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Staying crunchy.

I was reflecting with Hannah the other day on how, as your family grows (and you as parents learn and grow with it), perspective and experience gradually clarifies your approach to how you live out your values.  Some ways of living, you get even more and more confident and sure you need to do as time goes on.   Some preferences, though, turn out to be more situationally dependent than you realize, and when you find yourself in a different situation, you may make different choices than you imagined you would.  Other times, a tension appears between two values and you must choose between them or somehow make the best balance you can.  

And then, of course, occasionally you turn out to have been simply wrong-headed about something.

At age 25, I was a fairly crunchy, "continuum-concept"-minded mother-to-be.  Four children and twelve years later, which of my crunchy practices have I stayed committed to?  Which have yielded to a less-crunchy (or perhaps differently-crunchy) lifestyle?

Still Committed, Still a Believer, Still Going Strong

• Breastfeeding past toddlerhood
• None of that "baby food" stuff
• Co-sleeping nightly, well into early childhood
• Asserting our authority as parents, and striving for modeling and firm discipline that hopefully doesn't require "punishment" (caveat here is that I have always lost my temper a lot, so we have never been a yelling-free or attention-getting-swat-free house)
• Natural family planning (yes, I have reasons besides crunchiness, but it is pretty crunchy, and we are still with it)
• A parent at home full time
• Babywearing young babies
• Avoiding strollers
• Homeschooling

Even More Confirmed Than I Ever Thought I Would Be

• Actually being the parent at home full time.  (With every year that passes I am more comfortable and happy in that role, and more certain that the delegation is right for our family.)

Theoretically Committed, But No Longer Able To Figure Out How To Do It, Ergo Constant Feelings of Inadequacy

• "No TV or videos for kids under six"  
• "We don't eat that much sugar or packaged food"

Level of Commitment Has Waned, And I Don't Feel As Bad About It As I Expected Because Competing Values Have Grown Important

• Cloth diapering.  (With each child I've relied more and more on the convenience of disposables when out and about.)
• Babywearing older toddlers.  (My back can't take it.)
• Rarely leaving a baby with a babysitter.   (This would have shocked the younger me with only one child, to discover that I would use babysitters more than was necessary.  It turns out that my younger kids were greatly comforted by the presence of their older siblings.  Also, I now value getting regular exercise, and my older kids need attention from us too sometimes.  I couldn't have taken my big kids skiing, for example, without relying on the hourly child care there for the baby.)

Getting Lazy or Busy, and Aware That I'm Paying the Price

• Elimination communication/infant potty training.  I had #2 and #3 out of diapers by eighteen months.  I was so proud of myself.  I totally dropped the ball with #4, at 19m he doesn't even know what the potty is for, and now I have traditional potty training to look forward to.  It's my own damn fault and I know it.
• Patiently teaching very young children kitchen safety skills.  By the time #1 was 19 months old, he was well on his way to safely use various pointed and otherwise sharp or hot objects.  Not having invested that time yet with #4, it will be longer before I can be less vigilant in the kitchen.

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If I think of any more, I'll add them in updates to the post.  How about you? 

Added:  Jamie posts a response to this post.  How could I have forgotten homebirthing?  (selfdopeslap) Yes, homebirthing FTW. 

Ending up in widely different places.

I don't know if it is an effect of the Montfortian consecration prep or not, but I seem to be drawn more strongly to the Rosary these days.

The Rosary has never captivated me. "To each their own," I would say, "the Rosary is nice, but it's the Divine Office I love." I prayed the Rosary once in a while, and when I did, I truly got something out of it, every time. I was always glad afterwards. But I would never have said that I loved it, or that it had changed my life, the way that some people do. And I never looked forward to it, or felt that it fed me.

Lately it seems different. I don't pick up the beads every day, but I find myself wanting to at odd moments (sometimes when there isn't time). I got to Mass early this morning and borrowed my daughter's clunky blue plastic rosary to use while we waited. Most of the time I can never get five decades in before Mass, even if we arrive quite early, because of squirrelly kids. Today it happened that Mark had the baby and the five- and seven-year-olds were interested in their books, and so I prayed all five decades, finishing the Salve Regina as the processional hymn started up.

Do you find that you begin each mystery thinking about it the same way every time? I do. The Ascension, for me, begins always by meditating on the Scripture verse, "This Jesus who is taken up from heaven shall return in the same way you have seen him go." (paraphrasing from memory). And, for another example, the mystery of finding Jesus in the temple begins with a meditation on the idea I have that Mary must have thought the twelve-year-old was with Joseph and the men, and Joseph must have thought he was with Mary and the women and children.

Even though I always begin the same way, the meditations can take me in very different directions once I start. That is some thing that I find pretty cool about it. I keep expecting to run out of new (to me) thoughts about them, but I almost never do. I mean, not for all five mysteries each time do I think a new thought, but almost every time there is something new there.

Today, on the Ascension, I thought that maybe the "in the same way that you have seen him go" mainly means "don't expect him to come the way he came the first time, born again as a helpless baby." And that this maybe is connected to the identity of Mary as mother of God, because the flesh she gave him is sufficient for eternity. But another time, I found myself wondering why this particular event was marked by angels, and not others.

The last time I thought about the finding of Jesus in the temple, I wondered if the doctrine of her sinlessness meant that losing Jesus must have been Joseph's fault, or if they could both have made honest mistakes. But another time I thought about how it will not be long before I have a twelve-year-old, and how that is an age when many parents fear they are "losing" their children, and what a comfort the story could be to such parents.

Do you start each mystery the same way? What strange places have they taken you?

Quick-takes style, Marian consecration edition.

1

I'm doing this seven quick takes thing because of my weird blogger's block.  I'm not actually going to bother with Mr. Linky.   Incidentally, another reader emailed me and said that she felt oddly introspective while doing the 33-day Montfortian consecration, and so it rang true that I am having trouble writing while doing it.

2

But this seems kind of strange to me, because (what with school starting and all) I can only do a wussy version of the consecration prep.  There's a little bit of reading, and a couple of prayers, both grabbed whenever I have time; a different focus in my spontaneous prayer throughout the day; a general attempt to turn from "the spirit of the world;" and I'm noticing more  frequently how often I screw up and prove myself a very worldly person.  The Montfort subroutine is running in the background of my real life.  Hasn't crashed the system yet.  

I'm aiming for Our Lady of the Holy Rosary, Oct. 7, or more likely, the next day, which is a Saturday when I can attend Mass and go to Confession.

3

After I read St. Louis de Montfort's True Devotion to Mary, I felt unsatisfied.  All the people who'd told me about it claimed it was this amazing, mindblowing work, but it didn't really ring with me.  Really, except for the explanation of the consecration itself, it all just seemed like a repeating string of assertions about Mary, little of which were new to me (but maybe they were new to the people he was writing to back then?) and none of which were backed up by any arguments that weren't themselves simple assertions.

"God in these times wishes his Blessed Mother to be more known, loved, and honoured than she has ever been."  Okay -- how do you know?  Why particularly in these times?  "God the Son imparted to his mother all that he gained by his life and death, namely, his infinite merits and his eminent virtues."  Where does that come from?  How do we know this?  

I think it is meant to be inspirational writing, rather than thought-provoking writing, and I am peculiarly un-susceptible to inspirational stuff.  

And lookie here what I found:

"Were I speaking to the so-called intellectuals of today, I would prove at great length by quoting Latin texts taken from Scripture and the Fathers of the Church all that I am now stating so simply.  I could also instance solid proofs... But I am speaking mainly for the poor and simple who have more good will and faith than the common run of scholars.  As they believe more simply and more  meritoriously, let me merely state the truth to them quite plainly."

Well, there's my problem.  I believe complexly and not quite so meritoriously, I guess.   Let me hope I can glorify God in my infirmity.

 

4

On the other hand, the idea of the consecration itself was thought-provoking and interesting.  So I went looking for more modern writers, less concerned about writing simply and plainly.  And I found a gem of an online book:  Mary in Our Life, by Rev. William C. Most.  It was written in the 1950s. The link goes to a table of contents that links to all the chapters, online, for free.  Much more my kind of "inspirational" writing.

5

This is the kind of Marian writing that makes the tops of Protestants' heads blow off.  The word "Co-Redemptrix" is bandied about, for example.  And as I read it, I found myself struggling with some of the concepts, precisely because of the Protestant, anti-Marian influence in American Christian culture.  It was very edifying, because intellectually, Father Most's arguments make a great deal of sense to me.  And yet the logical conclusion of his arguments suggests an attitude toward the Blessed Virgin that feels radical to me.  Deep down, it seems, I feel a sort of repulsion against fully embracing the idea of Mary as intercessor, which as I search my history seems can only have come from contact with American Protestantism.  I didn't even realize that I felt that internal repulsion until reading Fr. Most's arguments forced me to confront it.

 

6

At the same time, it's exciting to have read this, because it's the first time in a long while that I have had a theological concept of any kind to grapple with in a radically new way.  I think it's funny that the concept itself isn't particularly new, and is even uber-traditional.  But it's really blown my mind and I still have a lot to think about.

(And yes, I could write more details, but I am having trouble expressing them.)

 

7

Meanwhile, all sorts of odd little messages from outside seem to be finding their way to me, encouraging me to keep on with the Consecration such as I can.  I'm aware that human beings are great at finding patterns where really there is only random noise, and that it's unsurprising that if I'm thinking Marian thoughts, I would see signs everywhere (such as, having just prayed for discernment about whether to make the consecration, being handed a business card 15 minutes later, on which was printed a call to people to make a Marian consecration!  That was a fun example).

It's time for me to get back to work, and writing this has exhausted my creativity.  Have a great Friday!

Conflict.

Typing feels like moving through wet sludge this week.  I'm going to try to get this post out, though, while the middle kids are decompressing with some cartoons, the oldest is finishing his mechanics assignment (think punctuation, not wrenches), and the baby is sleeping.  I mixed myself a rum and coke before I sat down, hoping that the combination of caffeine and relaxant will generate a little fluency.  *slurp*  Let's see.

I don't know why, but I have had little desire to write this week.  Many ideas, little desire.  Could be the early days of school; lots to do, less time.  Could be that I have decided to embark on the consecration I mentioned a few days ago (thanks to those of you who emailed me and commented -- it was very helpful).  On that, I've had a number of thoughts I've wanted to share, but had difficulty putting into words.  This probably isn't the post for it.  I will write about it.  I want to write about it.  Somehow I keep abandoning the posts after two or three sentences.

The kids are pushing back at me as we get started with school.  Except for coschooling, which is so far fine, my days are so much less than I want them to be.  If only there were enough of me to go around.  If only I had enough energy at the end of the day to greet "Can I watch videos now?!?" with anything other than relief.   I have made sure that my day's schedule includes a block of time spent one-on-one with each school-aged child.  That's an improvement over last year.  Now if I could just get the others to stop interrupting.  

And why so much drama?  Why so much wailing about what there is to do and how long it will take?  Why not just sit down and do the damn stuff?  

I'd better shut up on that last point, lest I have to take my own advice.

All right, I think I'm done venting.  I just wanted to keep the blog from going blank.  

Yesterday I went for a swim at the end of the day, and thought furiously as I plowed back and forth across the pool.  I just need to discern what I'm supposed to be doing, I thought, figure out how best to allocate the limited resource that is me.  An answer floated back to me as I touched the side of the pool:  No, it is much simpler than that; I just have to do what I can and do it in love.  If I don't know how to do that, I have to ask for the grace to do it, and trust that it will be enough.  It makes sense, but I wonder what it would feel like; I don't think I have ever tried.

"Looking up."

Marc at Bad Catholic:

"If you find yourself drenched in lemonade, but know that you haven't drenched yourself, what is left to conclude? That someone else has drenched you. If you find yourself drenched in worth, but know that you have no reason to feel worth, what is left to conclude? That someone has given you worth. It's a joke, see, because you're drenched in lemonade, and worth everything! Who among you would find themselves drenched in lemonade, look around and realize they could not have drenched themselves, and thus concluded that they were not, in fact, ever drenched."

RTWT.

...And the winner is...

Well, you know, it wasn't all that tough since all of FIVE of you sent in photographs, to the little contest/drawing/thingy that I sponsored with Dorian Speed of Scrutinies.  The "let me see your homeschooling space" contest.  Really it's more like a show and tell.

But there are lots more than five photographs, because (a) Dorian and I put some in too, and (b) those of you who participated sent in at least a few photos each.  

And what cool photos they are!  

(Be sure to look at the slideshow with captions:  some of the ones labeled "Dorian Speed" are photos that were submitted to her by email, and the photographer's name appears in the captions.)

Thanks to Jennifer Fitz, "Notes from a Mama,"  Ann-Marie Gorman, Cathie Baier, and the Meineke family (also known as commenter Kelly) for playing along.

But what you really  want to know is the winner of the random drawing:  

Kelly M!

Also, I want a comfy rocking chair to teach in like Kelly's.

Kelly, please email me at bearing@bearingblog.com with the email address that you wish to use for such great honors as receiving $20 Amazon gift certificates!

And the rest of you... feel free to continue uploading photos to the homeschooling pool.  I think it's still open.  Even if the loot is already gone.