Photo by Randy Stewart
I’ve been worrying all week about my ugly hair and my chubby face and generally being all Charlie Brownish about my appearance because I’m going on a business trip to where all the Beautiful People are.
And then I look at pictures like this and I’m all, “Giiiirl, you are HAWT!”
Way to make us look good, Randy!
I’ve been working about 25 hours a week at Lilipip since the New Year, helping out with various project management and operations tasks.
It’s been seven years since I last did this – wore something different every day, put on make-up, left the house before nine… you know, the USUAL.
It’s been a hard couple of weeks. I’m tired, and I miss my friends. My body is getting used to sitting at a computer again. But I know without a doubt this is what I’m supposed to be doing right now.
Several friends recently asked me how it was going, tolerating Bryan all day at work in addition to tolerating him all evening at home.
(Well, they didn’t word it that way EXACTLY.)
Working together is probably the best thing that ever happened to us. I can’t imagine doing anything else, now, and it’s only been two weeks.
I always figured at some point I’d go back to work, at least part time, and I worried. I didn’t worry about the transition from home life to work life; I didn’t worry about an identity crisis; I didn’t worry about missing my kids.
I worried about living in a divided household. I worried about going in one direction while my husband went in another. I worried about having Things To Do and Goals To Meet that were completely separate from Bryan’s goals and lists.
Maybe that sounds like I don’t have dreams, goals, or a life of my own, but that’s not how I look at it. When Bryan and I joined our lives together, we jumped into the same boat – and as the song says, sometimes it’s a Strange Boat.
We are much happier and healthier as a family when we’re sailing in the same Strange Boat, working toward the same Strange Goal. I hope we get to do this forever.
“A fool thinks mischief is fun, but a mindful person relishes wisdom.” Proverbs 10:23.
I quote this verse constantly to Ruthie because she gets a total high off pushing people’s buttons. I often catch her smirking… SMIRKING… as she’s, oh I don’t know… kicking my chair over and over at breakfast, let’s say.
This morning as she smirkingly pushed buttons I was all, “Seriously? SERIOUSLY?” and told her to go write down three specific ways she could honor her mom today.
So far she has two, but can’t think of another one.
LOL – Oh, the joys of parenting.
The creative mischief never ends at our house, and it seems I have two children destined for tattoos in their future. Some might prefer I be more concerned about this, but I just can’t seem to get worked up over a little ink.
It washes off. Usually.
Our Thanksgiving weekend was thankfully free of horror stories. I just heard one that involved three different drama-filled family gatherings & an unmedicated schizophrenic cousin. So yeah. We were drama free and appropriately medicated.
We ate a lot, slept a lot, adventured a lot, and watched tv a lot, and we did it all together, and WE LIKED IT.
That last point is directed at me, who typically feels a tad DONE with the kids after too much togetherness. But even I, selfish grouch that I am, enjoyed four days of family bliss.
Ruthie, now a first grader, is fully into reading and writing. This sounded exciting and adventurous at the outset, but I quickly realized literacy provides one more way to express defiance.
I should have stayed content with slamming doors.
I feel like I’m depressed again. I have that overwhelmed, I just want to stay in my pajamas, can’t handle more than what’s in front of me kinda thing going on. I wake up, put out fires, and go to bed. I feel unfocused, unproductive, and unlovely.
I have a case of the Uns.
But to be honest, I’m really busy, too, and I have a low tolerance for busy.
Busy makes me shut down. Busy makes me cling to things like my husband and my couch and my bowl of cereal. Busy makes me say no to fun things because it’s too much work to have fun.
So now I wonder, have I picked my sliver well?
I think it’s time to regroup, refresh, and reset my priorities.
Nothing cures a case of the Uns like a dose of the Re’s, amiright?
Last night the kids and I drove a friend into Seattle. It was dark, we’d had a long day, it was getting close to bedtime. The kids were feeling snuggly, but Thomas didn’t have his trusted blankie.
Out of the silence he says, “Mommy, can I have your phone because I took a picture of my bwankie and I want to wook at it.”
I didn’t answer right away.
Did he just say he took a picture of his blankie? With my phone? And now he wants to snuggle with that picture as a representation of his actual blankie?!
I can’t teach this stuff – IT JUST HAPPENS.
He’s so brilliant he’ll support me in my old age (so maybe I shouldn’t burn the stinky blankie after all).
Today technology is not bowing down to me. In fact, it is quite certainly giving me The Finger. My trick to getting work done in the afternoon is for Thomas to watch a movie, but guess what? The DVD player is crapping out, and for an unknown reason movies won’t play from the laptop.
No problem! I’ll just put the movie on Bryan’s computer in the office and wear headphones to keep The Clone Wars from distracting me. Right?
Of course not. You knew that wouldn’t work, though, didn’t you?
For some reason iTunes can’t find my music library. And I can’t plug the headphones into my iPhone because of that stupid jack issue with first generation phones.
So here I sit half an hour later, wearing headphones that won’t play music but will at least muffle the distractions.
Oh who are we kidding – they’re just keeping my ears warm.
Tonight on the phone Ruthie wished me a happy birthday, and in the background I heard Thomas channel his inner Scooby Doo – “Your BIRTHDAY?!”
He gets on the phone and says, all indignant, “Why weren’t we invited to your birthday?”
“Uh… there’s nothing to be invited to, I’m down here working.”
“But why didn’t you invite us to your birthday?”
“No, honey. I didn’t have a party.”
“But Libby said it was your birthday!”
“Uh, well, it IS my birthday, but we didn’t have a party.”
“You didn’t have a party?”
“No, it’s my birthday, but I didn’t have a party. Do you understand?”
“It’s your birthday but you didn’t have a party.”
“Right.”
(pause)
“But why wasn’t I invited to your birthday?”
God, your God, has blessed you in everything you have done. He has guarded you in your travels through this immense wilderness. For forty years now, God, your God, has been right here with you. You haven’t lacked one thing (Deuteronomy 2:7, The Message).
I think the tricky part to the Daily Grind is not drowning in the details. It’s easy for us to stare at the empty refrigerator we may or may not be able to fill next week or a full schedule that doesn’t allow us to breathe, and think to ourselves: Shit, we should have kept the day job.
But that would be too near sighted.
Every morning at six Bryan and I have coffee together and set our plan for the day. We are bloodshot and tense and running on five hours of sleep (well, at least I am), but thoroughly enjoying ourselves. Still, enjoying yourself doesn’t always pay the bills or add an extra two hours to the day.
So yeah, the emotional ratio of limitless possibilities to going down in a blaze of glory is constantly fluctuating.
But when I read this the other day I was all, “YES! HE HAS! HE IS! I HAVEN’T!”
And mentally – not literally, as I was still drinking my morning cup of coffee – I jumped to my feet, pumped my fists in the air, and did a few grunting body builder poses. I karate chopped the air, let out a WOO-HOO! and ran a lap around the dining room table – all still mentally, mind you, as I’m not this energetic that early in the morning.
But still, that’s how encouraged my inner Eeyore was after reading this passage in Deuteronomy.
Contextually, it’s a sermon Moses preached before he died and before God led the Israelites across the river into their promised land, the land that was just within their reach for forty long years.
Think of it like a product launch party, or a ribbon cutting ceremony, or a toast at someone’s milestone birthday party. So much led to this moment – joy, tears, sweat, uncertainty – but here we are! We arrived!
And we are not the same as when we left.
My wilderness seems immense right now – though filled with mostly good things. Even so, God is right here with me, and I’m not lacking anything.
Last night I escaped to my garden for a few minutes right before starting the kids’ bedtime routine. The sun was going down, the air was cool, and as soon as I reached for a tomato off my plants the anxiousness of our Days slipped away from me.
As I continued picking my Sun Golds and pruning branches and weeding weeds, I fell into a familiar rhythm of movement and thought – the same rhythm I get into when running or cleaning or cooking – my hands are busy so my mind can process.
It was a peaceful few moments that recharged me.
What I found myself processing through was how my gardens – both the vegetable and flower – were sorely neglected this summer. The water pressure issues with the automatic drip system and technical difficulties with the spigot didn’t help, but I was not as consistent in my love or care for the normally full and lush edgings around my yard.
Gardening had turned into a chore instead of a hobby this summer.
I took on some consulting work recently, which is a radical shift in how I spend my time. A few hours here and there spent on the computer or in a meeting displaces something else, though there were enough inefficiencies in my time management skilz to absorb a lot of this. But still, grocery shopping has been haphazard, meals thrown together, and I feel a general sense of disorientation with my schedule.
I know this will improve as I get into the rhythm of my days, and I realize August probably wasn’t the best time to take on new projects, but in the meantime I feel a little frazzled.
But as I tended to my sad little garden I felt the universe plop back into order. I remembered I’m slow to transition the Big Things in life – more like a semi-truck lumbering to a halt than a sports car screeching to a quick stop – and I needed to give myself time to find my way. I remembered that letting some things go doesn’t mean I’ve failed, but I’ve made choices and rearrange priorities.
And most importantly, I remembered my Identity is not rooted in being a stay-at-home mom, or a work-at-home mom, or a consultant, or a wife, and that tweaking any of these things does not change who I am at my core.
The cartoon pictured above – which is printed on the back of my business cards – was drawn by Hugh at Gaping Void, and it’s the matrix by which I make all decisions concerning home and work. Every time I take on something new, I have to decide where it’s going to fit and what gets shifted to the back burner. If I start to feel frazzled, I know I’m trying to do it all.
So if you happen to catch me freaking out, my friend, feel free to ask if I’ve picked my sliver well.
I think we were all stretched a little tight last week when Bryan was out every night at events, bookended by working both weekends. It was one of those occasions where it did no good for me to complain about it – whether out loud or in my heart – so I simply embraced the flow and made it work.
That alone was a miracle of Jesus-proportions.
It was Friday morning when I realized we both needed the car that day, because for some reason when he said “I have a video shoot,” it didn’t occur to me he can’t haul all his gear on the bus. I considered leaving the kids at home with our new house mate while I drove him into the city, then realized the commute would be a perfect stolen moment for the kids to see their dad.
I should have known they’d end up being roadies.
The kids made two trips with Bryan into the Maritime Events Center, hauling tripods and gear boxes while in their jammies. They felt important and useful, and I think it’s a memory they’ll store away for a long time.
Not bad, for a few stolen moments.
As for my own sanity, Bryan took me with him to an event on Wednesday. Friends kept the kids, I picked him up downtown, and we jetted across the lake to Mercer Island more than an hour before the event started – which was more than enough time to sit on the lazy veranda at Mercer Island’s Roanoke Inn, sipping cocktails and gazing into each others’ eyes.
I felt happy sitting there, relaxed despite the overwhelming week. Bryan had insisted I come with him, and I initially balked at the logistics of making this happen. But as I sat there, I realized it was his way of taking care of me, of loving me within the limitations of his schedule.
And I was glad I acquiesced.
Bryan with Kenji Onozawa and Adnan Mahmud.
And then we were off to our event, and I got to watch Bryan in action and meet the great folks at the Jolkona Foundation.
So now the question is, can we sustain this life pattern – these stolen moments – for the next few months as work and travel pick up? Can we make this work? Is an hour here and there enough?
We posed these questions to our faith community last night – friends from our church who love us, know us, and ask us the challenging questions. These are the folks to remind us of our vision as a family and as a lover of Jesus. They will celebrate our successes with us, and speak up when they see our priorities getting out of balance.
To us, Life is a group effort. Bryan can’t lead our family without the family’s support, and our family can’t thrive without our community’s support.
So as to the question of sustaining through the Stolen Moments? I have no idea how we’ll fare, or how long we can plug along at this rate, or even how long we’ll need to. But it’s fun being in this together, and it’s comforting to know we have Community to put things into perspective.
 Photo from Podcasting News. |
The reality of being in start-up mode is settling in as we run out the final dregs of cash money and tap into our back-up reserves. One item in our budget that always seems to get cut is wine and liquor.
WHY I do this to myself every time money gets tight, I will never know, because when times are tough WE LIKE TO DRINK.
So after two weeks of living in a dry house, we are now buying three buck chuck from Trader Joes, and will try our darndest to make a bottle last.
When money is tight in your house, what do you cut? What must you absolutely hang on to, even when times are tough?
We finally have a very awesome renter moving into one of our spare rooms. Our house has been empty for a long time – too long.
I love having people live with us, because our renters often become like family. We’ve had a teacher, a medical school applicant, and a pilot, among others. They share our space, and they share our lives.
The rental space is not a seperate apartment, or even a basement room or otherwise removed from the family. Our rental rooms are on the main floor, right in the midst of our lives. I can’t hide, and neither can they. We see each others’ bed head and grouchy pre-coffee moods.
Sometimes they hear Bryan and I bicker, or at least catch wind that all is not well. The teacher would ask me about it, and I would speak honestly. Eventually I would get to tell her how we resolved it – she had a front row seat to Marriage 101 for Single People.
The pilot lived with us during my postpartum plunge into depression after Thomas was born – he would often rock the baby in the car seat with his foot and quietly play the guitar while I gathered my wits.
The med school applicant lived with us right about the time I started working out my anger and control and rage issues (just read my posts from 2005 – 2006 for background on that!). She had her own issues. She got me, and we spent long hours late at night in deep conversation about woundedness and Christ’s restoration (and there may or may not have been cigarettes and cocktails involved).
Yet, despite the heaviness of these times, I remember having so much fun with these people. And despite the exciting things they were moving on to, they were sad to leave us.
In conversation I’ve had people, including some family members, cringe at the idea of having someone “in their space.” I get it. It’s not for everyone. But in this age of “building community,” and in this culture of “the Seattle Nice,” I wonder how many of us put our money where our mouth is, so to speak?
I’m not here to judge, but challenge. Consider these lyrics:
By law all are wounded
That you may know
You may know one another
(Woven Hand, “Cohawken Road”)
I am wounded, but so are you. So why should I hide my wounds? Why not embrace my own and mourn with you in yours? Our circumstances may differ, but we have more in common than you think: fear, anxiety, frustration, selfishness, and the like. And when we know each other, the joys we share in life are so much richer, knowing the struggles we have behind them.
This open woundedness is how I embrace writing, and blogging, and friendship, and community – that we may know one another. Share and listen. Pour out and encourage. Need and provide.
This is also how I treat my physical space – it is not mine to keep all to myself, but it’s been given to me for sharing. And I find when I share my space – and my wounds, and my heart – I am nourished by joy through famine into laughter.
This morning I woke up with a start at 6:45 when Bryan came into the room looking for a shirt. I’m usually up by 5:45 to get some work done, so naturally his question to me was, “Are you sleeping in today?”
I was groggy from the jolt, but the dream I was having was fresh on my mind (and was OBVIOUSLY trying to tell me something), so I started telling the story before I lost it.
I dreamed a man took me out to dinner at a nice restaurant, but I was waiting to get on a cruise of some kind – only I wasn’t wearing a watch and I couldn’t get my phone to turn on and I didn’t know what time the boat was leaving.
I kept telling him I needed to leave, that I had a boat to catch, but he kept telling me to stay and eat with him. Then he went to go choose a bottle of wine. While he was gone I left the table and walked down the street trying to find out what time it was, and I passed Monica from Friends talking casually on her phone as she stood in front of a door engulfed in flames.
Obviously that meant I was not going to borrow her phone, so I walked back to the table – which was located on the sidewalk, by the way. Not sure if I mentioned that part.
I continued protesting to the man that I needed to find out what time it was so I didn’t miss my boat, and he continued insisting I stay a little longer.
And then I woke up TOTALLY weirded out that my subconscious was anxious about the time.
HOW DID IT KNOW?