Whew....

The Adventures in Elizabeth's Life...
*
Sigh.
So yesterday I was having a good day...
until the afternoon.
*
The morning included a wonderful conversation
with my sister over gmail-video-chat.
I read her January 4's devotional piece by
Richard Wurmbrand
in his book
Reaching Toward the Heights
that Mr. Husband had in his collection
and that I am now enjoying.
*
I was hoping to bake bread yesterday
but my starter did not start.
So then I got late for lunch...
and then I forgot what I was cooking.
I forgot the lesson of don't leave the stove
when cooking.
When I remembered
well... the flame in the pan (!!) was not that big
but then I forgot the age old wisdom of
NOT putting water in a grease-based fire
and the smoke,
oh the steam and smoke.
So nothing at all was damaged.
The pan is fine; it is cast iron and tough.
 My nerves though from that smoke detector
screeching loudly and saying over and over
fire, fire, fire
is enough to want me to throw it out the window...
Needless to say
all the windows were open,
fan blasting in kitchen and Cleo hiding under
Mr. Husband's desk.
Poor Cleo.
Then I accidently locked Cleo in a room she was not
supposed to be in
and left for the library.
*
Talking to my Mom on the steps of the
small, and I soon found out
dilapidated library,
I saw one kid,
a pudgy preteen or young teen
holding this thick water soaked dirty cigarette
and asking for a light.
Then I saw another child walking the other way
a beautiful young boy
sobbing in great distress while talking on his cell phone.
My heart was breaking in to more than two pieces seeing this sadness.
How can I get plugged into this small neighborhood and maybe
bring some comfort to someone 
I thought?
*
I came home
and found Cleo in distress
still locked in that room
that I did not know she had gone in.
*
Let's just say that by 5 pm I officially called
my dear friend to ask for prayer
and say that I had
one of those
really bad awful day afternoons
and I still had to make dinner.
*
Well,
my spiritual father has told me about
loving more and pushing past self-love by loving more.
So I made dinner for my
coming home Mr. Husband who
I knew was tired and hungry.
*
So I turned to my Fannie Farmer cookbook
that I used for sugar cookies
and fried up some fish
and potatoes
as well as a mushroom and onion dish.


The potatoes turned out really great
as did the mushrooms.

 

The fish was not as good -
it was my first time breading and frying them.
It was a bit too tough;
could be in part the cut of fish and
I may have cooked it too long.
*
Then Mr. Husband and I
read some Chesterton out loud to each other.
Preface and Part 1 of
the ballad of the white horse
by GK Chesterton
and his beautiful language and the story of
long-long-ago England
was comforting to say the least.
I found a third edition, printed three months after the first
edition of this ballad for Mr. Husband
and gave it to him for St. Nicholas Day.
*
So today I am hoping for a bit more of a calm
less comically-bad-afternoon day.
I know it could of been worse
and surely there is much greater suffering
than this but still.
*
My bread started has revived;
I hope to bake bread.
*
I keep working on trying to meet new people
and make friends here.
It's hard.
The town I live in is not easy for this.
But I have some things in the works and
hope to have some good stories to tell...
but perhaps not ones that include
Cleo feeling the need to hide
under Mr. Husband's desk.