I’m just going to say it: the Christmas cards are NOT in the mail.  You read that correctly.  NOT.  And here’s the hardest part: I don’t care.  Really, I’m trying to care, but it’s like some door in my soul closed and I can’t open it again.  The girl who has had her cards in the mail the day after Thanksgiving for 16 years running, even if she had to hand carry 150 of them in her luggage because she was traveling over the holiday….decided she’d rather hang out at the holiday themed model train exhibit with family and friends than stress about some cards.  I didn’t even order my return address labels until SEPTEMBER!  I know.  It’s like you don’t even know me anymore.

It brings me around to answering a question I’ve received a lot lately: Lori, how to do find time to blog?  Well, it’s easy.  I don’t clean the ‘ole bathrooms liked I used to.  I KNOW!  It’s LIKE I’VE DIED AND REPLACED MYSELF WITH AN ALIEN.  Lori, the keeper of the sterile home, is looking right now at piles of breakfast dishes.  AND I DON’T CARE.  I’m less perplexed about the cards and the dishes than I am about my lack of stress about them both.

Which brings me to an argument God and I have been having since I quit working:

Me:  God, I thought I was supposed to LOVE staying at home.  Everyone said I would.  It’s actually a heck of a lot more work than I anticipated.

God:  You begged and pleaded with me for years to give you a family.  You know what they say: pray for rain and you’d better carry a big umbrella.

Me:  Agreed, and thank you.  But, I think we both know at heart I’m a selfish person.  This is a CRAZY stretch of the imagination that I could LIKE doing laundry all week just to put away the last load only to start it all over again.  WHO LIKES CHASING LAUNDRY IN CIRCLES?

God:  NO ONE.  That’s the trick.  You must find contentment in service to your family.  You must stretch.  You must grow.  And growing into this new skin will take some time.

Me:  And why does this new skin include acne, may I ask?

God: Vanity Lori.  It’s a sin.

Me: That’s fair.  Uncool, but fair.

God: Good try at diverting me, but I brought up time.

Me: Oh you’re going to go there?  FINE.  PATIENCE: I HAVE NONE.  Having none in this house is actually quite painful.  Every single day, it’s like a bruise on my brain that I don’t have enough patience.  Seriously, have you met Sara?

God:  Again, grow Lori.  Really try.  GROW.

Me: I don’t want to.  You spent forever getting me to where I was.  I was happy there.  This is too hard. I want to go back to Florida and live on a little island and drink on the water with my friends.  And I don’t even care how spoiled that sounds.

God: I need you to be this, I NEED you to be this, THEY need you to be this.  I promise, do this.

Me: UGH!  I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHAT THIS IS SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE!

God: Fall into the ambiguity, and I will catch you.  When have I not?

After months and months of trying and crying and seriously thinking maybe I’ve made a huge mistake in staying at home, I woke up to toys on the floor and dishes in the sink and I don’t even want to take about the laundry…and unfinished Christmas cards.

OH MY GOD.  I’m happy.  I’m actually quite content.  Don’t know if will last, but you know me…I’ll take any 10 minutes I can get.  What if it does last?  What if I CAN do this?  What if I COULD be someone else entirely?  It’s almost too radical a thought for me, but I love this idea, that we truly can begin again at any time, and choose every single day who we wish to be.  Or more importantly, who we need to be.

I’m sure I’ve typed this before, but it is a bit of an anthem of how I am feeling these days:

“A mother is a person who, seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie.” -Tenneva Jordan