Feast or Famine

I'm really more of a hamburger girl.

My husband and I have observed that his family when he was growing up either had beans or steak. When things were going well financially, they ate steak and raised their standard of living. When things weren't going so great, they ate beans and used sandpaper toilet paper. My family, in contrast, pretty much had hamburger (and bought Charmin--the important things in life, ya know!).

Our standard of living was consistent regardless of the income. If there was extra money, instead of blowing it, it was tucked away for a rainy day. When things got tight, the ant was able to eat hamburger off what had been stored up (Proverbs 6:6-8; 30:24-25).

That lifestyle just makes sense to me now. Financially, one can make hamburger work.

But I think it's interesting how often there are times of feast or famine in other areas of life. When one lives close to the land, it's easier to be in tune with the seasons. It seems we either have 10 dozen eggs in our refrigerator or we're out of eggs (right now we're in the famine season). We either have so much milk I'm making yogurt and cheeses to make jars available and giving butter away to friends and family to make room in my freezer, or the cow is dried up (again, we're in the famine season). We either have cucumbers and peppers coming out of our ears (okay, out of the garden!) or I stand in the produce aisle trying to decide if I really want to pay 89 cents for ONE cucumber or if we can just do without it.

We are either experiencing wonderful health and blessing in our immediate and extended families or everyone is sick or experiencing strife or serious trials and disappointments. We are either so busy we never have a night home together as a family or we have nothing going on and almost get bored with staying home night after night. We either have so many friends and so many relationships to maintain that we feel like a juggling act or we feel like we have no friends and don't even know who to call--and no one calls us. We either have so many opportunities for spiritual food that we can't decide which to take advantage of, or we feel dry and starving in a desert. We are either filled with joy and happiness and exuberance or we're down in the dumps and in tears.

My husband is really a pretty even-keeled man. He is steady and calm and doesn't get worked up about much. As someone who appreciates the reliability (security?) of hamburger, I sometimes envy his consistent temperament--especially when my highs can be really high and my lows can be really low.

Yet at other times I appreciate my wider scale of emotions. When I am silly and happy and (let's face it) loud (!) I am really, really happy and having a ton of fun. And when I am sad and mopey and discouraged--ugh, I'm really down. But the truth is, my 'down times' really make me appreciate the fun I have at other times. When I have the flu or a sore throat, all I can think about is how much I appreciate my normally healthy constitution. I wonder, if I felt the same all the time, would I appreciate it? Or does the very existence of sadness, illness, and want give us the opportunity to fully appreciate and value happiness, health, and plenty?

Perhaps beans make the steak taste even better! Or perhaps hamburger is more versatile than the extremes and we should take better advantage of its flexibility by managing our finances, emotions, health, and time more effectively. What do you think?