Toe Nails and the Soul....(If feet gross you out, this might not be your jam.)

It's sunny here, after a long winter...

Sunny enough to make me want to wear flip flops, the symbol of summer, lightness, ease and carefree living.  

This also rustles around in my heart, stirring the desire of a weary soul to find lightness, ease and carefree living.

Standing in the shower after a long run, water slipping down across the achy parts, easing sore muscles, I stare at my feet. 

White.

Blistered.

Black dead toe nail on left.

White dead toe nail on right.

Out of the shower, I squat down trimming and fussing over deadness of skin, feet well used and abused, cutting away, then reach for a bottle of toe nail polish.  Maybe this will resurrect the black, white and ugly.

As I attempt to polish and buff away the evidence of a life spent running, I have a mental image of an old woman, magnified mirror in hand, attempting to resurrect the lost eye brows and the withering lips, attempting to find youth, where age and time have taken it away.  Generous with lipstick, it does not stay contained in the withering lips, but bleeds out into the surrounding skin, as my toe nail polish bleeds out where there used to be healthy nails.  

It becomes clarity to my heart, this trying to cover up the abuse of years, with nail polish, lip stick, or eye liner.  Instead of resurrected toe nails and outer beauty, I want a resurrected soul.

I want to soar on these broken down feet, to mountain tops of the Lords making, not my patch work attempts to beautify a body and soul parched and in need of a drink from the Well that never runs dry.

And so I leave my nails as best as they can be, and look down at these feet, and say,

      "Thank you.  For taking me on long runs that open my soul to my maker, where I can drown out the voices that want to tear down my heart, and hear the ONE VOICE that calms all the questioning and seeking within me. Thank you for enduring the weekly miles that wear you down and callous your skin, so that I don't have to be a worn down, calloused heart."

So what ever your trying to beautify, to feel worthy, valuable, young, carefree....

Know its really all about our hearts.  

For where the heart is free, young in spirit, and alive, so is the body.

And I am going to go wear those flip flops and be proud.