Allergies, direction

I worked only a half day at the office yesterday. I was constantly blowing my nose, coughing and sneezing, and generally disrupting the atmosphere for everyone. With COVID protocols programmed into our every interaction now, when at 10:30 I asked permission to finish out the day from home, it was quickly granted. I did feel good enough to attend the dinner at church and the service last night but that will not be happening today. I am much worse today and I do not believe I can mask the symptoms sufficiently to attend the service in person this evening. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe not. We will have to wait and see.

On my way out of the office one of the managers stopped to chat with me and remarked on the unexpected increase of allergens this year – specifically the oak trees which we are surrounded by. Normal concentrations of their particular pollen in the air this time of year are 1,250 but right now the numbers are closer to 12,500. That could account for some of the symptoms I am experiencing. Mama attributes it to my having cleaned the chicken coops last weekend. I must admit that there was a lot of wind blowing the dust around me as I shoveled up the refuse from the floors of the coop and dumped successive loads into the compost bins. Actually, I was covered in the dirt and dust. I am not sure the root cause of my current condition, the coop or the trees, but I know this too shall pass. Preventing the recurrence is a challenge when so many possible avenues of allergen overload exist. The long-term outcome is that coop cleaning may require a mask mandate. This time, self-imposed.

What may be bad for me in the form of allergens is good for the bees. Many types of the pollen that make me sneeze and have a runny nose provide food for the bees. There is not a direct relation between the two, but I try to remember that pollen is bee food and to grow strong hives and feed the brood that will be hatching very soon, a large amount of pollen is required. The month of May in our area is the month of the Spring nectar flow. That means honey production will be maximized in the next few weeks. Mama and I will be ready for it, Lord willing. When we return from vacation next week, I will put the honey supers on the hives and hope for our first harvest of honey from the hives. It is worth suffering the allergies when I think of what the pollen will do for our bees.

For many months now the Lord has been impressing on me to write, but I have neglected that directive. It turns out that I am quite practiced at ignoring that obligation because I have felt the need to do so for years, but the urgency lately is more intense than in the past. So, I have been praying that the Lord would lead me to the right topic to put down in prose. In preparation for writing, I stumbled across a course on how to write creative non-fiction. A genre that suits me perfectly. It is recounting a real-life story in a way that makes it enjoyable for the reader. No make-believe characters or lands to create and support. Just accurately recounting and somewhat enlivening a real happening in the life of a real person.

Regrettably, life is somewhat boring for the most part; long days of uninteresting routines punctuated with moments of unexpected interactions to be followed by long days of uninteresting routines. Those unexpected interactions can be good or bad, joyous, or sorrowful painful, or full of bliss. Such is the case of our human existence. That thought is what makes living for the Lord such a blessing. Even the boring routines we labor through in our daily activities are precious to Him and He makes every moment lived for Him count to His glory and our benefit. The real joy is in knowing that I matter to God. My life can be glorifying to Almighty God! What an amazing thought. What a happy circumstance!

Anyway, I believe God laid on my heart last night the story I need to tell. I will need to get some permissions and do enough research on the subject to be clear and truthful in the telling of someone else’s story, but I feel a firm sense of direction for the literary exercise before me. The direction came to me in a conversation completely unrelated to the topic of the story in question, but the directive was clear. I know that partly because I have not forgotten it. Many times, over the years, I have had brilliant thoughts that, if not written down, were lost as quickly as they had come. When those epiphanies come to me and I clearly remember them later, I know they are meant to be remembered. In other words, I sense God’s help in capturing the thought so I can act upon it.

I won’t let the cat out of the bag – so to speak – right now, but it is reassuring to be so led.