07.08.10 at 1:36 pm by Kara_S
On September 4, 2009, I shared the following words with my online friends …
Four years and almost 1 month to the day after I stood before God and pledged my life to my husband, I woke up to find him gone. For good. Not coming back. Ever. That happened in early July. Since then I’ve grieved, learned to deal with the pain of rejection, went to my first divorce hearing, found out how amazing and gracious God really is, and discovered I have some of the best friends in the world.
Today marks the one year anniversary of that day when my former husband walked out of my life permanently. My perspective last year at this time was one of grief and my world crumbling down around me. Tears poured from my broken heart. The tunnel was really dark and seemingly had no light at the end.
Little did I know how dramatically my life would change within a year. I
Continue reading Rejected: One Year Later
06.25.10 at 8:28 am by Kara_S
At the end of April I started training for the US Census, and for the next two months I was one of those people that knocked on doors. Lots of doors.
As I drove hundreds of miles on country back roads, I learned a few things about life in West Virginia and life in general.
One of the first things I learned was that anything not 100% necessary in my life had to go. What that meant was if it didn’t help pay the bills or put food on the table, I had to think twice about it. Juggling the census and my work with Two Lane Livin’ became a very delicate balancing act. Throw in some book reviews and things got interesting. Blogging (as you well know) didn’t happen very often.
By weeding out the unnecessary things, I learned what was important to me and what I needed in my life to be happy. Those things have been
Continue reading Reflection on My Census Journey
05.18.10 at 10:34 am by Kara_S
I love patterns and orderly things. I also love dissecting them and seeing how they work.
My BF does drywall work as a side job, and one of his specialties is texturing ceilings. He loves to put “sunbursts” around ceiling fans. I can’t quite describe a sunburst, and unfortunately I don’t have a photo of one. A sunburst is a swirly circular pattern that extends about 20-30 inches out from the center of a ceiling fan or light. (The width depends on the size of the fan or light.)
I asked him how he makes the sunbursts, and I got the verbal explanation. It didn’t quite make sense, so I stood underneath one and tried to figure out the pattern. I wanted to know where he started and how the layers of swirls were created. After staring at the ceiling for about 5 minutes, I found one tiny, almost hidden, overlap of swirls. That little overlap told me all I needed to know.
I now knew where he started
Continue reading Trying to Find a Pattern
02.11.10 at 5:04 pm by Kara_S
So we were forecasted to get a bunch of snow … ya know, 6-12 inches which for around here is a lot. All the milk and bread disappeared from store shelves. Schools closed their doors. And everyone prepared for the worst … that never came.
Only a dusting of about 3 inches of really light powdery snow filtered from the sky during the past 48 hours. Definitely beats the 2-3 ft of snow that landed in my home state of Pennsylvania!
I guess things could’ve been a lot worse, like back in December when we really did get 12 inches of snow. That blast of snow sent our county into a blackout with many not having electricity for 5 days or more.
So I’m grateful that we didn’t get another 12 inches. But either way, I learned a few things from all this snow …
Our road crews are definitely doing a better job this year with road care. I’ve
Continue reading Lessons From a Not-So-Very-Big Blizzard
01.22.10 at 2:35 pm by Kara_S
As I was contemplating possibly moving after my divorce, my heart always felt heavy, but I never quite knew why. All of the usual reasons came to mind – friends, work, etc. – but they didn’t seem to be the root of it.
Finally, earlier this week, I figured it out. I was walking to my car with a friend one evening and we stopped to gaze at the stars. Here in our tiny county in the center of the West Virginia, the eye can see thousands upon thousands of stars. My jaw drops every time I gaze at the sky. There are so many specks of light and tiny galaxies!
Our area has little to no light pollution making the night sky jet black. The closest city with street lights is 25 miles away – probably a little closer if you were a crow – but that little town only has 1 street lined with lights. The
Continue reading Seeing God Every Day
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