Wherever we are

What a life I live. It's taken me so many places, I can't even begin to summarize it in a sentence, a paragraph, a blog post. However. I will say that among the greatest blessings of my all together overflowing cup, is the addition of family that came to me by virtue of God Himself, and not by obligation because of some sort of blood tie. Not that blood relatives aren't a positive, I'm not dissing that, but, I have been blessed to love so many as my own who did not have to love me that way.

This weekend I've shared meals and picked blueberries with my brother and his wife, a brother who did not grow up in the same house, or share the same last name, but a brother nonetheless. His wife, among my most cherished friends and confidants, and I wasn't able to make their wedding because of school, money, and crazy happenings that occurred just before the rings were exchanged. For the past 15 months I've condemned myself for missing the ceremony, but a few minutes ago I watched a slide show of all the pictures of that day, and it made me realize how many people attend a wedding because it's a thing to do, and then, after the wedding, those people are not there, anywhere, anymore, for any reason, ever.

As we joked with each other and my brother threw blueberries at my head *unintentionally as they fell of the bush, of course, * it occurred to me that the wedding was just the beginning of the gift I'd seen with them, just the beginning of the places we'd all go, or were going.
I remember once when David told me I'd always have a place wherever he was, and then he amended to say "wherever we are."

It's been awhile, and I blame myself for being so focused on making out of my first year of law school to enjoy the journey of certain wonders in my very overflowing and abundant life.
Even so, in the past few days, I've not felt worse about such focus, but better. I know that what I have been doing, I was supposed to, and am supposed to do, still it's true I could've gone about it a better way. I do believe fervently though, that it's only when one truly lives that one is entitled to say she has learned.
Robotic rote existence never taught anyone anything but monotony and memorization. I would rather not memorize my life, I'd prefer to live it well, and later on I'd like to be about to say that live happened all around all of us, wherever we were.

For now, it is a blessing of infinite worth to say that as it stands the Lord knows everything we need, holds everything together, carries our weight, feels our pain, and our joy, and never fails to provide His deepest, richest, and most undeserved wonders to all of us no matter where we're going, wherever we are, right then, right now, whatever, and whenever that is.

I know it's not easy sometimes to be where you are and enjoy it, but it's no less true today than it was yesterday, that He goes before us and He has been there too, so nothing happens that He doesn't know about, and He is always with us, before and behind, ready to shower and lavish us with His deepest affections and most indelible inheritance, Himself, and all that He has, which is everything. So no matter what, it is and has been, and yet will be my honor, to say that the Lord God, name above every name, is with us, on all sides, wherever we are.

Psalm 37:4
Wherever you go, there you are, and so is He,
Courtney