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10 Minutes Peace
by Susan McGrath
(Here's a favorite from last year. Hope you enjoy it again while I tame my busy schedule.)
You have one, don't you?
That small pile of mate-less socks that grows almost imperceptibly with each load of laundry. Eventually the pile needs a home and gets plopped into a container of some sort. My pile kept multiplying until it required the use of an entire laundry basket. This basket mocked me each time I passed it in the hallway. It sneaked up on me as I folded laundry, daring me to pair its inhabitants and put them neatly back in their sock drawers. It aggravated me when its contents were strewn throughout three rooms after one of the boys in my house dug through it looking for a favorite pair of gym socks.
After months of trying without success to diminish this pile of unruly footwear, I had had enough! I sat down with that basket at my feet and turned on a movie I had seen a million times. Then I methodically, ruthlessly and gleefully matched up those socks until my pile could be held in one hand (almost). Those leftover socks were put in a "temporary" pile until all the laundry cycles through. They get one shot and finding a mate and then they are history! I refuse to let this pile grow and taunt me and make me feel like a failure at something as mundane as laundry!
Come on, admit it. You have one. It may not be socks. Perhaps it's a pile of mail or school papers that you can never get to the bottom of. Maybe it's a perpetual pile of dishes that's always waiting for you. (You know, the things that won't fit in the dishwasher - you'll get to them later.) It could even be the clutter or evidence of meals-on-the-go lurking in your car. We all have some area of clutter in our lives that is tough to get to the bottom of and even tougher to keep under control once we do.
And what about spiritual sock baskets? I continually struggle with issues like gossip and laziness and apathy. These are not things I do maliciously or usually even intentionally, but they creep up and multiply, much like those socks.
Overcoming is not something we can do on our own. I give God credit even for something small like conquering my sock basket. Jesus told his disciples in Mark 10:27, "With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God."
That includes keeping my socks and my tongue under control and becoming the woman that God desires me to be.
Rate it:
a recovering journalist trying to encourage others and glorify God through writing;
living the small-town life with husband Tim and sons Lincoln, 12, and Sawyer, 6;
completing a few put-off writing projects while using chocolate for therapy.
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