Oh the daze of my life

When I was young, my mother was a fan of a soap opera called “The days of our lives.” I remember the title but I would never see anything like it. However, my mother enjoyed it and what is there to complain about.

As I thought about it, I felt that I must remember the days of my life. But, instead of “days”, I need to put the word “daze”, which more clearly represents my life.

Sometimes I wish I was 16 again because I was the smartest person in the world. He knew everything; all you had to do was ask me. Of course, at that time no one asked me anything.

When I grew up, I realized that there were many things that I did not know. As one of the FBI directors put it: “I don’t know what I don’t know.” I relate to that statement. How would my life change if I knew what I didn’t know?

Looking back, I must confess that my life has been primarily a daze. At the time, I didn’t realize it. It wasn’t until recently that I realized how stunned my life was.

As a veteran husband, I have come to know how dazed I have been living. I don’t mind what I don’t know. As far as I remember, it has never been a problem for me. So of course my memory is in a daze.

It occurred to me last week. The kind lady of the parsonage asked me a question when I walked through the door from one day in the office.

“Have you seen how much my pineapple has grown?”

I didn’t know where to start with this one. I just mumbled something like “that’s really amazing isn’t it?”

When I said that, she looked at me with one of “her looks”.

I’m quite familiar with that look so I knew I was in trouble, but I didn’t know what trouble I was in or why.

I just gave her a smile and tried to walk past her, but none of it happened that way.

“You didn’t know,” she said with both hands on her hips, “that I planted a pineapple tree in our front garden. Did you?”

Well, she got me there. You couldn’t tell a pineapple tree from a tomato plant when it comes to that. That’s how stunned I am.

With that information, he took me outside to where the pineapple tree was and showed it to me.

“Look,” he said, pointing to the pineapple tree, “there is the pineapple tree.”

Now my daze is getting more cloudy.

I need to understand what to do when my wife catches me in such a stunned position. How the hell do I get out of such a situation?

“That’s a pineapple tree,” I said with as much glee in my voice as I could. “It’s an amazing tree. You’ve done a great job with that tree. You must be excited.”

I stopped to catch my breath because I didn’t know where to go from there. He had no idea what he was saying and he had no idea if she understood what he was saying.

I paused, looked in his direction, and got my answer.

She said, “That’s my favorite plant I’ve ever planted. It looks so wonderful. I can’t wait to see it grow even more.”

With that, he smiled one of those smiles that told me he was out of trouble, at least for this moment.

Then we went back to the house and we were both happy, but for different reasons.

I’m not sure how long he had planted that pineapple tree in our front yard, and was afraid to ask why it could have been weeks or months. I wasn’t going to spoil a moment by expressing the level of my daze.

Later, while having coffee in my chair, I began to think about something very serious. What other areas of my life are a daze?

I could ask my wife, but then I would learn more about my grogginess than I needed to know at the time. One stun at a time is enough to handle it. I’m really not ready to find out how much I don’t know at this point in my life. It can be too overwhelming.

However, I could start paying attention to my life every day. That’s a challenging task, but maybe it’s something you need to do. Every day I should ask my question: “What do I not know today?”

Maybe you shouldn’t do it every day; maybe I should do it once a week. Or thinking more along those lines, maybe you should do it once a month.

If I could learn once a month what I don’t know, I think my life would improve in a positive direction.

In my evening Bible reading, I read what David said. “Lord, make known to me my end, and the measure of my days, what it is; so that I may know how fragile I am” (Psalm 39: 4).

If I know myself from God’s perspective, it will be a step to receive from God what he wants me to have.

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