Deferred Pain

It happened again today. Infant loss in everyday life. It's because really it's an every day part of life. Babies dying. But it hurts. Like a bruise that's only painful when touched, it lays there in my heart, dormant most of the time. But always there.
It used to hit me like a punch in the stomach, and I'd get sick all over.
Then, as a year passed, it turned more into this lingering sadness that welled up into tears.
Then it became unpredictable like a windy day. Sometimes the reaction barely showed. Sometimes it would blow in fierce and strong, bringing painful sobs. Sometimes I would see the detestation afterwards, laying in bed at the end of the day feeling a darkness lingering over my soul.
Now it doesn't hurt like a punch in the stomach.
But it still hurts.
And it always catches me by surprise. when a friend calls and says that her brother's lost his baby at seven months into the pregnancy.
Or I pick up a book and find the first chapter centrs around a baby's death.
When I read the name Grace written somewhere.
The ache is dull sometimes, but it's always there. And sometimes the sharpness is all I can handle.
Sometimes I just have to cry.
And sometimes I carry it inside and don't realize it until the next day or days afterwards, when I've just felt down without a reason. It hurts less every year. But I think it will always hurt, that sting of death. That burden of grief that's settled in my soul. And I think it's OK for it to be like that. Because I know one day it won't be anymore. And missing her makes me long for it even more.

Middle School

I've been thinking about middle school lately. It keeps coming back to my thoughts, these memories of being a stringy-haired 80-pound nerd-girl and walking to school and hating my teachers.
I wish I could see myself back then, walking the halls of Wilson school, a mixture of insecurity and outspokenness weaving between all of the friends and rivals.
I wasn't a really good student.
But I was a good kid.
The teachers liked me, at least most of them did. I did my homework and stayed out of the way, participated in class and minded my own business. I didn't break the rules and chew gum or use pen to do my homework. I didn't forget assignments at home or lose my math book. But I was lonely.
I didn't realize that the kids I went to school with were different than me. That probably more than half of them were sad kids from broken homes who hated their lives. What's it like to hate your life at age 13? I don't really know, because things were pretty good for me. I wasn't popular and I never felt like I had good friends in middle school, but I could lug that backpack and French horn home at the end of the day and my mom was there waiting. And my dad took me out on bike rides and my brothers played Nintendo with me. And the neighbor kids would come over and we could still play make-believe once in a while, even though we were supposed to be too old for it.
I didn't realize that most of the kids at school didn't have families like that. I wish I had, because it might have made me a little less righteous, a little more understanding. It might have helped me know why some kids just weren't nice. It might have made me a better friend.
I have so many memories from those three short years. And the best part about it is, even though I know living the day-to-day of tweenage angst was in no way pleasant, I mostly have good memories of that old school on the hill and the kids that went to it with me. I spent most of sixth grade writing really long stories in neon notebooks and drawing pictures while everyone else took notes. In seventh grade I just survived and wished that my mom would home school me every day. Then in eighth grade I made friends with two girls named Sara and we hung out the rest of the year and things were much more bearable then. I also realized that I'd been trying way too hard in school and I could still get pretty good grades without trying too hard. So I stopped trying as hard. I stopped doing things that would make me be popular because they weren't working, and I stopped caring too. My homeroom teacher that year was awesome and thankfully, we had a sort of understanding. I'm pretty sure I was one of the two smartest kids in the class, so I could pretty much get away with anything.
If I could go back to middle school, I wouldn't.
I would leave all of the angsty days and heavy backpacks and baggy overalls and hairpsray right where it belonged, in the early nineties. I would keep the good memories with the bad there on the shelf, seeing what they made me into in the years that followed. And if you looked back, you would see me there, scribbling down stories in the wireless notebooks with a bic mechanical pencil, hiding novels to read inside of text books, chewing giant wads of gum, and just holding my breath to the end of the day, when I could hurry home to watch Batman and hang out with my neighbors and my brothers. You would see me trying my hardest to do the right thing, even when it made me less popular. You would see a little girl praying every night for a best friend, who, looking back, discovered that she'd had one all along, and He never once left me alone. Even in the halls of middle school terror.

Wasting Time

I just read this article about how we spend our time. How people say "I don't have time for that" when really, they do. Because we spend a lot of time sitting around doing nothing when if we spent that time doing something productive, we'd find ourselves having more available time. It also mentioned that people say they work 70-hour weeks, but often it's more like 50. The writer had started keeping track of his time, writing down how much he spent doing what. And it was eye-opening.
I don't think i want to d othat because it might be convicting. sometimes I sit here, wanting something more to happen on internet world, while the real world is busy doing important, meaningful things. Sometimes I decide to watch a show while i fold laundry, and long after I'm done folding laundry, I'm still sitting there watching the show. There are so many other ways I could spend my time and I've known it for a long time. And I have all of these excuses for why i don't--I'm tired, I need my energy for the kids, I can do it later after they're in bed, I don't need to do that, etc. etc. etc.
And maybe I don't have to squeeze every last drop of time out of my slow-paced days. I don't have a lot of scheduled things because I don't like having to be places. But maybe if I spent even an hour more cleaning the house, I wouldn't always feel like I live in a disaster area. And maybe if I spent a half hour more reading my Bible, the days would go smoother. And maybe if I used my time more wisely, I wouldn't be in a hurry to "finish" playing with my kids and go do "more important" things.
I've been praying lately about this very topic, about being more committed to knowing God and actually working at knowing Him. And this is probably a good chunk of the answer. But here I am, on the computer again.

My Valentine

I'd planned to do all kinds of sweet things for Valentine's day. i was going to make little heart-shaped sandwiches for the kids and then bake cookies with them. I was going to go shopping and find the perfect card to give to Daniel. I was going to wear something cute and have teh house all cleaned up when he got home.
None of those things happened. Arlene was sick, and JJ compensated for the attention Arlene got by being extra belligerent and annoying. I didn't get the house cleaned. I didn't get anything done. And Daniel worked until after 7 pm so we weren't together anyway. By the time he came home, all I wanted to do was crawl into bed.
I finally understood how women say that they're not in the mood for anything romantic, because they're too stressed out from their day with kids. I was wearing a frumpy sweatshirt and fuzzy slippers and I could hardly talk myself into moving off of the couch. Ther was never any pressure, except from myself. Daniel didn't expect anything magical. Especially since he wasn't even home for supper. (He did come home at lunch and give me flowers and candy and a cute card, so it wasn't like he hadn't held up his end.)
It was a pretty bad day, really. Worse than the usual ones. And I know most people think Valentine's Day is stupid and worthless, but I like it, and since I hate sappy things, I think it's OK for me to allow myself one day a year to actually like a little bit of romance and sap. So I was disappointed with how it went.
Then we went upstairs and watched our tradition movie that we watch every Valentine's Day. And he gave me chocolate and took care of the kids, and at the end of the night, it just didn't feel like it had been that bad. Because that's what being married is like. You fill in the holes. You don't build up unrealistic expectations. You do what needs to get done for each other, and you hold each other at the end of the day.
I love my valentine. He's so good at encouraging me, and he loves me even when I'm a frumpy disaster.

For the record, we had our valentine's "date" on Saturday, so there really wasn't any good reason to celebrate yesterday anyway. But what can I say. I like chocolate.

Where do we go from here

Lately I've been pretty wrapped up in myself. It isn't like a diva thing. I've been busy helping the kids and planning this valentine's event at church and visiting with relatives and on and on with other things.
Today we stopped at the salvation army to look for a couple of items, and we were talking about how some kids don't have toys. Arlene and JJ thought it would be nice to give toys to some kid who doesn't have any. And i realized I don't really know any people who could use toys. It made me sad. And I don't really know how to change that. I guess i do know, but I'm not sure how to drag my kids along for things like that. It's this lingering question that's been bugging me for a while.

Face Lift

I think my page needs a face lift. I, however, have no idea how to update it. I've noticed that it's a lot easier than it was when I first made this page. I copied someone else's code to make this one. So if someone wants to come over and help me fix it up, I'd LOVE it. otherwise, I'm going to slowly lose readers because it's boring and bland. Hm.