July 19, 2012

• just can’t get it together

  I am discouraged.  Discouraged about being disorganized.  Discouraged about being female and hormonal and grouchy and unspiritual for at least a week out of every month.  Discouraged because my children don’t listen well the first time. Discouraged because I’m gaining weight and this has never happened to me before and I hate to run.  And I’m very discouraged about writing.  Earlier this week I wrote this wordy piece: 

  Out in the potato patch I dream a lot of dreams.  I think a lot of thoughts and plan a lot of posts. The mindless scraping of the hoe and the digging of weeds breeds noble aspirations and flowing words.

   Then I come to the house and see that no one put the milk away from breakfast.  And the clothes are still unfolded that I told Bryant to start on an hour ago.  Or someone comes crying to the garden.  And I remember that it’s past time to start dinner.

   And poof.  The nobility flies out the window into the hot July wind.  The aspirations melt into the pool of reality.

   

  I meant to go on.  Ah yes.  HOW I meant to go on.  But I didn’t.

   

  I’m discouraged about writing because I need to read more and write more if I’ll ever be worth reading  and there just isn’t time and I’m not disciplined enough.  It’s a pride issue, really. 

   

  NoT to in any way compare myself to the musician Fernando Ortega, but I can relate to what he writes here in his blog:

   

  I experienced a dramatic stifling as a musician when I was 21 years old. I flew out to the east coast to audition for graduate schools in piano performance. I had worked hard for several years and knew my pieces well. I was practicing Chopin Ballade #3 one night at The Juilliard School (a friend let me in), nervous about my audition at Stony Brook the next day. Suddenly I heard the same piece coming out of a practice room down the hall. The person playing was a fantastic pianist -technique to burn – gorgeous, mature tone – deep, thoughtful musicianship. I recognized instantly that at my very best, I would never be capable of playing the Ballade as well as this person. Thoroughly intimidated, I walked down the hall and peeked into the practice room from where the incredible sound was coming. Seated at the piano was a young girl, maybe 13 or 14 years old.

   

  The lesson for me was huge and devastating. In an instant, I became acutely and painfully aware of the limitations of my gifts as a pianist. I was not a world-class pianist (as I had secretly entertained in my mind). I was merely a good pianist – better than average, but by no means gifted enough to compete in the classical world I longed to be part of. I fell into a depression that lasted two years as I began to sort out more honestly what musical talents I had been given, and which talents I had not been given. I look back on the whole experience and recognize God’s hand of mercy on my life. 

   

  I don’t fancy myself to be a writer, let alone a world class one.  Yet there is something in me that screams (too strong a term there) to write.  But I don’t know how to do it like I wish I could.

    There is not time.  I am not smart. 

   

  I am discouraged about being discouraged because really?  I have the ideal life in so many ways.  I am discouraged because there are People! Who Make Menus Out for a Whole Year and almost every day I just wing it with what to cook for dinner, let alone snacks and other meals.  I am discouraged because I would rather visit my little German neighbor lady than clean my basement.  Maybe that sounds noble to you, but it’s like I LOOK for ways out of facing the hard stuff.

   

  I’m silly like that. Instead of listening up, taking heart, and being inspired by the menu maker or the lady who doesn’t believe in counting to 3 before making your child obey because God doesn’t give us 3 chances to listen to Him, I just get discouraged and give up.  And this is dangerous ground.  Because I’m setting myself up and saying, “this may work for you but it doesn’t work for me” before I’ve even tried it.

  

   

  Sometimes when I want to write I just scribble something on Facebook.  Here is my FB birthday post for Bryant.

  

   

  Today Bryant turned 10.  That pale 9 lb. baby who needed heart surgery is now a joke-telling dog-loving bookworm who puts away food like a young calf and dreams of being a football player or a preacher, depending on which day you ask him. He was a  charming little Belizean 2 year old and I miss those good days.  But it’s so nice to have children mature enough to choose strawberry shortcake instead of birthday cakes shaped like tractors or trains. 

  

  (birthday cake at Bible study last night)

  It’s nice to have muscles to push the lawnmower.   It’s fun to hear him quote funny lines from the books he reads.  It’s good to toss a football together. May laughter help you through the hard times of life, Bud.  May you always pop a great batch of popcorn.  May you soon learn to clean your glasses and brush your teeth without being told.  May you follow Jesus with all the fierce spirit that makes you you.  Love you forever.

  

   

   

  Donald Miller is fun to read.  He is not deep like N.T. Wright.   And not even as deep as Philip Yancey, my favorite Christian author.  Maybe someday I could write a little bit like him:

  How I need people to love me and to like me and how, if they don’t, I feel miserable and sad and how I am tempted to believe they are saying about me is true.  It is as though the voice God used to have has been taken up by less credible voices.  And when I think about this I know that Genesis 3 is true;  I know without a doubt I am a person who is wired so that something outside tells me who I am.  I am not trying to say I have some kind of terrible disfunction or anything, it’s just that other people’s opinions, after the Fall, have become very important, and if everybody says Saab cars are cool, then I want a Saab car and if people say that certain kind of music is cool, then I am more likely to listen to that kind of music.  And all this makes me realize…..that Adam and Eve had it a great deal better before they ate the fruit. ~from Searching for God Knows What by Donald Miller~

  Now I’m discouraged because it’s almost 9:00 a.m.  The children are still sleeping (again) and I have wasted time looking for Fernando Ortega quotes and uploading photos.

  *edit: I am also discouraged because I just read Linda and Amber’s stellar posts and I feel like a whiner.  I am discouraged because I am competitive and cannot seem to blog just for the fun of it.  I am discouraged that being a Christian and mom to six beautiful children and the wife of a kind man is not enough for me.*

  Honestly, there are 3000 more urgent prayer needs.  But if you think of me today or see me around on Facebook, pray that I will take steps to become a more disciplined person.  It is not enough to dream.

  One of Dan’s employees rescued 3 little wild bunnies and gave them to the children.

  I am UNecstatic.  The children are delighted.

  But this is one of the reasons I love Dan. 

  

  (feeding baby rabbit w/ medicine dropper)

  He cares for all of God’s creatures.

  ***********************************

  (another *sigh* edit follows:

  If you read my blog, you know that there’s that recurring theme of restlessness in my heart, problems with comparison, and the ever present need for more discipline & organization.

   

  After I posted this morning, I went thru the usual self-doubt thing.  There’s that fine line between honesty and pathetic let-it-all-hang-outed-ness that leaves people grappling uncomfortably with how to help you.

   

  And life has so many fine lines.  There’s that balance between accepting myself with all my flaws and striving for deeper and more.

   

  There’s wonderful grace to accept but there’s so much ugliness to weed out.

   

  There are the talkers and the listeners, the writers and the readers, the leaders and the followers, the inspirers and the inspired.  There are pessimists, optimists, and realists.

   

  And in this wonderful 21st century where we don’t have water to haul and wood to chop, there is time to prioritize and the worldwideweb to draw us in.

   

  It’s mind-boggling.  Sometimes I  need to Just Be Still. I need this: You are Good. Your ways are Good. Teach me Your principles.  Ps. 119:68 (I put this on a blue sticky note by the sink on Monday morning and need it always.)

  #she bows out quietly after imparting her small but longwinded bit of wisdom#

   

   

   

  • 11:06 am
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