My Tears

My tears are not under my control. They have become entitled and act as if they own themselves.  Ever vigilant, they wait patiently, collectively ready to burst forth.   Like a sly little army, they can quietly build an unbalanced liquid wall that inevitably tumbles down my cheek in any given situation.    

You could find me tearing up (or straight-up crying) at my children’s piano recital, over a handmade card, while singing at church, on my couch during a commercial, while laughing, or any other time where emotions could possibly be felt.  

I see them now a bit like I see my children – as much a part of me as they could possibly be, from my own body, yet with a will of their own.

Although my tears can appear at any given moment, for any given reason – I want you to know that I rarely cry truly sad or mad tears.   (To be honest, I know that if I start those kinds of tears, they won’t stop easily).  I have seen dark days, but my life is largely filled with hope and contentment.   

My tears appear because of the Beautiful, Meaningful, or Worshipful.  Because My-Heart-Hurts-For-You-and-With-You.  Because of the Gentle or Joyful.  

I am painfully aware that my tender heart empties tears so it can continue to beat and feel and share and not harden.

The tears I cry now are a consequence, a privilege even, a prize won after contending with the overpowering tears of grief and fear. 

Because I have experienced my own deep hurt and I work in an environment which catapults families into horrible nightmares of the unknown, the natural empathy with which I was born magnifies and translates into an acute sensitivity to what is Good.  To Small Graces.  I bear witness of Blessings big and small. 

My tears the tangible reminder that there is love, joy, goodness, peace in the midst of a troubled world full of heartbreak, loneliness, and suffering.

My tears used to embarrass me, but I no longer fight with them.   They come unannounced and unassuming.  Although I am at their mercy,  I embrace them. For they are a signal.  

          Pay Attention!

          This is Important!

         This is Worthwhile!

         This is Beauty!

         This is God speaking to you…

I will cry for commercials, yes.  (I’m an easy target, and I don’t care how much or how often my kids and husband laugh. Those commercials are made to be sweet and sad, and they ARE, and I FEEL it).   But I will also share your hurt, your joy, your struggle, my joy, and (if it’s safe enough) my own hurt, and my own hopes with my tears.

Beautiful depth-of-my-heart tears make me simultaneously vulnerable and invincible.  Once they are loose, I cannot hide.  Yet they fortify me, as they point me to observing God at work. 

Flying Low

There is a momma cardinal in this picture.  Can you find her?  She blends in SO well, minus her bright orange beak. (This is like my red lipstick, right?) 

I sat at my kitchen table, and watched her fly from across the street. She flew so low – not more than two feet off the ground – I thought she was landing in the middle of the yard. 

She flew at that “altitude” all the way to the feeder by the window.  Straight to the bird feeder, between waves of torrential down pours.  She was soaking wet.  All business, this bird.

It’s crazy weather.  Rain all day and night, flash flood warnings, severe thunderstorms.  I am settled in at home, many things that I should be doing floating through my mind. I really just want my kids and husband to come home safely.  With weather like this, I want the essentials (my family near me) and am thankful for the basics (shelter, food, warmth). 

This momma cardinal reminded me that sometimes, during storms, we mommas have to fly low.  We have to be all business, essentials only. 

Our wings might be wet from our struggles -- what life has rained down on us.  

We need to be ready to land at anytime.

ANY time.

There are other days and other seasons for flitting around the neighborhood beautifully and gracefully.  When the storm has passed, there will be time for making beautiful nests and melodic song.

But for now, in this storm, it’s necessities only.  And it is enough.

Don’t be ashamed to fly low, soaking wet, blending in with your surroundings during your storm.   Do what you need to do, (because that is often all you CAN do), and don’t worry what other people think. 

I PROMISE, your wings will dry and you will fly higher another day.  

In God's Loving Care

If you asked me how to get there, I wouldn't be able to tell you exactly.

I’d tell you to stay to the right, go over the bridge next to the weeping willow, up past the Jewish section, and then it’s on the right.

I just get there instinctively.  The years have made this part of my internal compass which knows the right direction.

I pull up and see a man in the next section, sitting in a lawn chair, next to (what I’m assuming) is his wife. He's reading a paper.  If I were him, I’d do the same thing.  I’d come and sit, read, and maybe talk to her for a while.  If I lived close enough, I’d try to come once a day.

I stole this time away from my family, from my kids.  I don’t always come.  My trips back home are fewer and far between.  This isn't always a priority.  

Yet coming here, being here, is good for me.

I just left a very sweet time of conversation and laughter with a friend who knows my heart. I leave that to come here.    And I will leave this quiet place to rejoin my family and all those boisterous children full of energy and innocence.

I come for this reminder.  This is my reality.  

Every Good Thing in my life tastes sweeter now. Sitting here for a time orders my life.

I will mindfully wave to the man in the chair.   I will gently smile and nod at the family dressed in their fancy black clothes.  

We share this place.  This peace.  This reality. 

I take note of the section.  But I remind myself, she's not really here.  As her gravestone says, she’s “In God’s Loving Care.”

  

Getting Started

April 30, 2014   Getting Started

I recently read that people who are accustomed to failure are often people who think little of taking risks. 

There are exceptions, but I get the general principle.  If failure is such a part of the past, there is little fear in trying something new.  

If you consistently feel out of your comfort zone, walk around in tension, or with a sense of unease on your life’s journey - taking a risk hardly seems to carry the same weight for someone who never has these experiences. 

On the other hand, there are those people who are afraid of failure.  They hardly ever do anything risky, and – obviously – stay in their lane, play it safe, and just ride through life … 

And in my case, am left wondering ...What If…

Right now, I am those people. 

Not that I haven’t experienced failure, hardship, devastating life events - but generally speaking – I look at myself and see someone who is successfully safe.  

Up until 18, I had no particularly hard trials in life.  Normal growing up stuff.  My trials were things like moving, fights with friends and parents, acne.

Then mom died. 

And I just tried to SURVIVE.  I continued going through life – college, then marriage, and work. I did it. I made it through my hardship. 

I survived, and that was success.

Then Chris had his surgery, and again, it was survival mode.  We did our best.  We continued getting through life.  And one day (and after some therapy) we realized we did it.  We made it through that hardship. WE SURVIVED.

Again, simply surviving was success. 

Since then, I’ve largely been trying to just find Safe Normal. 

Having kids, as wonderful as it is, throws normal out the window, and you have to find New Normal.  Then you have another, and you hope to find a new New Normal.  Then you move, and have one more squishy baby, and you see an even newer New Normal emerging on the horizon and you realize “I’m happy and secure and things aren’t perfect, but they are good”. 

I’m safe, I’m settling in… and I’m happy here, because up till now,  there has been no such safe normal settling in my life.  

There has been a remarkable amount of transition.  MOST of it was good stuff – don’t get me wrong.  But change is change.

I’m in my safe lane now and I know it -- because I am staring to wonder … What If… 

But I freeze.  I’m frozen.

[Insert: me singing “Let It Go” …  Just a reminder: there was ALOT of FROZEN being watched and sung here in April 2014].

I want to write. But, I’m afraid of failure.  I’m not used to taking risks.  I’m used to taking life’s cards and doing the best with the hand I’m dealt.

Yet I finally asked myself – and if you get to this point too – ask yourself… What is failure?  What is success?   

For me - Success is actually writing to for my children.  Sharing my heart. Pointing them to God’s love.

What I need to do is just start and stop being so afraid.  

I will try to remember (and want you to remember):

- The path you’re on is the right one.  

- Put one foot in front of the other. (This is a step by step process).  

- Just show up, you're not late. 

I don’t exactly know what all this will all look like,  but I’m confident that failure is not even trying. 

An Understatement: Having a Toddler is Hard

Please never ever EVER let me look at you and say “Oh Honey, these are the sweetest days of your life. They grow so fast.” 

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Having a toddler is hard.

Yes, I know. I KNOW these are sweet days - as a whole.  Individually though, they might be some of the toughest days I’ve been through.

But I was that mother  ( I FORGOT how hard it is to be that mother!)  – yesterday.  I was the one with the screaming kid in the grocery checkout line. And NO, I didn’t just have milk and bread.  I had a cart full of food that I needed to buy and just TAKE HOME. ASAP.  This was not a time I could cart-abort.  

The looks from everyone,  the tsk-tsking, the embarrassed smile from the clerk …  

… all the while I am thinking ‘I KNOW why he is crying!  He wants a stinking lollipop that this usually-awesome-for-everyone-that-they-give-out-lolipops store gives BUT it’s 9:15am!   I DO NOT WANT MY 20MONTH OLD TO HAVE A LOLIPOP AT 9:15AM!!'

But it’s impossible to tell anyone anything while he’s screaming and writhing and running and falling and “Up!UP!ing” and simultaneously “DOWN!DOWN!ing” in and through my arms. 

 SO. I deep breathe and wrestle my boa-constrictor angry-arms-legs everywhere possessed monkey child while trying not to spill the entire contents of my purse, remembering I have another child that I quickly look around for, to make sure he is still somewhere in the store.  (He was!)  (Victory!)

Anyways, honey.  Having a toddler is hard.  Mentally, physically.    I got home and was essentially done for the day.  Which is silly, because it was just the start of the day.

 

This is just one part of one hour of one day example of what it’s like to have a toddler. 

Please don’t let me forget. It’s hard.  SO Hard.

You can just call me and I’ll listen and just say “Oh honey, it goes so fast.” And you can hang up and be annoyed.   Wouldn't that be wonderful!?

Legoland of Crumbs

I’m spinning around.   

Not satisfied with what’s going on.

I am so conditioned to URGENCY.  This MUST DO IT NOW mentality.  PLAN THE DAY! 

FIT IT ALL IN! YOU CAN DO IT ALL!  Without this PRESSURE, I sometimes start to spin. 

And I know I’ll stop spinning eventually, but I wonder – who can I call who may understand? 

To just take a deep breath with and check in with and be told that unproductive days are okay?

That being home and letting kids do kid things is okay?

That my front door isn’t getting painted, I don’t know which floor to put in the hideous kitchen (and I have no intention to even think about it for a while) is okay?

That making dinner and unloading the dishwasher and simply keeping children alive may be my biggest accomplishment today is okay?

This, naturally, is where I just want to call my mom. 

And then the swallowing of that pit in my stomach.  The deep breath and pressed eyes to PHYSICALLY hold back the tears.   Because I can’t.   And I cannot live life like that... wishing.   THAT is why I cannot think about her too much. 

Because, on certain days, it can still can be TOO painful. On days I need her most, those are the days where I can’t need her at all.  I’ll fall apart.

At work, I’ve helped keep people alive.  Or at least I helped them stay safe through a night of pain or confusion.  Here, I look at one floor covered in legos, the other covered with crumbs and dropped strawberries, and I feel lost.

Helpless.  Purposeless.  

I know the only way to stop my spinning is to go to God. 

So I do.  And I look to His character and His love.  I pray for His purposes for me.   And I do wonder what IS my purpose, what AM I here for?  What am I being prepared for?  

(And thank you, God, for not caring that my prayers end in prepositions).

Then the deep breath. The peace. The awareness that right now --THIS.

This legoland of crumbs is my purpose today and it is okay.   

2011 - Miscarriage

2011 - Miscarriage

Four times last night, I dreamt that glass broke and then was given to me. It was so bizarre, that even in one dream I questioned, “Why does this keep happening?”

As with most people, I have trouble recalling any specifics of a dream – but wake with a vague recollection of the situation, people, and place.  (If there are specifics, they are sure to not make any sense if I dare try to explain). 

And this morning, unable to recall the details, the broken glass dreams stayed with me. The feel of it shattered in my hands… the repetition.  Two glasses. A vase. A crystal bowl.

After coffee, but before tending to my children for the morning, I searched “the meaning of broken glass in dreams” …

To see broken glass in your dream suggests something you thought would last a long time will end surprisingly and too soon.

Well, that makes sense.

I got pregnant easily, and to be quite honest – unexpectedly.

I told a handful of people.  It didn't feel quite real.

The midwife condescendingly asked why I was so surprised that I got pregnant.  She gave me the look that she probably had given at least a thousand pregnant teenagers.  She joked that my middle name should be Myrtle.  She made me feel bad - the married for thirteen years mother of two - because I was honest that this was unplanned.

I asked for an ultrasound. To see it growing there – to make it real.   She gave me an appointment for a week later. 

It is scheduled for tomorrow.

Instead of confirming my pregnancy, I think it will be confirming a miscarriage.  

I’m writing this only because I assume I will forget what this feels like.  I will forget and not be able to adequately describe it.  I may not talk about it much.  And even if I do, and God forbid, if it ever happens to you – I want you to know what it was like for me.  Whether this is or isn’t the same as what other people go through, is beside the point.

 I guess I just want to write it down so I have record of it, and so you do too.  I know my own mother had a miscarriage between my brother and sister – but that’s all I know.  I have no details of how far along she was, how she felt, how long it took to get pregnant again.

It’s so early, that I’m not attached to this child.  I know that sounds awful to admit – but I’m not.  What is awful is the fact that I had a baby growing in me two days ago, and now I am bleeding. Slowly, purposefully, and just a bit painfully.  

There is an absurdity to my life today. I was having a playdate in the park with friends and sunshine beaming all around me.  Our kids all playing so nicely together, while something inside me – literally – dies.

The fact of what is happening is sad.

I’m not sad that it’s happening to me, or to the baby – Lord knows there is a reason for it and I completely am at peace with that. 

I’m just sad that it had to happen at all.

To anyone. Ever.

I’m sad that sometimes things are so unperfect - that death is the better alternative.

And I’m sad that it has to happen in my body.

I have the ultrasound tomorrow. 

[The ultrasound confirmed a miscarriage. I got pregnant again the following year and had our third].