plums in an orange-filled world

Our souls differ little from our bodies in terms of healing.  Both require time, proper care, and retirement from certain strenuous activities.  We are often tempted to return to our regular activities before we are ready.  Many times, after recovering from a stomach illness, I must remind myself not to eat chili when I begin to feel hungry again.  I should not walk several miles at a time while recovering from bronchitis. 

Similarly, I should not attend large Catholic family events without plenty of time to rest before and after.  Holy bellies and babies, Batman.

I felt little apprehension about assisting at our local Catholic homeschool conference.  I knew that it might be difficult to browse all the awesome books and have no use for them, but such is my life now.  I forgot about All. The. Babies.  I think the most common number of kids per family at this gathering was nine.  Almost every mother carried a newborn in a sling or would clearly do so soon.  Luckily, the members of this group are joyful, loving people.  They pass around babies like bowls of popcorn at a party.  Everyone reacted enthusiastically to the news of our upcoming mission.  Still, I needed some time to recover afterward.

Last weekend, my sister and I attended a beautiful wedding.  The new husband and wife beamed the entire time.  My date and I, however, battled strong feelings of cynicism.  I fully understand why the priest asks the couple if they are open to life.  Yet, is it necessary to mention children six times during the nuptial Mass?  Is it right to imply that babies are the couple’s purpose in life?  This is probably cranky brain talking, but I felt awfully left out, like I was somehow “less married” than the other couples present. 

Certainly, I find no fault in the couples who have been blessed with children.  I am thrilled and delighted that God has bestowed such adorable gifts upon them.  I do not wish this pain of barrenness on anyone.  I simply long for direction.  What is my purpose as a married woman?

My husband and I talked about this recently.  He expressed his desire to become involved in various ministries, since our marriage cannot bear its own fruit.  I had pondered the same course of action, but came to a different conclusion.  Originally, I thought we needed to get out and volunteer so we could prove that our marriage is fruitful.  I found little peace in this mental trajectory.  Finally, I uncovered the question that lay deep in my soul.

“Can I just be married and serve my husband selflessly and faithfully?  Is that enough?”

At length, and after much prayer, God answered me in the affirmative.  I told my husband that we do not have a fruitless marriage.  We were mistaken about what type of tree we are.  We tried for so long to make oranges like everyone else, only to find little purple plums on our branches.  What?!  Plums?!  I want oranges!!!  But, no.  Our marriage makes plums, and there is nothing we can do to change that.  Unfortunately, there are almost no recipes out there for plums. 

What I mean to say is that there is almost no pastoral advice readily available for those suffering through infertility.  I have scoured the Internet, books, and even real live people to little avail.  The blog-sphere has been the most helpful.  At long last, I found people who understood my experience.  These women offered me profound insights into finding peace on this rugged, dimly lit trail.  However, much of my comfort sprung from the fact that they were just as lost as I was.  I was not alone.  Their peace of mind and spirit was hard won.  They still need care and healing too.  Who will help them in this fight? 

When seeking truth, I like to go directly to the source.  In the case of spiritual trials, it seems most logical to ask the advice of Holy Mother Church.  I opened my Catechism to the section on married love and fruitfulness.  Unfortunately, I found footnotes in the tome longer than the section offered to guide the childless.  The section goes on for pages about the iconic nature of the love between spouses and their children.  It gives clear and concise wisdom to help us understand how to respect the dignity of these life-giving relationships.  At the end, there are about three sentences that basically say, ‘Couples who cannot have children matter too.’

That’s nice.  Pray, go on.

Books written for infertile Catholics are all penned by couples who eventually had children, either by birth or through adoption.  I need to know that my marriage still matters even though we may never have children at all.  I need examples of what fruitful love looks like without the visible manifestations of our love running around our house.  Even in other books written about marriage and family, those struggling with infertility are given a mere “P.S.” I am certainly glad the Church thinks my marriage is important, but what is it supposed to look like in daily life?  So many people tell me to stay busy, go to work, get a hobby.  I have no desire to be distracted.  I need real, lasting peace.  I need to know how to love my husband in the midst of this pain.  I need to know what to do with these dang plums. 

Then, when I do finally find a crumb of joy, I need to feel supported when I feel like the world is staring at me wondering why I am not killing myself trying to grow my family.  I need someone to respond to my worries that by being happy without children, we are living selfishly.  I need someone to listen to Don Bosco when he speaks about the importance of making our love visible.  It is imperative, he says, for people:

“…not only be loved, but feel that they are loved.”

If you have known me for more than five minutes, you know that I harbor no desire for cute placations.  I do not want pity.  I seek something real.  With this help, I want to love my husband better.  I long to serve my creator more joyfully.  I need to let go of the bitterness that clings to my heart.

My guess is that you are not a bishop or even a priest, and you are certainly not the Pope.  (I think.  That would be kind of amazing…but I digress.)  So, why am I spewing these needs of mine all over innocent lay people?  Because, I want you to maybe have a little understanding as to why I am floundering.  Why I don’t have many answers when people ask me questions about how I feel or what we are going to do.  Why I feel so angry and confused some times, and full of joy at others. 

God is so good, and He is carrying this weak little lamb.  Yet, He never intended us to do battle alone.  I want to be able to support others in my situation, but I may need someone to throw me a line first.  Pray with me that either I am completely missing what the Church already offers and can end my ramblings or that someone will break the silence and I no longer feel like this:

Moved...for now

Whew.  We are all moved out of our apartment.  We even left it clean enough to receive our whole deposit back.  I would like to thank all of you for your prayers.  This moving thing that millions of people do all the time with no trouble is maddeningly difficult for me.  The process did not go perfectly, but it did go rather well.  I did not cry in frustration.  I only raised my voice twice, and briefly.  The husband did a rockin awesome job of lifting heavy objects, running up and down stairs, and organizing all our worldly goods. 

I can only describe this experience as grace-filled.  I felt tense and nervous along the way, but I made a concerted effort to invite God into my heart each moment.  In the midst of the sticky heat and boxes that have no lids, I could feel His calming presence. 

Now, here we are at my in-laws’ house.  Doing tons of laundry, sleeping in the husband’s old bedroom, confining our belongings to as small a space as possible, and trying not to get tangled underfoot.  I may simply be too awkward a person to deal properly with all this.  Next, we have to figure out what to unpack, what to store, and what to take with us on orientation and mission.

Monday was my last day at work, and I did not cry until I got home and read the sweet notes from my friends.  My job has been an immense blessing.  Each day, I was given the opportunity to perform works of mercy.  I helped feed the hungry, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless, comfort the sorrowful.  I loved every minute of it.  Almost.  I did not love the math on inventory days ;)  I also made some incredible friends along the way.  They have supported and encouraged me through some intensely difficult trials and provide me with beautiful examples of Christian love.  I love them dearly.

I don’t think I have fully grasped that we are about to leave the continent.  Though our lives are jumbled in preparation for such a journey, none of it seems real yet.  Perhaps I am afraid to allow myself to think about actually leaving.  I am excited about this adventure.  Really, I just hope our community likes us.  I know that whatever we do on mission will be tiny and clumsy, but God has asked us to do it.  So, here we go.  Also, hooray of hoorays, the husband’s corrected passport arrived today!  The original suffered a printer error and was missing half a letter.  I could just picture foreign airport officials detaining us for fraud.  No, gracias. 

Not only have we been moving, preparing to leave the country, applying for student loan deferment, and working, but I recently turned in my last chapter of book work for NFP teacher training.  I am now allowed to begin my student teaching, but that will have to wait until we return home from mission.  The husband has a few chapters to go…  I am super excited about participating in this ministry, even if we have to wait a bit to get started.

Since all that is rather boring, my family decided to spice things up a bit.  My grandma recently underwent hip replacement surgery.  Neither she nor my grandpa could be left alone for several weeks.  She was in the hospital or rehab facility, and he was at home.  My dear mother and two youngest siblings moved into my grandparents’ house for almost a month to take care of them.  Mom has not, however, perfected bilocation.  Making sure everyone had adequate care was like solving that riddle where the fox, goose, and grain have to cross a river.  You can only carry one item at a time.  The fox can’t be left alone with the goose, and the goose can’t be left alone with the grain.  Que exhaustion.  Thankfully, my grandma is home and recovering beautifully.  My grandpa is happy to have his sweetheart back.

Wow, this post is all over the place, but such is my life.  Today was nice, though.  Got to throw a football in the park with my sweet love.  Did bunches of laundry.  His parents made tacos for dinner.  Now, to curl up with my kindle and stay up too late reading my beloved Sherlock Holmes. 

Thanks, Jesus, for a beautiful day!  I love you!

Yea, though I walk through the valley of cardboard boxes...

We are moving this week.  This is also my last week of work.  My boss has been in England for the past two weeks.  My mind is a wreck.  I try to remind myself that this moving experience will not necessarily be a repeat of the horrors of last year's move.

I am certainly praying that everything goes smoothly with this move.  More importantly, though, I pray that no matter what happens, my husband and I will use each moment to act in love.  We cannot control what the coming days will bring.  We are, however, free to decide how we react to whatever ridiculousness lands on our heads.  Time does not care about little old me.  This time next week, we will no longer be living in our apartment.  Everything will be done on that front.  I fervently pray that I remember this experience as one in which our love grew and was made stronger.  I pray for the grace not to despair and worry.  I pray that I never forget that God is with me and that He gave me a wonderful husband to guide me to Him.

I know that this is a tiny cross to bear compared to the suffering of others.  But I am just a little girl who cries a lot, and God will have to carry me through this.

So, if I am still all in one piece next week, and my husband is not giving me the concerned sideways glance, I accomplished none of it on my own.  If you see any good, any strength in me, you look upon God's grace.  Please pray that I say yes to this grace and make room for it in my heart.  I will pray the same for you, and I cannot wait to see what beautiful things He creates with your help.

Mary, help of Christians, pray for us, that we may say with you: Behold, I am the handmaiden of the Lord.  Be it done unto me according to your word.

Friday, where have you been all my life?

I laugh way too hard at this.  It gets funnier the longer you look at it.  Happy Friday, everyone.

Cast your nets

I am re-reading St. Therese's autobiography, A Story of a Soul.  I highly recommend this book to all.  St. Therese has a wonderful way of reminding us that we are all called to be saints.  We need not perform great deeds or be big and important in the world.  Even the littlest ones of us can bring immense joy to Jesus' heart.

At one point, she references a Gospel passage I had heard hundreds of times.  The apostles had been fishing all night and caught nothing.  Jesus, standing on the shore, calls out to them to cast their nets one more time.  The apostles assure Him they have tried that already, and they are tired.  Jesus persists, so they give it a shot.  This time, to their great surprise, their net is bursting with fish.

google images

Therese discusses how this applies to each of our lives.  When we have spent all we have to give, we need only say yes to God's grace for miracles to happen.

Perhaps I have been forgetting this lately.  I keep asking, "Again, God?  Really?  Didn't you see what happened last time?  Not sure I want to go through all that one more time."  Yet, here is evidence that if these promptings to act truly come from God, I will certainly miss out if I refuse.  I must consider what God desires.  According to this and other stories, it is not to heap burdens upon us for no reason.  God, ever the gentleman, forces nothing on us.  He patiently waits for us to say yes to His invitation.  Then He floods our hearts with blessings we cannot even imagine.

I say all this like I actually practice it.  I know all this in an intellectual sense, but do I truly, faithfully believe it?  I want to believe it.  I want to abandon myself completely to God's beautiful grace.  For some reason, I continue to hold back that last little part of myself, just to be safe.  I pray that I may no longer desire this false sense of security, but the immeasurable grace that my Lord waits so patiently to shower all over me.

“Aslan is a lion- the Lion, the great Lion." "Ooh" said Susan. "I'd thought he was a man. Is he-quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion"..."Safe?" said Mr Beaver ..."Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.”

-C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Freedom from ALL THE THINGS!

Thank you for your prayers concerning my last post.  I found my phone.  It was right where I knew it had to be.  As it often goes when I lose belongings, I experienced a series of emotions.  Regardless of whether I find the lost item, the ordeal invariably ends with me contemplating my high level of attachment to inanimate objects.

What confounds me is that I have always felt this way.  When I was two years old, my dad used an engine hoist to lift a sewer grate so he could retrieve my cheap plastic one-inch-tall red barrel of apples.  Why?  Because I was HYSTERICAL over losing it...and my dad likes using engine hoists.  When I was nine, someone stole my awesome hand-me-down patchwork denim jacket out of our wagon at the zoo.  I still feel sad about that sometimes.  Why?!

Part of my trouble comes from a lifelong battle with obsessive compulsive disorder.  I have healed so much since finally being treated for this condition when I was in college.  However, one symptom that still bothers me is the presence of unwanted thoughts.  I can be minding my own business, and suddenly terrible things flash in my mind.  Sometimes these thoughts are memories.  Other times, they are awful things my crazy brain makes up.  Some days they run in my head non-stop all day long.  On good days, I am able to neutralize them and move on promptly.

This mental struggle often prevents me from being able to remember happy or even ordinary events.  However, if I look at a photograph or object connected to such an event, I am able to remember it perfectly.  Thus, when I lose these items, I feel as if I am losing memories.  Additionally, I sometimes feel as if I need to frantically memorize happy times so I do not lose them too.

There are other, deeper, reasons for my attachment to worldly things.  Those have more to do with my upbringing, and I do not have any wine handy right now to be able to go into detail.

I often consider how I would feel if my house suddenly went up in flames and everything inside were destroyed.  Would I be ok?  Yes.  Then why does losing individual belongings bother me so?

I tried to remedy these feelings by saying more prayers of thanksgiving for what I do have and letting God know that I would give up all of it if He asked me to.  This plan kind of backfired, though.  I began to feel like God might be disappointed with me If I were not constantly oohing and aahhing over His gifts.  In this way, I focused more on the feeling of the experiences than on God's presence.  Not bueno.

I have been praying and working on this for many years, and I have seen some improvement.  Recently, however, I had a bit of an epiphany.  I was reading Pope St. John Paul II's theology of the body.  In this work, the pope says that acts of love are eternal - irrevocable, even.  When we love God and one another, we are not simply doing something nice.  We are participating in eternity.

How does this help me not freak out when I lose or forget things?  Any good I encounter is from God.  God is love.  Love is eternal.  I may lose worldly possessions without hope of their return.  However, I need not worry that the love attached to those items is gone as well.  It cannot go away.  Even if I have trouble remembering it sometimes, God holds each act of love in His heart forever.

This realization has given me such peace.  So often, I cling to possessions or experiences, terrified of losing them and their meanings.  Remember that part where I have trouble trusting God?  Yeah, still working on that.  I always thought of the eternal nature of love in a general sense.  Realizing that God forever holds and rejoices in each tiny act of love means I am free.  I need not cling to anything in the world.  I certainly have not perfected myself in this way, but I am so thankful for this healing grace.

Frustrating challenges

Why oh why do these things keep happening?  Put money in savings account > have to get new tires.  Today, had a moderately successful yard sale > now can't find my phone.  No matter how hard we try, we just cannot seem to get ahead in saving and raising money for this mission trip.  I know I can't take these occurrences as signs that we are not supposed to go on mission, but why must it all be so difficult?

I haven't given up hope just yet, but I am almost there.  Please pray that I find my phone... and a little peace.  Thank you.