Stewarding what we have: Children

I have occasionally written about stewarding what we have and have always considered financial resources. But recently our daughter had another asthma attack that got so bad so quickly, I really feared for her life. It was a complete wide-eyed-mom moment at the medical check-in counter with a "Dear Jesus help them help my baby." She's fine now, but the incident brought me face to face with the mortality of our children.

As I've documented on this blog, I was slow to warm up to being a mom, but two years in, I'm all in. I am in the guts of mother-child relationships. Bowels might be more appropriate since this week we're back to potty training. This stage of parenting is so physical. There's a lot of hands on wrangling which inhibits abstraction. The diaper is wet or it's not. The spit up stinks or it doesn't. The plate of food is going in the stomach or on the floor or in the hair. Tickles result in full throttle laughter. Items are banged, slammed, and torn. I think this close physicality made me forget how thin the line between life and death is.

Being awakened to that reminds me that whether I spend a few more days and weeks with my kids or decades, their whole existence from before time into eternity is wrapped in the hands of God. In our overlapping time, however long that may be, I've been entrusted to take care of them as beloved children of God. On the one hand, this means that we've a much higher calling than to make sure they stay alive and learn not to be embarrassments to the family. And on the other hand, this means that God is particularly interested in each of them and active in their care and nurture so we don't have to bear the burden in our own strength and wisdom.

So the first step in parenting toward the cross is to remember that God is the ultimate creator and designer of these little lives. It's not about us creating our own little kingdom and our own family name. It's about realizing that like money, our children have been entrusted to our care for a short while.

Smiles

I'd say that I'm out of the physically miserable part of newborn care--the phase of truly wretched sleep deficiency, engorgement, and gas-induced baby wails. This happens to coincide with magnificent smiles from little DW. He beams from the core of his being. It's fabulous and frequent. So while there are plenty of bumps and humps in family life right now, this is one thing I'm really enjoying.

On clothing--Apropos nothing

Timed well with On Expecting's post on body image I suppose.

I finally went through my dresser and pulled out the winter clothes and the maternity clothes! Woohoo. I surprisingly fit back into my pre-maternity unmentionables which feels like a huge win, so I put the maternity ones away too. I also thinned out my closet of old stuff and stuff that never fit well.

At this point I have about three-and-a-half sizes of clothes. Maternity stuff for when I'm huge; big stuff for when I'm bigger than normal but not huge; normal stuff; and skinny stuff. There's not a ton of skinny stuff but I have a few items from when I inadvertently lost a lot of weight before my wedding. I'm currently wearing big stuff, but they are starting to be noticeably big. So I think I'll soon be back into my normal stuff. Hooray!!

Since things have calmed down with the baby, I'm willing to consider a third kid and I haven't got rid of all the big and maternity stuff. However, that'll be it's own day when all that stuff finally goes to goodwill.

I found a lot of t-shirts from college that I have a hard time parting with. And it reminds me that I need to "grow up" with regards to my clothing. And I fear that I'll go from a slouchy grad student right into a sloppy housewife. I definitely dressed better when I was teaching, so I'm trying to figure out where to land at this point.

I would like to eventually have a minimalist wardrobe of classic, quality clothing for summer and fall/spring--the two primary seasons here. But there are several obstacles: 1) a deficient fashion sense 2) a loathing of shopping 3) an aversion to spending money and 4) an unstable body size and shape. Currently, I'm using #4 as an excuse to not figure out ways around #1-3.

Anyways, we'll see. Right now I'll just revel in the prospect of fitting back into my old jeans soon.

Reflections on existential angst

I am dealing with a bout of existential angst. Basically, I'm realizing that whether we try to have a third kid is a big deal to me in a who-am-I way. Part of it is that I still have dreams of becoming a professor and there's a study out that found very few women with 3 kids in academia. And trust me, I get it. If we have a third kid, I am probably harming my potential to get a tenure track job in a big way. (Arguably, being geographically inflexible is equally or more harmful.)

So I've been pondering what is the big deal about getting a job, particularly since my husband provides handsomely for our family?

In no particular order:
1) What I do is fun for me. I like both teaching and research. I whine and moan about aspects of both, but at the end of the day I enjoy them. Part of the fun has been the people. I have worked with fantastic people and on fun projects.

2) I have been heavily invested in. I've been given a lot of money and time by various institutions and people who think I have a particular ability to contribute to society in this way. While they invested with no strings attached--I don't contractually owe anyone anything, I feel a responsibility to this investment similar to the parable of the talents.

3) I like "unlocking achievements". I'm told in video games that when you do enough of X, you "unlock an achievement". Seems like a fancy system of getting enough stickers to turn in for a bigger prize. Whether it's training from being a student most of my life or my bent, I like getting feedback that I'm doing the right thing, that I'm doing well. I've unlocked quite a number of achievements so far, but I have a few big ones left undone like getting a job, publishing in journals, and getting tenure. A teaching award would be icing on the cake.

Let us contrast this with being a stay at home mom.

1) I don't like a lot of things that go with motherhood. These include things like being physically miserable, dealing with someone else's body fluids, and a host of things that fall under "not being able to do what I want to do when I want to do it."

2) I have very little idea what I'm doing. Where professionally, I had an advisor who showed me the way and colleagues to work with, I feel fairly alone in this motherhood thing. Not completely, but I certainly don't feel as engaged as I was professionally.

3) There are no mommy merit badges. I want my merit badge for changing 2500 diapers, for taking all the night shifts, for nursing through mastitis, for not screaming or crying when I actually feel bonkers inside. As far as I can tell, there aren't real mom metrics. Your kid is alive still, clothed, and unabused. You're a mom. Yay.

With a comparison like this, it's easy to feel all sorts of negative things. Yet I as I review these sentiments, I am struck by how I have a special opportunity to live by faith and continue to be formed in Christ. I have been reflecting on how a theme in the story of Jesus is that he served individuals and humanity. The king of the universe became a servant. If I say, "I'm on his team," and I do, then my life should look like that too. While part of me resents the unheralded service my life has been "reduced to," I also recognize that the is an opportunity to live in the grace I've been given. And while part of me worries that my career is slipping away from me, I have the opportunity to trust that God is actively interested in my particular life and will take care of me. To top it all off, I have the opportunity to learn all this with a great family. My husband is a great husband and father and my kids are people I'm enjoying getting to know. While my angst is what it is, I have to acknowledge that I am living in grace abounding.

Weakness as gift

My mom is visiting her mom after having spent 5 weeks with us as we welcomed baby DW into our lives. So this week is the first time we've been left truly alone with our kiddos. One thing I've enjoyed is all the cuddle time with both my children. L, who has always been very independent, has wanted and enjoyed hugs and kisses more in this time of transition. And DW just patently prefers being held to pretty much anything else at this point. And I'm happy to accommodate.

But I was thinking back to my early 20s when I did a fair amount of living overseas for months at a time. This was pre-skype, pre-convenient email. And I suffered from intense bouts of loneliness. It did not help that I traveled to countries with little sunlight and lots of foul weather. During one of those trips, I read the book Five Love Languages. This book proposes that different people have different love languages and if you try to "speak" a language that another doesn't understand, they won't see your actions as love. The "languages" were quality time, words of affirmation, acts of service, physical touch and receiving gifts. Quality time and physical touch resonated with me as languages I understood.

But there I was, on some distant continent, far from people I cared about and I wanted to throw a bat through a window. It seemed extremely unfair to have physical touch be a love language when I was extremely single. At the time, I had never dated anyone and would not have known how even if the opportunity presented itself to me. And then there was the whole deal about how God designed sex for marriage and man, if dating felt far off for me, marriage really felt far off. Basically, I felt cursed to have an empty love tank. Ultimately, living a healthy life in my body would be a struggle the rest of my singleness. It was something I managed by God's grace--I took up more athletic endeavors in my mid-20s--with alternating bouts of peace and torment.

Now, I'm writing this as my newborn sleeps in my lap. Those days seem very far off. As the mother of young ones, I'm constantly touching and being touched. Books sometimes warn parents that moms can be worn out from constant touching and want alone time away from her husband. Maybe it will come to that someday, but that day certainly hasn't come yet for me. I love the sweetness of our current phase. My daughter will sit in my lap and rest her head on me while describing the most mundane realities of life. "Daddy blue eyes,""Baby DW sleeping,""Red bowl,""Blue shirt,""Stacky blocks all-fall-down." My son loves being held and petted. I could do without the wailing parts, but really the rest is great.

What once seemed like a curse has now become a gift. I have hugs for my kids all day and when my husband gets home I've got plenty more snuggles left for him too.

A moment of public grieving

NB: The following is not a complaint. I'm not asking for accommodation nor am I wishing for a different life.

While my day to day life in the past 18 months has been decidedly domestic, I am a linguist* by training. Today, I received an announcement for a conference workshop that is right up my alley. I have work I'd love to present there and get feedback on. I'd probably even be interested in the other presentations offered. Exciting stuff on the order of magnitude of being a U2 fan and getting a backstage pass--VERY EXCITING.

SO NOT GOING. The conference is in Australia. I don't think we budgeted for Australia this year. Then, it's in December of this year. As in, one month after a requisite family flight to my cousin's wedding. As in, I'll have a still-nursing, 8-month-old son.

What a bummer. I love my cousin; I love my children; my husband makes good money. I'm still sad that I can't even think of participating in this.

Ok. That's off my chest. Back to playing with the kids.

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*Linguists are not necessarily grammar, spelling, and punctuation freaks--at least I'm not.

Grace offensively

My facebook feed has been filled with an surprising number of Christians who appear to be defending a glee-filled response to the killing of Osama bin Laden. That feeling is something I can't connect with, and I've been reflecting on why that is. I think it's because I've been thinking about God's grace lately.

I recently read Zahl's Grace in Practice: A theology of everyday life. One of the points he stresses is humanity's original sin and how close each of us is to total depravity. It's from that state that God rescues us by having a perfect Jesus pay what we owed. Jesus died for Osama bin Laden. We might not be able to forgive him, but the Jesus I know was willing to die a death powerful enough to provide forgiveness to bin Laden. That's how big God's grace is.

And while I have never and don't plan to actively participate in killing people, Jesus made anger equivalent to murder in Matthew 5. So while justice demands that bin Laden pay for the deaths he caused, justice demands that I pay for the murders I've committed too. That's how sin works. It universally evens the playing field; Zahl describes it as the even distribution of sin. Before a holy and perfect God, no one is more or less sinful. We're all just sinners; none of whom should be anywhere close to what is holy and perfect.

I think that the notion of justice is what is attractive about the death of Osama bin Laden and perhaps the notion of retribution. However, Jesus as I understand him is about grace that offends justice. So when I think about how God saw bin Laden, I don't think God was disgusted or offended by him. I believe that until the moment bin Laden died, God was wanting him to come home the way the prodigal son's father wanted to see a wayward child come home. While I doubt that bin Laden ever did accept Jesus's death as payment for his own judgment, this does not make me happy or want to run out into the streets.