good-year

[photo by Katie Mulder • Michigan, 2013]

She is a good-year house.

Her rooflines are irregular. They jump and and skip and drop with every addition.  She stretches and breathes into new hallways, new bedrooms, new pantries as Providence allows. A new baby is coming. The crop was good this year. The old barn came down and there’s free lumber to build the pantry, the bedroom, the back porch.

She is still through the hard times, and plans are made. Needs are obvious. Dreams are prayed out loud with shoulders touching at the dinner table and shoes piling up at the door. Next year… next year, Baby will move out of the basement and into her own room. Next season, that root cellar will be dug. In a good year. In a good year, she grows. But for now, she learns. She rests and she plans.

All in good time.

She is uncontainable in good years, laying more foundation claiming new ground. Adding onto the old. Complimenting the family, the needs, and the blessing.  In a good year, she grows. There is always room for more. The siding doesn’t match and the floor is uneven, but she is strong. There is room.

When, exactly, did you realize that you didn’t have to be built perfectly- whole- to be useful? Or even, FULL. When did you breathe that sigh of relief after understanding you are a work in progress? Maybe just now? We do not start this life ready for the parade. We start with the framing and we add as we go. As we learn. As we pray. As we live.

I am a good-year house.

I am still in the hard times and wild in plenty.

Lord, may I be a student of both… but may I be a JOYFUL house in-progress.

I am built for life, with life, as it changes and allows.