Thoughts, Oatmeal and Grandpa...

My Oatmeal Grandpa

I spent this morning catching up on housework

that got a bit out of control 

from taking an afternoon away to the lake.

(but so worth it!)

All the kids, plus four friends, 

are volunteering this week at a friend's church

to be group leaders at Vacation Bible School.

So after dropping off a truck load of smiling kids

(well, most of them...the ones with their eyes open anyway)

and husband to their designated places of responsibility,

I came back home and got to work.

After I finished the massive mountain of dishes

I decided to take a breakfast break.

(I'm not a breakfast person)

"What sounds good?" I wondered.

Oatmeal.

With strawberries.

And almonds.

And maybe even a banana.

I always think of Grandpa when I eat oatmeal.

{photo taken with my I pad... After breakfast, actually, just for the visual. 

Sorry, no banana. I ate the last one

and the peel in the trash can didn't seem to...photogenic}

As I sat and ate my breakfast my thoughts settled on Grandpa.

And I thought of all the times he would feed me and my two older sisters and younger brother on our way to school.

Oatmeal.

Malto-Meal.

Grandpa passed away two years ago.

Every one knew him a bit differently.

To four kids, he was Dad.

To Grandma he was Edward Charles, her husband of 70 + years.

To me, he was the one who called me Peanut

and gave me attention.

He gave me Oreos and black licorice, my buddy as a child.

Grandpa.

And just like any other friend and family gathering,

whether wedding or funeral, 

stories were shared at Grandpa's funeral.

and I looked down at my bowl of oatmeal.

The strawberries were quite ripe when I added them

to the mixture of fruit and almonds.  

They were almost bitter, sort of like dehydrated fruit might taste.

And I thought of some of the stories that I heard 

at Grandpa's funeral.

Nothing to horribly terrible.

Just a bit obnoxious and surprising, to say the least...

{Overly ripe, almost tart and bitter strawberries}

We all see what we want to see in certain situations.

I needed a hero.

I looked for it in Grandpa.

We all remember what we choose to remember.

And then my thought turned towards how 

God sees us.

And how He forgets when we ask His forgiveness.

In fact, there is a sea named after this.

It's called the Sea of Forgetfulness.

He even spans the horizon with 'remembering no more'

in a statement when He says he forgives

as far as the east if from the west.

Like the bitterness of the almost dehydrating strawberries

in my oatmeal,

so can all my failures, mistakes and disappointments

season my perspective of myself or those around me.

My phone is ringing!

Kids are out of VBS!

deborah