Today my youngest daughter, Whitney, turned 17. Cool for her. She’s growing up. But all I can think about is how much this reminds me that her days with mom and dad grow fewer.

Happy birthday, Whit.

Now slow down.

Today is my most loved one’s [CENSORED] birthday. You’d never tell it by her beautiful face though. She looks way younger than her [CENSORED] years.

Darn it. This happened last time I sent her birthday greetings online. She must have hacked my blog again.

Today we’re heading out to dinner with family and friends to celebrate Diane’s [CENSORED] wonderful years. Then its back home where I have to finish packing for my trip to the States tomorrow. I’m going for board meetings and time with my doctor. Isn’t that special?

Major bummer is that while I’m gone I’ll miss Valentine’s Day, and Whitney’s 16th birthday. But it can’t be helped. Stinks really. But at least I get to be here for Diane’s [CENSORED] birthday.

Darn it woman, I wish you’d stop doing that.

Well, happy birthday to my bride. May you have [CENSORED] more wonderful years.

I turned 45 today.

I’m not one for birthdays. They haven’t really mattered to me for a long time. I guess the older in Christ I become (25 years last week), the more I realize that I have an eternity of days ahead of me. So why not enjoy growing older? In fact, I like getting older, I just don’t like what getting older sometimes does to me, or reveals in me, on this side of Heaven.

I expected to be celebrating this birthday back home in Mongolia. Instead, I’m still in Tucson, not scheduled to return until December 3rd—as long as my recovery goes well.

Recovery.

I’m in Tucson being treated for bipolar disorder. It is, apparently, something I’ve had for a long time, but the recent crash I experienced from my previous decades of constant mania (not to be confused with maniac) was what forced me to be diagnosed. Graciously, my Board in counsel with my pastor forced me to take some chill time in Tucson. So I’ve been meeting weekly with a doctor, getting some counseling, and riding an emotional roller coaster like none I’ve ever experienced before in my life.

So I’m 45 today and wondering how soon I can expect to get back to normal and, frankly, get home. I really want to go home. But I can’t. There’s that little thing of “getting balanced,” and meds, and getting refocused.

One place I’m refocusing is the scripture. Specifically, I’m spending my time in Psalm 37. Reading it. Absorbing it. Praying through its verses. Everything there just screams at me as so relevant, so helpful, so applicable to where I’ve been the last few years, and where I’m at, emotionally, right now.

If there’s one book in the scriptures that I confess I’ve never had much use for, it’s the Pslams. I’m not a poetry and prose guy—English or Hebrew. I like narrative, epistle, apologetic, exposition. That “Pslam stuff,” never seemed all that relevant to me.

Until now.

Then I realize, and wonder, how much more is there in the treasure of God’s word that I’ve been missing and didn’t realize it simply because of my preference for one kind of writing over another?

I think I’m about to find out. I guess that what part of “getting balanced” means.