I’ve started three separate blogposts in the last few weeks but I’ve run out of time to finish any of them. I have an unbelievable desire to write regularly, but with increased activity through the summer, my time to write has decreased dramatically. I think I sense the squeeze of past, present, and planning, and whatever energy I would have for writing has leaked out into the lives of those around me. At the end of the day, I have no words left to share.

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Walking up the hill to our upper kitchen with Middle Sprout the other night, I was stopped by a bar wench. (yes, they actually call themselves that) She was curious about my writing. “What sorts of things do you write? What are you working on now?”

I laughed and said I am not able to do any real writing right now.

“Writing is like breathing for me, and I have been gasping for air much of the time I’ve been in Colorado.”

The other bar wench who was listening to our exchange piped in,  “It’s got to be hard to write in the bus with so little space and all of those people.”

I acknowledged that truth and continued up the hill, but the more I thought about it, the more I know that the bus is certainly not to blame for my lack of consistency or my assuredly unproductive writing habits.

Middle Sprout walked thoughtfully with me for a few steps and then said, “Mom, you should go to a coffee house or something. You definitely need to breathe.”

She’s right, and I want to show her that I do that. That I prioritize my needs enough that I can keep breathing…and thriving. What an extremely important lesson to teach my almost 13-year-old. It’s important for all of my kids to see my investment in myself and I’ve admittedly sucked a little at that this summer. It’s likely why I was introduced to my inner bear. (see previous blogpost) I am generally better about prioritizing for my needs, but I think this summer what may have become more important are the needs of those around me.

So, I’ve thought quite a bit about the reasons my own breathing has taken such a backseat this summer and I’ve concluded I’m wading in a pool fed by three tributaries.

PAST

When I come to Colorado I am confronted full force with childhood demons and challenges I wish I could completely abandon. Hard emotions get easier and easier to navigate as I get older, but there is still energy expended there. I feel a sense of love and obligation to my family and to the friends with whom I’ve maintained lifelong relationships. There is, however, a cost to remaining committed to the past that shaped me.

I’ve watched my life in passing scenes on the hills of this site too. The beer guys transported kegs and plastic cups from site to the reception for our wedding…I carried our first baby up and down hills in a backpack …I lost our second baby by miscarriage after walking the grounds…Middle Sprout’s arrival was cheered with Huzzah’s when her dad managed to get back on site the day she was born on the last day of the show…I waddled around fully pregnant with Little Sprout while pushing a monstrous double stroller…all the Sprouts have been knighted and princess dresses and crowns fill drawers in our home…the big sprouts have learned to work out here and memories of driving practice will likely include some of these backroads. And our recent summer of camping experience has happened on the grounds of this Festival.

It is now both my past…and the past for our kids.

PRESENT

Now that we’ve converged at this present place, I’m struggling with what that really means. The Sprouts are all under the same roof and living with our singular family rhythm. When I look at the present clock too closely, I have to acknowledge that time is running out. Next week I’ll have two teenagers and in the fall they’ll all be in double-digits. By next spring we’ll have a driver and what might have been subtle shifts in responsibility will be a full-fledged handoff.

Of course there is the present reality of my upcoming 40th birthday in August too and despite my efforts, I cannot seem to ignore the symbolic milestones that come with that.

My Choosing to Grow philosophy is dependent upon living in the moment and celebrating the present. It’s honestly taking almost all the energy I have to live up to my own expectations.

PLANNING

And then there is the planning. I have built my life around planning and I’ve painfully learned the lessons of thwarted plans and increasing disappointment evidenced in children’s eye rolls at my efforts. As my teens have grown, my plans have simply needed to adjust to become “wait…wait…and wait some more for their plans to develop.” (rides here…money to go here, etc.) It has impacted me enough that poor Little Sprout does not have my best energy for planning. There was a point this summer (right around the arrival of the bear) when I literally threw in the towel for any more planning.

The more I’ve thought about it, the more I have come to believe that planning is necessary but it needs to be more about hope and faith than about control.

I plan to pray fervently about putting planning back into my routine.

The Fourth Dimension of MOTHERHOOD

I want our kids to know that motherhood is certainly multi-dimensional. Mother has a responsibility to herself and it serves as a model to her children. But motherhood is more than just teaching children how to be strong, independent, balanced and confident because they see that modeled behavior. It’s more than being a woman who knows what she needs and makes the effort to achieve her own goals at the cost of something else she also needs…relationship with her children. Motherhood is about something even more and it looks an awful lot like sacrifice.

I’ve spent too much of this summer being flat. I’ve been frozen without dimension because I let myself become too overwhelmed and it paralyzed me. I wanted to feel productive and important. I am at a critical phase in my life; sandwiched on all sides by past, present and planning pressures. There is a dimension I need to embrace, however, and the plan is to employ it immediately in order to legitimately refocus: LOVE.

Love transcends time and place, pain and pressures. The love I need applies to all parts of my day and my life. I need to be better at self-love, to be intentional about love for those from my past, for those who traipse across my day in the present, and for all those for whom prayer and planning are necessary to build hope.

As I try to finish this blogpost I just dismissed Middle Sprout to give me just a few more minutes of space. Space I have neglected to ask for this summer and, seeing the welling tears of hormonal disappointment, possibly the last time I will ask for this space while the Sprouts are snuggled in so closely. There is sacrifice in motherhood that piles up in pictures of their childhood. My choice is to be present enough…so I can love them back with everything I have right now…all before we have to make real plans for them to go.

***Despite my internal struggles, I have managed to get the kids out and about for some fun adventures. Pictures of ziplining and the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo with Little Sprout can be found on my website. ***

Copyright 2015  Meagan Frank                           Choosing to Grow

http://www.meaganfrank.com                                             

Sit with me and rest awhile.

Watch all the leaves fall down.

There is no stopping winds of change,

No silencing the sound.

No way to push back time that ticks

Or changing cold air style.

There is nothing to do at all my friends,

So come sit with me a while.

On my stove

My diced potatoes are softening on the stove. I grabbed a pot I think is a stock pot, and in it  I have combined the recipe ingredients I hope will turn into yummy-sounding loaded baked potato soup. Whatever I end up with will be what I serve my family tonight for supper.

On my laptop

There are storylines swirling in my head. Characters are starting to populate my thoughts and I realize in this very moment, I too am in the stage of softening. Fiction writing is a form of letting go for me. I have held my writing so tightly to my chest. Writing for me has been more about editing, revising, controlling, manipulating. The only stories I’ve allowed myself to tell are the real ones because my writing can be legitimized by something tangible. Made-up worlds are foreign to me and I realized today only by letting go will I have anything new to offer the world.

Quote of the day:

Why not go out on a limb, that’s where are the fruit is.

The dog began to bark and I knew my prep time had come to an end. My visiting friends from Woodbury had arrived, and it was time to take them through our new home. I simply laid down the strawberry slicing knife, ignored the fact things didn’t look quite the way I had imagined they would, and walked to the door.

It took everything in me to pretend I wasn’t bothered by how unfinished I felt. Actually, at this phase in my life, unfinished is the way I feel practically all the time.

My kids are in school full time, have been for years, and I have less finished on a daily basis than I ever did when they were crawling around under my desk.

I used to be able to finish blogposts (edited and polished and ready for the world.) The lives of our growing children has interrupted my finishing. Actually, for quite some time now, I have stopped starting…because I know I will rarely have a chance to finish the way I hope.

We’re not finished with a lot of things around here. We’re not finished emptying out the detached garage that is currently housing those must-move-with-us-but-probably-won’t-ever-unpack boxes. (we moved in April) We’re not finished hanging pictures or shopping for wall art or furnishing rooms that don’t have pieces to fill them. We’re not finished organizing the clutter in the house or training our children in the ways of the world or to pick up their own rooms.

I’m not finished culling through boxes of photographs or organizing my books onto shelves or putting piles of my paper into a functional system. I’m not finished learning how to cook and bake and I’m certainly not finished with so many writing projects that I have energy enough to start but lack time enough to finish.

This is my life

unfinished

unpolished

unedited

Before I even had a chance to finish this blogpost I got a text from our oldest. Usually the first sign I will not be finishing what I’m doing.

Our across-the-street neighbor, who is dying of cancer, has been out nailing and painting his mailbox the last few days. Maybe he is trying to finish it before the weather changes…or he runs out of time. I can only imagine the list of things he hopes to finish in the time he’s given and once again I am challenged by the life being lived across the street by someone whose life is finishing.

Maybe life isn’t about finishing at all. Things are always unfinished, but while I sit waiting… paralyzed to start things I don’t think I can finish well, I miss out on moments that could complete me.

I’ve decided completion doesn’t always look like finishing.

So, I am writing without being able to finish well. Sending my writing into the world is the way my life feels most complete. My new way to write reflects my new way of living…unfinished…unpolished…but unapologetic. Take it or leave it.

Middle Sprout has decided to learn how to play volleyball. Many of the girls had to step out on the court without really knowing how to play. I need to approach life the way a 7th grader approaches a new activity. Sometimes you have to get out there and do what you are not ready to do.  I don’t know how to write without really finishing, but my life demands writing and I’m not really living if I don’t do it the way I can in the moments I’ve been given.

The 3 lessons I’ve chosen to grow through this week:

You have to host before the house is ready.

You have to serve before you are finished learning how.

You have to write what comes out in a morning…and post it before it is finished