in her peaceful ocean of green

Not sure if this is true in your parts of the world, but Spring here always bursts open almost over night. I am always so amazed how one day I will drive by a field and see nothing but dirt and tiny sprouts, and the next day I will notice that spring has rushed in and announced herself with a knee-high ocean of green. It makes for beautiful pictures...

On this evening we were walking back to our car when I suggested to Bean that she go wade into the grass and find a place to make her nest. She was just settling into her little peaceful cocoon when she heard someone mention the possibility of there being some snakes also making nests in the sea of green. The thought of meeting even a small intruder shattered her nesting moment.

(Below: Can you see her wheels spinning? Really? There might be snakes in here too?)

I know I have written about this before (a lot!), but I have been thinking much about "peace" lately. Like how fragile mine is. How with one flicker of a thought about the possibilities of what "may happen" in my near or distant future, I am up and running off in a restless anxiety. Funny how those little voices can set off an alarm of worry that show me just how shallow my roots of peace extend.

I was riding in the car yesterday thinking about this all and I head myself say...
Tracey, how big can those "snakes" really be? Are they even there? Or are they just phantoms of my worry,  looming large in my imagination? 
And have I really made my God that small, that I believe even he cannot deal with those supposed "snakes"?

I am so human it's not even funny. I wonder how many beautiful, plentiful fields of peace have I forfeited for the game of playing about with the imagined worries of my mind?

(long thoughtful pause....)

Or perhaps knowing peace is more than just trying to emotionally shake myself into a place of of being worry-free. Maybe it is about trusting that even if those "snakes" do intrude upon my life in a very real and scary way, I will get through it. I believe God is big enough to give me the strength to do and be what I need to travel through it. (At least this is what I say. I will never really get to practice what I preach unless I go through it, right?)

I think I am finally understanding that, for me, my peace is not dependent upon my circumstances, but rather upon where I place my trust. 

And if I trust he is big enough to take care of me no matter what may come my way, then a beautiful, peaceful smile is the punctuation mark to the end of my heartfelt conclusion. 

I really want to exude this kind of beauty from knowing that kind of peace, even though it might take me a life time of practice. 

But I am workin' on it.
Thanks for letting me process. :)
Happy Monday.
T