Nice Bones

One of my favorite things to watch on TV are home renovation shows when they take old houses and redo them. A common phrase you here over and over again when the decorating experts are looking at horrible looking houses is, “Yes, but it has nice bones.” When Russ and I first looked at our house I was video taping us walking around the house because we thought we might buy it and wanted to show our parents. When we got to the furnace room and Russ, an electrical engineer by training, opened the door, I caught him on tape mumbling to himself, “nice panel” as he checked out the electric system. I just got our old furniture recovered and was happy that I had bought good upholstered furniture twenty years ago because it has, “nice frames” and could be recovered well.
Today I took Carter to the oral surgeon for a consult on her getting her wisdom teeth out. They took a 360 degree X-ray of her head so we could look at all her teeth. One of the shots they showed us was of her jaw line and cheek bones. We were very interested in seeing what was under her skin and the nurse said, “beautiful chin, mouth and cheek bones.”  
It gave me an appreciation for good bones that are the super structure of what everything else is hung on. We can change the outside or superficial stuff, but we can’t change the bones, at least not easily. Looking at the X-rays in all the various angles is like looking at the potential. Everything else can be changed.
The hardest thing for most people is seeing the possibilities. This is why so many realtors make people paint their houses neutral colors when they put it on the market. Most people can’t see past someone’s Victorian wall paper that is not their taste to the bones of a room and see how they can make it their own.
I have a friend who gained a little weight a few years ago and said to me recently that she is resigned that now she will always be this heavy, even though she is unhappy about it. I am the first person to say that what you are on the outside is no way what you have to be forever. I know this from both the up and the down direction. I wish I had a full body X-ray for my friend to show her what her bones look like because that is the limit of what her body can be. The outside drape is up to her.  
I am not suggesting that any of us should, get close to our skeletal selves, that is another kind of scary. Just that we all start with the nice bones we are born with and can build from there. It is not all about what people can see either. Like Russ admiring the electrical panel, it is the works that make us go and having a good internal system makes life easier.  
So I appreciate all my insides I can not see and take for granted. The outside that I obsess about can be changed, both for the better and the worse if I am not careful. Like my furniture I can be recovered as long as the super structure is in good shape. In this season of gratitude I am thankful for “nice bones” and keeping them healthy.