Women, part 4

But again, the Lord was there even without my knowing it or really even asking Him to be. He put us in that first house knowing I would need those friendly neighbor women. He knew I would need people to smile at me and my way too cute babies. He knew I’d need others to say, “It’s ok. I’ve been there.” And to plan neighborhood potlucks with and to introduce me to the world of homeschooling.

He knew that in a few short years after we moved to our first home, that Mary Grace and her family would be moving in just down the road from us. He knew I was in need of a mentor and a true best friend: a woman to walk with hand-in-hand through this beautiful season of life. He created in me an apprentice’s spirit, and He knew that I would need to have a friend to watch and walk alongside without my even being aware of it.

I was not created with an innate knowledge of the world of mothering and of women. I was not raised in a home with anyone modeling these things for me either. But I was brought up in an environment with a very loving and supportive father, and women all around me pouring into me in various ways that went unnoticed for years.

So now, to sum up a bit from all the ramblings… I realize that I really do like women.

I love being able to talk to Mary Grace for hours about nothing really worth keeping a record of, but still I can walk away feeling justified, supported, refreshed, loved, understood… I love that. I love that she can encourage me without even trying. Heck, she can encourage me in the middle of telling me about a tough moment for her just in the fact that I do not feel alone in my occasional chaos or struggles to be all that I am called to be.

I enjoy having another friend I met from church (Let’s call her E.) over with her children and we can let our 6 walking and talking children play together and make gingerbread cookies and while we hold our babies and share stories of support and encouragement of the Lord and His work in our life. We can mention something that we cannot quite put words to in our world of mothering and the other can say, “I know! That is so true.” Even when we do not have the right words to make it all make sense. The thought, the feeling… the understanding is still there.

And I like that I can call the slightly younger friend down the road (I’ll call her C.) with her very young family of two children under two years old and chat about the thrill and newness of our same-aged babies. It’s great that she can come over and try out a craft we’ve been doing for years and to watch her face light up as she enters this world of mothering that I have enjoyed for so many years (well, almost seven years… it feels like it’s been longer though!) and I get to feel just that little bit like the mentors who have meant so much to me over the years.

And the day I started this silly little Women post, after a morning chat with Mary Grace, a midday baking and chatting time with E. and her brood, and an evening spent at C.’s house where we were invited for a lovely quesadilla dinner and we stayed for a nice chat and some super cute play time between our two-ish year olds and our 7 month olds… well, that day it occurred to me that the women in my life are truly a blessing.

These days (though the aforementioned day was a bit more full than I am accustomed to) fill me up in ways that I cannot describe. To share a common thread with these women, to be a part of this world that I once feared… even hated at times… to be accepted, loved, understood…to have others see the beauty in the day-to-day details of my life and understand them on a level that only another mom could… well I am not the graceful and talented writer that is my friend Mary Grace, so I cannot find the words to describe the feelings that come with this connection. But, I have a feeling that if you are a woman reading this right now that you may just have some idea of what I am talking about.

So all this to say that my friends, the women that I can clearly see were chose by the Lord Himself to walk with me in this life, mean very much to me indeed. I once thought that a husband to love me and children to raise were all I needed.

It didn’t take me too long to realize that God had more planned for me. He knew, first of all, that I needed Him. He also knew that I needed friends. And I think He created us that way to begin with. I do not think women were meant to go it alone, you know? Not that every one of us needs to be a social butterfly. One best friend is perfect for me, and one or two other close friends to walk along beside me as well round me out just right.

But at this point in my life, at least now in this short but important season of raising up my young family, I am so very thankful that I can do it alongside a few other women who can hold my hand and hear my stories and enjoy them, and who can share theirs with me. And then, once I have gotten all my chatty excitement out on them, I have just enough left for my husband to enjoy but not to feel overwhelmed by. ;o)

After all, as my dad occasionally says to my husband with a wink, “You married her. She’s all yours now.” And half the time he’ll make the little flapping hand sign that is synonymous with talking too much. So I guess that even though I looked like a boy once upon a time… I always did talk like a girl.

And one last little point, though I have been terribly long winded already… I adore my sons. I love (and always have loved) the world of boys and I always did feel like I would be the mother of boys. And after three of them, I was pretty well sure that I was going to be the mother of only boys. During my pregnancy with Girly Pie, we did not find out her sex (as with all my pregnancies) and I was completely confident and convinced that she was a boy. I remember having pangs and thoughts along the lines of, "I never got to be on the daughter end of a winning mother-daughter relationship. And I wonder if I will ever get to be on the mother end of a right and good mother-daughter relationship." But I was ok with that. I was just thrilled to be having a fourth child regardless!

I am still in awe at times that God blessed me with a daughter of my own. I only pray that He has prepared the right women to come alongside in her life to help guide her toward His purpose for her as He did for me in mine. And I am so very thankful that He has allowed me the gift of being one of those women.

And, for the record, so far I am deeply enjoying this whole mother-daughter thing from the mom end of things. It has been well worth the wait.

Ok. I’ll stop talking now. ;o)

Women, part 3

Now fast forward a few years to the time of meeting, befriending, loving, marrying and eventually having children with the man I am proud to call my husband…

When I first married my Man, I thought, “Who needs friends? I have a husband. He’ll make me happy and complete.”

Are you laughing with me here? Because I am. Oh, how naïve and innocent I was then. I was a few weeks shy of my 21st birthday when I married my Man. I thought I had it all. We bought our first house three months later and life was good. The neighbors seemed nice, we had decent jobs, the house was perfect for raising a family.

Life was good.

And then the babies came. And oh how long I had waited for them! (well, it felt like a long time... but patience was not a virtue I yet had at 22 years old...) Now, still I thought that aside from my long dreamed-of children, my husband was the only person I needed in my life. I was still under this delusion. I was not a believer at the time, so I didn’t think I needed God. I was close enough with my dad, but I was grown now and didn’t want to “need” him anymore, either. I certainly had no need whatsoever for my mom. And those other women? Oh well. I could do it just fine on my own.

I had nannied for the years before marriage and up to the time Punky was four months old and again, though I didn’t realize it, these women I was working with daily were filling me up with the stuff it takes to be a woman, a mother, a friend. It’s funny how clear everything is when looking back. Hindsight’s always 20/20, right? At the time it was just a job. Back when I watched those children as an adolescent and teenager, that was just fun work with cute babies. But those women, those moms behind the scenes… it’s only now as a woman and a mother myself do I see the important role they played in my life. I didn’t feel like I needed anyone, because I had always been blessed with people I didn’t even realize were there.

But as my family grew and my children got older and needed more of me - the deeper me, not just my arms and my breasts and my kisses, but my thoughts and my instruction and my constant attention - things started to change. Suddenly, my husband wasn’t enough. Suddenly he didn’t want to hear about the daily goings on now that we had our own kids. Or at least he did not want it in the minute and monotonous details that I was so fascinated and enthralled with. Suddenly I had questions and challenge and stories that I could not share with him. Suddenly I was a mother, a woman… and I was alone...

...To be continued AGAIN (getting down to the end here...)

Women, part 2

God knew I would eventually be called to be a mother and a wife. I remember being perplexed at my cousin even in kindergarten as she dreamed of fancy wedding dresses and ornate jewelry and decorations… and I just wanted to hurry up and have babies. So God, in all His infinite wisdom, groomed me for the plan that He had set up for me. He knew my mother would be absent, but instead of my heart turning away from that world of mothers, I began to long for that life that I missed out on. If I couldn’t have a mom there when I got home from school, than darnit, I was going to BE that mom someday. If I couldn’t have a mom to bake cookies with me and teach me to sew and cook and bake and talk with me, then I was going to do all that and more when I grew up and became a mom.

I went out of my way to play with other people’s babies. I was blessed with some women in my life who had small children, and since I was a responsible and kind young lady who adored children, I played with them and watched their children often. At the time I was just enjoying the time with small children, but what I didn’t know was that my young mind and heart were being filled with the stuff that families are made of. These women took me under their wing. They loved me, shopped with me, talked with me, comforted me, invited me into their homes and made cookies with me and let me enjoy their children and play with them and feel just a little bit like the (albeit older) daughter of a woman who actually loved her children. Though they were receiving the benefit of cheap or free help with their young families, they were also pouring their love out to me.

And I drank it in.

These women were such a huge blessing to me in my life. They were the ones who actually gave me glimpses into this world of women that I someday would be a part of. And they made it look like a world that I might actually enjoy living in.

And then as I grew into the upper years of high school and got caught up in friends and driving and boys (well, the idea of boys, though no real boys actually existed in my world – also by God’s grace in hindsight) and I moved on from these surrogate mothers in my life, but their presence remained in my heart. I saw them occasionally, and spent time with some mothers of my friends, but I took for granted their presence and only in hindsight did I really see any of these women for the angels that they were...

...To be continued again (part 3 will follow soon... I felt quite verbose on this topic, can you tell?)

Women, part 1

I’ve decided that I like women.

Now that may seem like a strange statement, but hear me out here.

I grew up as the only child to a single father. My mom moved out of the house just weeks after my second birthday, and never came back. She kept in touch and I visited her fairly often as long as we lived in the same state, but by the age of five, my dad and I left sunny California and headed north for rainy Washington. From that point on, to the best of my recollection, I only saw my mom for weekends once every two or three months, plus a week or so in the summer and a decent stint between Christmas and Thanksgiving.

By first grade I was BEGGING my dad to let me get a short hair cut. I refused to wear anything even remotely resembling girl clothes, including anything dress-like, anything pink, or anything with ruffles, ribbons, bows or fancy collars. By third grade I had a complete boy hair cut and actually gelled my hair to a stiff shine for school each day. I wore jeans, frumpy tee shirts and sweatshirts and even my dad’s long baggy shirts. I did not really like to play with girls too much and really and sincerely prayed a few times in my life that God would just make me a boy. I really wanted nothing to do with the world of women. As far as I was concerned, my dad was the only person in the world who mattered, and my mom was really not who I wanted to grow up to be like, so the world of men looked way more appealing to me.

Now the funny thing was I was a slight, prancy little girl with completely feminine tendencies and a girlish way about me. I loved babies and played "house" often. I had girly features and pretty hair (well, it would have been pretty had I let it get longer than my chin) and I flitted around in all my frumpy boy clothes with dainty little mannerisms. But still, I was in complete denial that I was created female.

Of course I didn’t really want to be a man either, and eventually I grew to appreciate the world of women and girls more by the time I hit middle school. I still remember a boy (a punky popular kid – the kind who can say something stupid and everyone else thinks it’s cool) asking me if I was a boy or a girl. I thought (but didn’t say out loud) “I’m wearing pink sweats, Stupid. What do you think I am?” But for the most part, I started making female friends and getting interested in boys and playing with Barbies and all that. So it worked out alright eventually.

And thankfully, though I was fairly unaware of it the whole time, God was there all along, working His grace in my life and guiding me right where He knew I needed to go...

...To be continued (part 2 will follow soon)