My Heart Popped Happy

I don't have much time this morning, but it is February all of the sudden and I feel like I should update you dear readers before I lose you altogether.

I have been going on so many adventures these last few weeks and I'd so rather live in the moment than take the time to document every little thing.. except by way of pictures every now and then. There's a facebook album for those, though. 

From Scotland Highland festivals, to nature hikes in the woods. From foot races along the beach to jumping in a river with manatees... I couldn't call myself anything other than blessed beyond words.
Perhaps I find it difficult to write about because there aren't many words to describe it, and I'd rather not blog on and on about the great weather since my sweet friend humans back home are wrapped in blankets of snow and cold. 

My sister, Grace, and I took on the task of helping my aunt re-paint one of the bathrooms. I don't mind painting, but I hate doing trim work.. because it's boring. Using a little brush to do slow and tedious careful brushings so you don't paint the wrong thing. However, Grace had The Magician's Nephew on an audio book and we listened to it while we worked at it was most pleasant. It's been years since I last read through all of The Chronicles of Narnia and it was so great to be reminded of the beauty within the story.

There's a part where Aslan is singing Narnia into existence and an English cabby has accidentally happened into watching it and he says, "I would have been a better man all of my life if I'd have known such beauty existed." I loved that line. Because there are a lot of times in my life where I'm so chill with The Lord and hardly pursue Him, and then one day I'll sit down with Him and read His word and let The Spirit touch my heart and I think, "I'd have done this a lot more often and way sooner than now if I'd have remembered how wonderful this feeling is."

I wonder about that some. In the moment, I always think that it's a feeling I could never forget. Because the joy is so beyond all comprehension, you'd think you'd always dwell on that in your memories. But I forget. I don't know how I manage to forget so quickly, but I do. But it makes the moment I remember so glorious all over again. But I really wish I'd remember. 

But, yesterday, a beautiful thing happened. We took a boat ride to an island and the first thing we saw was a sign that told about all the different things we could see. Manatee was on the list and oh how I've WANTED to meet a manatee or see a glimpse of one in real life. I was so determined. I prayed for it and we hunted all over the island to try and find the water coast where people said they could be seen. We bush-whacked and hiked and saw the most beautiful nature. After an hour we stopped to rest and picnic after we'd found the coast we wanted but no manatee seemed to be present. We were just planning that we'd give up the search and hammock somewhere when a young man walked slowly up to where we had settled ourselves. He was volunteering with the people who remove invasive species, so perhaps he was intended to go pull weeds behind us, but my aunt was quick to engage him in conversation and asked about what he does and such. It took no effort for her to turn the conversation spiritual as all she had to do was ask, "So with all this beautiful nature, do you think it's a created world or an evolved world?" And like that, the man was talking of his beliefs.


Before long he was sitting cross-legged on the ground with my aunt as she  took him through the whole Gospel message and before we stood back up again, he had prayed to accept Christ. I was only a little sad that we saw no manatee, but obviously better things happened. I just prayed I'd see one as we boated out.
We arrived on the dock to board the boat when some man was so kind to tell us we'd JUST MISSED two manatee swimming by. WHY DO PEOPLE TELL YOU THOSE THINGS WHEN THEY KNOW YOU WANT TO SEE ONE?

I think everyone probably could tell I wanted to see one.. maybe it was obvious because I'd started praying out loud for them.. but the captain was all in the know and he kept a close eye out for them as we chugged ourselves along the canal. My cousins were praying for it too, knowing how my heart was so set on it, and so when there was signs of a manatee in the water, we all got really excited. The captain turned the boat off and I caught a glimpse of the manatee's nose, just barely. The captain turned the boat around for us, but it was gone.
What a nice captain. He was probably in his late 20s, and obviously there were other passengers on our boat besides us, but I think the fact that we were 6 ladies probably worked to our advantage a little.
So it was no surprised when we were just pulling into our own canal to dock and caught a glimpse of a dolphin just down the way, he delayed docking a bit longer and chased down the dolphin and brought us just up to it and it swam under our boat. My heart was happy at that point. But my aunt was still up for hunting down a better view of manatee for me.

We first tried a small canal that had a sign about not feeding the manatee and there was a little girl and two men looking for manatee there as well. One of the men told us there was a bridge on the highway just a mile away and sometimes you could see manatee there. We thanked him and piled back in the van and prayed our last hope. We saw people with their phones out looking over the bridge, so I had a lot of hope for this time. We ran over the bridge and I couldn't believe it. About 30 manatee were just chilling. AND SOME OF THEM HAD BABIES!! My cousin and I figured that they wouldn't have made a fence so low if they didn't want people to climb over it so we jumped over the fence scurried down the the bank and met them close up. My cousin took off her shoes and crawled in with them, and then I did that too... you only live once, you know? But the manatee swam away. We were seconds away from just swimming after them, but our aunt cautioned the $1000 fine should we attempt to ride one like we planned. But my heart was bursting happy anyways! All of my prayers answered in one canal. Kinda like when you hit the print button and don't get a response so you click it a lot more times and then you get a billion copies of the one page you needed. SO MUCH MANATEE! Yay!!!

Then, on the way home, we stopped for boiled peanuts (which were on my bucket list for before i left) and the man also had my very favorite fruit ever!! I was going to buy one or two before he ever even offered me to sample it, but as I retrieved my wallet from the van, he cut one up to see if we liked it. I got two... then he brought the price down so I got four.. then he packed up the one he cut up for me and let me have it for free to eat on the way home. BE.STILL.MY.HEART. The Lord is so good to me.

There's a lot more I could say, but I'll leave you with that stories and hopefully will see many of you in person soon, and I shall tell you of my adventures then.