being a mama

Never have I been more humbled than on this journey of parenthood.  Whether it is walking out of a restaurant with your kiddos poopie undies in the pocket of your hoodie (yep did that the other day) or coming face-to-face with some less than desirable personality traits reflected back at you it is a non-stop-always-and-forever-learning process.  You revisit things time & time again. You forgive & are forgiven.  You cry out & are constantly cried at.  Most nights you can't wait for bedtime & then other nights you go in their rooms after they are asleep because you miss them & want to watch them sleep.  You basically feel like a crazy person all of time because you can't remember anything & you are being pulled at talked at all day long.  You clap with excitement over lego creations & then curse later as you step on them.  You long for a night out with girlfriends & then spend the time talking about your little ones. You can't wait for free time & then when you get it you don't know what to do with your bad self.  It is all this & more.  It is nothing at all like I thought it would be.  It is terrific & sometimes terrifying.

It is real, messy, sometimes so beautiful & in-your-face you can't stand it, it makes your blood boil, and you love with both a fierceness & gentleness you didn't know existed.  You want to protect them & allow them to make mistakes all in the same day.  That and track on their sugar intake.  How is this possible?  How is it possible to train, parent, guard, love, cherish, discipline & enjoy all day long? Sometimes I just need to take a moment & reflect on the magnitude of being a mama. It is so much more than making sure we have milk & super-hero band aids. It is more than making sure the blankies are clean & the bedtime routine isn't forgotten.  It is more than platitudes & greeting cards could ever capture.  Moment by moment.  Day by day.  Step by step.  Then we wake up & start again.  Full on joy & mess coming at us the moment we arise.  It is more than words can say.  It is a feeling all to it's own.  It is being a mama.

Feeling like a fraud.

Maybe it's just me, but have you ever felt like a total fraud?  And then once you become aware that you've been a living life as a fraud you can't fake it anymore.  The blinders have been removed & no longer can you be oblivious or ignore the fact.  That is how I started to feel a few months ago when I considered how I "loved" others.  Sure I loved my family & friends.  Those were the easy people to love, but how did I do with the less-desirable peeps?  The ones you see on the corners?  The ones you hear about going to cold-weather shelters on a winter's night because you know THEY. LIVE. OUTSIDE.  The people who look a little different, smell a little different, make a little less,
sound a little differnt & have made some differnt choices than me.  I started to wonder if how Jesus talked in the Bible about loving others, taking care of others, feeding & clothing those who didn't have it & how everyone was made in the image of God (therefor deserving of the dignity & respect I showed my loved ones) what if all those weren't just feel-good words to take into consideration?  What if we were actually supposed to take them ,like,  literally?  What if we were supposed to live like we believed them?  Would I then need to become a radical & sell all I own & move to another country? Would we need to start a mobile soup kitchen out of the back of our minivan? How would that even work?  Do people at T-ball games even need soup? Seriously what would people think?  Would they think we've let a whole lot of crazy out or would they recognize the desire on their own hearts to do something?

Our family started to think that maybe for us it meant a little more than just sending a monthly check to World Vision for our sponserd girl in Myanmar.  Maybe it also meant we sashay a little into some uncomfortable situations so that others might benefit or at least so we could try to figure out what it meant for us to love others.  Maybe it meant we give our sleeping bags away so that on that very night someone may be a little warmer regardless of what we would do come summer time & our annual camping trip.  Maybe it meant that instead of getting upset with our boys & fretting about their sense of entitlement when it came to goldfish crackers or fruit strips at snack time that we take a pizza to some homeless people so that our kiddos might gain a bit of a different perspective.

Being a mom of two young boys I know a bit about imperfections.  How the ever present crumbs on the table & the floor can be enough to drive you cuckoo-bananas or it could be just enough to remind you that life is being lived right in front of you.  So can the needs you see & hear about in your community.  They can appear so huge that you are immobilized into doing nothing just frozen by their sheer greatness.  Or you can choose to see each one bit by bit as a tangible need you & others can meet.  The homeless drop-in center for teens wants board games?  Great, haven't ever played that cribbage game stuck in the back of the closet, like ever.  Some working poor people need some sensible shoes?  Great, I have a pair that would work.  Wait.  Am I crying about getting rid of them because they are a pair I like & are pretty cute?  Give yourself some grace.  Just because you are shedding a few tears doesn't mean that you are a selfish or self-absorbent person (at least that is what I told myself). It may mean you just came face-to-face with the realization that you have a choice.  Each time  you reach out, you love others, you see others you are choosing to put yourself a little lesser. There are some growing pains in that as it doesn't come naturally to us.  It is the opposite of everything we see & hear.  But, although it may hurt a little or be a bit messy there is beauty in it. I am starting to learn that putting yourself a little lesser is how we find some of the freedom we all long for.  When you start seeing others first you can almost hear the chinks as the wall you've built around yourself begins to crumble.  The light filters through & you wonder how long you've been in this solitary confinement you built up around yourself.  You breath in the fresh air you see the blue sky & you step out taking one messy, beautiful step after another.  Choice-by-choice.  Encounter-by-encounter.  One smile or kind word or action by another.    Probably won't get it right every time but then just try again. Slowly I hope to feel like a little less of a fraud & more like one who takes those words to heart & learns to live by them.

Imperfections-My Messy Beautiful.

Sitting in my kitchen.  Early morning drinking my first cup of creamer coffee for the day I look around in disgust.  The sink is full of dirty dishes.  The kitchen table has crumbs galore scattered all over it.  Are those from yesterday's lunch or dinner I wonder?  Did I really not wipe them off?  There are milk splatters, evidences of marker gone off the paper, scratches, indents & the table is just looking warn.down.  I am sure the table always looks like this, but this morning as the sunlight filters in just so it seems to highlight all of these "imperfections".

My husband & I bought this table when we were living in Minneapolis getting ready to host our first Friends Thanksgiving.  We realized that as our guest list grew our options of seating were dwindling.  So one day,while I was working, my husband & a friend of ours scoured The Cities for a table that would suit us.  They ended up finding a brand new table which I have to say at that time in our lives was a novelty as we were still in the mismatched, used, hand-me-down furniture phase. The table was less than $300 & the great thing was that it had a leaf that folded in to the table & when fully raised it could accommodate up 8-10 people comfortably. We were set for our feast! The not-so-great thing was that it didn't come with any chairs & our budget was used up at that point.

Thus our first of many Thanksgiving dinners with friends began with everyone bringing their own chair to sit in.  It was a mismatched & imperfect gathering of chairs, but it was a full & joyous gathering. That is the thing I seem to need perspective about so often in this season of mothering young kiddos.  Without it I can easily get amnesia.  On the mornings that I look around my kitchen in disgust I typically either shift into guilt mode: "Can't believe I let it get like this.  What a slacker mom I am that I can't stay on top of it.  I hope no one stops by."  Or I shift into To-Do list mode where I can't stop to play with the boys much less slow down long enough to answer a question they may have.  I get obsessed with the items on my list & crossing them off.  I also write things down I have already done & then cross them off to make myself feel even more efficient. Anyone else?  Seriously try it if you don't already do it.  Makes you feel a ton more productive.  There is no shame.   Don't get me wrong about the lists & accomplishing things & even cleaning  those are not bad things at all.  We are grown-ups and have grown-up things that need to get done at times.  Just for me those "things" can sometimes get in the way of living life.

Will my kids remember that we had a jacked-up table or will they remember making the messes & the memories that came along with it? Will they remember always having a full cupboard of clean dishes or will they remember me saying "Can't right now I have to do the dishes"?  Even though I am no domestic diva I can at times let the to-do's prioritize me rather than me prioritizing them.  Sometimes I see the crumbs & dirty dishes as my failings rather than as evidence of lives being lived in my home.  I see the "imperfections" as a negative & not as the obvious in-my-face reminders of how amazingly full my life is.  I am hopeful that when my boys grow up & reflect back on their childhood that the memories they hold closest to them will not be the cleanliness of our house, but that it was just dirty enough to be a happy home.  And I am hopeful that I will not get amnesia about the "imperfections" as often & will instead look around & be thankful for the beautiful mess that is my life.