Multiple times this week I’ve heard it –
Mom friends saying that they have failed in some way.
Maybe they raised their voice, or lost their patience.
Maybe they just couldn’t answer one more question in the car.
A mom in crisis at an ailing child’s bedside.
A mom in the midst of yet another day stuck in the house.
I’ve tried reaching out to comfort friends, and remind them of the truth.
To tell them that I understand, and that I have been there, too.
I try to remind them there’s no judgement here for mistakes they’ve made.
We’re all just trying to make do.
I felt it myself extra yesterday as I tried to make it through the homeschool day.
My daughter Paige is nine years old and her pandemic weariness is showing through.
Her head had been down in her hands this day much more often than not.
Her sighs were heavy, her eyes were tired.
She had whined and cried a lot.
“I don’t understand why you’re acting like this AGAIN!” I had said, sensing myself grow hot.
“I’m trying to be patient with you, but you’re making it really hard.
Now sit up and straighten up your attitude,
or you’ll lose your skatepark time reward.”
But she still slumped, and her voice withered,
as did the remaining shreds of my patience.
I snapped at her.
She burst into tears, and ran sobbing to her room.
I wondered in that moment just how much more of this Groundhog Day I could really take.
Coffee cold.
“Come SIT. DOWN.”
Did I shower?
What about dinner?
Lather, rinse, repeat.
I was so tired. I was mean. No energy.
She deserved a much better mom.
For a minute I listened to the lies I’d spoken to myself all on my own.
I decided to scratch the rest of my lesson plans, and we’d just watch some video off of YouTube.
Surely she’d learn something, right?
I’m sure she’d rather do that instead…
In science lately we’ve been studying soil and the properties of the earth.
I called her to come back, and I saw puffy, just-cried eyes when I looked at her.
“I’m sorry, Honey. I shouldn’t have yelled.
Can we please start again?
I decided we’re going to stop with today’s plan and do something else, OK? I think we both need it.”
A nod. A slight, weak smile.
Us and The Day’s Failure settled in together on the couch.
She was quiet and caught up in the video I’d randomly found that talked about rocks deep at the earth’s core and how through weathering and decay, all of the soil on earth comes from them.
I looked at her then, my baby girl, just trying to make it through today.
Our world is up on end, our plans have changed.
She wrestles loneliness each day.
As she watched her lesson, though,
in it I understood my own:
Our lives are soil studies, too.
The different layers of this life.
Deep inside, the rocky things.
Those heaviest to lift:
Our pains, our trials, our failures.
Much too big to move or sift.
But from those things everything we are to be is made.
Our thoughts, our character, our dreams.
What we do with our deep, rocky parts become all other things.
Weathering is what happens to break the big rocks to smaller bits.
The life lessons that we learn, and how we view them.
What we make of it.
Then there are the layers made from both nurtrients and decay.
Not one without the other because you can’t know joy
unless you’ve been swept by pain.
When broken down small,
(as is best to do with rocks, and life, and days)
Our most fertile self lays at the top
Where brand new life is made.
There are no perfect handfuls when you look at it up close.
What looks rich and perfect for planting flowers also contains bugs and rocks and bones.
We’d never have rich ground inside without those boulders that we’ve faced.
The hard days turn into soft ground we won’t tread on alone.
I hugged Paige quiet, and breathed in her hair.
It smelled wild like fresh air and dirt, and I saw us both, in that moment, for what we were:
Two people just doing our best.
We don’t always succeed how we want,
But sometimes we do.
She shapes me and I shape her.
Dear Mother, you are not failing.
Today is just a weathering day.
As Paige’s karate teacher one time said,
“There is no losing. You either win,
or you learn.”
That thing that now feels big and heavy in time will be a softer garden thing.
Fertile soil, dark and rich with its delightful scent,
when inspected close is made from the things that once looked immovable, and impossibly firm.
Growing pains are called that because growing can often hurt.
But cup your hand and look up close at the soil you hold:
Every garden’s beginning.
Life and lessons in the dirt.
This article was written by a guest blogger. The opinions expressed here are those of the writer and do not reflect the opinions of Bob Lacey, Sheri Lynch or the Bob & Sheri show.
Mom Outnumbered
Hi! My name is Kerri Green; Wife to Justin, and mother to four highly entertaining daughters -Alena, Chloe, Tessa, and Paige. I am an artist, a writer, a daycare provider, a lover of people, a believer that there is humor and beauty in all things, and the author of Mom Outnumbered; a blog about real family life, and my observations of it. My goal is to make people laugh, to be there for them when they cry, and most importantly, to let them know that they are not at all alone in this up and down world. I live with my family in Sebastopol California, and I am opening the window into our life. So welcome! Come in. Sit down. Just please don’t mind the mysterious wet spots.
