Megan Tietz :: SortaCrunchy

Project: Spring Green Begins TODAY!

photo by 416 style

Two weeks ago today, I invited you to join me in taking on a green goal for the month of April in a little project I am calling Project: Spring Green.

Many of you shared your goals in the comments on that post, and I am so excited that you are ready to take on a new challenge with me!

As I've told you, I am going to begin composting. 

When I was a little girl, we spent lots of time at my grandparents' house in Kansas City.  My grandfather had created beautiful gardens in their backyard - some for growing flowers and some for his spectacular tomato plants.  Oh, goodness.  A wave of giddy nostalgia just washed over me as I am sitting here remembering the taste of a warm tomato fresh from the vine on a sunny summer morning.

Heaven.

I digress.

whereby nobodies change the world

Hello. My name is Dina but I can pretty much guarantee you've never heard of me.

Which is fine, because it just so happens that I'm kind of a big deal back here where I live.

Where I'm from, I'm The Mama.

I married early, too early even to finish university and pregnant too soon and too often thereafter to entertain any idea about continuing my education. In the B.C. years (Before Children), I imagined that my contribution to the world would be fulfilled through an occupational pursuit, one that provided me with desired challenges and compensated me well. With my hands full with babies and days full of cleaning, cooking, and catching an occasional nap my impact on the world would have to wait.

Or would it?

As parents, as educators of the home, we have the ultimate responsibility: influencing the next generation that will, in turn, shape the world that we will grow old in. There is no sphere of influence, no position of authority, no occupational pursuit that holds such promise and such impact as our role with the young lives we hold in our hands and in our hearts.

For years after children, I struggled with identifying my occupation, though I had well learned the enormity of its privilege. Sure, I stayed home and did the laundry, cleaned the house, and even chose to educate my young children at home but I was more than any one of these, so what then was the sum of all of them?

Reading aloud recently with my older girls, I began to sputter and stumble as emotion spilled over through the words I read. The story was one that told of a past time, a time when life was simple though the days were long with hard work and your closest friends were those within your family. Nestled among the details of life on a mountain farm and the growth of a young shepherd boy and his pet lamb was this paragraph, the thoughts of his mother:

"Once the boy had come safely into the world, she realized how her prayers for him had changed. It was not for life and a strong body to hold its treasures she prayed, for he had these; he was a sturdy, shapely boy from the first. It was that he might be caring and useful in this world. Such a short way could she go with him on that path that was his life; only a few years she would have his hand in hers. For a few more years he would walk beside her; then he would be a man going his way alone, but if it were a way of kindness, the memory of that first day would always fill her with joy."

Parallel to this thought was the boy's own thought about his lamb. Just as he would shepherd and protect his pet, so too would his mother be that momentary shepherdess in his life.

That is what she and you and I share in common: we are shepherds and shepherdesses of the precious souls within our keep. For such a brief moment, we can walk beside our little ones, equipping and influencing them with the values and morals, ideas and characteristics that might better our world.

The necessities of reading, writing, and arithmetic are almost a certain guarantee that our children will possess. But what of kindness, what of humility, what of service, what of discipline, what of contentment? Who will be the models and educators of these essentials?

Whether through one life or four within the fold of our homes, it will be us in our role as parents that will impact the world. It will be through wisely understanding our calling as shepherds, as shepherdesses to instruct and model and develop the character of our children that we will reap the greatest rate of return on our investment.It will be by the age old truths of hard work and home grown values, through surrounding them with the friendship and love of family and good friends, that our children will navigate the ups and downs, the liberties and dangers of their journeys through life.

And by so lovingly and faithfully doing, we will have changed the world.

*the book mentioned here is Mountain Born, by Elizabeth Yates, one which this nobody highly recommends.

a student of life, learning daily through the unconditional love of her God, her husband, and her four children. a lamb to her Good Shepherd and a shepherdess to her young ewes, all the while hoping that somehow, someway her life brings about change in the lives of others that will last for all eternity.  Read more from Dina at A Worthy Life.

The Confessional: Mess

Riley draws lots of dots.

"Those are raindrops," says Rose.

"No," says Riley. "They're dots."

"No," says Rose.  "They're raindrops, and this is a great big tree."

"That's not a tree," says Riley. "That's a mess."

"It's a tree in the rain," says Rose.

"MESS," says Riley.

-- from Riley and Rose in the Picture by Susanna Gretz (an all-time favorite here that I memorized years ago after many readings)

It's all in the perspective, isn't it?

Recently, I looked through old posts and realized it's been quite a while since I visited the confessional.

What I need for you to understand is that although from time to time I share thoughts that you may find to be encouraging, uplifting, or even inspiring, my day-to-day reality is pretty messy.

At this very moment:

* Aliza is watching a movie (a Disney movie!  horrors!) while I type.

* Also?  She's naked.  As a jaybird.

* It's ten after ten in the morning.  I had purposed to have my disaster area of a kitchen immaculate and shining no later than 9:30.  I haven't even begun to take it on yet.

* Although I am one of the biggest evangelists of the Oil Cleansing Method you'll ever meet, I have to confess that at this very moment on my chin is a zit that brings new depth of meaning to the word YIKES.

* I have 460 unread items in my Google Reader.

* Last week, I found out much to my big, huge dismay that Typepad's commenting system has not been working the way I thought it was working.

When I comment on another Typepad blog and the blogger responds to my comment, Typepad sends me an email with that blogger's response.  Ergo, I thought each of my commenters were getting emails from Typepad each time I responded to a comment.  I cannot tell you how bummed I am to find out that this is not the case.  (Evidently, it's only fellow Typepad bloggers/account holders who are getting emailed responses from Typepad?)

I've been so overwhelmed with disappointment about this that I, for some illogical reason, haven't done much at all in the way of comment response in the past week.  If you are new here, just know that is not usually the case.  I promise.

* My email inbox?  Oy. If you have sent me an email in the past two weeks, there's a 100% chance I have read it, and a 99.9% chance I haven't responded.  I'll get there.  Eventually.

* The truth?  Since I'm confessing today . . .

When I get overwhelmed (and believe me, it doesn't take much), I shut down.  I choose the path of inaction and avoidance every. single. time.  And I don't like it.  In fact, I hate it.  And I am thirty-two years old and seem to lack the maturity/self-discipline/internal fortitude to change it.

So, that's me.  Here in this little corner of the sprawling universe, I can offer you the prettiest pictures of what I have to share.  What you'll find here has been polished (at least a little bit) and has been edited (usually a lot).

More than anything, I want to be authentic, transparent, and real.  I post things like this not because I am fishing for encouragement (in fact, comments are closed), but I just crave and very nearly demand balance.  You take the good, you take the bad . . .

So.

Things are pretty messy here.  But I like to emphasize the pretty more than the messy.  That kitchen that awaits me the moment I hit "publish" is a disaster area because of the remnants of art projects and sloppy, happy cooking, and time spent in there as a family that just doesn't lend itself to orderly.

No one will ever accuse us of being tidy, but we sure are happy.

(I'll be back later today - hopefully - to talk about what I had really intended to talk about today.  But I had to come and confess first.)

(ALSO!  Project Spring Green kicks off on WEDNESDAY!  Don't forget!!)

(Also, the link to Riley and Rose is an Amazon Affiliate link.  Thanks for keeping me real, FTC.)