When parenting is agonizing

Two recent conversations have had me thinking a lot about what it means to wear the hat of "Mama." It is, undoubtedly, one of the titles in my life of which I am very proud. But it is also one which often leaves me immensely stressed.

Since Mary Michelle was born 10.5 years ago, we've gone through lots of transitions. We stopped adding to our family and kids have actually started moving away to start their own lives.

[Little side note to our bigs who often read these posts... Daddy and Mama are ready to start adding to the fam again... but its your turn! Significant others and then, Lord willing after that, grand-kids, are welcome. Mama's gotten to hold some really teensy tiny littles recently and she thinks it is lots of fun! She doesn't care if you think this little  «parenthèse entre guillmets » is goofy! And yes, she is referring to herself in the third person.]

Sorry for that interruption! Ok, not really...But back to what I was wanting to say: in between today and Mary's arrival 10 plus years ago, it seems like most of our friends, as well, moved out of that new-baby growing family stage. Recently, however, there's been a stampede of younger friends having babies. 

I went to visit one of those sweet little families the other evening. It was a treat to listen to all that God has done for them, to grieve with them a little those expectations that weren't realized, to excitedly anticipate what God will do in the days, weeks and months ahead, and to remember when Tim and I held our first precious gift in our arms. As parents, we often have the message preached at us, in one way or another, that "the well-being and welfare of children should always be our focus." We are to care for their physical, emotional and spiritual well-being to the very best of our abilities. As new parents, we are confident that we will do anything to do just that.

What those giving such sage counsel forget to mention is how easily those good goals become idols, and how we are often powerless and inept at protecting our children from what comes their way. Ensuring the security of our children, physically, emotionally and spiritually is a certainly a laudable goal and one for which we should aim.

But... 

But that desire needs to be balanced with the reality of life in a broken world, ravaged by the effects of sin and the truth that it is what comes out of us that defiles us, not what is inflicted upon us. Security in this world is an illusion we strive mightily to maintain, and is often an attempt to ignore the sometimes painful sovereignty of God.

I also recently visited with another mother. Her child is older, but is experiencing really hard, unjust and unfair things inextricably linked with the consequences of sinful behavior choices. My heart physically aches for her and her child. For no matter how old our children get (I'm convinced more and more of this fact), parents long to protect them, and will go to extremes to do so. This mother is agonizing over the fact that she can't force the bad to stop, erase the hurt and then move bravely forward leaving the trauma behind.

I tried to remind her: God's hand is sovereign and He controls all that touches the lives of our children. Even when we don't believe we can trust the people and events influencing and shaping our children, we can trust the ultimate artist. God cares for them so much more than we do, He is always present, and it is often in the most difficult that we begin to catch glimpses of the masterpiece He is molding our young people to be...

It is agonizingly hard... and I'm not talking about that theoretically. I've lived it.

While still in Niger, our older children attended a French language primary school. It was not a choice I originally wanted to make - my coup de coeur had always been to home school - but because of many circumstances outside of my control and our missionary budget realities, it was the choice we felt we had to make. And then came the day that one of our daughters came home from school with a lump and a decent cut (and blood stains in her blond hair) on her head. 

It was our 11 year old son who recounted the story. He, in fact, was the one who ran across the courtyard to protect his sister, not a teacher or one of the playground monitors.  Why did this happen to our daughter? Probably because she was a white girl with blond hair and blue eyes and the gal that violently accosted her probably wanted to intimidate her. If I remember correctly, she thought our daughter's long blonde hair was a wig or extensions, and she wanted it for herself. I was traumatized... 

Yet the next day, we had to send her right back into that lion's den, and I couldn't be there to physically protect her. What I really wanted to do was smack a couple of teachers' heads into the wall, first for allowing it to happen and then for not even having the nerve to directly tell us about it when we came to pick her up from school that day.

We, of course, did meet with the teachers and the administration. We spoke with the girl  that had hurt our daughter. We talked about and rehearsed strategies that our daughter could use to prevent a similar event from reoccurring. We put her brother on guard - he knew was to look out for her and to immediately seek adult help if he felt that something was off. It was awkward. Everything in my mother heart told me it was not enough, that the probability of a repeat occurrence was high.

It wasn't enough. Because all of those actions we took? They were what we could arrange on our own, without reliance on God. Ultimately, our security, the security of our children rests in the hands of our sovereign, all-powerful, omnipresent God. 

When I recently asked my daughter about returning to school the next day - if she was afraid, she said that while she clearly remembered the event, she did not remember being afraid. And then she told me why: she remembered the different strategies we gave her, she felt able to execute them, and she remembered that the other girl had been strongly reprimanded by the authorities at the school once they intervened. I think there was one other thing that helped her, even though she didn't mention it. She naturally and easily trusted God, with a child's faith, to work things out and somehow take care of her. 

If I hadn't sent her back to school that next day, she would have missed that opportunity.

Did He stop other bad things from happening to our children while they attended that school? While they lived in Niger? Once they returned to the States? After we moved them yet again, to Canada? 

No. In this life, stuff will happen. 

We won't understand why. 

We will feel powerless. 

We will be angry and overwhelmed by emotions we don't want to experience.

It is what I, as a parent, do with "all of that" - that counts. 

It is what I model for my child that matters. 

Do I use each difficult situation unjust circumstance as an opportunity to let Christ increase while I decrease as the protector, provider and preserver of my kid's well-being?

And today? 

Well, we recently saw that childlike faith and trust demonstrated again, in the midst of events that had her far-away-parents more than just a little worried. We saw her big brother step up to the plate and help look out for her - a skill he'd practiced at least once before, all those years ago. God allowed frustration after frustration in this particular situation, but He also brought His arms, His hands - in the form of His people - to lend a physical hand and care for her. So even while I'd chewed my nails down to the quick... 

God gifted me another opportunity practice trusting Him with some of the ones I count most precious of all.

May I never forget to thank Him for those moments.

Ma chaise berçante... otherwise known as rocking chair "internship"

Tomorrow morning some time, my two older girls are taking off with a friend to visit their younger sister who is attending school in a different state. I'm delighted they are going to check up on their lil' sis. Yet, my mama-heart is exceedingly worried - the weather forecast ain't so great and even though they are all grown up and competent drivers, I know from personal experience how scary it can be to driving through the regions where they'll be driving in nasty winter weather.

It's even scarier as their mother... I literally texted one of them today and asked if we could Skype tonight just so I could be sure and hear their voices again if they died. Fortunately, said daughter kindly understood her mother's freak out...

I remember being a young adult, I remember my mom being worried. I remember having to work really hard (not always successfully) to not be offended by that worry. I had no idea how visceral and real and almost decapitating (as in the panic can sometimes interfere with any semblance of logical or reasonable brain activity) that worry can be... My family and God are pounding yet another parenting truth into my rather hard head.

One of my coping strategies to try and manage this overwhelming - and if I'm blunt, sinful, since it is me trying to micromanage their lives mostly for my own comfort with more than a dash of "their own good" mixed in - panicky concern is nostalgia. The fact that I recently heard a radio program highlighting the benefits, physical and mental, of rocking - for both big and little people - has had me mentally meandering through my rocking chair memories. 

The stories this chair could tell...

My parents gave me this Amish rocker shortly after we announced we were expecting our first child, in other words, back in 1995. I've sat in this chair during every pregnancy, rocked, nursed and sang to every one of my babies in this chair. It traveled to Niger (yes, Africa) in a container and spent several years, creaking and cracking on the back side of the Sahara Desert. I'm sure if I looked closely, I could still find bits of desert orange sand in the joints. Fortunately, it was spared during the great termite infestation that destroyed a couple thousand dollars of home school curriculum, videos and other termite delicacies while stored during a home assignment back in the States.

Then came the great conundrum. We were leaving Niger. We weren't shipping a container home. But I wanted my rocking chair. So I took it apart, carefully packed it into a suitcase, and brought it back to the American side of the Atlantic. Of course, taking it apart was much easier than getting it back together. Even with all the pictures we took. Tim offered to buy me another one. I refused.

I didn't want another one. I wanted THAT one. My rocking chair...

The chair I rocked in when my back was KILLING me during or immediately after each of my pregnancies (Believe it or not, I did not enjoy even though I've spent approximately 75 months, 3236 weeks, or 6.25 years - of my life pregnant. And yes, I was counting.)

The chair where I rocked and breathed and read until I memorized Philippians 4 after waking with panic attacks at 3 am repeatedly... until I experienced physically the "peace of God that guards my heart and mind."

The chair where I cuddled and nursed and deepened that relationship with each little life God's gifted to Tim and me.

The chair where I've read Winnie the Pooh or the Wheel on the School or Ruth to each one, because whether they remember it or not, I do.

The chair that I far too often left neglected in the corner of my bedroom for long stretches because I was too busy to stop and take the time, too concerned with my own dreams, my own plans.

The chair where I've spent uncounted sleepless nights with sickies praying for patience and health yet also appreciating those long moments of quiet with just one child rocking snuggled close in my arms.

The chair strategically placed under the air conditioner where I'd listen, the sweat still rolling down the back of my knees, to Jan Karon's audio books during sieste on a sweltering Niger afternoon.

The chair where I held my neighbor's deathly sick and desperately needing surgery little girl who continually moaned in pain while knowing there was nothing else I could do - just to give her mama a few minutes break.

The chair where I've prayed for bigger kids when they've been far from me and I've been worried about them - their safety or the wisdom of the decisions they were making.

The chair where God, along with my family, has persistently worked to gentle stubborn, hard-headed and selfish me, giving me a long "internship" in choosing joy while putting my desires (and sometimes needs) aside for a few moments to focus on serving another.

Chaise berçante... those words, pronounced in French even sound like the gentle to and fro of my chair as tilts forward and back, that God has used to gentle me. A place so comfortable, so comforting, that moves so gracefully - where I've learned some of the hardest yet most important lessons of my life.

That chair represents more than just the many precious or challenging memories of parenthood. It represents much of my journey with my Savior. I often wonder what that chair would recount... if it could.

Thankfully, a dear gentleman in one of our partnering churches was able to help put my Amish rocker back together. But it is definitely worse for the wear. Today, it sits beside our fireplace, held together by duct tape... 

...as today that "internship" continues. I pray it continues for many years, encore!

PS My girlies made their trip safely and are now hanging out and s'encouraging (yes, that's franglais). I wish I could be there with them.

of alarm clocks and such

My kids have a favorite radio station and they always ask to listen when we are commuting back and forth from school. It isn't a Christian station - the organization Tim works with has an application in with the government and they are just waiting on final approval from the government... I think - and so sometimes we turn the volume down for a song or conversation (and then discuss why we needed to turn it down). For the most part, however, the station tends to be family-friendly, is great French practice and is often downright hilarious, especially when the radio hosts begin to share interesting tidbits they've run across in the news, on the internet, etc.

Such was the case yesterday afternoon on the way home from school.

Apparently, a study has been done about the most effective way to get kids out of bed in the morning. 

As a mom of more-than-a-couple-still-remaining-at-home and even with the heavy traffic through construction zones, I instantly tuned in to the conversation. For, as most mamas know, especially those who have teens, sometimes you literally have to grab that young'un by the leg and physically drag them out from under the covers for even a groaning/moaning response. This week, I became a 23 year veteran of this parenting gig, yet I don't have this one near figured out. So, I was all ears to learn what the researchers had discovered. 

One conclusion was that, especially for kids and teens, alarm clocks are simply not effective. Younger bodies sleep longer and usually much deeper than the old folks with whom they rub shoulders. It is documented that children and youth often (if not usually) sleep through alarm clocks, fire alarms, emergency sirens, tornadoes... Hence sometimes, one of our basement dwelling teens' alarms will wake me, all the way up on the 2nd floor, before it ever causes them to stir. 

Yes - I write truth - even if they later deny it.

I also know for a fact that every single one of my kids is delighted when I wake them up by quietly entering their room leaving the light off, sit on the side of the bed (or snuggle right down under the covers with them), stroke their hair, scratch their back, and whisper softly next to their ear. The researchers found that this method was not only more pleasant for the child, but that youth are awake, literally with in seconds, when awoken gently. Compare that to the minutes, on average, required to drag a child from sleep when an obnoxious, obtrusive and very loud noise began to sound. It's also important to include that the gentle, rapid awakening resulted in happier, more compliant little people in the morning as well.

Also interesting? A female's voice - a mother's voice - was the voice that was effective. Dad whispering just didn't have the same impact.

Interesting eh?

As I've been mulling this over, I was also struck by just how God often uses that same, gentle approach when waking us from spiritual sleep. 

Sometimes, it feels like I am slapped in the face with truth or a need to change. But more often, it is the gentle whispering of the Spirit when I feel wrapped in the love of godly, encouraging friends, a surprising comment from one of my kids hidden in the humor of our family life, a passage of Scripture that replays over and over in one of the songs we listen to almost every day, a simple word that repeatedly comes up in all of the above and other situations that reminds me to return to God's truth and His way.

This shouldn't surprise me. After all, the Word teaches that all the flashy, amazing and brazen have little effect if not also smothered with tenderness and love: 

"If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing. Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails..."

Love never fails. I don't think that means love is like a fairy godmother's magic wand... I never realized until just recently that I've always treated those words like that, thinking, "Just gotta love enough and things will somehow work out." Rather, I've now come to think it means that love just keeps on keeping on and keep on and keeping on. Regardless. Regardless of the result or lack of result.

And, I'm challenged once again, even though I always fall short, to love like that.

I can be okay with falling short because where I am weak, He is strong. I can also rest in the other verse that came to mind as I reflected on that alarm clock study: "Surely I have composed and quieted my soul; Like a weaned child rests against his mother, My soul is like a weaned child within me... my hope is in the Lord, forevermore." (Psalm 131)

photo credit: WORLDTHROUGH1EYE Monday Mornings via photopin (license)

Another way

The phrase "soccer mom" generally refers to a married middle-class woman who lives in the suburbs and has school age children. She is sometimes portrayed in the media as busy or overburdened and driving a minivan or SUV. She is also portrayed as putting the interests of her family, and most importantly her children, ahead of her own The phrase derives from the literal, specific description of a mother who transports and watches her children play soccer. It was also used in names of organizations of mothers who raised money to support their children's soccer teams. The first reference to the phrase soccer mom in the US national media has been traced to 1982. In that year, the husband of the treasurer of the "Soccer Moms booster club" of Ludlow, Massachusetts, stole $3,150 raised for the benefit of a local soccer league. (from Wikipedia)

I don't remember the first time I heard the term "soccer mom," but I swore I'd never become one. I also swore I'd never drive a minivan or say, "Because I told you so!" to my kids. 

Yeah, well...

Then my son played soccer... softball... my daughters discovered that they liked volleyball and cheerleading (ugh... I still sigh over that one) and I tried to be present at as many of their sporting events as I could reasonably and feasibly attend.

Basketball has been the sport this school year. Five kids, five different teams. Some weeks, in between practices and games, it felt like all we did was basketball.

I loved it, even though it was exhausting.

Anna's basketball team played for the title in the final season tournament for their division. They played hard and won the bronze medal, second year in a row. Not bad for a team that never plays a home game (the gym at the school is not a full-sized gym) and only has access to that gym for one two hour practice per week.

However, their semifinal game broke my heart, and not just because they lost: 44 - 47.

They were playing a very good team, one with more resources, lots more opportunity to train, deeper bench and generally more skilled. However, our girls play with a lot of heart and had beaten this team in regular season play, in another nail biter of a game.

This game, however, there was a scoring/record keeping mistake. 

One of the gals on Anna's team drove for a lay-up, literally threading the needle to get to the basket, and scored. The electronic scoreboard showed the score immediately. But a few seconds later, the official scorekeepers took those two points away from Anna's team and then added them to the opposing team's total.

Friends, family, parents and other spectators cheering for Anna's team started immediately asking why. The ref went over to check the score sheets. Apparently, those two points had been marked... and tallied... in the wrong place and the ref left the score as it was: instead of 14 - 15 (leaving Anna's team one point behind), the score was now 12 - 17.

When one of the parents tried to insist, he was ejected from the game.

Is it possible that the other spectators present, all of those there and cheering for the other team, did not observe what happened? 

Yes, that is a possibility.

Is it believable that the other team's coach really didn't know what had just happened? 

Yeah... I guess, although I have a harder time swallowing that. In all honesty, however, I must add that I'm not naturally inclined to think the best of said coach as I was not impressed by the "coaching" demonstrated. 

Is it possible that our entire group of EVZone (Anna's team) supporters misunderstood and/or were mistaken and that the change was a just one? I guess - but I don't really think so. That's clearly some of my own bias showing.

The score remained 12 - 17. Our girls rallied, played hard, even had the lead a couple more times in the game - but in the end lost and ended up playing in the semifinals rather than the final game. 

I guess I don't know for sure. 

However, I hope that had the shoe been on the other foot, had a similar mistake been made that would have given Anna's team the advantage, that I would have chosen a different way. That I would have been the first to approach the refs and share my memory of what had happened.

For in my mind, herein is the real tragedy.

An opportunity was lost.

Once our kids get to that later high school/young adult stage, adults (parents included) must earn the right to continue to speak into their lives. Here, the adults present had an opportunity to teach a better, most excellent way - a way that sets personal desire and brief moments of glory aside, delighting instead in what is honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, true - and sometimes very difficult to do...  by denying self and choosing the other first.

I pray that the way my daughter saw modeled by her daddy and me, as we responded to what transpired at this game, fell into that better way category.

Because it is awful easy to get caught up in a soccer mom mentality, willing do whatever it takes to see my kid succeed.

Winning the battle.

But what do I risk losing when I choose the temporary and immediate satisfaction of a less excellent way?

Sous le manguier... or... Under the Shadow of the Mango Tree

I've often been known to remark that I'm not a sentimental mother. 

First day of Anna's last year of high school, August 2017

Don't get me wrong. I love my children, I love being with them more than almost anything else. But I don't long to return to those earlier days of this journey. My heart is too full with the right here and right now. My days are full enjoying life and just being with this gang - as my babies have become little people who have become/are becoming bigger little people who then morph into tweens, teens and finally emerge as young adults. 

I love discovering that I just don't love them because I birthed them and because they are mine.

I really just like them and the people they are becoming.

So this mama-thing, watching these kids grow up and become - more often than not in recent years - has kept me going nonstop, regularly takes my breath away and often leaves me without words (hence the much less frequent posting in this place).

So today, I thought I'd share some of her words, first in French because that's how she first wrote it for a school assignment. She agreed to translate it so that I could share it here. 

I'm proud of this girl. 

Anna giving cross country skiing a try this winter. 

She's always surprising me and it started from day I learned we were expecting her. I'd had a complicated (i.e. requiring a medical procedure) miscarriage just the month before and wasn't planning on another immediate pregnancy. She was the biggest of my babies, always happiest when she had all of her people within easy reach. We almost lost her once (that story is here, if you want to read it), and gratitude that we still get to enjoy her frequently catches me off guard, completely overwhelming me as thankful tears fill my eyes. 

In public, she's introverted and shy, so much so that it amazes me when her clownishness surfaces once we are back at home. She's a planner and she's not afraid to try something that interests her (like the time she made croissants or roped me into a three day bike ride that has us now planning a much longer one as soon as life permits it). 

She's a Senior (or Sec 5) student this year. Academically, she's doing fabulously - taking the most challenging classes and playing varsity basketball - all while working as a cashier and helping in one of the Sunday School classes as church. School has never been simple for her. In addition to her shy introversion (in a system that rewards outgoing and extroverted leadership), she has dysgraphia, which means writing (as well as a few other things) doesn't come easily or naturally. What takes other students 30 minutes can easily take her three times as long. 

I remember times while she was a student at École Alliance in Niger, when she and her classmates were required to copy lesson texts from the blackboard. She struggled to finish the entire text that others had completed in minutes. Her handwriting was usually illegible and her copied text was filled with spelling and orthographic mistakes. Each time she'd look away from the board to the paper, or vice versa, she'd get lost and by the time she refound where she needed to be, she'd have forgotten the sequence of letters she was trying to copy. 

Fortunately, she's always loved to write and God gifted her with a natural perseverance and "sticktoittiveness" that kept discouragement at bay, even in the most difficult seasons. Her hard work and refusal to give up have paid off. Last year, she passed two of her required ministerial exams (in French, mind you) - one with a grade of 98%; the other with a 100% score. As I was leaving the school one afternoon last week, her French teacher poked her head in the room to say that she's never seen someone make such a marked improvement in such a short time. Anna's slightly embarrassed smile at that comment sent my mama heart soaring, and I silently thanked God for this girl and all He's done in her life. 

I could say more, but instead, I'll just share Anna's words ~ 

Sous le manguier

Les samedis matin ou les après-midis après l’école, on sortait dehors pour jouer. Pour échapper au soleil brillant on trouvait refuge à l’ombre des manguiers. Les trois arbres étaient plantés dans une rangée. Notre préféré était le plus grand, car il était le plus proche du tuyau. 

Pendant que nos parents prenaient leur sieste ou que notre mère cuisinait, on construisait des villes entières autour du manguier. Avec la boue, les brindilles et les feuilles, on fabriquait des maisons, des ponts, des magasins, des fermes et des enclos pour nos petits chevaux en plastique. Le tuyau simulait la source d’une rivière qui entourait notre petit paradis. Au centre de la ville se tenait l’arbre. Parfois, il était un château, un gardien ou un lieu sacré. Son rôle changeait toujours. 

Plus loin que les frontières de l’ombre était un désert. Vaste et inhabitable, il représentait un danger constant pour les villageois. Lorsque le tuyau arrêtait de couler, les jouets s’organisaient en une caravane pour traverser les dunes. Sur l’autre côté de l’étendue aride attendait une nouvelle oasis. 

Quand on s’ennuyait de nos jeux imaginaires, on se couchait par terre et le sable, refroidi par l’eau et l’ombre, rafraîchissait nos corps. Parfois on observait les margouillats qui grimpaient sur les murs en ciment de notre maison. Si on était fatigué, on fermait les yeux et l’odeur du manguier remplissait nos narines. Même aujourd’hui, le parfum sucré des mangues me transporte dans un autre monde.

Under the Shadow of the Mango Tree

On Saturday mornings or sunny afternoons after school, we went outside to play. We sought refuge from the scorching sun under the leaves of the mango trees. There were three of them, planted in a row. Our favorite was the biggest, because it was the closest to the hose. 

While our parents rested or our mother cooked, we built entire villages around that mango tree. From mud, twigs and mango leaves we constructed houses, bridges, stores, farms, and corrals for our little plastic horses. The hose was the source of a river that surrounded our haven. In the middle of our town stood the tree. Sometimes it was a castle; other times a sentinel or a peaceful, hallowed place. Its role was always changing. 

Outside the safety of the shadow was a desert. Vast and inhospitable, that desert was a constant, endangering our villagers and their livestock. When the river dried up, our toys formed a caravan. Together, they marched across the endless dunes where a new oasis awaited them on the far side of that wasteland. 

If we got bored of our imaginary games, we stretched out on the ground, demolishing our village. The sand, cool and damp, refreshed our sweaty bodies. Together we’d watch the margouillats that effortlessly scaled the cement walls of our home. If we were tired, we’d close our eyes, relishing the sweet perfume of mangoes that filled our nostrils. 

Even now, the fruity odor transports me back to those days, that time.

Five Minute Friday - Guide

What kind of person are you? 

• One who comes alive at those opportunities to strike out into the unknown without map or sometimes even plan? 
• Or one who meticulously makes lists, charts courses with Google Maps and sketches schematics to ensure that all luggage will fit in the back of the car - considering every possible detail determined prior to unlocking the front door.

I like to think I fall into the second category, at least mostly. Or that is what my personality profile says.

But... (there's always a "but," isn't there?)

I don't clearly and cleanly fall into one category or the either. I do make plans, sometimes quite detailed ones, yet I also crave unpredictable and spontaneous adventure. I (actually) find it exciting when my meticulously made plans are smacked awry by real life, almost relieved that I'm no longer "caged" by my expectations.

And hubby, who tends to be spontaneous and impulsive (hence the text message dinging on my cell most afternoons around 3:30 asking what he can pick up from the grocery store to grill - rain, snow or shine), becomes a mad list-maker before camping trips and family outdoor outings or micromanages wife when company is imminently expected.

Personally, I find that a plan frees me when I remember that it is nothing more than a guide. I don't know why it has taken me nearly 50 years to figure that out. Ever since I first started teaching (around the age of 12 - swim lessons), I'd create plans and very rarely follow them to the letter - or even close to the letter. 

(Five minute buzzer has sounded...)

(...but I'm continuing!)

A guide gives me security without strangling. A starting point and a base to which I can return without defining. A gentle shove in a direction without confining. Established borders bequeathing freedom to roam at will based on what's best in the actual moment.

That IS how I teach. I make a guide, prepare so that I know my material well, and then rarely actually even look at the plan during the actual lesson. The plan is always there, but off to the side, available but not a script I read. Occasionally I glance at it, making sure we are on track or using it to recenter if our tangent is too far off base...

I've been thinking about this as it relates to parenting young adults - those ones who are out on their own, but not completely.

We've all heard the complaints about how there is no parenting manual. How it is all on-the-job-training. 

But that isn't really true. 

We have the Bible, and there really isn't anything new under the sun (to quote a much wiser man than I). We have the wisdom of our own parents and others who've walked this path before us. We have our own life experiences. And we have our young adults who are rapidly gaining life experience as well. It is easy to forget that parenting these bigger ones is very much a cooperative effort - a partnership. We can offer suggestions, guidelines, ideas - but the follow-through and outcome really is up to them. Thinking of teaching your kid how to drive. Sometimes it feels safer with a checklist - but no checklist will guarantee specific outcomes, at least not when it comes to this partnership with those living, breathing young adults God has gifted us.

God gives parents to kids to guide them. Family, however, is not a little kingdom where Dad and Mom dictate all. 

Guiding, especially with these biggers, is much more a question of influence born out of mutual respect.

A respect we parents earn, beginning back in those beginning days of parenting.

Five Minute Friday ~ Weak

They've had stuffy noses for a week.

Sore throats. Hoarse voices.

A bit of achiness and one complains that her ear hurts.

One of those viral rashes that feels like sandpaper rash all over their bodies.

I've even heard a bit of coughing in the week hours of the morning.

They aren't, like, super sick. I just got home after dropping them off at school today.

No fevers.

Still sleeping at night.

Laughing and playing and interested in life, once they get going.

But yesterday  morning, both little girls woke up still tired (even though they were in bed the night before far earlier than normal), clearly under-the-weather, huge dark circles around their eyes, scratchy, nasal voices. Both just seemed weak.

Could they have gone to school?

Probably. And they would have had good days... done fine.

But I decided to keep them home, to let them rest, to not make their brains work so hard in a second language all day long (even though that is only barely a factor any more), to let them enjoy YouTube Disney music videos and Pentatonix covers, to snuggle in bed and read, to eat a warm, fresh made lunch, to take a two hour nap...

Because it is when we are weak, we are more vulnerable...

Would it have been a wrong decision to send them to school? I don't think so.

Was it a good decision to keep them home?

I think so.

We had a delightful day together. I don't often have those opportunities any more.

Opportunities to care for my sick babies.

One of my Michigan bigs is sick... and I can't be there to pull the covers up around her, run to the store and pick up some NyQuil or make her a cup of Throat Coat tea if she asks.

One of my other Michigan bigs recently had an abcess near his eye. He looked like he'd gone a few rounds in a boxing ring and definitely came out worse for the wear. It kept him out of classes and work for a few days. Doctors orders. And I couldn't be there to drive him to see the doctor, to take him back for his recheck or to make sure he was eating healthy while his body was trying to heal.

I'm always worrying, at least a little, about my Iowa gal. Asthma, dorm life in a state where influenza counts are currently moderate to high and needing to refill her epi-pen because it is expired but waiting since they are expensive and she probably won't need it (yellow jackets) for at least a few more months. Those are plenty of reasons to keep me wondering about her and how she is doing, physical health-wise.

A younger mama, I might have insisted that my two littlest girlies go to school yesterday. Catching up is hard; it is that much harder in your second language.

I'm guessing I'll be taking advantage of those not always necessary opportunities brought about about by weakness - to slow down, stop, change my plans and care for those chunks of my heart that are always out and about, wandering around outside my body - a bit more often than I used to.

Back before they started to leave the nest

Perhaps the nostalgia I so often claim doesn't usually affect me has made me a little weak-kneed as I think about this kids God has gifted me.

first photo credit: FotoDB.de Fieberthermometer via photopin (license)

Last time for THAT moment with the last one of my gang

I love teaching. 

I'm passionate about teaching middle school. Fourth through seventh or eighth grade - some days you get the elementary school student, some days you get the high school student but on most days you get the student who's wandering back and forth between those two and totally clueless.

And I love it.

I do enjoy teaching younger children, but not with the same passion... unless you want to talk about teaching little ones to read. 

Or, teaching anyone of any age to read. 

One of the most memorable moments of my life was when, after working with a 60+ year old Zarma woman in Niger for over two years, she haltingly read a primer version of the story of Ruth from the Bible. As she struggled through the words, all of sudden all of the syllables and sounds came together and made sense. She looked at me, her eyes filled with tears of wonder and she emotionally said, "I know this story. It's from the Bible. It is the story of Ruth and Boaz. I'm finally, for the first time ever, reading God's Word for myself. It isn't a pastor or teacher or man reading it to me." I cried, too.

I've been so privileged to work with each one of my children as they've learned to read - either teaching them before they started day school or working with them in the language  they weren't using at school. For most of them, that has been reading in English. For a few, it has been reading in French.

There are so many moments. 

That moment when the code is finally deciphered and the learner realizes that those scribbles on the paper actually translate to sounds they use all of the time when speaking - and mean something.

That moment when reading transitions from struggling and halting and hesitant to fluent.

That moment when the words turn to real colors and smells and tastes and sounds and sensations, both palpable and emotional.

That moment when it is no longer simply reading aloud someone else's words, but interpreting them -and making it personal - to develop them into the story the reader wants his or her listener/s to hear.

That moment when God's story, as revealed in His Word, suddenly transforms from two dimensional to three and finally four or more dimensions, whe the reader is able to have his or her mind blown by His incredible-ness, His so-different-from-mere-man-ness, His powerful-ness, His bigness, His loveliness...

Mary Michelle experienced that last moment, for the first time, tonight. 

She was reading from the Jesus Storybook Bible. I just love its subtitle - every story whispers His name - but I digress. 

She read the following words: 

In the beginning, there was nothing. 

Nothing to hear. Nothing to feel. Nothing to see. 

Only emptiness. And darkness. And... nothing but nothing. 

But God was there. And God had a wonderful Plan.  

"I'll take this emptiness," God said, "and I'll fill it up! Out of the darkness, I'm going to make light! And out of nothing, I'm going to make...EVERYTHING!"  

Like a mommy bird flutters her wings over her eggs to help her babies hatch, God hovered over the deep, silent darkness. He was making life happen.  

God spoke. That's all. And whatever He said, it happened." (p. 18)

As she was reading aloud to me, I noticed that somewhere along the line, she's picked up a tiny touch of a southern accent (like me) - the only one of my gang, apparently, who has. Every single time she read the word "nothing," it sounded more like "nuthin' " This tiny twang showed up in every single -ing word. This fact makes me smile!

But back to the point. She read the above words, gradually slowing, and finally she paused. I thought it was because she was looking at the illustration or waiting for me to turn the page. Maybe. 

I was wrong she turned to me, and in that moment, the total awe on her face was priceless.  

She said softly, her voice trembling a little bit, "Mama, if God didn't have the idea to make people, you wouldn't be here. I wouldn't have you. That would be really sad," as her little hand reached up to cup my face and pull me closer to nuzzle.

I responded, "Hey, if He hadn't made people, you wouldn't be here either."

She startled, then giggled, "I guess that's right...." and her voice trailed off. I stayed silent because it was obvious she was thinking.

"I guess that means He didn't just make the world and the universe and all that stuff out there. He also made words and ideas so that could tell us about Him. Oh Mama! I'm so glad God made words and that He put the words in a book so I could learn about Him. And tell you I love you. And it's even okay that He made French words, too."

That moment! Witnessing His Spirit work in the lives of one of my children? It ranks right up there with the very best of all experiences, ever!

Will she remember the details of this conversation in a few days? I don't know, but I'm pretty sure that, in that moment, God just became exponentially "amaizin'-er," in her eyes. In my eyes, too. At the same time, her view of Mama decreased. I'm so glad that process is starting to happen.

In any case, there's no doubt whether or not I'll remember these details of that moment. I want to. I need to. 

That's part of the reason I put them down here. 

For posterity.