https://plus.google.com/117573984887329908834/posts/62hyHvTunE5
Today’s message came from here.
I just read another mommy blog post that although long-winded had a great little tidbit of wisdom. From all the places in the world for it to come from, I never expected it from Stephen Colbert. After digging for a bit, I found the GQ article where the wisdom orginially surfaced. It’s a gem. Go over and read if you have time. It might bring tears to your eyes.
If you don’t have the time, here is the Cliff Notes’ version. While at Northwestern University, Colbert was introduced to improv. Here are his words:
“I went, ‘I don’t know what this is, but I have to do it. I have to get up onstage and perform extemporaneously with other people.”
“Our first night professionally onstage, [our director said:] “You have to learn to love the bomb.”
Colbert spoke of how not just living with discomfort but embracing discomfort – really loving it – is essential to joy and success. He’s a deep dude:
“It took me a long time to really understand what that meant,” Colbert said. “It wasn’t ‘Don’t worry, you’ll get it next time.’ It wasn’t ‘Laugh it off.’ No, it means what it says. You gotta learn to love when you’re failing.… The embracing of that, the discomfort of failing in front of an audience, leads you to penetrate through the fear that blinds you. Fear is the mind killer.”
He shared how his mother helped him to live with courage after they lost his father and two of his brothers in a plan crash.
“I was left alone a lot after Dad and the boys died…. And it was just me and Mom for a long time,” he said. “And by her example I am not bitter. By her example. She was not. Broken, yes. Bitter, no.” Maybe, he said, she had to be that for him. He has said this before—that even in those days of unremitting grief, she drew on her faith that the only way to not be swallowed by sorrow, to in fact recognize that our sorrow is inseparable from our joy, is to always understand our suffering, ourselves, in the light of eternity. What is this in the light of eternity? Imagine being a parent so filled with your own pain, and yet still being able to pass that on to your son.
“It was a very healthy reciprocal acceptance of suffering,” he said. “Which does not mean being defeated by suffering. Acceptance is not defeat. Acceptance is just awareness.” He smiled in anticipation of the callback: “ ‘You gotta learn to love the bomb,’ ” he said. “Boy, did I have a bomb when I was 10. That was quite an explosion. And I learned to love it. So that’s why. Maybe, I don’t know. That might be why you don’t see me as someone angry and working out my demons onstage. It’s that I love the thing that I most wish had not happened.”
He went on to quote Tolkein. {Wow, he really knows how to get through to everyone: even the nerdiest, especially the nerdiest.}
” ‘What punishments of God are not gifts?’ So it would be ungrateful not to take everything with gratitude. It doesn’t mean you want it. I can hold both of those ideas in my head…. It’s not the same thing as wanting it to have happened, but you can’t change everything about the world. You certainly can’t change things that have already happened.”
I was in awe of how much Colbert’s message correlated with the post I started in my head yesterday based on the this sermon. Here are my favorite parts of it:
A vision of our Father’s incredible promised blessings must be the central focus before our eyes every day—as well as an awareness “of the multitude of his tender mercies” that we experience on a daily basis.
What will it matter in the end if what we have suffered here are the very things which qualify us for eternal life and exaltation.
So maybe you are wondering how the two correlate. Let me see if I can make sense of this. I just learned that some people who I love and adore just received the awful devestating BOMB that the last of their IVF transfers was unsuccessful. Of course after a year of full commitment and a $20k investment, they are devestated. They are paralyzed with grief founded in lost dreams. More than anything they just want to be parents. I cry with them today. I don’t understand the intricacies of their trial, but I do understand their pain. I have known BOMBS in my own life. Bombs leave devestation and paralyzing questions and fear. But, like Colbert says, we have to learn to love the bombs. Maybe not today, but eventually. So, after we process, we get up and walk in the direction of acceptance and understanding. The escape is in the light at the end of the tunnel.
We let our faith guide us and comfort us. We walk with God and we let him turn it into beauty. Like Tolkein versed, we turn the punishment into a gift. Or, like Linda Reeves said, “A vision of our Father’s incredible promised blessings must be the central focus before our eyes every day.” He’s going to give us everything he has. It may not be right now, and it may seem like he’s withholding, but he is always blessing us. Always.
So, when all crapola hits the fan in the form of your greatest fear manifested. Just listen. God’s voice is on the other side of the bomb. It’s quiet, but it is saying, “I’m here.” When you are forty-two and live in a two bedroom condo and just wonder why when you work so hard God doesn’t give you as much as everyone else. Just be glad you don’t really live in a warzone. When you have to put an elderly parent in a home because you don’t have the capablity to care for him and you’re heartbroken. Embrace the explosion. When you are suffocating under the weight of depression that most others don’t understand. Know that the black ball of TNT was meant just for you. On the other side of the sphere, opposite the TNT, it had your name on it. In a nice pretty mongram with an escape clause in small letters the words were etched, “I understand. I’ll get you through this.”
Meme enlightenment here.
Moms get depleted much like the water cooler on a family camping trip in ninety degrees. One need at a time. One cup at a time. Over and over and over again. Teenager needs to wash her face. Preteen needs to brush her teeth. Old child needs a drink. Little child needs to wash off the stickies. Baby needs a clean bottle. Mom offers everything she is with arms outstretched as her children learn and grow. She beams with pride and selflessly provides one ounce at a time. It turns into gallons and then bushels, and then whole bodies of water. They age and she does too.
Then, out of nowhere, a child presses the release button expecting the water he’s come to rely on, and nothing comes out. He tips the cooler and gets a trickle. This is usually mom’s warning signal to go and refill, but sometimes there are two other children waiting behind. She gives off another trickle, and another. Then she tells the next one to open her lid and pour out the very last drops. She does that a few too many times more. The next thing she knows, she just wants to cry, but there is no water left to form the tears.
Sometimes this empty cooler makes desperate pleas to people around her. Please, can I borrow a cup? Does anyone know where the easiest route to the filling station is? Can dad take a turn for a minute? Sometimes her pleas are more subtle. It takes special angels to see them. They come in the form of tears disguised as condescension during a church meeting. Trying to escape from the camp-sight all together. Hoping for the magic camouflage of a chameleon. Or maybe just angry complaints. Only other water coolers notice the dangerous existence.
Other coolers call out encouragement which the mom vessel appreciates, but she can’t transfer the advice to give her legs energy. She needs to walk to the watering hole, but she is frozen in fear and emptiness. Other times mom can’t see anyone or anything offering her anything at all. In fact, often the surrounding tents, chairs, and fire-pits laugh and stare. They say, that poor cooler, she should really get a better job. Then, another cooler comes, straightway from the spigot. She wraps her arms around the empty one and hugs tight. Magically, water begins to appear inside the cooler. One drop at a time. Until she is full. A tenacious drip appears. Drops of grateful tears sustain her previously barren spout. The drops heal. The children line back up.
Even though I have a large family and many friends I often feel terribly lonely. I am trying to figure out why that is, so that I can fix it. I really don’t like feeling lonely. So far I’ve come up with two culprits.
One, I’m hypersensitive. Two days ago I commented on an old mission friend’s facebook post. He linked an article that’s title hinted at planned parenthood and Jason Chaffetz. This friend lives in Virginia and he said something like, “Jason Chaffetz is dishonest.” I didn’t take time to read the article because I really didn’t care, but being the social girl that I am, I still commented, “I actually know Jason personally, and I think he is pretty honest. Planned parenthood should be de-funded as all other non-essentials (let capitalism do its thing), and all politicians are crooks.” That may not be exactly what I said, but it is pretty darn close.
So, this friend was really upset I hadn’t read the article. After being questioned, I admitted to not reading it. He then went off! I don’t understand why it bothered him so much, but it obviously did as he then personally attacked me. He berated me for being an idiot. He questioned, “how dare I comment without being well-informed?” I told him that I didn’t think it was a requirement to read every article in order to have an opinion, and I also didn’t appreciate his cruelty. I also gave him a few suggestions on how he could have been more validating to me. He and many of his friends then called me a looney-toon repeatedly over the next four hours. Not one person on his thread even tried to understand what I was trying to say in my own defense. I unfriended him, yet I still stewed about it in the confines of my own head for a significant amount of time. Eventually I turned off the repeated notifications I was getting, and washed my hands clean of it. I concluded that I really didn’t communicate effectively, and that I needed to be more careful next time. I also decided that anyone who was willing to act that way towards me was never really a true friend. I also talked myself off the ledge by reminding myself that one little facebook thread really didn’t matter. Nonetheless I felt alone. Very alone. I felt totally invalid, small, and stupid. I know I’m sensitive, and I therapized myself to let it go.
I also sent my husband an e-mail telling him that I was officially grateful I married him instead of this other missionary who I used to think was a great guy. At one point I thought I might like to date that other guy. Boy, that would have been a disaster.
Two, the world is cruel. Yesterday I was over life. I went to volunteer at the school for two hours, and then had to run to library to borrow a book for class. The copy I ordered has taken over a month to be delivered, and I couldn’t wait on it to get started for class on Monday. All the while I was lugging around a 30-pound baby that cries, whines, and poops at all given intervals. I decided to treat myself to a burger at one of my favorite local joints. I’d go home, lay the baby down for his nap, and get a few minutes to myself before digging in to my housework and homework. By catching a break in the middle of the day, I hoped to well up some energy to wrestle the baby on the soccer sidelines for four hours followed by the evening homework marathon.
As I pulled around the backside of the building in the drive-thru line there was a truck in the parking lot that was apparently trying to also approach the ordering position. I was pretty sure he was there first so I pulled out of the line to allow him room to get in. I pulled up alongside the parked cars in order to just follow him in. Meanwhile, the line was really backed up and we waited forever. At one point an orange car came around just as I had done, and seeing the situation drove all the way around the parking lot to line herself up behind the truck. As the truck pulled in she followed within 6 inches of his bumper to not allow me in. I rolled my window down. She rolled hers down, and screamed that she was there first. She knew she was lying. I knew she was lying. Why else would she have followed the truck so closely? How else would she have known to roll her window down in response to me rolling mine down? I was over it and baby Max was tired. There was now another car following behind her, and assuredly its driver would also claim preference. I asked her to pull up so I could just leave. She now uncharacteristically felt bad, and told me to go in front of her. I told her it was fine, and explained I couldn’t wait any longer. Then I left.
I was already exhausted and in a bad mood, so being denied a little essential happiness in the form of food therapy brought me to tears. I wondered why in life it is so common for other people to not give me the courtesy that I try so hard to give others. All I could determine is “the world is cruel”.
Then last night, I stumbled on this Ted talk. It convinced me that even after years and years of therapy, I still need to do a better job with my emotional well-being.
I plan to combat my loneliness by implementing Guy Winch’s inspired suggestions:
I will take action when I am lonely.
I will change my response to failure.
I will protect my self-esteem.
I will battle negative thinking.
I guess if I am focusing on these things for myself, I really won’t have to time to worry about the jerks in Virginia or the other ones in the drive-thrus.
I’m walking down the trail yesterday with my baby in a stroller and my dog darting about. My trail is asphalt, but there is a great surrounding riparian area where my dog loves to explore. She chases birds, sniffs for treasures, drinks from puddles. I imagine her trail-time is much like mine: she feels free and at ease with her instincts.
So, at one point this cyclist comes roaring around a curve, and almost runs over my dog. Not really slowing down, the cyclist shouted at me over his shoulder: “Please keep your dog on a leash so she won’t run in front of the bikers.”
What he had no way of knowing is that like the guy suggested and the law commands, I used to keep my dog on the leash. However, I found that the outstretched leash was a big problem for the cyclists. They would have to come to a complete stop behind oblivious me in my headphones, my wide stroller, the leash of death off to my left, and my dog trying to sniff the other side of the trail.
So, over a period of about three years I’ve learned to just let the dog run, and hope for the best. Whenever there is another dog approaching I quickly apply the leash. Lately though I’ve been searching for the right solution as there are a lot more cyclists during the earlier time that I’ve been using the trail. Sometimes Olive has obliviously jet out in front of them and I realize that’s a problem.
For the rest of my walk, I was considering this cyclist. I started out angry with the overpowering thought of, “how dare he?” “What makes him think he’s the king of the trail?” I silently deliberated on how aggressive he would have been had my dog been on a leash and he didn’t just have to slow down but stop altogether. I thought about all who share the trail and wondered if in ignorance I hadn’t been being considerate enough. Eventually my heart softened and I allowed the idea that perhaps I was the arrogant one and he was right to reprimand me.
Fast forward 6 hours to my daughter’s high-school soccer game. The opposing school’s soccer field is less than ideally situated. The sun blares down on it and on one whole sideline there is nowhere for spectators to sit at all. The school always posts signage telling the opposing team to sit west of the 50 in hot and sunny and the home team to sit east of the 50 where it is partially shaded. However above the sideline up a small hill is an adjacent park almost totally shaded by towering trees. Having hauled four of my children, a picnic dinner, and five camping chairs from the distant parking lot, and worrying over the baby getting too much sun exposure, we situated ourselves in the shade of the park. We expected to be there for two whole games (about four hours) as my daughter is rostered on Varsity but usually only plays on JV. Technically we were over the line in the opposing side’s territory, but we were so far back I hardly thought it mattered.
Fast forward to fifteen minutes into the second half of the varsity game. My friend Jen had showed up just after I did and was sitting next to me with her kids. West of her about 5 feet was an elderly gentleman in his chair. At some point, a gentlemen stood talking to friends directly in front of the elderly man at a coupling of chairs closer to the field at the top of the hill. The elderly man kindly raised his voice, “Down in front, sir.” The dude turned around and glared at the man and then turned back to the game. The elderly man did not relent. Again, “Down in front, sir.” At this point the man turned around and with the angriest face and beaming eyes said, “I’m having a conversation.” The old man: “I’m trying to watch the game.” The ball-capped late-40 angry dude: “Well, why can’t you stand?” The old dude: “Because I am sitting.” The ball cap man was ticked off and seemed to think that the old guy was being completely unreasonable. He failed to see the “share the trail” mentality.
In defense of the old man, twice I said loud enough for the man to hear, “It’s just soccer etiquette, sir.” It didn’t take long for him to turn on me. He walked in my direction and screamed, “Why do you think you have anything to say to me?” If you know me, you know I rarely back down. I said, “Because you were just really rude to this man, and I was defending him in the soccer etiquette.” Boy, did that make him even more mad. He still kept coming at me physically and vocally. “You want to talk about soccer etiquette, do you? What team are you from?” I honestly answered the name splattered across my t-shirt. He said, “You aren’t even supposed to be sitting here.” I silently realized four things: 1- This guy liked to deflect his bad behavior on to others 2- he was probably the one who always posted the less-than-inviting signs, 3- he was in a foul mood because our team was spanking his, and 4- there was a reason his team played so physically and aggressive.
Unsettled that my husband wasn’t there to gently lay his magic hand of mouth-control on my forearm, I quickly mulled over my options. One of which was him baling me out of jail at a later time. Lucky for my husband, I had small children to tend to and didn’t completely trust myself, so I knew I needed to stop him from coming at me. Loudly I declared, “Listen sir, I am crazy. Certifiably crazy. Papers and medication and everything. You really don’t want to mess with me. I am probably the last person here you want to pick a fight with.” He instantly retreated from me as if I would whip out a gun at any second and subsequently was finally out of the view of the old man. My friend Jen busted a gut. I busted a gut. The old man looked satisfied. Although with a lot less confidence, the mean guy was still mouthing off from a distance, I shut him out by suggesting that maybe he should get some medication too. We never heard any more from him.
Jen said, “What kind of man treats an old man and two mothers like that?” I answer her here, “the kind that thinks he doesn’t have to share the trail.”
The old guy turned to us and said, I’m actually here to watch his team, but I wasn’t about to say it.”
Dear moms,
Whatever stage of parenting you are in, on the first day of school, know this:
You will survive.
You might not have five kids, like I do, to place your phases into neat little categories, but it only takes one time for us to share the back-to-school bond.
So, if today is your first time, read below, and cry away. If today is your third time, please enjoy it for me. If today is your 15th time, accept my deepest respect.
Most importantly, (and I’m saying this for myself as much as I am for you) all phases are perfectly acceptable.
We will survive.
Phase 1:
On the first day of school, CHILD#1 was all dressed up in a perfect outfit selected just for the occasion. The brand-name pink dress matched her personalized pink backpack and chic brown leather boots. The boots were adorned with flowers that were the same two pinks of her backpack and dress. The detailed accessorizing was absolutely necessary. Her “look” had to equal her worth. Perfection was the only option. Her long hair was styled in flawless pigtails with stationary bows; everything was doused with hairspray to perform their duty throughout the long school day. She couldn’t get to her classroom fast enough. As she walked into her kindergarten class she greeted her teacher with a handshake, a hand-made note communicating her excitement to learn, double school supplies, and a carefully wrapped teacher’s gift. She already knew how to read, write, and do simple math. She was just there to show off and tutor her new friends.
Her mom would sit stoic through the parent separation meeting where the teacher read “The Kissing Hand.” Her permanent squint barricaded the threatening waterfall of tears. She would go home and bawl while praying for her baby to be safe. This daily ritual would last all year.
Phase 2:
On the first day of school, CHILD #2 was in the outfit that her mom gently guided her to choose from the clearance rack at Target. She didn’t really like the red polo top, but her mom said it made her look smart, especially with her new glasses. Her jeans were gently worn, and her tennis shoes were double-knotted so that the teacher wouldn’t have to be bothered to help her re-tie them later. Her hair was cut short to make it easier in the mornings. Between the glasses and the headband it would hopefully stay out of her face for the rest of the day. She clenched her mom’s hand and was barely dragged along to her classroom. She greeted her teacher with a bowed head, a forced smile, and a backpack full of supplies that her mom hoped she wouldn’t be forced to share. She had a few extra boxes of Kleenex for her teacher. She could write her name, read a few words, and surely her puzzle mastery counted for the math. She was there because she wanted to be a big girl like her sister, but she was scared to death.
Her mom would not listen at all during the parent meeting because it was just easier that way. She willfully forced herself from the school dragging her large cement slab of worry to the car where she would sit and cry with the toddler in the back. The next day would be a little easier, but her aching would last all year.
Phase 3:
On the first day of school, CHILD#3 wore the outfit her sisters told her was the cutest at one of the fifty stores where they went back-to-school shopping. It was a plain combination of a shirt, skirt, and matching shoes. The clothes were new and she was ecstatic about owning something that no one else wore before her. Her shoes did not have shoelaces, but velcro fasteners. Even though her mom had always sworn her kids would know how to tie their shoes by kindergarten, she had changed her mind after a hundred unsuccessful demonstrations. Her hair was mid-length in two messy pigtails. She gladly skipped along side her mom. After all, this school was her second home. She was poised and familiar with her teacher: she’d known her for a year already. Inside her backpack was everything from the supply list except for the unnecessary things that her mom knew that the teacher had never gotten around to removing from the ancient list. Her mom carried a whole case of Kleenex as a gift for the teacher. Teachers never have enough tissues and this kid had an allergy-induced dependency on them. She could write her name and sit still for a story, but that was it. She gave her mom a tentative hug and told her to hurry and leave before she embarrassed her further.
Her mom left the parent meeting in a hurry. She had a date with the local bakery for breakfast. The freedom would last all year even though she occasionally worried for the sanity of her kids’ teachers. The only crying would happen that morning while eating her quiche: a single tear would roll down her cheek because of the touching plot-line of her book.
Phase 4:
On the first day of school, CHILD#4 wore something. It may not have matched because if her mom told her it didn’t and she insisted that was what she wanted to wear, her mom relented. The clothes may have been from the rack at the thrift-store or from a bag of hand-me-downs in the garage. Either way they were new to her and she felt fancy. She was the first one in the family to wear sandals on the first day of school. It was warm enough, and her mom figured the easiest way for her to learn that she didn’t want sod trapped between her toes at recess was to get the experience over with. Her hair was brushed. She didn’t need her mom to walk her to her class. School was exciting, but not nearly as thrilling as Disneyland. Her mom insisted on walking her to the front door of the school and then again insisted on a hug before letting her sisters walk her the rest of the way. Inside her backpack was nothing but an emergency change of clothes in a ziplock bag. They’d get the supplies later. For the teacher there was a gift-card to Wal-mart, but it hadn’t been purchased yet. She knew how to write her name, but the “a” was always backwards.
If there was a parent meeting, mom hadn’t heard about it. She waddled from the school and hurried home for a nap. She only had ’til noon to pick her kindergartner back up, and there was only two weeks before her next baby would be born. The noon pick up would remain her largest source of frustration for the rest of the year especially when she had to wake up the baby from his nap. Some days she would cry about it.
Phase 5:
On the first day of school, CHILD#5 wore a t-shirt, some cotton pants, and a dry diaper. He was lucky she hadn’t left his pajamas on. He was shoe-less. He didn’t walk. His hair was brushed with some baby lotion to mask the musky baby boy scent. He sat in the stroller waving at all the energetic kids lining up outside the school. They would occasionally wave back when his sister pointed him out. School was a place where mom would take him from time to time. He and mom both waved to sister as she hugged her teacher and walked inside, but she didn’t turn around or wave back. His mom threw caution to the wind that morning and had brought him to the school without a bottle or a diaper. Really, she was just in a hurry. He couldn’t write his name. He couldn’t even say his name.
Mom conducted a parent meeting as she walked back to her car. She hurried the stroller past the other moms in her running clothes saying: “I was almost free. Lucky for me, this guy is going to keep me company for another five years.” After her run, when she got home, she refused to cry. She plopped the baby in the highchair with some cheerios and opened up her laptop.
Sometimes I wonder why I am a churchgoer. Well not just sometimes, all of the time. I probably think about this more than is considered sane. I would like to lay this consistent self-dialogue to rest. I find writing about troubling topics helps me to set it down and walk away.
Let’s face it, organized religion + imperfect people is a recipe for disaster. Sensitive people like myself are especially vulnerable.
There are so many reasons to NOT go to church. For an obnoxious person like me, there is a new reason about every minute. Embarrassing, but true.
They either don’t trust me to do anything,
or they ask me to do way too much. (I do realize this is a defeating paradox. And sometimes I actually feel both of these at the same time.)
I don’t have any real friends there.
I am not valued.
They don’t like me.
That guy just taught a bunch of crap over the pulpit.
I don’t agree with his viewpoint, or hers, or his, or hers, or his, or hers….this can keep going.
I’m too liberal.
That Bishop just pounded his fists on his desk and yelled at me to “repent”. (Yes, that did happen. And my husband was in the Bishopric. – It’s all patched up now. He was 80% right.)
That group of people I thought were my friends just outed me from the musical number.
That similar group of people outed my hubby from the college intramural basketball team.
That kleptomaniac stole my roast right out of the church kitchen.
They’re so full of themselves.
They play favorites.
No one understands me.
No one loves me.
I’m not a breastfeeding advocate.
I don’t do hypnobirthing. (ha. that’s not even a real word in wordpress)
The same ten people do everything, and my family members aren’t invited to the cool club.
I don’t 100% subscribe to essential oils.
I don’t want to be invited to your Mary Kay party.
They really don’t like me.
They never let me teach anyone older than 8 because they think I might corrupt them.
Those people I have to serve with dump everything on me.
The kids are way too out of control. Everywhere I go. No, not mine…the other ones.
You get the picture. I honestly could go on for at least another few web pages worth.
Why do I go? I go because no matter how dysfunctional they are (and, even more than them, no matter how dysfunctional I am) it’s home. It’s not my home. It’s my God’s home. And I need Him. I need Him more than the air I breathe. Sure, I probably do need Him more because of all of them, but I think that is part of the plan.
I don’t judge people who have left the church. I get it. Every explanation they give, I understand. If I don’t, I try to, with all my heart. I do not see myself as better as anyone because I stay and they don’t. But I do consider myself more blessed. Why? Because through all the crap, I go, I open my mind, and I let God love me…From His perfect house, full of imperfect people, HE ALWAYS LOVES ME. Even when they don’t. Especially when they don’t.
I am very much like Simon Peter. Let me take some liberty with the verses John 6:67-69…the italics are mine.
Then said Jesus unto the Alice, Will ye also go away?
Then Alice answered him, Lord, to whom shall I go? thou hast the words of eternal life.
And I believe and am sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God.
Today, on a “thousandth something” of Sundays in a row, I made myself forget all the reasons to run away as fast as I could, and I went home to my Jesus. He sent a very loving message my way to remind me that He is the reason I do anything I do. Thank you, Jesus. I know you get it. Even when the lady in Sunday school today said that we can’t understand the verse about you asking God WHY he forsook you, I know you know about all the times I have asked the same question.
I know I will never experience the pain and suffering you did. I don’t even have the words to thank you for your infinite atonement, but I guess she was right to a degree: even when I feel like you and Father forsake me at times, I know you never have. I know it’s all just in my head. I also know you never will, no matter how much I want that untruth to explain my offenses. Please, please give me the strength to never ever forsake you either. Especially when I’m so quick to have hurt feelings. Especially when they are so quick to judge and misunderstand me.
I had to write an emergence myth for my Wilderness Writing class. I’ve struggled with it all semester. My professor is all about the process of writing, so he doesn’t just take our assignments, grade them, and hand them back. He gives feedback, workshops, and hopes for his students to grow and evolve. As a black/white enthusiast this has been beyond difficult for me. The class is finished in two weeks and I have not even a hint at my earned grade. I’ve had to work on multiple projects at once. I’ve hit a lot of walls. I’ve vacillated between utter despair and overpowering revelation. This was the perfect class to initiate me back to school. I’m glad I stuck with it.
Here is my Emergence Myth, A Writer’s World. This emerged after five weeks of inner turmoil. I’m proud of it. It is the most personally powerful piece I have ever written. I hope it will be followed by many more that are nothing like it.
Her name was Nobody. All she wanted was to be a Somebody. Somebodies were better. Somebodies were happier. Somebodies were successful. So, she signed up for Somebody school. She left her stifling dreary brown Nobody world without looking back and happily entered the newest Somebody classroom with glass walls. Holding a pen and paper in her hand, surrounded by Somebodies and other people learning to be Somebodies, she felt happier. She thought only of Somebody ways. She tried to learn their words. She studied their beliefs. She liked the Somebodies. And they liked her. But when she went to sleep at night staring at the books in her lap, she felt like she was living a lie. She didn’t know how to write Somebody stories, even though that is all she ever wanted to do. So she read all of the great Somebody myths. She pondered Somebody tradition and she tried harder to copy the Somebodies. But everything felt like it was wrong.
Nobody was persistent and brave. She would not give up without a fight. She stopped talking as much and started to listen. She found better tools and used them to build new ideas. After a lot of hard work she surprised herself when she started questioning the ways of Somebodies. She couldn’t believe that along the journey she was somehow convinced that Somebodies weren’t always right. What happened to that Nobody girl that worshipped all the Somebodies? She had changed her own mind. Somebodies didn’t do it. She did it. She realized that Nobodies could be good and happy and successful too. In fact, the only difference between Nobodies and Somebodies was their names. She didn’t need to be a Somebody any more. She could be a Nobody. That was perfectly acceptable. She felt liberated.
She started to think about going back to Nobody world until she had a rude awakening. The only reason she believed Nobodies were good now was because Somebodies had taught her so. Now what? She was still a Nobody, but was also a Somebody. Where would she fit in? The answer wasn’t with the Somebodies. Desperate, she allowed herself to look through the glass walls back out to Nobody world. Mountains had emerged. The skies were every color of the rainbow with clouds of all shapes and sizes. The vegetation was magnificently varied. The animals seemed to holler at her to tell their story. Nobodies never saw those things. She was no longer a Nobody.
She decide she had to stay at Somebody school, even if she didn’t want to give up her Nobody parts. She didn’t know what she would become. Maybe she should just be a writer? Maybe she could tell Somebody stories and Nobody stories? Maybe the best stories would be about Somebody and Nobody together? She looked at her paper, her new world was in it. It was totally blank, but she was not scared. She started to fill it, one letter at a time. She made Nobody words. She made Somebody sentences. She changed them all around and rearranged voraciously. Over and over and over again. She deleted some and added some others. The paper took the form of a glass building surrounded by a bounteous earth. Sometimes there was a Somebody inside, sometimes a Nobody outside, but neither would ever be confined again. Her new world was in the paper and it would be whatever she imagined.
My kids don’t get what other kids get. Because there are so many of them they kind of get the shaft. I have five little clones and there just ain’t enough to go around. Ever. The shaft is not limited to my time. There ain’t enough of anything around here. Except kids…there are plenty of those.
So tonight, as I was brushing my teeth, I was thinking about my kids. (I always think about them when I’m brushing my teeth. Cavity bugs and kids have a lot in common…they sneak up on me every night at 1 AM.) Anyhow, I was thinking about how shafted they really are. When I compare what we give to our kids to what so many other parents give their kids it’s actually a little embarrassing and perhaps criminal.
It’s just impossible for us to give our five children what other people give their one, two, or three children. Maybe four is pretty even, but for argument’s sake let’s just skip four. Knick knack, paddy whack, give a dog a bone. (You double-figure families are a whole other story.) From me and my hubby, my kids may never get a European tour, a cruise, college tuition (much less room and board), ski passes, equestrian pursuits, private music lessons, designer clothes, sports camps, unnecessary shoes, to fly (anywhere), and/or a lot of other things.
I’m not judging you that do have fewer kids and/or can afford the finer things in life…more power to you. (Although, one warning: the therapeutic boarding school I worked at was full of kids from really wealthy families. They had a lot of “stuff” but not enough of what really mattered.) I’m also not writing this for you to feel sorry for me or my kids. I am just trying to paint a picture of what it is like to live in a large family. Let’s face it, when a couple chooses to have many children (I’ll let you define many, but I would definitely say our family is large) they know they are choosing family over wealth.
Interestingly, last month, in my environmental writing class I learned this FACT: When societies are more successful economically their family sizes drastically reduce…so, of course the opposite is generally true…when families are large there is typically less of a focus on materialism. In my family size I know I’ve chosen the better part. All one has to do is spend some one-on-one time with my kids to see that they trump any amount of money, possessions, or leisure I could ever stockpile. (Do not judge my opinion over one of our family dinners, with all the noise, you’d never possibly agree.)
So, as I was circling the bristles onto my gums encasing my molars I got a grand notion: instead of focusing on what I am NOT giving my kids, maybe I should start pondering on what I am giving them.
After all, they are amazing kids. They really are. I must be doing something right. I might as well give myself some credit.
Come to find out, I am actually giving my kids a lot of pretty amazing stuff.
As part of a large family here are what my kids get.
They get to learn that the world doesn’t revolve around them.
They get to learn how to make do.
They get negotiating skills.
They get a model of two parents who value family more than “stuff”.
They get communication.
They get never-ending support.
They get to live vicariously.
They get first-aid proficiency.
They get “do-it-yourself”.
They get trade secrets.
They get friends for life they also call siblings.
They get respect for the institution of marriage.
They get respect for the organization (or chaos – however you see it) of family.
They get a master’s degree in child development before heading to college.
They get to learn selflessness.
They get make it from scratch.
They get more psychology, human relations, and sociology than most people.
They get others to divvy with the responsibility of aging parents.
They get to know how to share.
They get a greater understanding of the opposite sex.
They get a greater understanding of the same sex.
They get goodnight John Boy’s and Maryann’s.
They get how to take care of a baby.
They get their place in a bigger plan.
They get to serve.
They get to survive living with a hormonal teenager before ever having one of their own.
They get gratitude for the little things.
They get cooperation and collaboration.
They get “fix it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.”
They get emotional know-how.
They get respect for difference of opinions.
They get empathy.
They get joy in the little things.
They get real appreciation for anything and everything given to them.
They get frugality.
The get homemade.
They get love.
They get even more love.
They get so much love, they don’t want anymore.
They get real connection.
They get patience.
After writing this little piece, I am now believing that all of our societal woes are actually based in the shrinking family size. Also, I came across this video that expresses the four most important things that a parent give to their child. 1-Time 2-Education 3-Spirituality and 4-Love
I guess I am doing a pretty decent job after all. My kids now sound like the luckiest kids alive. And, well, maybe they are…even without the expensive vacations.
Next time I will write about what I get. I’m sure it’s way better than any coin collection.
As you all know, I started back to college last month. It’s an exciting time for me personally because I am finally pursuing a life-long dream of becoming a better writer and a teacher.
Problematic to the ideal, however, is the fact that I am almost forty-two years old and smack-dab in the middle of my life as well as my motherhood. My life was already not for sissies before I started school. I have five kids and although I don’t have a “career”, my brain is already on the verge of explosion a good majority of the time.
“Mom, where is my bathing suit?”
“Mom, can I go to Wyoming with my boyfriend in July to pick up fireworks?”
“Mom, I need toilet paper.”
“Mom, stop lecturing me.”
“waaaa.”
That is what it sounds like around here at all times.
Then add in the hubby…well, we won’t even go there. On Tuesday, he came home with horrific tooth pain and was laying on the couch in extreme discomfort. I was the one to call the endodontist to insist that the man not wait another three days to be seen. It’s just what I do. Like LG’s paycheck, everyone expects what I get done around here.
Starting school was a really scary venture for me in my delicate psychiatric capacity. From the get-go I was having an extremely hard time processing all of the new information at school. Yes, I have a boatload going on at home, but the mom stuff is an old hat. The problem is the old hat doesn’t just jump down to make way for the new one. I feel like the Berenstein Bear in Old Hat, New Hat. I wanted to just run back home to my old comfortable hat and forget about the limitless possibilities they constantly explore at the university level. Lucky for me, if motherhood teaches anyone anything it is that YOU JUST CAN’T QUIT. So, I’ve stuck in there. I’m not a star pupil, but I’m a pupil.
My biggest problem with school is that it is making me feel like an awful writer. It has scared me so bad that I don’t even want to write anymore. It isn’t fun when it’s all just technicality-centered. My professor is a good guy and a really smart talented dude, but his emphasis is on work-shopping, which has just left me feeling like I can’t do anything right. Trust me when I say this, everything anyone writes can always be better. And everything of mine really seems to need to work. I know it does, that is why I wanted to go back to school, to learn, but still it is hard to keep trying when it feels like I’ll never be a “great”.
So, today, I come to the blog to vent…to get back to the place in writing that I love, baring my soul. Sometimes I just have to write without thinking about the noun to verb ratio and whether or not my syntax is going to be subjectively admired. Sometimes I just need to write…to write…and for no other reason than to organize my brain with way too much input. Honestly, I am trying really hard to believe my professor that all good writing is not random. I personally believe it is only defined as “good” by the readers and that one thing can be total crap to one person and the same thing can be a masterpiece to another.
I feel better already. This is why I love to write. It organizes the craziness in my mind. Constantly, I have too much going on in there, and if I can leave it on paper, I can move on…and only then.
Writing is my output. What is yours? Maybe I can convert…because this might not work out for me. Ha.
alice w. gold 