A little gift

Yesterday I was sitting in the house and all of a sudden I realized it was completely silent.  Not just quiet, but silent.  No noise at all.  I stopped what I was doing and just listened to the silence.  I couldn't remember the last time I had heard silence.  It was comforting.  It was nice.  It didn't last long- the furnace went on or something- but for a few glorious moments I was basking in pure silence.  It was really peaceful.  It would have been the perfect time for a booming voice to come down from Heaven saying "STEFF, MY PLAN FOR YOU TODAY IS........" but no voice.  It was a gift though.  I live in a very loud world.  Six people in one house makes it noisy, but the six people who live in my home happen to be loud  people.  Boisterous.  We enjoy life.  We don't hold back.  I don't think anyone would describe us as quiet, shy, introverted, or reserved.  My girls are not the soft feminine dainty girls.  We are more of the tornado kind of a family.  You know when we have been around.  It is always noisy in our house. Someone is always talking and usually someone is playing piano, somebody else is singing to whatever song is playing on the ipod, and  there is music on the wii.  Quiet doesn't happen, let alone silence.  So I am still just so grateful for the gift of silence that was given to me yesterday.  It was just a passing moment in the middle of the day, and yet it focused me and centered me.  It reminded me that there can be moments of silence in the midst of chaos, and that God is always in the middle of whatever is going in our lives.  He is there, and He knows what we need.  He is in the chaos, and He is in the silence. There was a time in my life when I didn't think I was ever going to get all of my kids in school all day, and here I am in the second year of it.  Although I wouldn't want to go back to the days of infants, I do miss it now and then.  Yet, I am done with that time, and am grateful that I survived it.  4 kids 6 and under was nuts.  I loved my babies;  I loved my toddlers; I look back and have no idea how I managed to do it.  So- I guess God gave me moments of silence back then as well.  Just enough moments to get me through.  I do believe that God gives us glimpses of Heaven on earth- because we cannot physically handle the joy/love/goodness that is Heaven on earth in their entirety.  Therefore we get glimpses.  In the same way, I guess He could give us glimpses of whatever we need to keep us sane while we are here.  I use the term sane loosely.  I just have to laugh because I really enjoyed the silence, and yet it really is not something I can count on to happen on a regular basis.  The life God has given me ( and I do believe my life is a gift from God) prohibits it.  I cannot be married to the man I am married to, mother to the children I birthed, and have regular periods of silence.  I cannot be me and be silent. I am not wired that way.  Isn't that ironic.  I guess I will go ponder some more as I go help with homework as the natives are restless.... (and you know that means it is no longer quiet in my house).........