uncharted waters

 (or, "in search of a growth chart")


I was lying on our bed this evening, cooling off after supper in the relative quiet of the upstairs, out of earshot of my two dishwashers pretending to be a rather chatty Mary & Laura Ingalls, waiting for my Farmer to emerge from a post-work, pre-board-meeting shower, thinking restless and unhappy thoughts.

I usually fill the gaps in my day, I realized, cramming them full of facebook and email and virtual community, stuffing my brain with Christian how-to books, or even the Bible.  As I lay there, waiting, gaps wide open for once, all this agitated discontent began oozing out from where I had pushed it beneath the surface.

I'm still hungry, but nothing appeals to me,  I thought.  I've got no motivation, and nothing I want to do anyway.  I'm wasting my life.  I could almost hear the subliminal whining:  "I'm booooored."

I don't know what's expected of me, exactly, but I'm pretty sure I'm not measuring up.

Did I do enough today?  I saw the optometrist this morning, meted out chores & played trains, listened to a sermon and a TED talk, baked cornbread (from scratch, because boxes don't get points, do they?), cleaned out the inbox, weeded a couple of flowerbeds, mailed a package at the post office, baked tilapia & boiled green beans ..... is this enough?  What's enough?

Does eating superfluous chocolate (and is there really any other kind?) cancel out the "from scratch" points?  Does spending time on facebook delete my weeding points?  How does it work?  How will I know if I'm doing it right??

Granted, a coughing Lil' Snip has kept me from getting much sleep the past few nights.  So my thinking might be the slightest bit warped.

But I'm lonely.  Unsatisfied with how I've "turned out" so far.  Aching to know that I matter, somewhere.

------------------------------------------------------------------

Awhile back I started a post I titled "DIY disease" in which I began to enumerate my many "from scratch" loves, from cooking to gardening to pottery.  I love to create, so much so that it's often hard for me to purchase something because the idea of making it myself is so tantalizing .... !

And then, too, there's the "should" element:  if I could make it myself .... then I should make it myself.

It was beginning to occur to me that my DIY fever didn't end with home decor and baked goods.  It had become invasive, encroaching even into my spiritual life:  It was crowding out grace.

I never finished that post.  I didn't know how.  There's been no neat ending in my life, and none in sight now.  I re-read my own words on grace, and perfectionism, and I sigh and nod, and still haven't conquered it.  Will I ever, this side of heaven?

So there's no growth chart for this, for these uncharted waters I swim through, no way to measure my progress.  I grew up on grades and "good job" and I don't know how to be enough, just being loved.  (am I?  I want to ask, am I?)

Other writers I love write of courage and positive action (showing up, doing the next right thing) and I despise my wallowing and still I wallow.

Where's the way out??

Just today, on facebook of all places, a friend reminded me of the words of one of my favorite authors, Ann Voskamp, on writing out her God-gifts:  "Because the picking up of a pen isn't painful and ink can be cheap medicine.  And I just might live."

So there's the way out, or at least through, once again:  to list them, all the day's joy-moments and eye-brighteners and spirit-lifters, to just write them all down after the post that doesn't end neatly no matter what, to just give thanks:


for healthy eyes, despite innocently overworn contacts

for my Farmer, who does know how to just be

for all those blue glass yardsale jars, washed so eagerly by Nice

for the wind outside, blowing my hair, cooling my skin

for the weeds, yanked out so cleanly and easily with
     those colorful new gloves

for a simple supper we always love

for sisters happy to play with each other and Lil' Snip

for hope, somehow peeking through

for God, patient in His all-knowing

for those tiny kittens, handful of helpless fur

for tea

for toast
(and yes, for chocolate)

for you, who read my words and care enough to come back

for those I know who mourn, that it will be turned to joy (Lord, let it be soon)

for all the ways God speaks to me ...
      in music, 
      in the creative process, 
      in beauty,
      in His creation,
      in His Word, and the words of His children

for air to breathe

for a wealth of flowers, His perennial gift to me



"But you, 
             O Lord, 
                       are a shield around me, 
          my glory, 
                      and the lifter of my head."

                                                                                                                Psalm 3:3

to be a mother

crocheted white lace placemat.

aqua glass of white-bell'd lily-of-the-valley.

smiles.

homemade cards.

"'oooh' over MINE, Mommy!"

eggs they made, and toast, and coffee.

the gift of 'go.'

a parking-lot pause, to breathe.

sun-filled car & friend.

drumbeats, goatskin under palms.

mushroom and goat cheese and spinach between bread.

downpour.

coffee again, and calories just because.

fingering all that beauty - beads & cloth & stone & wood.

talking lost & found, conflict & surrender.

home.

quiet.

breathe in.

hugs.

gingerbread pig dough and supper soup to make, and letting them stir.

bed made up with fresh sheets, by daughters.

ducks outside (mostly) where they belong.

piano music to Spanish crooning.

contentment.

I am a mother.  Somehow, they love me, those little people whose lives depend on mine for so much.  Somehow they forgive my faults, and - oh God! - forget them, besides.  They say I'm fun, and cheerful, and pretty and they truly see that in me.  These are gifts I never deserved, never thought to ask for.  

I've learned about God's love by watching Him form it in me for those little ones, growing so fast into what He made them to be.  What I didn't know was that He's also teaching me about His love .... by loving me through them.

and to top it all off, a rainbow after supper, interrupting dishes and baths-to-be.

Happy Mothers' Day 

to all of you who mother.

focus

I've had a sore throat for over a week.  I'd had enough by day three, when I lost my voice.  Waking myself up at night coughing did nothing to improve my attitude.  Despite leading a talk on home remedies at our moms' group earlier this winter, I could not kick this cold.

It's Monday, after a full Easter.  My throat still hurts, and I'm drowning in hormones and breaking the yoke in my egg brought the tears this morning and boy, do I want to wallow.

But it's sunny outside, a glorious 50 degrees, and the Brandenburg concertos chirp exhortingly from the livingroom.  My son is bringing me Lego cars, and towers he's built for me.

It's time to re-focus.


Count them with me?

1- daffodils

2- bluebells!!

3 - sunshine & WARMTH

4 - in his own words:  "My stuffy nose is getting better, Mommy!"

5 - a flat tire, noticed close to home instead of halfway there

6 - that a cancelled meeting means a nap for me

7 - the first day of our spring break!!

8 - a filmy scarf from Italy (handed-down)

9 - my husband, calling from work

10 - hot tea for my throat

11 - a prayer for me

12 - one for a friend

13 - courage to ask about crowns

14 - a line-up of Lego creations, all made for me!

15 - his precision in naming colors, already

16 - that color exists!

17 - Glennon being brave on the Today show

18 - anticipating a "drop-in"  :)

19 - curly garlic

20 - tiny bare toes

21 - a boy who asks for snuggles

22 - sisters

23 - laughter

24 - Southern Comfort for a cold (?)

25 - colored glass

26 - shoes for all their feet

27 - wool yarn

28 - crayon art

29 - embroidered tea towels

30 - wooden cutting board

31 - brilliant smile of a cancer-fighting friend

32 - indigo, aquamarine, teal, cobalt, french navy - all the blues

33 - buttercup, sunshine, tangerine, Kubota - all the yellowy oranges

34 - Isaiah, running pell-mell toward the trashcan:  

"I've a fuzzy!! Catch 'im, catch 'im!!"

Well, my throat still hurts, but my heart is happier for the hunting.  God always does show up.

"You will seek me and find me 

when you seek me with all your heart."  

Jeremiah 29:13

the last gift

Seven months ago, I started a list. 

Twenty-six pages of my composition book later, I am loathe to end it.  I have listed, in the last 200-some days, nine hundred and ninety-nine gifts:  noticings, lifted up from the ordinary into glowing shafts of gratitude, till their origins are obvious:  they are good and perfect gifts, showered down on me from the Father of lights, gift after gift after gift.

Seeing each gift required a stopping.  A stillness.  A savoring so difficult to come to
in life's swirling current.  Each gift was an island of quiet.  

They didn't come gift-wrapped.  No bows to alert my attention.
Some days I wrote nothing down; I never stopped to see.

Other days, craving more proofs of His love, I'd stop a long while
and write out a dozen or more.  I averaged four or five a day.  

How many did I miss, intent on other things?

: : :

My gratitude goes on, whether the list does, or not.
Maybe I'll just stop at #999, to leave room, always, for one more.

He gives more grace

He really does.

My ears had heard all they could hear.  The older children were happy-loud, and I was thankful for their health, but they had recovered not just their health but some of their bad habits as well, and I was too tired to do anything about it.  (I know, I know, I'm not supposed to admit that.  It was, however, the unfortunate truth.)

So I put earplugs in.  And issued a 10-minute whispers-only break-for-mama's-ears.  And prayed for strength to minister to the tiniest one, so grouchy from no sleep, wanting to be independent but wanting the comfort of mama more.

I showed him books.  I played trucks.  I played puzzles.  I tried and tried to understand his pidgin English.  So frustrated, he was, when mama didn't understand those almost-words.

I loved him.

I didn't have it in me.

To my utmost gratitude, God did.  And in His love and mercy, once more He provided, loaning some from His bottomless well of love and mercy to bereft me.

: : :

The little one's in bed now, and my earplugs are out.  Sugar, Spice, and Everything Nice are playing Memory on the kitchen table (at Daddy's "suggestion" after the rough-housing in the livingroom turned nasty).  They are mostly kind to each other.

Forgiveness is a valuable skill, too.  And tomorrow is another day.

: : :

[the list I didn't make, last week while I worried ... ]


# 533 - 543
         
           His faithfulness to forgive my sin

           His power, when I ask


           the warming wintry sun

           courtesy of a hunter, a stranger to us

           the deermeat he offered - God bless him for his generosity!!

           a child's prayer for success, answered

           a friend from long ago, buying my pottery with smiles

           

           all those teddy bears, even unsold

           rescue of one of God's precious children

            

           my Farmer, humbled to serve us

           a true power nap on my favorite "pillow"

rainy day thanks

When it's sunny and the children are cheerful and the husband is home and the floors are clean and time lasts longer than the to-do list, it's easy to be thankful, it flows effortless as springwaters after rainfall.

But it doesn't bless me like being thankful does when the rains have been scarce and the spring has dried up to a trickle.

Today, with tight schedule made tighter by bowing to Lil' Snip's needs, with heart heavy from one sister's careless cruel words to another, with eyes aching from sleep I didn't get, with dark skies out my window instead of sunshine ... today it blesses me to be thankful.

I will be thankful ...

... for my Farmer, willing to do the uncomfortable thing because it benefits someone else, the hard thing because it's right.

... that a nap is helping Lil' Snip's enormous grouchiness, even though it complicates my plans for the day.

... that my family defied my expectations and liked those chicken hearts, actually preferred them to maple syrup on their waffles!!

... for that look of love he gives me, still.

... for a daughter's rush of remorse over her unkindness.

... for hard pretzels and leftover cheese fondue.

... for hard cider, so sweet & uncomplicated

... that when the sewing machine wouldn't, it wasn't for a necessary project.

... for the longday ache and knowing that bedtime is coming.

... for a really good garlic dill pickle.

... for a choice to not be offended.

And I thank my Creator, who does all things well, that in his generous wisdom he commands me to be thankful in everything, knowing that the thanking will bless me even more than the blessings themselves.

thanking in the week ...

Some days the thanking comes harder than others.  Some days I don't even want to thank.  There is something sinful in me that wants to wallow, sometimes, something that shrinks whining from the light of the freedom that gratitude brings, and wants only to peer into the dark.

I'm on my fourth child.  Many have borne more than me, in quantity and "quality", if you know what I mean.  I wouldn't dare to try to claim that I've the heaviest load to bear.  But for me, for now, this load is some days all that I can carry - more than I can carry.  And I forget, sometimes, Him on whose shoulders the government rests, who offers to bear the load with me, to share the yoke, to catch my tossed-on-him cares, to care for me and give me rest for my soul.

I forget.

It was one of those days today.  The fourth child is birthing his own fourth, an eyetooth.  Stubbornly sensitive, lingering, that pearly little gem will not emerge.  The tender bud that will be gets in the way of everything he wants to chew: toast, beloved apples, even cheese.  Understandably, he resents that.  Unfortunately, he resents it loudly.  Unrelentingly.  Even in the middle of the night.

I don't know how many times we heard him last night.  At first, forgetting how it works with him, we went to him, all sympathy and warm comfort.  He hushed to our caresses ... until we laid him down.  How he wailed.  No one had e're been wronged like he had.  To be left alone!  In flannel-sheeted crib with special plush blanket!  (Compared to Mama's arms, it was a hardship).

By morning we were wearied, equally from his whining wails as from lack of sleep.  Some "extra" hour we'd had.

But gamely we pulled ourselves together and went to church.  All teary-prone, my "fine" fooled no one, and a few listened with sympathy to tales of teething, and remembered.

Later, when I had rested, I flipped some pages in my notebook and pen in hand began to think.  In all my weariness and utter, pathetic lack, what is there to be thankful for?

God's always good:  there's always something (usually more).  Here's what I found, today, bleary-eyed (and wanting only what I couldn't have: cease of pain):


391 - sympathetic ears

392 - hope for a new day tomorrow (and a better night tonight!)

393 - teachings of truth

394 - their delight in braided loaf, with butter and cheese

395 - long afternoon of quiet

396 - wealth of persimmons, overflowing baskets despite the birds

397 - the good-humored chuckle amidst all that whining

398 - wooden puzzles

399 - pampas grass swaying, shining silken in the sun

400 - sunlit life

401 - smart-alecky husband (but you're right, dear, I wouldn't want you any other way!)

402 - wool sweaters and afternoon coffee

403 - an outside for them to play in!

404 - "this too shall pass"


(my own refrain of praise, from #1 till now ....)

repeatable pleasures

[dug from the depths of the unpublished, forgotten archives, just for today, another overcast soporific day, great for napping....]

I'm still groggy.

That's right, I had such a crazy deep nap on such a crazy perfect napping day that I woke up with absolutely no idea what day it was.  I love that.

When Sugar came down from quiet time and asked to snuggle with me, I realized that I had just spent the better part of two hours unconscious of my surroundings.

It's overcast and drippy without actually (to my somnolent knowledge, anyway) raining.  It's the first really cold day of fall.  Add that to two nights out with the family and a serious need for sleep catchup and you have the ideal conditions for a knock-em-dead middle-of-the-day nap.

I'm so grateful for variety.  If every day were sunny, when would I nap?  If every day were cloudy, when would I click into gear and get productive?  (of course, the two are sometimes reversed....)

: :

other pleasures, from my refrain of praise....


# 265 - that little indomitable fellow, heart of my heart


# 269 - grey-green caterpillar, a find

# 270 - another walk through Big

# 271 - another sweeping sky

# 273 - shrunken sweater stitched into smiling bear

# 274 - a neighborly chat in a farm lane

# 275 - tucking persimmons into trespassing stranger's cupholder

# 277 - reconnecting, a thin thread

# 280 - stacks & shelves of books, for the reading

# 282 - pendant raindrops on crepe myrtle seed pods

Sunday best

I rose from a much-needed nap, chilled after being too warm.  Spotting sunbeams, I opened the back porch door and soaked in the shine, dazed by the brightness and still groggy.

It warmed me as it woke me:  slowly.

I took in the view, familiar, and always fresh.  Drenched in golden beams of afternoon, it all looked haloed.  The grass, so green it glowed, was not just lawn to mow, but jewel-toned food for eyes.  All the leaves and trunks of trees were edged in brilliance.

The night before a daughter asked a Daddy why we wear our Sunday best to church.  I didn't catch the answer, but looked around me now, engulfed in golden warmth, and saw a Sunday best that's not just saved for Sunday, but daily on display to feed my soul with beauty.

And the gifts just keep coming, heedless of season (outside or in my heart), pouring into my lap like love ....

: :

# 225 - that my Farmer bathes the crying one now
# 226 - his sacrificial love for me
# 227 - ethnic food, most 'specially (today) flan and Tanzanian chicken curry
# 228 - sun-warmed skin
# 229 - a needed nap
# 230 - a golden evening
# 231 - an extra minute with my Farmer over breakfast
# 232 - a new kitten - serendipitous!

perspective for a Monday

I walked along a riverside park today, newly healed from flooding.

I passed a tree, tipped over on its side, roots to the air and trailing branches in the current. It would not die: all along its trunk it sported sprouts, green hope that willed itself to live.

Where waters rushed the grass the ground was rough. My shoes would stick. I walked more slowly there, the grandeur round me lost for sake of footing; my eyes were down, saw mud and barely-clinging grasses new with spunk. The arching oaks above I did not see – till roughness past, I raised my eyes once more and knew my state. So like life I laughed – how roughness narrows vision, and all I see is churned-up soil, roiling and stumbledy with rocks. To see the beauty, then, I have to stop. I can't look up if I keep on, when I'm on tumbledy ground. I have to stop, or stumble on unseeing.

"Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of God."  Hebrews 12:2

But then! to look above the roughness and see far for once! A sense of smallness I didn't know I sought comes rushing in, a comfort. The trees are tall, have been here since before my eyes saw light. The rivers' banks will still be here when I'm no more. The water came from far and does not notice me before it passes by for parts unseen. It never hurries.

Some geese, distraught at my approach, honked their distress. Not wanting enmity, I found a bench to put their minds at ease (& mine). I watched the river, saw raindrops twinkling at the edge. The image given back was smeared, impressionistic. No bankside tree was clear in all those raindrops. A single drop would alter it but little; the multitude obscured the whole reflection.

"Now we see but a poor reflection as in a [bronze] mirror; then we shall see face to face.  Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known."  I Corinthians 13:12

Again, like life. The kitchen floor, the dishes, all the laundry piling up, the crying kid, the supper not yet planned – heap up like teardrops in my vision, keeping me from seeing clear the simple truth: they need my love.

Just love.

Just stop on stumbledly ground; look up into his Face and feel my smallness. The universe is on His shoulders, not on mine. I'm His and He will carry me. He was, and is, and always will be Here and Now: I AM's his name. Let God be God and I'll just be His child. Look up, and faith (my hand in His) will keep my feet for sure.

[adding to my refrain of praise....]

# 186 - a day off, and its potential

# 187 - (nostalgia)  the smell of fall's first heat:  hot dust

# 188 - chill air (again!)

# 189 - a friend who skips, and listens

# 190 - raindrops twinkling rivers' edge

# 191 - the maples, bit with color

# 192 - that whorl in bark, and wrinkling down to roots

# 193 - the sound of raindrops on my roof

thanking in the week

How easy it is sometimes to be grateful. This week is a particularly easy one to thank in – we're vacationing from home this week, and looking forward to all manner of enjoyment together.

Up for consideration: cheese-making, tent-sleeping, hammock-napping, campfire-sitting, woods-stomping, mushroom-hunting, comforter-quilting, railroad-riding, restaurant-eating, paper-making, movie-watching, cookie-baking, bike-riding, and story-reading, along with a healthy dose of the mundane (floor-sweeping, rug-shaking, grocery-shopping, dishes-washing, diaper-changing, and even dentist-going.)

I am eager for all of it, though, just for the togetherness of it. Somehow, preparing a meal for a family that is all right here is joy a few significant notches higher than when one very important member is gone all day.

My special beauties collected already, since Friday:

# 119 – excited whispers of sleeping-bagged daughters

# 118 - “head-rattling” hard pretzels and hot spice tea

# 117 – saying “yes”

# 116 - crickets for sleepsong after months of fans

# 115 – white muslin curtains on dark, scrolled rods

# 114 - hymns in the dark

# 113 - campfire's embers: sunset in ashes

# 112 - his first s'more

# 111 - that the list so quickly lengthens

# 110 - buttered toast with daughters around dim table, delicious!

# 109 - Lil' Snip glistening drool, agape in wonder at cold, and first sneakers, and fleece hoodie, and pecans on the driveway, just right for little fists

# 108 - the daughters playing school when I give them the day off!

# 107 - all four sleeping in for once!

# 106 - the Word, mine for the reading

# 105 - pulling on socks again

# 104 - air cool to make me thankful for four walls

# 103 - getting up anyway

Oh yeah. This week's an easy one.  Care to share your own gifts in the comments?  Small or large, easy or hard, each one drops from His loving hand....

Gratitude opens our eyes to truth and strengthens our arms for the burdens of life.

5 minutes on joy

[the parameters:  Gypsy Mama supplies the topic, writers type an unedited five minutes, add button, & publish.  enjoy!]

::

Joy, huh?

Joy is my middle name, the ironic birthright, since joy is what I often lack and seldom think I give.  I'm getting glimpses, though.

I've always looked around me for the happy things, the little beauties.  One Thousand Gifts gave me a structure for my habit, and disciplining it is helping, dosing me with joy, with slow-down, with how-to-thank-for-sharp-things.

So joy is choosing.  Whatever is right, whatever is true, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - to find these traits in everything, and think on them.  The ugly is so obvious, sometimes.  The admirable takes some searching, but always worth the hunt.

Joy when the baby whines - that he can, that he's here, that he's not always whining.

Joy when the husband's late - that he works, that he called, that it's home he's coming to, and not away.

Joy when the daughters fight - that they love, deep down, that they listen when I admonish, that they care enough to fight.

Joy when friends are silent - that they're there, still, for me to touch, that they forgive, that we forget and move on.

Joy when supper burns and my temper flies away again - that we have food, that God gives grace, that life goes on and tomorrow is a new day, a fresh start, a clean slate, "with no mistakes written on it yet."

....the five minutes fled.

thanking in the week.....

September 11, 2011

Starting the night before to get my Monday off on the right foot, I mentally gather my blessings and jot them down:

1) homemade bread, with butter

2) the skill and desire for (and delight in) making it

3) sharp knives to cut it with (well worth the summer week of college spent selling Cutco)

4) that I married into butter and not margarine!

5) open windows admitting cooling air

6) a laptop after years of being tethered to the desk

7) crickets and their universal song, reminding me of other nights, far away and long ago

8) my children's father and his gentle love for them

9) (also his mischievousness and love of fun)

10) (yes, even his tendency to exploit the gullibility trusting nature of his wife)

11) the simple pleasure of weaving glossy thread into girlish circlets

12) that our tv mostly lives up high and out of sight

13) the braided rug a century old bought from his grandma, nearly a century herself this year

14) the heritage we have, of trust in God

15) good books that give a glimpse into others' lives

16) giggles of a toddler

17) selflessness of the youngest sister

18) that sweeping the porch can be a fun privilege, the first times

And off I go to (19) my dry, unflooded bed to sleep with my Farmer, under (20) the wool comforter I took five years to make from squares of pale linen and rich earthy colors. Good night, sweet dreams, and feel free to drop a comment with some of your own “1000 gifts....”

Gratitude opens our eyes to truth and strengthens our arms for the burdens of life.