You want to use your stick? Or should I get mine?

-
I am part of a very special group of friends. We love being together whenever possible. Almost all of us have kids at home all day long, so when we get together during the day there is a significant increase in the noise level. 
As our kids get older, finishing a sentence - or sometimes even a whole conversation - is getting easier. But there are days when we are all taking our turns disappearing from the room to beat our children. 
I'm kidding about beating our children. 
But we do vanish regularly to have a word with this one, or to remove that one from a situation, or to exact some type of punishment for a certain unacceptable behavior. Sometimes, we have to disappear completely and go all the way home with a screaming child in tow. And no one looks twice. No one raises an eyebrow or tells us to take it easy or questions anyone's parenting decisions. We just shift over and start monitoring an extra kid or two while one of us is having to be the enforcer. And every now and then we play the enforcer with each other's kids. 
The result? Well, here's an example: I was able to, in good conscience, leave one babysitter at my house with seven of these kids one day, knowing they'd not give her any trouble at all and almost nothing in my house would be broken when I returned. 
Lately, I've been thinking about how grateful I am to be surrounded by families who have the same expectations of behavior that we have, and I brag a bit about it when someone compliments my kids. I use it a a chance to talk about how blessed we are to be a part of a group of people who help us keep them in line. 
Yesterday, a friend of mine tweeted a quote from Rick Warren (is "re-tweeted" an accepted verb yet?) that said: "In the poorest slums on earth I've learned that gangs & violence are not created by poverty but by the absence of fathers." 
Reading that, I was filled with gratitude that not only do these kids have moms who will keep them in line, but every single one of them has a dad who expects great things from them, and who also is completely devoted to their mom. And while we're not perfect, we are getting to see the benefits of doing this part of our life according to God's plan. When his plan gets broken and our kids grow up without loving parents who are going to hold them accountable to a standard of acceptable behavior, then our kids end up broken. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Where is Mister Rogers When You Need Him?

-
Image
It has been said that I am easily amused. Little things fascinate me. I like to know how things work. I like factory tours and behind-the-scenes stuff and those specials on Discovery Channel. I was definitely brought up this way: I remember my brother telling me about a conversation he'd recently had about "Jet Puffed Marshmallows." Topics covered were: What does "Jet-Puffed" mean? How big-a-jet are we talkin? What keeps the marshmallows from exploding when "jet puffed"? Several weeks ago, the girls and I caught an episode of the rarely aired Mister Rogers' Neighborhood. In that one episode, the inimitable Mr. R shed light on two very interesting processes when he visited a sleeping bag factory and a dollmaker's workshop. Have you ever thought about how a sleeping bag is assembled? Me neither, but now I know, and I am a better person for it. So here are a few jobs I would like to shadow for a day (or watch Mister Rogers shadow them), because ev...
Read more

An Open Letter to Everyone's Favorite Morning Radio Host

-
Image
Dear Mr. Morning Radio Host, How dare you, Mr. Morning Radio Host , while thinking out loud on air, suggest that we all turn around and give our tax refund checks to Compassion International? It's an economic stimulus package! Didn't you think of that? How will sending our money to poor people out of the country stimulate the US economy? Huh? That's just an un-American suggestion! You are proposing that we send our economy into further tumult, just to satisfy your whim of feeding orphans! If we don't use our money to consume more stuff, or go on little vacations or invest wisely, then, well, the package will be all for naught, and we will all be guilty of treason, or something. What are you trying to do? Save the world or something? Start a movement? You are a danger to this economy, sir. Sincerely, Amy Wright, who is thinking that there may be something to this, and will soon be investigating ways to encourage people to do it, provided the Senate approves the plan.
Read more

Ask me what I did last night.

-
A few of us have been wrestling a little bit lately with what it means to live in the grace of God. What does it mean to live fully covered by the Gospel? To embrace the freedom Christ secured for us on the cross? For me, last night, it meant big hair and hard rock. See, over the summer, I'd started to get a little self-conscious about my holiness. I was part of a study at church that consisted of mainly older, wiser, more conservative and traditional women. While I still felt largely like a voice of dissent - a raging postmodern compared to this crowd - there was a certain feeling starting to set in. An old nemesis. I can't believe I didn't recognize it, as we' spent so much time together in the past. Guilt. Guilt that I wasn't the teetotaling, perfect homemaking, gentle-speaking mother that I was being mentored to be in this class. I used my powers of wit and sarcasm to mask and suppress it, but with each chapter and interaction the guilt seeped deeper...wit...
Read more