A ladies group I belonged to decided to have a fashion show, depicting the night attire of yesteryear. I questioned my husband’s office staff and yes, one had a set of “baby doll pajamas” that she would lend us. As my husband was arriving by air that afternoon and going straight to the office, I asked the girl involved to just unzip his luggage and place the baby doll pajamas inside.
That evening when he went to empty his luggage he got this terrible look on his face and gasped…”good heavens, I’ve been framed!” It was one of the funniest moments in our marriage.
When I moved my mother in law into a nursing home I inadvertently almost ruined a painting she had had for years. It portrays a little man standing in the snow with footprints nearby and we always called it “The Good King Wenceslas” painting. I wasn’t sure how to fix it so I gave it to a friend to reframe it. It is much smaller now, the little man and the footprints are still there and it is familiar, yet changed. Even using the old frame, now cut down, it has a different atmosphere.
I guess we are all like that painting and as life goes by we get “framed” differently…each aspect of our lives putting us into different situations and different frames. Hopefully we are still recognizable but not always. If you have been to a school reunion you know what I mean. We have to “reframe” our last memory of the person in front of us. Then there is that “ah hah” moment when everything fits together.
One night I was at our church Christmas Carol Festival. Near the end of the service they always turn the lights out and we sit in near darkness with only the candles on the Communion table lighting the Sanctuary. We have a lovely small, grand piano with an almost ebony exterior. I was enchanted to see the reflection of the candles glowing there. It looked like a Christmas card within a large, black, shiny, frame and I thought about how often even in our darkest times we are asked to reflect the love of the Lord.
A friend once mentioned how strong I had been through my husband’s cancer. The strength was not my own and perhaps I was like the ebony exterior on the piano…reflecting the love God was pouring into me.
I am trying to be more perceptive about the frames I wear and how it might affect others. Sometimes, I notice frames of discontent, anxiety or pain around my friends. I know that often a smile or a hug will help change that frame and bring back the portrait of a happier and more content child of God.
