Sometimes [actually, oftentimes] I will listen to a song over and over and over. It's how I learn a song so that I can sing it myself, which begins essentially with knowing it well...knowing it so well that I do not have to think about knowing it. Still, with each repeat, I hear something new...something I hadn't heard before....and that new insight then becomes a part of the song from that point on. Sometimes I hear something during the umpteenth listen that I surely should've gotten all along. Such as after singing what seemed a typical woman done wrong song turned out to be, quite atypical, as the woman is Mrs. Claus and the wrong-doer is Santa himself. [I highly recommend Jason Robert Brown's Songs for a New World...hilarious, inspirational, and a terrific vocal workout all rolled into one!]
Last Sunday in church, I realized how liturgy does the same thing. I was a guest at my friend's Lutheran church, and the liturgy there is rich. As we collectively prayed The Lord's Prayer, new images came to my mind as we stated "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us". The mutuality of God's forgiveness of us and our forgiveness of our neighbor somehow became more real. The older I get, the more I crave liturgy. It's an avenue to hear the gospel in a manner that feels both more at home and yet new at the same time. And sometimes it helps me "get" something that it seems I should have grasped from the get go.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Motherhood as Noncompetitive Sport
A friend of mine mentioned her discomfort with "mommy group conversations"; the "advice talk" about getting your kids to bed, to eat well, to get dressed, to use the potty is plain daunting and leaves her feeling disconnected more often than not. She is a mother of an almost 6 year old, so it's not as if she's without need of advice. Still, she'd rather turn to a book. And while I've read my share of books to raise my son, I realize that I've benefited most from a particular genre of "mommy group".
Just yesterday, I had a mommy conversation after our boys jumped on the bus. After sharing my horror at something wildly inappropriate my son had recently exclaimed, one mom simply said:"he's a boy" and "boys do that for shock value". She laughed and helped me laugh and begin to let it go. As the mother of three boys, she knows what she's talking about. And, as a fellow Christian, her advice to "let it go" has credibility. Another friend of mine and I have discussed over the years how our children sleep with us. For Western parenting, this is, as they say, "not good". But she and I are inching our way into reclaiming our adult only beds; our methods are imperfect and our progress occurs in fits and starts. And we walk alongside each other both celebrating the starts and encouraging each other in the fits.
Mommy groups have become a competitive sport. Mom conversations on playgrounds and school drop-off points are all too often punctuated by one-upmanship: "Oh, my four year old daughter is reading chapter books!" "Oh, my son was potty trained at two!". I leave these mommy conversations feeling exhausted and alone. I am drawn to the real and the genuine struggle of motherhood...the challenging times, the stuff that's not in books, the moments the developmental theorists left on their analytical cutting room floors. And it is the mom's that share in this journey that give me energy and courage. They help me know I am not alone in my worries or my imperfections.
My son potty trained only when we "really had to"; we had a preschool deadline [he's very much like his mom....more productive with deadlines!]. He is just beginning to be confident in his reading at age 7 1/2, and he didn't go to sleep in his "big boy bed" until he was 6 3/4. When I beam with joy that my son says he "likes reading" or when I celebrate my ability to have an hour or two to myself after Gabe goes to sleep by himself in his own bed, my "mommy group" really "gets it". And, similarly, I really understand and celebrate with them in their moments of triumph. And our celebrations seem both more credible and more real because we have walked alongside each other in the muck. I say, three cheers to mommy groups with the motto: we "mommy group" to know we are not alone.
Just yesterday, I had a mommy conversation after our boys jumped on the bus. After sharing my horror at something wildly inappropriate my son had recently exclaimed, one mom simply said:"he's a boy" and "boys do that for shock value". She laughed and helped me laugh and begin to let it go. As the mother of three boys, she knows what she's talking about. And, as a fellow Christian, her advice to "let it go" has credibility. Another friend of mine and I have discussed over the years how our children sleep with us. For Western parenting, this is, as they say, "not good". But she and I are inching our way into reclaiming our adult only beds; our methods are imperfect and our progress occurs in fits and starts. And we walk alongside each other both celebrating the starts and encouraging each other in the fits.
Mommy groups have become a competitive sport. Mom conversations on playgrounds and school drop-off points are all too often punctuated by one-upmanship: "Oh, my four year old daughter is reading chapter books!" "Oh, my son was potty trained at two!". I leave these mommy conversations feeling exhausted and alone. I am drawn to the real and the genuine struggle of motherhood...the challenging times, the stuff that's not in books, the moments the developmental theorists left on their analytical cutting room floors. And it is the mom's that share in this journey that give me energy and courage. They help me know I am not alone in my worries or my imperfections.
My son potty trained only when we "really had to"; we had a preschool deadline [he's very much like his mom....more productive with deadlines!]. He is just beginning to be confident in his reading at age 7 1/2, and he didn't go to sleep in his "big boy bed" until he was 6 3/4. When I beam with joy that my son says he "likes reading" or when I celebrate my ability to have an hour or two to myself after Gabe goes to sleep by himself in his own bed, my "mommy group" really "gets it". And, similarly, I really understand and celebrate with them in their moments of triumph. And our celebrations seem both more credible and more real because we have walked alongside each other in the muck. I say, three cheers to mommy groups with the motto: we "mommy group" to know we are not alone.
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