Ta da! the game’s afoot!. This is the CJWS version of Connections, the brain stretcher that WSJ made ubiquitous as early morning coffee or tea drinkers try to match words that by some stretch of the imagination have a tie. The three above can be various reasons for a word to be revealed after a circuitous route developed by me to define actions of Easter Week.
First consider illucidate. Granted it is a dated late Latin verb, yet the meaning is worth noting: bring life to a latent desire. I cook. At times the thought crosses my mind that I would like to be a gourmet chef. I have yet to master chopping onions with the swift up and down motion of a knife while moving my knuckles out of the way just in time. I do well to crack an egg and manage to hold half of the shell in each hand so I don’t drop loose bits in the cookie dough. No amount of the mystery word will make me more than a line helper, so I stuck with my assignment for Easter lunch.
Then I moved on to imitate. Sometimes progress comes with watching, reading, and doing. My mother had fluidity in her motions and a certain surety about moving food from the kitchen to the table while still warm. I made mental notes, bought a booklet at the checkout stand with an easy ice box roll recipe, and from Good Housekeeping magazine adopted Peg Bracken’s pie crust recipe as my go to for success. Along with calling into play the mystery word, I had two make a good meal skills that I could count on.
I set aside Easter Saturday to meet my calling and ran into a need for immanency, that word which guaranteed a permanence in a skill I knew. At one time I had made both dishes several times a month and hand and mind memory meshed. Living alone has lessen the need for producing often and in bulk. I split the crust lifting it into the pie plate and had to add trimmed pieces to seal a gap. I didn’t roll the dough as even as in past days and some rolls were fat, especially compared to the thinner ones. At this point have you a revelation of the mystery word?.
In our lives practice can be a tipping point. Trying my best illucidated the truth I will never master calligraphy. I watched a twelve year old learn to be the team player who racked up points by watching him imitate exhaustively the sequence of catch, bounce, turn and shoot until he was the one to catch the ball and raise the score. Practice hones a skill one has, so that like an arrow in a quiver it is always imminant: permanently useful. Practice is applicable to the need of any moment from building a respectable character to producing a to die for pie crust.
What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things and the God of peace will be with youl
Philippians 4:9 ESV
Let Me Tell Ya 