Day: May 2, 2007

Another sweet letter

from Kathryn…

Now the calendar page has been changed and the date of her return trip home is in view – for this I do praise the LORD. I’ve so missed our girl –so missed her company, her sweet ways, her unbridled enthusiasm and zest for life, her spontaneity and sense of humour… O, and her piano music. I miss smelling her perfume, I miss her laundry, her coffee, the sound of her keys and the sight of her purse on the counter. I miss hearing her teach piano lessons and I miss hearing her read to the children. I miss seeing her jacket on the hook and her stacks of library books. I miss riding in her car and I miss going to Starbuck$. I miss hearing the whirlwind of plans and I miss hearing people call on the phone to talk to her. I miss all those things and more.

With all those things I miss and wish for… I do recognize that I won’t get text messages that say things like:

“Wow, you should see the bat that’s in our room!”
Or, “Cool! How was your day?”
Or, “As i was texting you, junior, my permanent side kick asked me if he could telephone a mzungo?!”
Or, “What? O okay, so you’ll call me around 10pm your time?”
Or, “Wow, I am in a thunderstorm and getting soaked!”
Or, “Thank you. One of the babies has malaria and I couldn’t stand to leave her at the orphanage, so I brought her back to our cottage to spend the night.”

I look forward to the day of her return. As with all other things I’ve wished for, it will be here faster than I could have imagined—though today it seems like forever.

So, today I am dreaming of our Sbx coffee date…

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Motherhood isn’t something to just “get through”

teacuppamela.pngWhen I first started blogging, I just wrote about stuff that was going on around me, sites I’d come across in my world-wide-web travels – cool stuff and helpful stuff… in addition, I wrote about what I thought of what was going on in “the church” today and the daily news stuff. And, for the most part, I suppose I still do all that… but with less pics and links (and that’s bcz of the limitations of this “WordPress” format). Anyway… I think For May’s blogs, I’ll just pick a theme to concentrate on… hmm… bling! The month of May… Motherhood!

Motherhood

I recently talked with a young woman who was lamenting her lot in life as sort of the worker-washer-cooker-driver-word repeater-shopper-picker-upper woman. Now, she didn’t call herself that, she just said one unfortunate phrase that lots of other tired worker-washer-cooker-driver-word repeater-shopper-picker-upper women say to their sloppy childish ungrateful children: “I’m not the maid around here.” (To which some innocent, pitiful child once said: “Well, then, who is?!)

It’s been a long time since I said those very regrettable words: “I’m not the maid around here.” And that’s likely when I thought or felt I was merely the family’s worker-washer-cooker-driver-word repeater-shopper-picker-upper woman. That was early on when I actually was the nurser-changer-worker-washer-cooker-driver-word repeater-shopper-picker-upper woman in our family. That was at a time when I didn’t grasp the high calling of motherhood and didn’t value the tremendous gift and opportunity afforded to the blessed nurser-changer-worker-washer-cooker-driver-word repeater-shopper-picker-upper women of the world.So, to that tired (and now visionary) woman I said, Motherhood isn’t something to just get through! And though she felt “put upon” for all that she needed to do, she really wasn’t just a maid. As a play on words, I told her… you’re not THE maid – you’ve GOT IT made: You’re the MOTHER! *Y*O*U* are everything *y*o*u* ever wanted. You get that? *YOU* are everything you ever wanted to be! You are what you were created to be and you are doing what you were created to do!

Now, at this point she said, No. No way. I just want to get through this! I am NOT everything I ever wanted to be. I said, sure you are… You wanted to love and be loved. You wanted to set things up your way. You wanted to drive all over. You wanted to create. You wanted to have things set up and you wanted to tell others how to do things. You wanted to be young… you wanted to talk… you wanted to make a difference, be important, leave your mark—you wanted to be someone! Well, you are someone! You’re a mother!

I went on to tell her one more thing. Be a good one. Be the best nurser-changer-worker-washer-cooker-driver-word repeater-shopper-picker-upper mother you can be. Be today what you hope your children will fondly remember. You only get one season to be the nurser-changer-worker-washer-cooker-driver-word repeater-shopper-picker-upper — and it may seem like a loooong season but whatever you do, whatever you say, whatever it takes: make the season count.

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