Proof Positive

I spent a pretty pissy weekend purely because of infantile behavior on my own part. I was missing out on something I really wanted to do but couldn't afford, and another, equally as good substitute fell through at the last moment. So, instead of looking forward to doing something different or just relaxing, I decided to be a baby and pout. Mature, huh? Yep. I can knock 55 years off my age without hardly trying.

Anyway, I moped around much of Sunday, not doing much of anything at all (I did make the bed at least), until it came time to fix supper. Got the potato dish in the oven, prepared the asparagus, and the beef, and after time enough for the potatoes to be almost cooked, went to the deck to start the grill. It was then I took one look west and realized something....I may have nearly cursed him a time or two over the lack of weekend excitement, but God had better things in mind for me, starting with that sunset.

When Eric was a little tyke, we once checked out a library book about a little girl in a perpetual bad mood. Nothing could get her out of it, and they tried it all, until one day she was jumping on her bed in a fit of anger, and started giggling. Turns out, no one can stay in a bad mood while jumping on a bed. It became my go-to for when the kid was grumpy....he was sentenced to five minutes of jumping on the bed. He always came out laughing, bad mood magically erased.

God gave adults sunsets because we're too big to jump on beds without breaking them.

Seriously, there I was, conniving ways to make the family pay for a crappy mood of my own making, determined to make the most of my self-wallowing misery, when I walked out the door, and was confronted with one of the most wonderful sights a body could ever imagine. I was mesmerized. Over the course of the next 15 or 20 minutes, the sky went from pale yellows and oranges, to deep, deep orange, to an intense pink, followed by a purple that was not to be believed, before fading off into shades of gray. As I watched the transformation, I felt the tension leaving my shoulders and back. My mood lightened to the point of euphoria. I actually started to smile. Next thing you know, I was thanking the Big Guy for the sunset, for my family, my home, my job (scary huh?), my friends, my country, my life. One little setting of the sun, and I was full of God's love instead of self-pity.

Amazing how He can kick our butts without saying a word. Thanks, Dude...I needed that.

Benjamin Franklin said that beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy, but I say a sunset is all the proof we need.