I have a kind of working hypothesis about grace that runs roughly thus: it's not that God lifts you out of challenging situations, but that God somehow transforms them from with in.  I am also very clear that grace is a free gift - it cannot be earned or deserved, it cannot be requested or desired, it just is, the unexpected moment of goodness, or hope, or meaning or whatever it is, in an otherwise demanding context.

This afternoon I took myself off for a walk, and more or less on a whim, went to Kelvingrove Museum and Art Gallery, hoping that I might find some postcards to add to my collection of memory prompts for my Mum - after all this was one of her childhood haunts, a comparatively short distance from where she grew up.

And then I found myself realising how serendipitous it is that I now live and work in Glasgow, and so can easily go hunting for postcards or take photos that might prompt memories for her.  I then I wondered if maybe this was another example of grace... not that God had sent me to Glasgow for this purpose, but that, given this situation has arisen, one means of God entering and transforming it is achieved by me being here, now.

I found a few postcards that I think might be helpful, and then spotted a book, a collection of photos taken mostly in and around Partick in what was, evidently, a very hot summer in 1955.  I'm not sure that Mum was still in Glasgow then, she may have already gone adventuring to the USA, but the images are pretty much contemporary with her lates teens and will, I hope, prompt some conversations when we get to share them.

I think it's grace because it isn't something I could have 'manufactured'... had I lived elsewhere the opportunity would not have arisen, at least not naturally.

Tomorrow is Mothers' Day, and somehow this year it feels especially important that I take time to give thanks for my own mother, and all she has done for me, for us, for over half a century.