Perks!

I can't remember who gave it to me (Joelle, I think), but I wound up several years ago with a recording of Luci Swindoll telling some great stories about singleness and her relationship with God. One of the stories was about her being alone after moving out to the L.A. area, not having her familiar relationships and things around, and feeling a bit blue. She was on her way to a meeting, didn't want to go, and asked God to just make her laugh a little, for a "perk". You know, like, "Come on, God. I could just really use a little something to pick me up. Do you hear me? And I wanna know it's from you." (In Luci's version, God calls her "Toots", like, "Here ya go, Toots." Excellent!).

In Luci's true story, she got off the freeway at her exit, and there, parked on the side of the road, was a pick-up truck with two fully dressed clowns in the cab, red noses, bad teeth, crazy hair and all, saying, "Da-dah!". She says, "I mean out of nowhere and it was like God said, 'That's it, Toots, right there.'"

That tape got passed to several friends, and ever since then, we love looking for "perks", God's reminders that he loves us on even the silliest, tiniest scale of personal attention and likes to bring us moments of joy.

For some reason this morning as I was getting ready for work, not because I was blue or anything, it dawned on me that I had two perks waiting for me at the office. One arrived last week in the aforementioned box of seasonal fun from Mom and Dad. I had set up just a few of the goodies at work to make people smile and invite them to snack!


Notice how the Ghostie and Pumpkin Peeps are open to reach the perfect level of staleness? Yum! And that's my Bunny Peep pen on the left, peeking out from my pencil holder, wondering where his holiday buddies are :) And, yesterday I found some of my candy corn note paper in my desk--fun! It's left over from a perk-full bucket of goodness from Corrina last year. I found the last of it again just in time for this fall.

And Perk #2: Terrific buddies God has provided in Idaho. This morning I was just struck with the goodness of these friends, God's provision of four very different personalities who have made the intentional effort to deepen our relationships with one another. I thought about them this morning because another pal, a Chilean national friend of Danielle's, will be here Friday and we are headed out to a great Mexican restaurant. The little surge of joy at having that to look forward to this week was just such a sweet reminder of how God has continued to care for me in Idaho, it made me want to rush to work and snap their picture. So I made 'em hold still before our afternoon walk around the campus :)

Danielle, Kathie, Becky, Karin

There was no big rush of homesick to quell this morning, or any sadness to cure...just a natural moment of remembering and appreciating God's joy and fun. Thanks for laughter, God, and for all the people you put in my life who pour out your perks on me--my big, smiley smile today is just for you, Jesus :)