Last summer several friends and I met once a week in the early evening to kayak into a quiet corner of Lake Stevens called "the Cove." My husband had given me a kayak for Mother's day several years before but I had not used it that often since I had to kayak alone. I'm one of those people that believe exercise and enjoying the outdoors is always much more fun with a friend! Case in point, after years of running alone for the most part, I met another runner who ran the same route I did at about the same time. We've been running together now for over 13 years! So, back to kayaking....several other friends of mine had kayaks too but we often seemed a kayak short...the more, the merrier, right?

Since I love my kayak, I began to look for another one like it, but really didn't want to pay full price. I missed out on one early in the summer on craigslist and kept looking, but never saw another one come up. I realized the time to buy a kayak was not in the prime summer months, so I just put it out of my mind for a while. Last Friday, the sun was out and I glanced down to the dock and saw my lonely kayak and the thought came...look on craigslist now.

And yes, I found my exact kayak, even the same color! The price was quite good, but the owner was about a two hours drive away. My husband is very adept at negotiating deals on craigslist so I asked for his help and he got the emailing going with the seller. "Was he open to offers?" "Yes". "Would he accept less if we picked it up?" "Yes!" I was so excited! I had to work at the clinic on Monday and made arrangements to drive down on Tuesday morning (today). I got home from work to check email for his address and there was an email....but, instead of an address it said he had sold the kayak to someone local who paid him full price. I don't know why, but this wave of disappointment just washed over me....more than a lost purchase on craigslist should. I felt so low...so discouraged. It was just a kayak, for crying out loud!!! Why did this hit me so hard? Thinking it over, I began to realize it probably had something to do with being tired after working a 10 hour shift...and some other hard things that are going on in our lives right now. The lost kayak was a little like the straw that broke the camels' back. I was washing some dishes and looked up on the window sill and there it was...a bible memory verse in my mom's handwriting. My mother died in a car accident in 1997 and one of the things I treasure is a small stack of her bible memory cards that I found in her purse. She always put the verse on the front and the reference on the back....testing her memory. The words of the verse settled me with such a sense of peace..."my times are in His hands," Psalm 31:15a.