Seasons

I took this picture yesterday when my soul friend was over for a coffee date and I marveled a bit at it today. To an outsider, it just looks like two friends on the couch together talking. But it represents so much more than that about my life and the season I’m in right now. I’m holding this photo as a little moment of remembrance of all the places I have traveled as a woman.

Right now, this picture is meaningful because I don’t have people over during the day for coffee dates very often. I am a small business owner and I have two small, part-time jobs that I work as I build my little corner of the world. I have a generous amount of flexibility but also a list of to-do’s that order my days.

There was a time when I worked a full-time job and had a nanny (which cost me basically 3/4 of my salary-let all the working mommas say ‘amen’). I would listen to my SAHM (stay-at-home momma) friends tell me about their days and I longed for their experience even as I felt the tension of that longing because I also loved my job. It was a dream job I was so grateful for and the confusion of that time is still easy to access as I think about that season.

There did come a time in my life when I and my friends (and their children) filled my home and we filled theirs. I remember the sweet chaos of those times as we lived life as mothers together. I can touch the gratefulness in my heart that I got to experience both sides of life as a mom; full-time working Mom and full-time stay-at-home Mom.

As my kids and I grew up together, I slowly added part-time work and volunteerism into my days. For a season, during the day, I can remember when my home was my own space. Quieted with kids at school for a few precious hours, time felt expansive to me. Time is not expansive now. What a rich gift it was to slowly re-enter a workforce while still being flexible enough to manage my family life and their needs too.

Life looks so different today! Jeremy works from home full-time and has done so for almost 5 years now. That’s just weird. It took tremendous adjustment for us to learn how to organize the days together in the same space with such different needs; we still don’t have it all figured out. Time is not expansive but filled up with work and drive time taking kids to all the places, managing who will be home and who can pick which kid up where.

Today, as I considered posting my sweet pic of my friend and I snagging precious time together for connection yesterday on IG (#latergram), all these memories of the places and spaces I’ve been in rose up in me. It feels more like a cherished moment in time to remember where I am, where I have been, where I used to long to be, and even what I hope for as I go forward.

I’m so grateful that I have had the opportunity to experience the many facets of motherhood and work so that I can share that with my kids one day from a space of having lived it. I have been poor and wealthy, I have been afraid and courageous, I have been proud and poured out. I am grateful for each lived moment in both pain and comfort.

I don’t think one way is more right or wrong than another when it comes to the challenging decisions of being a parent and working in some way. Each season had its own pros and cons for me. So if you are navigating those pathways as a young parent, blessings to you as you choose! If you have already navigated those spaces and have time to give, comfort and encourage someone else as they make hard choices. If you are still waiting and longing and hoping to get to make those kinds of decisions one day, may you find gratefulness for where you are now in the longing that you feel, and may it point you to what is good.

Love Amidst Crisis

Currently, in America we are under the duress of the Novel COVID-19. My friends have deemed this time, “under the Rona”. Our country has been warned to stay home and to limit our exposure to others, to significantly shrink our social circles to those whom we cohabitate with and to do so for the foreseeable future. My family has done this for the past three weeks and as a house full of extroverts, this has been very challenging. Yet, even my deeply introverted friends, who have also been staying home for the past three weeks, have said this is beginning to challenge their sanity.

 

Unfortunately, this situation is likely to remain this way for a long period of time. My heart has broken with disappointment as all the usual things in this life that I love are one by one going away. Summer is a season our family lives to enjoy. It’s our time to flex our hospitality muscles and be with ALL the people. We intentionally reconnect with everyone we haven’t been able to see due to full life and school and sports schedules. We stay out late and enjoy hosting events and going out in nature with friends and family.

 

The dawning that all these things are likely not to happen is so sad. And yet, my mind has begun to ask the question, “how can I show love to the people who matter to me if I can’t be with them physically?”. I think in this time, we need more signs of affection and support than we ever have because we are going to continue to be disconnected from one another physically in order to stay healthy and safe for the long haul. Let’s consider how to show love from the perspective of love languages:

 

1. Acts of Service
2. Words of encouragement and affirmation
3. Gifts
4. Physical Touch Physical Distancing with Compassion
5. Quality Time

 

Acts of Service: So you can’t do things yourself for the persons you love, but you can choose to do some safe things that serve someone. You can: send a friend a meal from a local business or make them a meal or treat and drop it off, mow a friend’s yard or do other yard work like pull weeds and trim bushes, go to the store and get something they need or go to your own pantry and give them something they need. Chalk up someone else’s driveway! Call your friend. Face Time them. Take the time to connect with them and just ask if they need anything!

 

Words of Encouragement and Affirmation: Send something in the mail! Drop a letter at their house personally. Organize a car parade and drive past their house honking and holding signs, send a text or a marco polo telling your friend how much they mean to you, start a bucket list of all the things you want to do together when this is all over and share it with your people, tell someone what you miss about being together or just that you miss being together! Tell your people what you like about them! (This is also great for the people you are cohabitating with!)

 

Gifts: This one is easy but it doesn’t have to be expensive or boujee. Cut some flowers from your garden/yard and drop them at a friend’s house. Buy a small container of fresh herbs to grow or some bulbs/plants that will last so that when you are together again they will remind you of what you went through. Paint a rock, a flower pot, or a card and give it away, draw stick figures of what you wish you were doing together and send it to your friend, send your friend something off Amazon that you know they would love!

 

Physical Distancing with Compassion: All of the huggers in the world are not ok. Please have compassion on them. There are still ways you can show people you love them without touching them. Please do not shame people at this time if they are sad and long for some physical presence. If you are a hugger and you are feeling this loss acutely, it’s ok to admit it. Do a drive-by for your hug loving friend, show them that they matter by keeping your distance but still being willing to be present and show your face. Talk to someone from their porch while you stand in the driveway. It is safe for us to do this IF you keep your distance. Just stay in the open air and stay 6 to 12 feet away from each other and stay one-to-one. Don’t give up on being present especially for those who are lonely. Visit through the window of your house! Be creative! 

 

Quality Time: Even though we can’t sit and just be with one another physically, you CAN give of yourself and your time even in the midst of these challenges. Set aside an hour to call or facetime someone you love and even schedule it so that they know you are thinking of them and they know you’ve carved this time out for them. Be intentional with your attention and signs of affection. It matters to these people greatly.

 

This is a time of stress. It is not the “new normal” it is ABNORMAL. Don’t call it normal! It is a time in life where we will be challenged to think outside the box. Keep telling the people you love that you love them and how you love them. It will help you to feel better and it will help the person you share your love with feel better too.

 

Finally, I want to remind us all that there is no shame in getting COVID-19. The people who have contracted this virus will need safe love the MOST. Don’t let fear rule you or keep you from sharing the love that you have for others. Be safe and choose to love!

Seen and Known

Two weeks ago our friends, the Metcalfes from Seattle, joined us in the freezing mid-west for a fun extended weekend together. We haven’t seen each other for almost one year! It was so good to be with them – because we have 10 years of history together. They have done life with us through some of the hardest seasons of our lives and they know how new things affect us as a result of that knowledge.

Sharing Stories of Loss

This was a hard week. By Friday, I found myself crying off and on throughout the day. I finally asked myself, “Why am I so weepy this week?”. As I looked back over the last 7 days, over each one and all that it held, I realized all the hard and sad news that was shared. It was as if I hadn’t noticed things stacked up in a pile in the corner due to all the daily life happening around me.

Each day it seemed there were new people reaching out for prayer. Sorrow and heaviness for sickness and trials, loneliness, a lack of community. As each new story was unwrapped, my heart sank.

Saturday morning, as I got ready to visit dear friends whose son is at Children’s Hospital right now, I read Psalm 126.

“Restore our fortunes, LORD, as streams renew the desert.

Those who plant in tears will harvest with shouts of joy.

They weep as they go to plant their seed, but they sing as they return with the harvest.”

I love agricultural imagery because it is so tangible and easy for me to understand. The analogy was so beautiful to see. Many times I have planted in tears. There are times in life where we think our tears are for nothing. But I had a picture after reading this psalm of tears watering a seed. It grows up and it produces an abundance out of sorrow. Joy out of sadness.

These things my friends are bearing are so heavy. They are planting in tears. They are weeping as they prepare the soil for what they long to see grow. And they will wait. But as we share those stories together, what joy will be there when that harvest is collected.