I wake up and swear that I won't do it.
Well, I don't literally wake up and swear. At least not since college, when I was late for brunch and couldn't find my meal card, and probably woke up in an unfamiliar dorm with a raging headache, and well then, yeah, I probably did swear as soon as I woke up. But that was a long time ago. I'd like to believe that I am now a new creation. But back to the point.
I wake up and swear I will not complain.
That I will not grumble.
Then cut to me, after morning Mass, and upon seeing my sweet friend who I have not seen in so long, I open my enormous mouth, and out it all pours.
You know, once in confession I asked the Priest if he could invent a contraption for my tongue; something to hold it still. He said he could try. I should really find him and see if he has made any progress.
Because the grumbling!
It comes all too easy.
Have you heard, we had horrible poison ivy?
And did you know, my kids nearly drove me to drive off of a cliff this summer?
And how about the mice and mites in my home?
Did I tell you about the dental visit with my kids and how much money their teeth are costing me?
How about the story about how I need a job?
Or the dead mouse under my stove?
Or the fact that I need to start dancing topless on tables just to afford drivers ed? (who am I kidding...I would never dance topless...I had four kids and nursed them all until they were 14...no one is paying for THAT!)
But honestly.
Why?
Why is it so easy to grumble.
To complain.
My daughter asked me while I was in mid conversation, "Why do you keep talking about the poison ivy?"
Why DO I keep talking???
I was struck by today's reading...
"How long will this wicked assembly grumble against me?" Numbers 13
I am that wicked assembly.
Even more eye opening to me was Monday's reading, when the children of Israel are lamenting about how good they used to have it! How the food was better! And now they are famished! And they say "we see nothing before us but this manna."
They forgot.
They already forgot how they were saved.
They already forgot the miracles.
When I grumble, and when I lament over my life, I, too forget.
I forget how I have been saved. Repeatedly so.
I forget where I have been.
I forget the miracles.
I see nothing before me...
I see no blessing
I see no gifts
I see no light
I see no Jesus
When I focus on what is wrong
what is hard
what is uncomfortable
what is unfair
what just flat out stinks
my heart hardens
I listen to all the wrong voices
I choose to walk according to my own will
And that walk is a walk through the wide open gate
that leads to darkness.
That poor friend of mine at church this morning.
Did I even ask how she was doing?
I think I did.
I might have.
I cannot remember.
Want to be my friend?
I sound awesome, right?
Good grief.
Jesus, my counselor...
help me.
Help me to stop grumbling.
Help me to search for you everywhere.
Help me to see you and hear you and take you with me everywhere I go.
Help me to always be grateful.
Help me to always remember the miracles.
And please Lord, silence my annoying tongue that gets a kick out of talking about me, and then me again, and then more and more of me...
I want to see nothing before me...but you.
I want others to not see me before them...but to see you.
Just shut me up, really, Lord.
Please, just shut me up.
Amen.
