Category Archives: reading

without fear: peace in the unknowing

Posted on by January 8, 2020

In the lobby of the dentist’s office during back-to-back cleanings and exams for all six kids, I’m reading Pilgrim at Tinker Creek while Aerosmith chants “Dream On” from the speaker in the ceiling. Four appointments down, two to go — and Vin brings me coffee from Kaladis and baked goods from Starbucks to help get me through the last hour. I guess he could’ve gotten them both from the same place…but we had a gift card to use, and friends don’t let friends drink Starbucks.

So far, we’ve scored one cavity and one referral to an oral surgeon. I’m fighting a little fear over that last point but counting my blessings that we’ve made it over two and a half years without any major medical issues. Most of the families we know who adopted from the same place we did have already dealt with at least one major surgery, and I’d almost think we lucked out if it weren’t for the attachment issues that provided enough heartbreaking material to write a small book out of.

We’re not sure what we’re dealing with aside from facial swelling, a biopsy, adult teeth overlapping somewhere near Andrey’s sinuses, and words like possible cyst and extraction…but we’re certain it has something to do with those first years of starving and neglect, when there weren’t enough nutrients to build bone structure to properly fit future adult teeth.

In the speaker overhead, Queen sings about this crazy little thing called love. And the irony isn’t lost on me, though I grew up on Dwight Yoakum and prefer his version.

without fear: peace in the unknowing

We’ll call the surgeon’s office when we get home. Make an appointment for a consultation. Briefly explain attachment issues to a whole new team of professionals in attempt to avoid regression. Brace ourselves for whatever comes next.

But for now, I’m reading about the anxiety of unknowing: When will this end? When will it get better? What happens next? And there’s irony here, too:

I wonder how long it would take you to notice the regular recurrence of the seasons if you were the first man on earth. What would it be like to live in open-ended time broken only by days and nights? ….how long would you have to live on earth before you could feel with any assurance that any one particular long period of cold would, in fact, end?

“While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease”: God makes this guarantee very early in Genesis to a people whose fears on this point had perhaps not been completely allayed.

– Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

While the last two kids get their teeth cleaned, I read more about trees and water and fear and assurance, munching on a croissant in the lobby while trying not to make a mess. It’s probably the worst possible thing to attempt this with; pastry bark has flaked all over me, the chair, and the floor. It would be more efficient to just rip the thing wide open and fling crumbs everywhere, since that’s what it looks like I did anyway.

But two pastries and a latte later – because my cleaning isn’t for another few weeks – we’re done, and home, and off the phone. We’ll meet the surgeon next week.

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And we wait, wonder, and pray. It’s what we do when we don’t know. Maybe it won’t be so bad. Maybe it’s nothing after all. Maybe it will be awesome. Maybe God is up to something. And of course, He’s always up to something, but sometimes I cringe because He can be such a troublemaker.

I am beside you to bless and help you. Waver not in your prayers. They shall be heard. All power is Mine. Say that to yourself often and steadily.

Say it until your heart sings with the Joy of the safety and power it means to you.

Say it until the very force of the utterance drives back, and puts to nought, all the evils against you.

– God Calling, edited by A.J. Russell

We fight off the what-ifs for the meeting, the doctor, the prognosis, the plan. We pray against fallout and fear, the emotions ripped right open and scattering a mess everywhere.

And a week later, we learned a little more about what we’re facing. Not much more, but some specifics — like an adult tooth growing way the heck up under Andrey’s eye, and another that looks to be encased in a cyst– and putting the medical stuff aside, it’s really the trust issues I’m most concerned with. Can we trust this team to handle our son and our family? Can we trust Andrey’s ability to handle this? Will Andrey learn to trust us more through this?

Can we trust God to know what He’s doing here?

And the answer is yes. Yes, and yes, and yes, and amen.

…that we, being delivered from the hand of our enemies,
might serve Him without fear,
in holiness and righteousness before Him all our days.

– Luke 1:74-75

At home, Andrey is sighing and grunting and stomping over his chore, as though he carries the weight of the whole world on his small shoulders over his responsibility to sweep the living room.

You are not carrying the weight of the world, I want to tell him.

I must carry the weight of the world, his behavior says. This is the default attitude of someone who has learned the world is not to be trusted.

You’re not in charge of all of this. Often, I do tell him this.

But I must be in charge of everything. If I mind everyone else’s business, I won’t have to deal with my own.

We adults have these same conversations with God all the time. Our healing and maturity are indicated by having them less and less often.

…because of the tender mercy of our God,
whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high
to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death,
to guide our feet into the way of peace.

– Luke 1:78-79

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We have a CT scan scheduled next week. After that, the surgeon talked about a procedure with a four-to-five day recovery, and then maybe a surgery to extract up to three adult teeth if they can’t be saved. Long term, he mentioned words like non-cosmetic orthodontics, extensive restructuring, root canal.

But short term, we pray. We’re learning to practice a stubborn trust, because God is always up to something.

work that God sees: a lesson for mothers

Posted on by August 12, 2022

Daylight is increasing rapidly now and it’s slanting into our house in ways we haven’t seen in a year.  I notice it reflecting off two pieces of old scotch tape on the ceiling. They must’ve been from the paper snowflakes that we hang at Christmastime every year…except last year I was sick and we had kittens and everything was running on minimalist survival mode. Now that I think of it, we didn’t hang snowflakes last year. So those pieces of tape have been there for at least 15 months and I never noticed.

work that God sees: a lesson for mothers

And they’re still on ceiling. Knowing they are there is an entirely different thing from taking the time to stop what I’m doing to drag the piano bench over and stand on my tiptoes to flail at small pieces of plastic that may or may not come off in one piece. Even in the magical second trimester it sounds exhausting. Not to mention dangerous.

The days are so full, there’s no time for nesting yet. I’d love to nest, to find more margin and quiet. But this season is pregnant in many ways, and just getting through the school day is enough to drive me batty.

Check this journal assignment. Print out these papers. Figure out how to multiply algebraic fractions. Find a map of Cape Horn. Check on the progress of the avocado plant, and find out exactly how toxic it is to cats who like to attack houseplants.

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I don’t mind doing school with the kids. You might think I’m nuts for saying this, but I even kind of like re-learning algebra with our oldest. It’s a game, a puzzle, a mystery with a perfect solution. Give me a quiet room and some time with a sheet of paper and a sharp pencil, and I’m a happy, geeky camper.

What I do mind is trying to help one kid with algebra on my left while helping another kid with arithmetic on my right, fielding questions from two other kids, and keeping a covert eye on another child who would rather do the potty dance than ask politely to go to the bathroom. It’s whiplash where I need white space, and it makes me the grumpiest camper in the house.

I’ve noticed that I get super peevish when they take turns asking the same question in five minute increments so I get to answer the same thing over and over and over. What’s for dinner? When’s Dad coming home? Are you going to share that chocolate?

My answers (and temper) get pretty short. Food. Later. Are you kidding?!

My other sore point lately is interruptions — which I thought we had conquered, but these things crop up again after a while until we are playing Bad Manners Whack-A-Mole — and I am quickly fried when I’m in the middle of an important talk with one kid only to have another kiddo (or two or three) come in and simultaneously ask/request/complain about something as urgent as an argument over who left the jar of peanut butter on the counter.

Before I boil over, I send two-thirds of them outside — all the math I have brainpower left for — and gut a squash for dinner. Are they ever listening? Don’t they see what I’m already doing?

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The honest answer is No, not always. And part of it, I know, is that I need to be listening closer and seeing them more, too. So much of it comes back to the mama and the environment created by her own attitude.

But another part of it is that they should not have to hear or see everything, because we are not doing our work for bragging rights, recognition, or applause. We are doing a work that God sees.

And why they went I cannot tell: some say it was to win gold. It may be so; but the noblest deeds which have been done on earth have not been done for gold. It was not for the sake of gold that the Lord came down and died, and the Apostles went out to preach the good news in all lands…

And there are heroes in our days also, who do noble deeds, but not for gold. Our discoverers did not go to make themselves rich when they sailed out one after another in to the dreary frozen seas’ nor did the ladies who went out last year to drudge in the hospitals of the East, making themselves poor, that they might be rich in noble works. And young men, too, whom you know, children, and some of them of your own kin, did they say to themselves, “How much money shall I earn?” when they went out to the war, leaving wealth, and comfort, and a pleasant home, and all that money can give, to face hunger and thirst, and wounds and death, that they might fight for their country and their Queen? No, children, there is a better thing on earth than wealth, a better thing than life itself’ and that is, to have done something before you die, for which good men may honour you, and God your Father smile upon your work.

– Charles Kingsley, The Heroes

Yes. All of that. But still…it would be nice to know that something grand is coming out of all this mundane chaos. The laundry will always need to be done, the budget will always need to be met, and the lessons (academic and otherwise) will always need to be taught. Tomorrow, we’ll wake up and do it all over again, and our kids will be one day older. And so will we. And where are we going with all of these days, anyway?

Is it someplace grand? Is it something beyond dishes and manners and algebra?

And He answers in scripture, in His own words:

Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.

– John 14:12, ESV

Honestly, I don’t think this is a very helpful answer at first because I’ve never really understood it. We will do greater things than He did? I checked the Greek, and “greater” really does mean greater: larger, older, louder, more.

Greater things than this we will do…did You really mean that? Is that what we’re doing? How is that possible?

Yes, I meant that, He says, and it’s possible for many reasons.

But for starters…well, Love, I was never a mother.

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Work That God Sees is now a much-loved book full of encouragement, laughs, Biblical wisdom, and easy recipes and projects for your busy days when you only have time to read a 3-page chapter while hiding in the bathroom. Get it here.

grace is the shelter

Posted on by February 20, 2023

The wind, this wind. It shakes the house and bows the trees. Ground is blown bare and small snowdrifts press against the edge of the house. The windows creak and the vent above the stove rattles, and the wind whistles between trees and across our chimney tops.

grace is the shelter: where we go when the wind blows

We try to be ready for power outages. We keep the laptops charged and the teapot full, and I’ve learned to use the threat of an outage to motivate the kids to clean up better before bedtime because no one wants to trip over toys or skid across books lying on the floor in the dark. In other states, these winds are recognized as hurricane force and mentioned on national news; here, schools are open and it’s business as usual — you just hang on to your car door as you open it to make sure it’s not ripped off the vehicle entirely. And you might want to drive a little slower on the highway, too, so you can get a good look at the semi truck that was blown on its side with its wheels in the air.

The wind keeps on for days and nights, and it’s 75 miles an hour outside with flying debris and a wind chill of about minus fifteen. But inside, everything is still. Six kids, all asleep. Half as many cats, also asleep. The computer hums, the teapot ticks as it’s heating, and between gusts there’s a perfect calm.

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In the morning we check for fallen trees and there aren’t any, though branches are everywhere like so much littered confetti. A couple of plastic grocery bags have flown in and attached themselves like windsocks to our trees, and across the street it looks like our neighbor has gained a shiny new trash can from probably three houses over.

We’re getting together with friends in the evening, and if they weren’t close friends — you know, the kind who are allowed to look for stuff in your fridge even though you didn’t even clean it before they came over — I might squirm a little and apologize for the mess outside. Not that the weather is my fault, but it just looks so ugly out there. Even though I have no control over it, and their yard has seen the same wind and is probably in the same shape, it’s not the first impression I’d want to make to anyone who’s never been here before.

But I don’t need to apologize, and they wouldn’t expect it. We have seen each other’s messes before. Marriage, special needs, dirty laundry, parenting kids unborn through adolescent. These are friends who are family, and we can let go of insecurities about the messes we can’t control outside, and just focus on the messes we can control inside — vacuuming, cleaning toilets, washing the dishes. Well, the dishes, I dunno…that might be asking too much.

There’s a turkey in the oven and stuffing on the counter, a green bean casserole in progress and pie crust to be made. It’s Thanksgiving at the end of winter; it’s February and we’re still thankful.

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Whipped cream is melting into late morning coffee and sweet potatoes are peeled and ready to boil. We send one kid to throw out compost and send another kid to timeout for throwing a temper tantrum. I make a note to ask my friend about different therapists and pick her brain about various issues we’re both facing. Because sometimes we can’t control the messes inside the house, either.

I’ve ruined gravy the last four times I’ve made it — too thin, boiled too long, not enough cornstarch in the world to redeem it — and our friends arrive right at that crucial juncture of constant stirring and watching for the first bubbles. I pass the task to a child with explicit instructions to only let it boil for one minute and then turn off the heat, and then run to greet friends at the door. I get halfway there and realize that child is right behind me — I stop, turn both of us around, and remind him of his task. For the love of gravy, watch this, stir it, and don’t let it boil for more than a minute. I’ll be right back andyouneedtostayhere. Double-back again to run to the door, hug, welcome, make a pile of jackets in the corner, laugh, go back to the kitchen.

And that kid has pawned off the gravy (sans instructions) to Vince, who is stirring away at what has obviously been boiling hard for a little less than three minutes and is destined to remain the consistency of half-and-half. So help me.

The house is full and a dozen kids will crowd around our table, but before we even got that far our friends asked me about the book I saved for them — that little book that is supposed to be about adoption and boundaries but is actually mostly about grace and shelter; the little book that was birthed here and grew through its childhood and adolescence and is now a big kid, not quite grown up yet but still launching off into the world of bookstores and reviews and grown-up real-bookishness.

And these friends whom we’ve shared messes with, who have been in the trenches far longer than we have, who showed us grace when we didn’t even know we needed it — these friends, we saved the first copy for them. And if I had been thinking correctly during the formatting stage (but wasn’t, because, oh, the morning sickness), there would have been a dedication page in this first edition, and it would have said what I scribbled to them on the inside cover:

To Cody and Sara: You have long been our heroes.

And I would have added: And to Larry and Sharon, who were wise and crazy enough to introduce such humble troublemakers to us.

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And now it is days later. The wind has subsided and the leftovers are pretty much gone. We have a new box of books that are shipping out all over the country in the next week. The ground outside is still a mess, and there are still messes inside, too, and I’m not just talking about the dishes…but it makes all the difference to know we are not alone. These kids, those issues, that grief, the big decision. The house shakes and the ground is blown bare, and we can still throw the door wide open. In all those storms, you are not alone. We shelter each other with grace.