In the last few years, my life has really slowed down. I am no longer able to teach piano and voice lessons because I cannot read the students’ music well enough, especially when it comes to sightreading aria and concerto accompaniments. This means fewer teachers’ meetings, and no more competitions to prepare for, sweat over, and pray about--I had the usual bunch of cardiac kids who waited till the last minute to pull it off.
My jog has also become a walk, at times with a big sturdy walking stick to steady myself when I stumble over something I did not see. Even something as harmless as a pine cone has taken me unawares at times, rolling beneath my feet.
It isn’t true that your other senses become better when one fails. Your hearing doesn’t improve, nor do your taste buds suddenly wake up. But you do learn to use them more, and that makes them seem like they have improved. So I am suddenly paying more attention to the birds on our property when I am outside.
Though I cannot always see them, I have learned many of their calls, and can now identify quail, doves, owls, whippoorwills, hawks, blue jays, crows, titmice, wrens, woodpeckers, and hummingbirds—and I don’t mean the pecking and humming of the last two, but their actual vocal sounds. And now that I recognize all of those, the ones I have not yet identified are more distinct when I hear them. There is one out there that sounds like a bad flutist.
My son thinks it is pretty amazing when I say things like, “There’s a wren in the live oak outside your old bedroom window.” But would I know where it was if I could not hear it? What is the most amazing thing of all is that my Heavenly Father knows where each and every bird is whether it sings or not. And that means He knows where I am, both physically and spiritually. He knows, not just because He is able to know, but because He cares to know. And that is the greatest security a child of God can have. “Yes for me, for me He careth.”
Are not five sparrows sold for two pence? And not one of them is forgotten in the sight of God But the very hairs of your head are numbered. Fear not. You are of more value than many sparrows. Luke 12:6,7
Dene Ward
My jog has also become a walk, at times with a big sturdy walking stick to steady myself when I stumble over something I did not see. Even something as harmless as a pine cone has taken me unawares at times, rolling beneath my feet.
It isn’t true that your other senses become better when one fails. Your hearing doesn’t improve, nor do your taste buds suddenly wake up. But you do learn to use them more, and that makes them seem like they have improved. So I am suddenly paying more attention to the birds on our property when I am outside.
Though I cannot always see them, I have learned many of their calls, and can now identify quail, doves, owls, whippoorwills, hawks, blue jays, crows, titmice, wrens, woodpeckers, and hummingbirds—and I don’t mean the pecking and humming of the last two, but their actual vocal sounds. And now that I recognize all of those, the ones I have not yet identified are more distinct when I hear them. There is one out there that sounds like a bad flutist.
My son thinks it is pretty amazing when I say things like, “There’s a wren in the live oak outside your old bedroom window.” But would I know where it was if I could not hear it? What is the most amazing thing of all is that my Heavenly Father knows where each and every bird is whether it sings or not. And that means He knows where I am, both physically and spiritually. He knows, not just because He is able to know, but because He cares to know. And that is the greatest security a child of God can have. “Yes for me, for me He careth.”
Are not five sparrows sold for two pence? And not one of them is forgotten in the sight of God But the very hairs of your head are numbered. Fear not. You are of more value than many sparrows. Luke 12:6,7
Dene Ward
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