Writer's Guilt

I've been fortunate that since finishing college I've been a stay at home mom.  Within two years of completing college, when my oldest was four, we started home schooling. I might not have been producing an income like Mr. W but at the end of most days the five children had a bit more knowledge in their heads. If anything we usually made a mess doing something fun. Then the youngest two entered the teen years and need less and less oversight from me. So I started filling in bits and pieces of time with writing. But I was still a home educator and still felt I had something to show for the way I spent each day. Now the youngest two are at the high school. Other than the evening check of “what homework do you have?” my work of teaching is over. This gives me oodles of time each morning to write. Of course this is to the exclusion of house hold tasks like dishes and mopping and weeding.

And this is where the guilt comes in.

Mr. W will come home and the dishwasher is still full of clean dishes which means the sink is now full of today’s dirty dishes. Or the laundry is piled on the bed, not folded.  You know how it goes.  Other than X number of words in a computer file, there is nothing to show for how I spent my day.

Maybe I should be like Jo in Little Women, holed up in the attic all day, and when Mr. W comes home he could see my ink stained fingers and a sheaf of hand written papers on the desk.  It’s not that Mr. W has ever begrudged my writing, but it seems to puzzle him and saying “I got 2000 words written this morning” has very little meaning to him as to what was actually accomplished.

The other part of guilt comes from society’s perception of work. Work is often presented as drudgery. As something you do so that you can then go and do what really want to be doing.  The mantra is often “do what you love” and most people may enjoy some aspects of their work very few actually enjoy all of what they do. Except for writers- the vast majority of writers I know, or know of, like actually they love what they do. [okay- except maybe the query letter, but even that can be an intellectually stimulating exercise and when it pays off in an offer off representation or publishing is quite rewarding]

So I sit here and love my work - ignoring the dishes in the sink and weeds taking over the flower beds and craft stories. One keystroke at a time. Someday I’ll have a printed and bound book in my hand and I can show family and friends, “See, here is what I do.”

Triumph

Parenting:

Moments of hope and despair

Moments of triumph and defeat

Moments of dependence and independence

Moments to love, hug, laugh, cry, do over, pick up, plan, be

Moments to take your breath away

Last week I received a note from my twenty year old daughter who has spent the last sixteen months in New York. She’s my spunky middle child who is so much like me that when she was little we’d butt heads. She was also the only child, out of all five who were home schooled, to never go to any form of public school. Home schooling adds another dimension to the parenting equation – another worry, another reason to say “I really can’t blow this”, and another element where as a parent I would have to step back and let them sink or swim on their own.  As most parents do I tried to teach her the value of work, play, compassion, respect (for herself, others, the environment), things of God, and things of learning- math, reading, history, science and such.

Then I got her note which says, “Thank you for helping me know how to be myself and be happy with being ME (something I have found to be a rare attribute to have). I love my life so much!”

Though it wasn't intentional in the midst of 1+1=2 and ABCs and "say your prayers" and "take out the trash" she learned one of life’s most important lessons.

There is no formula for parenting. It’s a mix of being present, encouraging, allowing freedom within safe boundaries, giving a helping hand when the fall is too big, and cheering, hugging, and letting go.

What is a moment of triumph you have experienced as a parent? 

Cousins

My mom sent me this photo taken at a family gathering in a small mountain village in northern Italy. Cousins. Years ago a met a few of them. If I showed up and announced who I was, who I belonged to, I’d be welcomed with open arms, fed, housed and fed some more. And I’m not even related by blood. My step-dad is related to these people, I'm not sure how, the family lines get murky so cousins covers it.

Around the table are a few of my kids (dark hair) and my three half siblings (light hair). The last time we were together was two years ago for our father’s funeral. We recently gathered together with their mom and her new husband.  My oldest half sibling is the same age as my youngest child. Technically they are aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews.  The kids get confused especially the seven year old “uncle” to the twenty-five year old “niece”.  Cousins fits better. A less completed way to explain the connection.

Here is my some of my family with my mother-in-law’s cousin’s child and her husband and their children. Something like my husband’s second cousin once removed. Not sure what my kids would call her kids. We opt for cousins. We get together as often as we can. This is so much easier to do now that we both live in the same state.

On paper the blood relationship my family has with each of these people is thin to non-existent. In the heart the feelings run thick. And for me causes my breath to catch and tears to form when I think of how many people I get to love. I see beautiful golden threads linking between all of us, entwining us and holding us close throughout this generation, the generation gone before, and the generations yet to be. 

What special "heart connections" do you have? People you think of as family though the genetic connection might be thin. 

Time and Chance Happen to Them All

The new calendar/planner/journal arrived today.

Blank pages. Blank days.

Waiting to be written on.

Choices. Options.

Must do’s. Want to’s.

Responsibilities to be met.

Opportunities to be embraced.

Foreordained moments.

Serendipitous occasions.

Lists and charts and plans

Moving time in a line.

Reflections circling it back again. 

"I returned and saw under the sun . . . [that] time and chance happen to them all." Eccl 9:11

How one family's crisis of faith strengthened mine

Recently I read a news story about a man and how he and his family left the church they had attended all their life and have found happiness in another denomination. It was a respectful and well written article in which this man and his wife told about things that happened that caused them to look elsewhere for a spiritual home. The article quoted the man as saying, “Before I was working for my salvation - today I am working because I'm grateful for my salvation."  I'm saddened that he had this misunderstanding and felt, in his former church, that he needed to be "working for his salvation". This made me wonder how many other Christians are misguided like this. How many others do the things asked at church because they feel like they have to check the boxes on the list or they won't be with God or their families forever? I asked myself do I do these "works" i.e.-  baptism, partake of the sacrament,  attend Sunday services, help out in teaching a class or organizing an activity or give service  (service given because it is asked of me or because I saw an need and quietly stepped in)  because I feel a need to “work for my salvation” or because “I rejoice in my salvation”.

I think it is easy to fall into the trap of “working for your salvation”. It’s one more thing to add to the never ending to-do list:

                Wash the dishes

                Read the scriptures

                Fold the laundry

                Say a prayer

                Visit my neighbor

And soon we are checking the boxes, feeling guilty when we miss the mark, and start equating in paying tithing with paying taxes and attending Sunday services is ranked with getting the grocery shopping done.

It is important that we give service, that we study the word of God, that we say our prayers, that we gather to worship with others, but no matter how long your spiritual to-do list is you can’t work for your salvation. No amount of work or perfectness or lists with little checked off boxes will earn your way into Heaven - just faith and repentance and love.

So, I serve and work and worship in Christ’s church because I rejoice in my  salvation, because I "stand all amazed at the love Jesus offers me", because I  know that  "my redeemer lives" and He does so for me. I know that whatever "work" I do in whatever way for His other children is just a bonus to the gifts I've already received from Him.

Wild Trees

I live where trees grow in neat rows flanking the streets or in ascetically pleasing arraignments with shrubs and boulders. The majority of street trees are flowering pear and 90% of the yards are a doppelganger of it's neighbor. If you are one who likes conformity and order then you'd think it was lovely (and to be honest, if it wasn't for the landscaping that softens the edges and brings green lawns and flowering pops of color I'd be living among tumble weed and sage brush- which yes, has it's own beauty, but I wouldn't want to live with it every day). I was needing wild trees, the kind that grow where they will, whose roots run in a maze and whose branches are left to bend, sway, break, burn and grow as high as they will into the sky.