Five Minute Friday: Last

Every Friday for nearly three years writers have gathered here for a kind of free write flash mob. We all spend five minutes writing on the same topic for just five minutes. And then we link up at Lisa-Jo Baker's site to share our thoughts.  Today's prompt is Last. Here we go:

The forks sang out as they were passed around the table and little bodies fidgeted in the chairs too big for them as we ate our last dinner together before school started and I had to share my children with too many people and allow them to have adventures where I wouldn’t be there to feel their playful hands slip into mine from time to time. It was the end of our last day of summer. We indulged in too much t.v. and a lot of free time with our friends. It was the last day of freedom before homework and bedtimes would for the first time, strangle our days and add hurry to them that we have never known. It was my last chance to tell them to remember who they are. I told them that no matter what happened to remember where the belong, remember what they were called to. They don’t have to look too far. I reminded them of why they bear the names that they do. We described the meanings and how each name we handed them was purposeful. We laughed and smiled and enjoyed. Then that hurry caught up to us and I rushed my daughter, budding with so much maturity and beauty, off to her 7th grade open house. I enjoyed the last bedtime routine with them. And closed my eyes that night, knowing that in the morning I would open them to so many firsts.

Ready to Go!!

Walking to the Bus

First Day of Preschool

Letter's to Tuck in Your Pocket

Photo Credit

Today I link up with Ruth Povey and Sabrina Fowles for their Letter's To series.

Well, my excited, giddy and somewhat anxious children, your first day of walking the school halls is upon us. Tomorrow I will walk you to the bus or drop you off at your new preschool and you will begin a new adventure with new friends and sadly, new foes. You will find your mind opened, stretched and bombarded too. So here is a little note, a blessing, a talisman that I wish for you to tuck in your pocket and in your heart. And when you come home, know that you have stepped again into that world where no matter what went on at school, you belong.

Dear child,

You enter a world where you will be told you can be anything you want and where many competing voices will attempt to define who you are. My prayer is not that you will become the anything offered by those who do not know you well, but instead you will strive towards the one thing you are called to become by the One who fashioned every fiber of your being and who has counted every hair on your head. My prayer is not that you become the labels that others are so willing to slap on your chest. My core hope is that you become the name we gave you and told you about since you were a baby. Your life, though not yet lived, is already recorded in God’s book. He has already seen your failures, and He loves you still. Dear child, walk the halls of that school with your head high, because you are called, you are named and you are loved. And when you return home each afternoon, I will be here, having prepared throughout the day while you were away to remind you of your call, your name and that you are deeply cherished and loved for who you already are.

Love Mom

Five Minute Friday: Small

I'm linking up with Lisa-Jo Baker for Five Minute Friday. The prompt is Small and though I can't say I stayed strictly in the time limit, I found there was a lot to be said.

Photo Credit

There is a part of me that feels small.

She’s the messy me that I’ve never had the courage to face. She shrinks away and tucks herself in corners of my heart because her story is painful and she carries much of what is too terrible to experience and yet stay sane for the day to day.

Now I live in safety, but she still lives back there in uncertainty and fear. The past bleeds forward so often that numb is my favorite state and though the highway won’t carry me there, my crazy coping methods will.

I keep the small where she was told to stay with my anger and self-hate so big and scary that no one dares mess when Mom goes there. Every uncomfortable moment in the present drags those old feelings of shame, rejection, helplessness, longing and fear forward like a child’s soiled blankie that never leaves her side. Before I even know what that feeling is, the anger is flying at it hard, slamming it back down and the rage is attempting to silence whatever it was that opened the door for the messy me to be seen.  I don’t feel like I even know what hit me. I’m flooded with shock when I survey the blast zone that I create in those out of control moments.But most of all, I feel numb.

I have worked hard for years to get to the bottom of all the destruction caused by my rage. I think, now, I see it.

I’ll find freedom by seeing it. By seeing the messy me.

By letting the small become big.

By taking the safety of the present and offering it as a gift to the past.

The discomfort of memory and emotion must be something I am willing to stay in for long enough to bring Christ to that moment. Yes. The discomfort of embracing the messy me is what I must be willing to endure, so that her finding comfort may finally make way for her finding love.

Today, I had an argument with an overemotional preteen whose anger often blasts away like her mommy’s. I felt my value taking a hit, and it was a familiar agony from my teen years. My anger marched in, took position and lowered its weapons. Then, I backed away. I fled. In retreat I asked myself, what am I uncomfortable with? Then I saw her disappointment and frustration. I was not comfortable empathizing with those powerful emotions. So that’s exactly what I did. I returned. I showed empathy. Peace settled and there was no blast zone to gaze over tonight.

There is a part of me that feels small, but hope looms large that she’ll finally be free.

photo credit: muffinbasket via photopin cc

Five Minute Friday: Lonely

It's Friday and I'm linking up with Lisa-Jo Baker at Five Minute Friday. The prompt is Lonely and we get 5 minutes to share our unedited thoughts. So here it goes.

5 full backpacks stand smartly against the wall and piles of new clothes have rotated through the laundry routine. Shoes still wait in the store, but soon we will venture out and pick several pair to bring home and wear the life out of. My kids are going to school. Big deal, I imagine people may say. The ads have been telling us that for the last month. But my house is not used to this August frenzy. We have home schooled for 7 years. I’ve been a stay at home mom since #2 was 6 months. That was 10 years ago. Starting in a week and a half (12 days my son would tell you), my kids will walk through the halls of the local schools, and meet new friends, and bring home schoolwork and fund raisers. And I will soon acquire 3 days a week of time alone. Necessary time. Cleaning time. Healing time. Resting time. And I know that lonely time will sneak in there too. It always has in these seasons when I find myself home more. It’s been so long and I fear the lonely. I pretend it won’t come. I imagine the things I’ll do. But the lonely will sneak up on me in all those silent hours. And my heart, like a slate will stand empty before the Lord, and it’s in the quiet I imagine he will write the most. It is when I’m at rest or doing chores that he will begin to script out a new direction for me, a new plan, a new identity. So I pray I can endure the lonely. For life will get its start there.

 photo credit: redagainPatti via photopin cc