When Carson was only a few days old, my sister-in-law Tara came over and made a plaster mold of his hand. It was so incredible! We forget how TEENY those little newborn hands are! The palm was like the size of a quarter. We loved it and put it up on our entertainment center. A few weeks ago, I was hanging up some pictures, and I bumped the mold with my elbow, it fell, and broke into many pieces. I was crushed. I cried hard. I was so angry with myself! Why couldn’t I have knocked down just another picture frame? This was something that was precious to me, and can never be replaced. It was a real souveneir of a time in Carson’s life that will never return. Truly, I was just sick about it. After the initial disappointment (and the bummer of telling Tara!) I started thinking more about this piece of plaster. I comforted myself by pointing out (yes, to myself–we have long discussions) that this was just a possession. Carson, my living, breathing son, was unscathed! His actual hand was perfectly healthy and chubby, and, well, currently getting into all kinds of things he’s not supposed to be near. This got me thinking even more about our stuff, and the word possesssions. For some reason, that word itself implicates (at least to me) a kind of “secular” vibe. As in, store up my treasures in heaven, and anything purchased with money here on earth is refusing to comply to that order. But I don’t necessarily think it is wrong for us to be attached to certain things that we own, as long as we never forget Who has provided everything we need. Right next to the mold of Carson’s hand is a wood carving that I got in Africa–also pretty irreplaceable. What about the scrapbooks that I have spent hundreds of hours and dollars putting together to capture memories? (I won’t lie–I’ve had dreams in which our house is on fire and I tell Trent to get the baby so I can save the scrapbooks.) And ALL of this train of thought led me to think about some of the victims of the hurricanes and tsunami, who LITERALLY lost all of their possessions. I’m sure that in the aftermath, there were some possessions that they missed more than others, but for those who lost loved ones, don’t we all know that they would gladly trade every thing they had ever owned for that life back. I know we would feel the same way. There’s really no point to this rambling, other than a moment of gratitude for ALL that God has blessed me with. Above all, the people in my life, and their health. But also, I am very blessed to have things like a roof over my head, food on my table, books on my shelf, a little extra money to scrapbook, and a new replacement molding of Carson’s 17 month old hand. (That’s this one.)