Beauty

     It's a beautiful Monday afternoon and I'm relaxing with my husband and 23 year old son.  No work for me today.  I took the day off.  Not for fun.  But for a medical procedure.  An old person medical procedure.  This morning I had a colonoscopy. 
     Now I know what you're thinking.  First, why is this blog entry titled "Beauty" when it begins with a colonoscopy?  And, you're thinking I'm too young to have a colonoscopy.  Well I will get to the beauty part soon.  And I agree that I'm too young, but the doctor has encouraged me to get one for a couple of years so I finally gave in.  Bright and early this morning, hubby and I headed to the clinic for this lovely procedure.  He was his usual lighthearted, fun loving self who tends to have a good time no matter the situation.  And I was an unusually calm patient.  Maybe it was because, after 25 years, I've gotten used to my husband having a good time and finally decided to embrace his attitude.  Maybe it was because I was just ready to get the procedure over. 
     While preparing for the colonoscopy the last day or so, my mind has gone back to a procedure my dad had about a year and a half or so ago.  Since I was on vacation that day, I went to the clinic to see how things went.  While back in post-op with him (which was a trip in itself.  If you've never been 'backstage' after a bunch of people have had colonoscopies, well you'll just have to imagine the sounds!)  I begin noticing the patients being wheeled by, asleep on their left sides.  One woman in particular caught my attention.  I'm guessing she was in her 70s, maybe 80s.  Hospital gown.  Asleep with no idea what was going on around her.  But she had her hair done and her makeup on.  There she was, about to be told to wake up and pass gas, but she had made sure she looked nice!
     Beauty.  Billions of dollars are spent on it every year.  We hear "beauty is only skin deep" and "beauty is in the eye of the beholder".  Solomon, in describing his bride, said "How beautiful your sandaled feet, oh prince's daughter!  Your graceful legs are like jewels, the work of an artist's hands......How beautiful you are and how pleasing, my love with your delights!"  Pretty much the entire book of Song of Solomon is a tribute to love and beauty.  Could it be that Solomon and his bride were in love and they were looking at each other thru the eyes of love?  Probably. 
     I don't know of any woman who doesn't want to be told she is beautiful.  Is that wrong?  The Bible tells us that we are not to let our beauty be from jewelry and braided hair (1 Peter 3:3).  We are not to be vain.  Yet God placed within us the desire to be beautiful.  At least beautiful to someone.  A bride is surrounded by bridesmaids who tend to her needs, preparing her to be beautiful for her groom.  She gets her hair done and paints her face, shops for the perfect dress, fusses over the details and walks down the isle to her groom, all so she can see the look on his face when he sees his bride. 
     Yet all our lives we are told not to worry about how we look.  I recently read that at 16 we can take no credit for our beauty.  But being beautiful at 60, that's different.  As we get older we realize that true beauty does come from within.  And as I've gotten older (no I'm not 60!) I've been told more often that I'm pretty.  I don't know why.  I never really considered myself pretty.  But I won't deny that I enjoy being told that I am!  I believe getting older definitely makes you feel better in your own skin and that's a beauty all it's own.  But I do believe that, more importantly, I'm learning to be more of a vessel for God's use.  And I hope that's the real beauty people see in me.