Patterns

When I was a little girl, my sister and I lived with our maternal grandparents.  Granny was an excellent seamstress and always had a project under the needle...with one waiting in the wings.  She'd often take us along on her trips to JoAnn Fabrics (a moment of silence, please) when she needed material and notions. My favorite times at JoAnn's were the trips Granny made to look for a new pattern.  That meant she would spend time looking through the pattern catalogs and we would have time to wander through the fabric displays.

All the colors you could ever imagine...silk to corduroy to lace.  Without fail, we would spend the majority of our waiting time at the calico display. It ran a good length down one of the store's walls and was organized by color family.  One pattern after another...it mesmerized me. We'd walk the length of that display, running our hands along the bolts of calico.  "I wish for a dress made from this one....and this one...and this one."  There is no way that I could have worn all the dresses I wished for had those wishes ever been granted. 

Patterns. We are surrounded by them.  For Granny's sewing projects, the patterns she used provided her with directions as to the construction of her project. Those bolts of calico...their patterns provided my eight year old imagination with a springboard for daydreams and beauty for my soul to appreciate.  All throughout the animal kingdom, patterns provide camouflage.  That camouflage offers a degree of protection.  Turning that around, hunters and observers will use camouflage to gain advantage over their chosen quarry. In poetry, patterns set a rhythm for the writer's verses.  In math and science, patterns are used to predict data.  Did I mention that patterns are everywhere?

Some are everlasting....cat will always rhyme with bat...a zebra's stripes will always be iconic...adding two and three will always give you five (I don't care WHAT "new" math might try to say).  Others are given to change; weather patterns, for example.  Since moving back to this neck of the southern woods, there have been as many as five hurricanes that have come to town. Only one pulled up as a full on hurricane...that would be Helene in 2024...the rest showed up as strong tropical storms.  During our initial period of living here, there was ONE who winked at Savannah and was big enough that the outer bands would have reached us ninety miles to the west.  The track of that storm shifted, Savannah was spared and we didn't get the first drop of rain.  

Across the span of our human lives, patterns shape us.  There was a pretty chaotic pattern during a portion of my childhood. I was caught up in the consequences of the decisions made by the adults around me. Do NOT read that as me throwing shade. I am simply stating the truth.  Thankfully, better decisions were made and healthier patterns became the norm.  New patterns develop but sometimes carry the watermarks or scars of the old.  My shampoo and conditioner MUST match. I sent the youngest Boyo off to his freshman year of college with mismatched hair products and I nearly came unglued. Big Lots let me down! The loud and intrusive voice in my head was raging on about my inability to properly mother my child.  My dish soap has to be lemon. I avoid eating eggplant because it was forced upon me as a child.  Patterns create habits...or, do habits create patterns?

I want the habit...the pattern of my life to be absolutely littered with kindness, compassion, and love. I want to live up to the signatures in my yearbooks that start with "to the sweetest girl I've ever known."  We all have bad days. We all have moments where our lips start flapping before our brains fully engage.  There are stories to be told of me being selfish, mean, rude, and unkind.  I'll be honest about those moments and save someone else the trouble of telling those tales.  Hopefully, those moments are few and far between and greatly outnumbered by the days when my "Jesus light" shines brighter than all the lights of Time Square.  

This modern life of ours doesn't make it easy to hold on to this kind of pattern.  There are days where all I want to do is scream, spit nails, shoot literal daggers from my eyes.  Not that any of those actions really do anything to improve things, but acknowledging frustration sometimes relieves the pressure of it.  Choosing the low road, choosing NOT to be the bigger person are the easier options. Giving in to the "why bother" mindset takes little to no effort. Deferring to my own self serving interests is surface level functioning.  Talk about the perfect ingredients for a shallow existence.  

It is a daily choice...sometimes, the choices are minute by minute...to create a life patterned by kindness and intention. Apart from the Holy Spirit, I'm choosing me every single time.  Don't be surprised by the mention of the Holy Spirit...unless you're a first time reader and if you are, welcome! My name is Michelle...the author of  these chronicles...and I love Jesus.  There's a verse in Philippians...4:13, to be exact..."I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."  This verse reminds me that I'm not making the decisions to create this beautifully patterned life on my own.  I can't. It's not my strength that allows me to push through the hard things when all I want to do is take to the bed. It's not my strength that keeps my mouth closed when all I want to do is breathe fire.  My strength is finite, fallible, and feeble (hooray for alliteration).  But the strength drawn from knowing who Jesus is...rooting my identity in him...and trusting that his plans are always better than mine is the bedrock of a well patterned life. 

Many years ago, I saw a statement on a tee shirt that made me laugh!  "Live your life so the preacher doesn't have to lie at your funeral." HELLO!!! Looking at this thought from a different angle...let your life do the preaching.  Let the pattern of your life speak for itself.