Embracing the chaos…

This past week I have been living in what I would call a self-inflicted valley. Those are the worst kinds because those are the ones I throw myself into, and I have only myself to blame. What sent me back to this spot again? I believe I went back there because I’ve chosen to hold onto my anger and my hurts and my disappointment.  I began licking these wounds once again, and I went into a tailspin that sent me down fast. But times like these aren’t wasted, and this was no exception. This time, I’ve spent asking Abba lots of questions. And He’s been answering, sometimes in ways I don’t necessarily want to hear. But I wrestled with Him, and He wrestled back. He reminded me He’s been on this journey with me all along…and that He will never leave me or forsake me.

There are three questions that I wrestled with.

Do I really believe Abba can heal me? 

Can I let go of my victim status?

Can I forgive?

When I come to a place of painful memories, I can either try to numb my pain by self-medicating, which can come in many forms or I can embrace the pain I have and cry out to the one who can heal, Jehovah Rapha. I spent a lot of time sleeping (my form of self-medication this particular time), but I also cried out, only half-believing that Abba can really heal me. I continued to walk and talk with Abba because deep down inside I know He has to be the answer. But many times I don’t really want Him as the answer. I enjoy wallowing in my anger and my hurt because there’s a certain satisfaction in hanging onto my self-righteousness victim status.

For a long time now, I’ve held onto bits and pieces of my anger and unforgiveness because if I forgive, then that seems to let the people who wronged me off the hook…I won’t be able to be the judge or the victim anymore, and I think I like playing these roles. I found this quote, “Forgiveness does not excuse anything…forgiveness is about letting go of another person’s throat.” (224) In the middle of my valley,  Abba revealed once again that these people are loved by Him as much as I am and have just as many hurts as I do, which invokes in me mercy and compassion for fellow sufferers.     

I can’t change what happened in the past, and some things may continue to make me sad, but all I can do is continue to cry out to the One who gives “the healing and grace my heart always hungers for.” Yeah, I still have forgiveness and healing that need to take place, but I’m trusting that Abba can do the healing, that He can do the forgiving through me.  I don’t think releasing these things is a one-time thing but is actually a slow, gradual process. And just like I haven’t walked through my valley alone, I’m not alone in this either.

Henri Nouwen said, “One may choose to trust that what happened, painful as it may

be, holds a promise. The other may choose despair and be destroyed by it.” This weekend was about despair, but right now, I’m standing out in the wide open spaces of God’s grace and glory, standing tall and shouting praise (Rom. 5) because Abba’s in the process of changing a heart…and surprisingly it’s my own.

I love to bowl. I can’t pinpoint exactly when I started to like bowling, but I think it has to do with those warm, fuzzy feelings I get of times long gone. I’m not a good bowler, but for me, that’s not really the point. I’ve just now come to realize that Jeff and I view bowling a little differently. He wants to knock down all the pins all the time. If I knock down 8 or 9 pins, I look at it like, “Look at all the pins I knocked down” and then start patting myself on the back. I think I’m just excited I didn’t put the ball in the gutter. My highest score ever was 121, and that was some crazy fluke in high school when I would go with my friends.

Bowling brings back good memories for me. When I was a Senior in high school, some of us would get out of school at noon and go out to eat and just hang out. We did stupid things like riding in the back of a pickup truck shooting water guns at people…this was before you had to wear seatbelts and before riding in the back of pickup trucks became illegal. We would also go bowling on occasion. Incidentally, I would never wear socks with my bowling shoes…I know, gross! I’m surprised I didn’t get some kind of foot fungus. My friends all thought it was pretty gross too, and one of them nicknamed me “Sugartoes” and then would proceed to make some nasty licking, slurping noises like he was licking my feet…But it was during one of those non-sock wearing times when I bowled my record score.

This morning as I was thinking about bowling, a memory flooded back to my mind. It was when my family would go visit my grandparents in Maryland.  Pop Pop took my Dad, brother, sister, and me bowling. I don’t know if we just went once or if we did it many times, but I remember going, and that was a special time for me, just being with Pop Pop and my Dad. Maybe it was at that point that I really started to like bowling. There’s something about associating good times in the past that draws me to the things I used to do.

A while back, Jeff and I took all of our kids bowling one Saturday, but having a 3 and a 4 year old bowl…well, it takes forever just for their ball to get down the lane. And sometimes the ball would get stuck smack dab in the middle of the lane. The older boys got a little impatient, but it was still fun, and we all had some good laughs watching the little ones bowl. This past school year, we let each of our older boys take a hooky day from school (we’re not really into the perfect attendance thing even though Jeff is the principal) and the boys and I ended up at the bowling alley where I’m in the process of making new bowling memories with them…

When I become a senior citizen, I plan on being at the bowling alley a lot. I will probably have my own bowling ball and my own shoes by then too. I’ve already informed my children that when they grow up and come to visit me they’ll have to look for me at the alley…’cause that’s where I’ll be…bowling with my new girlfriends.

A week ago, Jeff and I celebrated our 16^th anniversary, and he took me bowling…hanging out with Jeff and bowling…I don’t remember a better anniversary.

My husband and I are pretty boring people, and when we found out I was pregnant, naming children became quite the enjoyable pastime for Jeff and me.  Having 5 children gave us plenty of times to get out the baby name book and experiment with different names we could use. To make name choosing easier, we came up with some categories of our own.

1. Themes

Jeff and I joked about naming our kids after outlaws, like Jesse James or Billy the Kid. But after we thought up those two outlaws, we were kind of at a loss, since we weren’t familiar with any other outlaws.

We also thought the planets might be an interesting way to name kids…Saturn, Venus, Mars…but Uranus might be in bad taste, and Pluto kind of implies being stupid.

I heard of one family naming their kids after the month they conceived…my thought in all that was that they might have to explain sex way too early.

But we got a good chuckle out of thinking of naming our kids after civil rights leaders just to tick my mother off…Martin, Malcolm, Mandela, Mahatma…

We ended up naming all of our kids some kind of Bible name, even Julia. Her name is found in the last chapter of Romans as someone Paul greets…yeah, I know, that was a stretch, but it still counts.

2. Alliterated names (all beginning with the same letter)

We didn’t intend to alliterate our children’s names really…I always thought it was kind of dorky especially after the children became adults. We originally had our first three sons’ names picked out before they were even born (I guess I had some inkling that I was going to have mostly boys and that they were going to come in fast succession). We liked Jesse (the outlaw in me kind of stuck), and Jonah came from the movie “Sleepless in Seattle.” Jake, we thought, was suitable for a third boy because it was tough sounding, and we figured our 3rd son would have to be tough.

But, when we had our 4th child, we had the opportunity to veer away from the alliteration because she was a girl, and so it would have been completely appropriate to not name her a “J” name, but we were like moths to the light…we couldn’t help but go there. I really considered naming her Journey…I’m not so sure that Jeff was sold on it, and my mom was horrified, and even the baby books make fun of this name.  But we went with the name Julia, which happens to be a Beatles song, and that was what finally sold it for me.

We had a fifth child, and even though there are an abundance of names that begin with “J,” we were beginning to run out of options we liked. And you can’t have Jesse, Jonah, Jake, Julia, and Fred…it just doesn’t quite gel with the rest…so we were stuck with “J” names unless we planned on having a 6th child, which we weren’t and aren’t. So our last and final name was Jeremiah…how we ended up naming our last born with such a long name, I’ll never know. All the other kids will be out at recess while he’ll still be writing his name on his paper…

3. Popular names

When naming children from the popular name list, know that popular named children will always know their last name exceptionally well (which can be a good thing if lost in a store) or will need to attend a very small school. The names Jeff and Kim were both extremely popular back in the 60’s and 70’s, so Jeff grew up being Jeff D. while I was one of the three Kim’s in my graduating class of 37. Jeff and I didn’t intentionally name our third son from the popular name list, but it seems Jacob has been the most popular boys’ name for 9 years running, and our son turned 9 in January, but we call him Jake…so maybe that will help.

I taught fourth grade several years ago. Out of a class of 18, I had three Hannah’s. And remember all the Kaitlyn’s spelled any way you could possibly imagine or come up with yourself…

4. Family names

We always wanted the middle name to be a family name. Jeff’s family had many names to choose from, but my family ended up with the short end of the stick simply because I have a very small family; I only have one cousin. There are only a handful of people in my family, and three of these people have the name Thomas in all its various forms of Tom, Tommy, Thomas. We didn’t want to overdo an already overdone thing.

My mother was convinced we needed to name a girl Gillette after my grandmother’s maiden name…and for obvious reasons we didn’t want our daughter to be known as ”the best a man can get..” Earl is also a family name on my side, and I really tried hard to make it work, but Jeff was pretty adamant that Earl was just not meant to be. Ronald is yet another name, but we just couldn’t do that either…sorry, Dad. My mom also had some relative that was named Wilhemina…yeah…,no. Consequently, all the middle names came from Jeff’s side.

So there you have it. This is what two married English majors sit around and do for fun, and this actually makes us laugh out loud. So what’s in a name…more than you can possibly imagine.

I’ve had a few rough days lately, days that I just don’t want to get out of bed or somehow end up getting back in. It’s been dreary outside, and my house and yard look like they’ve been turned inside out…I’m sure my neighbors appreciate that about my yard…but then who am I trying to impress anyway…

The last couple days I haven’t taken my morning walk which I should always do, no matter what. It seems to give me perspective and appreciation and helps me see outside of myself. Yesterday, after I got up, I went into Julia’s room and saw that she had swiped some thermometers off my dresser, and for some reason, this sent me over the edge. I started yelling, and then when I reached down to pick up one of the thermometers off the floor, I smashed my head into the windowsill. And that, of course, made me yell louder and made me even angrier than I already was, and now I have a nice lump with a bruise on my forehead…I love it when Abba gives me a visible reminder that some things just don’t matter all that much, but I wasn’t really appreciating my reminder at the time.

This incident just led me to get back into bed where I tried to sleep off my irritability. But sometimes sleep doesn’t help that much. And when I woke up, I was still sad and irritated. Some things are soul issues that don’t go away with sleep.

I don’t handle transitions well, and now my three older boys are home from school. And, middle school boys are in an amazing category all their own. They pick at each other and run around and shoot rubber bands and steal hats and just generally cause a big ruckus and a mess that I don’t think I was ready to take on yet. A friend of mine told me years ago that you have to keep this age busy or they become really out of control. I guess it’s kind of like having really active toddlers who get into everything but with bigger bodies and bigger mood swings…how that is possible, I’m not sure. But it’s chaotic, and I just haven’t felt like embracing this chaos yet.

I think what I’m coming head to head with on a daily basis is my complete and utter selfishness. It’s a little scary to look at so openly and honestly and realize that some days I’ve made everything really all about me, and it’s ugly…real ugly.

I keep having this recurring dream of walking around topless. I wouldn’t even actually call it a dream…it’s just a sense of having done this…a really strong sense. I actually asked my husband if I had ever done this and more specifically had I done this in front of his parents. I’m sure Freud would have a heyday with this. But I know this has to do with being vulnerable, and I’m feeling vulnerable, like I’ve revealed too much about myself…like people are shaking their heads at me. It shouldn’t really matter, but sometimes it just does. However, I’m realizing my feelings change a lot, and I really can’t count on them to tell me the truth.

I’m going to keep writing these things, because I think this is all part of being human. And in confessing my weaknesses and my humanness is where the mask comes off and the façade fades and where Abba reveals Himself to me in my need. Having it all together is overrated and a lot of hard work to keep up…quite frankly I don’t have that much energy to expend on presenting something that’s false…so here it is…the good, the bad, and the ugly…but thank goodness today’s a new day, and Jesus is alive and working in me, whether I feel like it or not.

 5 essentials when traveling with kids:

     1.  Wet wipes

They’re good for everything even if you don’t have kids.  They are especially good for wiping sticky faces and hands if you were foolish enough to have taken anything that contained sugar, which not only makes a sticky mess but also hypes kids up beyond belief. Wipes are also good for cleaning up vomit (although you need massive amounts for this).

     2. Towels

I learned to carry towels with us when my first son routinely got car sick all over his car seat. Towels can be used to catch vomit or clean it up, but they can also be draped over cloth seats (which is unfortunate to have if you have kids) and car seats (which unfortunately are always cloth).

3.  Plastic bags  (preferably not Walmart bags)

I have found that they are very good for catching vomit if handed out in time. Walmart bags however do not serve this purpose since they almost always have holes in the bottom. I recently had to use one myself and am glad I checked the bottom of the bag first. If you don’t hand them out in time or don’t have children old enough to use them properly, then these bags can be used for the clothes or towels that have now been vomited on.

4.  Large cups with lids

Restaurant cups work well for boys who just can’t hold it any longer. But be sure to get rid of the straw after you put the lid back on, so you don’t accidentally take a swig later.

5.   Jackson Browne CD’s

This can be used for children who have been given sugar in any form (juice boxes included) and are now bouncing off the walls. These same children are bored with the DVD’s that they themselves picked out.  I must say, this music had an unexpected, but welcomed drug effect on my children…Jeff and I were like, “Hey, where did the kids go?”

This past weekend, one of my neighbors gave my third son Jake a turtle which he named Jerry.  Jake left Jerry outside in too small of a box, and by the time we got back from a walk, his turtle was gone. We were all in a panic and looked all over for Jerry. Our cat ended up finding him underneath some weeds a couple feet away from where the box was. Whew…close call.

When Jake plays outside, he takes Jerry out of his box and lets him hang out in the grass. Last night was no exception. But last night was very chaotic, more chaotic than usual.  Jeff brought one of the other teacher’s kids home with him, so we had seven kids running around the yard with Jerry smack dab in the middle of it all. By the time the other children were picked up, there was piano to do, teeth to brush, and we’ve been ending our nightly routine by playing a rousing game of foosball. Not until this morning before Jeff and the boys were leaving for school did we realize that Jerry was not in his box. Left outside all night, Jerry could have been anywhere. . .Jeff and I both realized we might be spending the summer looking for Jerry.

Jeff and my other two boys left early for school, but I let Jake stay home and look for his turtle. At one point he screamed out, “It’s just a stupid turtle anyway!” But for Jake, who loves all animals, he was heartbroken as only a 9 year old can be over a lost pet. In fact, in Jake’s back pack I had just found a picture Jake had drawn of Jerry…I was glad Jake had documented Jerry’s short life with us, because we’d surely seen the last of him.

Jake didn’t want to be late for school, so I went outside to tell Jake that we needed to leave soon. As I was talking to Jake, something caught my attention because I glanced over to my left. There in front of our shed was Jerry craning his neck at me…just waiting for us to find him…well, that’s what I’d like to think.

So, once again, Jerry had been found. I’m sure Jerry will escape again or be forgotten or lost, and there will be more tears and perhaps another search and rescue, but it’s worth it. It’s worth seeing my son hang out with his turtle and take care of something that makes him so happy. There will be disappointing, heartbreaking days for Jake…I’m just glad today was not one of them.

I’ve been climbing the hill at my house for almost a week now. I’ve been trying to do it once in the morning and then once again in the evening. Rumor has it that Garth Brooks owns a house at the very top of the hill…but I can barely see the house from the gate, and there’s a camera, so I haven’t investigated further.  We live at the bottom of the hill on the other street…we’re his friends in low places…

When you get to the top of the hill, there’s an incredible view of the entire city. There, in the middle of the city is the famous Batman building, which my oldest son insisted we all had to touch one night when we were in downtown Nashville for a concert.

I’ve been really sore from climbing the hill, and I was beginning to think I was quite the wimp. Even though I had taken a month sabbatical from exercising (sabbatical…makes it sound like it was planned; it makes me sound like I’ve just run a marathon or something and need to rest…actually I just got a little bored and lazy), I honestly didn’t think I was that out of shape to be so sore. Jeff assured me I wasn’t as much of a weenie as I thought I was, that it actually is quite a steep climb…I mean, you can see the entire city, and Garth must have an incredible view from his back porch…

I’ve found I like climbing the hill for three very different reasons. I like walking by myself in the morning…it gives me a chance to exercise and to talk with Abba away from all the chaos. I haven’t gotten up early enough these days to see the sun rise, but I discovered last fall that that is a breathtaking sight. One morning, I was excited to see a rabbit though. I like going again in the afternoon with Jeff because it gives us a chance to talk and hang out without “little ears” around.  But I think I especially like climbing the hill with my children…they notice the many things I wouldn’t necessarily notice by myself. When I walk with my kids, I have no agenda, other than keeping my children off the road when cars go by.  We get to stop for every caterpillar, cool stick, bird, butterfly, honeysuckle, and keys (which my second son has informed me is the name for those helicopter twirly things)…we take the time to stop and really enjoy Abba’s creation with child-like wonder and amazement that adults have to work hard to understand and relax enough to truly enjoy…maybe that’s why Jesus liked little kids so much…they get it…the wonder of it all…

Jeremiah, my 3 year old, was asked this morning at church what he wants to do when he grows up. He answered, “Feed the chickens.” I think when I finally grow up, I want to feed the chickens too…

We just went to a new church on Sunday. My children however do not like being left for the first time at a new place. Perhaps it’s because their parents don’t handle change well either. So all my kids, well 4 out of 5, were having their various meltdowns while we were trying to drop them off at their classes. Jesse (11) was the only one who was able to handle going to a new class. He told us later that he thought we were going to like the church, so he might as well go to his class, rather than delay it.

I personally hate trying new things. When I was 11, we moved from NC to SC ,and I had to go to a new Sunday school class for the first time. I remember wearing a long white fancy princess dress to Sunday school, and the girls in my new church just stood gawking at me…that was the last time I ever wore that dress.  But we didn’t make our children wear weird clothes…they can totally choose what they want to wear…Jeff and I don’t care in the least…in fact, Jesse’s Alabama hat is permanently glued backwards on his head.  Jonah (10) and Jake (9) would not even go look at their classroom, much less go into them. They ended up going with us to the service. Julia (who turned 5 that day) was having all kinds of fits. We tried one classroom and then another and gave her the choice about which one she could choose…that seemed to help. We left her and practically ran down the hall so we wouldn’t be seen if she tried to escape.  But Jeremiah (3)…well, that was the kicker. Jeremiah’s door can be seen all the way down the hall, which is a problem when parents are trying to escape from screaming, crying children who can still see them for another 2 minutes while they complete their trek down the hall and out the door. Jeremiah’s classroom door had a gate across it, so I had to lift Jeremiah over the gate with his legs kicking and put him into his class. But as I was halfway down the hall I heard his screeching voice scream out, “You butthole, Moooommmm!” Yes, that’s right. I just continued to walk on without looking back and acknowledging that I was the mother to whom these words were being addressed.  Now, my older boys, when they were little, they didn’t know words like shut up or butthole or various other crude words that kids eventually know exist.  So, needless to say, we are addressing these things… 

When we went to pick up our children from their classrooms, they were really quite fine, as we knew they would be. In fact, they actually enjoyed it.