last year

Can you believe we're already over two weeks into 2012?!!
Time doesn't just fly by, it zips.

I'll be 30 next year.
Next year on my birthday, we'll sit around and reminisce about how thirty years ago Moma went into labor with me, how it was a full moon out, how on the way to the hospital they had to stop at a red light and a car full of teenage boys pulled up beside them and one of the boys mooned Moma but she didn't even care because she was about to pop me out. How she got to the hospital and the doctor asked how long she had been having contractions and when she said for 20 minutes the doctor shrugged and said, We've still got awhile to wait then. You're just getting started. How Moma said, I'm having this baby now. How they said, Whatever. No you're not. How Moma plunked down on the bed and said, You wanna bet? and started pushing. How the nurses and doctor started yelling at her that she couldn't have the baby right there. How Moma didn't listen to them.
And finally, I made my entrance after 45 minutes of labor. I was in a hurry. I've been impatient ever since.
We'll reminisce about all that and say, Can you believe that was thirty years ago???

This is what I looked like back then...

You have my permission to be scared, or startled, or whatever tremulous emotion that picture evoked in you.
I feel the same way when I look at it.
I was a freaky looking baby.
Moma says I had a great personality though. I think she meant that to be comforting.

But I've really improved alot over the years...

... and I still have a great personality.

I have no idea where that story came from because it doesn't have anything to do with what I'm writing.
But at least now you know the fantastic story of my birth and your life is therefore more meaningful.

Time zipping by. 2011, 2012. Old year, new year.
That's where I was going with this.
At the new year, most of us look back on the old year and decide, It was a good year.
Or maybe, It was a bad year.
This year I looked back and, It was a good year.
I was going to recap the whole year for you, kinda put 2011 in a nutshell.
You know, something like how I discovered Craftgawker last year, fell in love with hot glue, became a honest to goodness coffee drinker, tried waxing my own eyebrows, and then went for three weeks without half my left eyebrow.

But I'm going to get down to the bones of last year instead. The most important part.

In 2011, I started to peel back God's onion layers.

Layer one:  The absolute perfect beauty of seeing God come to my defense. Like 2 Samuel 22 had just come to life.
When people, or circumstances, or sickness, or work became too much throughout the year, I could turn to Him and ask, Please? Will You take care?
And the earth shook as the heavens thundered and He came rushing for me.
And at first I stood there with my mouth hanging open, like an idiot, amazed by God's mighty arm. But then I had to drop to the ground and stick my hands over my head because His wonder was too much for me.
And after awhile, He came over, dusted me off, and asked, Little one? Are you okay now?
And I was like, Dude... but I couldn't say much more than that because I was crying too hard over Someone like Him defending someone like squrimy, wormy, undeserving me.

Layer two:  Trust is a thick layer to get thru. Sometimes I think maybe I'm not all the way thru that layer, I still have a ways to go. But I did learn some trust in God.
Learned to keep my mouth shut, that He'd defend and do the talking.
Learned that it doesn't do any good to fret over my family, He has them in the palm of His hand just like He has me.
Learned not to bite my fingernails over a job/money. Speaking of which, cool story about that.
I don't know about you, but I'm a worrier when it comes to work and paying bills and stuff like that. I worried when I was unemployed. And then I worried when I was employed again. I worried all in between too. It's what I do.
But one day I went to work and met another landscaper who happened to be working at the same location I was. He asked me if I was looking for more work about ten minutes after we met. I said sure. He introduced me to one of his clients who needed someone like me. That client just recently asked me be his full-time gardener starting this March. I'll get to charge my own rate, which isn't cheap. And work my own hours.
Let me say that again (because I like the sound of it): My own non-cheap rate, my hours, full time.
God was like, I don't know why you always worry so much. I had this planned.
If I hadn't been unemployed, I wouldn't have started working with the landscaping crew who needed me last year, and therefore wouldn't have met that other random landscaper who introduced me to his completely awesome client, and I wouldn't be telling you about how God landed me the coolest job ever... that pays well.
It was the stuff like that that helped me realize, He's got it.

Layer three:  I found out that God's sweet. I never once in my life thought of Him as sweet. More like stern, unsmiling, fierce, and sacrificial.
But now I know how smiley He is.
That He likes to hold hands.
That He thinks it's the coolest thing to give me presents and always waits for my delight.
He's sweet, sweet, sweet to me.

Layer four: Not just the sweet love of God, but to love Him back.
I wrote about that right here.
It changed everything for me and Him. It took me to His presence. Which is what it's all about.
I found out that to love God is to know, to experience, the sweetest thing in the history of everything.
And Him loving me first is even sweeter.
I set my heart to love Him, and in so doing, my feet stood on solid ground.
And He smiled smile wrinkles at me.

That's only four layers. There were more, but those were my favorites. The most miraculous.
This isn't one of those, Hey, check it out! I'm wearing two shoes and they're both called Goody! kinda posts.
It's just the way it was and I hope I never take it for granted.
I hope I never forget what God did for me last year.

He hath made every thing beautiful in his time.