A little of this, a little of that...some Monday ramblings
This afternoon on the stairs. E officiates, A follows, K observes with head craned back to see, hands resting on legs:
E,with Sunday's bulletin in hand, one corner wet and chewed by K, and re-taped by E. In a mock deep voice:
"Let's play church! Fold your hands and close your eyes...(silence)...Amen!"
"Now, we'll sing a song. Everybody stand up. Holy, Holy, Holy...."
"Please be seated. Let's pray...Amen!"
"Sing another song. Everybody stand up."
(To the tune of "Praise the Lord for...")
"Thank you God for planets
Thank you God for Saturns, too
Thank you God for letting us learn you!"
"Thank you God for sky and stars
Thank you God for sun and Mars
Thank you God for your shining love
Thank you God for sky and dove
Thank you God for your people that is loved by you!"
"The Son and the Holllllll-y Spirit!!"
"Now we're going to count by 10s."
I couldn't write it all down fast enough. Nor could I contain my giggles, for which E promptly reprimanded me. "What?" I cried, "I like it!" That was all she needed to keep going.
I love catching spontaneous moments of play and affection between the kids. It helps me remember what's good about being tied to home at this stage of life.
On the way home from the store and picking E up from preschool, I pondered how small my life feels some days, how insignificant even. Certainly, I had bigger plans for myself when I was a teenager and a college student. Certainly I imagined this stage of life to be far more romantic and idyllic than it is. I started imagining my kids saying to their friends someday, "Oh, my mom? She just stays home."
Just. I hate that word. She had big plans, but now she just....fill in your own blank.
We all have these reflective moments of negative self-talk where we beat ourselves up for what we haven't managed to accomplish in our lives. And we remember dreams we gave up long ago in the name of practicality or money or time. They can leave us feeling like we have a deficit in our lives. And those dreams can turn into regrets if we put them off for too long.
I wish I could say that in the new year I'm done putting off dreams. But it isn't true. In the past, I put them off for reasons that seemed important at the time--jobs, money, debt--but probably weren't. Now, I realize I have three very good reasons to put off dreams for a little bit longer. It's OK to set my own desires on the back burner for now. There are, after all, tangible rewards in it, rewards I hope my kids will sculpt into their own plans and futures as they grow: sacrifice, service, love, relationship, community,...did I mention love? And maybe, just maybe, my choice to stay home will counteract our culture's message that the measure of a life's value is found in its list of accomplishments, its accumulated possessions.
I find my distaste for the excesses of our culture growing, excesses that drive us to always do and always buy and always fill our lives with things we don't really need. I am finding that what I really need is people and relationships and love.
Retraining the focus of my heart and mind is hard and ongoing. It's tough to upend thirty plus years of assumptions about what is valuable and necessary. So I am grateful when that retraining comes from three little people who seem to understand God's world better than I do some days--who remind me to thank God "for letting us learn him" even on a mundane, hum-drum Monday afternoon.
E,with Sunday's bulletin in hand, one corner wet and chewed by K, and re-taped by E. In a mock deep voice:
"Let's play church! Fold your hands and close your eyes...(silence)...Amen!"
"Now, we'll sing a song. Everybody stand up. Holy, Holy, Holy...."
"Please be seated. Let's pray...Amen!"
"Sing another song. Everybody stand up."
(To the tune of "Praise the Lord for...")
"Thank you God for planets
Thank you God for Saturns, too
Thank you God for letting us learn you!"
"Thank you God for sky and stars
Thank you God for sun and Mars
Thank you God for your shining love
Thank you God for sky and dove
Thank you God for your people that is loved by you!"
"The Son and the Holllllll-y Spirit!!"
"Now we're going to count by 10s."
I couldn't write it all down fast enough. Nor could I contain my giggles, for which E promptly reprimanded me. "What?" I cried, "I like it!" That was all she needed to keep going.
I love catching spontaneous moments of play and affection between the kids. It helps me remember what's good about being tied to home at this stage of life.
On the way home from the store and picking E up from preschool, I pondered how small my life feels some days, how insignificant even. Certainly, I had bigger plans for myself when I was a teenager and a college student. Certainly I imagined this stage of life to be far more romantic and idyllic than it is. I started imagining my kids saying to their friends someday, "Oh, my mom? She just stays home."
Just. I hate that word. She had big plans, but now she just....fill in your own blank.
We all have these reflective moments of negative self-talk where we beat ourselves up for what we haven't managed to accomplish in our lives. And we remember dreams we gave up long ago in the name of practicality or money or time. They can leave us feeling like we have a deficit in our lives. And those dreams can turn into regrets if we put them off for too long.
I wish I could say that in the new year I'm done putting off dreams. But it isn't true. In the past, I put them off for reasons that seemed important at the time--jobs, money, debt--but probably weren't. Now, I realize I have three very good reasons to put off dreams for a little bit longer. It's OK to set my own desires on the back burner for now. There are, after all, tangible rewards in it, rewards I hope my kids will sculpt into their own plans and futures as they grow: sacrifice, service, love, relationship, community,...did I mention love? And maybe, just maybe, my choice to stay home will counteract our culture's message that the measure of a life's value is found in its list of accomplishments, its accumulated possessions.
I find my distaste for the excesses of our culture growing, excesses that drive us to always do and always buy and always fill our lives with things we don't really need. I am finding that what I really need is people and relationships and love.
Retraining the focus of my heart and mind is hard and ongoing. It's tough to upend thirty plus years of assumptions about what is valuable and necessary. So I am grateful when that retraining comes from three little people who seem to understand God's world better than I do some days--who remind me to thank God "for letting us learn him" even on a mundane, hum-drum Monday afternoon.
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| Stealing some baby love |