We woke up this morning and s.l.o.w.l.y made it out of bed. Eowyn was just sitting in her room, wide awake. Its days like these that I'm so happy for her patience. Its like-since the alarm doesn't go off she knows its a day to sleep in.
We opened up presents. We ate breakfast. We grabbed lunch with an out-of-town friend. We picked up more medicine. We came home.
and now we're here. we had to cancel our evening plans due to illness and I'm learning how to be a caretaker. Ben will graciously admit that I was horrible at taking care of him when we first were married. It was a sad sight folks. I was impatient, selfish, demanding. Yes, demanding of a sick man. So glad I'm learning. so glad he is so kind. With him being sick things obviously look different than I had imagined for our little first Christmas as 3. Luckily, we celebrate Christmas THREE times. If sickness was going to come-this is the perfect time for it.
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I keep going back and forth between taking a hiatus from blogging. Mostly because recently every other post I get anxious. I'm not sure why. I worry that my heart isn't being heard-that I don't know who's reading or I don't know where they're at. I've contemplated making this a private blog and doing invitation only, but so many of my closest friends have come out of the woodwork through this blog. That just doesn't seem like the answer.
I love this little blog for what its done for us. It's recorded our fondest memories, given us a place to express our hopes and has given us a way to let people in to our lives all at once. But its also naturally opened the door for criticism, and for misunderstanding.
Ben is an encourager. He's the one that dares me to put it out there. How many times have I written things that were on my heart and then got scared and wanted to take it down. He's the one that says "leave it." These little daily practices of sharing are perhaps what have made me learn how to be vulnerable face to face. I'm slowly getting comfortable with the anxiety and dread that comes when presenting oneself to an audience who's perception I can't control. Does this feeling ever go away? I doubt it. Because I care about you. I care for your heart and where you're at. Because of this, I doubt it ever will.
***
I always half-joke with soon-to-be-married friends that I don't expect to hear from them for 6 months or more. They act surprised, and somewhat skeptical that 6 months will be the time it takes for them to move back into the lives of others, but I've found it to be true-and it was the same grace extended to Ben and I by several friends. A friend of mine made mention that perhaps having a baby is similar, you need 6 months to figure things out.I think that may be why I loved Colorado so much. I had that time to just be us and begin to figure out what that meant. While I love Minnesota and all of its benefits, it also has a lot of responsibility, and a lot of reminders of responsibility I struggle now to maintain. I was blessed with several other mothers who offer support here, but that means also being surrounded by other mothers carrying different loads. I often fight to not keep asking myself "am I doing enough?" "Do they think I'm doing enough?"
But its even this very blog post that reminds me why I want to keep writing. Something wells up in my chest that makes me feel the need to share. And while I'm at home, often having to be flexible with a very emotionally sensitive little human, I feel God whispering to and changing this heart. This blog has allowed me to process and has allowed me to share here, even if it is a full week before I see another human (other than my husband). It gives me a place to share things like the fact I really don't have a clue what I'm doing, that sometimes I'm struggling to figure out the reasons I agreed to all this, remind myself I really am blessed even when having to cancel the umpteenth time on a friend because of life and sickness and mis-communication. Its allowed me to put myself out there and, while getting mixed responses, has allowed me to make peace with a lot of life. And then to celebrate it.
So, I guess all of this is to say thank you to the encouragers of this blog. Your little reminders that encourage my honesty are what has kept this from turning into a 'happy-go lucky-life is a piece of Jesus-loving-pie' kind of internet space. Its kept it authentic and sometimes messy, but at the very least real. Which has in turn influenced who I am-and kept me some sort of authentic as well. And while we don't share most of our troubles here, because that's not its purpose, I do appreciate your grace as I sort through what it means to believe in Christ in these different areas of life. I sometimes am curious if I don't have contradictory statements in blog posts from one year to the next as I grow. I'm sure I do. Thank you for the grace extended to someone who is and always will be figuring it out.
Thank you for your own ability to filter. Even these posts. It is often this fact: My readers have the ability to process through and decide what they agree with and not agree with, that allows me to be at rest that I haven't derailed someones interest in Jesus because of my twenty-three-year old probably-flawed theology. I'm glad we serve a God who can't be figured out in a day and that I'll be spending this whole life discovering Him.
Love you guys. Merry almost Christmas.
Brittany
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