Grappling

Hello,

I am grappling with greens of all kinds. First there are all those green things I picked from the garden. I gave one stem of brussel sprouts to our landlady. Check! That has been taken care of.

I froze quite a lot of celery this morning. At the same time I took out the ice cube trays and some coconut (for granola). Check! That has been taken care of.

Last night I cooked all of the leaves on one collard stem. The heap of leaves in the pan diminishes to about an eighth of its original size. There was enough for leftovers. Check! That has been taken care of.

I have more brussel sprouts, parsley, collards, kale, and broccoli. I eyeball the space in our freezer above the refrigerator and know that more will go in, but not all. Can I can any of this? Would we eat it if I did? Do I need to share more and if so with whom? If in the refrigerator will it be good to eat when we come back from DC?

Next it is on to that other green stuff, money, do you know it? At church we are to turn in our pledge for the coming year. I generally figure that. Last year was an up and down year with Leroy losing more than half of his work and then gaining a half back that actually pays more. And I got a raise midyear. So I can barely tell you what we made let alone what we should have given to God. This year, however, seems to be less cloudy. But when I added up what our last check amounted to and assumed that could be for the future, I see we are not paying a tithe as I thought we were. It is quite a bit less. Then I started to think about the problem. One thing came to mind. When Leroy was full time in the church, taxes were not taken out till after the check was in hand. He paid them as if a self employed person. Now taxes come out before the check is handed to us and I had been just figuring on that amount of money. Then the question is, Should one tithe before or after taxes?

Also, when he was with the church,  we did not pay for any of our health insurance and now we pay all so we did not tithe on that money, but we do now because we pay that bill from earnings.

Well, one thing I know for sure, we will raise the amount that we give, whether it is a tithe, I simply do not know. I can see why the Pharisees created all sorts of guidelines for living. On one level it made the answers clear, not necessarily right, but clear. Sometimes I like easy answers.

Paula