Pithy Quote

I had a pithy quote I thought I'd blog. You would have been impressed with my whit. But it's upstairs. I'm downstairs. And if I go upstairs, one of "THE FOUR" will ask me for a drink of water, or an extra "tuck in". They might even ask me, "What's for breakfast tomorrow?"

No thanks.

I'll stay down here, where they're less likely to venture. 'Cause here's a dirty little secret: I hate bedtime routines: the tucking in, the glass of water, the prayers, the whole shebang. It makes me crazy. Because I am so DONE with kids by bedtime that I don't usually have the tolerance for the "I'm scared.", "I'm thirsty.", "I need a band-aid." crapola my kids dish out at this hour. I am sympathy challenged at my best. So, I have absolutely zero feelings of charity and empathy towards kids who think they need water after I think I'm entitled to "clock-out" for the evening.

And there goes my Mother of the Year Badge.

You think, "No, surely not. The Stephanie I know is compassionate, and empathetic."

Um. Not so much. Here's Proof:

Emma comes in crying, "Mom, Ethan is picking on me."

I say, "Stop being an easy target."

Or how about this one:

"Mommy, I hurt my head."

I respond, "Are you bleeding?"

"No."

"You're fine. Stop crying."

Yep. Yours truly has uttered those words.

But this is the perennial favorite.

I say, "How many kids are there?"

"Four", some sheepish kid mumbles.

"How many mommys do you see?"

"One."

"Get in line, kid, I'm doing the best I can."

Yep, that mothering award isn't casting long shadows around here this evening.










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We're IN!

Yesterday, at precisely 5:01 PM, I received an email. It's the one I've been waiting for a forever of 6 weeks or so. And we're in, just like that.

We've homeschooled, mostly, and dabbled in private Christian school and now we'll be doing public charter school. Because all 3 of my big kids drew "seats" in the lottery for this fabulous charter for gifted and creative learners.

I love the idea of homeschooling, and have, at least in seasons, loved the actual doing of homeschool. But it's not the best choice for my kids now. And christian school is pricey. We've loved Christan school too. But it does tend toward creating "Club Jesus" and that is not what I want for my family or children. The neighborhood public school is bad, and actually not in the neighborhood. The district buses kids from our subdivision to a rough neighborhood. That would be throwing my kids into the deep end - not going to happen. So what to do? Well we found the answer in this little charter, and we prayed we'd get in.

We did.

This is big news. I'm thrilled - mostly. And a little sad for what I am losing. To a non-homeschooler this would make no sense. Believe it or not there are some sweet moments unique to homeschool. I'll miss it. Really, I will. But we're in a new season...a good new season, but still.

A few good reasons to homeschool

-We may (or may not) be a traditional school family as of next fall. It would be a good thing. However, there are some fairly fabulous things about homeschooling. For example:

-If you get a pair of rollerskates for your 9 year old birthday and you want to wear them while doing school....NO PROB! Roll on over.

-If you need an extra 15 hours or so in your life so you can research and then build a space station from Legos, then homeschooling is just your speed.

-If you have a cold and need to sleep in...no worries...stumble on down at 9AM.

-If your the teacher and you have a cold you can (and should) declare it a late start day.

-If you want to do you math in red felt tip marker you probably can.

-You can read science magazines for an hour and half before you fall asleep at night and it counts as school.

-If you need to stop to play with the puppy or you just need a break it can be arranged..

-Your mom just might let you pick your reading material for language, and it just might be the graphic novel version of Nancy Drew.

-Frog and Toad.

-Making cookies for math.

-etc...

When "Hell NO!" becomes "Whatever..."

I'm clumsy at using foul language - embarrassingly, so. Eddie, who grew up swearing like a sailor, can cuss proficiently (It's like riding a bike, apparently). So, my husband finds it "cute" when I am trying to be vulgar. It's irritating.

Mostly, I don't mind being a crummy at potty talk. I have a big vocabulary, and it's never posed much of a hindrance. However, there has been a few times in my life when my "no" has really been "Hell, NO!" Often, it's while metaphorically shaking my fists at the Almighty when I feel like he might be leading me someplace I don't want to go.

There was (still are) a time when I was (am) quite comfortable applying Christian principles to life's decisions and calling it "good enough". Fidelity, responsibility, stewardship, respect, these are good things. They are comfortably "christian". Yet, my God was not content with this from me.

He wants it all.

He's jealous like that.

And so I say, "Hell, NO, I won't go."

I will not live the radical adventure.
I will not choose the costly.
I will not uproot my dreams, and allow you to plant a new vision.
"Hell, NO, I won't go."

Because You will wreck my life.

Wreck it.

But time and time again I have been wooed to the "whatever." I am overwhelmed by the tidal wave of YHWH. His Love. His immensity. And I find my "Hell,no.." becoming "whatever." As in: whatever you have for me, where ever you take me, when ever you say. Because, in the end, there is nothing else that matters.

And the great tidal wave of YHWH tears through my life, and wrecks it. Every. Single. Time. Decimation. And then he rebuilds a new plan, a new vision, a new hope.

I'm talking in obscurities. The nuts and bolts of it seem a little too real - too raw - to share here in Podunk, Cyberspace. But I feel my most recent "Hell, NO!" slipping. Hands clenched are loosening, the ash of me dusting. It's the fine mist of a life I cannot hold.

The new vision is fuzzy. Unclear.

But the "whatever" is looming.
Whatever it is.
Where ever you take me.
Whenever you say.
No matter the cost.

M&Ms

Abby calls M&Ms: "L-M-N"s.

Sometimes having a three year old is absolutely magical.

What if...

I've been reading this book, "Irresistible Revolution." The copyright says it came out in 2006 - so I'm reading it in the wake of it's first run. I'm hip like that...missing trendy by half a decade or so. But I digress.

The book is good. Well it's good in a, "Oh Crap." sort of way. The dude (aka Shane Claiborne) is a hippy from Tennessee, and more recently Philly. Maybe he wouldn't own that title "hippy". But really: homemade clothes, dread-locks, and community garden = hippy, or neo-hippy. I went to school at CU Boulder; I know these things.

But Claiborne poses this question,and it chafes. What if following Jesus really changed the way you live - turned it upside down, even? The earliest disciples were absolutely wrecked for ordinary once they decided to follow Jesus. Many lost their homes, many lost family, and businesses. They were forced into exile and some died for their allegiance. They lived lives of radical community and wild adventure. They were NOT addicted to Netflix,or x-box. They didn't drive Beemers, and they were scare in covenant controlled communities. Just saying...

What if the American church was less interested in drawing a crowd, and entertaining? What if we were into transformed lives,and a call to risk everything for the only thing?

That hippy from Philly casts a vision that rumbles.

Now here's the grit of the thing: It sounds kinda pretty, but it's FREAKING hard to do. Because I do live in safe suburbs. But our house is full with 2 families - one of whom is is led by a newly single mom. It's a hard gig, that. And the messiness of it spills out into my life at the most inconvenient times. The answers aren't simple, or cookie cutter. Sometimes it isn't even fun. At all.

Then there is pumpkin of a three year old whom we call our baby. We adore her. Yet the trauma we were unable to protect her from will affect her all of her life. Invisible disability. And the brokeness of our world spills over in our living room.

Now most of Christian culture applauds this kinda stuff - at arms length. They are uncomfortable with the ambiguity. There is no, "kiss it and make it better." for urban poverty, generational addiction, foster care, and mental illness. Solutions are messy and costly.

Few are willing to roll up their sleeves. Pick up a shovel, and start shoveling out the sh**. And that's what we need.

Sometimes I'm one of the few who has been so transformed that I cannot wait to serve. But sometimes I would love comfortable suburbia, and I hold tightly to my latte and SUV. So this "Irresistible Revolution" feels very truly "resistible" for me. I've dabbled in it. I know the price tag; let's not be coy about that. It will cost my life. This kind of Jesus-loving is a destroyer of the American Dream.

I CAN say they times I've followed Jesus into place the Pro/Con chart would never recommend I haven't regretted it. It's good. Amazingly Good. Life but costly.

If I have not love...

Yesterday, Caleb went to a birthday party. He'd been excited all day and constantly checking the clock, so we wouldn't be late. Finally, it came. At 3:00 I dropped him off at his friend's a bouncy, happy seven year old kid. When I came to pick him up a couple of hours later he had the gate of Eyore.

"I didn't have so much fun."

"What happened?", I asked.

"Well no kids wanted to play with me. And when we played flag football no one would pass the ball to me." he said, trying to play it "tough".

"Ahh, Bud I'm sorry. Nobody?"

"Yeah well, a couple kids did sometimes, but no one really liked me. I'm not a good sports kid"

My kid, my cute-as-can-be seven year old, was hurting. The truth of the matter is that Caleb is not a "sports kid"; he inherited his mom's coordination (which did improve somewhat in adolescences). But adolescence is a million years from seven when your hurting.

"Yeah, that happened to me sometimes too. But I noticed that you're really funny, and a good actor. You've got a good ear for music. Maybe you won't be a sports kid, maybe be you'll be a music guy and learn to play the guitar - like Will, and Scott and Wil and John. He perks up. Those guys are hero material, and they DO play the guitar. I think I've won, but Defeat never gives up so easily.

"Nah, I'm gonna be the "no friends kid."

He is seven.

Seven.

#############################

"That heavy beat of failure, that pounding bass of disappointment, it has pulsed through my days and I've mouthed the words, singing it to myself, memorizing the ugly lines by heart. They become the heart. For years, I tried medication, blade, work, escape all attempts to drown out that incessant, reverberating drum of self-rejection. All futility, acidic emptiness."

Those are the words of Ann Voskamp - but they could be mine. I RAGE that the "heavy beat of failure" would pound against my son. He is seven. The assault is full - too heavy for little boy shoulders. It is wrong - I know it.

So what is the solution when I see the vibrations of Self-Hate course through the veins of my little boy? He thinks the song is His own. That vile tune of Shame seeps into the heart. Hell's song.

I need a new melody. A stronger one - one that will shake the gates of Hades.

CS Lewis argued that the most fundamental thing is not what we think of God, but what he things of us.

God says,

You are precious.
You are honored.
Gifted.
I love you.
You are mine.
I'd die for you.

"I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness." It's the Siren Song of God. It's the strong melody to overpower Hell's furious beat.

This melody must course through my veins and pound truth into the broken places. It heals. It frees. It overcomes.

If it were the catchy tune that stuck in my head, and I hummed it through my day, maybe my son would learn it too.

Precious. Loved. Gifted.
Precious. Loved. Gifted.
Precious. Loved. Gifted.
You are God's own child, set apart for the Great Adventure.

I could drown in that.

The ENOUGH

⁵ LORD, you alone are my portion and my cup;
you make my lot secure.
⁶ The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;
surely I have a delightful inheritance.
⁷ I will praise the LORD, who counsels me;
even at night my heart instructs me.
⁸ I keep my eyes always on the LORD.
With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken.

⁹ Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices;
my body also will rest secure,
¹⁰ because you will not abandon me to the realm of the dead,
nor will you let your faithful^b]">[b] one see decay.
¹¹ You make known to me the path of life;
you will fill me with joy in your presence,
with eternal pleasures at your right hand.

****************************************

I'm always trying to get my littlest to eat real food; she would be content to drink only milk. Maybe, many decades ago, my mom struggled to get me to eat my dinner too. But I doubt it. I like food. I like to grow food. I like to prepare food. I like the smell, and feel of food. I especially like to eat it.

If I am not paying attention it's easy for me to eat too much. Sometimes, I think it's because I don't actually pay attention when I eat. I'm trying to grab a bite between the many tasks and people who compete for my attention. I consume, but I forget to savor. I hardly taste. And in the end I'm left craving, for I never tasted, never savored. Forgot to chew -nearly.

All this to say - food metaphors work for me.

"Lord, you are my portion and my cup; you make my lot secure....You will fill me with joy in your presence."

So is God my enough? Does he alone sustain? Even when finances unravel and health is precarious, is he enough for me? When depression leaves me empty can He fill? More. Have I found joy in His presence. When a dream dies is He the bigger, greater vision. Have I stopped to taste and see that the Lord is, indeed, good. I know craving. I know longing for more. Have I even tried to find satisfaction in Him?

This sounds poetic. Because it is. But the truth of it is hard.

Because it might just mean that when I pray for the bonus, and clean bill of health I've got it wrong. When I pray for the easy and convenient I might have missed the point entirely.

He is the ENOUGH.

Really?

When a mother loses a child? Crushing depression? Divorce that ruptures a child's security? And for every abandoned child who finds a home many thousands languish.

Is He ENOUGH then? Is joy possible even in the darkest? Even when it all falls apart?

Sure. Sure. This world is not as it should be? And we can pray, should pray, "Thy Kingdom Come". We long for that which we were created? And God does heal; he does make right even in the now.

But not always. Not always.

And then He is the ENOUGH, the JOY that spits in face of circumstance.

Living Free

So I've been thinking...

Living free is a hard thing.
Like Lazarus, alive yet in grave clothes;
Gasping: That's me.
Tomb opened, the deep inhale, oxygen.
I am alive.
Because I do believe (want to believe):
He IS the Resurrection and the Life.

Yet I trip on the linens that mummify.
What's worse, I wrap myself in these death-clothes as if I were dressing for the senior prom. Vain in my religiosity.

Pride.
Insecurity.

(The same fabric really - woven in the belief that somehow it's all about me.)

Fear.
Shame.
Complaint.

And I am bound.
Saying yes, but living the no.

Holy God, FREE ME.

Teach me the language of liberation.
You, God Who Breathes Life,
Whisper your melody.
For I have been bound in grave-clothes

living pungent death.

If I reach out will your hand entwine?
Pull me near?

I've been thinking....

If my pulse could tangle in your heart...
If my breath was your last exhale...
So close to taste your sweetness...
Then. I could be free.

Phonics Song 2: It's stuck in my head