Joy in my Home Office

There is a sea of items on the desk.  They are piling on top of one another, vying for space and growing.  As I approach the desk to clean it there is a ball of anxiety that wells up, not for this small pile but for the redundancy of it, for the millions of small piles in my home, in my head. 

I see a handful of Lego dudes, a little plastic horse, little vehicles crafted by little hands.  Something in me stops, I don't WANT to pick them up.  I like looking at them. 

Normally when I have these sentimental pauses I push them to the side, shaking my head at my inability to just DO.  I routinely pick them up and discard them into small bins, big bins, a room of these bins so that I can create order out of the chaos of childhood. 

Today, however, I just stared at them.  I took a picture of them.  I cherished them.  What is this in me that wants to touch, treasure, LEGOS of all things?  After all, Legos are what I found in my two year old's mouth yesterday.  Legos are what I step on and curse.  They are the toy that refuses to be confined to its orderly bin.  

Somehow, perhaps for the music of JJ Heller waving through the house, or perhaps because the windows are open and Fall is here and I'm feeling something close to FREE; today I stopped and I just loved those little Legos. 

I love that Jonathan's fingers are still chubby and somewhat awkward as he puts them together, though he does it deftly and quickly, I can still see the rubber band wrist and the still-little fingernails as he works.  So rarely do I watch him do it, but I know how he looks when he does. 

There is a bubble of protective callousness in me that bursts when I see him helping William find pieces out of the bin and something so precious to me about Sam knowing what "guys" are, because at two he has already learned this boy term from his 

"budders". 

At some points in my life I would kick myself for not cherishing the small toys EVERY day.  I would respond to my tenderness with guilt, refusing to enjoy the joy of motherhood for all the hurts I have not comforted, all the toys I have literally thrown into bins as frustration and anger and exhaustion and confusion have tunneled themselves into hatred of those little plastic figurines. 

Not today.  Today I will love the joy, soak in it and work it into my head until bubbles of joy are forming.  Wash in it now, for tomorrow I will remember the sweet feeling of standing in the waterfall. 

Grasping at wild greatness

There is a children's book called The Story of Ferdinand.  In it a young bull grows up contentedly in the pasture, is suddenly and shockingly thrown into the bull ring, and if you haven't read it you really should because it has a cute ending and adorable black and white illustrations.

I have been thinking about my season of motherhood lately, trying to view it as through a telescope.  I need to get a far off perspective because I am tired and overwhelmed and also keenly aware that these days are expiring more and more quickly.  My children's wrists are losing their chubby creases and their faces are lenthening, their muscles starting to be more defined.  They are getting faster and faster and stronger every day.  It struck me recently that I am not molding small pots, but rather I am watching as these boys, these arrows, fly by me at the speed of light.  When I can I reach out and touch one, I leave my mark on it or adjust its course, but only very quickly and often subtly.  They don't sit or listen long enough for me to train them up as a professor teaches his students; I have to just stick out my hand and graze them if I want to leave any impression at all.

These boys are fast approaching manhood, and though it seems preposterous right now, it is always that way, is it not?  I remember working at a horse farm in middle school and one of the mares was pregnant.  It was a small farm, and there was only this one pregnant horse so we young girls watched her as though she were Cinderella transforming at the hand of the fairy godmother.  We were awestruck by the whole process and came as quickly as our moms could drive us when she finally gave birth.  We arrived in the early quiet of morning before the sun had even risen halfway into the sky.  There was this colt, this wobbly beautiful baby, and we were instantly in love.  He was named Jet, and as his name would suggest he was suddenly a strapping young stallion; it happened so fast we didn't see it coming.  The whole process of his growth was fascinating and startling; we marveled at his youthful energy and stubbornness and started in surprise when he nipped at our hands.  We giggled at his progress and learned to fear his unbroken strength.  The only way he became a capable, rideable gentleman was at the hands of the farm owner, a woman we all feared (as much as we feared Jet's youthful strength) and admired (a little less than we admired the horses, to be frank.)

Sometimes my fellas seem like this colt, with their unbridled strength, passion, and wilfulness.  I try to bridle it every day, but sometimes it is all I can do to keep up with them.  Thinking of the story of Ferdinand gives me a little lense into their youth and boy-ness.  Jonathan reminds me of a bull at pasture, rough and strong and content in his field.  William seems to often find himself in the china shop, and things get broken sometimes.  Sam was born in the ring and lives there.  He came into the world with a red flag in his face and has been attacking that thing ever since with a passion that will soon require restraint.  I am not eager for the attempt.

These handsome young bulls of mine are the most complimentary gift the Lord has ever given me.  To think that He believes in me to handle their wildness, joy, and stubbornness is amazing to me.  All too often I don't believe I'm up to the task.  I feel my humanity keenly and it feels like there is a great gulf between my energy, intelligence, and strength and their youth.

Perhaps this is the very reason God gave them to me, or one of them at least:  When I do manage to touch them as they shoot through the sky, there is a moment, and it is ever so brief, in which I feel like I am flying too.

"Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are children born in one's youth." Psalm 127:4

"But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.  They will soar on wings like eagles.  They will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."  Isaiah 40:31

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."  Philippians 4:13

Milk or champagne?

Who came up with the phrase, "Don't cry over spilt milk"?

I'd like to share some choice words with them.

Do you know what spilt milk looks like?  Do you know what it smells like?  Anyone who doesn't ever cry over spilt milk has incredible self control... or a maid.  On most days, I have neither (well, I never have a maid but there are lovely moments when I have self control).

Once I paid thirty dollars to have my car cleaned by the energetic gentlemen at Auto Bell, then went home and cleaned it myself... all because it smelled like a mouse had died in it, and not recently.  It turns out my one year old had spilled his milk on my yoga mat.  First I cursed the makers of his "spill proof" sippy cup.  Then I cursed the one who coined the whole crying over spilt milk adage.

I only discovered that the atrocious smell of rodent death lay in my yoga mat as I was participating in my class at the Y.  I kept smelling my hair, my armpits, my clothing ... all the while hoping my neighbor was not watching me.

At some point a cynical person amended aforementioned phrase to say, "Don't cry over spilt champagne."  I don't know if they were trying to be ironic or funny, but I find the new phrase much more appropriate.  First of all, champagne does not smell of putrid rot upon drying.  Secondly, I cannot feed my children with champagne nor can I produce it from my person.  These two qualities of milk cause it to increase in value enormously.  Champagne is made with grapes and is not the best use of them, in my opinion.  If it is spilled my husband will be spared a most infernal headache.

Advertisements and books I read and shows I watch keep encouraging me to appreciate the simple things in life, and that the best things in life are free.  I would like to add that the opposite is true: the simple harms in life, the simple mistakes, can also be the most egregious.

We are tempted to gloss over our little slip-ups, and I am to blame as well.  If I want to shed a tear over my spilt milk, I wonder how my six year old feels when I turn his tv show off five minutes too soon because we have to leave now.  If milk can cause my blood to boil, perhaps it makes sense that my three year old will cry when presented with purple lettuce that he must eat in order to receive dessert.

Sometimes I overlook an apology for little things; I forget to explain to Jonathan's teacher why I was late for AR testing.  I let my late arrival to a playdate be ignored and hope that it will just be forgiven.

Then I have a day where the little things in my own life pile up, like today.  At one point I was in the bathroom on the telephone with my husband (the only place I can finish a conversation other than the car) and heard glass being thrown around the kitchen.  You think I'm kidding, but last night Jonathan wanted a last minute glass of milk, so I filled a bourbon glass with milk and let him drain it.  There the glass sat, still with that one last drop of milk, overnight, until the two younger children discovered it this morning and decided to play volleyball with it while I attended to a phone call in my "office".

My day progressed, it had its ups and downs, but what I really needed was something simple to bring me back to equilibrium.  I didn't need damn champagne, I needed a tall glass of milk.

I met two of my dearest friends at the Science Center for a playdate and as I soaked up the giggles and the fish, the scampering feet and the delighted squeals and the interesting facts about tornadoes that William and his buddy can't get enough of, I felt some peace.

When you start to feel like you're making too big a deal of the small atrocities in life, know you're not alone.  We all make too big a deal of them, because they are like mosquitoes: small, obnoxious, and occasionally carrions of deadly disease.  When the milk spills, the shit hits the fan, and it's evidence of Murphy's Law, which is quite discouraging indeed.

Fortunately, what I've learned is that I can turn Murphy's Law on it's cheeky, arrogant head.  If anything that can go wrong will, sometimes all I need is for something to go right.  Occasionally a tall glass of milk going down cold and accompanied by a chocolate chip cookie is like a holiday at the beach.

So, cheers.  Cheers and thanks to my friends for our playdates, to my husband for overlooking the takeout dinner, to my mom for cleaning my kitchen.  I will cheers with a tall glass of milk (or a cheap glass of wine) and poo poo that champagne.

Mutually Assured Destruction

Driving in the car this morning. 

William: "Mom, what is dat gwumbwing sound?"

Mom: Sigh. "Um, that is us driving over a bumpy part in the road."

William: "No, what is dat GWUMBWING?"

Mom: "I just told you."

William: "No, what is dat gwum-- sou--, what does SOUND mean?"

Mom: "William, I am going to need you to stop talking until we get to the grocery store."

William: "K."

This is unbelievably, cross my heart, EXACTLY the type of conversation William and I engage in at least ten times per day.  You might be thinking that I am shafting him on some good old conversational training, or that I am stifling his adventurous spirit, or that I don't appreciate the adorable curiosity of a three year old.  You might be right.  

Nonetheless, continuing on these threads is mutually assured destruction.  Eventually William will still not have his question answered, (largely because the question mutates with the speed of light), and I will be raising my voice saying something like, "Well then you can take a NAP for all I care."

Which is exactly what happened later on today. 

From 10:30-11:30 I was pretty sluggish, being as we completed a to-do list six items long from 7:15 to 10:15. From about 11 to 11:30 William asked me every five minutes to make him lunch.  Finally I hopped up off the couch and said cheerfully, (yes, cheerfully, I specifically remember being cheerful):

"Ok, bud, what do you want for lunch?"

"Cheese and cwackus."

"Here is your cheese, crackers, and a banana."

"Can I have juice mommy?"

"Hold on, I need to make my lunch and Sam's lunch too."

"Can I have juice mommy?"

 

"Just a second bud"

"Can I have juice mommy?"

"William! It is NOT all about YOU!"

I give him the juice.  He takes one bite of cheese.

"I am finished wif my lunch"

It does not behoove me to tell you how I responded.  Suffice it to say, he ended up taking a nap.  Early.  

See, I know that we need to learn how to communicate with one another.  I know that a lot of our conversations are priceless.  Sometimes, though, it's better to cut them off at the pass. 

I really like it when he prays.  It helps that God is getting his earful too, and it gives me insight into my little boy.  For the last three nights he has been praying for his Aunt Maria, because she's having a rough week at college.  He also thanks God for me.  Every single night. 

The wrap-up, I suppose, is this:  Conversation with a three year old is exhausting, but there are gems in there that are worth the ride. 

The rough and the beautiful of it

Life is hard.  It keeps getting harder.  There is more pain.  There is more beauty.

A few weeks ago I needed a babysitter and called a friend to see if her daughter could handle my three boys.  She said her daughter would love to, but she had school, then track practice and homework, and needed to rest up for a big meet the next day.

I remember those days.  I remember the stomach twisting fear right before a race, the palm sweating stress of lining up on the starting line, the sweat and unintentional tears pushing up the last big hill, digging deep for that shred of speed it would take to pass the runner in front of me.  If Jesus and my track coach have had one thing in common, it is this: they believe I always have a bit more in my reservoir than I think I do.

Needless to say, I congratulated my friend on protecting her daughter and agreed that of course we would look for another babysitter.

People keep telling me that it gets worse, that parenting gets harder, that I will "miss these days" because "they go by so fast."

"Enjoy it while it lasts."

"It doesn't get any easier."

I hear you, I do.  I believe you.  But stop.

When my boys are teenagers they will be bigger than me, and when they are in goofy moods they will lift me off the floor and make me laugh.

When my son realizes no one else understands he will share his heart with me, because I am the one who has believed in him.

When his homework is too hard he will sit down at the kitchen table, we will be elbow to elbow, and we will get headaches together because algebra is so. stinking. hard.  I will notice how thick his arms have gotten, I will marvel at the stubble forming like peach fuzz beneath his chin, and he will roll his eyes and ask me why I am tearing up.

I know there will be countless moments of pain that I will endure, and I know that my joints may start to ache more, but do you remember what it feels like to be woken up at 6 am and step on a Lego?! 

Of course growing up is hard, and painful, but isn't it gorgeous too?  I love the soft skin on my baby, but I can't imagine that I won't be proud when his hands are callused and his arms are sinewy.

So here is what I say to the high school girls: I hear you.  I see you.  Life gets harder, but what you're facing right now is just as hard as what you will  endure at thirty.  You will get stronger.  You are hearing that growing up is gross, but that's all lies.  People treat you like you're living in a carnival, but I know better.  High school is awfully difficult, and falling in love and out of love is too.  Growing up is marvelous.  It's terrifying like a roller coaster, delicious like Cheesecake Factory, mean as a hornet, and tender as a lamb.  You will get wrinkles, but the growing pains ease.  You will lose your pimples and get some gray hairs.  Better haircuts are coming, and more expensive razors really do work better.  Friendships will get deeper.  Wine tastes good.

To all of the moms who have been here, and have moved on: Enjoy the quiet!  I know it's lonely, but just appreciate it, because I am looking forward to the quiet and I want to believe I'll love it, at least sometimes.  Also, I will get there.  I know it's more complicated where you are, I'm just not ready to think about that yet.  And occasionally I would trade one day of worrying about my not-quite-ahead-of-the-eight-ball retirement plan instead of trying to wrangle three children to two different doctor appointments without changing a stinky diaper in my car.  We young moms standing on the playground and acting like we know it all really do look up to you.  We are impressed, slightly jealous, and a bit in awe.

For myself: calm down, little girl.  You recently hit thirty, and you feel all grown up.  You're not, so relax.  You have lots more growing to do, much more to learn and much more time to improve on those decorating skills.  You will miss these moments, and you will be grateful you've gotten through.    There is so much happening right now, stop waiting for it to be cleaned up and put away.  Shower tomorrow, play Grinch Bingo today.  Take a moment and be glad there are NO AP Physics exams looming.  Your car is not from 1987.  Your clutter is adorable, it is tiny coats and tiny socks and papers with a little person's handwriting that is dripping with glue put on by tiny hands.

Time seems hell bent on destruction.  It feels like a whip, a scourge, a driving cattle prod.  I'd like to throw something back in its face.  I would like to whip around in the middle of my flight, plant my heels in the ground, and scream: I'm not afraid of you, give it your best shot.  Give me the option to go back, I won't.  Give me the option to skip ahead, I won't.  Just keep on ticking, clock.  You ain't got nothin' on the beauty of living.

Training

I woke up ten minutes late today.  Perhaps the day would have had a different trajectory had I woken up at 6:50, but I woke up at 7.  It's not really worth wondering though, is it?  Normally Josh, bless him, wakes up at 6:30.  He gets the big boys their juice, tells them to put clothes on, hops in the shower, and then fifteen minutes later wakes me up.  With a gentle reminder that I might want to be downstairs in ten to get lunches going, etcetera, he leaves the room and closes the door.  For the next ten minutes I am wrapped in the blissful cocoon of cool sheets, with sunlight waking up the room around me as I listen to the sounds of three children and their daddy starting a new day.  I settle my eyes back to sleep, and often catch a few more winks before I stretch myself out of bed and plod downstairs.   I groggily put pepperoni on bread, fill baggies with Goldfish, and hug a chubby baby face.  I answer the questions about what we're going to do today, later today, after nap, before nap, and for some reason all these questions require different answers.  I walk around the kitchen in bare feet, slowly, and sip black steaming coffee from my Anthropologie mug.  I hug Jonathan goodbye, watch William jump from the stairs into his older brother's arms for his farewell, and then I close the door and continue to sip my black coffee with only half opened eyelids.

Today, however, I woke up ten minutes late.  I jumped out of my bed and plodded downstairs.  I made two lunches because we have a friend staying with us, answered (for some reason) many more questions from my three year old, and then jumped in the car myself, with my half drunk coffee, William, Sam, and our buddy so that I could take him to his kindergarten while Josh trekked across town with Jonathan.  Only it didn't go slowly, smoothly, or sweetly.  As I was rushing out the door with no shoes on, I noticed Jonathan was lingering at the door.  Crying.  Well, almost crying- his eyes were looking watery and his chin was looking like a cooked spaghetti noodle.

"I don't want to go to kindergarten, mom, because I don't want to leave you."

Pause.

The craziness of the day, my sporadic wakeup and my half drunk coffee vanished.  Like the dance scene in Pride and Prejudice, it was just him and me.  We stood there in a desert by the back door and there was no other noise, just the sound of his softly pleading will and the sound of my heart being twisted, small capillaries of cracks forming there like veins on leaves.

Forty five minutes later I called Josh.  The situation had not improved.  With Charles having happily bounced off to school, Sam giggling in the backseat, and William still asking me what our plan for the day held, I wracked my brain for what to do.  LORD, I need you now.  Jonathan needs you, I need you, we need you.  

Obviously, I called my mom.  She suggested I go have lunch with him, validate his fears, take him a Lego guy to stick in his pocket and remind him that he is brave.  So I did, because I wanted to and I didn't know what else to do.

Sam's giggling turned to protest as his time in the car lengthened.  William's questions turned into tears, and still my mind stayed on Jonathan like a hound on a fox.  The noise around me wasn't soothing, it wasn't distracting.  It was grating and it was life, but it was like a hill beneath a runner's feet: it just had to be, because this was the moment I had been training for.  Sam cries because he needs to for survival, evolutionarily he is a leader of the pack.  Will cries because, well, I think because he is three, and three-year-olds have some innate need to get their life's quota of whining out of their system.  However, Jonathan cries only in extreme pain or angst.  Ever since I sent him off to school that morning I had been feeling like a fireman on the firepole or a runner at the start of a race.

Arriving at his school my stomach was twisted, not in fear necessarily, but because this was the race we had been training for.  For one of the first times I could not fix it for him, I could only stand on the sidelines as his coach.  We ate lunch together, he smiled, I met his friends, and then it was time for him to be the line leader.  Outside the bathroom Jonathan, his buddy Speirs, and I prayed for the day.  We tucked his lion lego in his pocket and I left.

I didn't look back.

In the car I prayed, took a deep breath, and drove back to my baby to pick up the day where it had been left off.

And Jonathan ran his race.

It's hard being a mom.  It's hard letting go, watching the gates fling open, watching them kick up dust and sometimes get nicked in the heels.  I hope the metaphor doesn't offend, but it's like raising a racehorse from a colt.  They nuzzle your hand with their soft nose, and you feed them apples with a smile in the corner of your mouth.  You bathe and train them, working long hours and sweating plenty.  You watch their muscles grow and refine, watch their coats go from fuzzy soft fur to gleaming garbs of velvet.  Then it's time to hire a jockey, and sit in the stands.

Golden retrievers and cheesecake

No mom, Madi did not eat my cheesecake.  Although that would be a reasonable hypothesis.  Actually, it is 1:15 and I am eating an apple cheesecake bar and drinking coffee.  It is not my lunch, I refuse to acknowlege it is lunch time.  This is breakfast, and these days breakfast and I have to get creative if we are going to keep our relationship alive.

Jonathan started kindergarten, but that is not what this blog post is about.  Sam is crawling and almost talking and sleeping through the night [finally, yay], but again, not the topic of the day.  William is three, I am doing yoga, friends are having babies, summer is turning into Fall, but again-- not the subject at hand.  The thing is, life is so darn full these days I don't know what to write about.  I don't know what to focus on.  My least favorite question is "What is new?" because honestly, what isn't new?!  Every stinkin day I have new adventures, obstacles, challenges, thrills --whatever you choose to label them-- and I can't stop my head spinning long enough to pick the newest of the new from the responsibilites, commitments, yadayadas --again, choose your vocabulary-- that seems notable.

I think that right now what I want to be new is quiet.  It is pretty loud around here.  As I write this Sam is protesting loudly from his crib that it does not in fact feel like naptime.  Soon we will get in the car and drive to kindergarten and there will be the noise of two little people needing me, always needing me, from the backseat.  There will be music playing that is on repeat because I'm too tired to argue against Jimmy Buffett's Cheeseburger in Paradise being played for the fiftieth time this week, and there will be an endless request for snacks.

Due to this endless stream of noise I am finding that I forget my mission on a regular basis.  Today I went for Target for four items, came out with about eight, and realized I had forgotten one.  I went back later for the one, came out with about fifteen, including an empty box of cheese puffs shared by cheesey faced boys.  Yesterday I went to drop a friend some dinner because she just had her second baby and I know what life is about to look like and I find it worth my while to make her some dinner so that for just one night she only has to worry about the forcing of the food into her children.  I meant to be in the neighborhood for 30 minutes.  It ended up being an hour, with a quick stop to a friend's house to "pop by".  The popping by turned into a soaking wet water play date with a hose, a motorized kids' jeep, and more that doesn't much need explaining.  I finally strapped three very wet boys into the car, sighed, and turned on the Cheeseburger song again.

The crazy thing is, when I sit down next to my golden girl and pour my cup of coffee at one in the afternoon, I realize I'm having a lot of fun.  If you read this blog a different way, [or rather, if I read it a different way] it seems that in two days I have successfully dropped my eldest off at kindergarten, managed to complete a whole shopping list in less than a day, had a super fun play date that managed to bathe my children in the process, succeeded in making a friend dinner while juggling three kids of my own, and I have to add that I feel pretty proud that I can sing along to a whole Jimmy Buffett song other than "Margaritaville."  (Doesn't this make me a certifiable Parrothead??)

While in the act of snagging snacks off the shelf to pacify my carrot tops in Target Round 2 today I bumped into a friend.  We chatted for a while over little whispy wiggly heads, and when we later met at the checkout she offered me a coupon for a free Starbucks.  "Would you want a cup of coffee?" she asked, proffering the ticket.

"Would I ever," I answered.

I placed my serendipitous cup of joe in the cup holder of my car and savoured the thought of sipping it from my couch perch in the sunroom.  Almost home, I remembered that while sweating and wrestling a hose from a one year old the friend I saw yesterday had offered me some of her famous apple cheesecake bars, freshly baked that afternoon.  Thirty minutes and two sleeping boys later, I heated up my coffee, grabbed my bar, and sat down in the sunroom.  With the door ajar I can feel a blessed summer breeze floating in and the music of trees, pregnant with green, swaying back and forth while the birds are singing their glory songs somewhere among them.  I can only be grateful, that my life is also so pregnant and green, with boundless adventure and the occasional quiet moment to sit beside Madi, sip coffee, and eat freshly baked cheesecake.  Who can complain about not having time for breakfast when a late breakfast is so durn scrumptious?  And who am I to complain about a very busy life when I realize that I am never ever bored?