Clean, Important - and Worth Doing

She always felt it when the train went underground - this sense of eagerness, of hope and of secret excitement. It was as if normal existence were a photograph of shapeless things in badly printed colors, but this was a sketch done in a few sharp strokes that made things seem clean, important - and worth doing.

- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged (p. 25)

This is the nature of the New Year. The nature of this new life into which I have been thrown. The fresh, the clear - they take me forever to sort. I have mental lists. I make small goals.

Lots of them:


*Getting out of my pajamas
*Getting Piper and Bredon changed and dressed.
*And feeding, the kids must be fed.
*Making the bed is a huge accomplishment. It is made today.
*A shower (without Pete in the house) is a bonus
*Making meals for myself
*Taking my pills

And there are other goals, bonus goals, the

*writing a post for the day
*visiting my online friends while babies nap
*cleaning out my inbox
*grabbing a photo here, a photo there
*figuring out the paypal so we can order my new computer so I can
*process my photos and
*fix my html code in my blog template (oy!)

I move in circles, slow circles.

My mental lists tangle with the hearts in this house. I keep quiet, breathing slow and trying patient, staying me for them, for me, for you. I try not to panic when everything goes crazy at once. "Just do the next thing."

The next thing that meant an ER visit Tuesday to find out that I have gallstones and need to have my gall bladder removed. Which means that I have to add to my list

*researching gall bladder and lyme treatment issues
*calling people who know
*planning different meals to stay healthy and push off surgery
*praying for wisdom and timing with my breastfeeding baby
*crying. I want that on the list. It hasn't happened yet.

And I added worrying yesterday.

My major goal yesterday was to clean and vacuum the living room before Pete arrived home. And maybe do the dishes. Which was his goal. If I did them, he would probably find something else to do. But I didn't get them done. He did. And we made dinner. And we had had a small, quiet window that felt sane. It felt like us.

I do have other goals. Long term goals. Small goals. Things I can see happening. Things that might not happen, but I'd like to try for them anyway:

*learning how to make Lightfoot Creamy Tomato Soup
*reading to my children
*creating a flash website for my photography

And then there is the grateful and the happy things to list that I breathe in and out and barely have time to count, the

*baby scent in my nose
*IV without dextrose
*sun in my eyes as I type (oh, it is beautiful, isn't it?)
*numerous comments and emails from friends
*enough milk
*love that goes around what doesn't fit in my arms
*sponge baths
*showers with my toddler
*hope that surgery may help the Lyme
*quality time with my husband, even in the ER
*eyes to see
*gasping astonished moments because God chose me to know Him
*phone calls with my mother, my friend, my new confidante
*a love story God wrote
*little girl time
*visits from family with perfect timing
*emails from friends I didn't know I had
*emails from friends I do know
*courage
*prayers
*familiar
*new
*toddler messes and imagination
* "yes" that lights up little girl eyes
*baby smiles that light me up
*naptimes to hide in kitchen and gain perspective
*light that falls across my bed into my rocker and onto my son
*the sound of baby breathing at night - one on each side of me

And my not-alone, those friends who have taken the time to offer me their "I see you..." in these last weeks of silent crazy:

*Ann who has so often given to me
*Lyla, a fellow introvert who emails and offers
*Anne, who followed God into my life
*Sarah, who found rest in my restless
*Corinne, who knows and cries and comments
*Maureen

Love Does That

All day long a little burro labors, sometimes
with heavy loads on her back and sometimes just with worries
about things that bother only
burros.

And worries, as we know, can be more exhausting
than physical labor.

Once in a while a kind monk comes
to her stable and brings
a pear, but more
than that,

he looks into the burro's eyes and touches her ears
and for a few seconds the burro is free
and even seems to laugh,

because love does
that.

Love frees.

- from Love Poems from God by Daniel Ladinsky

*Cassandra

I considered putting this in an email, but then I thought it might encourage someone else by being here.

Beauty heals. Beauty restores. Beauty is somehow deeper and more powerful than all of the other things we know to be true about our life in the fallen world. Even when
we don't have the answers yet and when life is not organized properly, if we can stop for beauty, however simple, every day, it can do an amazing work of grace on us.

I've noticed that beauty means much to you and that it charges your personal battery like it does mine.

Every time it happens, I'm astounded at how much beauty restores and strengthens me, even when my problems are not yet solved.

But I have to be deliberate about seeking it. Beauty doesn't just come to me often enough to nourish me in the hungry places. I have to search for it and arrange for it.

So here's a prescription: take a beauty vitamin once a day. A picture you adore, a vase of flowers (especially in winter), a bird on the window, music that soars, a book of poetry. As much as possible, surround yourself with it. Don't feel that you have to "earn it" by getting to a place where you feel like there is room for it. Just do it now, in the midst of the mess and the confusion and the sense of being overwhelmed.

I wish -- how I wish -- someone had told me this when I had babies.

I hope it helps.

*Laura, who tells me I'll capture the sky
*Elise, who sends prayers and wonderful advice

And you, my friend, with your world weaving in and out of new son and helper daughter and less sleep and heart-cracking love... I've been meaning to pop in and share something...

Every time I see Gideon and his stiff-step walk turning the corner into his sister's room, and I hear her shriek of excited laughter as she runs to pull him in and hands him a toy and begins jabbering to him, I've thought of you lately. I've tried to instill in Eliana a *peace* about her brother being around... to point out how very much he loves her and admires her and wants to be with her. And so far, I haven't once heard her ask him to leave her room. (except when she's changing! :)

So I wanted to share... cultivate that love between Piper and Bredon. Constantly point out, Oh, he loves you! See him look at you! and exaggerate... Oooooh, Bredon, look at sissy's (or whatever you're calling her to him- Pip?) toy, or book, or dress- isn't it beautiful? Isn't it fun? Thank you, sissy!

Gideon is alight, Eliana is alight, and I'm loving their relationship.

May He give you eyes to see, my friend. (And may I add that I'm praying you into the Light, in this time of potential dark...)

*Jennifer, who listens and feels what I feel
*Jessica, who shares in this time
*Faith, who gave me courage to trust
*Bonnie, who prays and writes simply what I can't always say
*Glynn, who gives helpful courage and kind affirmation
*Holley, who asked for my heart at (in)courage
*Heidi, who asks how I am every day, who is blogging again
*Arianne, who wrote to me even in her own sadness - in spite of my joy

I leave you with a happy award today, given to me just last night by another friend, Amy at Haven Space. If you like, consider yourself tagged (but I don't have time for memes right now... *wink*)

And there are more of you; if I were to write out the words that are living in my heart and giving me courage, I'd be writing all day, and I started this post yesterday. You have given me so much extra courage. I have felt your prayers. I wish I had time and energy to encourage you all in return.

Normally, I have a plan. A prayer, really. Something specific to ask God for. But here I am two weeks into the New Year, and I can't begin to nail down anything specific. Maybe I would ask for

*relationship
*patience
*tenderness
*one day at a time, because I can't live a whole year at once right now

But I don't really know what to ask. My prayers are mostly wordless right now, the aching, breathing, tearing-up kind that wend their way past ceiling into atmosphere that is not comprehensible by flesh and blood.

Ann suggested naming the new year. The only name that has come is Immanuel. This year offers me time, hope that I will

*look for Jesus as God with us
*speak more of the Gospel than I have
*pursue His heart in caring for other hearts

It is not much; it is so much. I laugh at that statement. My whole life is such a paradox right now.

I have thought many times in the past few days how we live in the mind, and I want to stay awake, to live for what isn't tangible, even as the tangible calls me into itself with baby cries and dishes and laundry and food. Really living is a miracle.

I think only God could figure out how we can do this and learn to love Him. There is so much that is worth doing. I only know what to do in the moment meant for it.





(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

God Unchanging

January fourth.

Four days into the new year.

I started a post this morning. Got interrupted by my two. Hated the post when I came back to read it.

It was just another post about the new year and what I want to do in it. Vastly unoriginal at this point, and not very much of me in it to make it more original.

I'm setting too many rules for myself again.

Right now, I don't need rules.

I need grace.

The kind of grace that means I don't have to measure up to the person I'm trying to be right now, the person I feel I have to be. The kind of grace that reminds me that even though it's a new year, I am still the same person, and God is still the same Person - yesterday, today, forever.

I cleaned up our bedroom this morning, with Bredon on the bed, setting up a holler. Piper, not to be outdone, came up with ten different issues that Mommy had to fix, now. With both kids screaming at me, I found myself staring at the ceiling as the "inadequate" rushed over me in waves that brought sudden tears.

Inadequate to mother two. I made repeated vows to stop having kids now. But oh, Bredon is so precious, so tiny. How can I close my heart to it again?

Inadequate to give my heart to a photography project that has come my way this year. I can never be so spiritual as I need to be to be the person God really wants for this job. What was I thinking to accept?

Inadequate to be His, to name His name, to speak of Him at all. I almost vow to give Him up; the words catch in my throat. Is He not enough for this too?

I'm out of control. Everything I know is in transition, overhauled in this new life we have now. The space I've gained for myself is no longer there to depend on. My schedule is shot. Yearly goals are impossible to make in moments driven by the immediate.

I'm still the person I was; I am not so afraid of losing that as I was - but I must be changed through this. It is the nature of growth, of God-work.

My responsibilities are simple now: eat, nourish, clean as I can, love my babies - keep my head above water. It is not much. It is not grand. I am not impassioned in doing these things.

I remember how used to spend time, and tears come again, unbidden, because I miss being 16 years old with nothing more to do than read one book after another after another. Life was so dream-full then.

And now I am living my dreams deferred, and they are not what I thought they would be; with these gifts, there is a reminder of God, a need to acknowledge Him. I am no longer able to use the gifts without gratitude, to live my own dreams without His strength.

The night before I went into labor with Bredon, He spoke reassurance; that He would be God on this side of the gift as He was before I knew who He was. I could count on that, rest in His unchanging heart, His Godness that I still don't comprehend. That I still don't need to comprehend for His grace to overshadow me, for His Son to be my righteousness, my adequate, my exceeding abundant above.

And I know where my heart will be this year, learning deep about this Son of Man, God-with-us who revealed the Father, who became sin for me, who was and is and always will be Alpha Omega, my enough.

a broken still

Don’t measure God's mind by your own. It would be a poor love that depended not on itself, but on the feelings of the person loved. A crying baby turns away from its mother's breast, but she does not put it away till it stops crying. She holds it closer. For my part, in the worst mood I am ever in, when I don't feel I love God at all, I just look up to His love. I say to Him, "Look at me. See what state I am in. Help me!" Ah! you would wonder how that makes peace. And the love comes of itself; sometimes so strong, it nearly breaks my heart.

- George MacDonald

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

Sometimes it is easier to write poetry than it is to put words to the emotional maelstrom that hits me every two, three days. I know I could write facts about events. I could even attempt to identify and process and organize the mess of me so that I am at least comfortable with where I am. But I don't always have the capacity to do anything but feel.

I wish sometimes I was less intense, that my reactions to life weren't so passionate - one way or the other. Over the years, I have come to accept this part of me, recognizing that God created me this way in order to glorify Himself. I am very Peter-like sometimes - a son of thunder. Or daughter, rather.

I have a favorite quote about relationship: "I do not wish to treat friendships daintily, but with the roughest courage. When they are real, they are not glass threads or frost-work, but the solidest thing we know" (Ralph Waldo Emerson). I admit, I treat my relationship with God with that "roughest courage" most of the time.

Pete says that God lets me get away with things he'd get struck dead for - you know, the point-blank, "I don't agree with You on this God" or the "I know, but..." or the "I don't get this, so I'm not going to deal with it right now." I think God knows I learn through experience, and He knows better than I the measure of my trust, the depth of our relationship. He is so kind to me, so patient.

It is truly the solidest thing I know.

Even on the days when all I can do is feel my human, when I can't make sense out of anything past the brain fog, when my temper is short and the cats get caged (because they really are too much trouble sometimes!) and the house gets wrecked because I need a physical outlet and not even music or writing or venting releases the pent-up emotion of change.

The day began for me with a sense that God is doing something new: the year of still I have lived is going to change soon, the waiting-for-direction is coming to an end as He reveals the work He has been doing in my heart, as He opens my vessel up to pour out for more than my family. The joyful anticipation mingled with equal parts terror and annoyance sent me into a frenzy that began with a justified nesting instinct for getting the baby's bed up and ready and expanded into a whole-house rearrangement that just. wasn't. working. with the furniture I own.

This, of course, grew into discontent over the state of our finances and "why can't I just go out and buy what I need for this little guy - I never even got to do this for Piper!" I saw my contentment slipping away. Well, actually, I sent it packing. The idea of the bigger house we've just turned down was growing more and more appealing, even if it would cost us several thousand dollars we don't have to make that move two streets over. A whole room for Button would be much easier than trying to make him fit...

At the end of the day, Pete took us out for donuts. We cleaned until 11:30, went to bed with Piper (who had merely napped at 7:30) at midnight, and I woke today to find I had enough again.

Living outside of my old condemnation leaves only the embarrassment of looking God in the eye and telling Him what happened (as if He didn't know already). I almost dare to ask Him "why did You make me this way?" and realize that the 14 hours I spent on my feet yesterday is a good indicator of how much endurance I will have for labor, a factor that has been scaring me lately - I've been so tired, I've wondered how I will get through it. Pete laughed last night over my furniture-moving stubbornness when I told him that "you can move anything if you're willing to move it an inch at a time."

I wonder if God feels that way about my heart.

I underestimate the patience of Love, the fullness of Gospel-grace. I try too often to deal with my own fears, to measure out my own strength. I think I assume it is too much for Him - doesn't He have other work to do? Shouldn't I get this by now?

The love comes of itself; sometimes so strong, it nearly breaks my heart.

Then there is no more room for words, for justifications, for fears - He is God, and there is nothing left for me but stillness in knowing Him. Peace I feared lost. A long, deep breath of remembrance - His provision, His work, His rest.

In my memory of frustrated yesterday, even in my glimpse of finite tomorrow, I won't lose the today-Truth of His unchangeable I AM.

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


This post also linked at Holy Experience for Walk With Him Wednesday.





(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

treasures

It was supposed to be a short walk. Really, it was. It hadn't been my idea in the first place. But somehow, Piper got it into her head that we were going for a walk, and I've let her hopes down so often lately, I couldn't hand her another "no" for her growing boundary collection.

I took a break from my work to change her diaper, but she decided we were getting ready to "go-go!" and laid down with rare compliance to get the change, complete with "goop" for the diaper rash she's had this week. (She always makes sure we remember the "goop.") As I finished, she was chattering away about "pants" and "shoes" and how we were going for a "wa'k" (she hasn't got that "l" yet), and when she was dressed again, she ran to the gate in front of the door with such a happy, "one, two - SIX!" (she knows "three,' I know she does! Only it's "pfhree" with her...) - I just couldn't turn her down.

So we went for a walk. I intended only to go to the end of the street and back, but the first 200 feet took us 15 minutes, because Piper was finding treasure.


She stopped for handful after handful of acorns to put in her pockets ("pox"), and we found feathers and a red dogwood "beerwee" and a round rock. She likes those rocks. We found little white flowers (that wilted overnight).

Finally, after stopping every ten steps or so, I impatiently asked her if she wanted to go to the park (for the sake of getting somewhere, since I was already time-wasting in my mind) and we finally started walking, treasure-laden.

I don't think of fallen acorns and rocks and feathers and dogwood berries and random pink squirrelies as treasure. I've been so busy trying to record and process pictures of others' memories in time for Button's birth; it's all I can see most of the time. But I'm missing my own treasure, holding back my heart from her "until later," because I just have to get through this so she can have all the time she wants.

But I wonder, will she still be here when I'm done?

It is not as if I'm at work, putting her in daycare. But working from home has its own set of challenges, because the work is always here, always something I should be doing, should be getting done. I'm not smart enough to balance this; her heart-needs don't fit my schedule. They don't fit any schedule, stopping every ten steps to collect something that she values, something I roll my eyes at, because I just need to get to the end of the street and back so I can do what I need to do.

Last week, I worked non-stop, up early, up late, ignoring Piper as much as possible - and I didn't meet my deadline, because my baby-body is too tired. My eyes just quit working after a certain point; I couldn't stay awake. I don't know how I'm going to finish this month. I don't need any more interruptions.

But Piper's not simply an interruption. She's not even a break from my work. She's a treasure. I have to stop, pick her up, put her in my heart-pocket, even if I've only made it ten steps in.





(Image © Informal Moments Photography)

queries on toddler-teaching

School started in our town today. The buses were out, the children supplied and dressed and sent in by eight to be "educated" until four. Many of my friends and acquaintances have also begun their homeschooling programs over the last few weeks.

In the last few years, I've been somewhat isolated from it all, but it is closer to home now than it was. It is something to consider: how will our children learn? I'm embarrassed to admit that I really have no idea where to begin.

Even at two, Piper shows how much she wants to learn with her letter recognition (spotty though it may be), her counting (we count to five, and she insists on adding the "six!"), and her pattern recognition that has her "reading" the titles on our unboxed videos. She knows most of her colors now (pink is her favorite - those of you who know me well will appreciate the humor in this), and she has opinions on everything.

I've been contemplating the idea of using an hour or so during the day to sit and learn a little together before Button comes in December. But what will we learn? What should I teach her? I know it will look like play to me because she learns so much through play right now. I don't want it to look like another movie, another hour she has to figure out what to do with herself while Mommy tries to get work done.

I am not very good at "playing" with Piper; we both have our own ideas about the way things should be done. I am realizing that the only way for me to try to teach my daughter anything at this point is to create a space where she doesn't believe she's being "schooled." Her strong sense of her own freedom turns those pages long before she's absorbed what I am telling her is on them. Yet she is very open to stories, interested in pointing out what she knows already.

I'm not sure how to make this transition from cuddling and holding to nurturing and expanding Piper's world. I know she is only two, but I think I need some time to grow into this, to learn her a bit more, to learn me a bit more, and she is so ready and eager to take it all on.

What have you done with your little ones when they begin to learn? I'm not a natural at this like my mom was. How is helping Piper learn to be an adventure for me? Do you have any suggestions for materials I could use, ideas for activities we could do? Thoughts on dealing with a toddler who has her own ideas about life?





(image from sxc)

time to think

This photo just makes me happy. It's from one of my favorite memories - touring with a chorale over spring break during my freshman year of college. We sang this incredibly difficult, wonderful happy song based on a Psalm over and over and over, and I never got sick of it. I ordered a copy of it for myself so I could learn to play it, and it still makes me smile and relax just to hear it, remembering the passion it touched in me.

I know I'm dwelling on a lot of memories right now - please forgive me. I'm rather sick, and mostly sacked out on the couch with not a lot to do but muse on the past. Today, I had a crying session and a talk with God about what I missed at college because of my health, and Pip and I took a nap together. Well, she slept. I watched Anne of Avonlea.

I get nauseated when I'm upright; it's easier to rest. BUT, I did get a shower today. I got dressed, got my hair done, and got our bed made. Small accomplishments, but accomplishments nonetheless. Another day done. This week is dragging.

I feel as though I'm learning to lay my dreams down and trust God with what He has for my life. It's a different sort of feeling. Not a struggle so much as a deep sense that what He has for my life is best for me. I'm finding that quiet acceptance doesn't always look like defeat.

the blur before the dawn

Every once in a while, when I'm shooting, I deliberately blur something. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. This one, though, taken in the pre-dawn light this morning, just makes me want to swoon - I love the sweeping gentle in the shot, the promise just like the dawn, that day will come, that we'll see the dogwood blossoms soon.

I stopped trying to plan my life a while ago. I don't know when it happened, really. I just know that somewhere along the way, I realized that God doesn't operate from a Plan A/Plan B construct. His will for me is to know Him and to love Him with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength.

This means that my high school "full time Christian service" commitment isn't necessarily defined. I don't see God leading me to be a Pastor's wife (I'm married to a lawyer, and THAT could only have been a God thing, you know). Or to go to the mission field. I used to try to figure it out that way, to define my future so I would know where I was going and get onto the "go" track.

I told God in my second year of college that I would go anywhere, do anything He wanted. Wow, am I glad for His mercy as I have not really lived up to that commitment with all my heart. But He pursues my heart, and I know He will help me do what He has put it in my heart to do - to follow Him where He leads. Just take it as it comes, one minute at a time, one day at a time, one step toward Him at a time.

My future looks kinda like this shot to me - it's there, I know it is. I know it is beautiful, because He is good. I also know that sometimes the most poignant beauty bears an element of pain with the hope that is seen in all really good art. God doesn't reveal everything He knows to us, everything He has ordained. He knows we'd run screaming away from Him if we had to face it without His grace for that moment that He knows is coming. I know; I have seen that He always draws me closer to Himself just before something big happens in my life. He always lets me know that He is near, that His incredible love is still sure.

When the light rises full and a bit more of my future comes into focus, I don't know if I will be able to forget the beauty I'm finding in the blur, the gentle knowing that it really will be all right, because God is God and He is good and He is Love that I don't deserve and couldn't earn in a million years. Do you think this is what contentment means?

The sun is up now, and it is a gorgeous day.

tiny find

We had a lovely weekend with some deliberate family/rest time. I think we're finally starting to feel settled enough to think about who we are as a family, a mom and a dad and a kid. Poor Piper has gotten a bum rap in her almost-21 months...

I'm planning to work my tail off this week to get ready for my Saturday wedding shoot, so I'm not thinking too deep about anything right now. We'll see how the midnight oil works, right? Seriously, pray for strength and organization for me this week. I've got so much I want to get done, and I don't know how I'm going to do it. I'm really having trouble seeing because of allergies I didn't know I had (wonderful thing, this moving to the South), and I'm trying to take extra time with Pip right now. The unfortunate thing with that is that the more I take with her, the more she wants...

L'Engle writes in The Irrational Season about the courage to have meekness - strength without pride that is revealed when it is necessary. I'm not sure exactly what that looks like, but I need it this week. Something like that little flower Pip is holding here - so tiny, yet blooming beautiful through the frost...

Time to start blooming...