Finding My Niche

I scan the pages of the writer’s blogs looking for “gray” like I’m searching for an old friend.  It’s Jr High all over again and I am looking to fit in.  All I can see are young wrinkle free faces with children running through sprinklers in abandon.  I read about problems of stolen writing time and mothering issues.  But this grandmother of five had a late season writer awakening.  How do I fit into the blog scene?  How do I offer up my years of experience all the while chronicling that which the Lord is teaching me right now and be relevant?

And then I remember Nel, a pastor’s wife whose beloved husband had already gone on to be with the Lord.  I think she had that hunger too.  She was so anxious to share her wisdom in our neighborhood Bible study years ago but we were so “in charge” and so “wise”.  I remember how we cringed each time she launched into her tirade of Biblical knowledge and experiences.  I wonder, did she go on for so long because she was afraid?  Afraid that there would be no next time?  

We should have listened more. Maybe she could have shown us how to be better wives and mothers.  And shown me how not to slip into “prodigal mode”.   And maybe, she would have eventually laid down all the right “answers” and given us a window into herself – the girl, the woman and the aged one. We might have heard not only her wisdom but the times she stumbled.  And what He had whispered in her ear and how He picked her up and walked with her and guided her.  Perhaps she would have stirred our young cocky hearts and taught us how to navigate the pot holes of living Him in this world.  Oh, we could have gleaned so very much.

I glance down at my hands on the keyboard and see my mother’s hands.  Life comes full circle.  My fingers type as thoughts spill over, filling the blank pages.  I ache to make an impact, to compel to a deeper Life and leave a legacy of Grace.  And like Nel, I hope to find a safe place where someone wants to listen.