Goals: Vibrant faith. . . loving marriage. . . caring parent. . . compassionate friend and daughter. . . musical mentor teacher. . . responsible steward of God's gifts.
Distractions: Hammering. . . lingering hail damage. . . wood-peckers on the house. . . squirrels in the ceiling. . . cats using urine warfare. . . kidney stones. . . STUFF.
I'm on day three of complete solitude in my own house. The kids and Bill went to Arizona without me. This kind of space brings unique emotions to the surface.
I've been cleaning and sorting closets and Mary's room. We can't start bringing stuff back from storage and moving into the basement until the home-front is stable. The front line needs to be secure.
I'm tired of pretending to myself that I don't need order for my best mental health. I do. That's it. I just really do. I know not everybody does. But I do. All I want right now is order.
Secondly, I'm tired of denying that it's not in my value system to have more stuff than I need. Ditto in triplicate for the kids. Yesterday I took half a closet full of coats, boots, and winter stuff to Coats For Kids. Friday morning the Lupus foundation picked up a porch full of bags and boxes. Lord, forgive me, for I have committed the sin of stealth purging. CIA style. All's fair in love and war. I'm winning this one. I may face court martial later.
If you've given me or my kids something over the years and you don't see it around anymore--do not take it personally. Some other child is reaping the benefits of your generosity. Maybe even a whole orphanage.
I'm losing the battles to the animals. Woodpeckers. Poor Isabella got a very fragmented lesson on Wednesday. Very hard to pick a "one point" lesson while--dare I say it--that little pecker--was on my cedar siding outside the piano room. I estimate every hour he pecks is a four digit repair bill. That's distracting. Heavy sigh. Where's is my robotic owl already???? Squirrels. Annika doesn't even flinch anymore when she hears the scratchy noises in the corner ceiling while trying to focus on Bach.
Cats. As I'm sorting photos to make a photo cabinet in the basement, Garfield jumps up unto the half full sterlite box on my lap and pees. Into the photos. This is personal. White flag. He wins. I'll give you whatever you want. There is no negotiating with that kind of nuclear weapon.
On the other front, I'm close to signing a peace treaty with the belongings in my house. For a long time I have used the phrase "I don't think God intends for us to spend so much time taking care of our stuff." I still feel this way, but in church last Sunday I had cathartic revelation. It was stewardship Sunday and the video was talking about how really everything we have already belongs to God and I thought, yeah! Even the messes. All God's. Even the chaos and closet doors that you have to push shut quickly. All God's. Even the made-in-China crap that breeds behind the drawer fronts. All God's. How does that change things? The junk only has control because I let it. I doubt God is losing too much sleep on account of His two Highway 13 storage units full of basement stuff. Neither then should I.
I'm still gonna clean it out as a personal favor to Him.
I'm winning this war. And then I will keep some troops here and there around the house--containment fashion. Maintenance mode.
Peace. Freedom to move beyond the stewardship--which after all was the last goal--not the first.
No comments:
Post a Comment