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phototherapy

 

I found this poem, sent from my sweet friend, Selena, in my inbox this morning:

 

The Devil's NOT In The Details

The details are holy.
Wholly
life-affirming,
life-saving,
attitude-adjusting.

How can you not be recharged by
constellations marching
sun glinting
blue skies blazing
trees changing
hawks soaring.

The details are holy.


©Mary Lee Hahn, 2011

 

 It was perfect timing, really. See, just this last weekend, I'd  turned to the details for aid in taming the wild, reckless thoughts commonly present in the minds of ...well, everyone I would guess. Deadlines, financial challenges, setbacks, longings, parenting dilemmas, co-worker drama, phobias, temptations plague most of us to some degree or another, and I am certainly no exception. Trying to reason yourself out of these stress-inducing ponderings is like trying to untangle sticky chewed gum from your fingers with your fingers and only getting more and more entwined in the stickiness in the maddening process - yes, I speak from experience. No, it's best (for me anyway) to walk away completely, turning my attention elsewhere ASAP. And that's where my own, self-defined, version of phototherapy comes into play. When life gets hectic, scary, complicated, I take pictures. 

 

 

There is something calming about reaching for my camera and holding it to my face, squinting my left eye and peering through the view finder with my right. The first thing I notice is my field of vision significantly decreasing. In an instant I am blind to everything peripheral. From there, I begin focusing intently on the mundane, becoming consumed by the quest for a new perspective on the simple sights I'm surrounded by every day but so often take for granted. 

 

 

Then there's the light. When attempting to capture a compelling image, light is everything. The first light and last light of any day is ideal, the way the rising and setting sun creates depth, highlights and shadows. I am hyper aware of light, thanks to photography. I seek it out, marvel at it's magic - transforming dew drops into glittering jewels. How could I not be recharged by such pure brilliance?

 

 

Phototherapy doesn't help pay our bills or erase the hard things I'm called to endure. Some might describe it as escapism, but I prefer the term medicinal - not eradicating mental and emotional disease itself, maybe, but providing me with the internal resources necessary to fight it off, to keep and keep on healing even when infected repeatedly by affliction. 

 

 

 

Phototherapy points me always back to the present, to the details, where God is.

 

The details are holy. 

The Way I See It: Patience

 

As my blog title suggests, I am continually on a quest for patience, it being  the holy grail of mothering and all. Did you know there was a time, approximately twelve and half years ago, when I assumed I was patient? I am a patient person, I'd decided. Then parenthood swooped in with its sleepless nights, unpredictability, unfathomable messes and LOUDNESS to squarely put me in my place. I spent my first five years raising children scratching my head in confusion and asking "Where did it go?" Finally, it dawned on me that patience isn't something I can own. It is elusive - it must be sought after, prayed ceaselessly for.  Patience can't be controlled or manipulated.

 

 

 Patience requires that I work for it, that I put forth some effort to reign in the angry words bubbling forth from my seething undercurrent of frustration. Dear God, help me keep my mouth shut till I calm down! I have to literally beg of Him in the thick of it. Then lo and behold, when and where I least expect it, patience will rain down upon me extinguishing the fire of my fury. And in that full awareness of my unworthiness of such a gift, I can only respond, "Oh thank you, thank you, thank you!" 

 

 

I experienced this just yesterday, when I told my sons to come and take a walk with their aunt and me. Throughout the last week, I'd been at my wits end trying to acclimate myself to my kids' rapidly evolving longings for more freedom, and to pre-teen mindsets in general. We'd been butting heads. Havemercyonmehavemercyonmehavemercyonme, I'd been praying in the car, at the dinner table, lying in bed.  Then there we were on an impromptu stroll through the park not compromising or talking out our issues but just being together while the sun shone and the fall colored leaves dazzled. Mysteriously missing was all tension between us. It felt wonderful, freeing, like a much needed do-over. Presently, I'm still reveling in that merciful boost of patience. May I use it wisely. 

 

Oh thank You, thank You, thank You for countless new beginnings. 

 

Do you have a photo or reflection on patience to share? Please link to your site in the comment section below. 

Next week's The Way I See It theme will be:  Simplicity

why do I flee?

 

Prayer

by Marie Howe

Every day I want to speak with you. And every day something more important

calls for my attention—the drugstore, the beauty products, the luggage

I need to buy for the trip.
Even now I can hardly sit here

among the falling piles of paper and clothing, the garbage trucks outside
already screeching and banging.

The mystics say you are as close as my own breath.
Why do I flee from you?

My days and nights pour through me like complaints
and become a story I forgot to tell.

Help me. Even as I write these words I am planning
to rise from the chair as soon as I finish this sentence.

It seems after ascending some ladders, I have landed on a long old chute. Waaah! Due to a small series of unfortunate events, down I've slidden, lickety split. I'm a tad too caught up in mayhem at the moment to turn myself back in the right direction. And my faith, too weary to ponder even noble theological truths or historical Church Tradition, has been boiled down to this:

 

 

 

Help me!

 

This morning I woke up acutely aware that recent conundrums sprouting up here and there and everywhere have got me stumped - I appear to be a bit in over my head. And oddly enough, my default defense mechanism (despite the fact I clearly know better) is to avoid silence, avoid stillness.  That'll learn me to subconsciously assume I'm on the up and up and up. None of us is less vulnerable than anyone else to setbacks - me most definitely included.

 

But honest and true, I've been undeservedly blessed with the ability to view this particular setback, this "I have no idea what I'm dooooiiiing" phase of motherhood I've stumbled into, as the extended hand of Christ reaching out for my helpless soul. 

Now will you let Me take over?

 

This post is a message from myself to myself:

 

Stop running already. Start praying.

 

firecracker

 

 

Who knew my arms were simply aching for a little boy they could hold?

Who knew a new unwritten chapter of my life would soon unfold?

Who knew the heavens were smiling on me,

that an angel they would send?

Who knew the joy that was awaiting,

in you, my gentle Ben? 

 

 

Well I've seen heartache, I've seen sorrow,

I've seen a world that's cold and numb,

but in your eyes I see salvation,

a promise of the Light to come.

 

 

 

O gentle Ben, my sweet surprise,

I hope you one day realize,

the gift you are, the hope you bring,

the song you've made my heart to sing.

(a love song to my newborn, Benjamin - 10/02) 

 

This morning at the parent teacher conference,  Mrs. S told me you are fully engaged in all classroom activities, which I'm pretty sure means that you're the type of kid who stands up and waves his hand frantically in the air while yelling, "Oooh! Ooooh! I know! I know!" before the question has even fully exited your teacher's lips.  I love that you wake up happy and alert. I love that you spiked your own hair for picture day. I love that when I volunteered in your classroom, I saw you (absentmindedly) gently tighten the falling loose ponytail of the little girl sitting in front of you. I love that you are growing and maturing within your own distinct time frame. You inspire, bless, exhaust me. 

 

Happy Birthday, Ben. I adore you. 

The Way I See It: Community

Every morning, between 5:00 and 6:00 am, my six-year-old shuffles into our room and sleepily whispers in my ear: "Can I lay with you, mama?" And I lift the sheets and blanket, wordlessly welcoming her into the warmth and safety of our bed.  Once snuggled between her dad and me, I feel her small body relax, her breathing slow down. For a half-hour or so, before the the demands of the day overtake us, we rest together in stillness. Just by being, I am a comfort. 

 

Coming together to cheer Benji on at his soccer game

 

I am a recovering people pleaser, which sounds nice enough until you realize, oh wait, what I'm hungering for is to be liked. Ooh that pride is sticky and tricky. See it all comes back to me. How do you feel about me? What do the actions of my family members say about me? I feel good, happy, when others accept and approve of me. But that happiness is short-lived, and can morph into insecurity at break neck speed. I cannot become a true healing presence to those around me until I deal honestly and forthrightly with my self-centeredness. Humility is necessary for freedom, courage, and growth. 

The meek man is not a human mouse afflicted with a sense of his own inferiority. He has accepted God's estimate of his own life: In himself, nothing; In God, everything. He knows well that the world will never see him as God sees him and he has stopped caring.-- A.W. Tozer

 

 

Cleaning up after book club. I love book club. 

 

To find beauty and Christ in every person I meet, and to serve that Christ unselfconsciously, is to grasp ( finally!) the key to all peace, to all joy. No one's disdain for me can crumble such a firm foundation of hope and purpose. Neither can being taken for granted, misunderstood, treated unjustly. Community, to me, means wholeheartedly entangling oneself in others' struggles, sorrows,  accomplishments, etc. and being healed by God's mercy in the process. In the loving of our neighbors, our spouses and children, in co-carrying their burdens and, just by being, lightening their load, we're able to shed that stubborn sin of selfishness that all too easily ensares us. 

 

A Thursday morning coffee date

 

 As an Orthodox Christian, my digestion of the utter imperativeness of not living for myself alone is paramount to my salvation:

 

There are no individuals in the Church. We are not autonomous beings who come to Church in order to get our needs met. This is an aspect of our Orthodox self- understanding that sets us apart in our American Christian culture. We are connected to one another. We worship together. We are saved together in the Church. We are members of one another in the body of Christ. Mainline Christianity in America assumes that we are selfsufficient individuals and all we need is "me, God, and the Bible." This is very different than our historical, Orthodox Christian Faith. The Church is made of persons created in the image and likeness of God that come together to be what they cannot be alone, the body of Christ, which is the one body, confessing the one Christ, celebrating the one Eucharist at the one altar, worshiping with one voice.

- Fr. Christopher Foley

 

 

Making Christmas nut rolls with the women of my parish. 

 

All for One, and One for all. 

A blessed weekend to you, my brother and sisters. 

 

Do you have a photo or reflection on "Community" to share? Please link to your site in my comment section! Next week's "The Way I See It" theme will be: Patience

hungry

after school snack

 

 

Song and Dance

BY ALAN SHAPIRO

Did you ever have a family?   

                                                    Dark   

dining room,

                  bright kitchen,

                                        white steam

from the big pot my mother’s stirring   

reaching in wavy tendrils to her face,   

around her face, all the way around   

to me at the table, then beyond me   

into the darkness where my brother is.

Were you ever a child?

                                             I’m hungry   

but I know we’ll

                         eat soon,      

                                           so

even the hunger’s sweet.

Did you ever really have a brother?

                                                                  He’s singing   

there in the dark

                           corner

                                     beside the stereo,

the volume turned down so low   

all we hear is him, his voice, and   

his eyes are closed so that there’s   

nothing around him anywhere

that might reveal he isn’t

who the song insists he is.

And that is?

                           Irresistible,

unforgettable,         

                            someone         

                                              to whom   

as in imaginary gardens

where “the nectarine and curious

peach into my hands themselves

do reach,” love comes as soon

as called, comes just as dreamed.

Did any of this ever happen?

                                                    The hunger’s

sweet,

          it’s as if

                           the song weaves

through the fragrance of the braiding   

steam from him to me to her

to me to him because her eyes

are closed now too; her

slippered feet tap, caper

a soft shoe while the ladle

sways in her hand as she stirs.

Were you ever a child?

                                             I know

I’ll eat soon.         

                           Did you ever really have a brother?

You should have      

                            heard him,   

                                              his voice was   

unforgettable, irresistible, his voice

was an imaginary garden woven through with fragrance.   

Did you ever have a family?

                                                   Their eyes are closed.   

That’s how I know      

                              we’re there   

                                                   inside it,   

it’s made of sound and steam

that weaves between dark

dining room, bright kitchen.   

We’re there because I’m hungry,   

and we’ll all be eating soon

together, and the hunger’s sweet.

 

Whew! This poem stabbed me in the heart.

 

All fall, I've been reflecting on how certain I was, when my kids were tiny, that my children could be trained to become everything I wanted them to be. I wouldn't have said that, of course, but I lived it. Enough positive reinforcement mixed with consistent time outs, consistent schedules, a perfect concoction of vitamins, and limited amounts of television just had to produce mild mannered, respectful, pious, industrious daughters and sons. The books promised it would. And I'd try to be perfect, only I'm not - so that was a problem. And, darn it, these kids seemed to have a mind of their own! "What gives?!" I'd wonder, and start pouring through the manuals trying to pinpoint where I went wrong. My kids shouldn't have temper tantrums, talk back, despise chores, balk at evening prayers, argue incessantly with their siblings. What does that say about ME, as their mother? Everyone's looking at ME, right? 

MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.

 

My children, to me, became their behaviors, their childish decisions. I wouldn't have said that of course, but too often I've lived it. Too often I've agonized over their failings and worked myself into a frustrated frenzy trying to force contrition upon them. I could not be satisfied until it was fully understood that I, as the parent, knew best...and was right. And guess how often that happens, especially as the children get older? Lest I doom myself (and my family) to a continual state of tension and misunderstanding, I am learning to throw out old ideals, toss off my pride and create boundaries. 

 

By boundaries, I mean emotional buffers. I mean, the roller coasters of emotions rocking my preteens don't need to rock me. I've been there (ages 11 through 18), done that. And now I best serve my darlings in the thick of it by staying calm, unflustered - by seeing beyond the angst into their Christ adored souls. Of course there must be consequences for ridiculousness but what isn't necessary is for my own joy and peace to be wrapped up in their messy, lesson fraught, up and down journey into adulthood; that's too much pressure on a kid. They need to feel safe to unload on me, to fail sometimes, to ask difficult questions, to doubt, without fear of breaking me or disappointing me. My kids will absolutely make choices I don't approve of, just like I made choices my parents didn't like. And I will have to get over the fact that they will be judged, and I along with them, by others who don't approve. And God-willing I will absorb that sting and be damn sure I never, ever point fingers at another mother or father. Parenting is a tough, tough job. We need to be good to each other.

 

So back to the poem, and why it floors me. Here I am emerging from a fog of misconceptions, alert now to the truth that I do not have it in me to micro-manage my children into "successes" (whatever that means) or out of necessary struggles. What I can do, however, and what brings me increasingly more satisfaction than anything in the world, is to make our home a safe, warm, loving place to come back to at the end of the day - a haven from the world with all its busyness and ambitions. What I can do is pray for my kids, and become a living example of the unconditional, unbiased, patient, forgiving Christ-like love I long for them to cling to, and pass on. 

 

We are family, for better or worse. And we're bound up together, we come together "as is" for support and encouragement. My babies are hungry, and their hunger is sweet. It is an honor to serve them. 

Good Enough

Origami Yoda

 

I've been busy being in "good enough" mode. I'd forgotten how beneficial it is to all of us when I step up from "giving up" but stop short of perfectionism. "Good enough" means I value highly my role as manager of our home, living  out my gratitude for this privilege of nurturing and serving these five other Sabourins I'm eternally connected to by fighting hard against my impulsivity. My impulsivity takes many less than productive forms, not the least of which is procrastination. A trashed kitchen and overflowing laundry baskets can have me internet surfing and random errand running if I don't watch it. And then I get further behind, and even more impulsive. It's an ugly, disconcerting cycle, let me assure you.

 

And "Good Enough" means I don't sweat the small stuff, because life is short. 

 

 

Trampolines are fun

It's funny the things that slap sense into me. The most recent being a memoir I'm reading called "The Zoo Keeper's Wife" about a Polish couple who risked everything to help Jews during WWII. Antonia, the heroine, was a hard, hard worker, carrying for years an inconceivably heavy burden of stress and fear. Oh, how I admire her. And imitation being the highest form of flattery, so they say, I've stepped up my efforts at maintaining some semblance of order within this zoo I'm blessed to dwell in. By "order" I mean keeping the rooms of this ancient house uncluttered, but not necessarily dusted. It means knowing  in advance what we will have for dinner, but being ok with relying on frozen meatballs from Costco. It means cleaning out the van, which today included the removal of:

a half eaten banana

two apple cores

a crumpled play script

an alligator head

a broken umbrella

two empty Caprisun pouches

a hair brush

and a filthy pair of athletic socks

...but not vacuuming it.

It means ironing my husband's work shirts when I don't want to. It means packing lunches the night before so our mornings aren't quite as nuts. It means finding contentment that is elusive when my own needs and wants come first. And yet it also means loving myself by not allowing myself to be absolutely ruled by chaos. 

 

Prissy's favorite soccer socks

And now I must help my big ones with homework and my little ones with their bedtime routine. I can only maintain this "good enough" gig one minute and one prayer (Please help me stay focused and pliable, please help me stay focused and pliable) at a time. 

 

The Way I See It: Growth

My thoughts are scattered this week and my hodge podge of "Growth" photos reflect that.

 

There are the children in my life, of course. I don't need to explain to you how they seemingly go to bed each evening and wake up two inches taller, two years older. You have no doubt been there, done that - you too have shaken your head and asked, "Who is this young lady in my kitchen, this young man in my living room?" I am sure. We are certainly not old enough to be parents to anyone that old, anyone that tall. At least we don't "look" old enough ...right? 

 

 

 

 

And then there's my walking, talking, slide climbing niece, Annie, who was just a newborn, I swear to you, and now look at her:

 

 

 

Alright now, that has to be as cute as it gets. Oooh, those little teeth, those whispy eyelashes! Annie is growing, the Sabourin kids are growing and I pray from the bottom of my heart that I, too, am growing, deeper. 

 

 

 

 

I often wish my personal/spiritual growth was more effortessly consistent, less jerky and exhuasting. Vrrrooom ahead, I speed, then screeech, what's that shiny thing over there? I need to see it, to touch it! Gaper's delay, gaper's delay! Shoot I forgot again, and again and again, that I have somewhere really, really important to be. Repenting of your doubt and self-centeredness, then starting over an infinite amount of times, until you die, can be arduous, uncomfortable,  like growing pains. 

 

 

 

 

But then again, nothing shiny, titillating, numbing, can compare with the fulfillment of nourishing someone other than myself with the fruit of those trying, humbling, growth-procuring, spiritual labors. 

 

I am most beautiful, as a woman, as a living icon of the Risen Christ, when I radiate, from the inside out, with peace, kindness, resilience, determination and authenticity earned the hard way. 

 

What about you? What comes to mind when you think of "Growth?" If you have any images, or reflections on growth, to share, please link to your blog in the comment section below!

Next week's The Way I See It theme will be: Community

something impossible up your sleeve

Fairy-tale Logic

By A.E. Stallings b. 1968 A.E. Stallings

 

Fairy tales are full of impossible tasks:

Gather the chin hairs of a man-eating goat,

Or cross a sulphuric lake in a leaky boat,

Select the prince from a row of identical masks,

Tiptoe up to a dragon where it basks

And snatch its bone; count dust specks, mote by mote,

Or learn the phone directory by rote.

Always it’s impossible what someone asks—

You have to fight magic with magic. You have to believe

That you have something impossible up your sleeve,

The language of snakes, perhaps, an invisible cloak,

An army of ants at your beck, or a lethal joke,

The will to do whatever must be done:

Marry a monster. Hand over your firstborn son.

   My husband is reading the Hobbit with our children in the evenings. At first they were a little skeptical because it's an old book written in language quite un-Junie B. Jones-ish, and its a long book as well. I've been delighted, however, to witness their gradual ascent into the story, into the magical land of Tolkien itself. They've been sucked in, captivated. They are emotionally invested in the adventures of Bilbo and Gandalf, as I was emotionally invested in the diabolical shenanigans of C.S. Lewis' White Witch, and the victorious re-birth of Aslan. I want for my kids a childhood in which the back of darkened closets are seen longingly as possible portals to another world. 

I love this excerpt from my underlined, dog eared copy of Madeleine L'Engle's book "Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art": 

St. Matthew says, "And he spake many things to them in parables . . . and without a parable spake he not to them."

 

When the powers of this world denigrate and deny the value of story, life loses much of its meaning; and for many people in the world today, life has lost its meaning, one reason why every other hospital bed is for someone with a mental, not a physical illness.

 

Clyde Kirby writes, "Meaninglessness inhibits fullness of life and is therefore equivalent to illness. Meaning makes a great many things endurable – perhaps everything. . . . it is not that 'God' is a myth, but that myth is the revelation of a divine life in man. It is not we who invent myth; rather, it speaks to us as a Word of God."

 

The well-intentioned mothers who don't want their children polluted with fairy tales would not only deny them their childhood, with its high creativity, but they would have them conform to the secular world, with its dirty devices. The world of fairy tale, fantasy, myth, is inimical to the secular world, and in total opposition to it, for it is interested not in limited laboratory proofs, but in truth.

 

When I was a child, reading Hans Christian Andersen's tales, reading about Joseph and his coat of many colours and his infuriating bragging about his dreams, reading The Selfish Giant and The Book of Jonah, these diverse stories spoke to me in the same language, and I knew, intuitively, that they belonged to the same world. For the world of the Bible, both the Old and New Testaments, is the world of Story, story which may be able to speak to us as a Word of God.

 

Being of such a similar mindset, I think this explains why I embrace so heartily and wholly the Orthodox Church's allowance of Mystery in its practices and theology. I don't want to make sense of the virgin birth, the Resurrection,  Christ becoming bread and wine and feeding me. No, I need for the Kingdom of Heaven to transcend sense entirely. At all times, I cling to my illogical belief that Love can do magical things, impossible things, like move mountains, nourish thousands with but a tiny offering of five loaves and two fishes, burn bushes without consuming them, bring the dead back to life, forgive. 

 

I, like L'Engle, am not interested in (and certainly not living for) laboratory proofs, but in wild, fearsome, awesome, Mystical, salvific Truth. 

 

Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal,

have mercy on us! 

little victories

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
 

 
I have one main goal each morning: to make it to 8:00 am (when school starts) without getting sucked in to any too unpleasant altercations with my children. This is no easy task, mind you. See, none of us is at our best before 7:00 am, and there is one main bathroom we're all sharing.   On a Monday morning especially, sock seams feel funny and tennis shoes misplace themselves. Monday morning bickering can drive this mother up a wall. "It's time to go. It's time to go. It's time to go." I repeat, increasing the volume with each delivery. Jackets, backpacks, lunches, homework, flute, trumpet, play scripts - oh mercy, there is so much to remember.

 

7: 50 am: We are flustered but in the van, thank goodness. I overlook the apple cores and broken crayons at our feet - gross. Breath in, breath out. I am choosing my battles, choosing my battles carefully. "O Heavenly King," I begin singing, and the kids, for the most part, join in. "O Comforter, O Spirit of Truth..." Our prayers are brief but crucial, especially for me and my urgent ambition to send my children off into this day feeling loved, supported, and hopefully, hopefully, inspired to be a healing presence in their classrooms instead of a negative or ambivalent one. Those humble morning car prayers help me remember what the point is, and hopefully, hopefully are planting seeds in the souls of my beloveds.

 

8:05 am: I grab my eldest's hand and give it a quick squeeze. He'll not be kissing me goodbye, of course, so we express our affection for one another this way - small, discreet, but genuine. It is my turn to pull up to the curb where a teacher is waiting to open our van's side door (now she sees the apple cores and broken crayons - gross. I've been outed as a frazzled mama). "Do you have your backpacks? Your lunches?" I ask again. They do (whew). Kiss, Kiss, Kiss, for my younger three. "Have a wonderful day!" I tell them, in the most cheerful voice I can muster at that hour. They leave smiling.

 

Even if I accomplish not one thing else today, I can still hold on to that - to the deep satisfaction of knowing that, this morning, my sons and daughters greeted their school day free of my emotional baggage, free of residual anger or sadness from a morning argument or misunderstanding. This morning, my children were free to be carefree, as children should be.   That power I have as a mother, to make or break my kids' days with but a word, a look, should never ever be taken lightly.

 

I am celebrating this small victory. I have to purposefully celebrate the small victories. The small victories are what give meaning to the every day.  And I am praying for an afternoon and evening with my family I can feel good about, and hopefully, hopefully, even cherish.