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I found this phrase, “girl falling into woman“, in one of my college journals.  At the time I was in between.  Not a girl-child and not ready to own the title woman. College was a comfortable place between identities.  Still a student, I hadn’t entered that thing people kept warning me about called “real life”.  I still ran to the mail looking for care packages from my granny and headed off to camp with our christian group.  But I was doing these things with a ring on my finger that told me once they gave me a piece of paper I was moving 12 hours away to be a wife and around the corner, a mother. I was a girl, wondering if the ring, my age, giving up the job of student, if one or all of these would make me a woman?  Or did the way I felt in my heart and in my skin still entitle me to be a girl?  I was in between.

A few years later I found out that a ring(which resides somewhere in a sewage system aftering getting flushed down the sink), a house, that even a husband and children didn’t stamp me like a cookie cutter into a woman.  I remember sitting with our first baby in the moments after she was born, amazed at the privilege the Lord had given to us. Then waking at home in shock when I realized I was still the same person with the same issues, skills(or lack thereof), doubts before the contractions started.   Which group did I belong to now-I was somewhere in the middle.

A decade of marriage and 3 more children and sometimes I still think I’m a paper doll trying on the outfits I think a woman should wear.  Can I layer the the funky skirt with the apron, a burpcloth, a haircut that might help me bleed past the edges that keep defining and limiting me?  Or should I alternate outfits for church, playdates, adult dates, trips to get coffee and write?

I’m still a girl falling into my own definition of a woman, although I don’t consider it such a dilemna anymore.  I’m a collage-girl, momma, daughter, mrs. darcy, artist, student, teacher, dreamer.

I’ll wear whatever I wanna wear.

I like to put my safe skin on first thing in the morning before anything can happen.  Before I shout at a child and see their hurt face, before I think about people close to me sick and whether they’ll make it, before I call a friend to get together and they disappoint me and say they’re too busy.  But my safe skin tends to get pulled and torn a bit when a sweet child runs up to give me kisses even when I’m not trying to hide my grumpiness, or when my eyes land on a toothy, 16 month old who’s feeding her baby and giraffe with a spoon.

That’s why it’s important to mend my safe skin quickly, because I know that a small gap is a great risk to get injured by something unexpected(only the expected makes it through my safe skin).

Luckily, I’ve found a few ways to toughen up my skin and keep it from ripping so easily.  As soon as I get a free moment I can eat food, particularly chocolate, to produce a dependable, thick buffer between me and any potential threats.

Reading a book that can take my mind quickly away from the present is also effective and works even better when combined with the food strategy.

Occasionally I’ll hear a voice breaking through my safe barrier, asking me to let it all down.  Working hard to focus on the book in my hands, the voice interrupts and suggests calmly (but with warmth and intensity) that if I peel back my safe skin and make contact with the disappointing and the unexpected, I’ll find a deeper joy than the shallow happiness I seem to be missing in the moment.

I eat some chocolate and think about it.

I reach for the zipper but it’s not there.  I pull and twist the skin only to find that I’ve been more successful than I thought at toughening the thing.  Now I want more than anything to get it off, to connect to those around me, to take some chances, to feel some pain and the joy that was whispered to me.  I think it’s going to take some giving up.  I think it might lead to a death or two.  I know it’s going to mean listening to that voice without a buffer.  And it’s going to take time.

Well, after my post lamenting the loss of summer before it had even begun for our family, it found us.  In our own backyard.

We found the sun…

We found the land of Narnia in the leftover puddles from the sprinkler…

We found a lot of smiles...

Popsicles in the shade….

Look alike sisters….

And Mama found reading…
(I always was better at reading school books when school was over!)

And bare feet!

It seems I’m being pulled into summer still wondering how I missed Spring completely.  I’m sitting outside at the moment, the wet heat a telling sign that a new season has settled into the air and under skin.  I fussed all winter about the cold, sunless days, the thin hope that eventually a cool 60’s breeze with the new sun would lift my spirits back to their proper place.  Some family health issues pulled that shade down and I sat inside many days finishing up school with the kids, taking care of chores, wondering when I would get into that spirit lifting breeze.  I felt it on the way to the car to the hospital, and then it was summer.

The sound of the ice cream truck and the cars parked at the pool sing the song of summer, a time we like to remember from childhood as less-burdened and busy.  But I’ve lost the rhythm of summer.  Two years ago it was the early sick months of baby in utero, last summer it was the sweet baby arrived and the mama trying to expand, and this year a few things keep masking the season and holding back my heart.

With my Dad in the hospital and our family firmly stretched, I haven’t been doing much cooking.  After four years gathering the first fruits of our CSA, opening each box like it was literally Christmas in July, I haven’t brought one local, fresh green thing into my house.  Past summers brought fresh raw tomato sauce over home made pasta, fruit crisp, and grilled veggie hoboes. Still eating from the freezer, my taste buds don’t know it’s summer.

With the erratic school schedule of the past months, our work lingers into the days, my teacher brain doesn’t know it’s summer.

With my heart accepting, resisting, surrendering, asking, escaping, and again accepting the various circumstances of our life right now, my heavy heart doesn’t know it’s summer.

With my bare feet hot on the pavement and my kids at the pool with friends, I’m beginning to think I better adjust my ideas of summer, and make up a new version for our family, before we get pulled into fall, and look back for the signs that we missed.

As I wrote this blog in my head, it ended with a search for summer, the summer I think sounds the best, the one it seems many of my friends get-their only goal the pool, their biggest trial a bad sunburn.  But as I searched for photos I realized that my last two summers, albeit challenging and in my mind at the time both lonely and limiting, were also filled with joy much deeper than a summer of afternoons at the pool.  Maybe, if I open my arms(and heart) to the possibilities, I’ll realize that what God has for my family is even better than the vision that taunts me just beyond my reach.

The subject of homeschooling can really stir the hornet’s nest when it pops up in conversation.  The homeschool moms, understandably, have chosen their path for very specfic reasons and are living them out daily with a heavy dose of blessing and trial and they are going to talk about it with passion.  The public and private schools moms, their own reasons and journey firmly planted, are immediately put on defense and feel called in to defend their own very personal choice for their children, and stand up for their mama-hood. All in all, despite my usual stance of “this is what’s good for us, but it’s a choice for each family” I’ve experienced a few stings and been tempted, out of exasperation, to give a few myself.

We can talk about the hot topics-socialization, education of the teachers versus parents, moral and spiritual foundations, but I only find myself getting really worked up when I feel that homeschooling is attacked because it’s a deviation from generation upon generation of “this is how we do it”.  New=makes people uncomfortable= bad.  Most of my friends have considered and researched(much more than more myself I might add) the choices available for their child’s education.  They’ve prayed and discussed, finalized their stand, and walked forward with it.  But there is the group that seems to go with public or private because it’s what’s done.

I watched a video today that I had to bring to my blog.  Set aside the opposing teams and listen. It’s a video to make you think.  And it’s for you, the homeschool mom, to consider carefully your purpose and methods for the precious time you have with your children.  And it’s for you, public and private school mom, so that you can consider what you hope your child will gain from the 13 or so years in the school system. How are you going to fight for that education model to help your children and their friends become more of who they are supposed to be, find their passions and talents, which will carry them through life not just through the successful admission into a college.  Whether you are at home or at school, do you feel like it’s a daily fight for your child to have the freedom to be him or herself, are they not fitting into your mold or the school system’s mold?  Maybe the mold needs to be broken and refitted for each individual child.  This is not a homeschool speaker encouraging people to homeschool.  It’s a well-educated, out of the box visionary, asking all of us not to accept the “always done it that way” just because it’s easier.  A change in our education goals is necessary across all gaps.

If you have 17 minutes, grab some coffee and a seat.

Click over to this blog to find the video.

You’re welcome to share your thoughts in the comments, but please keep respect and kindness in mind.  I’m not hoping to change minds, just to engage them.

Our girl scout troop really knows how to celebrate…here’s the pre-show

Absence
of me,
Here.

A short break broken into a loud, lingering
silence.

Fingers grown accustomed to short bursts of emails, awkwardly pecking to catch up with my thoughts.

No that’s not true.

It’s my thoughts that are awkward, chaotic, jammed like a stuck elevator and cluttered like the laundry on my bed.

Writing for me is a search for order, meaning, to the rapid input/output happening each blink of the day(and night for that matter).  My husband finds order in the beat of music.  If I’m already experiencing high traffic, music just clouds the frequency further.

But writing brings calm.  Also, like tonight, it brings dread at what I’ll find in the chaos, what’s calling out to be sorted.  But there’s a peace, a rightness, in beginning the process.

So I guess I’ll start at the beginning.

On another day.

Gotcha.

Nice to see so you again.

Dear Reader,

I’ll be taking a break until next Monday.

If you’re an Imperfect Mama just like me, you might enjoy reading Sally Clarkson’s two blog posts on parenting.

Blog Post 1
Blog Post 2

If you haven’t discovered her already, consider checking out one of her many books that offer a sense of purpose, hope, and grace for this crazy journey we call motherhood.  I recommend Mission of Motherhood, The Mom Walk, and Dancing with my Father. And her blog offers a daily dose of wisdom, truth, and encouragement.

See you next week.

The six of us went to bed last night with similar and yet different hopes.  The children hoped for the promised snow, a world of white peering in at them at daybreak.  (And yes they did get up at daybreak just to make sure the longed for snow wouldn’t get lonely).  I crossed my fingers for snow, but with conditions. Yes to snow if it was thick, icy, and early enough in the morning to cancel Mr. Darcy’s day at work. No to snow if it meant piles of wet clothes, the roads clear enough to traverse, and the expectation that I would actually go out into the cold.  That’s Mr Darcy’s job, it’s my responsibility to take pictures from the doorway (or hand the camera to the husband) and make hot chocolate.

The early risers found a very non-ivory landscape when they awoke and they wore the snow’s betrayal like capes across their shoulders.  As Mr. Darcy left for work, I cut my losses since the snow was obviously not going to adhere to my conditions.

And then the snow slowly, steadily arrived like a late guest to a birthday party.

The kids greeted the tardy arrival with forgiveness and little minds made big plans.

And it rained down miniature marshmallows and the world turned white and the kids entered the enchanted land for a little while.

Mama look, my first snowball!

My first snow angel, Mama!

And the wet clothes piled up and the hot chocolate got made.

Cheesy toast just like my mom used to make

And after I got past the cold, I found  myself admiring:

the layers of color against a fresh backdrop

the transformation of simple things we see every day

the joy the kids found in the very moderate amount of snow that visited them, even their mini-snowman satisfied their dreams from the night before

Not the snow day I had planned, but magical in it’s own way for a short period of time.