Q-Tips

We all have a morning routine. Mine includes makeup time in front of the bathroom mirror. I don't particularly enjoy this, except the eyeshadow part. Jellybean, on the other hand, does.  He climbs onto the top of the toilet tank and watches with that single-minded focus of a cat on the prowl. It's not so much me he's watching, since the most interesting thing would be the facial contortions of mascara application. No, he's watching the Q-tips.  

I am an admittedly poor at eyeliner.   So, it takes me a couple tries and a few Q-tips to get my eyes to match.  Jellybean loves Q-tips. I don't know why. But while I'm fixing, he's staring. Sometimes he gets over eager and steps on the counter and I have to push him back.  Occasionally he'll come around to the front and paw blindly at the surface to see if he can find it and pull it down. He's actually pretty good at that.

Here's the thing. Eyeliner Q-tips are gross. I have bought the boys catnip toys, jingle balls, feathers-on-a-stick-thingies, and even a kitty kong.  All of them end up strewn around the apartment, with the exception of the fuzzballs, which Buckley hides in my shoes. But the Q-tips are mesmerizing. If I find one Jellybean's gotten and set down somewhere, and through it away, he'll go try and figure out how to get the trash lid up so he can save it.

As much as I dislike my cat's penchant for used cotton, I can't get mad at him. I see myself do the same thing. Not literally, but God has given me so many gifts, and sometimes I catch myself chasing things that are the spiritual equivalent of secondhand Q-tips. 

Success. I want to be great and be able to point at achievements and show that I am, when I can have this journey made up of days hiking with God, some arduous of course, but overall they add up to a lot more than the praise of man. 

Justification. I want everyone to know when I've been wronged, when I can have the peace of knowing God is just and merciful and will fight my battles for me. 

Materialism. I want the most Q-tips when I could have the joy and contentment of God. 

I can get so busy hoarding Q-tips that I miss all the glories of a lavish God. Fortunately, he keeps giving, and the more time I'm with him, the less appealing this worldly waste becomes.

Jellybean doesn't agree, but he's a cat.

Thank you, Lord, for your incredible plenty and that even when I lose sight of the gift of just YOU, you never lose sight of me. You call me higher, deeper, and to a greater experience of the beauty of knowing you.  I don't want to spend myself on the cheap things. Draw my eyes up always. All my love.