I Want, I Want, I Have, I Have

Every morning at Myrtle Beach I found a different spot to read my Bible in the morning. (The one that always put me to sleep was the bed.) The first morning I found the sleep sofa still open at 7:30--teen boys had hit the beach at 6:30!) and I starting complaining in my spirit. I was discontent with the cheesy sleeper sofa; there wasn't a horizontal space on the mattress anywhere. It took up virtually the whole room, the only room besides the "dining room" where we could all hang out at the same time. There wasn't enough comfortable furniture for everyone to slouch on, so occasionally I'd get up and go elsewhere so one of the kids could have my spot.

I would have liked to be able to afford all our meals out.Why did I have to pack food, plan meals, go grocery shopping, and do dishes? After all that's my duty at home. I was truly wanting to be served everything, all the time. No work, no nothing, just a fully catered lifestyle for one week. I knew better; I thought I had resolved in my heart before vacation that it would be about serving others, namely Paul first since he "needed" it the most, and then the kids for the sake of good memories. It hadn't really occurred to me that serving others on vacation would be for the glory of God. (Elementary, my dear Watson. But then again, I've never been mistaken for Sherlock.)

After surveying the lumpy, lousy sofa bed, I criticized the decor. Cheap 80s look, I said to myself, all peach and blue with dumb wicker fish on the white walls and dime-store seashells in the lamp base.

Restless during devotions. Ever experienced that? I got up and looked out the sliding glass door toward the ocean. I could see a little of it from our condo. Why did we end up on the first floor anyway? We said anything but the first floor and they had said they couldn't guarantee it. I wanted to be able to take pictures from up high, and also not feel creeped out by being level with the parking lot.

I wanted to get up early and watch the sunrise. Problem was, our room was very insular. Dark, quiet, on the hall side, not the exterior side of the building, and no natural light. And no alarm clock to set. I wanted to get up and take a great sunrise picture one morning. Just one. Paul was more than happy not to have an alarm clark anywhere there, and he wasn't about to use his cell phone as one. He's fine just looking at other people's sunrise pictures. Sunsets, too, for that matter. So every morning I missed sunrise. I grumbled that there was no alarm clock for me for just the one day I wanted it. How much could it set back an owner to provide one?

I wanted to take long, romantic walks on the beach at sunset with Paul-- initiated by him. "Watch Joel till we get back, " I fantasized him saying to the older kids. "I'm taking the most beautiful woman on the beach out and I can't tell you when we'll return. Help yourself to the Twinkies and stuff." My fantasies continued...he'd look into my eyes, the golden red of sun touching his muscular bronze shoulder, his long fingers caressing my well-toned copper shoulders...and he'd tell me how glad he is that I'm his wife, and that he'd been saving this little birthday gift for this perfect moment, and then he'd reach into the pocket of his shorts and present me with a one-carat diamond necklace which he'd place around my long, sleek neck while nibbling my earlobes.

Okay, some of you who know me and mine are wetting your pants from laughing with me. (Or at me, I'm not sure which.) Can you even believe it's been over 20 years since I read a romance novel? It hasn't been that long since I read Song of Solomon, but that's a whole 'nother blog.

Anyway, my fantasy jolted into reality once again as I perused the vehicles outside our sliding door, and coveted other people's car-top carriers. Those 200-dollar models. They were as sleek, hardbodied, and aerodynamic as Olympic athletes. Ours was a canvas jobbie from K-Mart on sale for 25 bucks. Holds more, probably, but looks like a heap of coal.

Two ladies about my age and the age of my dear friend, Barb, were heading to the beach in their cute little tankinis and bright flip-flops. They had not a pinch of fat on their behinds. I wanted to look like them from any angle. I also wanted Barb there. If Ben could have a guy friend, why couldn't I have a girlfriend? She'd understand the whole sunrise thing even though she's up at 5 every morning to go to work and see sunrises in Kansas five days a week.

Complain, complain, complain. And I'd only been up 10 minutes. This was not a good start. I opened my journal to see where I left off my Bible reading the day before. I was up to Exodus 20.

Exodus 20? I said. Not that chapter, Lord. It's the Ten Commandments. I'm on vacation, for crying out loud. And that's all I did was cry out loud --waa,waa,waa--until I plunged into the familiar passage. I would love to tell you that I read every verse as if it was fresh for the first time but I was honestly ready to check it off my list and move on to feel-good passages in the New Testament.

"Thou shalt not bear false witness against your neighbor....." Check.
'Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain...." Check.
"Thou shalt not ....covet."

Lord, I'm on vacation. Can we not have conviction while I'm here?

At about this time, Joel woke up and shuffled into the living room and up onto the bed between my Bible and me.

"Can I snuggle you?" he asked.
"Of course you can snuggle me!" I beamed and hugged him close.
He stroked my cheek. "I love your face, Sweetie," he said to me, "There's nothin' softer. You're SO beautiful!"

When my four-year-old says these things to me, I can believe him. He is the most affectionate person I know, and the most sincere and nearly superfluous with compliments. He looked absolutely cherubic sprawled across my Bible and journal when he let go of my neck.

Suddenly I wasn't coveting anyone or anything. I have all my children. I have a husband with a good job that he is not married to and who wants to spend time with his family, I have never once doubted his faithfulness despite my insatiable desire for more romance, I have plenty good health even if I have an unsightly backside, I have the freedom to vacation anywhere in America without a passport or armed guards at state borders, I have a vehicle big enough to squeeze in my crew plus one, I have the Holy Spirit never leaving me or forsaking me, not even on vacation when I need Him just as much if not more for conviction.

I have, I have, I have. I'm grateful. I'm grateful. I'm grateful.

In my Abba's lap I had found everything I could ever want, and there's plenty more I can't even imagine.