Wake up and roll out of bed ...

Hug the husband,

Start the coffee,

Make the bed,

Water the garden,

Empty the dishwasher,

Take out the trash,

Scrabble together some lunch.

Morning chores ... mundane, monotonous;

the ordinary stuff of our ordinary days.

Necessary jobs using up (wasting?) our precious time.

The boring by-products of being alive on this earth.

But today ...

in the heavy, humid, morning air, 

I slowed down and paid attention to what I was doing.

And in this slowing,

in this paying attention, 

each act felt like a gift,

a precious reminder of my aliveness,

each daily chore embued with a sense of the holy.

I enjoyed the scrub of a beard on my husband's chin,

inhaled the rich smell of ground coffee,

pondered the gift of a soft bed,

stood in amazement at the abundance of our garden,

appreciated the clean dishes,

applauded our trash collectors

and praised God we had food enough for lunch.

AMEN.

Today, my morning chores were church.