Love is not the fence we build around our lives

As we hunkered down in our homes last weekend, bracing for the worst, Hurricane Harvey took an unexpected shift and unleashed it's fury on our neighbors in Houston.  As the horrific events continued to unfold, I felt sick to my stomach.  I cried real and big tears for the families caught in rising flood waters.  Images of children laying on their kitchen counters, people sitting on their rooftop waving desperately for help, the elderly sitting in a pool of floodwater waiting to be rescued flooded my Facebook newsfeed.  


I watched my beach home-away-from-home, Port Aransas, ripped to shreds from the hurricane.  The whole little town will need rebuilding, and while I don't live there or even own property in that little port of a town, I feel like part of me got ripped apart too.  Seeing the video and pictures of the wreckage was emotionally devastating.  It's amazing how places become part of who you are over time. 

On Monday, I sent Tommy off to his first day of third grade.  As I snapped his annual first-day-of-school picture, I thought about the Houston mothers who weren't sending their kiddoes off to school.  School supplies and new school clothes that will be considered one of many losses in their homes.  I wondered what they might be feeling and I felt a heavy blanket of ambivalence between guilt and gratitude.  Mostly though, I felt grief.

I have found myself uttering small prayers throughout every day as I feel a wave of sadness wash over me.  It's so close to home, and it's Texas.  They are my people.  They are me.  And I would need someone to think of me and pray for me because I know I would be crying on a Monday morning that I was supposed to send my child to school and instead was mourning the loss of our home and belongings and our everyday mundane normalcy.

Yesterday morning, I walked outside my door to an absolutely beautiful 75 degree morning, which simply does not ever happen in August in San Antonio.  The sun was shining and the sky was nearly clear.  There was an autumn-like breeze in the air that caught my breath and I stood in my driveway and closed my eyes.  It was so beautiful and lovely and I was standing there outside of my home, with car keys in hand ready to head off to work on a normal day.  I prayed for Houston and I prayed that some wife and mom just like me could feel some measure of comfort and peace in the same moment I was taking in the glory of my morning.  I felt overwhelmingly blessed and so undeserving. 

I've taken so much pride in watching my city and state come together to help one another.  There has been an abundance of people showing up, taking care, ready to help and chip in.  Our own Texas-based grocery store, HEB, had a disaster relief team in place the moment it was clear for them to get to the affected areas to offer food, supplies, banking services and medical attention.  Friends with boats have headed there to rescue those stuck in rising waters.  The very company I work for, created a donation station and our customers and employees showed up with water, food, and stuffed animals for the kids to deliver to Houston and the outlying areas. 

Churches and schools, radio stations, musicians, banks, stores - everyone is in this.  And while what has happened to our dear brothers and sisters is absolutely devastating, what is happening right behind it is glorious.  Everywhere you go, someone is helping, volunteering, and putting something together to help everyone.  All of it feels so much like the body of Christ I can hardly stand it.  People helping others, loving on those in need - it doesn't get more Jesus than that and I see His light in this everywhere. 

Our little family is donating, volunteering, and praying together every night.  Would you join us in prayer especially for Port Aransas, Rockport, and all the small towns outside of the Houston area that have suffered greatly as well?  All of us praying, giving, doing, going - it really does make a difference.  Let's keep it up - we have a long road ahead of us to love on our neighbors as we help them rebuild.

Recently, I've been listening to Nichole Nordeman's new album, Every Mile Mattered.  She has a beautiful and tender song called "Anywhere We Are," that feels so fitting for anyone who is going through any kind of storm.  If you are in need of some comfort tonight, I hope you have a listen and that her words and melody bless your heart and soul in all the places that need a bit of tenderness in all you are facing.

Sunday Thoughts

For three Saturdays in a row now, I've made our bed.  I'm not really sure why though because I've never quite seen the point in making ones bed to only use it again that very night.  It seems silly to go through the motions of tucking in sheets and fluffing up pillows and making it look nice, only for all of that to end up on the ground.  In fact, people who make their beds on a daily basis baffle me.  Please tell me, why go through the trouble of doing that every day?

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I've decided that being a grown up is incredibly lame.  A few weeks ago, I woke up to a flat tire which then led to the purchase of four brand new ones and a front and rear break job for my car.  I also had to buy a plane ticket and book a hotel room for a conference next month and so we basically said goodbye to all of our savings.  That particular weekend ended with a trip to the mailbox where I was lucky enough to receive a jury summons.  And I have no issue doing my civic duties, but I do feel like my name sure gets drawn an awful lot in comparison to others I know.  This is my fourth time to serve and my husband has been summoned once.  Last time, I actually had to serve on a jury and at this exact time in my life, I don't have any emotional space for a trial so I'm kind of hoping for a long day of book-reading and pretending I'm an introvert.

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It's weird how life brings people in and out of your lives.  Friendships that fizzled or failed or just stopped for one reason or another, reconnect.  I found myself at breakfast on Saturday morning with a gal who I lost touch with years ago.  We both find ourselves feeling the exact same feelings but her in her singleness and mine in my marriage.  It was good to cry together over coffee and eggs.  Somewhere between the french toast and the tears, I was reminded that we are all struggling with something, and we are only alone if we let ourselves be. 

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My son went to church dressed like this today. 

There was a point earlier in motherhood, where I wouldn't have dreamed of letting my child walk out the door in this condition.  He told me the other day that wearing pants makes him feel like a man and I'm pretty sure he feels six feet tall in a pair of jeans.   He asks to wear button down shirts and he has asked for more ties and this kid - he is something.  I'm learning to relax and roll with it, because he is teaching me how.  Isn't that funny?  We have kids and think that we're the teachers, when really, they're the ones that end up teaching us.

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I am preparing for the Brave On conference with Red Tent Living next month where I am going to sit on a panel and talk about self-care.  This comes in the middle of the year where I have battled with self-harm, depression, loneliness, pain and addiction in ways that I haven't in a long time.  And I don't understand how God even has me in this specific role, but I'm hoping to find some kind of words to share that don't leave me blubbering on stage, but not feeling like a fraud either. 

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My heart can't hardly bear the news.  I find myself sitting in disbelief that so much hatred and racism exists today in our country because I have been so sheltered from it being from where I am.  I grew up with friends of all colors of skin and only learned about segregation and prejudice in lessons in school about slavery and Martin Luther King and Adolf Hitler and the Holocaust.  I'm just sick.  As a white person who has lived in ignorance for so long, I almost feel embarrassed for all that I've been blind to and unaware of.  I don't know what to do or what to say or how to be a part of something that can offer real change.  I'm so, so grieved.  I'm grieved not only that there exists such evil hatred and white supremacy bullshit in this country, but that I've been so blind and ignorant that it's always been there and I haven't ever seen it because I've grown up in my own measures of safety and privilege. 

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Here I sit on a Sunday night surrounded by baskets of unfolded laundry, and Legos that my boys didn't put away.  I feel chaos in my home, my marriage, my country.  Things feel unsettled and broken and dug open, as if a digger has plowed up our front lawn.  And I don't know what to fix or where to start, or where all of the trying to put anything together will even lead me.  But, I can make my bed.  And I guess that's a start.

When your marriage is in the garage

It was supposed to be my space.  I wanted a little nook with a comfy chair and a small table with a lamp where I could retreat to.  A space to read and write and journal and cry without policing my children’s play or having to stop and search through Lego’s to find Batman’s helmet for the 127^th time.  Todd built a room divider for me and it seemed to be the best choice to make something from scratch as room dividers cost a lot of money.  We came up with the idea to use fence posts that would be screwed together with hinges so it could bend the way it needed to and give me the privacy I wanted for my little nook. 

He made it exactly the way I wanted.  The posts were painted the creamy white I liked with dark hardware on the outside.  I only got to admire it for a short time before it went crashing down to the floor and broke.  His solution was to brace the bottom of it with a larger piece of wood because the balance was off somehow.  He took raw wooden blocks and attached them to the bottom and I was immediately upset with it, because now the divider didn’t look pretty.  It was awkward and these weird stabilizing blocks on the bottom weren’t even painted.  In a matter of days, it only took a slight bumping of my elbow to the divider and it went crashing down to the floor again.  One panel broke completely off again, wooden splinters sticking out from where the screws were ripped from it in the fall. 

He told me he would figure out a different solution and propped the broken panel by the other pieces that were still standing.  I suggested calling someone, looking up a video, asking someone for help, like his brother who is a pretty talented carpenter.  He wouldn’t ask for help.  I guess he didn’t think he needed any.

Several weeks went by and I got angry every time I walked into my room and saw the broken divider.  He even got the equipment he needed to fix it, but it stayed by the door in our entryway and the dividers stayed as they were in our room.  Broken. 

I got angry about them yesterday. Really angry.  Angrier than a person should get about a faulty made-from-scratch room divider.  I told him the dividers were broken and to just get them out of our room.  He attempted one last time to fix them somehow by taking more raw wooden braces to try and fix on the other side.  The fix made the piece look even more unattractive.  I told him it was a bad idea.  The fence posts weren’t going to work.  It was broken.  I wanted them out of the room.  I was done looking at them.  I was done with the idea of even wanting to have them any longer. 

He was noticeably hurt from my demands, but he said nothing, and silently took them apart and put them in the garage.  And I cried later.  I cried a lot.  More than a person should cry about a faulty made-from-scratch room divider. 

And I realized that I wasn’t crying over the divider.  Somewhere along the way, the room divider became a visual of our marriage.  It’s off balance.  It’s awkward.  It’s been attempted to be repaired with quick and sloppy fixes.  He says that he will do things or fix things and doesn’t follow through in what he says he will do and the room divider was a tangible reminder of what feels broken in our relationship.  My heart looks much like the splintered wood where the screws had been ripped out after the fall.  And I don’t know the condition of his because he doesn’t it show it to me. 

All I know, is that our marriage feels like it’s in the garage.  It’s out there with the toys and clothes my boys have outgrown, the bicycles we never ride and leftover paint from other more successful DIY projects.  If it doesn’t get fixed, it will probably get tossed out as most things in the garage usually do.