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| Nancy: Writer since TODAY |
I'm beginning this now because I need something to be DONE, as in "finished" or "completed", at the end of this day. When I was a student, I could complete the homework. When I was a teacher, I could be finished with the class. Now that I am a stay-at-home-mother, it seems that my work is constantly UNDONE. The laundry is my best example of this. It. never. ever. ends. And some days that is fine. But some days it feels personal.
Some days I can see that laundry is just part of being human, everyone does it since the beginning of time, circle of life and all that. But Some Days:
Some days I can see that laundry is just part of being human, everyone does it since the beginning of time, circle of life and all that. But Some Days:
I just cannot believe I struggle to achieve something as basic as clean clothes. And then I am angry. Could have saved myself the trouble and gnashing of teeth in college calculus. Would have been better off taking some practical course. (They really should offer COUPONING 101, because THAT my friends is a hard, important skill, one I would actually use in this lifetime. Would have had a greater return on investment.) What was the point of getting degrees and taking out loans? Should have saved the money for a washer and dryer. Seems like a trick to me.
But at the same time I was spending my early adulthood in college, I was also falling in hot love with this man:
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| Love. Of. My. Life. |
Some people would take this gift of a man and just roll with it, but I fight things...FATE is my favorite thing to fight. Luckily the fight is becoming so familiar that it is beginning to look more like dancing. In my defense, with this particular man came a different life than I had planned (again, me vs. fate). Marrying this man meant I would be a Marine Wife. More gnashing of teeth here. I used to make sure that no one called me that. Marine Wife. I always insisted that I was married to a Marine...but that his job had nothing to do with the kind of wife I was. But it did, does, and is. I've faced it. I'm a Marine Wife. There. Said it. Only took me nine years.
Marine Wifedom is truly not that different from any other growing up story. It means that I have done things alone that I never thought I would do. And for this, I am fiercely proud, sometimes wounded, much stronger, and changed from the girl I was when I thought college calculus was my biggest challenge. Some days laundry IS the biggest challenge. Because doing the laundry is mind numbing. Cooking is at least creative. And raising my CHILDREN is many things, but never boring. Being a mother is separate from being a maid. Yes, I want things cleaned up and the chores to be finished, but you cannot have a tidy, "done" house until the little people are all grown up. And I adore the lives being lived out in this mess. But I struggle. With the housework, the Cinderella chores, the unnoticed necessaries. I want very much to do something that is SEEN.
The laundry room here is a HUGE step up from where I started as Marine Wife in a tiny apartment. There we had a miniature stacked washer and dryer in a closet. At our next home, I did laundry in a hotel common room for four months. Then we moved into our first house where the laundry was in a roachy garage. In the next house, the laundry closet was in the kitchen...two little boys got potty trained there. SO. MUCH. LAUNDRY. Then for this one blissful year we lived in a house that had a laundry SUITE...so big! I had a table and chairs in there. Plus I got these fancy machines (from the scratch and dent sale)! But it still didn't change my attitude about the unseen, undone, drudgery of laundry. And now...we live in a randomly assigned base house where the view from the laundry room is million dollar. A river flows right through my back yard. And I look at this...
The irony is not lost on me.
That river view is what my best friend calls a "love letter from God". "Chin Up!" I hear Her. "I see you...dirty, naked, downing your coffee, sick with flu, crying over your kid's grades, laughing on the phone, drinking a beer, making out with your hubs, cussing, fussing...I love you. And I see you." She says over and over, every day through that laundry room window. And isn't that what we all desire most? To be seen? It's our hearts greatest desire...to be known and loved. The world tells us we need to do big, loud, noisy things to be seen. We must EARN it. We must BE something in order to have love, respect, a place. But the Spirit says no. You are enough. As you are. Just Be. Better yet, Be Still and Know. Know that God put that river there, my house here, a laundry room window just so, for me. God wants to be seen too...that's the second part. Be still. And then Know the one who created the universe so vast, still gives quite the damn about you and the very littlest things you do. Like Laundry.
So today, I will fold the laundry. And it will be undone as soon as it's done. And we'll cook and eat and clean. Wash. Rinse. Repeat. But this part of my life, where I think and write and create will be COMPLETED. And seen. Maybe I will begin to know even more. Laundry to fold...
Marine Wifedom is truly not that different from any other growing up story. It means that I have done things alone that I never thought I would do. And for this, I am fiercely proud, sometimes wounded, much stronger, and changed from the girl I was when I thought college calculus was my biggest challenge. Some days laundry IS the biggest challenge. Because doing the laundry is mind numbing. Cooking is at least creative. And raising my CHILDREN is many things, but never boring. Being a mother is separate from being a maid. Yes, I want things cleaned up and the chores to be finished, but you cannot have a tidy, "done" house until the little people are all grown up. And I adore the lives being lived out in this mess. But I struggle. With the housework, the Cinderella chores, the unnoticed necessaries. I want very much to do something that is SEEN.
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| Evidence of The Struggle |
FROM THE LAUNDRY ROOM!
The irony is not lost on me.
That river view is what my best friend calls a "love letter from God". "Chin Up!" I hear Her. "I see you...dirty, naked, downing your coffee, sick with flu, crying over your kid's grades, laughing on the phone, drinking a beer, making out with your hubs, cussing, fussing...I love you. And I see you." She says over and over, every day through that laundry room window. And isn't that what we all desire most? To be seen? It's our hearts greatest desire...to be known and loved. The world tells us we need to do big, loud, noisy things to be seen. We must EARN it. We must BE something in order to have love, respect, a place. But the Spirit says no. You are enough. As you are. Just Be. Better yet, Be Still and Know. Know that God put that river there, my house here, a laundry room window just so, for me. God wants to be seen too...that's the second part. Be still. And then Know the one who created the universe so vast, still gives quite the damn about you and the very littlest things you do. Like Laundry.
So today, I will fold the laundry. And it will be undone as soon as it's done. And we'll cook and eat and clean. Wash. Rinse. Repeat. But this part of my life, where I think and write and create will be COMPLETED. And seen. Maybe I will begin to know even more. Laundry to fold...
Nance
