Alters

Do you know how the Bible talks about people building alters when big events happen in their lives?  They weren't for worshiping, but reminders of something that happened.  If you're scratching your head right now, go to Crosswalk and do a little search on there.  Anyway, I was just thinking about the alters we have now days.  I don't think we always make those alters intentionally now days.  Lately I've been noticing some of my own alters; Kaitlyn Joy actually pointed one out.  At Christmas time I put one of our trees up in my room (like usual).  Instead of putting our surplus ornaments on it, I put teddy bears with pink and blue shirts.

Now let me stop your thinking.  The tree isn't the alter.  But now that I mention the tree, each bear represented a baby we lost.  It's really humbling when you put an item in place of a number.  The tree wasn't lacking ornaments yet each one was a baby.  After putting it up Kaitlyn Joy and I just looked at it for a while.  By the way, this wasn't the finished tree; I later added garland.  At the top are the two stuffed bears I bought when I told Neal we were pregnant with twins.  Alright, my point in showing the picture was to say I found an alter when I moved the tree.  I decided I didn't like the tree in it's normal place so I moved it in front of this window.  When doing so I found the last maternity outfit I wore.  I was already popping out when I lost the twins.  My ovaries were HUGE and painful.  When I learned both babies had passed I went home and took off my maternity clothes.  I didn't care if regular pants would be painful, I wasn't going to wear them any longer.  What I didn't realize until this tree went up was I folded the clothes up, put them on the foot stool of the rocker which is where they stayed for nine months.

Another unintentional alter from back when I did my last IVF (almost a year ago), one that Kaitlyn Joy mentions from time to time are some Ritz crackers on my headboard.  We have waterbed with shelves and the crackers are in a sleeve on one of those shelves.  It was a first for me, but after the egg retrieval I was really sick.  The nurses say you have to eat and drink x-amount before you can leave.  I'm always determined to bounce back quickly.  Well, this bounce back including a sprint to the sink to empty my stomach.  Later when I had the D&C they didn't want to risk me getting sick again so they gave me anti-nausea pills before and afterwards then would give me very little to drink.

So what are your alters?  I have crackers (still there) and a stack of clothes (moved) among other things.