remember that no one was asking and obviously no one was listening. . .

So I spent the remainder of my day cutting all the leggy spent petunias and snapdragons–leaving 3 clumps that still seemed to be “ok”
I then raked off the tired dry grey bark from the bed.
Next I spread a big ol heavy sack of soil—all over the red Georgia clay that makes up the bed.
I had wanted the landscapers to add topsoil to all the excavated ground but remember, no one was listening.
I put in two dwarf fountain grass—
why you ask—
because they caught my eye on the way to the checkout register–
I think we call that an impulse buy. . .however not to fear, I liked them.
I added my trays of the new petunias and snapdragons—experiencing a bit of deja vu as I did so.
I watered, re-spread the tired grey bark- – – but no matter as it now matches the once pretty red supple pine straw the landscapers had put out, which is now dull, crunchy and grey.

One good last watering and I was happy—well, happier than I was.
I’ll really be happy when it’s finally fall crisp and magical. . .

DSC02524
(work)

DSC02522
(more work)

DSC02519
(leggy and spent)

DSC02533
(better)

I’m just asking for this one thing. . .

Praying, we usually ask too much. I know I do. Sometimes we even demand. I think I am learning to ask enough for the moment–not for the whole year, utterly veiled in mystery; not even for the week, the month ahead; but just for today.

Jesus said it all when He told us to pray: ‘Give us this day our daily bread.’

That bread is not only material, it is spiritual; in asking for it, we ask for a sufficiency of strength, courage, hope and light. Enough courage for the step ahead–not for the further miles. Enough strength for the immediate task or ordeal. Enough material gain to enable us to meet our daily obligations. Enough light to see the path–right before our feet.”
― Faith Baldwin

DSC02503
(tiger swallowtail feasting on the butterfly bush / Julie Cook / 2015)

Both of my grandmothers always had a good response when any of the grandkids began rambling off a list of wants—to what must have seemed like a never ending and ever growing list of wants.
And as the children, as in me, my brother and cousins grew, the “wants” exponentially became grander and more expensive–

The response from my mother’s mother was her dry “your wants never hurt you” with the response from my dad’s mother being her famous and very flippant singsongy “too bad, too bad”.

Now it’s not as if these two ladies were not doting grandmothers—they certainly were as they lavished their grandkids with a great deal–it’s just that some of those lavished items were indeed wanted and giddily accepted while some things were certainly not wanted nor had they even been a thought on the list.

New clothes and affording an education to a private school, if and when the need arose, was gracious and welcomed no doubt in the eyes of parents, but in the mind of a growing grandchild, the more pressing issues were for more fadish items or candy, ice-cream, the circus, concert tickets, bikes, horses, etc. . .these were the real items to the list of wants just waiting to be filled.

Both of these ladies were born at the onset of a new century–one in rural middle Georgia the other in rural Texas. They each lived through two world wars, a great depression and a myriad of other wars, police actions and the ebbing and flowing of the security of the world. They each knew difficulties and suffered loss while growing up. They each worked hard for what they had albeit in very different fashions.

To this day, I can hear my grandmother’s “too bad, too bad” ringing in my head every time I hear myself lamenting “I wish I had a [new] _________________________.
Filling in the blank with anything that is not necessarily essential to survival.

So it is on this once again hot and overtly humid day, which is just another day in a long and never ending string of hot and humid days, that I am heard to lament. . .
“I wish it was cooler.
I wish it was Fall.
I wish the weather would change.
I wish it wasn’t so hot.
I wish it wasn’t so humid. . .”
on and on ad infinitum

And somewhere in the back of my brain, I can now hear one of those two ladies amusingly replying, “be careful what you wish for missy, you might just get it. . .”

DSC02502

DSC02500

Good to the last drop

“We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean.
But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.”

Mother Teresa

DSC00477
(a fiery skipper works his charms on a butterfly bush / Julie Cook / 2015)

DSC00478
(a fiery skipper works his charms on a butterfly bush / Julie Cook / 2015)

I’m off to Dad’s today, a day which is now known as a Dad’s day. . .
We’re heading back to the doctor, again.
Just a follow up however or so says the doctor. . .with Dad asking if leaving the house is really necessary—
“Vitamin D dad, you know. . .as in the sun. . . that big hot yellow ball in the sky. . .
it might like to see you every once in a while. . .
You know those folks who suffer in the winter from SAD, that seasonal affective disorder which effects moods due to a lack of exposure to the sun, well. . .I think Dad has had a permeant very pale case. . .

I thought it would be nice to have happy thoughts today as one (in this case moi) never knows what one will find on the other end of the highway (aka at Dad’s). . .
The end of last week was not good—but things seem to be leveling back into place for the time being. . .hence the need for happy thoughts!!!

I just wanted to leave you today with the happy images of a little fiery skipper working hard at getting every last drop of nectar out of the butterfly bush. . .

Here’s to a happy Thursday to all!!!

DSC00470

DSC00471

DSC00473

DSC00474
(a skipper works his charms on a butterfly bush / Julie Cook / 2015)