October 16 = Duty Day

Zachary had duty today so the kids and I were on our own.  I decided we would all go downstairs and I would read while the kids played.  It kind of worked:

Later, we picked up pizza for the Mids and had one of the squad dinners on campus:

I love pictures of sleeping babies.

Here's the highlights of my reading today:

From a chapter titled "Don't Carpe Diem"

Every time I'm out with my kids, this seems to happen: 

An older woman stops us, puts her hand over her heart and says something like "Oh-- enjoy every moment.  This time goes by so fast."  Everywhere I go, someone is telling me to seize the moment, raise my awareness, be happy, enjoy every second, etc., etc., etc.

I know that this advice comes from a good place and is offered with the very best of intentions.  But I have finally allowed myself to admit that it just doesn't work for me.  It bugs me.  This CARPE DIEM message makes me paranoid and panicky.  Especially during this phase of my life while I'm raising young kids.  Being told in a million different ways that if I'm not in a constant state of profound gratitude and ecstasy, I'm doing something wrong.

I think parenting young children (and old ones too, I've heard) is a little like climbing Mount Everest.  Brave, adventurous souls try it because they've heard there's magic in the climb.  They try because they believe that finishing, or even attempting the climb, is an impressive accomplishment.  They try because during the climb, if they allow themselves to pause and lift their eyes and minds from the pain and drudgery, the views are breathtaking.  They try because even though it hurts and it's hard, there are moments that make it worth the hard.  These moments are so intense and unique that many people who reach the top start planning, almost immediately, to climb again.  Even though any climber will tell you that most of the climb is treacherous, exhausting, killer.  That they cried most of the way up.  And so I think that if there were people stationed, say, every thirty feet along Mount Everest yelling to the climbers "ARE YOU ENJOYING YOURSELF!? IF NOT, YOU SHOULD BE!  ONE DAY YOU'LL BE SORRY YOU DIDN'T!  TRUST US! IT'LL BE OVER TOO SOON!  CARPE DIEM!" those well-meaning nostalgic cheerleaders might be physically thrown from the mountain.

Now I'm not suggesting that the sweet old ladies who tell me to ENJOY MYSELF be thrown from a mountain.  They are wonderful ladies, clearly.  But last week, a woman approached me in the Target line and said the following: "Sugar, I hope you are enjoying this.  I loved every single second of parenting my two girls.  Every single moment.  These days go by so fast."  At that particular point in time, Amma was wearing a bra she had swiped from the cart and sucking a lollipop she undoubtedly found on the ground.  She also had shoplifted clip-on neon feathers stuck in her hair.  She looked exactly like a contestant from Toddlers and Tiaras.  A losing contestant.  I couldn't find Chase anywhere and Tish was sucking the pen on the credit card machine WHILE the woman in front of me was trying to use it.  And so I just looked at the woman, smiled, and said, "Thank you.  Yes.  Me too.  I am enjoying every single moment.  Especially this one.  Yes.  Thank you."

Oh my goodness- this part of the book has changed my life and I couldn't even remember (a month and a half later) where I had read it.

"Clearly, Carpe Diem doesn't work for me. I can't even carpe fifteen minutes in a row, so a whole diem is out of the question.  Here's what does work for me.

There are two different types of time.  Chronos time is what we live in.  It's regular time.  It's one minute at a time.  It's ten excruciating minutes in the Target line time, four screaming minutes in time-out time, two hours until Daddy gets home time.  Chronos is the hard, slow-passing time we parents often live in.

Then there's Kairos-time.  Kairos is God's time.  It's time outside of time.  It's metaphysical time.  Kairos is those magical moments in which time stands still.  I have a few of those moments each day, and I cherish them.  Like when I actually stop what I'm doing and really look at Tish.  I notice how perfectly smooth and brownish her skin is.  I notice the curves or her teeny elf mouth and her almond brown eyes, and I breathe in her soft Tishy smell.  In these moments I see that her mouth is moving, but I can't hear her because all I can think is: This is the first time I've really seen Tish all day and my God- she is so beautiful.  Kairos.

... These Kairos moments leave as fast as they come but I mark them.  I say the word Kairos in my head each time I leave Chronos.  At the end of the day, I don't remember exactly what my Kairos moments were, but I remember I had them.  That makes the pain of the daily parenting climb worth it.  If I had a couple of Kairos moments, I call the day a success.  Carpe a couple of Kairoses a day.  Good enough for me."

Then there was a little chapter about having a third kid... saving this for the future:

"Then the third arrives.  And as you hold her for the first time, you notice that your hands are steady and you're breathing easy.  The all-consuming fire is gone.  Love is just... love.  You don't feel threatened anymore by her or the world.  Because all of a sudden you see in her teeny little face that she is the world.  And you understand that you're not her protector anyway; she has One of Those.  You're just her teacher.  You're just borrowing her for a little while.  You decide not to spend so much of your precious time begging God to shield her from the world.  Seems silly, all of a sudden.  Because she, God, the world, they are all mixed up together inside that new skin.  

Then, as you count her tiny fingers with yours, you check your heart and find no guilt there.  Because you understand that you are about to present your older children with the greatest gift of their lives.  Who else but a sibling travels with you from the start of life's path to the bitter end?  And you know, now, that if your first and second born spend the next few months relearning that They're Not the Center of the Universe, well, good then.  It's an important thing to know and it's a lesson best learned early.  So there's another gift to them, courtesy of you, and this littlest one.

You understand that things will get tougher when she comes home.  You will sweat and curse more at the grocery store.  You will have less money to buy her the right things.  You will look far less graceful at playdates.  But you will care less.  Because you have listened to and spoken to enough honest parents to understand that we're all in this together.  And there is no prize for most composed. So you've decided to stop making parenthood harder by pretending it's not hard.

You look down at her, your third, and you think, what's so different about you?  But before you finish asking the question, you know the answer.  And your heart says to hers: Oh. You're not different from the other two.  I am.  I'm learning how to love without so much fear.  How to relax a bit in this brutiful [not a typo- she combines beautiful and brutal and makes the word brutiful] world.  How to let go and trust.  You are helping me breathe easier, you three.  One at a time and together."

Yep... I'm going to keep going.  I loved this because of my little Liam:

"We have to actually believe that our kids are okay.  

I know.  Tough.  But it can be done.  We can start believing by erasing the idea that education is a race.  It's not.  Education is like Christmas.  We're all just opening our gifts, one at a time.  And it is a fact that each and every child has a bright shiny present with her name on it, waiting there underneath the tree.  God wrapped it up and he'll let us know when it's time to unwrap it.  In the meantime, we must believe that our children are okay.  Every last one of them. The straight-A ones and the ones with autism and the naughty ones and the chunky ones and the shy ones and the loud ones and the so-far-behind ones.  

Because here's what I believe: a child can survive a teacher or other children accidentally suggesting that he's not okay as long as when he comes home, he looks at his mama and knows by her face that he really is okay.  Because that's all they're asking isn't it?  

Mama, am I okay?  

In the end, a child will call the rest of the world liars and believe his mama.  So when he asks us with his eyes and heart if he's okay, let's tell him: Yes baby.  You are okay.  You are more than okay.  You are my dream come true.  You are everything I've ever wanted and I wouldn't trade one you for a million anybody elses.  This part of life, this school part, might be hard for you.  But that's okay, because it's just one part of life.  And because we can do hard things, together.  We are a team.  And I am so grateful to be on your team."

Okay I'm tired of typing now but.  I just loved reading this and knowing that my little Liam is going to be okay.