$31 Cup of Coffee

A few weeks ago we were enjoying our first every family vacation. As were strolling through the beautiful Colonial Williamsburg trail I began to hear an odd sound. “One, two, three, four…” a lady on the opposite side of the trail was counting. “…five, six…” At this time I realized she was counting our children. Finishing her count at the number seven, in a overwhelmingly shocked voice she quickly exclaimed to the gentleman beside her “They have 7 children!!”.

Having more than 2.5 children we are quite accustomed to the stares and the customary questions; “Are these all yours?”, “Are you done?”, “I could never do that!”, “Do you know what causes that?” etc. I had never had anyone count the children out loud as they passed by. In these moments many emotions flow through our minds as we try to determine if we truly are an aberration of society.

Navigating the organized chaos that is life with a large family, we do not have an organized home, unvarnished vehicles (my Lexus has a scratch down the side caused by an unprotected bicycle handle), and we are on a first name basis with the folks at poison control; I came across the following scripture:

“Where there are no oxen, the stalls are clean, but from the strength of the ox comes an abundant harvest” Proverbs 14:4 TLV

Life may be significantly easier without any children, but I have learned that life is not meant to be simple. It is meant to be cultivated and developed into a harvest.

The lady we encountered on our vacation was overwhelmed and amazed with our number of children. The fact of the matter is she didn’t truly understand the gift and value of what we have been given.

I am very thankful that we have been blessed with so many strong oxen and we are already seeing an abundant harvest in our lives.

It was a beautiful spring day, or an ugly winter day I can’t really remember. What I do remember is starting my work day, in a cube farm, thinking about how many days are left until payday. After all the previous pay day was an agonizing three days ago. Leaning back in my chair, giving my knuckles a good crack at the joints I was now ready to have the best work day in the history of work days.

This is when things started to go south. I quickly realized I had not had a cup of coffee today! I sprang in to action, tracking down a coworker who was up to the challenge of the 1/8th of a mile trek to the designer coffee shop down the street. On our way to our destination the thought occurred to me, that I need to check my bank account to ensure I had the funds to acquire the overpriced designer drink at the end of the corridor. A sigh of relief washed over me as I confirmed there was indeed enough for this drink. $4.50 in the account and I only need $4.00, tis a glorious day! Mission accomplished we were back at our desks enjoying our coffee.  A few hours later, I had an inexplicable urge to check the balance on my bank account. Oops!! I had spent $1 on a snack the day before. This transaction had been permanently erased from my memory. My bank allowed both transactions through and graciously applied a $27 convince fee for the coffee transaction.  Wow $31 for a cup of coffee! What a bargain!

After repeating this process a number of times, I finally learned. There really isn’t anything better than a free cup of coffee from the break room!