Aug 12, 2014 | Dating & Marriage
Despite the fact I took a Master Gardening course for a semester, I have an uncanny knack for killing all things green. I’m not quite sure how my geraniums have survived the last month, since I haven’t tended to them since the Fourth of July.
My non-nurture nature isn’t specific to flowers. As a nanny, I was very brass tacks. I’m not paid to baby these children, I told myself. I’m paid to cook and clean and change diapers. So that is what I did.
To ‘nurture’ means to ‘care for and encourage the growth or development of’ something or someone. For those of us who are ‘Type A’, the time and patience required for this care may not be an exciting prospect.
But love is on the to-do list, and part of love is being patient, kind, and gentle – all traits which contribute to the nature of a nurturing spirit.
What does this ‘nurture’ look like? What is it, and what is it not?
Aug 8, 2014 | Christian Life & Theology
“There are times silence is like lettuce in your teeth; incredibly awkward, but without a sudden exit to the bathroom, no way to deal with it appropriately.
Our high school method for such silences was to lay one hand on top of the other, spinning thumbs like a turtle’s fins and hollering “AWKWARD TURTLE” until we were all laughing again. But I can’t do that at work, even though there are times I’d really like to. I can see it going down in the conference room, me in my black suit looking professional but completely ‘I Love Lucy’ on the inside:
“Where did these matriculation rates come from? The business intelligence office?”
{Silence.}
“AWKWARD TURTLE!”
It could be really great.
There are a lot of times I don’t know what to say, whether it be in a conference room, on the phone with a friend, or in the living room with my husband. Sometimes I know what I want to say but I know I shouldn’t say it, which leaves me gasping for synonyms like a landed catfish.
But God gives us a template for what to say in those situations. He even gives us a few options to choose from.”
Aug 4, 2014 | Christian Life & Theology
Type A Girl here.
I love children, and I can’t wait for the day Mr. M and I have our own. We’ve arranged our life in a manner that plans for children and is ready to support them if they happen to appear on the scene. But I’m not living in a fantasy world.
I already know what’s going to happen when my precious, mostly-silent infant gains a tongue and mobility: I’m going to be interrupted… all the time.
When I think about our future family, I get this knot of trepidation in my stomach not because I know I’ll be inconvenienced and interrupted, not because life will change, not because some sort of perceived ‘freedom’ is taken away by having kids – but because I know that my current self would have a very, very difficult time dropping everything to take care of pint-size interruptions.
It’s bad enough at work, during my spring cleaning, or even while I’m staring obsessively at my whirring KitchenAid.
I hold up one finger. “Hang on! I’m in the middle of something.”
“But -”
“I can’t talk right now, I’m doing things.”
Which is a lie, because I’ve always been able to talk while doing things. It’s one of my most developed skill sets.
I work with the most interruptable woman I have ever met. Her name is Joy, and she lives up to that name in everything she does. No matter what she is doing – which is always a lot – she will set it down, look you in the face, and listen to your need. She’ll help you. She’ll take care of you. She’ll even do your job for you. And she’s not the least bit put out by the fact you gave her no notice at all….
Aug 1, 2014 | Christian Life & Theology
The band was performing with gusto, lights flashing, fog fuming, guitars screaming. The lead singer rotated between unintelligible hollering into the microphone and racing around the stage with his companions. But it wasn’t his voice – nor his sick guitar skills – that caught my eye. His pants were, quite literally, center stage.
Not only were they skin tight on his large man-thighs, they were awkwardly skinny at the ankle, making him look something like a Thanksgiving turkey. And he definitely didn’t pick Curvy Fit, because the waistband was in a terrible state of gappage. I could see the better half (worse half?) of his plaid boxers, and I was more than a little grossed out.
In defense of female immodesty, some say: “Why are we only talking about women? What about the men, don’t they have to be modest too?” This argument is, at its core, invalid and fallacious; an ignoratio elenchi (ignoring the actual refutation) that shifts focus from the woman’s responsibility by drawing attention to the responsibility of the man. It never deals with the issue itself. Modesty, as pertains to women, is a dual responsibility, one that requires men keep their eyes to themselves and women to show self-respect and love for God by how they choose to dress. The 5 Myths of Modesty post deals with the female side of this equation.
But do men need to be modest? That’s what I’m addressing today.
Modesty is simply humility of mind worked out in dress. As the 5 Myths post concluded, how we dress is a direct reflection of our personal choices of behavior and worship of God. It is by no means the ONLY reflection – but it is one of them. Therefore the same attitudes, actions, and responsibilities that apply to women and modesty also apply to men…
Jul 30, 2014 | Christian Life & Theology
The light was bright as the sun: gleaming, searing, so intense I could only squint down at my feet as I shuffled up the steps. Enormous doors opened slowly as I approached, their engravings deep and elaborate. Everything – the doors, the steps, the light – was brilliant white.
Jul 24, 2014 | Dating & Marriage
It was 2007 and we were all sitting around the kitchen island, the shimmery July heat shielded by half-drawn blinds. Six of us – myself and the other three older kids, all slamming the swivel chairs into the countertop, laughing hysterically. Someone had found a pair of wind-up chattering teeth and they were gnashing their way across the counter to our utter delight. Even Anders and Laney, just little at the time, were giggling from their places below the counter.
Now seven years later I’m in my mid-twenties, married… and sometimes I feel like that set of chattering teeth. More than sometimes, really. I saw this picture on Pinterest:
And it’s true. So true.
I’m an external processor. I figure out what I believe, think, and want to accomplish by talking things through. I love intellectual discussion and argumentation. I even like a good ‘fight’, if it gets me thinking.
That may be great for classroom debate, but it’s not very conducive to a peaceful marriage. My idea of ‘family time’ would be everyone talking at once, shouting out some new story or information. Silence is both boring and uncomfortable to me, unless of course I am alone… and even then I’m known for talking to myself (I’ll see a counselor right after this).
Since marriage sanctifies, there are at least five things (and probably many more) I’ve stopped saying since I got married because of the tension these statements cause. We all bring different personalities and quirks to marriage so maybe your sentences look different from mine – but perhaps your reasoning is the same. I’m no master. I still struggle. But eliminating these phrases has drastically improved our communication in the last six months!…
Jul 21, 2014 | Dating & Marriage
I rewrote that title just five times or so. I still don’t like it.
Whether you are dating long distance or have a traveling spouse like I do, for some of us, traditional ‘dating’ is crammed into the two precious days of the weekend. The problem remains… those two days also contain all my deep-cleaning, homework catch-up, meal planning and even some errand-running.
So Mr. M and I find ourselves spending the weekend playing house: laundry, cooking, taking out the garbage, vacuuming, and ending it with a movie on Saturday night. While there is nothing wrong with this, we’d like to spend the few days we have together during travel season in a more productive, fulfilling way.
Here are a few ideas we’ve found helpful as we keep the house spic-n’-span while getting quality time together.
1. Use Friday night for chores, homework, and household clean up – then plan a surprise day out all day Saturday.
Is your impulse to use Friday night as ‘date night’? Ours too. But we’ve found a little switcheroo that helps make the most of our time: one accelerated evening of household maintenance! …
Jul 18, 2014 | Christian Life & Theology, Christian Womanhood
“Turn around and do it again!” My coach yelled from the fence.
“Tighten your legs!”
“Heels down! Look at the corner!”
“Turn around and do it again! Pick his hind feet up!”
Over and over I steered my horse along the fence rail and pushed him into a canter. Over and over I adjusted my seat, pressured him in the ribs and tried to force him to change his lead. His ears flicked between my murmur and my coach’s yell.
“That’s it, boy, come on, you can do it,” I said softly. I tapped his hindquarters, pushed him forward and twitched my ring finger. I felt the slight jolt of his shoulders and his stride changed. Immediately, I stopped him and patted his neck; his chest was heaving from thirty minutes of repetition.
The relationship between a horse and rider is more of a partnership than anything else: the rider asks something of the horse, and the horse responds in turn, with the reward of pats or pasture for his efforts. He may not always like the commands he receives; he may buck and pull and resist, but it is the rider’s job to train him into submission so the horse is fulfilling his full potential.
Husbands are not horses, but sometimes we treat them like they are.
Jul 17, 2014 | Christian Womanhood
My friend Leigh and I sustain a mutual coffee addiction of obnoxious proportions.
We celebrate cold brewing at home. We talk about french presses versus percolators. We send each other pictures of coffee.
Pictures. Of coffee.
We firmly believe that coffee counts as a vegetable, because it grows on a plant. (Okay, a tree, but it’s in the vegetative family.)
The day we found the article that said coffee was the best pre-workout beverage… we almost sang the Hallelujah Chorus together.
So really, we share two life priorities: Jesus, and coffee. As I was having my devotions with pour-over Chemex-brewed cinnamon-and-orange-peel decorated beverage in hand, it dawned on me: the Creator of coffee actually has a lot in common with this beautiful drink. And it makes perfect sense, considering how positively divine coffee is…
Jul 15, 2014 | Dating & Marriage
“The scale is cute, sweet, nice, then precious.”
My sister blinked on her mascara, leaning against the sink. I was leaning against the other, powdering on my blush.
“I think ‘cute’ is the death knell of fashion, ” I replied. “We could use that word in the movie Emma – ‘when I don’t know what to say, I just call her ‘elegant’.”
“Elegant is too good a compliment in this day and age to waste it as a word for mediocrity.” Autumn returned, capping her mascara and widening her hazel eyes.
I don’t know whether we read it in a Southern Lady’s Handbook or in Stacy and Clinton’s What Not to Wear, but during our bathroom pow-wows my sisters and I decided words like ‘cute’ and ‘sweet’ were secret, womanese insults. It became a running joke betwixt sisters – and if you came downstairs and your sister said you looked cute… might as well give up on life. Maybe not life, but at least that outfit.
Our childhoods form much of what we think about life as adults. I still have a hitch about ‘cute’ and ‘sweet’, even now as a working, married woman! So when I read a book that encouraged me to be ‘sweet’ to my husband, my first thought was me, in a pink jumper and a french braid, greeting him at the door like a giddy schoolgirl. And I bristled.
