Learning to Juggle...When You're Not Even a Clown

Oh, life is fun sometimes. By "fun" I mean frustrating, angering, tiring, depressing, and difficult. Not sleeping much adds to the delights of everything else that's going on.

I find people to be the most maddening things in the world. Maddening because they are what life is about, but sometimes I wish I could live without most of them. I find the majority of humans to be utterly confusing and selfish. Certainly I am not a very nice creature myself generally. But I must say that the people who I dislike the most easily are those who are inconsistent. Really.

For example, a person, call him Joe, says he loves someone, say Mary. Joe takes care of Mary, paying her bills, making sure she has food to eat. Yet Joe rarely treats Mary with the common respect with which you would expect him to treat strangers. He belittles her, picks on her (under the guise of humor), and sometimes even tells her to her face she isn't worth anything. Oh, but Joe LOVES Mary.

Worse, Joe claims to be a Christian. No one can really say he ISN'T a Christian. Indeed, he attends church regularly, is an upstanding citizen, and is generally a "nice" person. Truly, it isn't fair to accuse Joe of not being a Christian. Yet, the way he treats Mary is NOT Christlike. He treats her like a lesser being. He doesn't celebrate her talents (unless they are talents he is interested in himself), and makes little effort to support her acivities. But Joe is a Christian and he LOVES Mary.

Inconsistency. I despise it, although surely I, too, am guilty of it.

Add inconsistent humanity to being a wife, being a mother, and recovering from labor and delivery. Today, I need to wash diapers (cloth ones, naturally), not too difficult a task. But I would much rather sit around eating Reeses and watching TV. I don't much feel like cooking, but someone should, so we don't starve. And I am wearing these jeans, doggonit, even though when I sit down they somehow begin to cut off circulation in my belly. Who knew they could even DO that?

All complaining aside, I love my baby. I love my husband. Maybe God allows irritating people in our lives to teach us what NOT to be. If I love my husband and daughter, and claim to be a Christian, I must treat them the way I would be treated myself. Not only MUST I do this, but I WANT to do this.

So, as I unzip my jeans and exhale for the first time in twenty minutes, I resolve to make a GIGANTIC effort to treat others with kindness, whether they are good, bad, or ugly OR inconsistent!!!! Because I am no less flawed than any of them, just differently flawed.

Not Empty Now....

Today, I keep thinking about the scene in Little Women where Jo tells Professer Behr (sp?) that she is NOT married, and that she cares about him. He tells her he is poor, his hands are empty, and he has nothing to give her. She says, "Not empty now." I keep thinking that before I had Mae I felt like part of me was missing. I know God is enough for me, but here on this earth I felt like I had an emptiness. And today all I keep thinking is, "Not empty now." My arms and heart are full. Sigh. :-)

Last night during one of our feeding sessions, I was thinking about things I have learned or beein thinking about in the past week. Naturally, once I went back to sleep I forgot most of the things I had though of, but here are a few:

1. New Vocabulary: I have begun using words like "perineum", "episiotomy", and "areola" like I made those words up myself. I was also considering how, before I got pregnant I didn't understand the pregnancy counting system. How far along are you? Weeks? Can I have that in months? During my pregnancy, it became totally natural to say, "I am so many weeks." And I had to laugh a little when people would say, "What's that in months?" Funny how words and numbers change when you have a baby.

2. Sleep is FAR less important before you have a baby: I have always been one who needed a little bit more sleep than other people. I don't function as well without it, and I tend to get sick really easily if I am overly tired. NOW I have realized I CAN function with far less sleep than I thought, and also that I cannot skip any now or I possibly won't make it.

3. God made babies to look familiar for a reason: I keep considering that Mae just looks so FAMILIAR. This is probably because she looks vaguely like me or Daniel or members of our families. But I think God made her look like someone I KNOW, because then I cannot stop looking at her. I study her. She is someone I LOVE so much, even though she was just born and I do not even know her personality totally yet.

Maybe motherhood is always a thoughtful experience. I know it's a learning experience, and it is definitely a growing experience.

Quote: "Her eyes just look right into you. Well, she does have a poet for a mother." ~Lori McCulloch

Miss Pretty Pretty

Well, Mae was NOT born on her due date. The feelings of impatience and anxiety reached a peak on that day, July 4th. BUT we did not have to wait very long. At 4 am on July 5th, I woke up with contractions, which Daniel and I timed at about 8 minutes apart. So, we got ready and went to the hospital at about 7:30. At first, they weren't sure I was going to get to stay there, since I still wasn't very dilated. After walking, waiting, and being generally uncomfortable, they finally decided I was making sufficient progress.

Mae was born at 8:16 pm. She weighed 6 pounds, 14.6 ounces. She was 19 inches long, and her head was 13 inches around. When I first saw her, I was completely overwhelmed. I couldn't believe at first that I truly had had a BABY come out of me. I couldn't help but cry when I looked into her beautiful blue eyes. She is PERFECT!! Her hair is red gold, and she is so beautiful.

Since her birth, I haven't had much sleep, but she is completely worth the extra effort. I miss her while she is sleeping in the other room and I love talking to her, and watching her make little faces back at me.

I think I am still in a love-drunk stupor about her. I can hardly believe she is mine to keep, and am so thankful that someone was given to me who loves and depends on me completely. I pray I can live up to this beautiful task of motherhood.

I Wish You Every Beautiful Thing

When we found out we were having a baby I was so happy. I read over that sentence, and realized that that is probably one of the most obvious statements someone can make. What's more, the word "happy" is far to shallow to even approach the wealth of emotions that flooded through me then, and even now.

Having children has always been my dream. It was a dream with dimension. I dreamed of it, like any little girl might dream of being a princess or a ballerina, or, if they were tomboys, maybe they dreamed of being astronauts or firemen. Either way, this was my fantasy in the way that those other fantasies are-- somewhat unrealistic, all shiny, all happy. Yet, simultaneously, I recognized the struggles and effort that go always into having and raising children. Even as I acknowledged these issues, I knew I wanted them for my own. This is why, deep down, and after everything else, I knew that what I most wanted to be when I grew up was a mommy. All other "career" goals were secondary to this idea, an dream I almost never doubted would someday come true.

So, when I found out I was having a baby, I was more than happy. Several months later, we discovered this precious baby was a girl. How much happier could I be? I cannot wait to have her, and take care of her, and dress her in lovely clothes, and surround her with beautiful things. The beauty I feel when I think of her can't really be mimicked with clothes, blankets, or toys, but I want those things for her. I want her to have every beautiful thing there is, including the very best love I can give her.