Dear potential mama friends,
I'm (sort of) sorry my house is messy, but I'm tired. I thought about rescheduling, but I genuinely like you, and since tired has been more or less my state of being for the last 9ish years, I'm not sure when we'd reschedule. So, in the interest of authenticity, we'll just skip that. Speaking of authenticity....I'm sort of a homebody, and while I like people, I don't have the time to invest in that many. I don't like wasting time, so inautheniticty just isn't something I do. I don't intend to offend you, but really, if I'm too weird for you, it's best to get it out in the open right away. I've already accepted the possibility that I'm so odd that I may have to wait until my daughters are grown to have friends. Don't ask me if I like your dress/opinion/hairdo, if you aren't prepared for the truth. I'm looking for a few Jesus girls to live life with, eat tacos, let each other in to our real moments( the beautiful and the gritty ones) and laugh till we snort, which is strange, because I'm not typically the laughing out loud sort, but I'd like to be...I'm working on it, the whole lightening up thing. I need some one who balances me out on that.
What I lack in levity, I make up for in honesty and loyalty, but if you need someone to grab coffee and get pedis with every week, I'm not your girl. I need someone who understands, that while I'll always have your back if you need me, and I value our time together, I'm an extroverted introvert, so there will be times I may not respond right away, because I just can't people right now.
Finding mom friends is a bit like hunting for sea glass on the beach, so many beautiful things, and most of them aren't what you're looking for. I am not meant to blend in; I'm a bit too artsy/intellectual for my strait laced conservative friends, and far too Christian conservative for my liberal leaning artsy/intellectual friends. It's difficult to find someone who gets the tightrope walk of loving Jesus and being devoted to your family and home, while maintaining your identity and your art, but when the connection is found...that spark of recognition of a kindred spirit, it's worth it. I'd rather have two pieces of sea glass than all the white sand on the beach. The companions that God has given me along the paths of my life have been among His greatest gifts.
I love music of all genres, reading, growing things, beauty of all kinds, dancing in my kitchen, critters, and working out. I believe that friends should lift each other up and stretch one another, remind one another that behind the tired, there is an inspired strong woman, that friends should laugh and cry together and nourish one another; two souls who see one another's crazy hot mess and don't need perfection.
So, I see you mom on the park bench wondering if she's the only one, if she should start a conversation, or if that other mom will judge all your mom stuff...she looks so put together. We all have our days, mama, where we have our makeup fixed and our sunscreen and our snacks packed, and we look like we're not falling apart, but then, we all have our days when the seams burst, and our undone spills all over the playground, and we don't have any mosquito spray, and every mama out there needs a me too, and if that isn't your piece of sea glass, it doesn't matter, because you have been kind. There is never any harm in a hello. One day, if we are brave enough to keep saying hello, we will each find our little tribe of soul mamas, with whom we feel at home, that make us a little better every time we are together, and laugh with us when we fall apart, that see your hot mess and raise you a little crazy, and we will see that a little mess is nothing to be afraid of.
Thursday, March 24, 2016
Tuesday, March 15, 2016
Stuff
I am a stuff person. I don't mean that I'm materialistic; to the contrary. I am drawn to things not because of their cost, but because of their personality, or history, or what they evoke in me. If I purchase something, the likely hood that it will ever be discarded into the garage sale realm is slim. Unlike the decluttering and organizational books advise, I can not eliminate the things in my home which I don't find useful or beautiful, because I don't have such things. I love things for their, texture, their weight, their smell, for the storied past of those who have held them before.
When I was a child, I used to go with my mother to her grandmother's house. My great-grandparents had a house in town and a house in the country, so that when grandma Bessie passed away, grandpa Jess moved to town, and left the country house virtually untouched: sugar in the canisters, clothes in the closet, talcum powder in the loo. I played with toys there: an old Farris wheel that played music. I always had a vague notion that I could sense history, not in a grand sense, but in the small mundane miracle of someone else's daily life, children, a mother, a home...
The same is true with old books, generations before me, holding these selfsame sheaves of paper, living this tale beyond their own. Their weight and scent draws me in, as does their timelessness.
And new things, I believe I give a piece of my spirit to the things I choose to surround myself with. People have called my taste eclectic, I wondered if that was a platitude for "You have a lot of strange junk.", but it doesn't matter, our home sings a song of who we are as a family. I designed it when I wasn't singing, and every pent up expression of our love story flowed out of me as I chose windows,and faucets, and light fixtures, and it's harmony may be strange to some, but it is comforting and beautiful to us: the song of a homeland, and I hope, generations from now when I am gone, and my children's children's children come here, they hear it in their spirit, and it teaches them about where they came from and those who have lived and loved and gone before. Perhaps to you, they are just things, but to me they are stories of lives well lived.
When I was a child, I used to go with my mother to her grandmother's house. My great-grandparents had a house in town and a house in the country, so that when grandma Bessie passed away, grandpa Jess moved to town, and left the country house virtually untouched: sugar in the canisters, clothes in the closet, talcum powder in the loo. I played with toys there: an old Farris wheel that played music. I always had a vague notion that I could sense history, not in a grand sense, but in the small mundane miracle of someone else's daily life, children, a mother, a home...
The same is true with old books, generations before me, holding these selfsame sheaves of paper, living this tale beyond their own. Their weight and scent draws me in, as does their timelessness.
And new things, I believe I give a piece of my spirit to the things I choose to surround myself with. People have called my taste eclectic, I wondered if that was a platitude for "You have a lot of strange junk.", but it doesn't matter, our home sings a song of who we are as a family. I designed it when I wasn't singing, and every pent up expression of our love story flowed out of me as I chose windows,and faucets, and light fixtures, and it's harmony may be strange to some, but it is comforting and beautiful to us: the song of a homeland, and I hope, generations from now when I am gone, and my children's children's children come here, they hear it in their spirit, and it teaches them about where they came from and those who have lived and loved and gone before. Perhaps to you, they are just things, but to me they are stories of lives well lived.
Friday, March 4, 2016
Elven doors
For years, when I would meet someone new and tell them about my life, I would say, "I was a singer." It felt like a eulogy for myself. I gave up singing because it had always been about me, and I had reached an intersecting path where, if it continued to be about me, then that's what my life would become and remain: selfish and solitary. I made the right choice, a choice that has allowed me to have a great marriage and family. I knew singing was a part of me, but I was not safe with it, yet.
God pursued me down many dark alleys, and eventually, I surrendered to Him. I prayed to love Him, and He answered me. People came along side me who loved me and prayed that some day I could use my gift in a way that would not be about me, that would glorify God (thank you, I love and appreciate you). I could not see the path forward, but a time came when I felt a nudge to begin to study. He provided a way to pay for my lessons. My family encouraged me to find out how to become involved with the local opera company, but I did not do it, and then one day the door, which it seemed could never open for me flew open in my face, with the offer to jump in on the Turandot chorus. I wasn't ready, I told God and myself, and yet, I knew He wanted me to do it, and so I did.
Then, auditions came, and I told my teacher, "It's been too long, I'm not ready, I can't do it, I'm not good enough." She encouraged me. I prayed, and I read, and He reminded me that you can't mess up, circumvent, escape, or elude His plan. If He wanted me to do this, I would get a role, and if He didn't I wouldn't. That made me a little brave. I prayed to want what He wants. I got a part. I got a part; in the very opera that made me want to become a singer when I was a little girl. I felt so blessed to be able to do what I love and was made to do that I cried. I don't have to talk about myself in the past tense anymore. I am so thankful.
You might not sing, but the lesson is this: Like the elven doors that you can not enter with all of the force in the world if you don't know the pass word or have the key, if you are outside of God's will for your life, you can beat with frustration on the doors forever, like I used to do when it was all for me, and they will never open....but when you give it to His will, He will swing wide the doors that are meant for you. That doesn't mean it will always be easy, or that you will always "get the part" you thought you wanted, but that the one that's meant for you, you will. God goes before you. Whatever "it" is for you. Give it up, and be brave, even a little brave. Glory be to God, whose plan for us is better than our imagination.
God pursued me down many dark alleys, and eventually, I surrendered to Him. I prayed to love Him, and He answered me. People came along side me who loved me and prayed that some day I could use my gift in a way that would not be about me, that would glorify God (thank you, I love and appreciate you). I could not see the path forward, but a time came when I felt a nudge to begin to study. He provided a way to pay for my lessons. My family encouraged me to find out how to become involved with the local opera company, but I did not do it, and then one day the door, which it seemed could never open for me flew open in my face, with the offer to jump in on the Turandot chorus. I wasn't ready, I told God and myself, and yet, I knew He wanted me to do it, and so I did.
Then, auditions came, and I told my teacher, "It's been too long, I'm not ready, I can't do it, I'm not good enough." She encouraged me. I prayed, and I read, and He reminded me that you can't mess up, circumvent, escape, or elude His plan. If He wanted me to do this, I would get a role, and if He didn't I wouldn't. That made me a little brave. I prayed to want what He wants. I got a part. I got a part; in the very opera that made me want to become a singer when I was a little girl. I felt so blessed to be able to do what I love and was made to do that I cried. I don't have to talk about myself in the past tense anymore. I am so thankful.
You might not sing, but the lesson is this: Like the elven doors that you can not enter with all of the force in the world if you don't know the pass word or have the key, if you are outside of God's will for your life, you can beat with frustration on the doors forever, like I used to do when it was all for me, and they will never open....but when you give it to His will, He will swing wide the doors that are meant for you. That doesn't mean it will always be easy, or that you will always "get the part" you thought you wanted, but that the one that's meant for you, you will. God goes before you. Whatever "it" is for you. Give it up, and be brave, even a little brave. Glory be to God, whose plan for us is better than our imagination.
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