Strange and beautiful ice in my life

Ice is a strange substance.  It's the solid form of water, and yet it floats (most solids sink), which means it's lighter than water.  Of course, we could say that water is a strange substance, but I want to stick with ice for a moment because we have SO MUCH of it here in Minnesota right now.

It's been sleeting all day and there's a coating of ice on everything -- roads, trees, little frozen plants, the windows of my van, which is really annoying when you're in a hurry to go somewhere.  The ice is inconvenient, but pretty, in a twisted kind of way.  I say twisted because what we find beautiful is the ice encasing everything -- smothering it, you could say.

Some of the smaller cedar trees are bent in half from the weight of the ice.  I kind of laughed because that looks comical, but I also sighed internally, because that's often a picture of me going through my day.  It's a bit tragic, if you want to go to the dark side of that thought, because the weight of that pretty ice can break the tree in half, or at least break the branches off.

As I drove through the day delivering my Yellow Books (yes, DO call off your vicious attack dogs as I walk up to your front door -- and do NOT open the door and let them come charging out at me.  Thank you.), I thought of how spectacular the ice would look if the sun suddenly came charging out of the dreary clouds (kind of like those dogs).  Spectacular!  But it didn't all day.  Darn.

So I thought of how we add things that we think are good and beautiful to our lives, when all the while, it's slowly bending us in half from the weight.  Things like electronics (portable or not), new vehicles, another shiny kitchen tool (but for sure get the Pampered Chef can opener), that lovely diamond necklace you've been pining for, the latest computer accessory, and a myriad other things that we think will make our lives easier and happier.

How does it weigh us down?  It takes our time... time to play with it, to take care of it, to pay for it.  Oh sure, when we first get the shiny new thing, we are happy for a while.  And then strangely, we are dissatisfied again.

What else can we get now?  Oh yippee, the new version is out!  And only 15 months after the last version came!  How thoughtful of the manufacturers to come out with it as soon as we've gotten bored with that last version.  They're so nice to us.  Not!

What's so sad is that we all are willing participants in this mad merry-go-round.  Me included!  The advertisers know this, we know this (even if we're not willing to admit it sometimes), the "trend-makers" know this.

I know this is trending towards material things, but there are some good and beautiful activities we add to our lives that may be weighing us down as well.  If what you're doing is causing you to lose focus on the important things, like God, spouse, and children, then it can be deadly and destructive.

De-icing for me means spending more time with my kids, trying to communicate more with hubby, having a quiet time each day to think about what's important and counting my blessings.  Simple and beautiful, without all the bells and whistles.  Or ice.

What's your ice?