on brothers and milestones

my little brother leaves for college this weekend. between beach trips and summer school and a busy schedule and the crazy/hectic/beautiful life of a teenager, i haven't seen him much these hot months. but i still call him every night and i'm still planning the long trip east this weekend to move him in. the same way i did for my sister, and they did for me upward of ten years ago.

and it's wonderful. it's such a gorgeous thing to grow and go and move and experience new things. but it's got me thinking about life and children. about the cycle of it all.

because no one ever tells you how to love a child. they tell you how to make your own hair bows with ribbon and a hot glue gun, how to sneak vegetables into a casserole, make all the voices on sesame street, bury pets discreetly, and make a halloween costume from a bed sheet. you learn how to pack a baby dress without crying and to drive away from the preschool with only one eye left lingering, sobbing and hot, still searching for her face pressed against the window. you become a doctor, blowing kisses on a skinned knee when the training wheels are taken off too soon. you are counselor and culprit, bank and hotel.

until one balmy summer, you find yourself in the middle of a little college town wondering how in the world it came to all of this. how the one person you know better than anyone is getting smaller and smaller in the rearview and you think as the pit forms in your gut if you really loved her the way you could have. if you didn’t have to learn all those things and take on all those roles. if all you had to do for eighteen years was lie in bed and cocoon her against your chest, rocking her back and forth as she grew in the nook of your elbows, her knees against her belly at first, then jutting out and resting against your own, until eventually you are two well-rested persons who have not really lived, but who have loved to their core.

it's times like these i think on such things. and lo, when that day comes that we are faced with this time, i hope i handle it with half the grace and optimism my parents have. because while no one teaches you these things, you do indeed learn. that's the mercy. and the learning and loving make a padding for the leaving.

love you, clint.

a southern analogy: leroy's tractor

 xxx

robert did some plumbing work last week for a man named leroy. and maybe it was robert's calm manner, or the fact that he just fixed his pipes, or that last week was unseasonably warm and bright, but leroy confided in robert. he sat and shared and told him about an incident.

leroy was pulling up a heavy root with his tractor one day when he pulled too hard. the entire machine toppled over and pinned him underneath. he was trapped until help came. as wheels spun and the engine roared. he emerged without one broken bone or scratch. he proclaims the greatness of our Father everywhere he goes now, praising Him for keeping him safe during those dreadful minutes. he talks to anyone who will listen, even plumbers.

and as robert was telling me this, i thought about all the weight crushing me, and i wondered how different my struggle really is from leroy's.

the tax information that keeps coming in the mail.
the school project due in april that is actually just one big, massive speech. that falls on my birthday.
the textbook reading.
pablo chewing his paws.
the technology exam guide collecting dust on my desk.
the dayplanner with scribbles on every single day.

we're all trapped under a tractor. we're all thrown occasionally. stuck in a rut as the tires rotate inches from our heads. there was one time i thought it would be funny to walk on a treadmill backward. i slipped and fell and was pinned against the wall with the belt still moving on my back. it was awful. and taught me that one should always move forward, and that things are designed to work in a specific way, for our good.

so we're all here together. pinned with weights on our shoulders. we don't know how big each person's tractor is. some are under tiny weedwackers. but some are under massive john deeres.

the analogy is cheesy. it's overused and a bit flat. but it's true.

this week, i resolve to be more like leroy. to trust that someone greater than me will pull me out of this rubble. this grave i've made for myself. we may not always emerge without scratches. sometimes we will bruise our own hearts. but the thing is, we will emerge. we do. because we're watched and cared for by someone who moves those boulders like they're tinker trucks. because it's not the weight of the burden that matters; it's the power of the lifter.

blind as night that finds us all

is there anything more still than wheels on a black, empty highway? than streetlights and billboards dancing with energy, doing a silent rumba for weary late night travelers? like a shopping mall at closing time, or a grocery store in the wee hours of morning, where everyone, everywhere, has not yet charged to day-mode. i rumbled down I-40 on monday night with a coffee in the drink well and my arm against the robert.

we made our way down to raleigh only moments before the flood gates of rush hour let loose and a million sedans and pickups came barreling our way. we got there early, and ducked into one of our old college haunts, a little seafood shack at the farmer's market. but no one wants seafood on a cold, rainy monday in january. so it was deserted, save a few tired waitresses and an older gentleman waiting for his take-out order.

we drove around campus and looked at the buildings. oh remember when you would meet me there and we'd walk to class together? remember that time you brought me tacos in the middle of the day, and i left class and ate them in the hallway? remember that night we fought under those shade trees? and the morning we met there again to make amends?

it's a four-hour round trip to raleigh from our house. for my night classes. i skype typically, but i wanted to be there in person for our first class of the semester. and he went with me. just like he has before, and will again. because he's good and kind.

it was only when i got to my classroom door that i realized my class wasn't meeting until tuesday.

all that way for nothing.

but on the way home, we stopped for more coffee. and we played music into the heavy fog and made a list on the back of a post office receipt of all the trips we wanted to take this year. and somewhere between myrtle beach and the lake superior circle tour, i stopped and looked at him, hands on the steering wheel, mouth gaped open, laughing.

and i understood the purpose, the divine order, to our ill-planned trip.

the great wait

i thought on this blustery monday, i would have it. at least have the baby steps toward it. that inching toward the light i'd so hoped for. but the meeting for my speech easy has been delayed until november 11. a private matter in the speech pathologist's life that prevented her from meeting last week.

so this monday looks like any other. the frost on the ground outside is slowly melting as the sun creeps up. i've got my coffee cup and my Bible beside me, fuel for the day. pablo is asleep on the bed in the next room, curled up against the chill of seven a.m.

and i will wait. as sarah waited for children and job waited for grace. because it will come. not on my watch or agenda. but nonetheless, it will happen. just as the tree outside my window turned ruby at just the precise time in october. a scheme not my own, but His. and with prayer, i just might grab a glimmer of that illusive patience that has always slipped right past my touch. it's a lesson, this waiting. but one worth learning.

the jade plant

 
sunshine spills in the cottage. it pours through half-closed blinds and washes the sofa during these dog days. it lays its rays on the kitchen counter at high noon and cuts a line across to the sink, illuminating unwashed dishes when no one's home to see.

but i can't keep a houseplant. the little windowsill above my sink does well enough, with begonias and a jalapeno plant reaching their green faces to the sky. but an actual potted plant? droopy within days. immediately yellow.

i blame it on my need to over-nurture. let's not forget, i'm the girl who tucks her dog into a velvet blanket each night and prays over him. so i behave with plants. they are alive. dependent on me. my responsibility. so i do what my own mama does--i feed them heaping portions. as mama shovels chicken pie onto our plates even as we insist we only want a tiny slice, so i fill up my watering pail and feed the plants every morning. it's too much. it kills them.

but i come from a long line of women who show love through food. it's in my nature and i'll inevitably pass it down to my children. i can think of worse problems to have.

so i did something the other day. i bought a jade plant. the little tag said it didn't need much water. didn't even need much sunshine. i believe the exact phrase was "excellent for beginners. requires low maintenance."

a plant that doesn't need me too much? yes, please.

however, every morning, right before heading out the door in my heels, i take the plant from the living room and place it on the counter, where sunlight can fill it and it can stretch. i can't help it. and so far, he's a resilient little thing, growing only up.

and so nature blends with nurture. the two currents joining in a symbiotic relationship fueled by good intent. that's what i'm going to keep reminding myself--it's the intent that matters. long after the leaves turn yellow.

the soft things

 

my grandfather keeps a stack of magazines on his coffee table.

he used to get people, then sports illustrated. sometimes forbes. occasionally, an alumni magazine would weave its way into the pile. but there have always been two staples in this treasure trove: reader's digest and reminisce.

and while i appreciate reader's digest for the clean jokes, the recipes and the pocket-sized motivation, it is reminisce that has captivated me. a magazine devoted to days gone by, with polariods and advertisements for products no one uses anymore.

long before i loved vintage. before i swooned over images of high-waisted bathing suits and pretty pin curls. when i was just a girl in middle school. with too much free time on my hand, a journal and a pen in my purse at all times, and romantic fancies dancing in my not-yet-seasoned heart.

i read a line in reminisce once that has stuck with me. i carried this line into my little cottage, and remember it often. i can't recall the exact phrasing, but an elderly man had written to the magazine about his wife who had passed away.

he said, she valued the soft things in life. like cooking, gardening and crossword puzzles.

every time i stand over a sink full of dishes, or a boiling pot of water. every time i tuck pablo in his doggie bed and say a prayer over him. every time i get up early just to curl my hair and eyelashes, paint a little magenta on my lips and iron that new skirt. i feel it. when i drag robert out at night with a flashlight just to look at the strawberry plant and its white flowers. when i get down on my knees and pull weeds from the bushes and carry them out to the woods.

i feel the soft things. and i think i'd like someone to say that about me one day. and i think its the most moving tribute i've come across. the most romantic notion. at my worst, i can be hard. i can be bossy and mean and rude and disappointing. but i can also be terribly soft. and it's that which i want remembered.

via

to be vulnerable

xxx

in my high school english class, we had an assignment where everyone went to the whiteboard and wrote one word that described humanity.

i wrote vulnerable.

and this week, i've seen exactly why i felt that way back then, and how it still rings true to me now. i received the sweetest compliment from an elderly woman at wal-mart. a simple, "i just love your dress" kept me elated for the next few days. it was enough to get me through pressures at work and growing demands at school that threatened to swallow me whole this week.

but i've been put down, too. called down, pushed down, and gently placed down off my invisible pedestal. and that's been enough to ruin me for weeks at a time. it's a vicious, yet altogether worth it, two-sided coin, this being human.

because at our very nature, we are interactive. yet, as the Bible reminds us, we are also flawed, imperfect creatures. so on this earth, we correspond every day with people who can never, no matter how hard they try, be 100% good, 100% of the time. we're going to hurt each other, there's no getting around that. but we're also going to lift each other up to unexpected heights, too. because as humans, we have the power to do both.

sometimes i forget the weight of my words. their heaviness and impact. their power to leave scars or to erase them. it's a huge and overwhelming responsibility. but scanning through the cold freezer aisle of wal-mart, i was reminded.

that it's also a beautiful gift, bestowed on us by a God who believes in our ability to do great things, and say nice ones. to lovingly reach for that perfect goodness, even if it's always right past our fingertips. because in the reaching, we love, and in the loving, we lift.

rain and remembrance

i thought time would take it away.

that after 10 years, i wouldn't hear the voice of the boy across the lunch table telling me, in tone loud enough to cause tears to rise from my gut, that i was nothing but a stutterer. the  moment after that big presentation, when the sea of relief was replaced by anguish and a faceless whisper from a boy in the back of the room. "that was g-g-g-great." the teacher by the whiteboard, asking me, while my classmates sat in stale, cold silence, to take a deep breath and start over.

i ran into that lunchroom bully a few months ago and we exchanged the kind of formalities that old high school acquaintances do. a quick side hug and quicker duck out the door. by his wide smile, i could tell he didn't remember. and how could he? but i did. that teacher, the one who also taught my mama, passed away a few years ago. i haven't heard from that whispering boy in ages. last i heard, he got married and lives nearby.

everyone, everywhere, has forgotten. and that's fine. and you know, i forgive them.

but there are days i remember more than i want to. when someone at  work raises an eyebrow as i explain something, or a phone call to my family goes silent for a second when i'm trying to catch my breath. when the glottal blocks give way to giant insecurities that make me want to take a vow of silence.

but then there are days like yesterday. when i saunter in to an executive's office and present my case, in a fluency that is altogether alien but more and more familiar to me. with a slow, deliberate message and confidence rising with every fully pronounced syllable. and again, the cycle of doubt recedes.

and isn't that all we can do? to hope that little by little, those moments of exhilaration join like water molecules until one day they bring forth the most beautiful, healing rain. one that will wash away all the bullies, taunts and lingering fear.

yes, a rain deep enough to cleanse away the past and rush me, on its raging ocean, into a happier future. that's all it would take. and i'm almost there. because after the rain comes the rainbow, and you best believe i'm not missing that.