If I were to complain about being powerless, a lot of you would understand I don’t need a pep talk from Oprah, but one from AEP.

I’m all about pre-Christmas snows, especially the ones that don’t start until well after my evening commute. Even better are the ones that hit on a weekend, since there’s no stressing about getting to work on time while wrangling with two-hour school delays.

So when the rumblings began about the snow storm coming our way, my husband and I did the West Virginia equivalent of a seasoned Floridian who has just heard that a hurricane approacheth—nothing.

While our coastal cousins are warned of the need to board windows and batten hatches, our forecasters send us rushing to Krogers for eggs and milk.

But like many StormTeam disbelievers, we scoffed at the predictions and chose to ride out the storm without benefit of freshly stocked larders.

It was nearing midnight Friday and Geoff and I were deeply involved in a movie where the main character was facing down a squad of emergency responders while wearing nothing but his not­so-tighty not-so whiteys when our power went off.

Annoying, we thought, especially considering the phone was out, too. But it was no big deal. We’re in South Charleston, after all. Land of three-times-weekly trash pickup. Surely a place this civilized would have power and phones restored by morning.

By morning all we had was more company in our bed. Nothing promotes closeness like no heat.

And nothing promotes creativity more than desperation. Which is what happens when those accustomed to hot coffee are faced with cold turkey.

Our home has a gas fireplace, but having moved there after decades of all electric, I’d been too frightened of the dangers of gas to try it. Even on nights when I longed for the ambiance of a fire, I didn’t dare give it a shot. Still, with the power out and the house growing colder, it wasn’t the chill that sent me after the matches, but my gnawing need for caffeine.

That the house got warmer from my water-boiling apparatus was merely a pleasant side effect.

Being snowbound without power on Saturday was nice, once the fire was lit and the demon quieted by his dose of caffeine. My husband, daughter and I played board games while our meal of potatoes, carrots and meatballs cooked campfire-style in foil pouches. Later, we read and napped, then played in the snow, anticipating the power would come on any time.

When night came, we looked out on the streets below us—the well-lit streets below us. The ones with those silly Christmas lights I’d once so admired, the ones that were now senselessly wasting precious electricity we’d have given our daughter’s eyeteeth to have. (For the record, those teeth kinda need to come out anyway.)

By Sunday morning, we no longer had to look up the power company’s phone number in the Yellow Pages. It was committed to memory. And we no longer needed to listen through the recorded message to hear which buttons to press to hear the latest power restore time prediction.

By Sunday afternoon, it was no longer amusing to go into a room and catch ourselves mindlessly flipping a switch.

And by Sunday night, we were phoning friends, looking for one who had both power and space. Celeste and I bailed, staying with our friend Shannon while Geoff chose to brave the night alone in our cold, dark house.

Come Monday, I took my disheveled, frizzy-haired self in to work, where I listened jealously as coworkers told of having their power restored in mere minutes or hours, or of having stayed in a hotel.

Alas, by five o’clock, our lights were still out. Since my parents had power, I fought traffic all the way out to Red House, then lugged my stuff in and eventually got situated at their computer, preparing to work on my column.

Which is, of course, when the telephone rang.

My husband was calling to say he’d seen the light. That there was power to the people. That we were re-volted. No longer de-lighted.

So I pulled the plug. And headed for home.

A few weeks back, after I wrote about wanting to have a white elephant Christmas, a friend shared an article about a couple that deliberately hosts an annual Bad Christmas Party (bad in a fun way), where the evening’s festivities culminate in a white elephant gift exchange.

“Everybody brings something, and we pick numbers to determine the order in which gifts are chosen and opened,” the hostess was quoted as saying. She said most gifts come from second hand stores, with guests competing to outdo each other with the gift that’s judged as the absolute worst.

“Our friend George is really good at finding strange portraits,” said the hostess, who told how George once brought a gigantic glamour shot he’d found at Goodwill. The photographic portrait of a heavily made-up woman with teased hair-a total stranger to them-appeared to be nearly life-sized. At five feet tall by four feet wide.

What the rest of that article was about, I can’t say, because at that moment, inspiration struck. I was busily imagining the beautifully confused expressions such gifts might prompt if given to unsuspecting friends or family members. 

Especially if the recipient is celebrating their first holiday with the group.

The first year my brother brought Sherry, who is now his fiance, to our parent’s house for Christmas, I inadvertently had some fun at her expense. My teenage nephew, Zac, seldom turns down a dare, so for Christmas that year, I’d gone to the Clay Center’s gift shop and purchased a variety of flavored bug treats (cheddar-flavored crickets, nacho worms, scorpion lollypops). 

Zac was quick to open the disgusting treats and pop a few in his mouth. His younger sister, Madeline, tried a few, too. Both gave them “not bads,” then offered Sherry a bite. At the time, she’d only been dating Kurt a few months, so to prove herself a good sport to his kids, she reached in, got her cheesy worms, and barely flinched as she tossed down a few.

She made it a good 30 seconds before having to run to the sink.

But sometimes, the gag gift doesn’t turn out as planned. Last December, my daughter and I were out shopping when Celeste spotted a large, creepy vase. It was adorned with identical faces-which had eyes, but no pupils-repeated many times all the way around. Looking at it was disconcerting as it seemed just a tad out of focus, like an image set over the same image, but not completely lined up. So awful was it that while she was carrying it through the store, several customers stopped her to comment. It was, she decided, the ideal prank gift for her stepdad.

For weeks before Christmas, she’d retrieve the vase from its hiding place in her closet to show friends or visitors, and they’d laugh over the reaction she thought Geoff would have. She planned on acting as though she found the vase manly and attractive, perfect for his home office, and knew he’d be too considerate of her feelings not to display the terrible thing.

But the one reaction Celeste didn’t anticipate was that Geoff would go nuts over the vase. He absolutely loved the strange thing.

In fact, he loved it so much he decided it was too good for his office. So he placed it lovingly on our mantle instead. 

I’ll frequently sit at my computer, certain of the subject about which I will write, when my attention will be drawn another direction. Such was the case this evening, when I glanced away from my screen long enough to see our tough and once-feral black cat, Sully, stretched out on the floor next to a stretched out brown rabbit. 

And the rabbit was NOT Sully’s dinner. 

Sully, the epitome of independent cats, is hardly a snuggler, yet there he was, accepting the companionship-starved rabbit’s somewhat aggressive snuggles with only a modicum of disgust. 

For the first month or so after the rabbit, Winnie, came aboard Fuller’s Ark this past June, we kept her segregated from the other animals, fearing they’d harm her. Murry, our oldest dog, was first to make contact. Mere minutes after meeting, he was treating her to a thorough ear cleaning, something he’s continued to do on a regular basis.

 Dog No. 2, Chewie, greeted Winnie in the same jovial manner he treats all but vacuum cleaners, lawn mowers, and the first ankles he sees following a knock at our door. With splayed paws and wagging hind end, he invited Winnie to a game of chase, thus treating us to our first of many opportunities to see a rabbit chasing after a dog. 

Canine No. 3, Roo, reacted the same way she does with all non-meat forms of stimuli, be it thunder or dust. She hid in the closet. 

Cat No. 1, a 22-pounder named Squirt, hasn’t had much contact with the rabbit since Winnie lives on the second floor and Squirt doesn’t do stairs. (Squirt doesn’t do much of anything beyond occasionally serving as a hairy speed bump, though in that, he excels. We haven’t had a speed-related accident in our hallway for nearly two years.) 

But Cat No. 2, the aforementioned Sully, was living the life of a self-sufficient and mostly feral cat when we met five years or so back. In those days, catching moles was his specialty, and I would often see him at post next to a mole mound, one ear cocked to the ground, listening for movement. Eventually, he’d slam his paw deep into the soft ground and pull out his catch. He was wickedly accurate, and I suspect he removed more moles in those years than most dermatologists do in a lifetime. 

As wild as Sully once was, I couldn’t imagine we would ever feel comfortable allowing him anywhere near the rabbit. At first, it wasn’t difficult, as the rabbit was mostly caged. Once she mastered her litter box, though, we began leaving her loose longer and longer. Before long, her cage had become just another of many dust gathering, but mostly untouched possessions, much like the ironing board and exercise bike. And eventually, someone forgot to shut the door to my home office, which I share with both our rats and the rabbit. Next thing I knew, there was Sully, whapping at a peanut shell that Winnie had been trying to hold still long enough to chew open. He would whap one and she would chase it, then she’d drop part of the shell and he’d whap it again.

I kept a watchful eye on the odd couple, fully expecting Sully to make the transformation from mildly amused feline to blood lusting carnivore any second. But the change never took place. 

These days, it’s become normal to see cat and rabbit napping together. Sully seeks her out, deliberately pushing his way in the room, tolerating her glee as she races laps around him, excited over having a guest. Sully will check out her food and take a few licks of her water before choosing a comfortable spot, then he’ll pretend not to notice her sidling up to him, worming in closer and closer until they’re back to back. 

Prior to this, I never would’ve considered Sully a candidate to be a companion. He’s independent, aloof, self-absorbed, and there’s his atrocious singing voice and those noxious fumes he sometimes emits. Yet as I look at Sully, lying on his back on the floor, furry black belly exposed, I can’t help but smile at my baffling cat. 

And the rabbit who loves him.

“When searching for gift ideas for friends and family this holiday season,” the magazine article began, “What better way to say I care! than to craft their gift with your own two hands?”

I’m a big fan of homemade gifts, but I’ve worried that giving them doesn’t make people think I care! so much as it makes them think I’m cheap!

Last year, while enchanted with the idea of saving money by repurposing old items into something new-which I’d then give as gifts-I spent many hours transforming an old headboard into a bench for my parents. Except in the wee early hours of Christmas morning, while adding a last minute embellishment to the bench, I tripped over a box and dislocated my elbow. Thus transforming not only a headboard into a bench, but also my least expensive gift into my most costly.

But as we’re told at every turn–in spite of the crowded malls and packed restaurants–these are desperate times. Many of us, struggling with tough financial decisions, are having to make ends meet by doing such things as selling ad space on foreheads or getting Mamaw to work an extra shift doing lap dances at the Palace. For those of us this applies to (and thanks Mamaw–you’re a trooper!), it simply makes fiscal sense to pull out the felt, pipe cleaners and glue gun and give the old creative juices a stir.

Since these are the times that try men’s souls.

That separate the wheat from the chaff. 

Only the strong will survive.

And their leader just might be Martha Stewart.      

Or her bargain basement sister–yours truly.

For instance, who doesn’t have an extra bathrobe in the back of the closet or tucked away in a drawer? Well, pull that puppy out, remove the label, belt, and belt loops, and voilà! Instant Snuggie. 

Those with Photoshop skills can give friends and family members the new body they’ve long dreamt of having. 

And there’s always personalized coupons entitling the recipient to have their car washed, their children babysat, or their pets watched while they’re away on vacation. 

I wish I could get the adults in our family to do a White Elephant Christmas, where each of us would wrap and bring something chosen from in our own house, the stranger the better. On Christmas, each of the White Elephant participants would draw a number, then go in numerical order to choose their gift. 

One year, a family I know that does the White Elephant thing required the gifts given be completely useless, and claims the stipulation made the gift giving even more fun. 

Since the entire family all lived in the same small town, one relative gave a set of postcards from their town. On the back of each one she had written, “Wish you were … Um, never mind.”

Another year, a cousin with a fabulously bad singing voice recorded himself singing a dozen Christmas songs and put it on a CD. He even made a cover for his CD featuring a picture of him sipping cocoa while holding his dog. Both he and the dog were wearing matching holiday sweaters. 

I come from a wickedly imaginative family, so if I can convince them to get on board this White Elephant, not only will we all save some money this Christmas, but I imagine we’ll have a holiday we will never forget.

Last week’s column about a Thanksgiving prank involving a turkey (sneakily stuffed with a Cornish game hen to convince the chef she’d cooked a pregnant bird) prompted an email from my friend, David Miller.

“At Carbide’s Tech Center,” wrote Miller, a retiree from Carbide. “There was a long-standing prank where any newly hired Ph.D. chemists or engineers were told that the company gave away Thanksgiving turkeys. The unsuspecting marks would be instructed that, to get their free bird, all they had to do was go to the stockroom on a certain day and ask the attendant for their turkey.

“The thing was, the gentleman who manned the stockroom wasn’t the sort to be trifled with, and he’d often chew out the poor souls who came there trying to get something for nothing.”

Eventually the company, to save money, converted the stockroom to self-serve, so it seemed the silly tradition might have come to an end.

“But the pranksters were determined to continue their fun,” wrote Miller. “A group of them set up a fairly elaborate fake lottery, which was rigged to make certain their mark would win.”

When the winner was announced, the man was so thrilled about his prize that he called his wife to tell her he’d be bringing home their Thanksgiving bird. Except what he’d won wasn’t actually a turkey at all, but a frozen jug of water the pranksters had wrapped and sealed in plastic to resemble a store-bought bird.

The perpetrators were beside themselves with glee, patting each other on the back, imagining the look on their victim’s face when he went home and unwrapped his prize.

What the guys didn’t know was that their victim’s boss, John Maher (now a VP at Marshall University), had gotten wind of the prank and had gone out and bought a turkey about the same size as the jug. He wrapped his turkey with the packaging the men used on the water jug, then put it in the office freezer, where the jug of water had been. Then Maher clued the mark in about what was going on.

When it was time for the mark to collect his prize, Maher called his group together and told them how thrilled he was that one of their own had won the lottery, then he produced a camera and said he wanted to get a picture of the winner displaying his prize.

As the lottery winner began working to unwrap his prize for the picture, it was clear the pranksters were growing more and more uncomfortable over the prospect of their hoax being exposed in front of their boss.

“Just as the fellow finished unwrapping his prize and held up his Thanksgiving bird, my friend snapped the picture,” wrote Miller. “A shot of a man with a turkey, and a crowd of men with their jaws hanging open.”

Although not Thanksgiving related, Miller shared a few other Carbider practical jokes. This next was my favorite.

“Every year, when the new phonebooks arrived, a memo would be sent out instructing employees where to take their old books so they could be recycled. Except on a number of occasions, the official memo would get intercepted and the wording changed, instructing everyone to take their used phonebooks to so-and-so’s office. That poor soul who’d been selected would arrive at their office to find hundreds of phonebooks piled up.

“One year, though, the intended recipient caught on and managed to redirect the books to a senior colleague’s office. This senior colleague was well known for being a perpetrator of these events, and he took the assault in good stride, even complimenting the young engineer on her resourcefulness. The engineer was proud, thinking she’d staged the ultimate in one-upmanship. Until she went to her car that evening.

“And found it had been propped up on four large stacks of phonebooks.”

The air smells of leaf piles and wood smoke. And tastes of pumpkin pie. 

And yeast rolls and dressing and cranberry sauce.  And broken bits of candy cane. 

The still-sandy Coppertone bottle begins its annual migration toward the back of the bathroom shelf. Cut offs and flip-flops and swimsuits and diets get boxed up ’til next year. 

Coffee tables are littered with catalogs, pages dog-eared. Items circled.

The door opens and cold barges in, sending tumbleweeds of dog hair skittering down the hall, past dusty stacked boxes of Christmas decorations, ambitiously brought out even earlier than previous years. (What heightens the holiday spirit better than tripping over unopened boxes for nearly two months?) 

It’s a time of red kettles and hand bells. Construction paper chains. Nut rolls and cream cheese icing and cards from every imaginable service provider wanting to make sure they aren’t forgotten.  

And time to recall my favorite Thanksgiving prank. One I’d give anything to have thought of myself, but it comes second hand, courtesy of an anonymous friend. 

“One year at Thanksgiving,” the story goes. “Our family was invited to dinner at my sister’s house, where she planned to prepare her first-ever holiday feast. “My sister Patricia is sweet, blonde, and innocent, and totally inexperienced in the kitchen-all qualities that made her an irresistible target for our mother, who prided herself in being a top-notch practical joker. 

“Mom waited until shortly after the turkey went in the oven, then told my sister she needed something from the store.” Since they were unfamiliar with the area, they convinced Patricia to run to the store to get the item for them, while they kept an eye on the bird. “As soon as my sister left, Mom took the turkey out of the oven, removed the stuffing, then shoved one of those small Cornish game hens deep into the turkey, then she restuffed the turkey and put it back in the oven. 

“Patricia came back with whatever it was Mom had asked her to get, and we continued preparing for dinner. When it was time to eat, my sister pulled the beautifully browned turkey out of the oven and proceeded to remove the stuffing. When her serving spoon hit something hard, she looked puzzled. She grabbed a pair of tongs and used them to reach inside and grab hold of the object. Once she got a good grip on the thing, she yanked. Out came the little bird. 

“That’s when my mother, with a look of total horror, exclaimed, ‘My God, Patricia! That turkey was pregnant!’ 

“My sister, of course, shrieked–and then started to cry. It took our family nearly an hour to convince her that turkeys lay eggs.” 

Making me think how funny it would be if, this next Thanksgiving, they sneaked out the stuffing and refilled the bird with hard-boiled eggs. 

Amy is asking for patience to deal with stupid people and courage to tolerate their ignorance, “Because Lord knows if I ask for strength, I will beat them to death.”

Madeline is making a cow laugh to see if milk will come out of its nose.

Candace is wondering if it really is possible to laugh one’s ass off. 

And Karin is intimidated by the need to come up with something clever.

Karin is not, however, a fan of Mafia Wars, collecting sea creatures, snowball fights that involve no actual snow, or married folk inadvertently reconnecting and rekindling with an old flame. Still, in spite of the many pitfalls and annoyances of Facebook, Karin is still a big fan.

Although she’s tired of speaking of herself in third person.

During a recent meeting, a coworker complained that Facebook was ruining friendships; that all this online back-and-forth was taking the place of face-to-face (or phone-to-ear) contact. Since I’d only been a sporadic user of the site, I didn’t speak up in Facebook’s defense. It wasn’t until this past week that I recognized what Facebook can provide-the sense of community that I’m sometimes missing. 

Growing up, I’d say we knew about 90 percent of the families who lived on our street. We knew whose yards we could cut through, who would buy Girl Scout cookies, and who put the strangest stuff on the curb come trash day. 

The familiarity was more than comforting. It provided a sense of safety, of being cared about. Of belonging. 

Social networking sites, like Facebook, can make it possible to experience that sense of community again.

Last week, I was sitting at my computer, honing my mastery of procrastination skills by flitting around the Internet, half-heartedly looking for column ideas. I wanted something fun to write about, as I’ve been stuck in a serious rut far too often of late. I decided to pop over to Facebook and ask for suggestions. 

Within minutes, friends had supplied me with a long list of ideas. The comments generated some back and forth chatting among those posting, some of whom hadn’t met before then, but they had a common denominator-like living in the same neighborhood once provided-that opened the door to them conversing. 

It gave me a nice feeling. Not quite the warm fuzzies, since no cutesy pictures of kittens were involved, but more that comfortable sense of belonging that comes after a talk over the fence with a neighbor or when the kid from up the street stops by just to chat. 

When I first signed up with Facebook, I wasn’t all that enthusiastic. It was more to see what the fuss was about. It wasn’t long before I understood.

It was exciting to be “friended” by my favorite Camp Carlisle buddy, Martha McKenney Elliott, now a Texan; to play catch-up with my ages ago Movies 3 coworker, Todd Hensley; to hear from my long lost friend, Jona Bayless Pritt, who I’d known in grade school, then worked with one summer at Dairy Queen.

Facebook has given me a chance to know some of my former Nitro High classmates much better now than I did then, as well to see the lighter (and far more sarcastic) side of some coworkers. 

It wasn’t long, though, before the novelty began to wear off. I found myself visiting less often, and almost never posting a status update. 

Most people, when faced with an entire blank page to fill, might suffer writer’s block, but that never deterred me. It’s Facebook’s small box for status updates that makes my mind blank. 

I wondered if perhaps I was intimidated by the idea of sharing information about myself since I’m such a shy and private person, which I really am-except for that column business where, y’know, I occasionally hang dirty laundry. But I think it’s more that I’m intimidated by my desire to be briefly clever, to come up with witty one-liners or profound thoughts that will make those who read it think highly of me.

Now that I’ve experienced the sense of community that Facebook can offer, I’m determined to be a more active participant, responding to others, sharing more of myself.

Regardless of whether Karin is feeling clever or not. 

I recently wrote about a series of struggles that had me coming unglued. A recently paid-off car that needed a new engine. A surgical procedure that required the $900 co-pay up front. Both a dog and a furnace in need of repairs. A disgusting plumbing problem.

And a gross of squirrels in our pear tree.

Instead of complaining about the situation, I began an earnest effort to follow the simple advice of missionary Elisabeth Elliot and “Do the next thing.” I wasn’t going to allow myself to look at all that had gone wrong or the many small and large things I sensed were lining up, planning to jump out at me next.

But it seemed for every step forward, I’d get shoved two steps back. And then came a well-timed e-mail from a reader.

“I had a similar experience back in 2007,” wrote Jennifer Goddard. “Within a four-week span, I received the news my corporate job was eliminated, my mother was diagnosed with Stage 4 cervical cancer, and my sister-in-law was hospitalized with potentially deadly complications after a routine surgery. I couldn’t believe the mess my life had become. In despair, I foolishly asked the universe ‘What next?’ with no regard for karma’s sense of irony.

“Was it because I dared ask that question my house caught fire after a freak December thunderstorm? Lightning struck the pole by our house, traveled through the power line and caught our breaker box on fire, which caught the laundry room ceiling on fire! Thankfully (though I didn’t feel that way at the moment) we were home. We heard the smoke detector, we had working fire extinguishers and we knew how to use them. My husband quickly put out the fire while I called 911.

“If you’re going to have a house fire, that’s the way to have one. We saved our home and pets and only had to move out for 24 hours. We found cleanup of smoke damage is much easier and really just an inconvenience compared to recovering from extensive fire and water damage.

“Our breaker box was replaced and we celebrated having a cautionary tale to share with friends and family. My sister-in-law recovered from the blood clots with no lasting health problems. Not everything was resolved the way I would have hoped, but because I wasn’t working, I was able to care for my mother during her brief illness and was there at her side when she passed away in March of 2008.”

What comes next is my favorite part of Jennifer’s e-mail.

“This experience parallels my mother’s early attempts to keep me focused on the positive things in life when I was little. Apparently (my brother backs this up), I was a bit of a whiner when I started preschool. My mom made me tell her three good things that happened before she would allow me to share a complaint. She said it was often a challenge for me to find something good to share. With prompting from an early age, and now as a way of life, I try to find the good things and be thankful.”

When I e-mailed Jennifer Goddard to ask permission to use her e-mail in my column, she said her mother, Donna Reed, a longtime teacher and volunteer at First Presbyterian Preschool, was such an amazing woman that sharing her with others helps keeps her spirit alive.

Said Jennifer, “It is hard to stay positive, and I’m certainly aware how easy it is to fall off the wagon and gripe. Sometimes you just need to vent, and that’s OK, too.”

You hear all the time how a good marriage takes work. How raising children is work. How being healthy takes work. What I never seem to hear is that being happy takes work, too. It isn’t something that just happens when the stars align right. It’s an attitude that takes nourishing and shoring up and attending.

I like to believe that I’m one of the happier people you’ll meet. I can find the funny in most any situation, and that comes from having had a life that’s frequently forced me to look.

So I’m having to look a little harder this time. I know that I’ll find it.

I’m lucky that way. 

The news was something I wasn’t ready to hear. A grim diagnosis.

The engine in our 2004 Toyota Matrix was on borrowed time. The mechanic said we could still drive it, but the end was inevitable.

As Geoff limped home in the Matrix, I followed behind in our other car, a 12-year-old VW Jetta.

The Jetta had been acting its age for a while, yet its decline had been more expected. A leak here, a part missing there. Windshield wipers that acted like they were possessed. The car’s gradually multiplying (and mostly minor) quirks were almost as amusing as they were annoying.

For the past few years, we’d begun to accept the Jetta might not be long for this world, but we’d only had the Matrix paid off for a year. We hoped the initial diagnosis was wrong, but a second mechanic concurred.

There was no room in our budget for a new engine or another car payment. No nest egg to poach. 

No choice but to make do with one car for a while.

While still numb from the news, I called my doctor’s office to schedule a fairly routine surgical procedure I’m to have near the end of this month.

And was told I have to pay, up front, the 20 percent our insurance doesn’t cover. A little over $900.

Again, not in our budget.

That evening, I was greeted at the door by two of our dogs. I went looking for the third. And found he’d injured his leg.

That night it got chilly. But the furnace wouldn’t kick on.

While working to clear a sink that seemed hopelessly clogged, the toilet overflowed.

And I fell apart.

There’s a danger in asking, “What’s next?” since the question will often be answered in a way that tops, in grand fashion, the many little disasters that lined up before it. But after a week of one blow after another, I was feeling picked on enough to let one slip while talking to my friend, Julie Blackwood.

Julie mentioned an interview she’d heard with Elisabeth Elliot, who was talking about her life in Ecuador following the murder of her husband while they were missionaries. As a widow with a young infant, living in the jungles of a foreign land, Elliot’s world must’ve felt as though it had been turned upside down. But instead of throwing up her hands and saying, “What’s next?” she asked, “What’s the next thing?”

“You can imagine how tempted I was to just plunk myself down and say, ‘There is no way I can do this.’” Elliot said in the interview (taken from an online transcript I found). “I wanted to sink into despair and helplessness, then I remembered this old Saxon legend, ‘Do the next thing.’”

Instead of allowing the burdens to stack until they completely blocked out the sun, Elliot dealt with them one at a time.

She said you shouldn’t sit down and think of all the things you have to do because it can be overwhelming. Instead, just pick the next thing and do it, then move on to the one after that. She said while pushing through them, you’re likely to find that many of the problems will work themselves out.

The wisdom of her simple advice soaked in, and in the days that passed since the pinnacle of our disasters, the clogged drain cleared, Geoff got the furnace working again, our dog’s leg seems to be healing on its own, and my parents loaned us the money for my surgery.

We’re still down to one creaky old car with possessed wiper blades, but my sense of feeling picked on has been replaced with a comforting realization that the weight of the world can fluctuate as much as my own.

Don’t like the weather? Wait a while. It’ll change.

And while you’re waiting, you can do the next thing.

DO THE NEXT THING 

Author Unknown as quoted by Elisabeth Elliott

I’m sure I’ve done stranger things, but it might take a while to recall what those things were.

It’s hard to top having spent several hours decorating the skulls of dead fish.

In the big city, such behavior might earn me the title of Performance Artist. In these parts, though, I expect folks are more likely to be calculating what size back-strapping jacket I’ll need.

The adventure began with my daughter Celeste and her friend, Emillia Samosky, visiting a yard sale on our street. They returned with several strands of multi-colored wire garland, a white silk corsage, and two rectangular Styrofoam blocks meant to serve as a base for flower arrangements.

The girls looked at these items and saw in them the foundation for building monsters.

 I looked at the items and saw the possibility for getting much done while they were distracted.

It wasn’t long, though, before they needed help with a nonfunctioning outlet, and the next thing I knew, I was rummaging through the garage, looking for monster-making materials of my own.

When our home’s previous owners moved out, they left behind a good bit of stuff in their garage, and we’ve had fun gradually sorting through what they left. Among the more curious things we found was a stringer of fish heads that dangled from a nail near the door. I don’t know much about fish beyond the tartar sauce part, but we were told the heads came from Muskies, which are large and fierce-looking fish with many small, jagged teeth.

Celeste was so thoroughly repulsed by the fish skulls that we quickly removed them.

And relocated them to random places throughout our house.

Fish heads are surprisingly handy devices, ideal for holding keys, posting notes, and storing hair bands. Ours wore witch hats at Halloween, a pilgrim’s hat at Thanksgiving, and what better way to say Merry Christmas! than with a holly-wrapped fish head, complete with glowing candle propped in its jaws?

The skeletal Muskies also turned out to be the ideal starting point for making a monster, although Celeste and Emillia initially disagreed. They wanted nothing to do with the pair of dusty, cobwebby fish heads I brought from the garage. Until I spray-painted the heads shiny silver, and their interest was piqued.While the girls worked to embellish their Styrofoam one-eyed and multi-eyed monsters, my silver fish heads went the glam route, with feathers, lashes and breasts.

In time, the Short One and her friend began to be swayed by the influence of the group’s elder member, and were soon adorning their monsters with such charming details as a uni-brow, soul patch, and chest and pit hair.

Most creative projects for kids involve craft shop staples like felt, pipe cleaners, and puff balls, not severed doll limbs, spray-painted glove thumbs, and an assortment of glued together washers and nuts.

Frankenstein would’ve been proud.

Martha Stewart would not.