I just wrote my final post on Dream Planter and thought I was done for the night, but I feel hollow, like I just said goodbye to a good friend or like I feel traveling home from vacation...looking to what lies ahead not with dread, but without that extra spring in my step. When I signed off I felt like I was closing a good Danielle Steel book for the last time or a heart pulling devotional...or the Shack.
Like the Shack, I think this past year opened up a lot of opportunity and with that came a lot of intense soul searching that forced me to reconcile and continue to work on some old demons. I am clinging to the phrase "I am fond of you." in looking ahead to the next fun thing God's got in His agenda for me....I am hoping my agenda doesn't prevent it and that is one of the demons that continues to plague me.
It's funny, at Fuddrucker's tonight they played that Breakfast Club song...Don't Forget About Me..which happened to be my senior song in high school and as I was trying to summarize our adoption finalization experience, I found myself praying that...don't you forget about me...don't, don't, don't, don't you...forget about me. As I wipe snotty noses, change a million more diapers, get up every few hours to comfort a painful teething cry....don't forget about me as I step off the cloud of adoption and into the depths of parenting....don't forget about me as I navigate raising a black child in a white family....don't forget about me as I cry out in not understanding what the 7 year old needs...don't forget about me as autism rears its ugly head at the most inopportune time...don't forget about me as my body turns 34 but my insides resonate 17. I am hoping He hasn't because living this past year in the freedom of His plans was THE most wild ride of my life and I'd like more....I think.
So goodbye 33...the year 2 babies became 3 and I started to scratch the surface on what it really means to trust and that grace and love and faith are not just foo-foo words found on devotional books in Wal-Mart, but they are real life forces that offer safety, comfort, and FREEDOM in our relationships and from what plagues us.
Each year for either my birthday or Christmas, someone usually gets me some type of warm, always fashionable, socks. These are a pair that I've had for a couple years and they have strings with balls on the end (insert story of ex here). If I was a cat I would do nothing but play with these socks. So, as my snot nosed booty was racing around to give E her 3pm feeding before squealing out the door to pick up the older girls I was SHOCKED when I tripped over nothing. Then I looked down and shapow! Here's the culprit....in my rush I had knotted myself. Boy, is that an understatement. As I waddled to the kitchen to add the formula to the bottle, I felt like a prisoner in my own socks. A prisoner....a prisoner of my own bitterness, of anger I can't seem to let go of, feeling stuck in my own socks...my own self. Maybe it's the cold medicine speaking, but even though I could have easily slid one or both of these off, I didn't. I continued to wade in the waddling of being trapped. I laughed out loud at how ridiculous I looked. I grabbed my phone and took a pix of it and then I chewed on the metaphor of how this does or doesn't reflect my reality. The reality is I can get out of whatever is entangling me quite easily-I think. The question is do I want to do the work to do that. I don't know, I'll let you know. Meanwhile, the darn things are still knotted...good thing I married an Eagle Scout!
