What is Love?

So I have stayed away from the bloggy world for a while.  But I’ve thought about it, frequently.   About what I wanted to tell you and what God has been teaching me.  I just couldn’t quite articulate it.   But today I’m going to give it a whack.

We all have these expectations in our heads, wherever they come from, of what things “should” look like.  Maybe our parents taught us, or we saw it in an ad, or on television, or a neighbor modeled it for us.  Expectations of what a family is, what a successful marriage looks like, how a grown man should act, what toys girls should like, how boys should dress, what a husband does, what a wife does.  “When I grow up I’m never going to do that.”  “When I can make my own decisions, I’m doing it that way.”  Whatever that looks like to you, you’ve got an idea in your head about that sort of thing.  And maybe you know that Leave It To Beaver is not an accurate representation of what a family is in real life, but you figure it ought to be somewhere between that and the Simpsons.

Well, for most of my life I’ve had very strict concepts of what I thought things were supposed to be.  At least, how I wanted things to be for me.  I didn’t WANT to spend my life being shuttled around the world at the Air Force’s whim and told which career I was going to have and which country of whom I was supposed to be killing the members of that week.  I have no issue if YOU go out and do that stuff, you go on your merry little way, but that’s not what I want.  So of course, when I had the opportunity to do that, I tried it and said no thank you.  I also had firm ideas, if not a trifle vague, about what kind of husband I’d marry, where I’d live, whether I’d have children, how I wanted to dress.  I thought, “This is my life and I am an adult now and I get to pick.”  If I don’t want to eat collard greens or rutabagas or beets, I don’t have to.  If I don’t want to wear long flowy dresses and makeup and whatever’s “cool” right now, I don’t have to.  (We saw how well that went when I chose to succumb to peer pressure in the form of parachute pants… oh my gosh, could I not have chosen to bow to major fashion trends when chunky necklaces or cute scarves were the rage?  Why did I pick parachute pants?)  I really thought that what was right for me was just right, and screw you if you didn’t agree with it.  This was me.  (Isn’t that just charming?  I mean, really, how could you not love an attitude like that?)

Enter God and his Agenda.  Yeah, just being a new Christian I didn’t realize He has one.  When I accepted Christ and said, “God, I have no idea what I’m doing in life, but clearly I’m screwing it up, could you just take it over for me?” I thought that was more like, “God, I don’t like where this is going so could you only send me nice pleasant things from now on?  Thanks so much buh-bye.”  Yeah…. Homey don’t play that.  When you choose to give your life over to Christ He gives you the things He knows you need, not the things you think you need, and sometimes those things are wildly different. 

In the very beginning of my shiny new Christian life, I prayed, “Lord, send me a love.  Somebody good.”  I’d had relationships before, but nobody who really blew me away, nobody who I really knew was “the one.”  So I gave it up to God and said, “Lord, if you want me to be married to someone, you are going to literally have to bring him to my door because clearly I cannot pick them.”  And I left it at that, and of course I met Dallas and the rest is history.  (Maybe he would say, “and the rest is all downhill from there.”  Or “and that’s where my life spiraled completely out of control into this nightmare.”  Couldn’t say, you’ll have to ask him.)  Certainly he wasn’t what I expected.  I had in my mind that I’d fall for a guy a few years older than me (Dallas is younger), much taller (he’s only a few inches taller), with a nice career (I made more money than him for a while), probably a lot like Dad (he is and he isn’t), not necessarily a hunk but someone who didn’t have warts and horns readily apparent (he’s a hunk, he’s mine, and keep your hands to yourself).  But I knew in my heart without a shred of doubt that this was the man God wanted for me, so down the I aisle I merrily skipped, while he was none the wiser to this wild bag of emotional, hormonal, and judgmental cacophony to which he’d just hitched himself.  FOREVER.  And ever.  And ever.

As we moved along together in this life, God was teaching me ever so slowly and patiently (well maybe not patiently, I know He’s got those oh-my-gosh-will-she-never-learn-this-FINE-let’s-do-it-again moments) that His ways are not my ways.  I’ve always thought my ways were pretty good.  Not perfect, but they were MINE, and if they were mistakes, they were my mistakes.  When God tells us to love our neighbor as ourselves I thought I understood that to mean the physical nature of serving people.  Like helping the homeless, donating clothes, caring for widows and orphans, sharing the gospel, etc.  And I loved people; I loved my family and my friends and those whose company I really enjoyed, not necessarily for what they could do for me but how well I got along with them.  How nicely they treated me, how much we had in common, how well we “clicked.”  Everybody else that I either didn’t know or didn’t WANT to know was just kind of doing their own thing in life, and they were on the periphery.  Let them figure their own selves out, I’ve got enough on my plate, thanks ever so.  There was no animosity, really, just an absence of close interest.

But I have come to see the profound and tragic error of that, and remember when I said if you can’t be a shining example, then be a horrible warning?  Well, I’m your horrible warning.  Let me tell you, when God says “love them” He does not mean “love them the way you think they ought to be loved.”  He means “love them the way I love them.”  There’s a difference.  There are people in this world that I found I could. Not. Stand.  They annoyed the poo out of me and it wasn’t because they were obnoxious people, it was because they didn’t rise to the standard to which I thought they ought to adhere, given what I thought was expected, based on my experience, be it taught from snazzy advertisements, well-meaning adults, or my own narrow-mindedness.  You’re a grown man; act like it.  You’re an elected official with years of experience, why are you acting like you don’t have to obey the same rules we all do?  You’re a wife and a mother and this is how you should be expected to behave in this setting, so why are you not?  You’re a perfectly intelligent coworker with a college degree, why are you not understanding this concept that is so clearly laid out before you?  You’re in customer service, for pete’s sake, why are you not just bubbling over with joy at the anticipation of serving this morose and ungrateful line of patrons before you?  Want me to respect you?  Do something worthy of respect and then we’ll see about it.

Seriously is that not just a delightfully charming perspective?  Who would NOT want to be my close and personal friend?  Yes, when you lay it out like that it sounds just exactly about like what it is; pure, unadulterated snottiness.  I liked what I liked and whatever I didn’t like I had no use for.  Just go away, I’m busy living my life over here.  I had such derision for people who did not act the way I thought they should, based on what my perception was.  In some cases to the point of unbridled hostility, and while I shudder to admit that, now I see it for what it was.   God truly convicted me of this, and I prayed, “Lord, help me love them the way you love them.  Help me see what you see.”

People, I have missed so much, for so long, and it breaks my heart.  By focusing on what people were NOT, I missed what they ARE.  I missed who God made them, with His clear intentions and perfect plan.  When I worked at the homeless shelter, I ceased to see people who had deliberately made unfortunate choices in life, who’d succumbed to temptations and hurt themselves in the process, and I saw THEM.  I saw people who’d been mistreated, who’d been weak, who’d endured hardship and unkindness and yet were still getting up each day ready to face whatever comes next.  People who weren’t afraid to be humbled and admit they’d screwed up and needed Jesus in their lives.  People in whom I invested because I truly cared about their story, their wants and needs, their hurts, these people that God made EXACTLY THIS WAY ON PURPOSE and that God had allowed to go through who knows what horrors, just to teach me a lesson in love.  I began to see what a prideful wench I was, and how much I had missed out on.

Do you ever fold laundry and leave it in nice piles to be later taken to drawers and closets?  Do you ever see trash cans full of trash, ready to be taken out and dumped?  Dishes ready to be washed, lawns ready to be mowed, steps ready to be swept?  Boys can’t.  I’m telling you, this is a uniquely female thing, to be able to see a dishwasher full of clean dishes ready to be emptied.  They also don’t see dirty floors or socks that need to go in the hamper.  The little pile of dried jelly on the counter?  Completely invisible.  The dry laundry on the line, ready to be brought in?  Purely there for ornamental reasons, and isn’t it lovely, wafting there in the breeze?  Children and teenagers also possess this unique blindness, this ability to remain completely unaware of the blatantly obvious things that need to be done around the house.

When we were newly married, and for a long time after, I held this blindness firmly against Dallas with a mighty hand and not-so-gently encouraged him to change this inescapable quality about himself, which clearly he’d developed intentionally purely as a way to torture my type-A tendencies, with all the compassion and understanding of Thor whacking with a hammer bluntly about the head and neck.  Let me tell you how this did nothing but confuse and stun the poor boy, who could not understand why his usually kind and loving wife (heh) would throw a rod and spiral into a meltdown over a pile of laundry.  It’s laundry, not a toxic waste spill.  I’ve learned that he just doesn’t see it.  Only girls see things like this; other women have confirmed my hypothesis.  Ask him or the kids lovingly, “Would you mind putting the clothes away or washing the dishes?” and they do it immediately and with a song in their hearts (kinda).  Maybe not that far, but not begrudgingly and not with the malice they might otherwise have toward me had I bullied them into it.  The difference is that I began to see him as he is, not how I wanted him or expected him to be.  Of course I see something that needs to be done and so I do it, doesn’t everybody?  Well, no.  They don’t.  Because God made them different from me, with qualities so perfectly unto themselves as to make them wholly unique and to be treasured.  Do I treasure this laundry-blindness in my husband and children?  Not necessarily, but I accept it.  They aren’t oblivious to the things I think are vitally important, purely in their malevolent intentions to annoy me and make my head spin 360 degrees; they’re just not always on my wavelength because THEY’RE NOT ROBOTS.

God has made each of us just exactly the way he wants us.  Teachable, malleable, unique, wonderful masterpieces of biology, whom He knew before He formed us.  Our life experiences have shaped us, but nothing comes to us that hasn’t touched the hands of God first, and God works everything for good, even the awful things of which you think nothing good could possibly come.  Did Leah, or Jesse, or David know that the SAVIOR OF THE WORLD was going to come from their lineage?  Well, probably not; they certainly weren’t around to see it.  But He did.  God had a unique purpose for their lives that was unlike anyone else’s in the history of time.  Did Leah have this chewing problem where she sounded like a cow masticating a sticky pile of cud when she ate?  Maybe.  Did Jesse pick his nose and wipe it on his shirt right in middle of pleasant conversation?  I don’t know.  David screwed up righteously, repeatedly, and with abandon.  And yet God made them all just how He wanted them, and used them for His glory.

I have missed the beauty of each person’s uniqueness in my life.  I have not loved them the way God loves them, and I regret it profoundly.  Don’t let this be you.  Have they sinned against you?  Forgive them as He forgave us.  Don’t just forgive their sins against you, FORGET THEM.  That’s what God chooses to do with our sins; He very purposefully forgets them.  He knows what they are just as well as we do; He just chooses to forget them, to erase them and let them go (LET IT GOOOO, LET IT GOOOO…. Elsa moment).  Don’t just look at people, SEE them.  Look at the wonderful qualities they have that God has placed within them, instead of focusing on what you think they’re missing.  Are they the most brilliant of creatures, the most socially pleasant and accommodating?  Probably not but neither are you (face it).  Are they far too dependent, far too oblivious, far too selfish for their own good?  I’d be willing to bet you can be a wee bit tad selfish as well. 

Really look at the waitress next time.  She’s somebody’s mother, sister, or daughter.  Yes, she might have every square inch of her body covered in tattoos and piercings, but God made her and He loves her.  Look at the customer service person next time you go shopping.  Is she a royal snot-and-a-half and would you like to poke her in the eye with a fiery torch?  Yes.  And she probably deserves it for not letting you use two coupons in the same transaction (I’m lookin’ at you, Michael’s).  But God made her and He wants to redeem her, and if you don’t show her Jesus she may never see Him.  Can Dallas not see a pile of laundry until it’s sat there a week?  No, he cannot.  But he has a million beautiful songs in his head, he understands things about politics I can’t or don’t care to, he loves flowering plants and trees and knows exactly where they’re going to go best, he loves his children with all that he is, he is the only one on this earth who is going to love me even as rotten as I am, and GOD CHOSE HIM FOR ME.  Therefore, I’m going to cut the boy some slack and ask him lovingly if he’ll put that laundry away for me.  I’m going to respect him as the head of our family and support him in the choices he makes even if I don’t always agree with him.  I’m going to submit to him in the way God intended wives should do, not by blindly accepting every decision he makes with ignorance and a lack of interest and fine-do-it-your-way-but-I-don’t-like-it, but by presenting him my opinion, my thoughts, and my advice in a loving way, speak up when I think he’s wrong, and not leave him to flounder by himself… but then TRUST HIM to make the best decision for our family and allow him to lead it.  I’m going to pray for him and love all the parts of him, forgiving the parts that rub me wrong. I’m going to tell him how I feel about things, not let them fester inside and grow into resentment.  Talking is hard.  Admitting you screwed up, you’re wrong, you’re unkind, you’re just as much as fault… it sucks.  No, it SUUUUUUUCCCCKKKKSSSS.  But it’s necessary and it’s what God always wants us to do, to ask for forgiveness when we screw up, to love our neighbor just as he is, and to forgive when others screw up.  It’s not easy, it’s humbling, it’s embarrassing, it’s against your better judgment as far as self-preservation of the ego goes.  Will I always get it right and have the right response to people?  Nope, I will consistently over-react, under-react, be selfish, be petty, be a snot.  But then I have to say I’m sorry, and ask for forgiveness, and truly try to love as God loves.  I’ll never really get there, but that’s what God has asked us to do while we’re on this earth, and nothing else.  He didn’t say “judge this sin worse than that one and treat this person accordingly,” He said “love them.”  He didn’t say “By your actions show this person the error of his ways so that he will realize he’s a blithering idiot and act completely different to please whatever ludicrous expectation you have in your head about how he’s supposed to act,” He said “love him the way I love him.” 

I’ve missed so much and I can’t get it back.  I can’t take back hurtful words I’ve said in anger, or dirty looks, or the way I’ve treated people unkindly.  I can’t erase the fact that I didn’t forgive them their slights against me and forget their sins when I should have, and I held on to the hurt.  All I can do is what God asks of us – say I’m sorry, ask for forgiveness from those I’ve hurt, repent, and ask God to help me love them.  If I ever made you feel less than you were, or not good enough, or not just exactly what you were meant to be, I’m sorry.  Please forgive me.  There, you can use that, you don’t even have to come up with your own.  You can write it down if you can’t speak it.  You can say it in the dark where you don’t actually have to look them in the eye.  You can write it in icing on a cookie cake to make absolutely sure they see it.  But the people that God has brought into and out of your life, even for a nanosecond, God made them and he loves them.  He wants you to love them too, and in order to do that you have to see them as the wonderful, purposed creations they are.  They aren’t here to lick the peanut butter knife and put it back in the jar because they know that will completely wig you out (not to say I know anybody who does this; I’m just sayin’).  They aren’t here to ask you repeatedly what you just said because they know that will drive you insane and make you want to whack them with the nearest blunt and/or pointy object.  They don’t strew their dirty clothes around the house purely in a calculated mission to make your OCD buttons blink red at a panicky tempo.  Love them for the disorganized and germ-laden person they are and hire a maid.  Does she have this annoying tendency to not get ready until the last possible second and make you late to every function you have ever been to or will ever attend (read: not me.  Maybe.)?  Tell her you have to leave half an hour before you really do and get on with life.  He can’t find his own butt with both hands and a flashlight?  Draw that boy a map and LET IT GO.  He’s that way.  Barring a lab accident that may also have the effect of changing him into a supervillain, at this point he isn’t going to change.  He is what he is, now love him for what he is and forgive him for what he isn’t, and move the heck on.

Do I mean that for people whose husbands are abusive, or whose wives spend every dime they make with reckless abandon, or whose parents are alcoholics and drug addicts?  Love them for the whack-jobs they are and leave them to go to Hell in a handbasket or similar containment device?  No.  Use your brain, that’s what God gave it to you for.  Use social services, ask for help, go to counseling, get exercise, eat right, make a move.  Toxic relationships have no place in a healthy life. Don’t just sit there and accept it and endure it.  But oh, don’t MISS it.  Don’t miss loving the people God brings into your life.  Make today your turning point and ask God to help you; you can’t do it on your own.

So that is your horrible warning for the day, my friends.  From the bottom of my biscuit to yours.

Epiphany

I hate my body. Except I love it.

These are the warring factions that have been inside me for pretty much ever. I know there’s a whole movement about body image. I get that. I don’t really care because I’m talking about me. And you, because you feel the same way I do, you know you do. All my life I’ve struggled with my weight. When I’m overweight, I let that fact dictate how I feel about everything. And I do mean everything. What I weigh impacts whether I want to go out or stay in, participate or not, get naked or not.

And don’t even get me started on the self-loathing that goes along with it; the running commentary in my head. I don’t want you to see me naked, I’m fat. I can’t wear that dress, I’m fat. Why do I have no self-control? Why am I eating this again? Well, I’ve already ruined today, I might as well really ruin it. Why can she eat anything she wants and I can’t? I wish my stomach looked like that. These pants used to fit. Dangit. I’m worthless.

That was in my head for about 25 years. Until, by the grace of God, I came to understand the value of myself in a different way. It took a loooong time to get here. I’m not “there” yet. But I’m not where I used to be, which you might recognize.

I was a chunky kid. Big thighs, big ankles. Not athletic by any stretch of the imagination. I’d rather read. I don’t know when I started eating to feel happy. I just remember doing it. And yet eating makes me big and being big makes me sad so I guess I’ll eat. Why not, let’s just throw in the towel. WHY is the way I feel about myself tied to my body? Why should it be? It makes no sense.

I have a scar on my right hand where I was getting my bike out of the shed one day when I was probably 12, 13, something like that. The shed was really just a lean-to; covered on the sides and top with corrugated tin because we stored firewood and the mower under there. And the bikes, to keep everything out of the rain. Anyway I was getting my bike out one day and sliced my hand down the corrugated tin and it eventually healed into a perfect little raised line about a centimeter long. I remember it very clearly for whatever reason; maybe because it sliced my skin so perfectly (up until then I’d only scraped knees and elbows; no real injuries) and it was kinda fascinating to see inside there, and maybe because it happened before I’d really even realized it. My Uncle Hubert and Aunt Marcelle were over for coffee that evening. Mom and Dad used to have them come over for coffee every so often and they would sit and chat and it made me happy to know that they were happy. Sometimes I’d listen to their conversation, even if I didn’t understand it, and sometimes I’d stay in my room and just hear them laughing and talking, and sometimes I’d go outside and leave them to it, like that evening. They were good friends and it was comfortable, hearing them laugh and talk together.

I tell you this because it’s part of me. I look at that scar and I remember Uncle Hubert and how I loved to smell him smoking his pipe, before he got smart and quit. It’s not pretty, but it’s me. I have a spot on the bottom of my right foot that hurts sometimes when I step on it wrong; it’s from when I stepped on a cigarette butt in front of the old Kmart one night while Mommy was shopping and Daddy and I waited outside so he could smoke. It wasn’t his cigarette butt; he was still smoking his, but somebody else had thrown theirs to the ground and I walked my little bare feet right over it. I cried and Daddy picked me up and held me and I could smell his t-shirt with the dirt and oil and grease on it from having changed the oil in the blue truck earlier that day. He let me “help” him do that; crawl underneath the truck and watch the black black oil drip down into the pan.

Carter asked me what the scars were on my hip last week. They’re stretch marks and they are totally unfabulous. If he’d come out when he was supposed to come out, a week and a half earlier, I wouldn’t have had them. But he didn’t, and I got bigger, and bigger, and I have the stretch marks to prove it.

My mother makes carrot cake like you have never tasted carrot cake. Seriously, whatever way you think yours is good, hers is SO SO much better. She does this thing where she sugars the pan, and then when the cake bakes it comes out all wonderful and sweet, and then the icing. Oh. My. Gosh. The icing. Only Mom can make cream cheese frosting like this, and you put it with the carrot cake, and it’s unreal. I eat far too much of it, and I can’t resist it when she makes it. She makes me this fudge-ribbon cake for my birthday that’s all chocolatey goodness and cream cheese ribbon (holy cow, maybe there’s a theme here) and I can eat that whole thing with no help. My thighs are a testament to that carrot cake, and that fudge ribbon cake.

These hands have caught vomit, wiped away tears, checked for fevers, and sewn Halloween costumes. My boobs are pathetic floppy reminders that I couldn’t breastfeed my own children, yet they drive my husband out of his mind. My booty is rife with cellulite but my booty has sat on hard bleachers through baseball games, and on horses, and through cold nights around bonfires. My tummy has rolls. So. Many. Rolls. My rolls actually have rolls. My children made those rolls and stretched out my tummy and left their mark, and they lay their heads on my soft tummy now when we snuggle in the bed reading books. The skin under my arms? My bat wings. Flap flap flap. These arms have held cranky babies, crying loved ones, and toted groceries to feed my family. They’ve hauled firewood to the truck from the woods and they’ve had kitty cats fall asleep in them.

My body has stories. My body has been USED, people. It’s not pretty. It’s not skinny. It’s too lumpy in places, too fat in places, too wrinkly in places, too rough in places. But it’s beautiful, because it’s what God gave me to walk around in, to love in, to help in, to comfort in, to be happy and sad in. Love your body too, no matter what shape it is. Stop trying to make it fit into whatever size you think will make you happy. If it feels good to exercise, then do it. If you have a few more pounds this year than you did last year, then so be it. Buy bigger pants. Look at what God has given you in this body and what you’ve done with it. It's a beautiful, strong, amazing body.  It doesn't need to "look good" in pictures.  It's too busy living life.

Absorbing the Blow

As a mom, and a daughter, and a female, all of those things put together, I’m continually struck by how much we as our gender in each role, endure. How much we balance, and juggle, and attempt to be all things to all people; especially to our own families. I’d like to say “well, that’s just how it is in my family, we ladies are very giving people,” except that I see it in all of my women friends, relatives, co-workers… I think it must be a singularly female thing, or maybe it’s maternal, since a lot of the women I can think of who are like this are moms, or maybe it comes with age. Like mold. I don’t know. Maybe boys are like this too, or would be, you know if they didn’t have penises that took over their brains and laser-focused their entire existence down to a razor-sharp pinpoint of hormonal urgency.

I have always heard it said that you should “turn the other cheek.’ Yes I know it comes from the Bible, I even Googled it so I could tell you where it was. Matthew 5:39: “But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.” God said it so you have to do it. But if that’s not enough, if Kenny Rogers can put it in a song then there’s probably something to it that should be heeded, much like knowing when to hold things and fold things.

But with me, and some other females I know and love, I don’t think it’s so much turning the other cheek as absorbing the blow. We aren’t solid, steadfast pillars who take adversity and unkindness and ingratitude with no discernible surface impact; it’s more like we’re air bags. We kind of catch the unkind remark, the additional burden, the carelessly-tossed backhanded compliment like a football, absorbing that impact of that blow instead of having it glance off in a funky-angled trajectory to ricochet into somebody else. And it might leave a mark.  Not to say all women are like this, or that we’re like this all the time. You do have your Jerry-Springer-tennis-players who take every insult, perceived or otherwise, and fling it back toward the sender with equal fervor and vitriol. Everybody has one of these inside them, the knee-jerk reaction of “you hurt me, I’ll hurt you,” the toddler-mentality of “if you break my toy, I’m breaking yours.” I’m talking about the kind of catch that comes with age, maybe with mommyhood, maybe just as your relationships stretch from grades to years to decades and you realize what really matters in life.

It’s a kind of grace, really. When I was a teenager in the throes of my hormonal angst and I would rail against my mother’s carefully constructed safety barriers, she would endure my blasts, buffeting them off to the side like ineffectual clouds. She’d stand there weathering the storm until I blew myself out, realized she was right to begin with, and moved on. Not saying anything about it, just gathering herself quietly, knowing there was going to be another onslaught at some point for which I would not apologize, but taking a breath after having withstood this one in preparation for the next. It’s kind of like how you envision following a toddler around when they’re learning to walk – you’re right behind them, ready to catch them if they fall, but not actually touching them. Even as they grow, not offering any advice (unless they ask) or guidance (unless they ask); your arms are out wide to keep them on the path and prevent things from ramming into them, but they’re going in their own direction and all you can do is follow and hope they remember all the good advice you gave them, back in the beginning when they actually thought you knew what the heck you were doing. Before they figured out that you’re winging it like everyone else. That’s one of the things I imagined would be hardest about being a parent, based on how I saw my own parents as I grew into adulthood. How do you walk the line between being there when they need you, but not parenting them? Catching them when they fall – letting them hit to see what it feels like but not so hard that it leave scars – after all, that's your baby - and setting them back on their feet, but not carrying them forward? It’s a narrow line, people. A line my parents somehow managed to navigate throughout my life but one which mystifies me as much now as I walk it as it did then, watching them walk it.

I wonder how we get like that. There are so many beautiful women I know that have endured such trying circumstances (read: having me for a teenager) and yet still come through it with this patient, beatific look on their face like, “Yeah, I got that one, what else you got? I can take anything you dish out, and I’ll still be standing here, and I’ll still love you afterward.” I’m not even talking the big guns -- ladies who’ve been left without moms too young and had to pick up the slack; had to deal with poverty, alcoholism, and abuse. I’m only talking about the day-to-day minutiae of LIVING. We take on school PTOs, handmade Halloween costumes, the pain-in-the-butt project at work THAT WILL NEVER END, the laundry, the ring in the toilet that. Will. Not. Come. Out, no matter what caustic military-grade solvent you put on that sucker. The dog with the bee sting who can’t breathe and has to be rushed to the vet and the little soul that needs to be soothed because the birdie fell out of its nest and “we just found it like that.” We take on the smart mouths, the eye rolls, the hair that gets dyed pink and green and then has to be fixed at the salon, the questionable fashion choices, the sarcastic comments, the judgment in that other mommy’s eyes because OUR yogurt is SMACK DAB FULL of red #5 and HERS was organically grown in a star, nay, coaxed to life fairly nestled in a fairy’s bosom. We endure the “we didn’t do it like that in my day” and the “give that kid to me for a week, I’ll straighten him out.” We deflect well-meaning comments from friends and relatives that we take wrong; surely they didn’t MEAN to make me feel like an ineffectual dunce who can’t connect two bumps on a pickle, and WHAT THE FRESH HELL IS THAT SMELL COMING FROM THE WASHER?!   I didn’t mean for something to come across that way – and holy hell they are totally letting me have it and I didn’t mean that at all but can’t they see I frickin’ LOVE THEM?

And there you have it. There are so many women that I know that love even when it isn’t deserved the tiniest bit. Who keep taking what gets dished out, absorbing blow after blow from every conceivable direction, and are still standing there ready to pick up whatever pieces fall and hand them back over whenever the circumstances dictate. They get their feelings hurt and they swear they’re not going to fall for that again; they’ll be tougher next time and they WILL NOT be there to catch the next free-fall… and still there they are. Right when you need them before you even knew it.

If you are one of those women who are patiently buffeting blows or waiting to catch the next stumble, understand how much you’re appreciated even if you never hear it. Seriously, you may never EVER hear it. Understand how WE are able to toddle off into the great unknown because we know you’re right behind us. If you’re one of the toddlers who are railing against someone who’s in your face and up in your grille and has GOT A FRICKIN’ OPINION ABOUT EVERY LIVIN’ THING YOU DO – take a minute and be grateful for their interest and concern. It is so good to be loved. To be loved and watched from afar, but also to be smothered under the 3-inch quilted cotton oxygen-sucking monstrosity that is whatever your most difficult relationship is right now. God made us to love each other but He in his infinite yet unfathomable mind-numbing wisdom didn’t make us all the same way and so we love each other differently – and that is also why there are bell-bottoms and gauchos. Because somewhere out there some idiot thought they were beautiful fashion choices to be embraced. Go embrace all the strong women in your life today and tell them you appreciate them, and thank them for loving you when you were a pain in the arse.

Bad Words

Yesterday we were on our way to school in the car, it’s about 7:30am, and Carter says from the back seat, “Mama, is F@#K a bad word?”

Um.  Yeah.

So I said, “Well, it’s not a nice word, so we don’t say it in conversation.”

“What does it mean?”

Well, I didn’t go THERE.  But I said people use it all kinds of different ways; as a verb, a noun, an adjective… you have to admit, you can't beat it for versatility.  Personally I say it quite a bit, usually in my head, occasionally alone in the car, but not within earshot of the kids.  I find it very satisfying and at times, the only word that fits the situation perfectly.

“Well, is sith a bad word?  Siht?  Something with an S.”

“S@#T?”

“Yes, that one.”

“That’s not a very nice word either, so we don’t use it.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s rude.  Remember how I told you that holding up your middle finger means that you’re telling someone they’re useless, they’re lower than dirt, and that’s why we don’t do it?  Using those words make people feel like that too sometimes.  So we don’t use them.  You’ll probably hear other people using them, though.”

So I asked him if he’d heard someone saying those words recently.  He said there were two boys in his class that were talking about it at lunch and they were trying to think of all the bad words they knew.  “They said there was an f-word, two s-words, three e-words, and a c-word.”  Little boys, you BETTER NOT teach my kid the c-word.  (I can't think of what the e-words must be.)  I’m not upset that he knows those words.  I knew it was just a matter of time and I’m amazed we made it this long.  I learned the s-word earlier than he has; in second grade when Justin Lavoie wrote it on a desk.  It didn’t mean anything to me then, just like those words don’t mean anything to Carter now, he just knows they’re “bad.”  But, he said, “I didn’t like that conversation very much.”

I’m not thrilled he knows those words now, just like I won’t like it when he no longer believes in Santa or the Tooth Fairy.  But I know those days are coming too.  In some ways I wish I could keep them both little forever, homeschool them and control everyone they meet and insulate them from all the bad in the world.  Last week these same boys asked him if he was friends with another kid they thought was weird.  Carter struggled with that, because he thought the weird kid was just fine, friendly even.  But he could see what those boys were asking, “Are you friends with the weird kid?  Because if you are, you’re weird too.”  We talked about that, and I told him he’d face that problem all his life.  Even as an adult you face that, adults are just more subtle.  “I don’t like that person, so you don’t need to like that person.”  

He asked me what he should do about it.  I asked him if he liked the “weird” kid.  He does, so I asked him if he thought it was a good enough reason to not be friends with him just because the other kids thought he was odd.  And I told him that if he stopped being friends with the odd kid, it would probably hurt his feelings.  But I didn’t tell him what to do; I asked him what he was going to do.  He said he was going to invite the boys to play with him and the weird kid, and they’d see how much fun he was. 

Yesterday I asked him what happened with all of that.  He said he introduced them all, and they played tag, and he doesn’t know if they all like each other but they all played together.  My boy the peacemaker.  I asked him what he’d do if those boys started up the “bad word” conversation again.  He said he sat with somebody else at lunch so he wouldn’t have to be a part of that conversation.

I’d really like to save him from that crap.  The peer pressure garbage and the do-you-like-me-I-like-you-but-different-is-bad idiocy.  There were some people I was friends with in school that weren't exactly scholars, nor were they the best-behaved people, but there was something to them I liked.  One girl had (and still has) the absolute best sense of humor; she wasn’t exactly brilliance personified but dang, she could make me laugh.  Another girl I knew used every expletive there was in every sentence she spoke – but she WAS brilliant and probably one of the kindest people I’ve had the good fortune of knowing.  I’d hate to know I’d have missed out on them if I’d been “saved” from the peer pressure of being friends with them.

I don’t know how I’m going to help these kids navigate this world.  It’s ugly.  As Christians, we need to be in the world and not of it.  That’s hard.  When you’re in the world you see all the ick and you have to deal with it.  People will hurt you, influence you for good and bad too, make you uncomfortable, and force you to make difficult decisions.   They make fun of you for being different.  You get labeled as a prude because you don’t do the same things they do; if you do the same things they do to “fit in”, you’re a hypocrite.  I don’t want anybody to teach my kids the c-word, offer them drugs, or tempt them to steal.  I don’t want them to be put in the morally-questionable yet socially-defining position of “let me copy.”  But neither do I want to completely insulate them from it, because the awful people of the world, that’s who we’re instructed to tell about Jesus.  To show them Jesus, because that might be all they ever see of Him.  How will they ever understand what people are going through, the temptations they face, the trouble they’re in, if they never have to see it?  How do they ever have an “I’ve been there, and this is how my faith in God helped me through it” conversation? 

I’m trying very hard not to keep all the bad things from reaching my kids; I AM trying very hard to warn them before they get blindsided with something, and to help them face the tough stuff.  To know where they stand on things before they’re challenged, so they’re confident about their opinions.  I worry those challenges will come before I’m ready.  I want them to be able to make good decisions when I’m not around to tell them what to do, and to know that awful things are out there and will have to be dealt with, one way or another.  I shudder at the mistakes they’re going to make, the temptations they’re going to fall prey to, and the horrible things that may befall them.  I can only pray that God will protect them and save them from themselves and the myriad bone-headed decisions they will inevitably make.  When I think of all the times I did something that could’ve gotten me maimed, beheaded, or killed… well, they say God protects fools and children and at any given time in my life, I’ve been one or the other.

So as much as I totally didn’t want to have to explain the word f#@k to my 8-year-old with my 5-year-old in earshot, at least we got the chance to talk about it.  Frankly I’m just glad he didn’t hear it from ME.  

Conflict Sucks

I can be a weepy. sobby, emotional mess.  I know this.  But let me just tell you what these past few weeks have been like. 

Week before last, I was at the rescue mission and I stopped by the men's side to drop off some sugar in the kitchen.  I said hello to one of the guys.  One of the directors saw me, called me into his office, and proceeded to rail at me, basically accusing me of trolling for dates.  I left in tears and didn't go back to the mission, and I was miserable for a week.  I finally decided the next week I had to talk to him.  I had to confront his accusations because what he said wasn't fair.  He didn't even know me.  Everyone I've talked to, except him of course, appreciated me being there, and since I go with my entire family, they know I'm not trying to hook up.  So I called every day and left a message.  I never could get him on the phone.  By the end of that week I was a basketcase.  So the next week, I showed up on his doorstep, even though I was scared to death about how this next conversation would go; the first one had tanked in the first 10 seconds.  We ended up having the type of discussion I think God had in mind in Matthew:

“Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother. But if he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that ‘by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.’ And if he refuses to hear them, tell it to the church. But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector.” (Matt. 18:15-17)

I REALLY just wanted to walk away and not talk to this guy again, like ever.  But the people who would be hurt by that are the people we were both (theoretically) trying to help, and I can't help anyone if I'm not at the mission.  So I walked in his office and sat down, and we prayed together, I told him how hurt I was by his statements, he apologized all over himself for hurting me, and then he told me what he'd REALLY wanted to say and failed miserably at.  During all of this of course I was a weepy mess again, 'cause I'm a girl, and I'm embarrassed at not being able to control myself, but here's the thing.  I was proud of myself -- of US -- for handling a conflict the way God intended.  It wasn't pretty.  It made me vulnerable and it made him have to step up and admit he was wrong, and ask for my forgiveness.  It required me to be brutally honest to a virtual stranger and set myself up for probably being hurt again, since I didn't know how it was going to turn out.  At the end of the discussion we parted as friends, brother and sister in Christ, and partners in the effort to help people who are going through the worst challenges of their lives.  The crapstorm of the week before was gone.

I wanted to tell you this because if you're struggling in a relationship, I want to encourage you to speak up.  I want to encourage you to resolve the conflict and go to the person and say, "You hurt me" or "I know I hurt you and I'm asking for forgiveness."  The conversation I had required that I bare myself and confront someone I barely knew about an incredibly sensitive situation.  I hate confrontation.  When I first married Dallas, I couldn't talk to him about anything emotional unless it was in the dark and I couldn't think too hard about what I was saying -- I just had to blurt it out real fast before my brain could catch up.  (You'll be glad to know I'm past that; yes, over the last 12 years I've improved.  Slightly.)  Suck it up, buttercup, and say it and let the chips fall where they may.  God wants us to resolve conflict, admit when we're wrong and ask for forgiveness.  

So what do you do when your situation doesn't turn out like mine?  When the person you're confronting says "I didn't do anything wrong, I'm not admitting to anything, and I don't care whether you're hurt"?  Beats the heck out of me.  I don't know where you go from there, I guess it depends on whether you have a blunt object in your hand and whether they'll fit in your trunk.  All I'm saying is that if you want to have a relationship with someone, you've got to at least try, do your part, and be honest with them.  All you can control is your own actions.  When you've hurt someone, you've got to acknowledge it, however difficult it is to admit you're wrong (and believe me, it's difficult).  I respect the man I argued with for owning up to handling the situation badly, and repairing the relationship in a Godly way.  He said he respected me for coming back to confront him and not running away with my tail between my legs, badmouthing him to everyone else.  I screw up so often it was nice to feel like I was doing something the right way for a change.

Unfortunately I have other crapstorms I'm currently dealing with, where I feel like I'm being treated unfairly.  I desperately want to call up some people and give them what for, use some very satisfying words, throw things and stomp my feet.  However, I'm trying to handle it like an adult (being an adult sucks) and like a Christ-follower should.  To be a doer of the word and not a hearer only.  I don't know if these other situations will turn out as well but I'm just praying for some divine guidance, as usual, and trying to do the best I can.  Onward and upward, as Mom says.