The Both-ness of the Holidays
I’ve got these red jar-style drinking glasses in my cupboard. I found them scattered on a dusty shelf in a chain store in the highlands of Papua New Guinea. They’re cheaply made, and the red flakes off if they’re anything but gently hand washed, but we love using them for holiday dinners. The harder clean-up is worth it to my family. I’m coming to realize that the holidays may be sweet as we move forward, but they may never be easy again. I wrote these words to a friend this week, the same friend whose family sat with us around our table in the tropics, pretending that the roast chicken was turkey and laughing as my youngest held her red glass high in ridiculous toasts to everything. The same friend who spent part of her Christmas break two years ago carefully...
Read MoreOpen Letter to the Mama Who Feels the Too-Muchness
Dear Warrior Friend, Yes – warrior. Because if you weren’t fighting for your kids you wouldn’t be here. Let’s just get it all out there on the table before we go any further. This mom gig is the hardest thing. I’ve seen the social media memes and the you’ve-got-what-it-takes articles and all those things that are meant as an encouragement to all of us who are momming in the trenches. But the too-muchness of motherhood still creeps in like children’s little fingers under a locked bathroom door. And there isn’t a season of motherhood that isn’t without its own too-muchness. From the wild-eyed newborn days to the drama of middle school to the heartache of watching grown kids make destructive choices, being a mom can feel like more than we signed up for. I understand...
Read MoreThe Gift of No
We sat in the office of the private high school’s principal. She was compassionate and apologetic, but unequivocal. We had a spot for her and wanted it to work out. We really like her. But it’s not a good fit. …can’t accommodate her needs… …more severe than our other students with ADHD… …so sorry… We knew something was different about our first daughter from the time she was only a few weeks old. She was extremely sensitive to temperature, light, and noise; she would wake up even if the phone rang in another room. By 18 months, her lack of impulse control was evident. In chaotic places like the church nursery, she became aggressive towards other kids, and while we were potty training she once dove head-first into the toilet. She couldn’t explain why. At age three...
Read MoreOpen Letter to the Man Who Holds My Hand in the Dark
Dear Man of Mine, A couple of months ago when we were at a friend’s wedding, I stood in the fellowship hall before the ceremony wrapping the stem of the bride’s bouquet with a white ribbon, silk over thorns, and I thought. I thought about the day sixteen years ago when we stood, bare toes on rough carpet in a plain little sanctuary, and you held my hands as we made promises for better or worse. Someone had put red glitter in the foot washing water, and the pictures took so long that all the food was gone by the time we made it to the reception, and it didn’t matter one bit because I had you and you had me. And a couple weeks later we sat in the car by a pond and talked about all the things we didn’t know yet. And it’s true. We didn’t know what was coming. But you...
Read MoreLet It Be
Some things don’t settle in until you see it in somebody else’s eyes. Especially when they’ve known you forever and they can see the change. I stood on a hillside graveyard in Kentucky last weekend, bare toes in deep moss, and looked sixty or so of my family in the eyes. There was no pretending – not for them, not for me. It’s been a hard couple of years. There are more fresh graves on that hillside than seems right, and that’s just the upturned soil we can see. Almost all of us are working a little harder this year to fill our raw lungs, and there aren’t many of us that aren’t asking why. Why are there seasons like this? What’s the point of grief and cancer and heartache and aging and broken relationships and dreams that disappear like smoke in the wind? A...
Read MoreAn Open Letter to the Folks We’ll See on Furlough
I’ll go ahead and say sorry. I’m sorry in advance for the things we’ll do and say on furlough. We’ve only been away from the States for a year and a half, but we’ve already forgotten a lot about how to live there. When we show up to speak at your church and neither of my children can find their shoes, it’s not because we’re neglectful or disrespectful. It’s simply that shoes have become an accessory, not a necessity, and why in the world would you wear shoes when there are puddles to splash through and soft grass and warm stones on the dirt road? And, yes, I realize their toenails and the bottoms of their feet look like they need a good scrub. About the time the stains fade and their feet look respectable again, it will be time to return to the land of unfettered...
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