At least I'm not Jennifer Aniston...

I just finished reading Anne Lamott’s Some Assembly Required.  I find her writing poignant, raw, hysterical, honest, and sacred.  I do and don’t recommend her depending on the platform because her colorful language may scare away some folks.  For better or worse, it doesn’t me.  I appreciate the breadth of emotions she shares and the vivid hue of that language seems to suit.  This is also how I’m justifying some things I may or may not need to work on.

This particular book is a journal of her son’s son’s (yes, her grandson’s) first year of life; all of the family navigating that comes along with this kind of blessing.  Chaos, humor, and beauty fill the pages.

Three years prior to this, I read her book Operating Instructions when McBaby #2 was a newborn and it was the journal of her son’s first year.  It was so timely as it was filled with unbridled joy and uncurbed insanity.  So, it was especially interesting to read the book since it was 20 years more recent and co-written with that very son. 

I found myself shocked at this passage of time.  Being that McBaby #3 is now 8 months, when the book started out and the "book baby" was 1 month, then 2, then 3, I felt a kind of sadness that my own McBaby was older.  As soon as the “book baby” passed my own baby’s age, I suddenly relaxed and felt like I was the newbie and the he was old. Somehow, it seemed like I had beat time.

The first part of the book was the feeling I get when I think I’m old.  Like when I went to a bachelorette party recently for a 20-yr old dear family member and upon being introduced to one of her friends and, consequently, shaking her hand, her friend looked at me and said “oh, shaking hands – that’s cool!”  As if I was from some other time era…  I was reminded that I was in high school when she was born and that none of them could legally even order a drink at the party.  Or like when McHusband and I feel like buddies to his amazing high school students… and then realize that we could be their parents.  Wahp wahp. 

But, when that point came that the “book baby” was over 8 months, I changed to the feeling that’s like when I remember that at least I’m not as old as Jennifer Aniston and she’s still the cat’s pajamas.  I mean she graces the cover of People still, folks care what she wears, she’s still an “it girl”.  Never mind that I don’t have her rockin’ bod, money, or resume.  When it comes to time, I win.

So, part of the book stopped me in my tracks.  Having traveled one summer of college to Finland, Sweden, and Russia, I visited many of the places she describes in this book at one point.  I’m oohing and aahing at the experiences she’s describing and then she comes to a part where she names something that is even better than these times she’s having in the magnificent, historical places that week.  She writes the following - the passage includes her tourist friend Ann and her travel companion, a Jesuit Priest named Tom.

“Ann and I walked and walked until our feet ached; we were blessed out on the sights, the views, the people.  But the best part of the visit was when I huddled alone with Tom before dinner.  After my nap, we sat in the hotel lobby, looking at a catalogue of flowers that Tom would plant at his house and mine in the fall.  He wanted me to pick out my favorite color daffodil for him to plant, but I said, ‘Don’t they just die in four or five days, and not come until the following spring? So what is the point?’

‘The point is those four or five days,’ he said.”

My, how I have missed the point.  And, sadly, often.  I shake my tiny fist at a big God and scratch my head (whose hairs he knows the number) baffled at why he didn’t do things the way I would’ve and eased the passing of time differently.  God, why make them little for such a short time?  Why take some of our friends home to Heaven “before their time?”  Why make us so aware of the tension that lies in aging?

The point is God knows that 4-5 days is complete for a daffodil.  We can either celebrate that or not. In all areas of life.

I was convicted, so I led a short devotion on this idea at worship team rehearsal last week.  We swapped Holy moments like these.

Then, the next day, my Mom met us for lunch.  Not knowing any of my reading material or thoughts, she surprised McBaby #1 with a bouquet of daffodils before we drove off.

“Get in the car Mom.  I need to talk to you.”  I said.

“Ok…” she replied.

“Why did you buy these daffodils?” I prodded.

“Well, I saw them at Trader Joe’s and they were so pretty and even though they won’t last very long, I thought of the smile on [McBaby #1’s] face and knew her reaction would bring great joy to both of us."

My, oh my, Lord.  Please continue to teach me.  Thank you for my mother that gets it, my children that get it.  Give me eyes to see.

PS – the daffodils did fade quickly, but McHusband noticed and re-filled my jar and love tank with a new bunch today.

The Pain of Childbirth???

Before McBaby #1 was born almost six years ago, my grandmother told me “life is going to get very bright”.  Oh, I had no idea what I was in for.  “Sito” (Arabic for grandmother), as we call her, was so right.  Until you’ve come to the other side (that’s parent-speak for becoming one of us), you can’t fully know the experience of parenthood of course.  Unspeakable joy, unbridled wonder, unconditional love; loads of laughter, heaps of hugs, countless cuddles.    

What she didn’t share was that it would be coupled with intense darkness.  I wonder often why, upon asking, none of our grandmothers seem to remember darkness.  Is it me?  Is it my inadequacy?  I’ve landed on the fact that it must be them. (When in doubt, blame someone else…)  Maybe times were simpler?  Maybe demands were less?  Likely, they simply have amnesia...  no wait, Gramnesia.  (Wocka wocka.)  Somehow, the good Lord has allowed them to forget the sleepless nights, the never-ending laundry and dishes, the worry about a sick-with-what-exactly child, and the bone-weary fatigue that comes in droves when multiple littles are at home – and none of them can wipe their own rear.   For me, the darkness of post-partum anxiety and depression has fallen over me like an oppressive cloud hanging dangerously low at times.  Light and dark.  Isn’t this the way?  The only way to truly appreciate the sun, the dawn, is to have wandered around after dusk and stumbled around through the night before?

My heart hangs heavy tonight.  I am left to my own demise as all the McBabies are asleep and McHubz is upstairs reading.  Me and my thoughts and the good Lord Jesus in this sacred room where children sing, toddlers play, and babies stare at their hands and find the one dangerous thing left out to put in their mouths. 

As we started to talk through the specifics of our summer plans, one mention of the calendar and vacation and it’s like a game of Jenga or pick-up sticks.  You move one piece and you’re nearer to collapse.  No plan is an island… or something like that.  We talk about the calendar and it reminds me of the looming date… August 1.  The day McBaby #1 starts kindergarten.  Mention summer and about 8 Jenga pieces have been pulled out simultaneously.  It is heavy.  I am fearful.  I already grieve time without my Grandmother – playing cards, playing piano - multiple times a week.  I tear up at the thought of not seeing my Jido (Arabic for Grandfather) again on this side of the thin places – baking bread, gathering around the table all the time as well.  Will I have this heaviness upon sending my five-year-old-McBaby to school and miss what was for the last nearly-six years?  I’m scared.  And no matter-of-fact, circle-o’-life, get-your-head-out-of-the-sand, it’s-your-job-to-raise-your-child-independent-of-you, pullin’ it together talk will set me better.  This is the pain of childbirth.

Genesis speaks of this pain.  And I’ve alluded to it before too on blog posts.  Does childbirth hurt?  Duh.  Does Dolly Parton float?  Is the Pope Catholic?  I’ve had 2 natural births.  Yes, that means no drugs at all.  It’s intense - yet I wouldn’t trade it for anything.  It’s also why I had my 3^rd with an epidural. Jury is out on what I would choose if there is a next time. Surely, that alone isn’t the pain of childbirth though.  That is short-lived, relatively speaking to the scope of a lifetime.  For me, right now, the pain of childbirth is watching each McBaby be reborn into a new season every time I turn around.  Light and dark.  Bitter and sweet.  I am preparing to help birth my child into her own new season this fall and I am pregnant with the weight of it.  I am unsure about the delivery of it.  I am ill-equipped for the newborn state of it because I’ve never done this.  This is light and this is dark.  In the beginning, God created the light and the dark; every tension comes back to this dichotomy now; childbirth is one I will have to face as long as I am a mother, which is as long as I live.  Come Lord Jesus into these tiny cracks and guide me as You conceive all new things.

Would you consider posting below and answering what has carried you in these transitions?

Pics: McBaby #1 @ 5 years old; McBaby #2 @ 3 years old; McBaby #3 @ 7 months old; Easter day after too much candy, too much stimulation, and too much bribery to get them back into their Easter outfits for one more shot... proof that we survived Easter 2013.  Thank you for appeasing me peeps.