One strand of hair at a time!

Dear Friends

If you ever find yourself complaining about how long it takes you to get ready in the morning, because you have a certain routine related to your care of your hair, we must learn first to ben excited about each strand of your hair. Many of you remember when I lost my hair, eye brow or eye lashes due to cancer treatment years ago. I am going through that experience again, not for me, but with my baby brother's wife. This reminded me of how I had forgotten about "being grateful for my hair".

I was so blessed to be able to hang out in Japan for a few weeks related to work. This is always a blessing because it affords me an opportunity to be close by my family. My brother's wife has lost almost all of her hair after her second chemotherapy treatment but she was totally prepared for it, since her wig which was ordered specifically to fit her was ready just in time.

Uncertainties related to life is not anything new in the history. However, these uncertainties pose quite significant challenges to most of us. Mentally, it is difficult to accept that you cannot plan your life. It is also uncomfortable emotionally to agree that you may not know how you feel about anything tomorrow, because the surrounding circumstances may take on completely new appearance tomorrow.

Cancer is one disease that would expose you to the most uncomfortable and uncertain experiences, both emotionally and physically.

I count my blessing for the fact that I rely not on my own certainties but on the permanent certainties that are offered to us. If you are one of the precious ones who knows that Christ is the same yesterday, and today and forever, you would know what I mean.

I am grateful for so many things that I have been able to experience both here, aboard, at home, or any new places that I don't know yet. I am very very happy to know that I am an instrument to serve others. In doing so, I would have to ensure that I don't forget the happiness and gratitude that I held dear when I had no hair on my head. When you have nothing, you re grateful for what you lost. I will give thanks to a small strand of my hair today , and for how complete we are made. We truly are blessed today with how we are taken care of. If you have not thought of how much you have to be thankful for, start it by thanking your creator for small things, such as,,,,a simple thing you may see that puts a smile on your face, a beauty of your flower bed, or even your hair, ,,,,,,,,one strand of hair at a time.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

One Glorious Hallelujah at a time.

 No words are sufficient to describe the work of Handel and Messiah that he wrote in such a short time. Messiah was composed in 1741...yes, it is a bit ago. The first performance was apparently in Dublin and later in London.  In 2020, the year of Pandemic, we still enjoy Handel and his work. Christmas season is especially precious in terms of music that we add to our festivities welcoming the birth of Christ.  Our family, all of us, definitely enjoy Music in all shapes and sounds. We have been so blessed to have a pianist who can play things his parents can't play. We are also blessed to have a high quality Grand Piano, our miracle Steinway.  Someone requested Erik if he could play this piece for a service and he worked on it for weeks to prepare. On the 20th of Dec, 2020, he performed it as a postlude after a Christmas Service. I enjoyed listening to it during the Service so I did not record it. I asked him if he would let me record it at home later in the evening. ...
Read more

Birthday

Image
It is December 9th, 2009 in Japan already. My mother was born, Dec 9th, 1933. I am very grateful for all her effort and sacrifices she made to raise my brother and I. It is a very special time to reflect and remember how precious it is that she was born and how fortunate I am that I was born as her daughter 33 years later. The 4th photo is the home where my mother was born. She is held by her mother in front of their home that my grand father designed. It is located in Jiyugaoka, Tokyo. My grandmother's portrait is the last one on the left of this paragraph. She was a model, I heard, primarily because she was so tall for her generation (but I am taller than her) and she was quite beautiful. She never sought out to become a model, of course, she was quite a revolutionary character those days so she stood out. She used to tell me that she was one of the first woman in Kyoto, Japan who began regularly wearing western clothing, or ride a bike in public, or go to college. It did not bo...
Read more

One City at a time.

Today, I spent about half and hour playing with my son. I play the flute but I am not at all an expert like my son is with his piano. But I love the music and what it does to me when my mind is tired. I have been frantically working on my course assignment for my doctorate class at the same time I have been working on all the lecture preparation that I am giving in Japan in a few weeks. Lecture is very technologically demanding these days. I have made three sets of slides, each set is like 40-50 slides. Some have video, some have several photos with music embedded in it to enhance the learning and enhance the delivery. So, I probably put too much energy into the creation of my slides/video/audio combined presentation. So I decided to take a break and had fun practicing a few pieces with Erik. Erik was able to sight read this peace so we put something together for fun. Another video is from the reformation Sunday this past week when Erik presented his offertory at Church. A mighty fortr...
Read more