tiny sphere

I've been quiet here.  I think we've just been trying to find a new rhythm with school starting back up. Having one in elementary school, one in preschool, and a baby means lots of juggling schedules and a lot of transition in most of our days.  We've just been trying to hang on for dear life, and put some systems in place that will keep the peace (if that's even a thing for families with little ones).

I'm head down over here.  Transitioning myself to a world that seemed to shrink over night with the starting of school and a baby needing to nap smack in the middle of that time.  We stick close to home most days which is a huge change for me.  My sphere of influence feels immediately under our roof.

I'm learning the art of staying home.  Not "staying at home" as in being a stay-at-home mom, but literally staying home.  Not going anywhere.  Not trying to fill our time and days with playdates and outings simply to keep busy.  Focusing on our home and learning how to manage it better and more consistently.  Focusing on actually getting on the floor and playing with my kids, and not allowing the to-do list to hijack the entire day.   More days end than I'd like to admit with me sneaking in their rooms to tuck them into covers that have been kicked off and staring at their sleeping, squishy faces wishing I'd been more present with them that day.  Did I look them in the eye enough when they had a question or wanted to tell me something?  Did I give the impression that I was too busy for them?  Did they feel loved?

Tell me you do this too??  I simply cannot wait for them all to be asleep and for the "Mom!, Mom!, Mom!'s" to stop, and then all I want to do is go in and soak up their sleeping angelic faces.  Gosh, I love them. And I seem to remember and feel that a lot more when no one's fighting, throwing a tantrum,  or whining about what I made for dinner.  

My oldest just started first grade this year, and I'm sitting here watching the lightbulb of self-awareness flicker on.  For the first time, she's realizing that she will be evaluated and judged in school. Tests have started, and a subsequent realization that somehow her score is a reflection of her value and that top scores are highly regarded.  Even her pediatrician asked her if she makes good grades. Geez.  I'm sitting here wondering, "Can't she just be kid for a little longer?"  She seems so young, so not ready to bear the weight of this inevitable pressure.   So, I let her make clothes for her dolls out of her socks and underwear, just because designing is her jam...and I order her some more when I realize she has none left and the shoes she's worn sock-less smell like a frog crawled in there and died.  But hey, all in the name of artistic expression, right?  She spends more time upside down than right side up, honing her gymnastics moves, and I cheer her on, regardless of the fact that she's probably going to be 6 feet tall when she's grown.   She will face enough naysayers in her life.  I don't have to be one too.

My middle somehow grew when I wasn't looking.  He still feels baby to me, but he's almost 5.  I feel like I missed the whole last year with him.  It's all a sleep-deprived blur and somewhere in there he started writing his name and throwing a mean spiral.  His favorite questions are, "Does this look scary?  Is this dangerous?" He's all guts and glory, but with a deep need for belonging and connection.  An insatiable need for belonging and connection.  I'm busy loving on him and trying not to flip my lid when he flips his.  He is big and bold with his emotions (kind of like his mama), but his heart is golden and generous and often surprising.

My little demands our attention.  She's feisty and fierce and makes her presence known.  The root of her name means persistence, and she definitely lives up to that.  She may not be walking yet at 15 months, but she gets around faster than a speeding bullet and climbs everything she can.  Lately, her communication seems to have exploded, and I see her wheels turning, figuring out everything around her.  She lights up when she sees us, calling out the truth and beauty in each one of us.  She is the arc in our family...the little bit that encloses the circle and brings us all back around to ourselves.

These kids.  They've wrecked my life for the better.

Sometimes...often...I want more.  I want God to call me to do something great.  I often need to be reminded that raising these tiny humans is something great.  Like the prophet Isaiah, I want to say, "Here I am!  Send me!"  And as those words leave my lips, God replies, "But will you stay?"  Is it that "here I am" for me means not that I will go, but rather that I will stay and be fully present in this moment.  Here I am in this most important moment with these most important tiny humans.  One day they will grow into big humans.  One day, my tiny sphere of influence, my three littles, will reach out into a big, bad world and hopefully be a beacon of light.  Hopefully, they will be kind and courageous men and women.

For now, we will practice the art of staying home, of loving each other even when it's hard, of celebrating our sameness and our differences, and of laughing a lot.

Mamas, we are called to this beautiful, sticky mess every single day and bravery in that is to simply keep showing up.  Keep making the lunches and kissing the owies and juggling the schedule and cheering on silliness and wiping bottoms and breaking up fights and giving encouragement and being present.  Keep showing up, and our tiny sphere will become the greatest work of our lives.

Every day is a little life, and our whole life is but a day repeated. 

~Joseph Hall

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broken windows

I'm a runner.

Not the lace-my-shoes-up-and-hit-the-pavement kind (though I wish I was), but more the when-the-going-gets-tough-I-want-out kind.  In reality, I can only pinpoint a few instances in my life that I actually physically walked (or ran!) away from something.  That time I quit track in high school, transferring universities (which in hindsight was one of the best decisions I ever made), and leaving a summer long dance festival under the guise of a hip injury when reality was probably that I felt out of place, homesick, and not quite good enough.

Most people who know me will probably say that I'm a really strong person, that I don't give up easily and work hard for everything that I have.  The adjective that I've heard the most about myself is intentional.  I agree whole-heartedly.  But sometimes while I am externally intense and somewhat convincing, internally, I'm running.  I'm restless and mentally planning, plotting, and arranging my escape from the difficult.  

This has been a restless year for me.  We added a new baby who had feeding issues, sleeping issues, and massive acid reflux, when simply "we added a new baby" is enough to rock the boat.  We've walked through the toughest transition we could have imagined to a family of five with our middle son, which I wrote about here.  I journeyed through the physical difficulties related to pregnancy and Pippa's birth.  Struggled through postpartum depression (which deserves it's own blog post soon).  Several close friends moved away.  We renovated our kitchen, which I'm so glad we did, but the process and subsequent upheaval of pretty much all of our house as well was pretty brutal.

Here's the thing, though.  These are all things I couldn't quit.  I couldn't walk away from any of this.  I couldn't physically run, so I mentally run.

Lately, I've been running to Redfin.  Redfin?  Yes, Redfin...the real estate app.  The turmoil of this year has left our home in shambles.  While I'm thankful for our home, it's messy and disorganized and seemingly bursting at the seams holding our whole family and all our junk.   As a highly sensitive person deeply affected by my environment, my home currently feels like a place I want to escape.  I'm paralyzed by the work that needs to be done, the upkeep, the kid's messes. I long for a quieter, slower pace of life, outside of the city with a big yard for kids to play and some space for my introverted spirit to be alone sometimes.   So, while I want to make things better, I put on my blinders, brace myself for another day, and dream of leaving it all behind for a 4 bedroom modern farmhouse with lots of natural light on two acres.

And maybe I will live there one day, but if we move, I want it to be that I'm running towards something good, not running away from something I can't handle.  We have many discussions about where and how we should live, without any real decisions or resolutions at this point.  This restlessness...it is not a positive directive or prompting from God.  It's fear and it's disorder and it's disruptive.  

My poor husband has to process through all of this with me.  He's a good man.  A level head when I'm often a pogo stick.  As we processed through whether or not to purchase a piece of land outside of the city, in a moment of brilliance he basically said, "I don't think we should do this.  We take our dysfunction with us.  Moving to a new place doesn't solve our problems, doesn't clean the messes, or create the systems that we so desperately need to put into place."  I told you, a good man.

We agreed to adopt the Broken Windows Theory for our home.  This theory was first introduced in a 1982 article by social scientists James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling, and later increased in popularity in the 90's when it was adopted by Mayor Rudy Guiliani and the New York Police Department to combat crime.  Basically, the premise is that if a building has a few broken windows, the tendency will be for vandals to break a few more.  Broken windows become the norm, a signifier welcoming more vandalism and eventually leading to more neighborhood crime.  Or if litter accumulates on the pavement and no one cleans it up, soon, more litter accumulates and it becomes a dumping ground.

I know it's a stretch to liken our home to a crime ridden neighborhood, but the fact of the matter is that in a lot of ways we've given up.  We've allowed one broken window to become three and a broken furnace and unfinished projects and piles of mess in our basement and a garage full of junk.  We are the vandals in our own home.  The community that no longer takes pride in their surroundings or who feel that it's beyond them to make things better.

So, last week, I scheduled a guy to fix our heat.  Novel idea.  And when I couldn't get our new thermostat wired properly because our furnace is ancient, I called him again for help.  I set up a system for dealing with the piles of artwork and school papers for the kids.  I took a day and folded ALL the laundry.  We have plans to make a list of things to do to fix all of the figurative broken windows, and then actually do them.  To make our home work for us.

We've lived in this house 4 years, and I've yet to hang pictures on the walls.  In a lot of ways, it still feels like a house.  We haven't made it home.  We haven't made it work for us. That's our goal right now.

Who knows?  Maybe after all that we will still say it's not working.  Maybe I will still want to move.  But it won't be because I'm running away.

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learning to ski and other things

A few years ago, we decided that we wanted to really value time together as a family and place high priority on having time for just the 5 of us to connect and have fun together, away from our normal lives.

As part of that commitment, we recently went skiing for a week over spring break.   I have long had this vision of our family all skiing together one day when the kids are older, and cultivating a fun, outdoors, athletic, and bonding thing we can as a family.

My husband grew up skiing.  I did not.  You should know that before this week, I'd been skiing exactly 2 times: one day in 2000 and one day in 2010.  You should also know that I do not like to do things that I do not do well.  I'm a perfectionist in the worst way, and if I know that I'm not going to be the best at something, I don't even want to attempt it.  Hence, as an adult, I do not like to try new things.  I abhor it.  I want to stick with what I know and not go through the pain or (ahem) embarrassment of being a beginner.

Unfortunately, though, following through on my vision means I have to learn something new.  The thought of sharing this experience as a family and with my kids trumps any pride or insecurity I have about learning a new skill.  I have to overcome my fear of falling, of failing, of people all around me knowing that I have no freaking clue what I'm doing.

I was able to ski three days that week, and while Ryan was with me the whole time, I spend a lot of time swimming around in my own head as I made my way down the mountain.  I literally had a running internal voice saying, "Weight on your upper edges, shift your weight, turn!, edges, shift your weight, don't fall down, I'm out of control, stay up, stay up!, don't run into me, my knees hurt, don't hit that woman, you can go faster, you can do this, ouch, get back up, snow down my shirt!!, keep going, watch that bump, which way?, I made it!"  Yes, literally.  Audible voice in my head saying all this stuff.  Someone ring the crazy gong.

On day two, I had improved about 300 percent from day one, and there were actually times that I was having fun and not having to work so hard.  We stuck mostly to green runs, and I could feel myself relaxing as I mastered more technique and could enjoy what I was doing and take in the beautiful scenery.  And then I did what I always do.  I mentally pressed myself.  "Greens are not good enough.  When will you master blues?  When will you be an amazing skier and conquer black diamonds?"

Wait.  Stop.  When did skiing become something to conquer instead of something to enjoy? 

Then the thought came to me that skiing green runs was not failure or something I should be ashamed of.  That maybe learning to ski for me was more a lesson of learning to enjoy myself and accepting where that falls.  Of being satisfied with fun and easy and not feeling the need to push and push and push and then quit because mastering a black diamond seems so out of reach.  Why does a black diamond have to be the ultimate goal here?   Why can't skiing a green and loving the heck out of that be the ultimate goal?  Why can't just having fun be the ultimate goal?

I want to find pleasure in something by simply doing it, without comparison or self-sabotage.  To be so ok with simply being ok at something.  This is new for me and it feels weird and rebellious in a refreshing kind of way.  

I learned to ski.  But really, I learned so much more than that.

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life giving

The cursor blinks in the top corner of this blank screen taunting me like the dripping of water, like the ticking of a clock that mocks me with each second spent since seconds are hard to come by these days.  And when a second does come, I'm paralyzed by indecision.  Do I clean the kitchen, fold the laundry, swap out kids clothes for new sizes for the millionth time, paint that window trim, organize our bathroom closet, read a book, rest, write?  Whatever I do seems the wrong thing.  If I rest, I'm kicking myself for not being productive.  If I try to be productive, I'm kicking myself for not fueling my soul.

These seconds came because my husband took the kids out of the house for a few hours.  He knew that if he didn't, he would have a mess of a wife for the next week.   I'm an introvert, and I desperately need alone time to recharge, and quite simply to be a functioning human being who isn't a basket case day in and day out.

We have a 6 year old, 3 year old, and 4 month old (at the time of this writing).   I don't sail into motherhood gracefully.  Rather, I crash land with each new birth.  I used to beat myself up about this, but now I just accept it.  I know that I will go to dark places, that I will take more time than most to bond with my kids, that I need time to myself away from my kids, even that brand new baby.

On the whole, our life is beautiful.  Three amazing kids, a home of our very own, great community of friends and family.   But I have often felt like I'm drowning, like someone is standing over me, holding me down with a hand on top of my head as I thrash and flail against them.  I have felt so defeated as the house is messy again, my son screams in my face, my daughter runs to her room and slams the door, the baby has trouble nursing, there's dinner to cook again and clean up again, diapers to change, lunches to make, toilets to scrub, parenting books to read.  What is urgent overshadowing what is important.

Yes, this is holy work, this raising of tiny humans, but I don't know how to balance the monotony with the chaos of this task.  I don't want this mundane hand on the top of my head.  I haven't learned yet to find beauty in the simple rhythms or to understand that sometimes it's these ordinary moments that make life extraordinary.  I'm working on it.

And so, I seek.  I write.  I make a list of what brings me joy...what is life-giving to me:

And I write down what is life-sucking:

And then I stared at them...hard...and what should have been blatantly obvious suddenly became so.  Almost EVERYTHING I'm doing, the things that make up most of my days, are on the life-sucking list. Hardly anything I'm doing is on the life-giving list.  Somewhere along the way, I got lost in my own life.

I normally pride myself in my strength and being able to handle any challenge, but sometimes that self-sufficiency becomes a crutch not that holds me up, but that slows me down and makes me limp.  I'm learning to ask for help and to say specifically what I need.   I'm learning to think about what brings me joy and pursue those things even if in the margins.  Hence, this blog that is stumbling along.

So, I ask you.  What brings you joy?  What makes you come alive?  What is life-giving to you?

Whatever you must do...do that.

If you'll humor me, write what is life-giving to you in the comments here.  I dare you.

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