Recently, in a rare moment alone with Ward I discouragingly admitted, “[My] life feels like such a mess right now.” He looked at me knowingly. With the right crowd, I wear my discouragement openly, like a Beverly Hills mom might wear Prada to the playground. I continued, “I feel like a gerbil on an exercise wheel. I can’t get off the wheel and even if I stop moving, I have to hang on for dear life because the damn wheel keeps spinning! I have lost control. I know what to do, I just don’t know how to do it.”
Yesterday I drove my neighbors two daughters to karate. For reasons I have not yet explored, their young mom is usually disinclined to accept my offers to drive. We live two houses away from each other and drive the two kilometers to and from karate twice a week, often in our own cars. It does not make sense. Yesterday was in fact the younger daughters’ first time in our van.
The six and seven year old girls, in their crisp white karate ghee, climbed in and buckled up. I hadn’t even backed out of the driveway when the older girl commented, “Is your car ever dirty!” I sighed deeply; both the uncensored honesty and sickening truth rendered my lips speechless. But Yohannes who was sitting right beside her answered, “Yeah, I don’t think my mom has very much time to clean it.” And then, bless his little heart, he proceeded to point out all the messes and how they happened. “The chocolate milk here was Lauren’s friend, I don’t know how she spilled it so badly,” after each admission the younger daughter “tsk, tsked” in her middle row seat. Yohannes carried on and pointed out the squished jellybeans from Easter, the single muddy mitt, the pencil crayons, the schoolbooks, someone’s shoe, the crushed french fry container and the water bottles lolling around under the seats.
The younger daughter, who has the same zest for detail told us about all the rules in their new vehicle.
“We are not allowed to have food in our car” she boldly stated (as if that was a good thing).
“No food?!” Yohannes queried.
“Nope. Only water,” she answered.
“Only water,” he repeated emphatically.
“Yup. And no toys,” she continued.
“Huh? Toys are not messy.” Yohannes informed her.
“According to my dad they are” she said.
Yohannes breathed in sharply, shook his head, and let out a “Wow”.
I suspect it will be their last ride in my vermin van!
What I really wanted to say was, “You think this is bad, you should come into our house!” But alas, she was only seven years old, what did it matter? Truthfully my workplace often reflects back exactly how I feel on the inside. When I am facing messy emotions, my house spews debris like a steam locomotive emits steam; it is periodic yet never ending, and I don’t always have what it takes to keep up. (Right now, it looks like we are preparing for a flea market – or a prospective estate sale).
I have been to other mothers’ houses and been shocked and somewhat appalled that they could ‘live like that’! Those were my pre-parenting years. I came home feeling no empathy whatsoever; I had ‘mightier-than-though’ thoughts and wondered, truly, if they were blind. I shook my head and wandered through my orderly and alphabetized house with a sense of superiority. The day of reckoning has arrived!
This week, I told my husband that this disorder was driving me crazy and I simply needed to clear the house of its occupants.
He mused, “Where will we send the kids?”
I bellowed, like a fog horn on a dark night, “Pack your bags, you’re going with them!” Nobody picks up his or her stuff. One culprit printed a picture for a school project, cut it out and let the paper fall to the floor – where it rested for two days, until she-who-shall-not-be-named barked out an order to pick it up followed by a tirade on the common impractical topics, “What were you thinking?’ and “Whose job do you think it is to pick up after you?”
In my idealistic fantasy of my own childhood, this kind of thing did not happen; we were a different breed of child - weren’t we? (Mom, any words of support here?)
Relationships often fall into the ‘what have you done for me’ and ‘I deserve more than this’ categories – both destined for disappointment and disharmony. Human relationships are messy (let’s be clear, humans are messy!) Messes cannot be avoided. And yet there are days when I would walk until my feet were bruised and raw in search of easy street, a place where daisies grew in abundance, the sun shone every day and the mouths of the occupants dripped with gratitude. Every so often I become overwhelmed and I yearn for simple; I crave easy with such ferocity that I truly believe having it would change my whole existence.
In family life simple and easy come and go so quickly we don’t even recognize them. On the other hand, complicated creates emotion, and some emotions suck the energy out of you faster than a mosquito sucks blood at sundown. How does one move gracefully from complicated and messy to easy and simple? I don’t know, but when in doubt – clean.
I spent a full day sorting and cleaning just the main floor of our house. It was a hands and knees kind of clean. It felt good. Order begets order – for a moment or two. It felt so good to me that I was utterly shocked that not one of my housemates even noticed. Not one! Six hours of labor and no gold star!
My husband arrived home and I asked with exuberance, “Do you notice anything different?”
“Well. . . I just walked in,” he said, “but, no.”
The very fact that he could walk from the garage to the kitchen without wounding himself was a dead giveaway. “Look around again…… please,” I beseeched.
“Wow, it really looks good,” he said. It was too late.
Why am I so bent on sticking labels on my experiences, my living – and trusting that those labels hold truth.
Why messy? Why not lived-in, over-abundant, well-used, home-sweet-home?
Why inadequate? Why not, still learning, trying my best, not-yet skilled, imperceptibly imperfect?
Why, struggling? Why not simply, in need of TLC?
Who would we invite into our messy lives? We women are inclined to clean up before inviting over a friend or family member. It is no different when the mess exists out of view, inside our head, heart and body. We want to clean it up on our own before inviting anyone in. Because of some illogical fear, we stay stuck in our own mess, when what we really need is companionship, community and support. It is a difficult journey, but one worth risking.
I did drive the girls to karate again, and still my van was not clean. They commented on it again, and I simply smiled. This is where we live, and we are living fully right now. Halleluiah!
