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Puppy Prayers


                Sometimes, Grace is a patient, focused puppy. This afternoon as we had our outside time, I noticed she was watching something: a pink balloon being driven back and forth along the ground by the wind. She watched as it rolled closer, then flew further away again. Her concentration was focused entirely on that balloon. I didn't matter. Her ball didn't matter. People walking or riding bikes past our site didn't matter. Barking dogs didn't matter. In a dog's simple way, she was praying that the ball would come to her and she was content to watch and wait until it did. Now, of course, this isn't the only kind of puppy prayer she prays - sometimes she dances, sometimes she refuses to budge, and sometimes she's vocal. This time, she watched. I didn't think the wind would cooperate, but it did. The balloon rolled within reach. One nose, one paw and it burst. She didn't quite know what to make of the transformation.

           This fall it seems as if I have been praying for some balloons. Sometimes they seem to be blowing in my direction, but most of the time they are out of reach, just rolling back and forth in someone else's yard. Sometimes my inner critic acts like a stubborn, mean old master, just not letting me run free to go over there and get that air-filled piece of pink plastic. I'm sure it will be more fun that playing with my little pink plastic ball that rarely goes anywhere on its own. It must be magical and I want it, but I don't think I'm as patient or focused as my puppy. Of course, sometimes when those ideas do show up, they break the moment I touch them.

         That doesn't actually happen to have been the case this afternoon, because while she was watching her balloon, two ideas showed up for me. They didn't quite appear from nowhere. I think it might have had something to do with what I was reading. One of those balloons was the answer to the prayer of "It's been too long since I wrote anything for Mission: Faithwalk, but nothing much is happening. What do I wrote about?" Answer: puppy prayers. The second had to do with the problems of both making what I was trying to say clear and building a transition to the next thing I want to say. The answer:  architecture.

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