How Did I Get Here?

I have two children, one girl and one boy.  They have been my life's focus since they were born.  I am a reader of parenting books, a planner, a goal setter and an action oriented person.  I worked part time when they were small but still was able to find time to seek out the parenting techniques and tools that seemed the best for us and for them.

Once they entered school I was blessed with the ability to stop working.  Well, that's a fallacy, I stopped working for an establishment and worked solely for my calling - being a mother, which is funny because before I was married I wasn't sure if I wanted kids, but that is another story.  When I stopped working I had one child, a daughter, in kindergarten and the younger child, a son, in preschool and home with me.

When we release our children in the world we have hopes and dreams; fears and trepidations.  I remember the first day of kindergarten for each of them.  On Emma's first day, Cole and I walked her to school in this wonderful community-based neighborhood and she was looking as cute as could be.  We gathered on the kindergarten yard with all the other expectant children and distraught parents.  Cameras captured the moment in time and everyone was dressed in their kindergarten best.  We stood outside the classroom, lined up in a kindergarten-orderly fashion and waited for the teacher.  This adorable, grandma-aged, quintessential kindergarten teacher came out with her shiny little silver bell (can't you see it?).  She gently rang the ever-so-sweet bell, the kids (and parents) all looked up and she said, "Welcome to Mrs. Jacobs class!"  My daughter, who was basically fearless, walked right in with the line, turned, said, "Bye Mommy!" and walked confidently into the big, unknown, elementary school.  WHAT???  No tears?  No clinging?  I was robbed!  I walked home pushing Cole in the stroller crying my heart out both out of separation anxiety and beaming pride.

Then, Cole went to school three years later, same school, same yard, new teacher, but same basic experience.  Mrs. Rovzar came out, similar adorable-looking teacher, loving nature, same precious little bell, same reaction by my child.  Only one big difference, that adorable teacher, sweetly walked down the line of anxiety-ridden parents and handed out a cute rolled up piece of red paper with a gingham ribbon holding it closed.  I knew better than to read the letter right there.  I had been warned.  I went home, laid in my bed, slowly untied the gingham ribbon, unrolled the letter as if it was a scroll from the Lord God himself, slowly read through my tears and finished with a good old-fashioned sob session.  Seriously, Lord, why give me such precious gifts if I just have to give them up and send them off?

For your own amusement, I would love to share that wonderfully understanding letter with you. 

Did it make you cry?  If it did, you are my people!  We are in this together!

School, in general, has been a good experience for both my kids.  Today as I write this, Emma is mid-way through fifth grade and Cole is mid-way through second grade.  At school I did as much as I could.  I volunteered in the classroom, took on helping jobs that enabled me to get to know the teachers, school staff and the other kids in my children's grades.  I have, and continue to, help with homework, talk through social issues with friends, continue to read parenting books and thoroughly enjoy my role and my observations as a proud mother of two wonderful children.

About a year ago I was lucky enough to see the documentary, Race to Nowhere.  If you have not seen this movie and have kids 20 years of age or less, see it!  This documentary brings to life the pressures our children are under in the school system, the sports system, the competition system, the society system; just pick a system and name it!  It was real to me, very disturbing, but true nonetheless.  It made sense to me, but I left the movie feeling very frustrated.  If you are at all like me, you are happy to discuss problems but only if the discussion is wrapped up with a conclusion, a course, a path, a plan of action.  I would not be an effective 'think tank' person.  I want action.  In-action, when there is an obvious problem, frustrates me.  The movie's 'call to action' was to spread the word to begin, and fuel, a grass roots movement to challenge the educational and societal system that our children are operating within.  What does that grass roots movement look like?  I had no idea.  What was I to move toward?  What grass needed roots?  What needed to be watered?  What needed to be cultivated?  After my viewing, I went home and, much to my husband's chagrin, had a fire lit under me.  What was the purpose?  Why show the movie?  What could I do in my world and what did that mean for my children?  Since my initial viewing and reaction, the movie has gained huge momentum and I do follow that movement, watch and listen, and am glad for the support and results they are achieving.  But that particular 'grass roots movement' is not my purpose.

No, I don't want my children to race to nowhere.  Yes, I want them to be understood for who they are and what their unique talents are and I want that to be celebrated in their lives.  I want them to be what God created them to be....

WAIT!  What God created them to be!  That was the answer, like no illumination or vision I have ever had, God said to me there is a 'Journey to Somewhere'!  I had been running, for exercise, not from the Lord, and thinking through the movie and my need for action and a solution. As I was running, my sweet and patient Lord, in no uncertain terms, spoke to me in a stronger manner than at any other time in my life.  Maybe I am a little more dense than any other time in my life, but this time, I HEARD him!

Each of us has a 'Journey to Somewhere'.  That is the crux of Jeremiah 29:11, "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future.  Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me and I will listen to you.  You will seek me and find me when you seek me with your whole heart."

Our precious children have been entrusted to us, by God, for a time.  We put them into the society machine in good faith.  We don't want to see them stressed out, but we want them to learn, we don't want them to strive for things they don't want, but we want them to do better than we did.  What is a family to do?  Do we remove ourselves from the machine, take our kids out of the craziness, find a remote location to live in, let them run free in the fields and wait for the Lord to return and gather his people to him?  While that may sound, in many ways, divinely wonderful, it is not reality and it does not create a future for our precious little ones.  So, what is a focused, active, loving parent to do?

That is where this writing began.  With a movie, a run, an epiphany and the grace of God  to move forward.  We need to equip our children for the path God has created them for.  Thus the topic of my next entry...stay tuned.

By His Grace