Lord, That I May See

So, Turtle has successfully entered a very integral stage of childhood. She is able to identify and point out (enthusiastically!) her bodily functions upon sight. Most specifically, the kind that is most visible in her diaper or her little potty. The other day, we were driving home from the park, which had been a bit muddy. She was sitting in the carseat holding a big ball that is a favorite and sometimes has to accompany us in the car. She accidentally dropped it down onto her sneakers where she began kicking it. Soon I heard a little surprised voice coming from the back: "Poo! Poo!" Glancing back I see her, wide-eyed, pointing down at the ball -- which is covered with smears of mud from her shoes. I laughed at her. I couldn't help it! Great association, don't you think? That reminds me of a 3yr old boy that was in the primary classroom at a Montessori school that I was an assistant in before Turtle was born. This little boy, short and goggle-eyed, with glasses th...

My baby is a big girl now. Yesterday, early in the morning, fresh from sleep and covered in smiles, Turtle politely decided not to nurse. For this past month, our only nursing snuggle time has been that lazy time just upon awaking. For me, this was perfect. I did not have to wear nursing cl0thes during the day and she was not dependant on me for bedtime or naptime any more, but I could still have our morning snuggle -- something I am more attached to than she is. Now, that is all over. She's a big girl now. She can drink from a glass, draw pictures, can climb into the stroller and close buckles and open Ziploc bags and wash windows and wipe her tray and blow out candles. And she doesn't need my milk. Not any more. I'll still offer it, when I get her from her crib, so irresistable and warm in the mornings. Maybe, out of habit, or polite indulgence, she will nuzzle a bit, casually. Then, in the warmth of my bed, I can grab a few seconds of what I'm missing. The smell of h...

What a pregnant woman needs to hear sometimes: "My dearest daughter, We must not be unjust and require from ourselves what is not in ourselves. When troubled in body and health, we must not exact from our souls anything more than acts of submission and acceptance of our suffering, and holy unions of our will to the good pleasure of God. . . .As for exterior actions, we must manage and do them as well as we can, and be satisfied with doing them, even if without heart, languidly and heavily. " ~St. Francis de Sales

It might be true that the sun rises regularly because he never gets tired of rising. His routine might be due, not to lifelessness, but to a rush of life. The thing I mean can be seen, for instance, in children, when they find some game or joke that they specially enjoy. A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do it again"; and the grown up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown up people are not strong enough to exault in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exault in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning "do it again" to the sun; and every evening "do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them...

Walking into the church this weekend for confession took over 10 minutes. Turtle loves to walk and is still so proud to have accomplished what she worked up to for so many months. So, instead of carrying her, which would have gotten us there quicker and with a potential for having to wait in line a shorter time, we walked, hand-in-hand. We stopped to look at all the cars passing on the road we walked beside. And she exclaimed: "Car! Car!" We sauntered down the walk by the rectory. Her little sharp eyes scanned everything. The sunshine lay bright and warm on the grass and concrete. We crossed the street. This "wasn't safe" enough, so Turtle got carried for just a minute. We walked down another sidewalk. Turtle slowly patted the sunwarmed stone wall to her right as she toddled by. Then, up a couple steps. Oh, there were daisies! As tall as Turtle! She sniffed one, then another. And, more! Yellow ones this time! These flowers were touched, very gently. A sign, just...

"Writing can be a creative and invigorating way to make our lives available to ourselves... we may discover that the better we tell our stories, the better we will want to live them." ~Fr. Henri J. M. Nouwen

Some days you think you just can't take one more thing: can't change one more dirty diaper, can't swat one more of the spiders invading your house, get through one more day without air conditioning, can't clean up one more mess, or deal with one more tantrum or make one more dinner when you can't think or stand straight for the tiredness. You want to run away deep deep into a cool forest with a blue lake and never, ever come home. You want to scream or stomp or just sit down and cry. And then, as you stumble to your hour of adoration, exhausted, frazzled, having wolfed down your dinner after coaxing a squirmy crabby child into the bed, and wonder how in the world you will sit in a hard pew and get quiet and pray when all the turmoil of thoughts in your head are bitter and dissatisfied and churning and churning in a mass of self-pity and frustration . . . Then, after a futile, restless half hour, there comes, in an instant of quiet clarity in your head: "Give M...

When you're 15 mos. old, Frustration is: -- being unable to buckle yourself into your own carseat -- wanting to eat the scrambled eggs off your mother's plate that are exactly the same as the ones on yours, and being told "no" -- being stopped from taking every single library book in your sight out of its spot on the shelf -- having to share a big basket full of crayons with the other children in the library -- the doll stroller that just won't fit behind the table -- the mother who won't get you the hard green berries that you see on the blackberry bush from whence you just ate 50 black ones. It must be hard to be 15 mos old with strong desires, single-minded drives and an almost non-existent vocabulary to make it through the day. The mother of the 15 month old clings to this thought as she struggles to understand that a strong will, determination, and knowledge of one's needs are blessed, God-given traits that will stand her daughter in good stead as sh...