After perusing the offerings separately, we decided to pool our gift cards and buy a pasta machine. Our family happens to be huge fans of pasta...all kinds of pasta...and hubby and I like cooking. It was delivered today, so of course we had to try it out.
We learned an important lesson on our first try:
On the first pass through the rollers, the dough will tear and have holes and will generally look completely ruined. Do not despair! Fold the dough over and send it through again. And again. And again. And again. Eventually, the dough will smooth out and as you decrease the distance between the rollers and increase the pressure on the dough, it will show it's hidden strength, becoming so strong that on the thinnest setting it will stretch until it is nearly transparent and still not break or tear.
Life's like that, too.
So many times, the pressures and stress of life have stretched me thin, tearing holes in my life. Financial problems, medical issues, family trouble - all of them have, at one time or another, ripped huge gaping holes in the life I thought we were making.
It seemed that as soon as we had things patched up, we'd go through the ringer again and new holes would show up. Patch those, and...you guessed it...back through the ringer again.
I can't tell you how many times we went through the ringer, its rollers squeezing us and pressuring us. Eventually, we realized that each pass through the ringer got a little easier. The rips and tears and holes got smaller and were easier to patch.
All that squeezing, all that pressure, all that stress and trouble, made us stronger, more flexible. We don't tear now, we stretch. Things might get thin enough to see through, but we won't break.
So, give us a little squeeze, love.
How about you? Is life sending you through the ringer? Feeling stretched thin?