Category Archives: Observations

My Experience Providing Foster Care
(part 1)

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As promised, here is the first part of my story.

Like most things in my life that have stuck, this all began with little that I would call “effort” on my part.

My sibs and I were all teenagers (my older sister was in college already, I believe) when my parents decided to become foster parents.

I don’t remember them telling us kids before the process was almost complete (my mom assures me she did, and that we were all in agreement), so there wasn’t much time between becoming aware, and the arrival of our first fosters.

That would be foster*s* plural.

There was a set of three sisters, and my parents agreed to take all three so they wouldn’t be split up. It was a short-term placement (the caseworker promised), and we all agreed that we could do anything for a weekend.

They left not a whole lot longer after they should have, but their caseworker soon called again, asking if we could do a longer (months-long) short-term.

I’ve never asked, but it seems to me that “short-term” means anything with even a theoretical end-date. Ish. If the kid(s) hang around longer than expected and everybody stays cool with that, they become long-term.

So with 2 1/2-days of experience, we became a family of 8.

I was 17.

My parents sold our old Bronco (I never realized till then how attached I was to it) and bought a Suburban. Rooms were rearranged, and I began sharing with a 6-year-old. I also got my advanced degree in child care.

You see, I had got my undergraduate in the previous four years of Calvins and Margrets (who were also *great* kids that I enjoyed, and am thankful I was in their lives), and now I was apprenticed to two experienced professionals.

These kids were good. I’d done dozens of bedtimes, but the older two, especially, knew how to drag it out. I’ll probably never know if the questions were genuine or calculated, but either way I couldn’t resist their clambering for my wisdom.

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Different Kinds of Chaos

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Not all chaos is created equal.

Take, for example, my current chaos.

Right now my chaos is one of abundance. We spent almost three hours shopping yesterday (and I am an efficient shopper– even with littles along) and replenished our supplies that have been lagging since the anticipation of our trip over Thanksgiving week.

First big shopping trip in about a month. And it was big.

I now have produce in the the house again. Scratch-meals on the mind and *options* for dinner!

I also have two young chickens to cut up and steaks I got a great deal on to learn how to cook. (Sorry, don’t mean to hijack the blog to domesticity for long.)

This chaos is exciting and stirs my energy and creativity.

The Chaos of three days ago– a chaos of scarcity– sapped my mind and made me tired, even though I knew what to do with myself (which is not always the case).

With a moratorium on movies until the girls lifted their own strike, little clean laundry, and little in the refrigerator (coming on the heels of three days without milk– a bizarre experience that threw us all off-balance), I felt as much *lack* as maybe a middle-class home can feel.

Which, admittedly, isn’t much, but was still hard for me to function under.

But contrasting today with that day is intriguing. That day I didn’t even have the energy to blog or play EQ2 with my husband (we just re-started, and usually play over his lunch-hour while the kids nap). Today I’m writing while I brace myself to dive in. My lovely family’s actually getting a three-course meal today.

At least, I think that’s what it’s called (not really my realm, so I’m not sure). The steaks (I’ll figure something out), cream-of-cauliflower soup, and biscuits. There will be some green stuff too, but since I don’t do anything with it, it hardly counts as a “course,” right?

And the kids were adorable when I picked up the on-sale cauliflower. “What’s that?” (distrustful) “What do you do with it?” I explained it by saying you can do anything with it you do with broccoli. One of the girls gushed, “You can make soup with it!”

So that’s where dinner came from.

Will Work for Cookies

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I am so proud of my husband.

This weekend, for the 3rd or 4th time, Jay went out to his cousin’s house and fixed her computer.

That machine’s got *issues.*

And as soon as he got there, K started some chocolate chip cookies to thank him for his work.

Well, Jay did his thing, got it all functioning properly again.

Had a brainstorm and *Tip here:* asked them to take a picture of the screen the next time the computer does something dorky. This way he won’t have to spend time trying to recreate the problem in order to fix it.

As he was ready to leave K gave him a gallon ziploc of cookies.

And I thought, How perfect. Here is a lovely example of, well, two things. First the willingness to help out family without regards to reward (I think Jay’s chocolate-chip cookies are better than anyone’s, so it’s not like he needs her cookies), and second, it was a way of seeing all time as equally valuable.

They both spent an equal amount of time (exactly this round) in their efforts to bless the other.

Frequently, because our modern system of payment measures one job as more desirable or more scarce than another, the time of those doing that job is treated as more valuable. (This is where/why I guess the time of SAHMs is valued so little).

But an hour of my life is not less than an hour of the President’s, and all time should be recognized for what it is.

Watching my husband help another SAHM, honoring her time as as valuable as his own, I was proud of him. I can’t say (not knowing) if this is an accurate application of the term, but this is one reason I heartily praise him as an honorable man.

“God have mercy on his soul.”

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The phrase was said sorrowfully in a warm Nigerian accent– all the O’s very open. The words and inflection sent a thrill of small horror through me.

I’ve read the expression before, of course, but I’d never before heard it spontaneously in conversation. The hugeness of what it signified hit me as it never has in print.

Here was a believer, awestruck at the evil encountered in an individual, and her instinctive reaction was both to recognize the destruction he was sowing and invoke perhaps the only possible response of a believer watching from the outside.

I suppose it is used as an exclamation more than a prayer for most people. And I’d even assume that many of the other people who say it are not particularly interested in the eternal reward of the transgressor. But it’s made me think: of how Jesus prayed for Peter, and all the stories of restoration I’ve read.

God is so much bigger than our wants or dislikes that maybe an instinctive reaction like this, even if it is thoughtless, can be healthy. Perhaps we give too much emphasis to the idea of being always “present” and consciously choosing what we do.

That is good for a beginning, but what if some things were better not to think of?

To use the analogy of a child learning how to walk: It is right and natural for him or her to focus all thought and energy on mastering the cooperation of muscles. It is silly and a waste of time (or symptomatic of worse problems) to continue that level of focus as an adult.

If I can invoke or train some muscle memory to maintain right-thinking, isn’t that a healthier way to live than having to think and decide every time if I’m going to, say, pray about a problem? Or be joyful?

My best example says yes. Thankfulness is one thing I almost never have to think about.

I’m convinced this has something to do with how I was raised, and how we watched God provide for us. Not the enforced thank-you notes, though. Sorry. Still hit-and-{late} on those.

If my kids are able to say there is one virtue that comes naturally as the result of their upbringing, I will feel a huge measure of success.

But thankfulness to God is instinctive for me.

I am continually floored at his timing and provision. The thanks is on my lips as soon as I stumble– because I didn’t fall, or I didn’t hit the ground baby-first (true story). I am grateful beyond words when God plants something in my husband’s heart along with mine, so neither of us has to convince the other of anything.

And my thanks comes automatically, with awe and delight at the hugeness of God and His ways.

Wouldn’t it be amazing and wonderful to be that instinctive with forgiveness and mercy too? To remember that the monster who probably deserves Man’s death penalty is still one of those Jesus died for, and one He would rejoice to redeem.

I don’t think my walk is that well-trained yet, but I begin to wonder if I’m too old to teach myself to pray, to say– if nothing else as a reminder to myself that it was the purpose of Jesus coming–

God have mercy on his soul.

A sign of the times we live in.

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I was at a musical production about the Christmas story tonight, and was a little shocked to watch the young woman playing Gabriel at the annunciation to Mary.  The surprise wasn’t that the angel was a girl, but the fact she was shimmying.

While informing Mary that she (Mary) was God’s “favorite virgin.”

More than a little weird and an odd beginning that distracted (me at least)  from other, better, elements of the program.

It didn’t help that the angel took Mary’s hand and “taught” her the shoulder-shimmy through the last series of “favorite virgin” repetitions in the chorus.

An Alternative to Reversing Sterilization

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I began to think recently about the stories I’ve heard about sterilized couples being convicted as to the value of children. Usually (every time, actually, in the stories I’ve heard) the sterilization is successfully reversed and the happy couple goes on to have 5-8 more kids to raise in the fear/nurture/admonition of the Lord.

Now, I don’t want this to sound like a criticism of what they did, but does anybody know how often these couples (with a renewed vision for the value of children) look at their self-inflicted sterility as part of God’s plan?

That is, are there any stories of couples taking Paul’s admonition to “remain as you were” (i.e. his advice about circumcision) when they had their awakening? I am thinking of adoption. Specifically adoption from the American foster system.

As someone who has done foster-care, and who expects to again when it will no longer be a risk to my own children, I feel sad sometimes about the local “lost” children who are forgotten in the clambering for easier over-seas adoption, and families built big at home, rather than taking in needy children.

Again, this is not a criticism of those God has called to other things– I mean, he hasn’t called me to it (yet), and– God help me if he does!– I know how much extra work that is. So I know it’s not for everyone. But I hope and pray that these sterilized couples–

Frequently they are older couples who have a measure of child-rearing experience and so are good foster-parent candidates–

I hope those that have had an awakening to the value of children might consider the value and neediness of “the least of these” who have none but the State to look out for their well-being.

And if the couple feels called for their lives to make a statement about the value of children, it might be a louder statement when spoken with the children who were invisible to others.

And [Jesus] said to them, “Whoever receives this child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me receives him who sent me. For he who is least among you all is the one who is great.” (Luke 9:48)

The Easiest Way to Go Insane

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Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is reason.

The general fact is simple.

Poetry is sane because it floats easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite sea, and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion…

To accept everything is an exercise, to understand everything is a strain. The poet only desires exaltation and expansion, a world to stretch himself in. The poet asks only to get his head into the heavens.

It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits.

G.K. Chesterton
from Orthodoxy

I’ve just started reading this again, and this time the passage made me think of a conversation I had with my dad where he warned me not to try too hard to figure out all that theological stuff (I think I was playing both sides of an argument by myself).

“Remember, this is God we’re talking about here. It’s not like he’s really going to let us nail him down entirely; as if we could put God in a box and say, ‘Now we know he will *always* do this.'”

The Trouble With Beauty

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And the trouble with (little-t) truth, and (little-g) goodness: Too often it is so narrowly defined that only one thing at a time can fit the label.

Let’s see if I can explain what I mean.

Years and years ago, Chinese girls of all classes believed that tiny feet were beautiful. They believed this so profoundly that some maimed their daughters and endured their own inability to care for their households (or sometimes even themselves) with feet bound to convey the illusion of smallness.

There may have been many social and relational reasons for this (fascinating, but not the point of this essay), but the result was generations of women, primarily in the wealthy classes, who lived their lives in pain in order to appear beautiful.

Those too poor to be allowed the luxury of useless women still admired the unrealistic standard, forming their opinions on something as impossible to dictate as foot size.

Eventually the ideas of the “outside world” invaded and (if I understand correctly) Christian missionaries led the active campaign to end foot-binding. Remarkably, in a single generation the custom essentially died out, and the Chinese people themselves began to see the bound foot as distasteful and deformed.

The sorrow to me in all this, was that in the effort to promote a newer and healthy form of beauty, that which was formerly beautiful had to become ugly. The women who had endured years of pain and limited freedom for the esteem it bought them found that they were now the symbols of a barbaric and embarrassing time.

~

In the pursuit of beauty we can easily see this extreme polarizing. It also exists in our pursuit of truth or goodness. While, in theory, honest, useful debates can exist, in reality we’ve usually already made up our minds (with or without guiding reason) and reflexively villianized the views that don’t line up with our own.

I think this is where defensiveness comes from– either in an actual debate or in (compulsively?) explaining why you did something. Ultimately I think defensiveness comes out of fear, or worry: “Did I do the right thing?”

So we seek out like-minded people who made the same decisions, articulate defenders who shoot down the opposition, energetic promoters who put into words the reasons for this choice.

Homeschooling, birth control, large families, abortion, medical intervention, breastfeeding.

These and more come under attack and are vigorously defended.

For me the sad all-or-nothing discussion right now is the birth control vs. large families debate. (<–Though that link is an excellent “discussion” Jess posted on Making Home, and goes a long way to making a gesture of understanding for both sides.)

~

A little more than a year after I married, I hated what I saw hormonal birth control doing to me and what I was learning about it. The “question” as to whether it was abortafacient was the final nail in the coffin. I quit.

No godly woman had any reason or right to use hormonal birth control. Why does one need to be inoculated against children anyway?

Then, within six months of each other, I met two women with endometriosis, and was humbled to learn from one that the lining-thinning property of hormonal birth control is one of the most (some argue only) effective management option available for that painful condition. There is no cure. Yes there are other methods of living with it, but I had learned what I never expected to find: a significant, therapeutic use for birth control pills.

This began a process of opening my eyes. Not, I hope, to “situational ethics” where I can dictate right and wrong, but to the reality that God does not call everyone to the same kind of obedience in all things (1 Corinthians 8).

If there is one thing I’ve been learning this stint in a mom’s group, it’s the reminder not all goodness (e.g., good parenting) looks alike. I had been around enough… under-developed parenting I’d forgotten that. I had forgotten that not everybody needs my help, and I needed to be reminded that God has different ways of accomplishing his will in each of us.

Those of us who understand our vast freedom in Christ are warned not to hinder the faith of others in the exercise of our freedom, and I’ve been thinking of two different ways this hindering can look.

First, we shouldn’t affirm selfish behavior just because we wish to affirm the individual. By this I mean (for example) reflexively agreeing with a wife’s unexamined use of birth control, or a young mom working outside the home just because she can.

I believe either of these things could be legitimate, but we “older women” (such as we are) aren’t helping them learn to think critically if we agree with a decision they’ve made on merely cultural grounds.

I’m not suggesting we go out and lecture people. I’m referring to those who approach us, asking our opinion or seeking our approval.

Second, we should also be careful not to share our own stories as if they were absolute models– because we shouldn’t encourage anyone to think that by looking like us they will be obeying God’s plan for their lives. That could be just exchanging one set of prayerless assumptions for another.

Better than anyone we know our own imperfections, and I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t dare condemn anyone else to mine.

God has planted some amazing beauty and truth in my life, but I hope I never again assume that that beauty and (little-t) truth are the only things that can be called by those names.

Frequently, when I begin to feel sure of one small “fact” (Women who don’t breastfeed are a reflection of our selfish, me-centered culture.), reality will break in. God will gently insert an exception into my life to remind me that I haven’t got it all figured out.

It’s how he teaches me grace.

~

All this God also uses to remind me of himself, and my forever-insufficient understanding him.

My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered from time to time. He shatters it Himself. He is the great iconoclast. Could we not almost say that this shattering is one of the marks of His presence? The Incarnation is the supreme example; it leaves all previous ideas of the messiah in ruins… But the same thing happens in our private prayers.

All reality is iconoclastic.

C.S. Lewis
From A Grief Observed

The Difference Between Joy and Passion

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(This will be one of those “for me” posts that may untangle someone else’s thoughts as well, but is mostly for my own benefit.)

About a month ago I read a reference to a book called The Renaissance Soul. I popped over to my library’s reserves page (have I mentioned yet I *love* that they’re on-line?) and snagged the next available copy.

It is a mouthful, and takes some chewing (and sifting– as it’s such a broad topic and she tries to cover everything), but it has been helpful in several ways.

First of all, the acknowledgment (that I always fought for) that I’m not weird, just different, and don’t have to have ADD just because I have more than one or two things I love to do.

Second, with that understanding as the foundation, the author (a renaissance soul herself) suggests tools techniques for

  • Narrowing your foci to a manageable number (usually four), with the emphasis on not being locked in forever providing the psychological freedom to be truly present for these passions, this season.
  • strategies for staying focused in this season (when you’ve been in the frustrating habit of popping from project to project– almost as though you couldn’t help it) and
  • time-management for people with more than one passion.

When I started reading this book I followed the directions and made a list of everything I could think of that I loved and/or wanted to spend time and thought on.

Then, following the advice of the book, I went back through the list and whittled it down to my top four passions. Lobenstine emphasizes that your daily work (unless you feel it meeting one of your four focus points) should not take one of the four.

This troubled me as a homemaker and a mother, because, well, don’t we want to be passionate about our children and how they are raised?

The next day I was still pondering this when I met a friend and was telling her about my four focus points. I think I was seeking affirmation that I wasn’t being unbiblical in making these distinctions– putting writing on my list, for example, but not preschool planning.

“Being a mom is my job– my good work– but it isn’t my passion,” I said, searching for the right word, while the new vocabulary (“passion”) still sounded new and unnatural. My friend is married to a renaissance soul herself, and seemed to understand what I was saying.

“It’s not your passion,” she confirmed. “It is your joy.”

The relief I felt at having a new word! It filled in the missing piece for me.

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When you’ve got a reputation…

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I’ve mentioned here before that “plain speaking” is my default position.

In my interactions with “real” people, however, I actually try to use that “story-sense” I mentioned earlier in order to match the level of openness in the person I’m talking with.

Only, I’ve had at least one situation where I wondered if my attempt at sensitivity backfired.

Some time ago I got a call from a woman who had been through a recent personal tragedy. She wanted to come over and visit, saying we hadn’t talked in a long time. This was true enough, but I was surprised she felt a loss in that.

I called my husband and asked him to be praying for our interaction because I didn’t know this woman well, and didn’t want to, well, accidentally hurt her. I feared she was fragile.

He gave me a handful of good reminders that activated all my attentiveness and I was the perfect hostess. As our children played together I let her guide the conversation and was careful to look for clues in what she did and didn’t say. She stayed longer than I had expected her to, but when she left I still had a sad feeling we missed something important.

Evaluating it later with my husband (and even now, still) I wondered if she’d come to me wanting me to bring up the “unspeakable” because I was someone who’s known for speaking plainly. What if what I considered my huge liability (that might even hurt her) was the one thing she sought me out for?

I prayed for her a lot after that– that she would find what she needed if she didn’t get it from me. And I’ve prayed for wisdom in future interactions like these, that I would be able to (sensitively!) test the waters and be sure I know what a visitor needs from me.

In all, it’s made me think again about what gentle sensitivity looks like.