Celebrating Life...: Of flu and beauty in the world

God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God's work from beginning to end – Ecclesiastes 3:11

On Saturday 2 July 2011, at around 10 am, Duncan Reyburn and Linda Neethling declared before God that they would belong to each other forever. What a stunning wedding. Untraditionally, they walked into the church together, preceded by their parents, bridesmaids and bestmen, all jamming madly to Macy Gray’s hit Beauty in the World (listen to it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qX7ZsxD3Ik )

Dunx and Linda are the kind of people who bring beauty into the world all the time, and they inspire others to do the same.

Cam was able to watch all the beauty on his little video camera screen, which kept him fairly quiet (as did a steady supply of sour worms from Aunty Samantha’s handbag). Scott slept through most of the beauty, but one day we’ll show him pictures.

After the wedding, I got flu. I read once that you shouldn’t say ‘laid aside by illness’, but rather ‘called aside to stillness.’ So, I had some weekend thinking time, while Murray diverted the boys, and I’ve made peace with the fact that my list of half-term break to-dos remains un-ticked. Cameron kept appearing at my bedside, all grown-up and compassionate and voor-op-die-wa, saying, ‘Dalene, are you ok? Dalene, do you want some tea?’ He also thought he would help by dissolving four effervescent Supradyn tablets in a glass of water for me. Thankfully, Murray stepped in before I succumbed to toddler-induced kidney failure.

Yesterday I dragged myself and the boys to Pick ‘n Pay, more because I had run out of energy and ideas for entertaining them at home than because we needed the groceries. I stooped to one of the lower levels of parenting and gave them each a sucker, relying on the mess of cream soda, drool and sherbet to keep them happy as clams for at least twenty minutes. It worked. Scotty was transfixed. Cam only tried to climb out of the trolley once.

Scott is unbelievably cheerful, even when I’m reprimanding him in the sternest tones to stay away from something dangerous. Which is kind of worrying. But still insanely cute. He tries to climb out, up and into everything, and he hurtles around on all fours after me wherever I am in the house. Cam continues to have us in quiet hysterics with his random statements, like ‘Nebuliser machines are heavier than snackwicher machines’, which was the very first thing he said the other morning as he sat up in bed. And, ‘I had a small Rice Krispie accident’, which was his way of explaining how his breakfast ended up on the floor this morning.

So much beauty in the world.

Then God looked over all he had made, and he saw that it was very good! – Genesis 1:31