A Leak Under the Sink

Kitchen lemonsToday was yet another where I ran around from one thing to another. Laundry, reschedule appointments, car emissions test, grocery shopping, credit union, watering,  several hours at the hospital, etc. It was a relief to get home and sit down to rest… Until I discovered about 1/4 inch of standing water under the kitchen sink. It’s a corner sink so there is a lot of space under it, and a concrete floor on which I’ve stored various cleaners and other chemicals, cleaning tubs and buckets, etc. All that had to come out and is now on my kitchen counter. My husband fixed the leak when he came home from work not too long after. We put some newspaper under it, then went out for dinner.

When we returned, the paper was dry, so Stu sprayed the floor for bugs. Just now  I went to put the stuff back, but the floor is wet again. He thinks it’s the bug spray which for some reason did not dry near the open cabinet doors, but did at the back of the space. So the stuff is still on the counter. It may stay there til morning. When I once again must get up early and drive somewhere, this time across town for yet another doctor’s appointment.  This is one where if you’re late they’ll cancel the appointment and force you to reschedule.

Our lessons of late have been about thought testing. About how the spiritual life really occurs in the thinking. Will we think human viewpoint and earthly-thoughts, or will we think in line with the Word of God? Will we capture every wicked thought that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, or let them have run of the place? Will we deal with pressure situations with divine viewpoint, or fall back on the pseudo-solutions of human viewpoint and defense mechanisms like denial or anger or sublimation…?  My thoughts have been challenged repeatedly seemingly from all directions… the business with the waiting room yesterday, the fatigue, the dog being a pill (it’s pathetic when one surrenders control of one’s soul to a dog) (fortunately there’s rebound), the leak, even a ridiculous email from some guy who’s started a review blog of Christian fiction and wanted to know if I had “plans for 2010”. 

Wondering what that was about, I followed the enclosed link to his site and discovered he’d done reviews of Arena and The Enclave and thought both of them were lame. In fact, he began his review of The Enclave by saying that having read a few of my books he was not looking forward to reading it at all, especially when he read what it was about. He did anyway and his expectations were not disappointed… So my question is… why in the world was he writing to ask what I was doing next??? Given everything else that was going on (I found it right after the leak) I do not believe it was an accident. One of those attacks of the mosquito that can be more devastating to your spiritual state than an all out disaster.

Fortunately, tonight’s lesson also talked about how Jesus did not entrust Himself to men. He just gave His message and moved on, whether people received Him or rejected Him.   So I’m going to do that, too.

Finally, an update on my mother: thanks for all the prayers out there. She’s doing very well — was up twice today, using the walker and the bathroom, but she had a lot of pain when she moved her leg — particularly bending it at the knee to get her foot under her so she could stand up. Standing up was no picnic either. Still, she pushed through it. She also sat upright in a chair for several hours with no discomfort. And they are getting the food issues settled and the dispensing of the drug she brought from home has worked out fine as well.  So all in all, that part was good. Actually, it was all good. Cool to get the doctrine in class and then have events hit you where you can apply the stuff you’ve just learned. It makes God’s presence very real.

0 thoughts on “A Leak Under the Sink

  1. Rachel Starr Thomson

    The guy with the review blog — wow. Just wow. When I post reviews that are even half negative I hope the author doesn’t see them, because as a writer myself I just feel so bad about making negative comments to a real person, as opposed to a name on a front cover. It’s a constant struggle to be honest, actually, now that some authors do actually stop by my blog when I’m touring their books :). (But don’t worry, all of my praise for The Enclave was sincere!)

    I liked how you put this: “Will we capture every wicked thought that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, or let them have run of the place?” That is absolutely where the struggle lies. I’m working on a novel right now in which the characters deal with that struggle to maintain faith in the face of faith-draining circumstances, and so much of this comes down to a practical struggle in the thought-life.

    Reply
    1. karenhancock

      I know what you mean about wanting to be honest and yet not wanting to put up negative comments on someone else’s work when the possibility of them encountering the review is very likely. My solution has simply been to refrain from writing about books I mostly didn’t like, or to confine my comments to objections to some aspect of the content (like my objection to Dean Koontz’s theme that we are our own salvation and can see God by touching a sleeping dog…. wait! Did I even blog about that… Yes, on the old blog. The first installment was One Door Away from Heaven and the second Good and Evil

      And from those I see that I use the things I object to as a prompt to lay out my own thoughts on the subject. So it ends up not really being a review I guess…

      Reply
  2. Rachel Starr Thomson

    Thanks for the links! I just read them–some good thoughts there. During CSFF Blog Tours, I typically review a book one day and pontificate on whatever prompt the book gave me the next. It’s a good way to balance positive and negative as well as looking at how fiction reflects life and affects readers.

    I would rather just skip negative reviews, but since the publisher has sent me a free book, I have some obligation to write down what I thought of it.

    Reply

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