Tag: motherhood

Palm Sunday; a.k.a., sweaty-palms Sunday

Well, we did it. We parents survived a mammoth Lenten sacrifice: the Palm Sunday liturgy. Which, in the eyes of children, is tiresomely long and full of disappointment as they are told continuously that no, the palm branches are not for sword fighting your brother or tickling the person in front of us. And let’s face it, twisting a palm branch into a cross is one of the great Catholic mysteries.

It has gotten much easier over the years. Most of my children aren’t children anymore, and this year our toddler fell asleep during the penitential rite and didn’t wake up until communion, praise be Jesus. But hearing the musical cries and screams of children throughout the sanctuary reminded me of those sweaty Triduum liturgies when you have to trust that grace is real and somehow the prayers are passing through your ear canals and sticking somewhere in your consciousness.

If I could go back and give the younger-mom-me advice about wrangling children in Mass, I would say, “Girl, chill the eff out.” At the time, I thought I was teaching my children manners by insisting they sit still, kneel and stand when appropriate, remain mostly quiet. But looking back, I think it was 10% an attempt at parenting, but 90% a worry about being judged by others. It took several years to relax. Gradually, my husband and I both got used to spending time in the foyer or on the steps of the church, sometimes for most of the Mass. And even more gradually than that, we got used to not being angry the whole time we were in the foyer or on the steps of the church. We tried a rewards system, bribing, lecturing—and none of it worked. If anything, it made our kids loathe Mass. Eventually, we concluded that we would rather our kids wiggle and squirm, and come away with a give-or-take opinion about Mass, than hate it because they were constantly in trouble for just being a child.

Things settle. They figure out how to sit through Mass. And the younger ones learn from the older ones.

It was beautiful to hear the musical cries and screams of children in Mass today. I just kept thinking, “I feel ya kiddo. This is a long and strenuous Gospel to sit through.” It was also a rare year where I could close my eyes and—imagine this—pray and meditate along with the Passion. I’ve learned to treasure and appreciate those Masses, as they are few and far between.

As my children keep growing older (they do that), I am realizing that Mass will become contemplative for me once again. That time is coming. And while I’m looking forward to that, a part of me will mourn those crazy, sweaty Triduum liturgies with over-tired, hungry, half-crazed toddlers. I promise now, that when that day comes, I will look at a pair of young, frustrated parents and smile. I might even envy them. A little bit.

3 Rules of Improv for the Home

As a parent, there are lots of things that come out of your mouth which you never thought you’d have to say, like, “Do not chase the cat with a stick”, and “Yes, you have to change your underwear EVERY DAY”, or “Who took a bite out of the cheese brick in the middle of the night?” But the saying that takes the cake, which tops them all with its ridiculousness and frequency of replays is:

You are not in control of each other’s imagination!

I can’t believe how many times my husband and I have had to say this, usually with one child shedding tears of frustration and another fuming in rage. Here is an actual, real-life example: one daughter wanted her “magic” to be the color blue and wanted her brother’s “magic” to be the color red, but he didn’t want it to be red, he wanted it to be blue. It took us a while to figure out exactly what the conflict was, and I’ll never forget my husband’s face as he said, “Wait, wait, this ‘magic’ you’re talking about… is it an object you’re playing with, or is it pretend, as in imaginary, as in invisible?” It was, in fact, the latter, to which he replied in a low, firm voice, “You are not in control of each other’s imaginations. His ‘magic’ can be whichever color he wants it to be, and you’re just going to have to be okay with it.” He and I then debriefed, and laughed, and marveled at how often we had been called to intervene in imaginary games which made no sense to us but meant everything to our children.

And then it hit me: the rules of improvisational theater applied perfectly in this situation. Now, it’s not often that I realize what I spent a concentrated part of my life studying (and for which I am still paying for monthly) actually becomes useful. I was plum-giddy. I set out to teach my children some rules of improv. And… it worked.

Rules for Imaginative Play

#1 Comedy Comes in 3’s

How many times have you been sitting at the dinner table and heard the same joke repeated six, seven, fourteen times? Yeah, me too, and I’d rather stick a knife in my eye. So I showed my children vaudeville comedy routines like Charlie Chaplin, the Three Stooges, etc., to prove that comedy comes in 3’s. You take a drink from the wrong glass and spit it out once (funny), twice (hilarious), thrice (peeing my pants), four times (bored, what’s wrong with you?). I don’t know why; I don’t know what it is about our brains, but for whatever reason, the 4th time isn’t funny. Neither is the 12th. Therefore, a joke, punchline, or silly word may only be said three times in one sitting.

#2 We laugh WITH someone, not AT someone

Nothing kills creativity like self-doubt. This was especially apparent in the very small window of time I taught and directed high school theater. One of my mentor-teachers wisely told me (and I remembered this as a teenager) that a drama teacher spends the first year just breaking down the self-consciousness that keeps actors stiff, quiet, and uncertain. They’re so worried about what their peers will think and say (and let’s face it, people can be terrible to one another so the fears are real), that they don’t loosen up enough to play. But children, unless they’ve been through trauma, don’t have those walls up. They’re delightfully silly and their imaginations are wildly free. Imaginative play is vital for a child’s development—I would argue that it’s also vital for a strong faith-life—so it’s super important that each member feels free to be silly. Don’t mock or laugh at your playmates, but absolutely laugh with them! Don’t put down anybody’s ideas, which is related to the next, final, and most important rule:

#3 Yes, AND

One of the more challenging aspects of improv is working alongside someone else’s spontaneous ideas. If someone initiates a scene of invading aliens, you can’t decide that aliens aren’t really your thing and insist you’re an unlucky lobster in a grocery store tank. You also can’t half-ass the effort. The response has to be yes-and, meaning you immediately accept the idea and add to it. And, if you did get stuck with a bum-idea in the first place, the yes-and principle actually saves the scene much quicker than trying to completely change it. This is also the best way for children to approach imaginative play. It takes practice and a little coaching, but when kids use the yes-and principle while playing, each child (ideally) can feel heard, accepted, and included. It’s also important to establish that no one’s idea is dumb, stupid, boring, etc. And you don’t need to try to control the other person’s imagination; your different, unique ideas can work together.

Pas de Deux

When I was 13, I saw The Nutcracker ballet for the first time. It wasn’t my family’s style to go to the ballet, or symphony or theater, but my best friend and her mom had invited my mom and I along. I went in cold without any knowledge of the music or story, and I probably thought I was too cool for it or something, fairies and tutus and such. But the anticipation alone was excitement enough. The whole experience of dressing up, handing over our tickets, finding a seat through the crowd, a live orchestra– all of it was new and exhilarating. I felt immediately elevated; I felt wealthier, smarter, more beautiful; I felt like a classy broad.

As soon as the orchestra played the first several measures and the curtains swept back, I was gone. By thirteen, I had quickly buried my love of fairytales and sense of wonder in favor of a more enlightened and cynical worldview, but The Nutcracker called my bluff. I don’t even know if it was critically good, but I will never know because I was in love with all of it: the costumes, the narrative, the story-telling through dance– all of it was magical. But the moment that transported me was the Pas de Deux. I was sure I had never heard any music so ethereal. I was swept away with its romance and grandeur. When we got home, I picked out the melody on the piano, and later when I received the soundtrack as a Christmas gift, I listened to it over and over again. It was like getting wrapped in a tender whirlwind and lifted off the ground. I regularly listened to that album, just as regularly as Smashing Pumpkins’ Siamese Dream and Tori Amos’s Little Earthquakes.

It wasn’t until I had children that I began to explore more of Tchaikovsky’s work. I excitedly introduced my little girls to Disney’s Sleeping Beauty, which had been my absolute favorite animated movie as a child, only to realize that Disney had borrowed Tchaikovsky’s Sleeping Beauty ballet as its score. Watching that movie as an adult was like finding the source of my own aesthetic: the stylized art inspired by medieval tapestry, the sharply angled faces of the heroes and heroines, the woodland cottage and stately castles, and the score that carried it all on a current through peril and triumph. This was the foundation of beauty for me.

I was thrilled to introduce my children to Tchaikovsky, and while the ballet is still expensive, many ballets are available on disc, which is how we watch The Nutcracker every year, and how we’ve all seen Sleeping Beauty and Swan Lake. I have loved watching it capture their imagination as they bound about the room copying the dances and memorizing the melodies, and then when they’re older, discussing themes, motifs, and artistic choices. It renews the wonder for me. Gradually, I take one child at a time to the ballet (or live theater) as we can afford it so they can experience the heightened anticipation of a performance, and possibly be transported by a song.

Even now, thirty years later, something happens to me when I listen to the Pas de Deux, like the invisible string that connects me to my Creator pulls taut and draws my attention. I’ve thought a lot about why. I think it captures the overwhelming feeling of longing and desire, and the exclusivity of romance when the world passes away and the only other body you’re aware of is that of your lover. There’s safety, protection, and strength in its exclusivity and one-ness. The continuous, climbing scales within the song that ascend and descend capture the moments of anticipation, of joy and delight, at times of sorrow, and ultimate ecstasy of love. The grandeur of the song– and the moment in the ballet– captures the pursuit of God the Lover for us, and the full realization of our purpose in communing fully with Him.

Going to the ballet was transformative. It opened up a whole new arena of visual and musical storytelling, of beauty incarnate in the human form. There is a cathedral-like quality in the ballet, a sacramentality where conceptual beauty meets the human form and music tells a story to draw our attention elsewhere, not to escape, but to connect more fully with our humanity.

Gaude, Gaude; Pivot, Pivot

Usually, St. Nicholas’s feast day is a big deal in our home. Usually, we open stockings before breakfast. Usually, these stockings have the traditional chocolate coins, clementines, maybe a small gift or two, and a striped candy cane. Usually, we feast on a supper of Greek roast, mashed potatoes, and broiled vegetables. Usually, we enjoy delicious gingerbread for dessert. Usually, we read The Miracle of St. Nicholas, and I do the voices. Usually, it’s magical.

But this year was different.

This year, for the first time, I have three teenagers in away-school, as opposed to home-school. Sure, they come home every night, but they’re tired and people-saturated, and after a quick debriefing, they retreat and complete homework. They’re also in band and theater and board game club and sports and they have a peer group that appropriately takes up a lot of their social energy. AND they have to GO TO SCHOOL on the feast of St. Nicholas.

With younger children still at home– and it’s already been hard for them to adjust to a quieter house with their siblings away– I refused to let these Advent feasts pass by. We had a family meeting, we rearranged expectations, we set the date for our St. Nicholas celebration this weekend. I shall not be moved! Family feasting shall prevail!

But… (sigh)

I forgot that three of my children were going to birthday parties, and one had closing night of the high school play which was followed by a cast party, and inevitably, we ate Greek roast and gingerbread in shifts. Lame.

But… (sigh)

I asked for this. My teenagers were depressed a year ago, desperately wanting more of a community, hungry for peer affirmation, bored with home-schooling. And around this time last year, I started pleading with God to do something: make me ready to do whatever I need to do to help them through these difficult years, open my ears, move mountains, part waters, heal their wounded hearts.

Remember that scene in Friends when they’re moving the new couch up a flight of narrow stairs and Ross keeps shouting, “PIVOT! PIVOT!” That is the secret sauce to parenting that no one ever tells you. You never arrive. You never do it perfectly. People change, times change, communities change, and so we PIVOT-PIVOT. And sometimes that damn couch is never going to get through the narrow stairway. I think in this new age of parenting I’m going to have to let go of a lot of traditions or expectations I hold onto which I love in exchange for something that looks different but might just be better.

It happens to be Gaudete weekend, the third weekend of Advent, the rose candle, the we’re-almost-there-so-rejoice Sunday. This St. Nicholas feast wasn’t quite what I wanted it to be, but damn, I’m so happy. My kids are busy! Dudes, they are going to birthday parties! In an alternate version of my life, I could have easily resented today with all its driving around and having all of us in different places, but my kids are feasting socially with wonderful peers. They are becoming more confident in who they are through performance and music and sports and peer affirmation. I am rejoicing.

glances

Since I last wrote, one daughter received her first Holy Communion, three children received the Sacrament of Confirmation, I started post-trauma therapy, sold and packed a house, caravanned 2600 miles with a truck of stuff and van of people, and a dear friend passed away. Since school started, half of us have been sick with something, including the toddler (=no sleep for my husband and I). We’ve also been delightfully busy with fun and wonderful things to do: a musical, a Shakespeare play, Trail Life, swing dancing, school dances, homework, parties. Between festivities and illness and grief and trauma work and budding new relationships and new EVERYTHING… I’m tired y’all.

There’s good weariness, like after a satisfying workout or Christmas shopping. And this is for sure a good weariness. This big move (which I will talk about more later) has been fruitful. It’s just a lot. I feel like we built a new house very quickly and now the foundation has to settle.

Through therapy and by necessity through the fast-forward events of this past year, I’m trying to chill spiritually. Not laziness, but less anxiety. The first day of this year, I had a three-hour Confession-session, one of the juicy fruits of which was realizing how much I have felt I needed to EARN love. (thud) I needed to relax and enter into God’s unsolicited love for me. And this year has offered ample time to do so. All I do is pray on the run. St. Thérèse called it “ejaculatory prayer” which, while jarring to our modern ear, is a mother’s arsenal. And if prayer is– also St. Thérèse– a “glance toward Heaven”, then (sigh) that’s all I got right now.

I know it’s not a form of life-sustaining prayer. The relationship has to be there, has to strengthen and grow through the sacraments, contemplative prayer, adoration, Scripture, etc. And I’m looking forward to entering into another period like that. But right now, God is balancing me on this highwire. There’s a lot less of me, and a whole lotta Him. And honestly, it’s nice to know that when I let go, He will catch and carry me.

About five years into motherhood, I discovered the Benedictine motto “ora et labora”– pray and work– and it’s been my lifeline ever since. I’ve always had the phrase near at hand to remind me of how to anchor my vocation. I just painted it on the hood over the stove in our new house. It feels a little more like home now. And it’s a reminder that praying in weariness, little glances towards Heaven, is about resting in God’s unsolicited love, offering the little I have, receiving a hundredfold.

mystery scar

Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed.

Save me and I shall be saved.

For you are my praise.

Jeremiah 17:14

I have a long, gnarly scar on my shoulder. It even has a couple crossbars like a jacked-up railroad. The fun thing about scars is the stories behind them. I have an especially grotesque one on my left arm that’s a weird conversation starter. (“Wow, what happened there?” “Oh this? I had a huge-ass mole removed when I was 16.” “Was it cancerous?” “Nope. Purely cosmetic. Vanity, vanity, vanity.”) But I have no idea how I got this new one. Even stranger, I didn’t notice it until just a few months ago, this long, gnarly scar that deserves a better story than, “Yeah I don’t know what happened.”  

This is what I want to say if someone asked me about it: You know it’s funny, this scar is a manifestation of the hidden scars that have just recently started surfacing, forcing my prayer and attention, making me an emotional, crumbling mess, and inconveniencing the hell out of my life. But that would probably make for a dismal conversation starter. 

The thing is, part of me wonders if it’s true. 

With this mysterious scar, I feel more like a character created within magical realism whose spiritual wounds begin to manifest themselves outwardly, etched in her skin, deforming her body, where she can no longer hide them or—worse—lie to herself about their existence. 

Something happened to me when my last baby was born. The torrent of afterbirth—which was especially grotesque this time around— was followed by a metaphysical torrent. A few months later, I wondered if I was in some kind of bizarre post-partum depression, when I reconnected with a friend who told me a harrowing story of a car accident that had unleashed past trauma during her rehabilitation. I learned that it was neurologically possible and even common that present trauma could indeed activate memories of past trauma. These weren’t memories or feelings that I had forgotten; it was more like I had separated and parsed the traumatic events out and stored them in different parts of my brain. I can pinpoint moments in the past twenty years when a memory or two has been jostled into my consciousness, usually because of a trigger (damn, I hate that word right now because of how over-used it is, but I mean it in its true, psychological sense). 

Since then, I’ve been on this speed train of healing. The timing was right, I guess. The funny thing—GET THIS—is that when I found out I was pregnant this last time, I was justifiably terrified, but really wanted to practice total trust, and prayed for complete healing through my body. This was, hilariously, the most traumatic birth yet. My body is shot, folks. No more babies for this super-uterus. But God was most certainly healing me, yet in a more whole way, a way I didn’t see coming and didn’t know I needed. He was preparing me for mercy. Labor ripped me open, and with that came a torrent of healing grace.  

So this scar… It’s a reminder to be honest, to resist wanting to quickly patch this all up and move on. It’s also a reminder that the past is a part of my story, and I’m beginning to see how it’s not a source of shame, but a sign of grace. 

lap of luxury

My family sat down to watch All Creatures Great and Small last night, the new series on PBS starring Nicholas Ralph and Samuel West (shout out: West played Prince Caspian in the old-school BBC Narnia series, oh yeah). It’s a show that my teens as well as my younger kids can appreciate, and it’s been rare lately to find a show we can all enjoy together on our traditional movie night. 

In the episode, there’s a scene where the housekeeper, Audrey, has just seen the men out the door. The 60 seconds which follow are an indulgent fantasy: Audrey sits down on the couch in front of a fire. She pauses there, smiling at the golden retriever curled up at her feet, then gleefully opens her book (an old, lovely one, the kind that crackles when you open the front cover). And that’s it. The story moves along from there. It was delicious to watch. My mind sort of stayed there in the parlor with Audrey, wistfully thinking how luxuriant it would be to sit in a quiet room— a fire seems a bit indulgent, not necessary, but delightful nonetheless—with a good book, uninterrupted.  

And that’s where I’m at in life, the kind of busy-ness where sitting in a quiet room with a book looks like the lap of luxury. I know very well that’s a near-impossibility for me at this stage in life, and to be honest, if I woke up tomorrow morning and my family surprised me with a day-alone-reading-by-the-fire, I know exactly what would happen: I wouldn’t know what to do with myself. On the rare occasion I do have a quiet morning or afternoon (so very rare, mind you), I feel almost overwhelmed by all the things that I could be doing or should be doing that I sort of freeze. If I were granted a day-alone-reading-by-the-fire by a genie, this genie would also need to clean my house, do the dishes, scrub the bathrooms, and organize my garage (and quite possibly a few other things) before I felt the freedom to sit on a couch with a book.  

My mind is usually so preoccupied that I forget words. That’s right, just words. Whole nouns will escape my memory. My mind sometimes reads like a fresh mad-libs page with blanks substituting actual nouns and adjectives. Sometimes I find myself saying things like, “I need to go that place to do that thing,” or “Hey, fruit-of-my-womb, can you put that thing in the thing with the thing?” I’m lucky enough that my children and husband can, for the most part, anticipate my meaning. My head is an overstuffed sandwich with mustard oozing through the bread and the pickle sliding out the side. While sometimes I want (and do) just pause and cry, or sneak away to the dog-park for a cigarette (P.S. I don’t have a dog), I’m also overstuffed-thankful for my life. Like, really. I love hanging out with my family. 

I recognize that sometime in the not-too-far-future, I will be home alone, and I will sit on a couch with a book, or rather a stack of books that I’ve been meaning to read for decades. I won’t be as put together as Audrey from All Creatures Great and Small; instead of a wool skirt, stockings, and cardigan, I’ll be wearing the synthetic soft elastic clothes of a modern and confident middle-aged woman. Instead of a dog, there may be a cat or two. And I’ll probably sigh—even for just a moment—as I remember bygone days when my home was a madhouse.  

a participating parent

Recently, I went to “Parent Participation” day at my daughter’s dance studio. It was, as the title suggests, an opportunity for parents to go through each stage of dance rehearsal with their student. I’m guessing the goal is for us parents to see all the hard work our children put into dance, maybe see how great the teachers are and how much fun they all have—which insures we keep pouring money into this extra-curricular machine. But I knew it would be humiliating. I was a dancer—and a mediocre one at best—about 20 years ago. But my daughter—Viva, as I call her here—was so excited about it, begged me to come, so I swallowed my pride and agreed.

When we arrived, the receptionist handed me a goody-bag of water, aspirin, and an ice pack. Very funny, guys. As I stood awkwardly in the room in my mom-yoga pants and Star Wars t-shirt, I quickly tied my hoodie around my waist to hide my mom-rolls. I kept expecting Viva to be embarrassed that I was there, but she was standing close, holding my hand, and beaming. Her confidence made me feel confident—for the first time in our relationship, our roles had reversed. The instructor turned the lights off, turned on some mood-music, and we laid on the floor ready to stretch. I wanted to crack a joke about my creaky back, but when I looked over at Viva, her eyes were closed, she was breathing deeply, 100% in the moment. She was in her element, more relaxed as an awake person than I had ever seen her. It was an incredible parenting moment—you know those moments when you see your child as a truly separate entity, becoming a unique person all of their own—and there was Viva, truly herself.

My daughter, this daughter, is the token extrovert in our family. I don’t know how it goes for other moms who homeschool extroverts, but for me it’s tricky and laced with guilt as I wonder how to feed the people-monster in her heart when I personally find extended social experiences exhausting. I’ve never read that book about love languages, but from what I’ve heard, Viva’s would be time-spent together. She’s right smack in the middle of six kids and doesn’t get the attention she would love. I hug her a lot, but she needs more sit-down-and-talk time for sure. And this seemed the perfect opportunity to spend time with her—on her turf, at her pace. As I fumbled and bumbled through the dance moves, I thought she would be embarrassed, but she wasn’t. To see her joy made me realize I need to make more of an effort to do things she likes to do—and these aren’t elaborate things, but simple stuff like go to Starbucks and share some sous vide bites, watch a girly movie, cook and bake together, garden together.

Each of my children has, in a unique way, challenged my comfort level. Each one has drawn me out, stretched me, sharpened me— sometimes with sparks. It’s one of the great mysteries and gifts of parenting. But it requires a degree of listening and perceptiveness, which is difficult when life gets busy. Viva reminded me it’s good to participate— to get down on the ground, roll around a little, play and relax, be a fool for love. It made me ready to listen.

a deciduous life

I’m sitting in our hobbit-ranch home on the edge of a small Oregon town which is bordered by farms, and beyond that the Chehalem mountains which are aglow this time of year with autumn hues and evergreens. Up to this moment today, the sky has been a clear, glorious blue, which makes the large maple outside our window look like a sacred flame. Rather suddenly the weather has turned. There are bursts of wind, from which there is no shield, coming off of the flat farmland; the sky is a bright gray, like one large flat rain cloud. I’ve opened the window just a little, even though the air is bitingly cold, because I love the sound of the wind in the trees. It’s one of those moments that touches all human senses and places me in the realm of the beyond, remembering God as Creator, and myself at the mercy of His touch.

In just a half-hour of wind, the giant red maple is a third barer than it was earlier today. I feel a kinship with that tree, as it gets tossed about in this unforgiving weather. It reminds me of a conversation I had years ago. I had a smoking buddy in college. After studying all afternoon and into the evening, we’d meet up and walk around the small college town talking about everything and nothing, smoking our cigarettes. We both had ghosts in our pasts, and we never talked about any of that—we kept conversation pretty light and nonsensical, and yet a lot was said in all that was unsaid. A couple times I tried to bring up something real—like faith or love—and I knew right away by his body language that he didn’t want to go there. So I quietly agreed to this arrangement, like smoking without inhaling.

It was the end of fall and the ground was littered with fall muck—the muddy mixture of rotting leaves and pine needles and standing rain water. The trees were mostly bare. I looked down at my shoes a lot during those walks, and I remember seeing the wet leaves matted to my boots. He asked me, “If you could be a tree, what would you be—coniferous or deciduous?” He half-smirked, as though he knew it was a silly question. It was the kind of question one might be asked the first day of an orientation, a dumb get-to-know-you question; it’s ridiculous, but still reveals something about the person’s character.

“Deciduous,” I replied, without pausing. I’d thought of it before. I’d rather be beautiful and glorious for a short season, than the same for all time. At 20, that’s all I’d been doing my whole life, changing and moving and growing. I was intimidated by constancy. Having a career sounded daunting, marriage sounded terrifying, living in the same town for the rest of my life sounded like a prison sentence. I was thrilled and delighted by changeable things, and everything that celebrated it—fashion, art, film, etc—in the way a moth is to a flame, stupidly and thoughtlessly drawn. Of course, that kind of changeableness is exhausting and ultimately unfulfilling.

It strikes me as ironic, as I sit here, looking out at the calm after the short-lived storm, that though my life has been quite different than what I imagined at 20, I have in fact lived a deciduous life. It’s been ever-changing and shifting, but not from my own choosing. Everything about me—shape, color, fruitfulness, bareness—has shifted and moved from season to season. I feel more like a weathered tree, like the maple outside with the tips of its branches exposed. I’m only 37, but I am a bit worn and weary. I often think of Bilbo Baggins describing his weariness as “butter scraped over too much bread”. Exactly. At 20, when I imagined my “deciduous” life, I imagined it changing with adventure, travel, relationships, artistic endeavors; in short, a selfish existence where I called the shots, marked the seasons, changed when I willed. Of course, that never would have come to pass, even if I hadn’t had a conversion, hadn’t met someone that anchored me and helped me be a better human, hadn’t promptly started having babies and pouring myself out. Even if all that hadn’t happened, I would have eventually grown disillusioned, or frustrated with the many changes out of my control, even in a supposed self-driven life.

When I was 20, I didn’t really think about the tree’s seasonable bareness, just its ravishing beauty. But of course now, I see the cycle in its wholeness. I know this period I’m in of child-rearing and successive tasks is just a season. Another season is coming, with its own beauty and hardships. Even though I am weary and feel a bit physically ransacked, I have no regrets—this is the best way I can think of to spend my life. If we as humans are intended to spend ourselves, it’s best to embrace the deciduous nature of human existence; to embrace the seasons with trust in the Creator.

I am with you, for I have called you by name; your labor is not in vain.

O, Happy Festival

or, The Day My Daughter Went All Verruca-Salt On Me

The other day, my four-year-old daughter heard the word “festival” and grew very excited. She said, “Do you remember the Tulip Festival?!! That was SO FUN!”

Do I remember the Tulip Festival? Yes. Yes, do I ever. It was the day my daughter turned Verruca-Salt on me. This is how I remember it:

The local tulip festival is an annual celebration lasting a few weeks during peak tulip-blooming season. We’ve gone a handful of times and I have beautiful photographs of my children at various ages amongst the brightly hued flowers. And this was The Perfect Day for Tulip-Admiring: the sky was clear and blue, it was sunny (yes, in April!), and the tulips were at their peak. It was a rainbow-hued horizon with Mt. Hood in the background to boot.

And that’s when it started. The Biggest Tantrum That Ever Was. Well, I know it probably wasn’t the biggest of all time, but this was the worst I’d ever experienced as a mother.

Mind you, I am a seasoned children-under-five-mom at this point, and my four-year-old (here I call her Blossom) and three-year-old (here I call him Buck) were thoroughly watered, rested, and fed before we even set foot on festival grounds. Usually that guarantees a good two-hour chunk of fit-free-fun. But not on this ill-fated day. I want to blame the festival. Before we even reached the tulips, we had to pass a mini-carnival of bouncy houses and hay-slides. Almost immediately Blossom and Buck were complaining—“When are we going to the bouncy house?” “I want to go on the slide!” “Maybe later,” I replied, without really meaning it, “but we’re here for the tulips.” I was patient at first, but less and less the more this carried on.

Buck started taking off, running through the rows of tulips, the top of his head disappearing beneath the tall stalks. Blossom followed suit. Weighed down with my mom-junk (you know, the big mom purse, water bottles, camera, not to mention the 20 extra pounds of life-giving child-bearing weight), I tried desperately to rally them. They’d hold my hands for a short time, then take off again. I felt helpless.

Sweaty and exhausted, I rallied the troops and we started the long walk back to the parking lot. I had stupidly said in one of my desperate attempts to get them to listen that maybe we could get some ice cream. Feeling I should make good on my promise, I slowed down at the ice cream stand to realize there would be no way I could afford everyone ice cream if we were going to eat dinner for the rest of the week. I kept walking past the ice cream, hoping Buck and Blossom wouldn’t notice, but Blossom started in with the demand that would become her war-cry for the next solid hour: “I want an icey-cone! I want an icey-cone! I want an icey-cone!” If we were at home and this happened, after being asked to stop, she would eventually be sent to her room where she could have her little fit without disturbing the rest of us. But what to do when one is out in public?

I asked her to please stop. I pulled her aside to try and talk sensibly with her. I promised her a treat for later if she would calm down. It only made things worse. “I want an icey-cone!” And now Buck had started in. We slowly inched our way through the festival to the parking lot. It was a long, long walk of humiliation. By that point I had two hysterical children, one on each hand, screaming, “I want an icey cone!” People started to stare. Blossom threw herself onto the gravel and screamed. People started walking around us like we had an imaginary perimeter, but definitely slowed down to stare, like when everyone slows down traffic to leer at the fool that just got pulled over for a traffic violation. Some people tried to be encouraging, others made smart-ass quips. It was like an out-of-body experience. I could see myself, standing in the middle of a gravel parking lot with four befuddled older children behind me as a buffer while two otherwise normal toddlers laid in the dirt screaming. It’s almost funny.

We finally got to the car and I could hardly buckle Blossom, her body was writhing in expert tantrum form. Buck soon calmed down, clearly exhausted. For the first 20 minutes of the drive, Blossom kept going (truly remarkable stamina). My older four kids reached a state of stupor and no longer heard anything. I was so impressed with their saintly patience, I decided that as soon as Blossom fell asleep (which is inevitable, right?) I would go through a drive-thru and get smoothies for my normal, sane children. At last she did, mid-sob, and the car was finally quiet. I pulled into the drive-thru and practically whispered an order to the attendant. Not even kidding you, Blossom woke up, and started right where she left off. “I want an icey-cone!”

There was a lot of good that came from this day. I probably sweat off at least five pounds. Blossom learned a lesson: she did not get a smoothie that day because of her fit, and she brought it up a few times the next few days: “I’m sad because I didn’t get a smoothie.” Me: “Do you remember why?” Blossom: “Yes. Because I threw a fit.” Win.

I also saw my older four children exercise heroic patience. Win.

But I definitely do not remember the tulip festival as “so much fun”, as Blossom does. I’ve been thinking a lot about this, the fact that she doesn’t remember how miserable she was that day, and how miserable she made everyone else. Somehow in her memory all she sees are the beautiful tulips. In her mind, that was a good day, while the rest of us remember a hot sweaty mess.

Yet this is humorously similar to my own recollection of life. There are periods of time in my adult life that I remember fondly, even if they were incredibly difficult. I look back now and I am amazed at God’s hand through it all, but when I really think about it, I was a big stinker during those periods of time too. I was needy, whiny, and I pitched some pretty good fits. But I like to recall all the beauty, the work of God’s hand that I see in retrospect.

I’ve been trying to meditate more on God’s Fatherhood—that He is my Father, I am His Child, and He loves me. Simple, but sometimes difficult to wrap my heart around and truly believe. This isn’t the first time God has used my own experience in parenting to show me His Heart: He holds His ground through my own fits of tunnel-vision and stubbornness with patience and wisdom, and maybe with a little smirk of amusement, is happy when, at long last, I can see the beauty, and have grown a little through the dirt and tears.