As I sit here at the keyboard and as I was just about to click “enter” and pop to one site or another in this cyber world, I was interrupted by darkness, then rain, and now thunder . . . got me to thinking about interruptions which we sometimes mistake as a curse when they are really blessings . . .
The neighbors have dogs which do not like this noisy weather and don’t understand it much . . . so I know right now, there are adults sitting in comfy chairs in living rooms with dogs in their laps . . . the dogs shaking in fear until the human speaks in soft tones. I know they likely had other things to do, but somehow the image of a stormy day and providing comfort to a creature that only knows how to love us seems a blessing to me . . .
A friend from church has a small boy. He’s just a year old and just started to walk. It excites her to see this and also reminds her that he’s growing up so fast . . . there was a message a little while back, not so long ago, of a day when he was extra clingy. She spent a great deal of time that day just cuddling him . . . she had so much else to do that day, and yet I know what she spent her time doing blessed her . . .
There was a little girl in my life some years back . . . we were taking a walk. It was a walk with a purpose. It was hot and we didn’t have a car that day and we needed to get to the store. She stopped. I prodded her to “come along now” and turned to see that she’d stopped to poke at some weeds. I was about to tell her to leave that mess alone when she turned to me with love in her eyes and said “flowers for you Aunt Martha.” I had those treasured “flowers” in my room for a long time after they’d gone limp and then dry . . . I now carry the memory . . . and it blesses me still.
It is positively pouring out just now. I remember a time I was heading from the subway to a college I wanted to attend. I was required to be interviewed before I could be officially accepted. I didn’t listen to the forecast that day and thus as I rushed up the street just two blocks from the school and the registrar’s office, I got soaked by a sudden rain and realized I had no umbrella. I was shocked, felt stupid, and was sure the interview would go badly, but then I realized that I was beyond the point of doing anything to change my circumstance and started to laugh! The rain stopped as I headed into a public restroom and dried my hair using the hand blower. I was distracted by all that and forgot to be uneasy over my interview. I got accepted probably because the rain made me forget to be afraid I’d fail.
So, rain on! I didn’t really want to go out and run errands. They can wait. I shall curl up in my recliner with a good book. We have enough bread and milk to wait another day or two.
Life is full of unexpected blessings! Embrace them!
Posted by Martha L Shaw 
Psalm 30:5 tells us that “weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.” Oh, joy! Sure. You know, sometimes life deals us moments of spectacular and sometimes not so much. It seems to me that it’s easier to hold onto the “not so much” than it is to hold onto the joy. Why is that? It seems simple enough to understand that some of the things that make us weep, and these relate to the Psalmist’s words here, are anger, hurt, and discouragement. We may not wish to admit to our tears, and we may try to hide them, but they do come. These things certainly would make us “weep for a night.” Why, then do we tend to hold onto these negative feelings and worse yet share them so eagerly? Why, also, does joy seem to be so fleeting? Why do we tend to jealously keep it to ourselves rather than share it? 
