A Great, Big Valentine's Bouquet

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I used to hate Valentine's Day. All romantic notions and lofty daydreams wrapped in red satin bows, just waiting for disappointment and disillusionment. It never works out the way it does on the Hallmark channel. I tread carefully here, since I've had the same Valentine for over thirty years and I absolutely wouldn't have it any other way. He speaks a beautiful love language. But offerings of flowers and candlelight on a specific day in the middle of February isn't it.

Truth be told, I'm not the best gift-giver either. I try hard, but I can't always make the grand ideas in my head match what actually happens, especially on a deadline of someone else's making. Two years ago, I hated Valentine's Day the most. That was my first year of Instagram. Since I use Pinterest maybe 4 times a year and only when I'm specifically researching to find out how to do something, Instagram is my visual connection to the vast world out there. 

Instagram explodes with hearts and flowers and husbands and mothers who are just so very good at this whole Valentine thing.  Last year, I didn't even look there at all on February 14 because the year before it was so deflating. Not good enough. Not good enough. Not good enough.

It's a language problem, really. I see that now. Love speaks so many languages and sometimes, there is only one person in the world who can understand the language of another. And, if that is the case, then a picture posted for all the world to see probably isn't going to convey its meaning.

My friend Lisa-Jo is writing today about all the ways Love runs. She is putting words to the expressions of love that far exceed cards in red envelopes and out-of-season, not-local-at-all flowers. She's got an amazing, amazing act of love to tell you about, something we can all share. 

She asked about gardens and love. I laughed out loud, alone in my bed last night, when I read it. Gardens are sort of running joke around here. In my imagination, I have a lush, beautiful garden growing in my backyard. Something nearly big enough to sustain us. It's a ridiculous dream in a lot of ways. I can't do the labor to establish a garden of that size. Most of our backyard is a soccer field. And, really, do the math: do you know how much spinach I'd have to plant to keep a family this size in salad? It's crazy. My husband spends long days working and any "leisure time" caring for his children. He wasn't called to be a farmer, even of a little farm. He was called to be the dad on the sidelines all over the world.

So, I have a little vegetable garden and a full bed of roses along the side of the house. And I can't ever go out to tend those roses without remembering the words spoken by Blessed Teresa of Calcutta. "How can there be too many children? That's like saying there are too many flowers."

My husband has spent the last 26 years gathering the most amazing bouquet for me. He tends it ever so carefully. He shelters it in life's raging storms. He tenderly tucks warmth around it on cold nights and he offers it nourishment and refreshment on hot days. He blows gentle breezes onto its faces and smiles sunshine at how beautifully it blooms. 

Today, he'll try to do a little airline magic to get home after all flights were canceled yesterday. Likely, he'll have to drive to an airport other than the one he intended originally. He'll have to catch a plane that flies "home" to the airport in the city instead of the one ten minutes from our house. He'll have to drive home in the slippery, ugly aftermath of what used to be a beautiful snowstorm. And then, he will walk through the door and love will light the room. He'll gather tender rosebuds, and tall, woody reeds of gold. He'll tousle their heads and kiss their cheeks and take their handmade offerings and tell them how wonderful it all is. 

I will remember that this is my Valentine bouquet, grown in the garden of his heart and this man has sown seeds of love and made sure the finest blossoms grew. every. single. day. since he first promised he would on a dark Valentine's Eve 32 years ago. That's one dedicated gardener, there.

 

"There is no greater happiness for a man than approaching a door at the end of a day knowing someone on the other side of that door is waiting for the sound of his footsteps."

~ Ronald Reagan

My heart skips a beat just thinking about his footsteps on the front porch.

Psst: Go visit Lisa-Jo.

Knit or Read, Read or Knit (and some great quotes for marriage)

Seems like a good day to join Ginny for a Yarn Along. I haven't done that in a very long while. I'm a woefully slow knitter. I don't have much new to show from week to week. For nearly a month, I've been working along on a Honey Cowl in Opaline Pashmina. Beautiful yarn, it's a pleasure to knit. But goodness, I hope I have it finished before the winter is over!

My great dilemma these days has been whether to knit or to read (or to sew, but that's tomorrow). I know there are people who can do both simultaneously. I am most definitely not one of them. Beth recommended Breath of Peace to me a couple weeks ago. I mistakenly had Amazon ship it to Christian's house instead of mine. I picked it up Saturday night when I dropped him off, then I finished the book Sunday -- all in one day. I'm kind of a binge reader like that. One of the biggest draws in homeschooling for me was the ability to give my children permission to do nothing but read some days. Very rarely do they request such a day. Somehow, I've not raised the voracious readers that I am. Come to think of it, I do have some accumulated Audible credit. I could listen to a book read to me and knit at the same time. Do you have some favorite fiction read aloud to recommend?

Back to the book. Very, very thoughtful. And thought-provoking. It's the story of an ex-monk in the 1300s who marries at midlife. I'm not sure the plot is even plausible and I do not want to debate the theology, but the messages woven into the fabric of the compelling story are well worth willful suspension of disbelief. I almost abandoned it in the beginning because I couldn't bear to read the dialogue between the man and his wife. Do people really talk to their husbands that way? I can't even imagine it. Late in the book, we hear the wife's thought process and maybe I better understand her. Still, I can't imagine even thinking so much snarkiness. I didn't really identify with either the woman or her husband exactly. I understood his ghosts well enough, but was astonsihed at her lack of compassion. Still, page after page, I was intrigued by their story. And the lessons here are excellent ones. None of us might be quite as extreme as these two, but all of us could work on our communication skills and our understanding of the history we bring to our marriages. And it seems it's possible that a married couple could learn a great deal from a community of monks who live mostly in silence. Hmmm.

I've gathered a few quotes for you here.

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“When I cross the threshold of our home, for mercy’s sake, this should feel like a sanctuary. I should not be bracing myself for whatever might hit me this time—what reprimand, what fault exposed. As I open the door, I take a quick glance at your face to see if I must expect trouble. Sometimes, all is well. Sometimes my heart sinks and I think, oh save us, what have I done wrong now? Heaven knows I’m familiar enough with that kind of home: but I’ve always cherished the dream it doesn't have to be this way." 

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“Love, love is not a matter of endearments murmured in the bedroom and forgotten in the day’s work around the yard. Love is for the everyday, and its courtesies are for the ordinary round, not just for the conquest of seduction.”

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"I think, if you are willing to let things go sometimes, not have to have everything done right, that will help. So what if the fox steals a hen or two? Is that more serious than letting the devil steal your marriage? Do you really want William dancing like a puppet while you pull the strings, afraid to offend you, frightened of what you'll say if he makes a mistake?"

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"It's a hard lesson to learn and it asks a lot of anyone. I think even when we've practiced for years it takes more than most of us have, to get it right. Again and again in community here, I have to ask my brothers' forgiveness when I forget myself and say something cutting or contemptuous or intolerant. And I imagine it must be the same in marriage. Except, in the night, where we have our holy silence to help us, you married folk are also blessed with an extra way to put things right."

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"Maintaining careful courtesy and gentle speech began to drain Madeleine's resources after a while. She wondered if the brothers at St. Alcuin found it as hard work as this, or if it somehow came naturally to them. Even so, she had to admit, pleasant and cheerful conversation added something of a flavor of courtship to their evening together. Everything felt less empty and prosaic than it usually did."

Dear Fifteen-Year-Old Me,

That whole Mike Foss thing? It works out really well;-)

Date Night

I hung the outfit on the bar in my closet on Tuesday morning. I knew then that it was a sort of silly thing to do and I also knew that in this crazy life, it was highly possible that plans would go awry. Still, I hung it there. And now it's Friday. And tonight is Date Night. I think we're actually going to go.

I nearly forgot that my reliable "babysitter" would be in Steubenville, but Michael and Kristin can make a last minute save. The under-13 crowd approves of my choice of supervisors. Cross my fingers and click my heels, I think Mike and I are going to go out tonight.

This whole date night concept is kind of new to us. I think my husband was on a bit of a quest last year. He's very smart guy. After 25 years of nursing babies and very attached toddlers, he made his move. Not just dates, but trips. Actual "vacations" away. Three of them. In the same year! People, we never had a honeymoon. These were the first three trips of our marriage. We went to Miami and to Baltimore and then, in September, we spent a week in California. 

On these trips--particularly in California--I learned the language of date night. My only regret? That I didn't learn it sooner. Not day goes by even now that our trip to California doesn't come to mind. I think I actually said aloud to someone the other day that it was "life changing." And it was. It was a honeymoon, 25 years later. Now, we have mini honeymoons when we have a date night.

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In California, we visited Napa, and toured wineries. We watched the sun set over the water in Monterey. We took a leisurely drive down the Pacific Coast Highway and we meadered back on 17 Mile Drive. We went to Mass in an old Mission church. We met friends for dinner in an amazing restaurant. We hung out backstage at a Dave Matthews concert (haven't blogged that one yet, have I?). Mostly though, we had hours and hours of uninterrupted falling in love--again. 

Tonight's date night will take us to dinner and a Virginia winery we've grown to love since returning from Napa. We'll drive our own mountain roads and sip some local artistry. My guess is it's all going to feel very much like California did, deep down in our hearts. Sometimes, though, instead of sun setting over Monterey Bay, we sit at the lake in our neighborhood and watch the sun go down as we eat a carryout Chinese picnic.

Good enough. Really good, actually. 

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I spend so much time here talking about living an intentional life with our children. It occurs to me that Date Night is the best of intentionality at the heart of a marriage. Mabye it's not a night out. Maybe it's getting up a half hour earlier so that you can [try to] be up before the baby and have breakfast together out on the front steps. Maybe it's hiring a sitter or asking the empty-nester next door to just come for an hour after everyone's asleep so that you can share a dessert and a cup of chai on the patio of a local coffee shop. Slip out. Get away (even if it's just to the playhouse in the backyard).

Fall in love again.

Renew

Last year was pretty huge. I was so tired, so completely spent at this year's beginning that I noticed year-in-review posts on other blogs, and just pulled the quilt up tighter around my ears and closed my eyes. I didn't have the energy--physical or spiritual--to revisit it all, even virtually. It was just.so.much.

I went through that year of many, many transitions kicking and screaming. Turns out I'm not a big fan of change. The reality is that I liked the baby years, loved them, really and never once wished them away. And yet, in the big giant year of transition, they were indeed being swept beyond my reach. I left my children for the first time. And then for the second. Someone turned four and there was no one younger than her around the table at dinner. But there was someone new at the table. And she came to be one of us. I gained a new role. The transition was absolutely unmistakeable.

Our culture is so youth oriented. For the most part it seems, no one really searches out ways to be older. We celebrate 21 in a big way. We mark midlife with black-themed birthday cards and bad jokes about being over the hill. I think I bought into that mentality a bit. And I think I know a big reason I was such easy prey.

I was so dang tired. The truth is that this wholehearted, all-in, very attached parenting style had depleted me to the equivalent of soil dust. Nothing rich was growing there. If this was what the mid-forties felt like, I could not imagine sixty.

But I have a four-year-old. And my most fervent prayer is to grow old healthy, and holy, and helpful. I want to be there for her. I want to see how the story unfolds. I want to get out of bed in the morning without my knees cracking so loudly it wakes my husband.

In the blur that was the new year, friends were choosing words for the year--just single words upon which to focus, meditate, seek wisdom. A word to live for the whole year. I couldn't wrap my brain around one. 

And then I could. Aimee said her word was renew. Renew.

That's it. That's the word. It's the word that says that this stage in life is not the beginning of the end. It's the beginning, instead, of something better, stronger, wiser, and yes--older. But older in the richest way. That's certainly being proven true in marriage. Did you know that the sweetest wine is grown from the oldest vineyards? Grapes grow best when the farmer works in harmony in with the earth, when he embraces the whole and considers that plant and the land around it as they were endowed by the Creator, with an eye towards preserving the quality for a long time. The goal of biodynamic farming is to be sustainable. When you grow grapes, you draw something from the soil and you have to replenish that. 

When we learned about biodynamic vineyards, one point that came home to me is that growing practices greatly influence how long the vineyards will continue to bear fruit. The vines where the practice is focused upon sustainable growth--where the big picture is considered and every element of farming is oriented towards ensuring health of the vines down deep and over time--are the vines that bear the sweetest fruit. At first, the explanation of biodynamic farming sounds a bit hokie. But then, you can literally taste and see that the fruit borne of the wisdom of old is of a superior quality.

This image works so well for me. The Bible is rich with imagery of vineyards. Clearly, God wants us to consider how to grow in a sustainable way in order to renew the face of the earth. I've never been more certain of that than I was this morning. I had written the above over the course of the last few weeks. I clicked over to visit Aimee in order to link to her in my post. When I did, I learned she's writing today about sustainable homeschooling. My jaw dropped and I smiled widely at God's thunk over my head. If ever I asked for a sign that I was on the right track, I got a clear answer at 7:00 AM on Tuesday January 29th while visiting Aimee's blog. It's a post that just might easily have catapulted to my favorite home education post ever this morning. There is wisdom there, my friends. Rich, rich wisdom. Get this: middle aged wisdom. Yep. There is wisdom and it's invaluable.

I look around at the friends with whom I've had babies and I am blessed to know that they've grown wise. How amazing! We all learned something during those hazy, intense, sleep-deprived years.

So, now I embrace renewal. I look to tend the vineyard of my soul, to be sure, but I am not going to neglect the rest of me any more. The big picture of renewal is one that encompasses physical health, spirtual growth, creative energy and enthusiasm, and an invigorated sense of hope and optimism for the future. I look to my home, to my homeschooling, to the relationships within these walls and to the people I love beyond these walls. Renewal. All of it is waiting to be made new again. 

What a different perspective than that of a withering towards an inevitable end. We can renew and renew and renew again, until our dying breath. God is generous that way.

I've talked a bit about stillness. About allowing Him to come in the silence.

Be still and know that I am God.

The last two weeks at Mass, an old familiar hymn has settled on my soul in a new way. I've listened to You Are Mine and heard the refrain of stillness. I will come to you in the silence. But I've also heard the rest. I heard the echoes of Isaiah 43:1

But now, thus says the LORD,

who created you, Jacob, and formed you, Israel:

Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;

I have called you by name: you are mine.

There is nothing to fear. I am redeemed. 

And the promise of John 14:27

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid

Transitions can be scary. Aging can be scary. Renewal, though? The sustainable model of growth that keeps us renewing until we reach heaven? That's peace.

Last year, was a hard year. It was exhausting. It was a compost year, I think. A year of creating very fertile ground for renewal.