The Perfect Weather

The weatherman said we were under a "winter storm" this week.  I guess 3-5 inches of projected snowfall can be a storm.  We looked out and decided it was perfect weather for a walk.

I know I don't need to tell you that we love the snow around here.  Even Silas, who's been squawking at me for days was still, mesmerized.

Snow makes everything lovely.  All the frumpy and overlooked slips like Cinderella into a brilliant white evening gown.  So long dead and dormant.  Hello showstopper.

Sometimes you look out and aren't even sure what's under the snow.  It could be a heap of garbage that just looks like a rolling hill.  But it's all just snow now.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines forgiveness as 'to grant free pardon and to give up all claim on account of an offense or debt'.  Forgiveness is like snow, covering up the brown and broken.  There may be trash underneath, but it's all just forgiveness now.

Current book love: Donald Miller's A Million Miles in a Thousand Years (thanks, Kenna!)  And he writes that life is a story and that all good stories have conflict.  All great stories have heroes that overcome obstacles, propelled toward what really matters.  Harry Feversham in the movie The Four Feathers, braves his own fears to keep his friends safe from their war-time enemy, friends that called him a coward.  In real life, Steve Saint's father was killed in a remote jungle.  One of the men who killed his father?  Steve's kids call him "Grandpa."  (Check out more of the story here.)

These are the stories we love.  Overcoming the conflicts of disappointment and hurt  - not ignoring it, but giving up claim to it - doesn't make any sense, but it's fighting for what really matters.  As my dad routinely says, we are just broken people who break things.  And we are all in process...

Forgiveness stoops down and covers all in its brilliance.  And those who see it or those who experience it, cannot help but be mesmerized.  (And maybe even do a flying psycho-dog leap in the air.)

There's so much more to say.  And there's still so much undeveloped here.  But it's late and I want to share and say that I hope we snow storm forgiveness on the people in our lives.  I hope we live good stories.