After all that....but before anything else

It's been a tough month around here.  There's been drama.  And I have felt a heaviness.  The initial freedom of casting off from the moorings has given way to a different sort of weight.  A weight of all the responsibility without breaks: Single Motherhood.  Maybe even a little depression.  And a good dose of ugliness on the part of certain people, including, sometimes, myself.

Admittedly, I've also hit busyness.  Not "business."  No, busy-ness; the kind of "busy" that doesn't stop.  It's like, "The holidays are over, now get back to the insane-busy schedule of having four children."  Since the family kinda fell apart just before the holidays, nothing was "normal."  But I suddenly realized last night that we only have one unscheduled night a week now--and even that's about to go away, once the spring sports hit.  I guess that's "normal."  But I'm hating normal.  I'm hankering for an early midlife crisis (Hey, I'm only 34, so I've been informed it's "too early" for a real one!) where I don't run the suburban rat race.

So as the busyness has increased, and people observe that we appear to be "back to normal," I'm again encountering the dreaded "How are you?" question.   But I, frankly, feel a little "stuck."  Elizabeth Corcoran posted an essay about not knowing how to answer the question, "How are you?" and I found I resonated with her thoughts.  In my comments, I mentioned that what I really feel like saying is something like,

"Well, everything looks OK on the outside, but it's not.  So, I'd hate to say, 'Great!' Because I'm not! But I can't very well say, 'Well, I'm past that stage where I literally couldn't sleep at night; where I was on the verge of panic attacks; where I couldn't see a road ahead; where I couldn't feel the sunshine. Yeah. I'm a bit past all that now, most days, at least.  Now, I'm pretty much in a phase called--'After all that, but before anything else.'  That's how I am."

Sunday Serenity: Hope

Hope is a funny thing, isn't it?  It's usually such a good word.  But it's a real be-yotch when you've been putting your hope in something that doesn't work out.  I mean, if you've really been putting your hope in it; in an all-your-eggs-in-one-basket sort of way.  The funny thing is, I rarely realize I'm doing that, until all my hope comes crashing down, and it hits me, "Uh, I had no Plan B."  That's when I know I've done it, but usually not before.

Now, I know that the problem isn't hope, in an of itself.  It's what I put my hope in.  And that's usually my own best-laid plans.  And those plans usually involve some variation of:

[Maximum Happiness + Minimum Pain = My Master Plan] 

It's usually followed up with some sort of prayer to sanctify it, such as, "Oh please! Oh, please! Oh, please, God!  Make this be Your plan!!!! And Thy will be done and all that too.  Amen."  If I was Catholic, I might throw some Holy Water in the direction of this "hope."  And then I'd call it a day, and go about my business. 

Until it doesn't work out.

Then, I go back to God and ask, "What happened?  Why did You mess up the plan we'd agreed upon?"  (Actually, usually I try to weasel my way into going back to bed and hiding under the covers, but that, thankfully, doesn't usually work out.)  And then, if I'm lucky, I might finally hear that still, small voice.  And I start to get an inkling of the fact that I've been putting my hope in something other than the right thing.  Actually, something other than the right person.  'Cause I know He doesn't let me down. 

My hope is built on nothing less,

Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly trust in Jesus’ Name.

Refrain:

On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand;
All other ground is sinking sand.

When darkness seems to hide His face,
I rest on His unchanging grace.
In every high and stormy gale,
My anchor holds within the veil.

Refrain

His oath, His covenant, His blood,
Support me in the whelming flood.
When all around my soul gives way,
He then is all my Hope and Stay.

Refrain

When He shall come with trumpet sound,
Oh may I then in Him be found.
Dressed in His righteousness alone,
Faultless to stand before the throne.

On Christ the Solid Rock I Stand by Avalon

Hugs, Ruthie

Cherishing the Moments

She cupped my cheeks in her chubby hands and whispered,

"Momma, you da apple of my eye.  I love you."

She is two.  Really.

My baby.  My "Isaac."  My "Joseph."

Two recent posts on Motherhood had me, in turns, busting a gut, and then feeling (somewhat) graciously reprimanded.  What do you think? 

Is motherhood just getting through the Chronos, in hopes of the Kairos?

Or is it to be cherished every minute, of every day.  No matter what?

Or is the magic of motherhood, maybe, some of each?  Or, even, both at the same time?

I thank God that whatever it is, there is grace when I miss it, in the midst of the Chronos, and grace that awakens me to those moment of Kairos.

Gotta Get Up

I hope your Christmas day was everything it was meant to be.  Mine was, even if it wasn't everything I thought it should be, it was everything God meant it to be.  And that was pretty glorious.

So we were in the middle of our glorious Christmas morn.  Well, glorious by our standards--which involves a lot of jumping off couches, screams of joy, and general whooping-it-up mayhem, with a little sibling rivalry and "Stop that, or you'll go to your room!" thrown in for good measure.  I've said it before: we're a wild crew.  At some point, we decided to take a break from the present-opening extravaganza (for which I bought almost nothing, yet God deluged us with the most beautiful hand-me-down gifts.)  I baked up a mediocre egg and sausage breakfast casserole, and we congregated around the table. (Note: I didn't say "sat down."  That's out of our league at this point.  Baby steps.)

There was general merriment, as the children discussed the gifts they'd already opened, and the ones they hoped they still might get.  Suddenly, my oldest child blurted out, in all sincerity,

"Hey everybody!  Do you know what my favorite holiday is???


[insert one millisecond of suspenseful silence]


Saint Patrick's Day!  I just love wearing all that green."

I sat dumbfounded for a minute, waiting for a great big "JUST KIDDING!" or some other retraction, but it never came.  He dove right back into his eggs without skipping a beat.  The other kids looked at him cockeyed for a split second, and rolled with it.  (I probably should have rolled with it too, but I tried arguing with him, before I realized, "Why?")

And his left-of-center comment got me thinking.  It got me thinking about myself; about how many times in the midst of God's lavish grace, I totally miss it.  I may not miss it maliciously, but I'm still missing it; missing the gifts God's piled all around me.  Right that very minute.  And I miss it, just because I'm thinking about something else.

It's easy to forget that I'm living the best time of my life right in the midst of the dirty kitchen floor and out-of-control kids.  While thinking about cleaning up and getting the kids "settled down," I forget that the dirty floor and the crazy kids aren't detractions from the dream, they are the dream.

At one of my Al-Anon meetings recently, a woman shared an edgy mantra she'd created for herself during the holidays to help her readjust her expectations: "Kill Norman Rockwell."

"I know, I know, he's already dead," she said.  "But I just have to get it through my head that it's almost never like that, and then if it all somehow works out, I'm just pleasantly surprised."

How much of my life do I spend waiting for Norman Rockwell, when God's blessed me with something very different, yet wonderful?  I can miss the wonder and the joy of the "best days of my life" through nothing more than sheer oblivion, if I'm not careful.  Or, I can miss it, by wishing for something else.  Either way, I can miss the chance for gratitude.

This Christmas could have easily been a time when I felt sorry for myself: "The Christmas after my marriage fell apart," or "My kid's first Christmas without their Dad," or something like that.  Instead, God sent me the message loud and clear that this year, I am to rejoice.  I have so much to be thankful for.  My heart was seared with the realization that life, in and of itself, is to be so treasured.  My eyes opened to see that I am surrounded by others whose hurt and pain is so much greater than my own:

A friend who sat, a hollow shell of her formerly vibrant, free-spirited self at Christmas Eve church service: unable to speak or stand after a recent massive stroke.  Wheelchair bound, she still tried to rouse herself for her favorite carols, but could not.

A lonely family member whose cancer has returned.  In three places.  

A young mother: her 34 year old husband dying of Lymphoma at a nearby hospital.  She, with a two year old daughter: begging for prayers on Christmas Eve night for how to guide her daughter through a final goodbye to her Daddy.  

I am speechless in the face of others' agony.  As I am surrounded by stacks of both literal an figurative gifts, I bow humbly before God.  I beg Him to show me how to treasure up all the blessings He's given me, and hide them in my heart.  Like Mary....

I want to pay attention, and be "present" in the time that God gives me.  I don't want to miss the fact that I'm living amid blessing heaped upon blessing, every morning that I still wake up with the gift of life.   I don't want to miss Christmas Morning, pining away for a paltry St. Patrick's Day.

I "Gotta Get Up" because I do not want to miss it.

Rich Mullins': "Gotta Get Up" about Christmas morning.

P.S.  I have no problem with St. Patrick's Day.  It's a wonderful holiday, in and of itself.  But it's no Christmas morning ;-)

All I Want for Christmas Is......To Get My Own Way

Today, I'm posting a quick thought about something that many of us may be struggling with.

Today, not everything is going my way.

It's Christmas Eve, and I've already had the usual barrage of very NON-holiday-ish child-rearing episodes.  I've already had one or two exchanges with people that were....well.....let's just say less than Baby-Jesus-in-the-Manger-Picture-Perfect.  And, to top it all off, I've had to spend well over an hour on one task that I really didn't plan for today.  It was upsetting.  It was a real downer.  Not what I wanted to be doing.

And I was starting to get mad.  How could I focus on Christ, in the midst of all this??

But you know what? The real question is:  How can I not?

Baby Jesus (and the grown up Jesus) doesn't look at it like I do.  He knows that it's not going to be perfect.  He knows that as I celebrate His amazing arrival, things aren't going to be all set up just right for me to "feel reverent," and "get holy" all of a sudden.  His very coming down was to us here in the muck and mire of our tangled up sin.  Ugly sin.  Killjoy sin.

And today, I'm going to make sure that I don't forget that God knows where I'm at.  Celebrating His birth doesn't have to be picture perfect, and I'm not going to let all the "stuff of earth" cloud my ability to marvel in it--and that includes my own selfish desire to just get my own way.  Even if "all I want for Christmas" is to be able to "focus on Christ," even that can get in the way.  Because although the desire to have a Christ-focused Christmas is a very good thing, turning that desire into an idol, and making it in my own image (It has to look like this!") is a very bad thing.

And letting Jesus come on his own terms is really what I want, after all.  I just tend to forget.

Advent: Waiting for Someone who Loves You

Sometimes I go to Al-Anon.  It's a support network for people in a relationship with an alcoholic.  I'm not actually in a relationship with an alcoholic.  That's not why I go.  I go, 'cause I'm a rebel.  I'm wild like that.  Well, technically I lied.  I do have several alcoholics in my life, but most of them are sober, and have been for years.  (According to Al-Anon and AA, once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic.  Even if you haven't had a drink in years, you're still a "recovering" alcoholic.)  The idea is, the alcoholism still affected me.  And, frankly, I'm pretty sure that's true.  Anyway, that's another long, hairy story.  And we're not doing hairy today.  (So don't look at my legs.)

Today, we're doing uplifting.

Well, the night before Thanksgiving, I was playing a round of my most favorite game.  Some of you know it.  It's called "Stare at the Ceiling at Three A.M. and Wonder How You Got Into This Bloody Mess."  Sometimes I refer to it as "SCATAWHYGITBM" for short.  It's entertaining and all, but it gets old after a while.  Finally I started praying, since prayer is right up there on my list with "SCATAWHYGITBM."

Anyone else out there struggle with prioritizing prayer?  Is anyone else even out there??  Ahem. 

Anyway, as I was talking to God, I found myself telling Him, "Yeah, God, I know you love me.  I mean, I've kinda known it my whole life.  I've seen it clearly in the past, and I can read about it in the Bible.  But.....it would be really nice to just.....sorta.....hear from you again about that; to hear again that you love me.  What I'm trying to say, God, is that I could really use some proof right now." 

And that was basically how God and I wrapped up the night.  I managed to get to sleep after that, and by  morning, the only reminders of my little chat with the Almighty were the bags under my eyes.   Oh wait, those are there every day.  So, I didn't have any reminders.

Alright.  Coming back to my Al-Anon meetings.  I got up and went to one that morning.  I try to go every Thursday.  Yes, I even went on Thanksgiving because I'm so screwed up hardcore like that.  And the topic that morning was (of course) Gratitude and Thanksgiving.  And lots of people shared their Gratitude Lists.  It was an open share group, and we talked about what we were thankful for, even in difficult circumstances, and how gratitude helps us keep things in perspective.

Then, at the conclusion of the meeting, when we were all feeling warm and fuzzy, the group leader suddenly changed directions with a comment that absolutely floored me.  She said,

"Okay.  Now, I want each and every one of you to think of all those things on your list that you are thankful for.  Right now."  I easily envisioned my four beautiful children, my extended family and friends, my home, and a myriad of other blessings.

"Now say to yourself," she continued, "Every single one of those is proof that my Higher Power (God!) loves me!"

The memory of my three a.m. prayer came flooding back over me.   Those were the exact words I'd used: "God, can you show me some proof that you love me?"  It had been just a few short hours earlier!  I had begged God for proof, and there it was in black and white.  He did, indeed love me.  And all the blessings in my life were the proof.  Why hadn't I seen it before?  God had answered my prayer.

Since Thanksgiving, it's been just a little easier for me to say, "Okay, God.  I'm gonna trust you here, because I've got proof that you love me.  Thanks for giving me that, in the midst of a tough time."

Frankly, I'm just amazed that God answered the pitiful prayer of a girl who didn't even take time out of her day to really talk to Him....just squeezed in a desperate plea between bouts of insomnia.  I can't believe He was listening.  If He was listening to me, He's definitely listening to you.  I couldn't have asked for a kinder, gentler, way for God to start my Advent.  It's a different season, when you're waiting for Someone who loves you.  I'm putting that on my Gratitude List.

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