November 5: Seasons Come and Seasons Go

The leaves were blowing on the breeze today.

Crunching underfoot.

Scuttling across the cement.

The wind plucked them from their place in the sky.

Brown and shriveled now.

Their glory has passed. 

Sometimes it seems like this season will last.

The brilliance; the light.

The crispness in the air.

But eventually it, too, will cease to be there.

The things that plague you now won't always be.

What God's doing now isn't the only thing you'll see.

A new season is coming.

The Junkie Mom at the Park

{Originally written over the summer}

The sweltering day had tapered off into a shadowy, refreshing breeze. I love when the scale of the year tips winter-ward and the summer nights begin to cool off, teasing of autumn, and tonight was one of those perfect nights. After a late dinner ala fridge and close to bedtime, we decided to take advantage of the weather and walk to the park.

We rolled up the hill with the dog in tow, who insisted on tugging relentlessly at the hunter green leash and barking at every squirrel within a quarter mile, and I saw her sitting on a weathered wooden bench across the park. When we sat down on the opposite bench, she yelled, “how old is your little girl? She’s pretty!”

Then I thought she said that she loved her hair, too, so I reached over, stroking her blond, bouncy locks, smiled and said, “thank you!” But she quickly responded, “no, yours!”

Oh, okay. That was sweet.

People at the park will smile on occasion, but they aren’t normally too friendly in the city, just as a general rule. They tend to keep to themselves, although I try to initiate some conversation when I’m feeling like getting out of the hermit shell inside my head. So I was a little surprised by this anomaly.

I sized her up from my seat, noting her seemingly clean purple and white-stripped cardigan and jeans.

Hmmm… She looks about my size, I thought, and for a second, I reverted back to middle school and considered befriending her in an effort to swap clothing. Sharing wardrobes was a trademark BFF thing back in the day. Then I quickly remembered the prevalence of bedbugs and fleas and other pests in the city, so, coupled with the obvious creepiness on my part, I scratched that idea. She proceeded to have a cigarette, which further reaffirmed my decision.

Her two girls were chattering excitedly about the dog and how cute he was and how they wanted to pet him, and I hesitated for a moment, because sometimes he can be quite boisterous and scary, his bark being much bigger then his bite. He hasn’t, in fact, ever bitten anyone, but still, I was nervous. As they inched closer, he relaxed his ears and seemed to welcome them, so I gave them permission. They loved on him enthusiastically, despite his frequent kisses and horrid breath.

My son was playing with a tennis ball on the slide, rolling it down with the inherent problem of having climb down and retrieve it each time, but she picked up the ball, which practically rolled right to her, and tossed it back up. They played like that for a little as I watched, debating whether I should get up and take her place like a “good mom” or allow them to continue.

Her girls tired of the playground and wanted to swing, and though they were plenty old to push themselves, she readily got up and went to push them. They were laughing, legs intertwined and facing sideways into a banana split, and she pushed them back and forth as they squealed.

I didn’t suspect anything yet.

My kids wanted to swing now, too, of course, so I situated them in the bucket swings and gave them a push alongside the other mom. And that’s when I first caught a whiff of it drifting by on the wind. The smell of urine. I didn’t immediately connect it to them, but then I noticed it each time they were near.

As she swayed back and forth with each shove of the swing, she asked if we lived close by. She lived in walking distance, too. She talked about summer and the start of school, which is all in the realm of normal mommy conversation, but I began to notice a strangeness in her movements. A kind of jerky, twitchy, awkward thing. It was mirrored by her seemingly compulsive style of speech and lax personal boundaries.

And then I realized, although it was a cool evening in July, she was in a long-sleeved sweater, jeans, and shoes instead of sandals. Everyone else was comfortably dressed in summer attire from head to toe. It’s the addicts, thin or even emaciated from the poison coursing through their veins—the very thing that is psychologically necessary to sustain them is, in fact, stealing their very life out from under them—who dress for an imaginary winter nobody can feel but them.

As her girls grew bored, she hopped up off the bench and suggested a game of follow the leader, and the girls filed in line behind her. They invited my kids to play, too, but the only response they received was a few blank stares.

She started marching across the playground, climbing over the stairs and ducking under the slides before weaving through the swings and finishing off her turn by going round and round and round the few pine trees in the park before rescinding her role.

“You’re a better mom then I!” I relented to her as I sat on my bench and observed, feeling pregnant as could be after the week of a heat wave we experienced. But was she, I wondered?

On one hand I admired her willingness to jump right in and play with her kids. Playing isn’t really my thing, but I did my time thrusting the rubber bucket, while tiny feet dangled effortlessly in the evening breeze, and I tossed the tennis ball up the slide to my son more times then I really cared to. On the other hand, I wondered what the inside of one’s house must be like if everyone who lives there walks out the front door smelling like a middle school boys bathroom.

With kids there is an awesome type of filth that comes from a day spent outside under nothing but the blue sky in the summer. Knees grass-stained, fingernails grubby, little feet with a ring of dirt around the bottom, and head full of sand. I always wonder, when we go out in the evenings after a day like this, if the people we come in contact with will think my children are neglected. Frankly, I figure there’s no point in changing their filthy clothes until bath time, because it’s not just the clothes that are filthy. Maybe that’s just me.

But these poor girls… They were a different kind of filthy. The kind that doesn’t just have the spills and stains from today on pink shorts, but the grime from yesterday and the day before, too. Maybe even all week. The kind of dirty that has an accident in bed at night and doesn’t have a clean pair of clothes to change into. The kind of dirt and sweat on faces that has blended into what looks like a tan after probably days of not bathing.

When I was young and thought I was utterly invincible, I would ask people what drug they would do if they had to choose. I, of course, picked the riskiest one I could think of, which was heroin, despite my always-existent fear of needles. I know now that given the right cocktail of pain, loss, circumstance, anger and fear, people are capable of anything. In our soul of souls, I think we are all a lot worse then we would ever dare to imagine.

But even still, the pit of addiction is one that I don’t ever care to have to climb out of; so thus far, I haven’t been tempted to jump in. And heroin of all things—it leaves a trail of destruction and ruined lives in its wake. I wouldn’t go as far as to say I’d never go there, because I think that type of ignorance is just foolish, and I’ll be the first one to admit that I enjoy me some wine. Sometimes a little too much. But that cross, that self-imposed thorn in my flesh, is not one I’d ever like to bear.

Yet, there she is in front of me. The product of those choices in the flesh. And I wonder how she does it—be a mom—day in and day out. Parenting is a bitch most of the time as it is, let alone with a layer of addiction on top. What you thought would be the icing on the cake, the sweet, melt-in-your-mouth escape from reality, ends up weighing you down, trapping you in the gooey muck that is now your mess of a life, and the once buttery richness has lost all its flavor. How do you survive there?

I guess part of me admires her for showing up. For swinging her kids with her twitching hands and awkward conversation, for ducking down and following them around the pine tree, again and again. For, when one daughter asked, after she had to be dizzy from all the spinning, “is this fun mom???”

And her saying enthusiastically, “Yes!”

October 28: Write 31 Days: The Discipleship that is Motherhood

Sometimes the best kind of discipleship--

the vessel that lays down ones life

and instead takes up His--

is the kind in which you have no choice.

I suppose there's always a choice,

but in vocations like Motherhood

you can't send the children back, 

as much as you want to some days.

It's a forcible dying to self before

the child even enters the world.

The change of diet and drinking habits, 

of sleeping and bathroom breaks.

It's a loss of modesty in the mess 

of it all, in the casting of your body 

aside to give life to another.

Life that changes yours forever.

It's sacrificed sleep and sanity, too,

to care for the sweet babe.

Feeding schedules, dirty diapers 

and more consume your life.

Their needs first; your needs last.

More experienced moms say that

this too shall pass, but in the trenches

of long days it's hard to understand.

The self does not go willingly but

Flails and stomps and storms about.

Even mothers have an inner toddler who

Could use to learn a lesson or two.

Over time you realize the joy that comes

with serving others first. The love and 

satisfaction that comes in frequent bursts.

And you slowly start to conceive that

The "important" things you cared about 

don't really matter all that much.

Because new life always springs from 

the One who was broken for us.

The Secret to Living Big in This Life

Live simply so others may simply live. {Ghandi}

We were all sitting around the dinner table the other night, sausage sandwiches and macaroni and cheese strewn about on mismatched plates.

"These new chairs are so comfortable!" my son exclaims.

He brought them in off the front porch that night and placed them neatly around the table, willingly and without complaint. We really needed more kitchen chairs, and these happened to be free.

After a painful series of "Doubles" addition YouTube videos finished, we talked about school and upcoming events, among other things. 

"These new chairs are awesome! They are soo comfortable!" my son exclaims, again.

I chuckle and, leaning over to my husband, whisper, "I love that he shares our low standards."

And we both laughed. 

The "new" chairs, comfortable as they may be, are clearly old church chairs of some kind. They were going to be thrown out but instead have a second chance at life in our home. Far from glamorous, they are functional and fill a void we were lacking. We may reupholster them, but part of me wonders if it's even worth it, because the kids are going to ruin them either way.

As I glance around the room, I note that our current kitchen table was also free, as was the one before it. The end tables and most of the furniture in our living room were given to us by one person or another, and so were most of the items in the bedrooms upstairs.

What dawned on me that night at the dinner table was kids don't care about that kind of stuff. They're just happy to have a seat to sit on, bonus points if it happens to be a comfortable one. Their small hearts don't naturally reside there--it's parents and the culture at large that feed them the myth that it should.

It starts at a young age with well-meaning parents who want to bless their children and give them the world. They unconsciously set the expectations. They groom their standard of "normal." It continues as families settle down in nice little suburban developments or country designer homes, watching every summer as Mr. Smith down the road gets a tractor upgrade or as Bob across the street sets up increasingly spectacular light displays with each passing Christmas. 

It's the unspoken competition for the fanciest parties, the most well-manicured yard, the highest achieving children. It's the road map for success on this side of things that tells school-aged children they must go to college, hop the escalator to the career fastback, buy a home and car tricked out with all the latest stuff, and retire at 50 in order to have a happy and successful life. 

But I wonder in this mad dash to have it all, to achieve the American Dream regardless of the cost, financial or otherwise--and there's always a cost--if we've missed the secret to living big in this life.

Living big outwardly--whether it be bigger houses, bigger vacations, bigger bank accounts, bigger storage units, bigger yachts--doesn't yeild a bigger heart. It doesn't yield a bigger attitude of gratitude or a bigger appreciation for the people in your life. The only thing it's probably guaranteed to yield is a bigger desire for more.

Because the secret to really living big, living Life that is Truly Life, is actually living small.

Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? {Matthew 16:24-26}

What if, instead of pursuing bigger homes or flat screen tv's, we pursued bigger hearts?

What if, instead of striving for promotions, we sought to promote the needs of others above our own, consciously choosing to live small, below our means, in order to give the rest away?

What if we exchanged the hurry and stress of a full schedule of activities for simple, quality time with those we love? A game of catch in the backyard between a father and son instead of a season of half-hearted games under the glare of the sweltering sun? Dance parties in the kitchen instead of skipping family meals in order to make it to dance class several times a week? And, dare I say it, devotions around the dining room table as a family from time to time instead of dropping the children off to learn from someone else every Wednesday night?

What if we spent half as much time focusing inward on the health of the small, fist-sized organ in our chest as we do on the outward appearance of our person, home, career, and children?

Sometimes small really is big. Sometimes less really is more. Less to clean, less to manage. Less to fight over, less to lose. Less to organize, less to pay off. Less to heat, less to cool, less to maintain. Less to fuss about, less to control.

Less in some areas naturally leaves room for more in others. 

I guess the question to leave us with today would be, where is the extra room in your life?

October 21: Write 31 Days: To Live Within Your Means

I had most of the bin filled with off-season clothes already when I noticed the old label on the side.

Boy clothes.

How many years have passed since I printed that neat, white label on my handy organizing must-have, only to have misplaced it all these years later somewhere in the abyss of unpacked boxes in the basement. How many other bins of clothes have since been sloppily thrown together and tossed to the side to be rummaged through again the next season in equal haste.

Once upon a time, much like a nice little fairy tale, I used to be organized. A place for everything and everything had a place, with labels to boot. I cleaned my house weekly and completed tedious "extra" tasks, such as vacuuming couches and stairs, regularly. There were meal plans and menu boards, and upon reading the yummy list of options for the week, friends would say, "I'm eating at your house!"

About three children into this whole motherhood thing, the scales tipped against the camaraderie I had with the noble pursuit of organization. Really, it was probably after the second kid, when I stood home alone for long and weary days, desperately outnumbered and reduced to a pile of tears or sheer numbness by tiny humans barely three feet tall.

It wasn't that I no longer wanted to be organized, that I didn't want my days to run smoothly. I was one person now stretched three ways thin. Then four ways thin, and now soon to be five. It was the simple realization that a mother of four, or certainly five, cannot perform in the same capacity as a mother of one. The freeing conclusion that, for a mother of four, priorities were simply not the same as they were with one.

As the seasons of our lives shift seamlessly as summer does to fall, as the families under our roof grow and change, we need to learn anew how to live within our means. As humans, as women, as mothers.

Not our financial means, although that certainly does play a role, but I'm speaking more of our physical, emotional and mental means. Because those change with time, and it's okay.

For many years I strove to achieve this ideal image of a stay-at-home wife and mother. For myself, mostly. I thought my house should look a certain way, that my children should behave a certain way at all times. The pressure I put on myself was intense, and I would feel incredibly guilty if I yelled at my children or didn't manage to keep up with every task at home like I thought I should.

And while there may be some type A+ people who can keep up with mopping floors and washing bedding and dusting crevices and whatever else on a weekly basis, I finally had to face the reality that it's just not me.

For me, sustaining those demands is not living within my means. Because I became a very angry, resentful person when I tried to do so. I sacrificed quality time with my kids for clean floors, traded good communication with my husband for a thorough deep-cleaning, and exchanged the calmness of letting go for the stress of keeping up.

If you want to know the truth, I'm actually on the I-can't-remember-the-last-time-I-mopped-my-floors cleaning schedule now. Contrary to popular germaphobe propaganda, you will not, in fact, keel over and die from dirty floors. Or bedsheets. Or bathrooms. Just in case you were wondering.

Life that is truly life isn't found in striving towards an imaginary ideal or comparing your life to someone else. It exists in the freedom of being enough exactly as you are. Doing what you need to do for yourself and your family in order for you to survive, and on a good day, even thrive. And that will look different for everyone, because Lord knows we all function at a different capacity.

As needs change, so do priorities. A friend of mine mentioned over the summer that she had been up until 1:00am scrubbing her toddler's muddy shoes clean.

Girl, please.

I laughed to myself as I thought about the pile of muddy shoes that have been sitting by our side door for months. In fact, they're still there today. Ain't nobody got time for that. Seeing as how a colony of spiders has apparently moved in, the only place they're going now is the garbage can.

Priorities. That's good enough for me.