Twice this weekend I was awed by beauty.  Both times I was doing something I really did not want to do.  The first time was late one freezing night.  Nick had gone to bed early so I was stuck with taking the dogs out.  I really wasn’t excited about going out, but when I walked outside, I was greeted with a beautiful full moon.  The night was so bright that there were shadows under the dogs.  And it was silent!  So rarely do we have silence here.  When we lived in the mountains, I came to appreciate quiet.  I stood there listening intently to the silence and letting it fill my noisy soul.  Oh, I slept good that night.

The next time was the night that we were going to have a hard freeze.  Here in Texas, we are not prepared for 20 degree weather.  I realized, again late at night, that there were cans of paint in an outside storage building.  I dreaded going out to get them, but since I was the only one up again, I had to.  As I walked across the yard, my flashlight caught a wonderland of ice diamonds on every blade of grass.  I felt like I was walking through a field of jewels.  It took my breath away.  I had to stop, freezing toes and all, to just drink it in.

Surely there is something to learn.  You just never know when something beautiful is hiding behind a dreaded chore!