*Most of this series is now found in Oh My Soul: Encountering God in Honest, Unconventional (and Sometimes Messy) Prayer and is available for purchase at Amazon and anywhere books are sold.
Category Archives: marriage
I love avocados. They’re expensive here, often a few dollars each just for one good organic one – so we don’t get them very often. But maybe the real reason we don’t get them very often is that Vince thinks they’re disgusting, slimy green vegetables that sneak into otherwise perfectly good sandwiches and tacos, rendering them completely inedible. Something like that.
So, in our grand gardening experiment, he was not real impressed when he saw this little guy. The conversation went like this:
Vin: You’re growing an avocado plant?
Me: Um…yes.
Vin: This is Alaska.
Me: I know. I’m kinda from here.
Vin: It won’t grow in Alaska.
Me: It’s okay, we’re growing it inside. It’s science, see?
Vin: You realize that avocados grow on trees, don’t you?
Me: Mm-hmm. I’ll trim it…and it will be shrubby.
Vin: And it will grow avocados in the house?
Me: In five to seven years, maybe.
Vin: You’re growing…an avocado tree…in our house, for at least five years?
Me: Um…(looks at other small avocado starts that he hasn’t noticed yet) Actually…three of them.
Imagine me flashing my most adorable and winning smile. See?
Only one of them is growing so far – it took weeks (maybe a couple of months?) to get roots and a shoot, so we’re patient with these other two, also.
Well, I am patient. The kids are patient. Vince is patient…with me.
We tease each other, but really, we are on the same side. I give him a hard time about eating pig guts (otherwise known as chorizo) and we’re even.
Teasing each other is okay when the trust level is high. Ours is high…it has been low before, it bottomed out at one point, but half our marriage ago we learned to be on the same side. We’re trying to teach our kids the same thing.
They are learning that trust is something that has to be earned, and once lost, it has emptied their tank of credence. It takes many deposits of goodness, sensitivity, and believing the best in each other to earn it back. It takes a long time to refill the tank, and there’s no teasing in the meantime. In the mean…time.
It’s been a year (or two, or more) of battles, from within and without. We’re learning to fight the good fight with many and various special needs and special circumstances, and our family is learning that we have to be a team in ways we’ve never had to before.
Conflicts come up with our kids. Between our kids, between us and the kids, and this is something we’ve been trying to teach them: we are on the same side. We’re for them. We’re not fighting them. They’re not (really) fighting each other.
We’re moving from this mindset of being in trouble to being corrected in love, and we both need to remember it. Both sides. Because we’re really on the same side.
Mom and Dad are on their side. We’re trying. And sometimes, despite that, we still have some convincing to do:
Chamberlain: Look at the bug! Dis is his bottom.
Me: We don’t talk about bottoms.
Cham: We only talk about bottoms in the baffwoom?
Me: Yep.
Cham: An’ we don’t talk about bottoms when we’re not in the baffwoom?
Me: Right.
Cham: Not even about bugs bottoms?
Me: (laughing hysterically)
Cham: Hey! Stop waffin’ at me!!
Me: I’m trying! (stifled laughter, turning into squeaks)
Cham, running off to closet: Now you’re fake waffin’ at me!
Me: I’m sorry. (snort, cough) Come here and give me kisses.
Cham, shaking head: You’re still waffing at me.
We’re trying to remember that a gentle correction brings a gentle response, so they will learn that a gentle answer brings a gentle correction. Because we’re not mad. Because they’re not perfect, and we know that, and we’re all learning. Together. On the same side.
The sun went down on a brilliant victory for the Confederates. Yet the night brought disaster for them.
Eager to find out what the Federals were doing, General Jackson rode out towards their lines in the gathering darkness…
“The danger is all over,” he said carelessly. “The enemy is routed. Go back and tell Hill to press right on.”
Soon after giving this order, Jackson himself turned, and rode back with his staff at a quick trot. But in the dim light his men mistook the little party for a company of Federals charging, and they fired. Many of his officers were killed, Jackson himself was sorely wounded and fell from his horse into the arms of one of his officers.
“General,” asked someone anxiously, “are you much hurt?”
“I think I am,” replied Jackson. “And all my wounds are from my own men,” he added sadly.
As tenderly as might be he was carried to the rear, and all that could be done was done. But Stonewall Jackson had fought his last victorious fight. Eight days later the Conqueror of all men laid His hand upon him, and he passed to the land of perfect peace.
– H. E. Marshall, This Country of Ours
He’s been talking to me about this a lot lately.
I wrote a piece recently for another site (scroll past all the linky icons), and it was supposed to be sort of short…er…but it didn’t turn out that way, because He’s been talking to me about this for a while. Apparently He had a lot to say, and He’s still talking. It’s an important message and I’d love for you to read it.
The friendly-fire among the family, among the church, among the troops, is born of fear and self-defense. Confusion, insecurity, and panic, and our deepest wounds have been from our own men. But what if our aim was truer because our vision was clear, and we realized that we were on the same side?
We would stop letting fear have its heyday with us.
We would choose to believe the best in each other.
We would trust that He made us for a special purpose with all of our special needs (because we are all special needs) and we would realize that we don’t need to fit into either the ideals or the insecurities of someone else. We don’t even need to try, and we don’t need to apologize for not trying, either.
He gently leads those who are with young…
We would trust that He knows what He’s gotten us into.
He’s on our side, too, you know. He’s for us. He’s not mad, because we’re not perfect, and He knows that.
Hello, Saturday. We meet again.
Kids are doing chores, I’m doing oatmeal. We’re late. It leisurely turns into brunch and we usually finish breakfast by lunchtime, and this happens almost every week. It’s okay. This is our catch up day, our finish-the-laundry day, our listen-to-music-and-read-Oliver-Twist-and-play-with-seeds-in-the-dirt day.
I’m chopping apples to stir into oatmeal and the girls are ready, like always, waiting at the table. The boys, like always, are still raising a ruckus in their room, finishing their chores and getting ready to vacuum. Except for the last few minutes it’s been…quiet. Strange. That should’ve been the tip off.
The stillness is suddenly broken by music blaring from upstairs, from the boys room, as loud as the stereo will go. I immediately recognize it – it’s the Imperial Death March from Star Wars (you know it, too, but I strongly suggest you go ahead and click the link to experience the full effect of this).
I look up and…there is Afton, solemnly marching towards us, past us, on his way to the laundry room, with his right arm fully extended out in front of him. Dangling from two pinched fingers of the extended limb, so as to to keep the offending article as far away from the rest of his body as possible, is a pair of dirty underwear.
I realize that the music was for my benefit. It’s kind of fun to live with a soundtrack.
The rest of the day putters through with chores and reading and a late lunch that nudges into naptime. I answer a million questions during the day and realize that, oh yes – I also have a three-year-old in full bloom.
“What is God’s wast name?”
“What? I dunno. I don’t think He has a last name.”
“He doesn’t?!” Incredulous disbelief. “Does Jesus have a wast name?”
“I don’t think so.” I consider whether or not I could get away with saying “Josephson” and then decide not to.
“He probwy knows. I fink I know His wast name.”
“Oh really? What?”
“Pattycake.”
All kinds of questions. A lot of them lately involve underwear, as this is a new development in our lives. Our sweet piano teacher – and anyone else who will listen – gets an earful pretty often about potty charts and new underwear and how many squares of toilet paper you’re supposed to use. Also, I undergo regular interrogation about this business of mommies and daddies not having to wear jammies, footie or otherwise, at bedtime like kids do. After six kids I reserve the right to deflect any question I don’t want to deal with at this time. Like why baby boys have sticky-outy parts and baby girls are…you know, normal. Ay caramba.
We roll through naptime, quiet time, and Vin comes home. Our weekend commences and we are so excited because it’s going to be four! days! long! and we finish dinner with the kids and do bedtime and get ready for our weekly movie date.
It’s a fairly lame movie, but the food is good and the company is excellent. The kids are all asleep and we’re two-thirds of the way through the movie, and suddenly –
Darth Vader’s presence is announced by a full orchestra and approximately eight squadrons of Storm Troopers.
The Imperial Death March is blaring from the boys room. And it’s midnight.
One boy is screaming, another boy is thinking about screaming, and another boy is sleeping through the entire Imperial Troop invasion, softly snoring…just like he did when the tree fell on our house. At least some things are predictable.
We fumble in the dark for the volume button, for the off button, for the electrical plug, whatever, and finally, there is quiet. We calm down all screaming and potential screaming. The cats, those lazy feline rubberneckers, wander in to see what all the fuss is about. We discover that while setting the soundtrack for the Great Imperial Underwear March, someone accidentally set the timer to go off again at midnight.
After pushing every button on the stereo in a totally random fashion, we somehow manage to un-set the timer to resume bedtime, resume sleep, and resume our lame-but-almost-over movie. We leave the room and a whuffly snore erupts from the bottom bunk. Still oblivious.
Strong, the force is with him. Question him tomorrow…we will.