Journal

"Here, let me see," I hold my hand out to Jane. She nabs her journal, jaunts around the coffee table. I shimmy out of the deep black couch, see-saw Joe's drowsy head in the crook of my arm. She flops the notebook open, thrusts it toward me.

"Joseph loved his father," I read.

She points to the looping gray. "If you love, you have a good result," she says and pokes the sentence next to O for Observation.

"That's true." I nod, sway Joe at the corner of my elbow. He nuzzles close.

Jane lowers the tatter cornered journal. Myra cockles from the bedroom, but that notebook between us, that bass note of a notebook humming, reverberating, we let the moment elongate and stretch. I nod again, the perpetual motion a sway of newborn comfort.

"Almost anything," Jane finally says, "if you love, you have a good result." She dips her head, "If you love and you don't keep any secrets, you have a good result." She nods in that grown-up way. I furrow my brow, and we bob our heads.

"Huh," I say. "That's true."

Love, and have no secrets. The moment skitters back to motion and we carry on, the secret inside: Love, no secrets.

Gratitude:

3609. "We all have different ways we hug you," Lucy says as I make the rounds to hug each child.

3610. "I want to hug Momma more," Jane announces.

3611. And, "Jack," she says, "stop fighting against Mother. You'll never win."

3612. I stumble upon another quote, "The impatient Christian is a weapon in Satan's hand."   ~C. Missler.

3613. "Orangoutangs are the most intelligent animal," I say, "I didn't know that." The children look at each other. "Even more than chickens?!" Jane says.

3614. Myra spits at the dinner table. When we frown and gasp. She panics and licks it up.

3615. Creamy soup with rice and lemon, we share it at Mom's.

3616. We carry on in Revelation. Even the children want to know about it.

3617. Jack crunches an apple and reads to Joey. Joe studies his face, watches Jack's mouth.

3618. "You guys don't get elephant skin, I don't think," Lu remarks. "I got elephant skin. Like Uncle Dan."

3619. Baby melons on the counter, love from the farm, we eat them, juice dripped down our chins and on the floor.

3620. The phone rings during dinner. "I'm not going to answer that," I say. "Mom, toll free," Myra shouts.

3621. The kids and I have Writer's Workshop.

3622. Pesto chicken, crockpot special, invented from what we had.

3623. Jane reads her Bible, a dolly slung up on her shoulder.

3624. Lucy tries to rehydrate a black marker on the way to Grandad and Grammie's. I bust up laughing at her jet black lips.

3625. We make celebration of the August and September birthdays with a party, swirling bliss of children and adults, a carnival of family.

3626. Virtue. We name our favorite things about the birthday girls and boy this past year and replay before our eyes, virtue.  Whatever is good, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable -- if anything is excellent or praiseworthy think about such things. And so we do.

3627. New clothes for fall, a birthday gift, the felicity of feeling pretty.

3627. "I stepped in some bear poop in the orchard," Janie announces, "and it had plum pits in it."


3628. We pick 12 gallons of plums in the snarled old orchard.

3629. We can plums late into the night, the first five gallons a grid of purply red quart jars.

3630. Craig and I pause to crunch rice krispy bars and stare at the old hand-me-down bin still half full of plums. "Ya know," Craig blurts between bites, "that is a lot of plums." He sets me to giggles. We shake our heads, smiles wide, laughs full.

3631. Myra blisses out over piles of plums. One here, a handful there, it's hard to say how many she ate. And so contrite when everything turned terribly stinky and messy, she hopped in the bath and covered herself head to toe in conditioner.

3632. Jack confesses to growing his fingernails long to try to grow claws.


3633. The children awake from Sunday naps. "Change into dirty clothes and you can dig worms," I say, "as long as you fill in the holes." They whoop and holler and, rapturous, tumble out the back door.

3634. Myra bites off little bits of plum and stuffs them in her dolly's mouth.

3635. "Are you trying to make it look like actually you?" Jack asks as I process a photo.

3636. Actually me. Another good week.

Resolve

"Why does God LET us lie?" Jane snaps her head from side to side. She frowns and wrinkles her brow, eyes puffy and red.

I sit next to her, planted on the edge of my bed. "Because," I say, and she stares into my eyes, "if he controlled us and MADE it so we couldn't lie, we wouldn't be able to love." She holds my gaze, her face all splotches and swollen. "We can only love if we CHOOSE not to lie. Love happens when we choose." I tuck my chin and smile into her blue oceans of eyes. She blinks. I sigh.

"Momma,"she says, "will you forgive me for lying?"

I let our gaze hold, long like a bass note. I sigh. "Yeah. Jane, I forgive you." I put my arm around her then pull her back to arm's length. "I forgive you completely," I say and before she looks away, "I can do that because Jesus forgave my sins. All of them. Completely."

"Oh," she says and we pause as if the moment were a comma.

"Kinda makes you see how even good people are wicked inside and need Jesus to forgive their sins, huh?"

"Yeah," she sags her shoulders, "even I need Jesus to forgive me."

"Even you need Jesus to forgive your sins, and I need Jesus to forgive mine."

I encircle her in my arms. She rests her head on my shoulder, my cheek on her curly mop. And for the longest time we just we sit and let that soak in.

*****

Later we all bunch up on the little black couch. I nurse Joe. They perch on the arms and take turns squeezed in next to me.  Myra, a shifting sea of knees and elbows, washes up around Joe and me like high tide.

"Did you know I think you're great?" I say and grin at Jack balanced on the sofa arm.

"Did you know I think your eyes are pretty?" he spikes back, chin tucked and eyes bright.

"Your shirt is pretty," Lulie adds and pokes a black flower on my tummy.

"You're pretty all over, Momma," Jane slides off the kitchen bench all tall and shoulders square.

"I think your eyes are pretty," Jack chimes again at my elbow.

"I love you," Jane adds, "I don't love you 'cause you're pretty. I love you cause you're you." She smiles. We all do and let the moment roll by like leaves falling in autumn as if there were a thousand more to come.

Gratitude:

3267. "Mommy," Lucy peals, "I have practiced swimming so much I can BARELY swim."

3268. Myra nuzzles my shoulder while I nurse Joe. "Can I nurse 'im?" she asks.

3269. "Daddy, thanks for working so hard," Jane greets Craig when he gets home. He catches her eye across the room. "Aw, I love to work hard to take care of you guys," he says.

3270. "I watered some worms," Lucy announces, "so they will grow longer and we can use them we we go fishing."

3271. "Everyday is beautiful," Jane tells me, "'cause it's a day that the Lord has made."

3272. Craig works long hours all week and my mom stops by to help me cut the backing for a quilt I started eight years ago.

3273. She listens while I tell her again and again all I love about each of the children, and I glean the fields of her wisdom.

3274. Two ferns that look like wings.

3275. Drop in company between Rose Show events from Craig's mom.

3276. Jane practices the writing process. She writes about worms and colors and bike rides -- starts to memorize the moves.

3277. Lucy trounces in from out back. "There's a yellow ant on me," she says, "It already fell off. Do you think they can bite?"

3278. I begin to rise early and start a new morning routine.

3279. Bean soup with corn salsa and parmesan. 

3280. The kids and I make a picnic with Jimmy John's day old bread and whole milk Greek yogurt.

3281. Lulie tries to play Uno with Myra. "When I win, Myra, we're gonna stop this game."

3281. I see again how the key to discipline is resolve, and then marvel at how these sweet children sense even the slightest waver in steadfast resolve. 

Trust

"So, I want you to read it out loud to me for a while." I lower my chin, nod into Jane's unblinking eyes.

"Why?" She tilts her head. We let the moment of correction turn, slow like a sundial's shadow.

"Because you broke my trust." I wait for the moment to be long enough. "I will always love you and appreciate you and want to be around you. But if you want me to trust you, you have to be very careful with my trust." I watch her turn this over in her mind. A blink. A nod.

And, small like a puff of wind, the moment ebbs. I hug her to my chest. "Just like I have to be very careful with your trust," I say, "if I want you to trust me."

We linger. She kisses my neck. I kiss her forehead.

And silently, like her warmth in my arms, authority circles back, makes a path of equal footing. Isn't this what always happens when we learn to submit to authority?

Night falls, and we're home late. We linger again, the whole car of us stopped at a red light.

"How come if it's a red light and no one's there and you see it's clear, you don't just go?" she wants to know.

Before I can weave a thoughtful answer, the words spill out, "'Cause," I say, "if we did that it would change us into the kind of people that disobey when no one's looking."

There again, that equal footing. The light flashes green, and we speed away home, another glimpse of the path ahead of us.

Gratitude:

1962. The children peeking over shoulders and around elbows to see pencil sketches turn into watercolor painting. How they clamor for paper and paint and try to copy.

1963. A hot fire, warm coffee, salted chocolate and a photo to sketch.

1964. How I ask Myra how she slept and she responds, "BIG."

1965. How Jane tells me that when you read your Bible, you start to think what God thinks.

1966. How Myra makes her baby wave at me.

1967. How Lucy confesses to breaking six eggs.

1968. How Myra raises her hand to be like the big kids.

1969. How Jane, Jack, and Lu all help Myra sled in the backyard.

1970. A whole pizza and all the laughter that went with it.

1971. Myra leaned on the counter watching Craig make scrambled eggs.

1972. How the children have the entire living room turned into a bed when I get up.

1973. How Myra wears Lucy's shoes over her footie jammies.

1974. Jack's exhortation, "Jane, I like it when you clean."

1975. His admiration for Craig, "Daddy, you have fat muscles."

1976. A surprise date from Craig, how he and his buddy make our house feel like a fancy restaurant for an evening. And how it reminds me of the early years, back before kids -- but better.

1977. Lingering conversation with his buddy's wife.

1978. Feta and bacon stuffed chicken, seared green beans, red potatoes, ice cream and rum sauce.

1979. Craig's wild enthuasiam over his latest project: mealworms. And how he greets me Friday morning, "Wanna see my mealworms?"

1980. Noticing what beautiful hands my mother has.

1981. A blue wallet purse that even holds my keys.

1982. Waking up to "Oh, My Darlin'" on Jane's dulcimer.

1983. Jack's latest inquiry, "Will I have rubber toots because I swallowed my gum?"

1984. Meatball soup and apple crisp.

1985. A vintage cutting-board.

1986. Jack's admonition as waits patiently to feel the baby kick, "Shhhh, if you're quiet you can hear him kick."

1987. Three of the four kids poised, hands on my belly waiting for a baby kick. And how Myra tries to copy, her hand on Jack's shoulder.

1988. How when one of our chickens winds up dead under the little ramp, Craig handles all after death proceedings.

1989. Babe still growing in my belly and the calm before the storm of major life change -- birth.

1990. Taking each day in small measures and being faithful in the small things.

Lead On

"Momma, I'm sorry," Jane shakes her head. "Will you forgive me for trying to make it look like I'm working when I'm really just sandbagging?"

The living room a kaleidoscope of laundry and legos, dollies and dart guns, velcro shoes, rain boots, socks and tinker toys dispersed like tide, I sigh. I smile at her tilted head, curls askew. "Yeah, I forgive you."

And so it is, all the counterpoint of discipline and training and it comes to this: repentance. Suddenly, she's easy to lead. Fierce girl that she is, strength under control is greater strength yet.

Gratitude:

1900. Lucy's announcement, "If it's on the bottom right, that means it's in the middle."

1901. Family puttering around the table making breakfast together.

1902. How when I tell Jane that flattery will get you nowhere she asks, "Is flattery a street?"

1903. Family gathered for cousin's birthday, and how we laugh and visit, three conversations going at once, and land soft and tired for bed.

1904. Thai peanut sauce made from scratch.

1905. A trip to two grocery stores and home in less than an hour, a record to be sure.

1906. Jack crossing the street alone, off to fight nerf wars with the cousins.

1907. How he could jump off practically anything.

1908. Craig home safe from a conference away from home.

1909. Excavating the playroom into the new baby's and Jack's room, and all the help that went with it.

1910. Refurbishing cloth diapers in tiny sizes for new baby boy.

1911. The continued search for a one syllable boy name that Craig and I both love. (Any suggestions?)

1912. Jane's observation, "Daddy can make practically anyone laugh."

1913. How she wakes me this morning, "Momma, will you get up, I'm dressed and already ready for church."

1914. How when I tell Jack he's a nice boy he says, "You're a nice girl! Or woman."

1915. A road trip with the kids to run an errand.

1916. My huge belly and how all the quiet moments are filled with baby kicks and life moving inside.

1917. Learning the hard road of setting standards high and expecting the children to jump.

Math

"Ok, about five more minutes, then you should be done." I poke my head out of the kitchen, raise my eyebrows to Jane.

She nods, cups a hand over four remaining math problems. She scratches another answer on her paper then pauses, "I try to hide it from you," she says, glances back at the paper, "but it's just like, you're no dummy."

I laugh. She grins then rotates her pencil for the perfect hold and scrawls out more answers.

From the kitchen I chop onions for stew. I think of how Myra tried to eat a penny a couple of days ago, hand cupped over her mouth.

Jane and her math, Myra and her penny, I turn the images like smooth stones in my pocket.

Later, schoolwork a stack next to the jar of sharpened pencils, stew heated to a simmer, Jane lingers in the kitchen. Conversation orbits around dirty dishes, smudgy cutting boards, the way the world works.

"Maybe you should pleasure read," I suggest.

Jane leans on the counter. I plop a dish in the sink. "I sometimes just pleasure read," she says, "because I know I can get away with not doing school work if I hurry and start reading."

"Oh. Well, I guess that probably works, doesn't it?"

She nods. I laugh.

We visit, make the afternoon long and wide, a place we can hold hands and explain the world.

Gratitude:

1819. How Lucy tries to help Myra be big like her. "Do this, Myra. Walk like a KANGAROO."

1820. How the story of David and Goliath collides with the topic of child birth and Lucy concludes, "I guess he just popped out ENORMOUS."

1821. How I corral Myra for bed and Craig warns me, "She may still have potatoes in her mouth -- although she did brush her teeth, twice."

1822. Lucy's raised eyebrows when she reports, "Jack said that if I peed on a towel in our room again he would give me the cold he caught."

1823. How Myra discovers fuzz between her toes and pulls all ten apart to check for more.

1824. The realization that she's been eating it.

1825. Jack's matter-of-fact, "You weight more than you used to," as he nods to my belly.

1826. How Lucy holds her baby doll up to the chalkboard and makes her write school stuff.

1827. Nearly a foot of fresh white snow.

1828. Myra decked out in diaper, hats, mittens, and cowboy boots vying to play in the snow.

1829. Lucy's assessment, "We played in the snow today for nine hours. Or five hours."

1830. Trying to figure out why kissing boo-boos really actually helps -- if the kiss actually lands exactly RIGHT on the boo-boo that is.

1831. How Lucy miraculously develops the skill of looking me in the eyes when she gets in trouble in Fred Meyer.

1832. How she tries to soothe Myra, "Myra, cool your jets off!"

1833. A new baby wrap for the new babe.

1834. Making a new friend and her kindness to our family.

1835. How kindness is contagious.

1836. How Jane wipes Myra's face after lunch.

1837. How Lucy prays at dinner, "God, thank-you that we have enough food to fill up our bodies."

1838. Her description, "Huh-HA. It's a bad word. It means YOU'RE WRONG."

1839. How Craig announces at breakfast that he felt the baby kick and Lucy's incredulous, "You have a baby in YOUR tummy?"

1840. Watching Myra try to whisper during school.

1841. How I listen to a Chapter 2 of Learn the Bible in 24 Hours, and Jane responds, "People are naughty from day one."

1842. How Lucy sings Holy, Holy, Holy in three-year-old soprano while she works a puzzle.

1843. How Myra makes an eight pretzel tower with her lunch.

1844. Homemade pizza and caesar salad with friends and how the children play games all night while we relax.

1845. Ice cream with peach rum sauce and an evening of reading by the fire with Craig.

1846. The sledding run he sculpted outback.

1847. A black baby for Lucy given with love, one that fits into to all her favorite baby jammies. "This one just popped out of my tummy," she says.

1847. Her admonition, "Be VERY quiet because my baby's to sleep in the stroller. He didn't sleep very well, and then I gave him a kiss and a hug, and he fell right asleep."

1848. Learning how to dye.

1849. Myra on my back shouting, "BOO!"

1850. Taking one thing at a time and feeling capable of at least that.

1851. Reading how the people of Israel said, "What is it?!" the first time they saw manna, and realizing I say that to most of the best blessings in my life.

Storm

"What sort of things was I saying when I was so mad this week?" I ask Craig.

He settles into the sunroom's brown recliner, heaves shoulders back, reclines, "That is a good question."

"You don't remember?"

He shakes his head.

"Huh."

And so it is. Amid slammed doors and crossed arms, stomping feet and furrowed brow, one image persists: Jack's voice heralded from the kitchen table.

In the building volcano of that morning, I staccato over hardwood floors, punctuate out irritation to pierce mountains.

And from the table he calls. "Momma, Momma," he calls, "I drew a picture for you. Did you know I drew a picture?" He calls, a trifling chirp in the back of my mind. "Momma, I drew a picture of Jesus dying on the cross for you."

The morning sways, a ship at sea. A sideways glance, Jack's drawing: all pencil scrawled, but little crayon-drops of blood on Jesus' hands and feet, his head. In small degrees we finally settle, pebbles at the bottom of the ocean.

Like surf rolling in, I build apology on apology, smooth our ragged shores.

It's three days later when I remember, Jack's call, Momma, I drew a picture for you, the eye of the storm.

Gratitude:

1420. A phrase still ringing in my ears, "Well, -- really, you wouldn't be having any problem at all if you were completely unselfish." (Thank-you, dear friend!)

1421. And our children's wide eyes when I tell them these words, "She was right. She is a good friend to me. I was having a problem this morning because I was selfish."

1422. The gift of a pizza.

1423. Women friends who listen and empathize and remind me, showing respect is more important than getting what I want.

1424. How once an argument is settled Craig forgets it as soundly as God -- except for all the funny parts that we laugh over for years.

1425. How he mimics my antics, caricature complete, but never criticizes me at all.

1426. My father's words years ago, they resurface when I need them, "Men interpret respect as love." And how it's so true, great marriages hinge on unquenchable respect.

1427. A whole day out with my mom, my birthday present.

1428. How Craig says, "I just tried to make everything easy for you. I'm so glad you got to go out with your mom."

1429. New silver flats and tiny socks.

1430. Material for aprons.

1431. Jane, head bowed in prayer when I come to discipline her for disobeying.

1432. How Jack hops on one foot as he clears the table.

1433. Jack tugging at my elbow, "If you would like some of my SweetTarts I would love to give you some."

1434. Jane's prayer when we notice a broken part on the window of Daddy's truck. "Jesus, please help the robbers notice that part and change their heart and say, 'I'm not gonna break in.' Amen."

1435. Lucy's rendition, "Please help the robbers stay away, and please help them to be okay when we kill them. Amen."

1436. How Craig fixes the offending part.

1437. How Lucy tots out, a dolly wrapped in a plastic sheet. "Mom," she whispers, "I got a newborn baby." How she pats the stiff sheet, "She's got her blankie." Another pat and frown, "It's kinda dusty."

1438. How I probe to see what Jane looks for in a friend. "The fruits of the Spirit," she says.

1439. How my mom helps me to wrestle our sunroom into open spaces and small tasks.

1440. The boxes we donate to charity. And how I panic as the attendant comes to unload the car but feel light and free as I drive away.

1441. The intimacy of working side by side through exhaustion and chocolate with another person.

1442. How my mom knows what things I'll actually miss in 30 years.

1443. And learning to see through her eyes, the landscape of several paces ahead.

1444. Her trip to Africa.

1445. A birthday party, and how the gathering of family is still good, better than ever, after all these years.

1446. Reading The Help aloud with Craig, the folds of a good story, and how we laugh out loud as we read.

1447. A whole cookie sheet of roasted almonds.

1448. All the mercies of friendship and love, that catch me when I fall, a safety net.

1449. And how after a whole week of hanging on by a thread, I finally see it: apparently a very strong thread.