Tuesday, December 13, 2005
The dishes are soaking, the drier is humming and I am folding a load of laundry while I compose my thoughts to write. The air is thick with the smell of poopy diaper and I am giving it another two minutes before I go searching out the kiddo that lovingly gift-wrapped that present for me… *sigh* why wait? So that I am sure they are done and I don’t end up changing the same poop three changes in a row. He he, twelve people just clicked away thinking this was way more info than they wanted. Ah well, this is part of what my life is about these days. To be honest, I am glad it stinks. Can you imagine how raw the poor kid would be if I had no clue and he/she stayed in it?
The Den and living room (transformed into the playroom for the daycare) are joined, yet gated, so that I can watch the kids while I type. In this case, I am also folding laundry. This way, the little ones can’t come and play in my piles like they were leaves. The den also acts as the infant sleeping room with a changing table, and two pack and plays set out here. My computer is off to the side, as is the piano, accessible to my own kids and in the living space so they are monitored, yet separate from the daycare play section so they aren’t playing near the wires. This arrangement seems to be working for me for now, but I don’t know how many kids I can bring in without it getting too crowded. The layout of my house kind of limits it getting too big.
I don’t know why I wrote all that above. No one is going to be interested in reading it, there is nothing transforming or informative in it, simply me going through the layers of my mind, getting down to the place where I can access the stuff that does matter.
Lately I have been able to get more writing done.
Writing, that matters to me. Lot’s more than maybe it should. I have thought a lot about it, what it is attached to inside me that makes it so important for me to write. It isn’t glory or fame, if that were the case, I think I would be better at getting more of my stuff out there and under the noses of editors. Right now, it’s about getting better at it. It’s about the act of creating and having a place to channel it.
My husband is a wonderful man, one who completely commits himself to whatever it is that he is doing. Translation: when he is at work he gives 110 % and when he is home, he gives 110 % and he seldom has time that he can call his own that’s all about or just for him. I push him out the door to spend time alone or time with friends or even time with a book as often as I can. But he can’t help but feel jealous of the time I take for myself to write or read. Sometimes, when I am obsessive about a story or a project, and the laundry slides or the house is a wreck, he will make a comment about how I still had time to write. He doesn’t take the time for himself and so I sometimes feel quite guilty for taking the time that I do for my own nourishment.
The thing is, I know that he needs me to drag him into having fun. I know he needs me to develop those relationships with other people and bring them into our circle so that he can reap the rewards of an intimate social group, even though he doesn’t have the time to maintain them on his own. So I also know that this is part of me that he loves. I try hard not to take it personal, cause I know it’s the differences of who we are that make us such a strong couple and better together than apart. It’s also the place where he and I are the most raw with one another too.
I need to develop myself on a level that rests outside of children. Something outside of what I have always done. I have a crazy fear of becoming a boring old woman who can only talk about the weather and her housework. (Politely ignore the first 2/3rds of this entry while I was working my way down to this section, okay?)
How do you balance what your dreams for your future are, with the needs of your family? One day and one decision at a time I suppose, but the tension, the tightrope of walking that line can get difficult. I don’t have the same issues that some families do. Some women were in vital careers before having kids, and then had to make the decisions about how much time they devote to the family or their careers. I have many friends who have college degrees that they aren’t using while they raise their kids. One of them made it all the way through med school and then stopped to have and raise her family. Even though I never made it to college, never had a career bigger than caring for children, I still feel the desire to learn new things. I want to grow and stretch my mind, I need it. I need it like the air I breathe.
And….
And it makes me crazy, because at this stage in the life of my writing ability, it looks so much like a leisurely hobby.
Am I whining? Yeah.
Thanks for listening to me whine. I don’t know if it’s better or worse than a rant, but it feels good to articulate it and maybe somehow make a connection with someone else.
Thank you for walking beside me for yet another day.
Sometimes it's nice to see life from someone else's point of view. I am a mother, writer and amateur photographer. This is what the view looks like from where I am standing.
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Monday, December 05, 2005
A Protestant at a Catholic Retreat House
December 3, 2005
God said, “Be still, and know that I am God.”
I wonder how often I get to know God, moments of really knowing him, because of my inability to be still. There is always the housework, the kids, the phone, the TV or radio going, how often am I really sitting still?
We don’t like confrontation. We don’t like being told we are doing something wrong or sinful. I think that is why many of us don’t let ourselves get quiet with God. Protestants don’t go to confession, so we can keep our sins to ourselves. Where they fester and grow and consume us.
Because that is the nature of sin; what it is designed to do. God likened it to yeast because it grows in the dark, places. What He wanted us to do, was to take our sin directly to Him. To expose those dark places to his light, killing the bacteria of sin, not to another human who has not the power to forgive, nor cleans us from that sin. God wanted to remove the barriers between his people and himself.
But the problem us, many of us do not come.
When he commanded the Israelites to leave Egypt that Passover night, he told them to take their bread unleavened, to leave the sin behind. It was only a symbol a subtle statement he was making, but the truth is still there.
Catholics, though they go to a priest for that absolution – they do indeed go. While a priest does in fact hear those sins … So does our loving and mighty God; the one who placed his spirit within our hearts to test us and know our authenticity.
Catholics know how to meditate and center their thoughts on a king, one they genuflect to and revere. Protestants treat him with an intimacy that he invited us into when he called us his children. We no longer live in a Monarchy and it’s difficult to imagine how to slip off the shell of an awful sinner, and wear the crown of a prince or princess as it says we become when we are born again into this family. It’s an interesting dichotomy between the God that the Catholics and the Protestants each portray. We have drawn lines and shed blood over the centuries between these two factions, but it is the same God we serve and try our best to become family with.
I am at a Catholic retreat center, a place where they encourage you to sit and meditate. A place designed to slow you down long enough to expose your sin and hurts to God. They offer the sacrament of confession and reconciliation, they offer their time and ear for counseling and they offer a quiet place to rest and put yourself back into balance.
Because I am not Catholic, and I have not taken the traditional steps that are part of this order, I don’t risk offending those who do not understand why I come here. So I have never done confession in the Catholic tradition. They have a complex series of oral quotes and replies that I do not know. There is a sacredness to their traditions that I would not step on.
But they don’t mind if I attend the retreat. I enjoy their conferences where they speak of the love of God and I recognize his character and nature within their eyes and the way they offer peace to me. I have found much healing in these hallways.
I think that is why I am writing this, to honor them and this place. To recognize that God is bigger than we are, that he has ever reached down to us to met us at our own points of need, no matter what our background. We are all from such vast experiences and cultures, is it so hard to believe that He can meet us where we are and draw us to Him from that point? It is a relationship.
I will use my own children when describing the next thing I want to say, because God used the analogy of children and parents when establishing our relationship with Him from the beginning. When my children were babies, I revealed myself to them by meeting their needs. I forgave them when they behaved badly, I bandaged their boo boos, I disciplined them when they needed it and I always, always, always told them that I loved them.
When they grew older I needed to show them that they could trust my word when I spoke. This meant that when I told them to stay in the yard, I had to follow up and do something about it when they didn’t obey. When I made a promise, I had to keep it so that later on, when I needed them to trust me with things they were too young to understand, they would still obey me until I could provide them with answers that would satisfy them.
When we come to God, we are first as little babies, who throw temper tantrums when we don’t get our way. We hold him responsible for the things that happen to us, without giving him control of our lives. We want it both ways.
Gradually I think we grow to a place where we understand that prayer is more about changing us and how we view things than it is about changing the circumstances. Not to limit God or make it sound as though he only operates under stealth any more… not so; only that we must come to that place where we surrender our control. Surrender our need to be right, to exact vengeance and to shape things to our liking. Prayer reminds us of our relationship to him; that being, one where we have permission to approach him on a personal level, yet never forgetting that he is the King. It puts our relationship with Him into proper perspective,
When we accept his authority in our lives and in our circumstances, when we are no longer trying to fight him for control, then he has the freedom to move in our lives and the changes, the transformation from baby to adult can begin. Here is where we find joy in the midst of strife, where we can be at peace even during war-time. When we release our burdens and hurts and pains that we cloak ourselves with, (that define who we think we are), then we are free emotionally to move freely within the circles that he has set us within. We are then able to be the part of God who has skin on to offer help and hope to those who are still struggling and lost.
As humans we are so quick to judge one another, to assign blame for the circumstances of others on whatever sin we think we see. Do you know how God sees us? He sees us harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. Did you know that he left the ninety nine for you? That when no one else believed in you, he did? That through those long hard years when I personally held on to the sin I did and the sin others did to me in order to make myself strong, he was showing how weak he’d made himself? He left the glory of heaven in order to make it possible for me to be with him, while I was still sinning, before I ever knew what choices I would make.
He knews the outcome because he sits outside of time, he created it for us to live in. So he knew what I would choose, but that never once made it any less my choice or my responsibility to choose. It never made my struggles any less real.
This has turned into an evangelical letter. It wasn’t intended to, it’s just the way I lean into things I suppose. Thank you for letting me rant and spill the things in my heart, especially if you followed me through this far, even though I worked myself into preaching, I thank you. I get stirred up and I just can’t keep it quiet.
Have a great day today.
God said, “Be still, and know that I am God.”
I wonder how often I get to know God, moments of really knowing him, because of my inability to be still. There is always the housework, the kids, the phone, the TV or radio going, how often am I really sitting still?
We don’t like confrontation. We don’t like being told we are doing something wrong or sinful. I think that is why many of us don’t let ourselves get quiet with God. Protestants don’t go to confession, so we can keep our sins to ourselves. Where they fester and grow and consume us.
Because that is the nature of sin; what it is designed to do. God likened it to yeast because it grows in the dark, places. What He wanted us to do, was to take our sin directly to Him. To expose those dark places to his light, killing the bacteria of sin, not to another human who has not the power to forgive, nor cleans us from that sin. God wanted to remove the barriers between his people and himself.
But the problem us, many of us do not come.
When he commanded the Israelites to leave Egypt that Passover night, he told them to take their bread unleavened, to leave the sin behind. It was only a symbol a subtle statement he was making, but the truth is still there.
Catholics, though they go to a priest for that absolution – they do indeed go. While a priest does in fact hear those sins … So does our loving and mighty God; the one who placed his spirit within our hearts to test us and know our authenticity.
Catholics know how to meditate and center their thoughts on a king, one they genuflect to and revere. Protestants treat him with an intimacy that he invited us into when he called us his children. We no longer live in a Monarchy and it’s difficult to imagine how to slip off the shell of an awful sinner, and wear the crown of a prince or princess as it says we become when we are born again into this family. It’s an interesting dichotomy between the God that the Catholics and the Protestants each portray. We have drawn lines and shed blood over the centuries between these two factions, but it is the same God we serve and try our best to become family with.
I am at a Catholic retreat center, a place where they encourage you to sit and meditate. A place designed to slow you down long enough to expose your sin and hurts to God. They offer the sacrament of confession and reconciliation, they offer their time and ear for counseling and they offer a quiet place to rest and put yourself back into balance.
Because I am not Catholic, and I have not taken the traditional steps that are part of this order, I don’t risk offending those who do not understand why I come here. So I have never done confession in the Catholic tradition. They have a complex series of oral quotes and replies that I do not know. There is a sacredness to their traditions that I would not step on.
But they don’t mind if I attend the retreat. I enjoy their conferences where they speak of the love of God and I recognize his character and nature within their eyes and the way they offer peace to me. I have found much healing in these hallways.
I think that is why I am writing this, to honor them and this place. To recognize that God is bigger than we are, that he has ever reached down to us to met us at our own points of need, no matter what our background. We are all from such vast experiences and cultures, is it so hard to believe that He can meet us where we are and draw us to Him from that point? It is a relationship.
I will use my own children when describing the next thing I want to say, because God used the analogy of children and parents when establishing our relationship with Him from the beginning. When my children were babies, I revealed myself to them by meeting their needs. I forgave them when they behaved badly, I bandaged their boo boos, I disciplined them when they needed it and I always, always, always told them that I loved them.
When they grew older I needed to show them that they could trust my word when I spoke. This meant that when I told them to stay in the yard, I had to follow up and do something about it when they didn’t obey. When I made a promise, I had to keep it so that later on, when I needed them to trust me with things they were too young to understand, they would still obey me until I could provide them with answers that would satisfy them.
When we come to God, we are first as little babies, who throw temper tantrums when we don’t get our way. We hold him responsible for the things that happen to us, without giving him control of our lives. We want it both ways.
Gradually I think we grow to a place where we understand that prayer is more about changing us and how we view things than it is about changing the circumstances. Not to limit God or make it sound as though he only operates under stealth any more… not so; only that we must come to that place where we surrender our control. Surrender our need to be right, to exact vengeance and to shape things to our liking. Prayer reminds us of our relationship to him; that being, one where we have permission to approach him on a personal level, yet never forgetting that he is the King. It puts our relationship with Him into proper perspective,
When we accept his authority in our lives and in our circumstances, when we are no longer trying to fight him for control, then he has the freedom to move in our lives and the changes, the transformation from baby to adult can begin. Here is where we find joy in the midst of strife, where we can be at peace even during war-time. When we release our burdens and hurts and pains that we cloak ourselves with, (that define who we think we are), then we are free emotionally to move freely within the circles that he has set us within. We are then able to be the part of God who has skin on to offer help and hope to those who are still struggling and lost.
As humans we are so quick to judge one another, to assign blame for the circumstances of others on whatever sin we think we see. Do you know how God sees us? He sees us harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. Did you know that he left the ninety nine for you? That when no one else believed in you, he did? That through those long hard years when I personally held on to the sin I did and the sin others did to me in order to make myself strong, he was showing how weak he’d made himself? He left the glory of heaven in order to make it possible for me to be with him, while I was still sinning, before I ever knew what choices I would make.
He knews the outcome because he sits outside of time, he created it for us to live in. So he knew what I would choose, but that never once made it any less my choice or my responsibility to choose. It never made my struggles any less real.
This has turned into an evangelical letter. It wasn’t intended to, it’s just the way I lean into things I suppose. Thank you for letting me rant and spill the things in my heart, especially if you followed me through this far, even though I worked myself into preaching, I thank you. I get stirred up and I just can’t keep it quiet.
Have a great day today.
Taking Stock
December 2, 2005
We all have moments of self doubt, times when we reflect and take stock of what our lives have become verses what we wanted them to be. We cling to our childhood dreams of what we wanted out of life before our own choices and those of others shaped us.
And what do we do with those moments? Do they draw us into bitterness? Do they lead us into acceptance? Or do they do the unexpected thing and carve a new career, lifestyle or spiritual renewal out of the flesh of the past?
Sometimes it takes great courage to simply get up the next day and care for the ones in your keep by doing the thing you don’t like in order to provide for the ones you love. Sometimes it takes courage to follow the serenity prayer and trust that all things have purpose and that what you are doing matters. And sometimes, yes, the bravest thing is to change and remake yourself. Scary, that one. It means that you are trusting without evidence that your vision of a future will be better than the one you are living now.
I have done each of these things in turn in my own lifetime. I have accepted what I cannot change, I have followed the ordinary in order to touch the extraordinary and I have stepped outside the pattern and chosen to remake myself. All of them carry risk, even the ones that seem safe and familiar, there is the risk of loosing yourself and being consumed by the pattern.
Sometimes the changes come weather we will them to or not. Death will do that to you, and so will love. Both are catalysts for change, both carry with them the seeds of change. God designed it so that once the grief lessens, life begins again. Once the powerful emotions of love cool, you are propelled by that love into a new pattern. And so the wheel turns.
Patterns. It becomes easier to see them as I grow older.
But what does that mean for me? For the here and now, that is. How does this reflection focus the lens of my attention? I don’t know. I used to think I knew what I wanted out of life. Then my choices and those of others narrowed my field of vision, made all but a few paths in front of me possible. So, I stepped onto them and followed one foot after another until one day I realized that I was on a path that lead me into darkness. It took a great deal of courage to step onto a new one. I have been on paths since then that seemed dark too, but the companion beside me, lit my way, shining a light at my feet.
Today I sit at a house of prayer. A silent retreat center, one with lovely gardens, winding paths and a special spot reserved for the memory of the woman who bore my husband, taught him how to love and welcomed me into her family. I was a divorced woman with a past, a woman who was not Catholic like she had raised her family to be, but nonetheless opened her heart to me and my son. Her name rests on the door of this retreat center, and a secluded garden with a statue of St. Joseph resides in the back.
Patterns and cycles, the wheel that comes back and moves time forward with it. As an individual human, I take stock and ask myself if I am pleased with the patterns my life has created. Are the pictures and stories of my life beautiful and strong? Am I complacent or active, growing or stagnating? Do I carry burdens I aught not, in favor of the ones I should be lifting? What is the state of my heart? Am I loving with open hands or am I a tight fist, curled in to protect its self? What am I pouring my life into? Is it the things that are most important or the things that shout the loudest?
I used to be far more flexible and teachable, I have found that this sort of examination is getting harder to do the older I get. However, it is necessary. I need to know that I am not wasting this one life that God has given me, because I see how fragile it is. Sherri died, my mother-in-law died, young Tim died… and I know that we are not promised tomorrow. The thing about death that compels me to think about it often is that it is so very final. I feel the clock ticking in my own body, and I hear it’s echo in those I love around me. I will only get one shot at this life, there is no do over. So I am keenly aware that I must make the most of every year, every moment. I am not pulled into the fear of death, I know where I will go when I die. But I fear not leaving a legacy, a taste of myself behind.
I am laughing at myself, what arrogance to want to set myself beyond my years, but I must be honest, this is what I want. I want to leave the printed word of my spirit behind for my kids to read and somehow know me. I want my husband to know that his love freed the caged bird that was my spirit and allowed me to dream higher, to let me soar as high as my wings could carry me. I want my friends to know that my life was made better and stronger for them being in it. Their stories … mattered to me more than my dishes and housework, that their companionship fed and nourished me. That I found purpose and joy in being part of their stories in return.
If you really want to know me, look through the pictures I took, see life through my eyes. Look through the conversations I have had and stories I have written. That’s where I am. Look in the eyes of my children; see their character and their nature, see my smile on their lips, my twinkle in their eyes and my form in theirs. Don’t look for me in the repose of death, but in the memory of the song. This is what I want; this is the immortality I seek.
So here I am, reflecting on the patterns my life has taken. And I know that this day will never come again. I know that the choices I make in these moments of pause have a fundamental impact on how I govern my time and resources when I return to the real world.
What choices have you made? Will you be able to look back on your life and say you did what you wanted to? Will you understand the role of the companion who guides stumbling feet? Will you let yourself forgive and unclench that tight fist of your spirit? In all these things there are choices, and each of them takes courage. To remain under pressure with grace is courage. To accept the thing you cannot change and heal the chaffing you’ve done under them requires courage, and to step outside the pattern completely and trust in that other vision takes the greatest courage of all.
I will close for now, I seem to have a great many questions and it’s time I focused these questions on my life and the specific issues that I deal with cannot share in this open forum.
Thank you for sharing the first leg of my journey with me. I will do the rest in private, It’s nice to know that out there somewhere are others, brothers and sisters who also take stock and ask themselves the tough questions, working to be flexible to change.
We all have moments of self doubt, times when we reflect and take stock of what our lives have become verses what we wanted them to be. We cling to our childhood dreams of what we wanted out of life before our own choices and those of others shaped us.
And what do we do with those moments? Do they draw us into bitterness? Do they lead us into acceptance? Or do they do the unexpected thing and carve a new career, lifestyle or spiritual renewal out of the flesh of the past?
Sometimes it takes great courage to simply get up the next day and care for the ones in your keep by doing the thing you don’t like in order to provide for the ones you love. Sometimes it takes courage to follow the serenity prayer and trust that all things have purpose and that what you are doing matters. And sometimes, yes, the bravest thing is to change and remake yourself. Scary, that one. It means that you are trusting without evidence that your vision of a future will be better than the one you are living now.
I have done each of these things in turn in my own lifetime. I have accepted what I cannot change, I have followed the ordinary in order to touch the extraordinary and I have stepped outside the pattern and chosen to remake myself. All of them carry risk, even the ones that seem safe and familiar, there is the risk of loosing yourself and being consumed by the pattern.
Sometimes the changes come weather we will them to or not. Death will do that to you, and so will love. Both are catalysts for change, both carry with them the seeds of change. God designed it so that once the grief lessens, life begins again. Once the powerful emotions of love cool, you are propelled by that love into a new pattern. And so the wheel turns.
Patterns. It becomes easier to see them as I grow older.
But what does that mean for me? For the here and now, that is. How does this reflection focus the lens of my attention? I don’t know. I used to think I knew what I wanted out of life. Then my choices and those of others narrowed my field of vision, made all but a few paths in front of me possible. So, I stepped onto them and followed one foot after another until one day I realized that I was on a path that lead me into darkness. It took a great deal of courage to step onto a new one. I have been on paths since then that seemed dark too, but the companion beside me, lit my way, shining a light at my feet.
Today I sit at a house of prayer. A silent retreat center, one with lovely gardens, winding paths and a special spot reserved for the memory of the woman who bore my husband, taught him how to love and welcomed me into her family. I was a divorced woman with a past, a woman who was not Catholic like she had raised her family to be, but nonetheless opened her heart to me and my son. Her name rests on the door of this retreat center, and a secluded garden with a statue of St. Joseph resides in the back.
Patterns and cycles, the wheel that comes back and moves time forward with it. As an individual human, I take stock and ask myself if I am pleased with the patterns my life has created. Are the pictures and stories of my life beautiful and strong? Am I complacent or active, growing or stagnating? Do I carry burdens I aught not, in favor of the ones I should be lifting? What is the state of my heart? Am I loving with open hands or am I a tight fist, curled in to protect its self? What am I pouring my life into? Is it the things that are most important or the things that shout the loudest?
I used to be far more flexible and teachable, I have found that this sort of examination is getting harder to do the older I get. However, it is necessary. I need to know that I am not wasting this one life that God has given me, because I see how fragile it is. Sherri died, my mother-in-law died, young Tim died… and I know that we are not promised tomorrow. The thing about death that compels me to think about it often is that it is so very final. I feel the clock ticking in my own body, and I hear it’s echo in those I love around me. I will only get one shot at this life, there is no do over. So I am keenly aware that I must make the most of every year, every moment. I am not pulled into the fear of death, I know where I will go when I die. But I fear not leaving a legacy, a taste of myself behind.
I am laughing at myself, what arrogance to want to set myself beyond my years, but I must be honest, this is what I want. I want to leave the printed word of my spirit behind for my kids to read and somehow know me. I want my husband to know that his love freed the caged bird that was my spirit and allowed me to dream higher, to let me soar as high as my wings could carry me. I want my friends to know that my life was made better and stronger for them being in it. Their stories … mattered to me more than my dishes and housework, that their companionship fed and nourished me. That I found purpose and joy in being part of their stories in return.
If you really want to know me, look through the pictures I took, see life through my eyes. Look through the conversations I have had and stories I have written. That’s where I am. Look in the eyes of my children; see their character and their nature, see my smile on their lips, my twinkle in their eyes and my form in theirs. Don’t look for me in the repose of death, but in the memory of the song. This is what I want; this is the immortality I seek.
So here I am, reflecting on the patterns my life has taken. And I know that this day will never come again. I know that the choices I make in these moments of pause have a fundamental impact on how I govern my time and resources when I return to the real world.
What choices have you made? Will you be able to look back on your life and say you did what you wanted to? Will you understand the role of the companion who guides stumbling feet? Will you let yourself forgive and unclench that tight fist of your spirit? In all these things there are choices, and each of them takes courage. To remain under pressure with grace is courage. To accept the thing you cannot change and heal the chaffing you’ve done under them requires courage, and to step outside the pattern completely and trust in that other vision takes the greatest courage of all.
I will close for now, I seem to have a great many questions and it’s time I focused these questions on my life and the specific issues that I deal with cannot share in this open forum.
Thank you for sharing the first leg of my journey with me. I will do the rest in private, It’s nice to know that out there somewhere are others, brothers and sisters who also take stock and ask themselves the tough questions, working to be flexible to change.
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