Doing without

No, God. I didn't give up the microwave for Lent. Did you hear me? I gave up Facebook and sweets. NOT. MICROWAVE.

That's what was going through my head about five weeks ago when, after punching in the time and pressing start, the contraption above the stove began to make a sound like unto an electrocuted cat and to spit sparks out of the top vent. Being the level-headed person I am, I screamed and started dancing and looked around for something to throw at it. Failing that, I said a short prayer against frying myself and hit the off button, then jumped to the other side of the kitchen.

Mark poked around and declared it dead. The circuitry up top was completely toast. We've been waiting for a few appliances around the house to finally bite the dust. Our house was remodeled by the previous owners almost 10 years ago, and our time is almost up on a few of these. There's a dishwasher that requires an exorcism before running and when it does it makes a sound like it's washing gravel, the dryer that doesn't stop running when you open the door so if you forget to turn it off it shoots clothes out at you like a t-shirt gun...but the microwave was not on that list. It wasn't even hinting that it wanted to be. Maybe it was feeling neglected, in the shadow of all those appliances with more personality. But whatever the reason, it was pretty inconvenient since a new one cost at least $199 plus tax and every red cent this month is accounted for and assigned elsewhere.

The choice was pretty much made for us. We'd have to do without, at least for a while.

But what on earth was I going to do without a microwave? That thing gets a lot of mileage in our house. I mean, I have two small children. Children who demand chicken nuggets and Trader Joe's mac and cheese. And if they don't get it...well, things could get ugly for everyone.

This wasn't what I planned to give up, I thought. I mean, I'm giving up FACEBOOK and SWEETS. Seriously, God? Do you know how much I love those two things? Do you just want me to move to Amish Country? The whole thing was making me want to start playing Farmville while shoving pie in my face just to be contrary.

I spent at least a day or two stewing about it. I know, I realize it's not the heaviest cross to bear, but still. I was really peeved at being required to go without something that made my life so much easier. But in going about my days, I noticed a few things.

First, pretty much anything you normally microwave CAN BE COOKED IN THE OVEN. I know. I was shocked, too. It does require a little more planning ahead and adds 15 minutes to meal prep, but in the end it's not that big of a deal.

Secondly, things that are cooked in the oven TASTE BETTER. Another shocker. Even the same stuff tasted better. The nuggets were delightfully crispy on the outside and evenly cooked on the inside. The TJ's mac and cheese? Wonderfully buttery and gooey and just a little crispy in parts. I may never microwave it again, even when I can.

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, needing to think about what to feed my family instead of just shoving the same old same old in the microwave helped me make some better decisions. After all, if it takes the same amount of time to bake a corn dog from the freezer that it does to bake a seasoned chicken breast, the scales aren't tipped quite so much in the corn dog's favor. I found myself willing to actually make something from scratch more often, even just for lunch.

The conclusion? As I type, we've been microwave-free for about five weeks and at this point I don't even really notice. I definitely don't feel the driving need to replace it as soon as possible. Maybe we'll just repurpose it as a child art display and leave it there, hanging impotently above the stove.

I find it interesting, the timing of all of this. We've definitely been financially crunched lately - lots of little unexpected expenses, lots of coupon clipping and squeezing every penny. It's figured prominently in my prayer life, but when it did make an appearance, it was always basically asking God to provide more money.

He didn't do that. We're still making due with the same amount as always. What He did give me, though, was a heart more disposed to doing without. I saw in this that not only was doing without grudgingly possible, not only was it even just tolerable, but that sometimes it's surprisingly better. There are several other expenses in our life that I've been reluctant to go without, and gradually I'm finding that I am more open to letting them go. Things that once seemed to be necessities have started to be viewed as luxuries. Taking that final step of cutting them out is looking easier and easier.

So I'm thankful for our busted, sparky microwave. I'm thankful that somehow I don't miss it. I'm thankful that I was shown in this little way that when I go without, somehow, there are blessings I never expected that reside in that small sacrifice.

And I find myself asking, what else can I let go of to find those blessings?

A workable solution

So, I've been working recently on ways to improve my prayer life throughout the day that is both manageable and effective. To this end, I found a few great, short prayers that I printed out and planned to hang around the house in places I'd regularly see them and be reminded to say them.

Now, where to put them?

On the bathroom mirror? No, I don't really spend time getting ready long enough to make that workable.

On the fridge? No, usually I'm trying to feed ravenous, crabby children when I head that way so that wouldn't really be practical.

Maybe the microwave? Well, no, since it's broken and I don't really use it (more on that later).

The front door? No, same as above, it's not exactly a place in the house I'm liable to stop and linger.

After going around and around about this, I finally landed on the one spot in the house I'm likely to be alone (sometimes), holding still for a period of time, and willing to read something.

I hung it on the shelf facing the toilet.

Somehow, I think God will understand.

Why Sam's teachers looked at me funny at pickup today...

I would like to introduce you to my son's latest creative masterpiece. At his school, the kids often illustrate books and the teacher writes in the narrative as dictated to them. Sam's brought home a few of these, most having to do with fire trucks and fires.

Until today.

Without further ado, I give you:

That's right, folks, the next great children's picture book. "Zombie Hill."

Aw, look at that nice guy in his nice house. Too bad we all know what happens to people in stories like this with names like "The Guy."

Isn't that always the way it goes? You want to climb Zombie Hill, but you do not know. YOU DO NOT KNOW. Look how happy he looks. Smiling and everything.

Yup, that's right. There are zombies on Zombie Hill. How could he possibly have known?

It doesn't seem to bother him too much. After all, he's still smiling.

Man, I hate it when that happens. Thats what you get for buying a house right next to Zombie Hill. New realtor, dude.

What's that?? A happy end for our hero? Well, well, well. Looks like The Guy has defied horror cliches and lived to fight it out again at his poorly researched long-term investment, The House at Zombie Hill.

Hope you had the hero shoot him in the head, honey. Otherwise I smell a sequel. But don't worry, Sam's Teachers, we'll cover that at the next The Walking Dead family viewing party.

Writing "Space"

Thanks to Jennifer Fulwiler over at Conversion Diary for providing the inspiration for the post - a picture of my writing space.

First, although you may be astounded by the beauty and organization before you, please rest assured that this is in no way staged. This is actually what my space looked like right after I posted the piece of wisdom and insight immediately following this. Yes, that is really a half-eaten pickle and wad of wrappers in the upper left hand corner, all handed to me by my considerate children while I immersed myself in the art of writing. I am also supposed to be creating a shopping list this morning instead of blogging, as evidenced by the circular on the left and half-finished scribbles about food on the right that I abandoned when I decided writing would be more fun. And also the fact that one of my children had a pickle for a snack this morning. You can also see that I physically shoved my coffee cup away from me to avoid drinking any more and tempted myself with a glass of water. And don't forget the dirty breakfast dishes I still haven't tended to.

I count it as the progress that can only come from motherhood that I'm at all able to write in this state (although the quality of the writing could be debated). In college, before I could put pen to paper everything had to be meticulously clean and organized or, I told myself, I couldn't concentrate. Now, I could clean for an eternity and never find time to write, so I've learned to let this particular requirement go. Obviously.

Yoga Class

"And breeeeeeeathe.....open your body to the iiiiiinfinite....."

My yoga instructor has a bad case of Yoga Teacher Voice. She seems like a very nice lady, but every time she drones her instructions in her flat, drawn-out, modulated-down voice, I wonder if she speaks this way in other areas of her life.

Job interviews? Dates?

"Sooooo, teeeeel meeee.....what do you doooooo?"

In spite of this, I'm enjoying the class. I used to practice yoga more often when I was pregnant both times and a bit afterward, but slowly running began to take more of my time. It's been interesting to return to it now with all the miles under my belt after so long a break. In some ways I'm stronger, in some ways my body yields more easily, and in other ways I'm more tense and inflexible.

This particular practice is more flow-based, so we are moving through poses as the instructor gives us direction. Downward Dog into some sort of twist, into a standing pose, into Tree Pose. I'm finding it much more enjoyable and less static than holding Warrior for interminable minutes, and the breathing comes easier.

As the instructor tells us to "let our bodies be our teacher," I find my mind wandering over to Pope Benedict's criticism of yoga, that it can devolve into a "cult of the body." At the time I heard it, I thought it was kind of an eye-roller. After all, I was exercising, not worshipping. It's easy to look at the old dude observing all the young whipper-snappers doing this devil-worshipping yoga and think it's rather silly. But his words were underlying a larger truth, one that my mind groped towards as my body moved from pose to pose.

Anything can become an idol, a religion, if we allow it to stop there and not travel through it to God. Bodies, after all, are valuable teachers. But they ultimately are designed to point to the Teacher Himself. It also highlights that almost anything that is good and beneficial, if not ordained toward God, can become detrimental. G.K. Chesterton wrote that "the modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad." We love, but without a full understanding that love is sacrifice as well. We hope, but without looking closely at what we are building our hope upon.

Taking care of ourselves is good. We are told that our bodies are temples for the Holy Spirit. But they are icons, not idols. Icons provide a roadmap for God, a tangible way to experience Him in a way our limited human-ness can understand. Idols cause us to exploit our limited human-ness and make things into gods. In our innate desire to search out God, we make gods instead of search for one.

So, I get what Benny XVI was saying. He looks at the world and sees people stopping at the body instead of going through it, and calls us on it. It has gotten me thinking, especially during Lent, about all the things I am tempted to see as an end rather than a means. When I am busy and parenting and stressed it's easy to get caught up in the utilitarian nature of the things I am doing, just getting from point A to point B without making a mess.

But everything, every day, can be examined and found to point to God in some small way, even the messes. And part of what I am called to do is find those ways.

And avoid developing Yoga Instructor Voice. Definitely that, too.

Yellow belt

I am a proud mama this weekend. Yesterday was Sam's advancement test in karate from white to yellow belt. He's been salivating over this moment for months, although we had our ups and downs getting here.

Sam begged us to take karate. We finally relented in September and said we'd give it a try, and he was so excited. His dojo is structured so that each child gets an individual or small-group lesson once a week, and can come to as many classes as they'd like in addition. Every Thursday after school Sam would change into his gi and off we would go to his lesson, and every Saturday Mark would take him to his big group lesson.

We ran into trouble about 4 weeks in, when the newness started to wear off and his white belt, which would eventually hold 3 black stripes signifying advancement, remained bare.

"I don't want to go to karate today! I want to quit!" came the whine from underneath a pile of pillows on the couch. "Karate is boring!"

"I understand you don't want to go and you want to quit," I said. "But we made a promise to Sensei that we would be there this afternoon, so we have to go today. We can talk about this more when we get home if you'd like."

His attitude would always have improved after class, but we still had a rough few weeks. One time, I actually had to carry him in to the dojo while he clung to my neck. We were both obviously pretty frustrated with each other. His Sensei saw and came over, with an expression that said he knew exactly what was going on.

"Let me talk to Sam," he said.

I left the waiting room and wandered outside with Caroline, knowing I wouldn't be helping if I was standing there. I watched through the glass as Sensei got down on Sam's level and talked to him and I saw Sam nod a few times, then smile and follow him into the open gym area for class. Afterward, Sensai came and talked to me, told me that it was normal for kids to go through phases like that, and that it was important to just keep coming back.

Things got better from there, but we still had some ups and downs. Sam was sent to sit in a corner a few times during class when he was disruptive or not listening, but Sensai always took the time to talk to Sam afterward about how studying karate takes focus and he knew he could do it. He told me privately that Sam's penchant for falling down on purpose or blowing random raspberries was something he remembered doing as a kid when he felt like his energy was all cooped up, and he knew what he was going through. I observed many times when Sensei would give Sam positive reinforcement in front of the group, such as praising him for his tenacity or focus during a particular exercise, or noting how hard he was working at something. I saw Sam's attitude towards karate change as he gained the stripes on his belt, and eventually the invitation to the yellow belt test.

We weren't allowed to attend the test itself, but Mark was able to come at the very end and observe the way the kids were given their belts. As the parents entered, all the kids sat quietly meditating, kneeling on the ground with their eyes closed while their parents snapped pictures. The three senseis at the dojo walked around and quietly placed each child's new belt and certificate in front of them, telling them that when they opened their eyes they would find out if they passed.

When Sam finally opened his eyes, Mark said that his face told it all - shock, joy, surprise, pride all mixed together. You can see it written all over him in the picture Mark took of him holding his certificate and belt with the senseis. Afterward, Sam told Mark that part of the test was that they were each asked what they learned from their studies so far. Sam's answer was that earning a yellow belt takes a lot of focus.

So yeah, I'm pretty proud. And, as I told Sam, not just of the accomplishment but of the fact that he worked so hard, stuck with it when it wasn't as fun, and kept coming back. I'm also really heartened to see the relationship between Sam and his sensei, especially as we get ready to send him off to kindergarten and years of adult authority figures who are not us.

But most importantly, I see that Sam is proud of himself. He was able to articulate at the test what his particular challenge was, and voice that he overcame it. I see that he is proud not just of the belt, but in all of the work that went into earning it.

And I also reflect on what Mark and I do to show and reinforce those values. That we value working hard over trophies. That when everything seems overwhelming, sometimes just showing up when you promised to is enough for now and the rest will come later.

I know we'll have lots of ups and downs in our future, over karate and over other things. He'll want to quit, he'll get frustrated and sad when he doesn't make progress, doesn't win, or feels like all the work is in vain. But I hope we can help him understand all these things, put them in perspective and remind him that working hard for something takes time, and is ultimately its own reward.

Natural Consequences

I may possibly be willing to whisper under my breath that Caroline is finally potty trained. I whisper because if I dare to speak out loud, the Gods of Bodily Evacuation will surely smite me with a #2 in the middle of Target. So, we'll speak softly about this.

Caroline was so very different from Sam on this count. With Sam, he basically woke up one day and decided he was done with diapers. Ok, maybe it wasn't quite that smooth, but there was no doubt that he drove the bus on that one. Did I mention he was a few months past his second birthday? I will definitely say that there are good points about having a stubborn kid.

Caroline, however, approached the entire venture with suspicion and fear. I knew that she knew when she had to go, and she would even tell me when she was about to go but would insist on going in her diaper (thanks for telling me, kid?), turning her nose up entirely at the idea of sitting on the potty.

I kept expecting that she'd let me know when she was ready, like Sam did. But the thing about Caroline is that sometimes she needs a little push out of the nest, and I have to know when to give it.

I made up my mind about three weeks ago on a Wednesday morning. We'd run out of diapers and I was frankly too lazy to go out to the store and get some with both kids, and I couldn't find any of our diaper covers for the cloth ones that would fit her. So I took a deep breath, set up the potty and some strategically placed towels, and decided she'd bare-bottom it for the morning.

Maybe I need to interject here that there are two things I struggle with in parenting (and life) more than most, it seems - messes and natural consequences. And it hardly seems fair how often those two things seem to go together. Allow your kids to play with play-doh and they don't clean it up, and the play-doh is dried out and no more play-doh. At least, that's the way it should go. What usually happens is that my sanity is slowly chipped away at by the sticky floor, the unavailability of my kitchen table and the general clutter, so I either make the kids clean it up or do it myself.

I hang my head in shame. I always said I'd be a stickler for letting my kids experience natural consequences, but it is so, so much harder in practice than it is in theory. And in looking back, it's hardly surprising. I've never been good myself about connecting my actions to their consequences. It's so much easier to eat that fourth cookie and then feign surprise when the number on the scale doesn't move, or kick yourself for delaying and staying up late writing that term paper, even when it's exactly what you did last time and the time before, or run on that injury, instead of exercising a little patience and temperance, and make it worse. I am terrible at that stuff. And I'm probably not the only one. It often seems that our entire world is not really all that concerned with natural consequences, either. No matter what you did to lead to the jam you're in, there's a quick fix for it, often at a price. Entire industries are built upon our inability to pay attention to and learn from natural consequences.

So, with the entire world and all my self-worth riding on it (I kid!) I resolved to at least give this a whole-hearted try for a few days in relation to Caroline's potty training. And it was messy, and time-consuming, and required me to constantly be on alert in a way that slowly fried my brain over the course of the day. There were all the pee-soaked clothes and, inevitably, the urine-filled boots and shoes. Each short errand or run to the store felt like some sort of human waste Russian Roulette.

But you know what? She learned. When she had an accident, I said, "Oops! That's ok. Let's clean it up together." And we did. When she was bare bottomed on the second day and asked me for a diaper so she could poop, I shrugged and said, "Sorry! No diapers available!" and let her make a decision about what she was going to do with that information (she eventually went on her little potty). When we were out and about and she balked at the large, scary public toilet, I said, "Well, this is the only potty available right now, so you let me know what you want to do." At first she chose to hold it until we got home, but will now use almost any potty anywhere.

I'm very proud of both of us for sticking with it, even when it wasn't comfortable. Frankly, it was a daily (heck, hourly!) struggle to bite back "you don't want to have an accident, do you?" or just take her bodily and PUT her on the darn potty when I knew she had to go. And this was just one small part of parenting, one small cornered-off area of the vast expanse of decisions and consequences my kids make every day that I help them with. I had to remind myself that Caroline wasn't the only one making a behavior change, here.

But the whole experience got me thinking about how this relates to my faith life. I believe that part of we humans' relationship with God is very much based on this idea of natural consequences. We have pretty much as much rope as we want. Free will and all that stuff. God very much wants us to choose the path that leads to Him, but He gives us that choice. He doesn't make us, although I suppose if that's what He wanted He could have made us to do so. But he would have had robots instead of loving, amazing, smart, impulsive, demanding, questioning human beings. I have to think that there is some pleasure for God in who we are, since He made us in his image.

And I believe that we parents who believe in this God are called to reflect our relationship with Him in our relationship with our own children. Doing so allows them to know Him through us, and to grow in their own faith as they get older. So, with this in mind, perhaps the best thing I can do as a parent is just to say,

I'm here, and I love you. If you make a mess, I'm always here to help you clean it up. If you leave your play-doh out and it dries out and you are sad, I'll listen to you. If you don't do your homework and have to stay up late or get a bad grade, I'll bring you a snack. And I hope you learn from all of that. But if you don't, I'll be here the next time, and the time after that, as long as I'm alive. Because I know you. I know you so well. And I know you can learn, I always hope that you will.

Make no mistake, I'm sure I have some spleen-filled cleaning binges and frantic calls to teachers in my future along with "I told you so" escaping from my lips more often than not, but I hope and pray very hard that I can let go of the controls and let my kids experience the natural consequences of their actions. In the end, they will be far better and more lasting teachers than I.