For My Eldest Daughter

You wake up at the same time as me. You're twelve. You have many opinions laced with sarcasm and beauty and fear and joy. It's six o'clock in the morning and you want to tell me your opinions.

About football.
About coffee.
And a few stories about boys who keep stealing your science papers.

In between the lines of the stories are more questions. You are searching, muddling out your own new thoughts which are forming at a rapid rate.

It's six a.m. I wasn't made for loud mornings. I was made for gently crescendoing ones starting with hot coffee, two splashes of soy creamer, thank you.

I give you a morning hug. Your head doesn't fit under my chin anymore. You almost look me in the eye. You are tall, that is evident. But you are also lovely and I wasn't prepared for that. You don't know that you're pretty yet. When you look in the mirror you see a girl who is fun and goofy. But I see a pre-woman and I don't quite know what to do with the information.

We're both navigating the kitchen at the same time in the morning. Our bodies are colliding. "Sorry." "Pardon." "Can I squeeze by?" You are in my way a lot and I laugh at the reason. You are adopting my schedule and my habits. You even take the other vintage jadeite mug in the morning, filling it halfway with hot, black coffee and two splooshes of cream. Just like me. You hardly drink any, but there it is, matching my equally brown coffee.

Some of my clothing is missing. Some shoes. My winter boots. And also some gloves and a green coat. They appear to have found their way to your feet and shoulders and hands. You are thinner than me, but almost as tall. By the size of your feet you will grow at least two inches taller than me in a few scant years. This both delights and terrifies me.

Earlier this week you were spending all your time in your room. I was barking at you a lot. If I could change one thing about myself, it would be to bark less and to woo more. I try, I do. I fail a lot. Anyway, I was calling for you and you were annoyed because you were creating two dozen little stuffed objects out of felt. I never want you to lose the magic of creativity, taking something which is base and simple and ingredient-like and giving it form.

There are other goals I have for you.
Never stop asking questions. But ask them in a spirit of curiosity.
Be kind. Also be true and firm.
Like yourself. Love yourself. Be yourself.
Ask God many, many questions. He will answer you.
Laughter is learned. It's worth the work.
You are loved deeply. By your dad. By me.

Life may seem wobbily right now. You are changing at a rate which is faster than any other time in your life, suspended between childhood and adulthood, testing boundaries. By God's grace, I'll show you the footpath that I know. It's not perfect, but I'll do my best. Meanwhile: Run, grow, love.

Merry Christ-mess

It's a tremendously important time of year, Christmas.

I need Christmas more than ever.

I need the story of Mary's shame. And then her song.

I need the story to have a smelly donkey.

I need the inconvenience of all the circumstances. The rushed marriage. The disappointment of Joseph. The hurried journey for the census. The volatile government. The angry king. I need all the feelings to be messy.

I need the simplicity of the sleeping arrangements and the variety of visitors at the stable.

I need God to be flesh. To be poor. To be tired. To start with nothing. To be needy. To be inconvenienced and to be very small.

And then I need my soul to meet him there.

I need to enter the fear of Mary and Joseph as they wondered how they would start their life so impoverished and misunderstood.

I need to be still when people who I don't understand are called to be in my life. People like the shepherds. Or people like the kings, chasing stars, leaving symbolic but very odd gifts for a child. Perhaps they sold the frankincense for bread. Who brings perfume for a child?

I need the weariness of the Israelites, the tired watchers, looking for signs, longing for hope.

And then I need God to be born in me. To prepare a simple, earthy place in my heart where He resides and grows and spreads.

Everything which represents death to me, I need Him to be there. The rush of the season, the credit card bills, the misplaced expectations, the shame of being found wanting. I need God there in the murkiness of it all.

I need him to hold my schedule like the reins of a donkey and gentle guide me through all the busy places to the quietness where He is.

I need Him to feed and clothe me simply with forgiveness.

I need Him to meet me as a graphic designer, in my every day work and declare with wildly loud and bright, angelic proclamations that He is not contained by anything. Not by suits or ties or good presentations or perfect type treatments. Not by how we look or smell or how much money we make.

I need Him to remind me that families can have odd beginnings and endings and that the middle isn't perfect either.

I need Him to open my heart to make friends and acquaintances with whoever He sends my way. No matter what stars they chase.

I need Him to accept my gifts, no matter how wildly crazy or simple or inappropriate. I need Him to accept me, with all the ineffective ways I have clothed myself.

And then I need Him to grow in me, stomping on all the death in my life, leaving a trail of beauty where there was heartache and ashes and shame. I need Him to fill me so much that all the heartache in my life is simply a herald for new life to form. All the exhaustion is perfect for new strength, not my own.

When I don't have enough time or money or patience or aura or love or clarity or esteem. When I succumb to really good marketing because I don't have enough time to research something else,  I need Jesus to laugh and say, "Welcome to Christmas. Rest. Be loved."

Happy Happy Soul Soul

Over and over again this year, a line has been running in my head and it goes like this:

I want to live a life observed.

I know where this thought originated. I'm ashamed to admit it.

It came because I was throwing food down my throat without thinking or tasting or knowing. Or I'd skim through books and think I had reached the essence. It came because I told myself "If only I can be a little more efficient in this area of life, then I can truly rest in another area." Only the rest never came.

This thought of living a life observed originated when I put life on auto-pilot and treadmill mode, never going anywhere, just doing life. Keeping up. Filling out forms. Pushing paper. Rearranging schedules. Always planning for life but never really allowing myself to enjoy it.

But when I push the efficiency aside, when I shush my expectations and just let my soul speak up a little, I realize that it won't take too much to live a little differently.

Instead of showing up to work early, I can use 15, maybe 30 minutes to read or pray or draw or walk.

Instead of beleaguering a math problem with my 7-year old, I can stop and play a game. Reset our brains.

Instead of taking a walk by looking at caloric numbers accruing, I can take deep lungs-full of air and look at the sky.

An odd thing happens when I push the pause button on life... Somehow I am more energetic and focused and present. I've connected with a deeper part of myself.

I'm doing the slow work of saying "no" a whole lot to a bunch of beautiful invitations because my family needs breathing space. Adding margin to our schedule.

I'm marveling at people who tell slow, beautiful stories. Our society is so bullet-point oriented. In the past few years, I've altered the way I've spoken to people and not for the better. I tell them how many points I have to make and then I rattle them off. I didn't realize how much I spoke this way until I was in a parent-teacher conference with Eve's teacher and the teacher laughed saying that Eve numbered her points before speaking. I managed a smile, but my heart sank a little.

I have a few red flags which tell me when we're running low on time or time to think:
When I buy a lot of office supplies or organizational knick-knacks, that tells me I'm feeling stressed.
When I nosh on carbs.
When I bark at my children or say negative, brash things.
When I forget if I took my vitamins.
Or when someone lovely, like my daughter Morgan, looks me directly in my eyes and talks to me and I have to catch myself to listen to her.

I don't want to live a big, busy, soul-less life.

So when I make my way to the kitchen in the morning and see the pile of greasy dishes we neglected to clean the night before, I roll up my sleeves. I pour warm water and too-much dish soap in the sink and watch the suds climb up, up, up. I immerse a few dishes to soak. I look out the window and marvel at four fat chickadees and sparrows bouncing around my patio, eating seed that fell from the feeder. I start some coffee. I drink it slowly while sitting. I don't let myself stand until I have had a few minutes to enjoy the morning. The clatter of the morning will start soon enough.

Morgan is at a great age for sharing hilarious, loud and dramatic stories. So at 6:30 in the morning, I try to listen. Dan is laughing and Eve is just getting out of bed, her hair knotted in the back.

I take a dozen papers off my kitchen desk. Note to self: Make desk a happy place. This thing is a pile of responsibilities. Noted.

I push aside thoughts of the desk and push flash cards in the direction of Eve while finishing the last of my coffee. She is bouncing on a chair, waving her hands in the air while she answers correctly. After ten or fifteen minutes, she is beyond done answering what 3 + 8 is. So we play a game, her choice.

She bossily tells me how I must play and how I must act and I obey everything that she says. We laugh and enjoy these few moments before she goes to school.

She has lost her shoes again. And a library book. It seems like this happens every morning. I am tempted to run to my computer for answers to these stressors, but it won't matter, not in these minutes. I help her get out the door.

I write a few thoughts on my blog and start the day.

Not efficient. Not perfect. Just observed.
My soul is happy.