A year ? . . .?? . . . really?

I am kind of in shock that it is April again already.  Tax Day is next week.  I know I don't feel like it has been a year since I made my big heavenly deposit when my Dad passed away.  Some days it seems he has been gone for a long time, other days I almost start dialing the phone to ask him a question or tell him something funny.  I still feel my heart is pretty raw.  The wound is still very sore.  The missing is still very close to the surface and it doesn't take much to bring it on.  I think my empathy and understanding of life and people and the struggles, choices, wrongs, and rights of life have gone up in this year though.  I have learned that stress and grief and lack of sleep can really put you through the ringer.  Sometimes being an ostrich has a very big appeal.  Either sticking your head in the sand and pretending everything is fine, or taking off in a fast run to  . . . somewhere.  But also that sticking with it and keeping going is good too.  I still find myself wondering what the next shoe will be that drops in my lap will be though.  I saw a great sign the other day though that felt so true.  It read "Due to recent cutbacks - the light at the end of the tunnel has been shut off!"  As I have felt this way many times this last year  - or wondered if the light was the next train barreling towards me -  I thought this was a great sign.  But all at the same time this last year has had good things too.  I know we built a house - lots of fun but also lots of work.  Met lots of new people.  Moved to a great community.  Are almost through 4th grade!  I still can't quite believe that!  I think that this last year has made me think more too.  Taken serious thinking to a deeper level.  A friend and I were talking about life and choices the other day and it really was interesting a point she brought up.  Like we are all wheels with spokes going out and touching the lives of others.  If something happens in our lives it affects those spokes, those relationships and all those lives.  My choices matter.  It is like the ripples of water on a calm pond.  They keep going out.  Affecting other water.  Other lives.  So what choices am I going to make? I can affect others in a way that brings them closer to healing, closer to Christ.  I can bring friendship and caring.  I can bring love.  I can bring questions and concern for others.  Those are the ripples that I want to give off.  For those I meet to know that I genuinely care about who they are.  Simply because God had crossed our paths so that I could be a blessing to them.  It goes back to my favorite verse.  Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, Plans to Prosper you and not to harm you.  Plans to give you a future and a HOPE!" God has a plan in mind.  I can't see it.  I can't see the end of the road. I have questioned the plan.  But I have clung to the HOPE!  Even when I was thinking that maybe my plans would be better, I could not let go of that Hope!  Even when it felt there was more harm coming the Hope is too strong.  The hope is sustaining.  That eternal Hope that now my Dad is enjoying!  The hope he shared with so many.  The ripples on the spokes of so many lives.