Yearly Archives: 2015

For all the movies that have shown people jackhammering, this is my first experience in real live flesh.

The impression is that you need to be burly and have muscles that are sizable.  I have neither.

But the jackhammer does the work.  I just do some lift and carry.  Which is considerable considering the consideration that the jackhammer is around 60 pounds standing naked by itself!

My hope is in to complete a cracking of concrete today that will allow us to put in new plumbing for our basement bathroom.

No mean feat, but I figure a good days work and a massage at the end of the day ought to do it!

Check back with me tomorrow – perhaps I’ll be a little bit sorer but certainly a whole lot happier if things work out!

Maybe we need to plan more for interruptions!

I imagine the coffee break was one of those planned interruptions.  Working for hours on end can be both boring and unproductive.  A good manager makes sure that time is taken off to rejuvenate.

I have this tendency to work incessantly.  Just because things need to get done.  Like a horse with blinkers (a reference to my heritage there!), I just go, go, go.

And often times I slow, slow, slow.

So yesterday, a lady in our church provided the interruption – with iced tea, some of the best cookies I’ve ever tasted and with a rhubarb crisp for later. 

I had another fellow working with me.  We both determined 30 more minutes of work would reward us with these delicacies.

And then the joy of interruption! 

Wouldn’t it be interesting if we proclaimed each time we were interrupted that joy had entered our lives!!

I loved the opportunity to eat hotdogs and hamburgers.  To sit around a table and talk to friends.  To see kids enjoying bouncy castles. 

I look back almost 40 years ago and remember a church picnic, with the same church, that took us out to a small “lake” nearby.  We ate hotdogs and hamburgers, talked to our friends in the church and joined in on some baseball and other fun activities.

Not much has changed – at least in format.  But the people are new – a new generation.

Where baseball was the big thing, now bouncy castles suffice.  Where conversation was around an outdoor picnic table, now we sit in side.  Where food preparation was the “picnic lunch” provided by each individual family and shared with all, now the church cooks the meat, provides drinks and dessert.

Just different ways of achieving fellowship.  May we never lose that impetus in our lives – to be with others, for their sake, for our own sake and for God’s sake!

I’m constantly amazed at our Canadian craze for productivity.

Not at the desire to do well and to put in a hard day’s labour.  That is a given for me – spurred on by my parents’ example and affirmed by my Christian beliefs.

But by our our desire to never stop in the quest for greater production.  And maybe that is where the craziness of our society pierces my soul.  As a Christian, I believe that once a week we should unburden ourselves.  At least for a few hours, if not a whole day (and I lean to the whole day idea!).

For me, this past week was centered on working physically with renovations of our house.  I came to the night before Sunday and was exhausted.

Not in a bad way – just physically tired.  I had determination to continue to the work.  But I, hopefully, am getting wiser.  I chose – intentionally – to set aside the hammers and pliers.  Instead I joined with a group of other people this morning who also had completed a workweek.  Of professional labour, manual labour, house work, consulting and much more.

I rested with God and with each other.  I worshipped God.  I ate a meal together (today was our picnic so hotdogs were on the menu – YAY!).  And this afternoon I literally fell asleep for a few hours.

I’m thankful for this day – a day of rest.  May there be many others and may you also find restful days.