Perspective

This is what it's all about:

An Ode to Laundry and other things I didn't figure in...

I dreamed about guitars and walks in the woods...and helping people. I dreamed about traveling to India or writing music and poetry. These were my grown-up dreams in college.

I loved college. I loved the soulful, beautiful people I met there. I loved the freedom of finding my passion in life. I loved my writing classes and my mentors. I loved being alone.

I did laundry in college...at the laundromat. Sometimes I used the campus laundromat. It was always full of fantastic people. Funny people, studying people, people folding jeans. I liked to sit on my dryer and just be with them all. Sometimes we'd go to an off-campus laundromat, toss our clothes in and run quick to the Baskin-Robbins next door for ice-cream.

I never dreamed about my future laundry. Laundry was not as dreamy as music and poetry...and certainly didn't have the altruistic pull of digging wells in third-world countries and feeding wide-eyed hungry children. My dreams were much more magnanimous than washing clothes.

A couple of years into college, my friends started pairing up. Some were getting engaged, some were getting married. I was reading Amy Carmichael books, contemplating a single life traveling to foreign countries to save the world, and writing. Do missionaries do laundry? A picture of humanitarian aid workers washing socks never entered my imagination...just dirt and sweat and pony-tails.

Then something entirely unsuspected happened. I fell crazy in love. Total misjudgment, I know. You just can't plan these things. One minute you're building your castle in the sky, next minute you're gazing into the blue eyes of your destiny. And you start dreaming together.

Ten years and four little blue-eyes later, dirt and sweat and pony tails are my reality. So is sock-washing. My dreams never really faded, they just evolved. In truth, they came in to focus. Writing and walking in the woods, seeing people loved and transformed...these are still at the core of my aspirations. Only now, I'm dressing a few of them in Halloween costumes and trying to remember to pre-treat the chocolate smudges before setting the wash cycle.

Not to say that there's never a tug-of-war between my dreams and the laundry, I feel it nearly everyday. I've just learned to love the challenge, to let it teach me. If the laundry is smothering my heart, I feel discontent trying to creep in. Patience with my children grows thin. Then I try to do exactly what I want my children to learn...shake my head, take a deep breath and have grace...on my growing self.

I'd choose the laundry again.

Valentine's Day

I admit it. I've never been a big Valentine's Day person. Holidays in general are fun, yes. But I really detest the commercialism of it all. I'll stop there. My dear friend Stephanie loves Valentine's Day. It's her very favorite holiday. She makes the cutest Valentines with her kids and makes the sweetest treats. I take water bottles to my kid's Valentine party at school. I like Valentine's Day as much as any day. My husband usually comes home with flowers and a hug and we give the kids a little candy. Everything was different this year. I'm typing this post on my Valentine's Day gift. This year my husband got me a blush pink Asus EeePC...the cutest laptop I have ever seen...so I can fulfill my dream of sitting under a tree or in a little coffee shop enjoying some solitary writing time.
Baaah consumerism. Yay for Steph, who knows what V-Day is all about. And love, love, love to my hubby who scored big points this year, not just for the laptop but for knowing that I like to write sitting on a blanket under trees.

Thankful Thursday: Just what I need...

"All is perfect, so perfectly perfect!

Whatever being lives, moves

And breathes on Earth

At every level from atom

To galaxy is absolutely perfect in its place..."

The Principal Upanishads

Yes, Thankful Thursday is back. I meant to write this yesterday, it just didn't happen...the day started out good but some tumultuous emotions overcame me a bit during my breadbaking and gravy making. I just wasn't composed enough to write a TT post.

This has been a difficult year for me. In the midst of personal loss...the loss of some very important relationships, I have had to wade my way through many questions and feelings. Yesterday brought those feelings to the surface again. Sometimes I deal well with them, other times I melt. It's honestly hard for me to write about this and I've admittedly avoided it but I can't do that today because I'm feeling too grateful.

I'm grateful because I know that everything I experience in life is exactly what I need to grow as a spiritual being. If I succeed, my spirit is enlarged and I am deeply grateful for God's wisdom working in me. If I fail, I have a wonderful opportunity to learn and grow. It's all so good...so perfect.

None of this means life is going to be easy. We all face trials...some more than others. We are all at different places with different needs, different lessons to learn and challenges to grow from. I am thankful to see this journey as perfect, the people I travel with as just who I need close to me and each experience, joyful or painful, exactly what I need to go through.

And I have to add that I am so unbelievably blessed to share this journey with my husband...who is just the person I've always needed, and four radiant souls who fill my days with light.

Thankful Thursday: My Sweetheart

Today my Sophie graduated from kindergarten. Papa took the morning off to attend the festivities. The program was adorable, but it was the sweet moments caught on camera afterwards that I will always remember: Watching Sophie throw her arms around her Papa's neck with such a delighted sparkle in her eye was enough to make time freeze for a moment. It is overwhelmingly obvious that my children are crazy about their Papa...and so am I.

I am so thankful to be married to my favorite person in the whole world.

Thankful Thursday: Somebody Loves Me

Yes, it's true.

One day I was standing near the computer talking with my sweetheart, and our email alert (a little yapping puppy carrying a letter) came on the the screen. I said, "Let me see if somebody luuuvsme." Now we laugh when Amazon.com or some other thoughtful emailer like iTunes or AllRecipes sends us a message. ebay luuuvsme! Okay, some of you might not think it's that funny. I do. It's funny. But here's my point: Yesterday when I tried to start my Thankful Thursday post, Blogger was inaccessable, I guess the server was down or something...so I didn't get my post done. This morning when I booted up the computer and checked my email I really did get a message from somebody who luuuvsme! The subject line said, "I want my thankful thursday!"

So here it is: I'm thankful for You, Luke. I'm thankful to be loved by you, thankful that you see the authentic me past my outward struggles, and encourage me to keep growing into that person. i love you.

I met the greatest guy...

I have to spend a few minutes today on the subject of the most important person in my life. His name is Luke and I am so grateful and amazed to be loved by him.

A few things I really love about my husband:

He has a great red-ish beard.

He is tenacious about the important things in life.

He paces when he's thinking really hard.

He like's altoids.

He patiently listens to my ramblings and to all the little treasures I find in my readings of Frost, Wordsworth, etc.,etc., and may be the only person who keeps up with my blog.

Now, my husband is not exactly excited by poetry, so this is a labor of love: You know what's really great? Seeing him smile at me like he enjoys hearing me read to him just because it makes me happy. Now, that is love.