TC Larson

Stories and Mischief

A New Type of Mischief, Part 1

17
Apr

Sometimes I dabble. I’ve been known to dabble. I’m dabble-y, a dabbler. Even though some people find their one thing and stick with it for years on end, I have a smattering of interests that come and go. Sometimes they don’t come back, or they return with a renewed intensity. Maybe it has to do with the barometric pressure??? Here are some examples of things that ebb and flow in my year.

Scrapbooking

Don’t stop reading. I know scrapbooking is a deal breaker for some people, but stay with me, okay?

Scrapbooking is interesting to me, and I want to record the lives of my children and family. It’s just that in order for me to really make pages I like, I have to drag out a bunch of stuff which I then have to put away. That’s no fun. In addition, I don’t really work in an organized fashion, so I have to play around with stuff and discover what I want to put together. That makes me a slooooow scrapper. That means I pull out all that stuff, only produce two pages, and have to put it away. Or, as is more often the case, I have hopes of finishing a couple more pages tomorrow, so I leave out the gear…and it sits on the table, getting in the way of everything, for the next two weeks.

I am finding solutions in a couple different approaches to scrapbooking so it doesn’t require quite so much effort/work. More on those another time.

Gardening

I love to work in the garden. I love flowers and dirt under my fingernails. I do not love nettles, Creeping Charlie or allergies. I also do not love sweat in my eyeballs.  And did I mention the weeds? Most times I start out strong, but fizzle out as the summer progresses and the humidity makes me drip just by throwing back my sheet in the morning. But the payoff of those flowers keeps me coming back.

Knitting

Maybe it was only implied above but I should mention my short attention span. I’m challenged by anything that requires more than a couple days of work or slow progress of any kind. There have to be a lot of built-in rewards and successes. You’ll never see me knit an entire sweater. You might see me finish one enormous mitten, but only one, since it would require too much work to fix the first one and plus, it is pointy like a stick and who wants to wear a pointy mitten anyway? (Can you tell I speak from experience?) It is also not nearly as much fun to knit in the summertime, so it is reserved for a winter activity.

Where’s Your Follow-through, Man — er, Woman?

Contrary to what you may think, I’m actually quite comfortable with my dabbling.

The few listed above are only a sampling of the things I’ve tried along the way (friendship bracelets, beaded safety-pins come to mind), and that’s okay.

These are all experiments with different types of creative expression.

Some of them are steps to build upon, some of them are ways to find out what things don’t work. It is easy to decide something is lame or outdated if you don’t have the context in which it was discovered or used. Each of these expressions have been tied to relationship in my life, often times a shared activity or an outgrowth from a friendship. Some of those friendships were tied to place, season of life, mutual interests or proximity. Those things changed over time, and that’s just part of the natural cycle of things.

Just because you try something, it doesn’t mean you have to go all-in, and it doesn’t mean you have to commit to that one thing with all your spare time for the rest of your life. I think pressure like that keeps people from trying new things.

Let’s talk about tennis. What if you wanted to try your hand at it? (I pick tennis but you could insert almost anything for this illustration.) Fun sport, you can play it with more than just one other person, good exercise, nice to be outside OR inside. What if you could only pick up a tennis racket if you were committed to the grueling training and match schedule that would make you become a competitive tennis champion. It’s champion or nothing. You’d probably resign yourself to watching it on TV — who has the time, talent and finances to commit what it takes to become a champion?

It’s a silly idea, of course, but it’s almost as if we place that level of expectation on ourselves when it comes to trying new things. We rule ourselves out because we think in order for it to be “worth it” we have to be as “good at it” as a professional or make that level of commitment. We limit ourselves before we even try.

Come Back on Monday

I’ve discovered a new kind of mischief that taps into a couple of my interests, and I think it has staying power. It combines my spiritual walk (or wrestling match, as the case may be), my love of words, and a chance to use images/color to convey ideas or emotions. It’s called art journaling — have you heard of it? I hadn’t, but I’ve stumbled into this whole other world of expression. I don’t claim to be any kind of expert, but I’m having fun and I can’t wait to tell you all about it. Here’s why I think you’ll like it:

  • You can’t do it wrong
  • If you try something and you don’t like it, you can keep going and transform it
  • Because you can’t do it wrong, you can release your perfectionist expectations
  • It taps into creative parts you didn’t know you had
  • You can discover an unconventional way of “doing devotions” or spending time investing in your spiritual side (if you choose to focus on that while working on your art journal)
  • It’s stinkin’ fun
 Did I Mention Come Back on Monday?

I wish I knew how to do fancy giveaways, because this blog could probably use some. Since I don’t know how, I think I’ll make my own rules about it. If you come back on Monday, you’ll get a chance to see a few samples of this new mischief, art journaling, and I’ll give away some “equipment” (which may be just a bottle of acrylic paint…but maybe something more!). I’ll hope to see you early next week!

In the meantime, I’d love to hear about fun activities you enjoy. Do you play a sport or make time to work on certain projects? Have you heard of art journaling or have any experience with it? Tell me everything! When you have some free time (“free” meaning you don’t have to be responsible and use it picking up groceries or running errands), how do you spend it?

The guy on the Mat

10
Apr

Today I’m over at my friend Bethany’s site for her new series Sacred – the Dark and the Light. I’d love it if you’d come check it out. If you click this link, it should take you over to her site: http://bit.ly/1jwcsRx

Here’s a little sample to get you going…

There’s something about a cliché that makes my eye twitch.

…Maybe not literally, but you get the idea.

It’s the same with Christianese and those answers all neatly packaged that serve nothing except to shut down conversation. If I can shut you up with a tidy answer, then I don’t have to entertain your idea as valid. If I lift the drawbridge, then your issue with a certain doctrine or theology shall not pass.

Dontcha wanna come read more? Hope to see you there!

Just one word

27
Mar

Can you name one teacher who saw something in you?

Or can you remember a coach who pushed you to improve, knowing your potential?

Do you have champions in your life? People who claim something – call it out – about you before you’re able to see it in yourself?

Calling to you quietly,

Singing over you with words you dare not repeat,

Dreams you dare not claim as your own,

Bolster, buoy you with unearned confidence, trust, and opportunity.

Secret poems written in scrawled pencil, smudged by the hurry to get it down and tuck it away in its safe place.

Songs hummed over and over inside your head, only aloud when the woods or parking lot afforded you safety and solitude.

Have you heard the whisper?

Let it draw near and echo in your ears.

You are mighty.

You are beautiful.

You are powerful.

You are fierce.

You are loyal.

You are true.

You are not alone.

You are not finished,

And no matter where you are right now, God is not finished with you yet.

If you can hear just one word (which is really more than a single word, but it is a single thought) today and let it ring mightily in your ears: you are loved. Now. Here. No modifications or improvements required. You are loved.

||||

Question: Is there someone who makes you brave, calls out the best in you, someone who makes you be the best version of yourself? How do they accomplish this feat, and how can you do it for someone else?

This is a link-up with Lisa-jo Baker, who just happens to be having her book come out next week. If you want to linkup, read other posts, or find out more about her book, here’s the website to click: http://lisajobaker.com

I’m Taking Death and Suffering Personally

26
Mar

Every death I hear about is now personally connected to me, whether or not it is actually someone I’m close to. I’m not arrogant enough to think I will maintain this level of sensitivity, but right now I embrace all hardship and suffering as an affront to my own person. And death and suffering are suddenly everywhere.

In the past six months…

A friend I had in college died, leaving behind a husband and two children. This was a healthy woman, a woman my age, a woman I had not talked to face to face in more than a decade. I felt her loss keenly.

My uncle is considering drastic steps to combat his multiple, complex health issues, and I count his suffering as one of my own.

My sister-in-law lost her grandmother, and I grieve almost as if it had been my own grandmother.

My grandfather passed away and even though he was 94, it was quick and unexpected.

And now, after a controversial decision and a drastic reversal by a hugely respected charity organization, the level of polarization within the Christian community was revealed.

What are these dark thoughts of inevitability, impending doom and constant bracing for the worst? What is it that makes my heart feel clenched and heavy?

My sister named what I could not: despair.

Isn’t that Melodramatic?

Despair sounds like a pretty drastic word. I think of it being used in a scene from Princess Bride when the albino henchman with the raspy voice starts telling the heroes their location: the Depths of Despair.

I used to be aware of danger, but didn’t bother with the possibility of it coming to me. We bought life insurance, but didn’t really discuss the possibility that one of us would actually DIE. It was all theoretical, and to dwell on it felt pessimistic (and honestly, it really didn’t occur to me to dwell on it anyway – it just wasn’t in my mind). There’s almost always something positive to find, even in the midst of hardships. Sometimes you have to zoom waaaay in to notice it, but the positive is in there somewhere.

Is this what was meant in Romans 12:15, “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep”? Have I only chosen to listen to the latter all these years, ignoring the challenge to enter into weeping?

Weeping makes me all red, puffy and exhausted. It makes my throat hurt. I’m not a pretty or dainty weeper, and it might be paired with wailing when it happens. It is probably uncomfortable for any parties who witness the weeping, but I’m glad to say that it is only a small number of people who have been subjected to it. (I’m sure you’d be happy to have avoided it if you knew what it looked like.)

Other translations of the verse mentioned above use the word “mourn” and today I feel the burden of the world, and a sense of mourning.

Some may say that word too is dramatic, too extreme for the circumstances.

I disagree.

Mourning is just right.

/////

There are events so significant, their scope so broad in impact that mourning and despair are the only appropriate words.

Tonight, I am focused on the betrayal so many believers feel, on both sides of the issue. Some felt so betrayed by World Vision’s decision to allow gay married couples to be on staff that they withdrew their sponsorship and condemned both the decision and reiterated their abhorrence for homosexual people. People on the other side of the issue got their turn to feel betrayed when the organization reversed its decision, and asserted that they’d make sure their employees signed a document agreeing to a specific lifestyle code.

It feels like the final glove has been thrown down in the ongoing battle. Knives have been drawn in a fist fight. There is no room for middle ground anymore. How can either side try to meet in the middle and agree to disagree when the reactions have been so extreme? Such vehement spewing of un-love in the name of love makes me question if there can be – or should be – reconciliation  after such a display. Where can we go from here?

Despair.

Fracture.

Heartache.

Sorrow.

Sorry I don’t have a tidy end to this post. I would ask that in discussing this, we all keep each other’s humanity at the forefront of our minds, and treat one another with utmost respect in any comments we offer, knowing that we come at this from very different angles.

 

 

One Eye on the Sky

21
Mar

It might be spring in Minnesota.

I say “might” on purpose.

We have safely passed the boys state hockey tournament, and that seems to be a good sign, since there’s almost always a snowstorm during the tournament.

The DNR records say that there have only been a couple historic snowstorms in March (2007, 1997,  and 1985 if you’re curious) so it is possible that I’m overreacting in my hesitancy. Just because it’s…

STOP>>>

The above post was begun two days ago.

Yesterday, it snowed more than two inches. Heavy, wet snow that blew around and made a mess of the nice clean pavement we were so excited about.

STOP>>>

Now we’re up to the current time and it is 40-some degrees, sun is shining, birds tweeting in the trees. It seems like one should be able to relax into believing it is truly spring.

Except that I can’t.

I can’t believe it and get sucker punched once I relax. And by sucker punch I mean another foot of snow, or an epic ice storm, or a Noah-esque flood.

STOP>>>

Ooookay, for real, now we’re really up to the present time and it is 20 degrees and it is forecasted to be a slushy, icy mix of nasty over night.

Why do I even listen to these forecasts? It’s not like I have some major cross-country travel plans. I’ll probably stay within a five mile radius, and maybe not even leave my house (who am I kidding? I will leave the house. We need milk, eggs, and there’s always a reason when you have a need for a fountain-drink…every day).

‘Is this going to be an ongoing, herky jerky post about the weather?’ you may be asking yourself.

http://mrg.bz/D8JWTr

http://mrg.bz/D8JWTr

Well, I am in Minnesota, so the weather is like a person. We all like to talk about her behind her back. It brings the rest of us together to gossip about her, like “Did you hear that they got another six inches of snow and had to close I-94 out west? That’s crazy!” You can say this to just about any total stranger here, and you’ll be able to keep a conversation going for a solid three minutes without ever knowing the person’s name.

To answer your question though, because, Dear Reader, I am a mind-reader and I’m sure that’s what you were asking yourself in not so many words — No, this is not going to continue to be about the weather. Shall we move on?

The way I feel about the weather is the way I feel about life right now.

Just without the hopeful expectancy of spring thing.

This is unlike me, because I tend to be a blind optimist, someone who sees possibility in the most hopeless circumstances, someone who can find a positive angle in almost any situation. It’s like I need the positive, to be without it is something I get frustrated with and remove myself from. Most people have friends who they might categorize as an Eeyore friend, someone who leans towards being mopey, negative, down-on-their-luck all the time.

I don’t have many of those people in my life.

It’s not that I’m actively anti- Eeyore when I walk around all day. I’m just not drawn to them, nor they to me. We’d probably drive each other nuts, because our approach to the world is so very opposite.

Thing is, I’m starting to see the merits of being more Eeyore-ish.

Waiting for the other Shoe

My family’s been listening to a book-on-tape (but they’re CD’s now – did you know that? It doesn’t have nearly the same ring as “book-on-tape” does it?) of The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis. Near the end, there’s a statement that goes something like this:

In life you’ll find that when things go bad, the tend to go on getting worse for a while. But when things start looking up, they go on getting better and better.

It’s not a direct quote, but that’s the basic idea.

Right now, things are in a downward trend. It seems like things just keep piling up on top of one another. Rather than expecting things to turn around or start easing up, I have started to wait for the “other shoe to drop” and since nothing has specifically happened to me yet, it’s probably going to drop on my head.

I know with my brain that God doesn’t make bad things happen.

I accept that the world has a lot of pain and brokenness, even while it has beauty and joy.

However, with this series of events, my heart has become more superstitious, waiting for the next bad thing to happen, preparing that it will happen to ME, and keeping an eye on the sky. It’s not that I don’t trust God, I just feel like He’s asleep at the wheel right now. I’ve got top watch Him from the corner of my eye, keep my abdominals flexed so I am braced for whatever will come flying at me next.

And I don’t like it.

If only there was a nice, neat way to wrap this up, a good lesson that came from it or a tidy way everything worked out.

There’s not.

It might not work out nicely.

That’s the truth of it. And to face that square on is a scary dose of reality that I’d rather avoid.

Floating Together

17
Mar

Lately I’ve been fixated on an idea, trying to find the right way to express it.

That’s not as easy as it sounds, even in general, but you see we’ve also been on Spring Break over here.

We didn’t go on any exotic trip to distant lands, but we stayed plenty busy.

I hope, then, that you’ll indulge me if my expression of this idea is less than beautiful.

I’ve been thinking about the body of Christ, the fellowship of believing people.

When I began picturing it, probably because I have three elementary-age kids, I thought of gack…

(Or is it officially Gak with a little circled TM after it?)

Start with Jello,

Goo,

Slime,

Flubber,

Something smushable, physically both solid and liquid, translucent or opaque, a state of plasma.

Gooey and messy, mesmerizing even while it is a little bit gross.

This is the mystical body of Christ.

Okay, not the gross part, but stick with me for a minute.

Imagine an enormous, floating state of suspension off in space somewhere.

And you’re inside of it, along with a LOT of other people.

This is how I picture the body of Christ.

It’s not a physical body, of course, but the community of believers aiming in the same direction, aimed at resembling Him more and loving more fully.

Don’t try to google map it, you won’t find it.

Don’t bother making a pilgrimage, you won’t get there.

It is what happens when you understand that there is world full of people who fill the air full of holy moments, full of whispered hopes and tear stained prayers.

These people are your people.

Their theology may look different.

Their details may not line up with yours.

But when the brush of angel wings pass by, they feel it.

When the Spirit settles heavy in the room, they know.

These are my people.

Maybe the image of a river current works better for your stomach than the idea of being surrounded by and submerged in breathable Gak. I can’t blame ya.

Let’s go with the river idea (but I have to say that the tangible, textural surrounding of plasma, almost like being “underwater” in a ball pit has a sense of a full-body hug, which does work for me).

A river…Ahhh…that’s nicer.

Creek River Tunnel Mud

Like a quiet river, the body of Christ carries me along when I can’t paddle myself. Their current lifts me and I lean back into the knowledge that they can pray on my behalf. They can believe for me when my belief is reduced to a pebble. There will come a time when I can carry someone else along, hold them up so they can safely drift. Right now it is my turn. It is my turn to trust their prayers will be heard, since I cannot form them on my lips. I trust their candles, their worship, their long obedience that will pull me further down river until I can regain my footing and my strength.

My own lack of activity does not diminish or detract from the river itself. I am still an addition, and I am enveloped before I need ask.

I glide along beside them, safely held until I regain, or form in a new way, the faith I’ve always had.

Even though this post has a sense of lightheartedness, I mean this in every serious way.

There are days when too many things are piled on top of an already heavy burden.

There are days when God’s hand seems withdrawn.

Sometimes, I want to take issue with God and the slapdash way He’s running the place.

Sometimes I don’t want to think about Him at all.

In these times, be they long or short, I have a sense that I don’t have to muster up faith. I don’t have to pep-talk myself into belief. There is a whole ball-pit, Gak blob, river full of people who can do that for me. Until I can do it myself, they can float me along, regaining my strength, hope, optimism, trust.

And if you’re one of those people in the river, I thank you. I hope that one day I will be able to carry you along on the current of my belief, and I hope that is soon. Until then, I won’t struggle. I will allow myself to depend upon you.

Don’t let me get water up my nose, okay?

 

Five Minute Friday: Encouragement

17
Jan

Someone close to me brought me a meal.

I hadn’t had a baby, broken a leg or been in a car accident.

But she brought me a meal.

So did another friend, and she was the one who had just delivered. I was supposed to bring her a meal.

Words sent to someone else and passed on to me — kind, affirming, validating.

These things breathed air into my floppy balloon, the one that was in danger of settling on the floor, a puckered, withered, sandy shadow of the party favor it had once been. Their words, their phone calls, their messages, buoyed me up and let me float in a more proper balloon-y place.

Maybe I’m not floating on an airstream across the world with a special note hanging from my string, but

I’m more in that middle air of the hallway, at the level that makes you think there’s a person walking towards you,

the kind that makes you jump and if someone’s watching they laugh to see your surprise. That moment that gives freedom from worry and concern, hope that there will be laughter again.

The encouragement of friends who hold you up when it is hard to get off the floor — this is a precious thing indeed.

*****

Join a great group of people for Five Minute Friday to write without editing for the sheer joy of it. Find out more at http://lisa-jobaker.com.

Are you facing challenges or a hard time? This is a safe place to share about it. I genuinely hope you have people in your life who can help breath air into your life. Maybe in the comments we should name names. Who is an encourager in your life?

Learning An Unwanted Life Skill

29
Nov

In the past few days, I have nearly stapled by thumb, sliced off the tip of my finger and vegetable peeled a stipe of skin into the potatoes I was preparing.

I find myself staring at nothing, blink and force myself back to reality.

Do you know how it feels to be lonesome? (Explore)

(Explore) (Photo credit: geezaweezer)

Sometimes it feels like I’m wearing noise-blocking headphones.

Sometimes it feels like I’m half asleep.

Either I’m not hungry at all, food doesn’t taste like anything, or I just want ice cream since it is easy and actually has a flavor I can taste.

Sometimes my stomach feels nauseous or like I’m carrying a rock in there.

These are all unpleasant new experiences, things I’d rather avoid.

_____________________________________________

There are sweet people around me who want to help me feel better, who are sincerely sorry that my dad was just diagnosed with cancer and who wish they could do something, anything to make the situation more tolerable.

I haven’t told many people. I don’t know how to tell them, don’t know how to deal with their sympathy.

Before I can tell others, I feel like I have to be ready to allow them to be sad. The problem with that is that I don’t have any help or support to offer them.

Last week a friend of mine left at home her husband, her seven kids, her job working at least 20 hours a week and drove an hour and a half to meet me. She gave up six hours of her Sunday afternoon to help shoulder the diagnosis my family is trying to absorb. This is a gift I don’t know how to repay.

Maybe that’s part of my learning curve, learning how to accept help rather than being the one to offer it.

I have to learn how to respond when people say, “I’m sorry” about my dad’s cancer.

I have to learn that it’s not up to me to live up to anyone else’s expectation of my reaction. If I’m numb, I’m numb. If I’m teary, I’m teary. If the roles were reversed I suppose I would be prepared for any number of reactions. But in my mind I wonder if people wish I would break down and cry so they could feel like they’d helped get something off my chest, like I trusted them enough to bare that part of myself.

It comes down to the fact that I don’t know how to be the recipient of sympathy.

Who wants to learn how to do that? It’s a skill I don’t desire, like learning how to shoe a horse. I’m not interested in being in a situation that would require me to have that knowledge.

However, situations are not always chosen. More frequently they are thrust upon us.

That’s the other thing. I’m worried that it can come across as me making a big deal out of something small, or milking a situation for personal gain (although I’m not sure what I would gain by my dad being sick). I’d rather not have to admit I can’t help with that thing, or that I’m too unsure of my ability to compartmentalize that I can’t trust myself doing that event because I get choked up at the most inopportune times.

Maybe as time passes and we’re further away from the initial diagnosis this will get better. Maybe it will become the new reality rather than feeling like a bad dream that we’ll wake up from. Things will start being more manageable, they’ll feel like less effort.

Until then, I’m stuck in a class I hate learning something I don’t even want to know.

Do you have any websites or blogs that can offer some perspective or tips on how to learn this life skill? Have you ever dealt with illness and do you have any helpful suggestions for how to get through it?

My Sister made me clean out my Makeup (and I didn’t like It)

21
Oct

Do you have a hobby? Maybe you like to scrapbook or maybe you’re a duck hunter? Maybe you collect vintage cigar boxes or propagate orchids.

I have varied interests but there is one thing that seems to have risen to the top of my list:

The quest for the perfect lipstick.

I realize that by admitting this I may have immediately lost some of the points on my feminist leaderboard,

And it gets worse.

What started off as a quest for the perfect lipstick has expanded.

It has grown in size and scope.

Now rather than simply looking for a nice, longwearing, subtle shade that compliments my skin tone,

I’ve started looking for other makeup products that can give me the same buzz as finding a candidate for the perfect lipstick.

This isn't all of it.

This isn’t all of it.

I know. It’s a problem.

In my defense, the photo you’ll see below represents ALL the makeup I own. Can you wear the same stuff in the dead of a Minnesota winter that you wear in the middle of a humid, sunny summer? I think not. Therefore, in my defense, it looks worse than it really is. I think.

My sister was so flabbergasted to discover the depths of my storehouses that she insisted we go through it together and clean out what I didn’t use anymore.

“What?” I said.

“Let’s get rid of the stuff you don’t need,” she suggested.

“What?” I said.

“Come on, bring it out here,” she bullied.

And that’s when I discovered that perhaps I have a little more than is reasonable to hang on to. Observe:

She's sad and amazed...so is my niece.

She’s sad and amazed…so is my niece.

Yes, a couple of those bags are empty, but at least one of them is filled to the gills.

In sorting through it all, we discovered that I had 16 eyeliners. 16. Some were worn down to the nub and needed to go. A couple of them were extremely similar in color…like almost exactly alike. So she made me get rid of those.

She’s bossy like that.

While we went through it I came to the conclusion that I like concealer and blush, a lot. In my defense, I have chronic dark undereye circles (and apparently I have bags too although I did not know about this problem until a peppy, unrepentant girl at a sales counter informed me of this ailment. ‘Come out from behind the safety of that counter and tell me that,’ I thought.) that take some attention and sometimes multiple products are the only way to make a dent.

That still doesn’t justify how many concealers I had.

There was some negotiating, some finagling on my part to make my sister see the merits of certain products.

You see, Rae is a minimalist.

Seriously.

She hardly bothers with makeup at all, and when she does she’s got five things to choose from in her tiny makeup bag.

I think I gave her four of those five items.

Therefore, Rae cannot grasp the necessity of two different types of bronzers.

“All you need is one,” she claims, as if she’d know.

And when I explain what a primer is, she has a look on her face that is both confused and longsuffering.

“How many mascaras does one person need?” She shifts subjects to keep me off balance, thinking I won’t notice that she just threw away the primer we were discussing.  I’m wise to her tactics and while she’s helping my niece put on a string of pop-beads I fish out the primer from her “throw away” bag.

In the end, we got rid of a lot. It may not look like it in the picture, but this is now my entire arsenal of makeup, all seasons of the year represented:

She got rid of a couple more things after we took this picture (but I snuck them back into my bag when she wasn't looking).

She got rid of a couple more things after we took this picture (but I snuck them back into my bag when she wasn’t looking).

Rae asked me how I felt once we had completed the job. And I have to admit, it did feel good to clear out all the broken, worn out, bad color pieces from the collection. I gave my niece a couple things to play with, thus securing my spot as Best Auntie for the day. I felt lighter, more in control of my stuff rather than the other way around.

In truth, it bothered me to see how much money I had invested over time.

Maybe that was what made it hard to get rid of any of it — I knew I had paid money for it so I needed to justify it by keeping it…

Kindof backwards logic when you spell it out, huh?

In the future, I plan to keep better track of what I have, in order to spare myself the trouble of storing things I hardly even use, along with freeing up space in my mind and budget. And if I need to get rid of a couple things, I’ll probably pass them on to Rae. Lawd knows she has room in her makeup bag.

Do you have a quest for a perfect item, be it jeans, jacket, haircut or lipstick? How do you keep it in check? What do you stockpile that you could do without (or do with less)?

Five Minute Friday: Red

6
Sep

Timer set for five minutes. Ready. Set. GO.

I lost my crockpot.

Don’t ask me how.

If I could retrace my steps and figure out how I lost it, I’d be able to find it.

And I can’t.

It’s not like a chapstick or a pencil. You don’t have another one laying around in the bottom of a drawer someplace. It’s definitely not a huge deal, but when you’ve started using one, you find it is a nice option to have.

So when I took my son to his friend’s house, I told the funny story of not being able to find it. “Who loses a crockpot?!” I joked.

The mom said, “Do you want one of mine?”

Huh??

She told me she had an extra one she never uses, an inexpensive one she picked up somewhere along the way, one she didn’t need.

My pride department wanted to keep me from taking it. But my time management department told me I could really use it. And she was being generous, offering me a gift. She wouldn’t offer if she didn’t want to.

So I took the crockpot, almost accidentally broke it on the way out the door. and now my family can have shredded pork tacos again.  But the takeaway is that I almost missed out on the chance to be part of this new friend’s story of generosity. My pride almost kept me from allowing her to help me. And how often, especially as moms, do we choose to tough it out because we don’t want to admit we need help?

STOP

Red Crockpot

******

Like most Fridays, this post is part of a linkup with Lisa-jo Baker’s Five Minute Fridays. You write for five minutes flat, then linkup your post on her website: http://lisajobaker.com . Check it out for more details, but if you’re interested in finding other writers to connect with, Five Minute Fridays is a great way to do so.

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