Keep going

What’s the rush?

If you’ve known me more than five seconds, you know that I am not God’s most organized creation. I was born into a family of people who are planners, whose ‘junk drawer’ looks like the neatest drawer in my house, who wonder aloud how I came to be one of them.

God is the Ultimate Planner, knocking off all of creation in seven days. I can’t create a grocery list in seven days. God bought our salvation through the ransom of his son in three days, from death to resurrection.

It doesn’t matter whether you believe the Bible or think it’s utter claptrap, the point is that the most trusted brand in origin stories is filled with references to time. More of a Torah fan? Circumcise your boys within 8 days, oil burned for 8 days, matzo, the no-rise bread alternative for busy homemakers.

Smug atheist? No problem, life is chock full of it’s own schedules. If you’re a parent, there’s sleep and potty training schedules (for one of my children I clung to the wisdom ‘no child goes to kindergarten in diapers’ like a prayer), childhood broken into elementary, middle and high school all with their own unique rules and milestones. Four year degrees, two year degrees, tick tick tick. No kids, yet? Let me introduce you to the biological clock.

Slow down…

because our story, your life, your heart is what happens within and between these markers. This is where you triumph and fail and fall and rise again. It’s where you write your birth and resurrection story.

Stop….

and smell the roses. Those schedules? Their only meaning is for your memory, so you can answer the question ‘How old was I when’, and find the answer by remembering that you were in college or your son was two or you’d just started a new job.

Breathe…

so that you don’t miss the miracles. What you’re supposed to remember about the resurrection story is not three days, it’s the miracle. The car wreck you survived? Calamity morphs into miracle Line at Starbucks drive through so long you were late to the meeting but the person in front of you prepaid for your coffee? Inconvenience turns into miralce.

Pray…

for the presence of mind to ignore the clock and lean into the belssing. Pray for peace, and healing and light and love. Pray that the you’ll meet the next annoying person you encounter with love. Pray that the next time you check your watch it’s to see how much time you have to be thankful, to give kindness, rather than to see how little time you have to get the next ‘important’ task done.

Be….

just as you are, without fear or haste or judgment. Sit with yourself a minute and remember that your life may not be perfect, but you are perfectly made.

Claiming my truth

Part of this whole being a writer thing is claiming my truth. I’m off to a slow start.

I drink my coffee in a way that can be best described as having some coffee with my cream. It’s such a light color when I’m finished that my daughter once thought it was white wine in my mug. This wouldn’t even be worth relaying where it not for the fact that I am a recovering alcoholic and white wine in a mug (so sneaky!) was my jam. For a moment my daughter thought the quarantine had bested me.

But, back to my profound truth. In a continued effort to lose weight without having to, ya know, exercise, I decided today to give up cream in my coffee. To rise above, take a stand, make a change, take my life back from the scourge of vanilla creamer.

I lasted 1/2 mug before admitting defeat to my husband and making the “I wouldn’t ask you to go to the store for something trivial, but this is important” face. Mercifully, we are early enough into our marriage that this worked, although I’m aware I’m living on borrowed time there.

Writing is meant to be restorative, cleansing, bracingly honest. Today I take the first brave step and announce I do not like my coffee black.

Watch this space for further writerly truths. I must say I feel stronger already. Feel free to leave your own truth in the comments – you’ll feel better, I promise you.