Most every weekday of the school year, I pass as many as six crossing guards. My three children attend three different schools, so this isn’t out of the realm of possibility. Still, I do spend at least a few minutes of our commute in awe of these men and women. [Note: I should say man and women due to the fact that only one of the six is male. My personal theory is that women make good crossing guards because we are excellent multi-taskers. For instance, I am—right now—simultaneously typing this blog post, cooking supper, and texting about carpools. Oh, double-X chromosome, is there anything you can’t do?!] Since we see these same six people 180 days of the year, I begin to feel like I know them. For instance, I’ve created a backstory for the man in front of our elementary school. He has a New York-type accent and a pointy, white goatee. (true) I’ve decided he’s an independently wealthy, retired CEO who moved here from Silicon Valley to find some peace and quiet. He only does the crossing guard gig to get out of the house a couple of times a day. (fiction) He replaced a lady who worked nights, stopped traffic in the mornings, went home to sleep, and then returned in the afternoon (That part is not fictional. We got to know her as we walked to school. You can actually find out a lot about a person with just a couple of sentences a day for six or seven years). One of the most famous crossing guards in Murfreesboro’s history has to be the lady who directs traffic on Memorial Boulevard. She wears costumes and/or holds props for all major holidays (including Veteran’s Day). Her movements are as smooth as a Japanese kabuki dancer. She seems oddly at home right in the middle of five lanes of busy traffic. The lady who stands at the convergence of the elementary, middle, and high schools near us is the most cheerful crossing guard I’ve ever seen. At 7:45 in the morning, you’ll find her giving out two-handed waves as she walks to her spot. Looking at her beaming smiles, you’d think she was on a float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, instead of directing traffic on a cold, rainy Monday morning. Which brings me to the weather… Lately, we’ve had some very cold and icky mornings, especially for November. They can be seen suited up with bright, yellow raincoats, thick gloves, and rubber boots. In spite of their regulation outer garments, I know they’re freezing. And yet, these six community servants can always be found at their spot, on time, doing their job. It sounds obvious, right? They apply for the job, get trained, do their job, and get paid. But look at the job they do: they keep the traffic moving, they protect kids trying to cross the street, they intentionally put themselves in harm’s way for us. I love to point out these six people to my kids. I want them to see that no matter what job they choose they should do it well. Like the smiling crossing guard, they can find joy in everyday chores. Like the graceful crossing guard, they should take pride in what they do. And like the crossing guard who—when directing traffic in front of the private school down the road mouths thank you to the driver who she stopped and is now allowing to drive again—they should always strive to be polite. I also want them to see what it means to be a part of a community. We live out the phrase my grandfather used to say in all his prayers before supper. He would ask the Lord to “guard, guide, and direct”. If we can be God’s hands and do this for our fellow man (or woman), then maybe we can make it through this mess!

Earlier this week, someone told me I am the most well adjusted person he knows. To really appreciate this comment, it should be said this is an exceptionally wise person. If he weren’t a resident of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, he’d probably live high in the Himalayan Mountains. People would climb the treacherous cliffs just to ask him deep questions about the meaning of life. Then, he would stroke his long, white beard thoughtfully and answer with something like, “Life is like macaroni and cheese…” and no one would understand his philosophical and enigmatic responses. This is why I started to wonder how I could seem so well adjusted—like I said, he’s a super smart dude…and I fooled him. Kids of preachers and pastors (P.K.’s) are often skilled at making it look like we’ve got it all figured out. Even if no one ever tells you to get your act together because the members of your father’s congregation are looking at you, you can sense it. You sit on the front pew and feel the eyes boring in to your ponytail. You just know they’re watching to see if you fight with your sisters or get too many desserts at the Sunday night potluck dinner. After a while, it’s possible to forget what you really think or feel and only live in the expectations you’ve absorbed from that front pew. But it’s not just for P.K.’s. Being truly authentic will always be a struggle for some of us. And now, with the advent of Facebook, it’s even harder. We’ve become professional image consultants and fact spinners. We’ll post parenting failures and cooking disasters but only to the extent we can control the story. We want to look fallible without looking like a total failure. It’s like the girl who said, “I know this is bad but I’ve never donated blood before. I feel horrible about it but you have to weigh more than 100 lbs.” Yeah, you feel really bad about being TOO SKINNY. That’s a like a backhanded compliment, but with opposite intentions. Of course, it’s possible to be overly transparent. Status updates about eating your placenta or how your marriage is falling apart may be crossing the line. Mark Zuckerberg may think that belongs in my newsfeed but I beg to differ. Transparency is one thing. Ripping open your guts and showing us the contents of your large intestines is another. So how do I strike the right balance to live a life of authenticity? How do I set aside what others think of me and just be honest? Does it involve swearing off mascara and never shaving my legs? Who knows. Maybe it’s different for everybody. What I do know is that I prefer to spend time with people who are honest about their flaws but not consumed by them. They are so busy being interested in others they don’t have time to focus on their own mess. Their mess is out there, not white-washed and swept under the rug, but there for a reason—to keep them humble and empathic. I can’t say it any better than the Skin Horse in The Velveteen Rabbit: “Real isn’t how you are made,’ said the Skin Horse. ‘It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.’ ‘Does it hurt?’ asked the Rabbit. ‘Sometimes,’ said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. ‘When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.’ ‘Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,’ he asked, ‘or bit by bit?’ ‘It doesn’t happen all at once,’ said the Skin Horse. ‘You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

Our boy loves his daddy. And who could blame him? His daddy is tall and handsome. He’s smart and strong. He can kick the soccer ball and is willing to hold him endlessly in the pool. All adoption-related material about acclimating kids to new parents says that children will often attach themselves to one parent over the other. I’ve read it and seen it in other families, but I guess I never really thought Ezra would gravitate more to Brent. How vain can a girl be? With our kids at home, I was the number one choice and daddy was an acceptable substitute. This may have something to do with the fact that I was the singular source for their nutrition for the first months out of the womb but who knows. I’m not complaining. It’s been such a pleasure watching Brent with Ezra. He’s a natural nurturer, which I already knew. And Ezra hasn’t completely ignored me. He’s allowed me to feed him and rock him. I gave him a shower yesterday and he was fine. Runner-up isn’t so bad, just an adjustment. In the Congo, as in a lot of other African countries, the men are often called papa and the women are called mama. (If you want to call someone “my mother” it’s mama na besu.) It’s a term of familiarity and respect. It shows the village culture at its best: we’re all here to raise these kids because it takes all of us to do it right. Today, I heard Ezra call Brent da-da. This may have been him parroting the times I’ve referred to Brent as daddy, a habit from home. But I’d rather think he said it because Brent has crossed an imaginary line in Ezra’s mind. He’s gone beyond the men around our hotel—Pablo who drove us to the market and high-fives Ezra every day or Carlos who cleans our room and lectures him in Lingala about obeying his parents or Samba who rakes the gravel in the parking lot. Whatever is going on inside his head, he’s starting to trust us. When he wakes up in the morning, he looks unsure of where he is and who we are. After a several minutes of sweet-talking and offering food, he warms up to us. It’s a game we’ve played every day we’ve been here and we’re ready to play it for keeps.

I was unable to post a blog last night (my last night would be your yesterday afternoon). It was a day we’ll refer to as “The Many Faces of Ezra”. I know he doesn’t have a multiple-personality disorder but the thought did cross my mind. At the end of the day, I turned to the wisdom of Napoleon Dynamite on the laptop instead of collecting my thoughts and writing a post. My overall, midweek impression of our boy is that he is a 3-year old. It has been said that God created 3-year olds to make the “Terrible Twos” seem like an overstatement. As with my other darling children, it is an amazing age of “I do it!” from them and “No hitting!” from us. Ezra, like a lot of African children I’ve seen, is remarkably self-sufficient. They make American kids appear pretty wimpy. He can osuba (pee) and osumba (poo) all by himself, and though this week marks the first time he’s sat on a zongo (toilet), he’s taking it all in stride. (He loooves the flushing part. He likes to walk in the bathroom and spit in the potty just so he has an excuse to flush it.) He can put on his sandals all by himself and, like any self-respecting 3-year old, he prefers them to be on the wrong feet. He uses a fork and spoon (sometimes simultaneously) even though he’s probably only eaten with his hands. We got him a Congolese staple for supper last night: fufu. Fufu is hunks of doughy bread that is eaten with stewed meat. This time it was goat. He ate the entire thing like a champ, greasy goat meat and all. He’s amazing. On the other hand, he’s showing himself to be very strong-willed and a bit of a stinker. At the beginning of the week (the time we’ll now refer to as “Shy Ezra Days”), he was happy to just cuddle and kick the soccer ball with Brent. We’ve got great video of him heading the ball and catching it. It’s my unbiased opinion that he’s got the makings of a soccer super star. Now it seems the honeymoon is over. He wants to throw the ball in the pool. He won’t share with the other kids staying at our hotel. He tried to stab Brent with a plastic fork and thought it was hilarious. Before bedtime, after he’d been especially aggressive toward Papa (Brent) and I had fussed at him and told him “Te!” (no), he gave me an “eat dirt” look (like a smile it is the same in all languages) and he threw himself on the floor for the cold shoulder treatment. I tried to lie next to him but he would always roll over, away from me. He wasn’t wanting maternal comfort. I had hurt his feelings. I know he’s testing us. He’s trying to see how far he can push us and what we’ll do about it. The African parenting culture looks different than what we’re used to. We Americans tend to pet and coo over our kids more. His caretakers up to this point have probably been a little more stern and a little less smiling. This is not a critique of African parents. God help us all when it comes to raising kids. It’s just a different set of cues and facial expressions for Ezra to learn how to read. At first, he may have seen us as pushovers. (“This white mama just cries and kisses me”) Hopefully, he’s realizing that we’re firm but devoted. We’re meeting his needs and thereby proving ourselves to him. It’s a lot of work but terribly rewarding.

After more than 24 hours since our departure flight from Nashville, we have arrived safely in Kinshasa. Flying internationally can be fraught with mishaps, and this trip marks the farthest either of us has ever traveled from home. Our adventure began with the first of many “How Did We Get Here?” moments. Our good friend Mary dropped us off at the airport. When we went to weigh our luggage, three of the four suitcases were over the 50-pound weight limit, each by five or ten pounds a piece. This forced us to open our carefully packed suitcases, exposing all manner of undergarments, and re-evaluate the contents. We were able to move enough things around and only threw away a box of sidewalk chalk and a couple of cans of sunscreen and bug spray. (Don’t worry. We still have plenty.) At some point in the second half of the trip, the exhausted, ridiculous part of my brain staged a coup to take over all operations form the reasonable part of my brain. Let me explain: Three songs started playing in rotation in my head—“All About that Bass,” the theme song from the Bill Cosby show “Picture Pages,” and “Deep in the Heart of Texas.” There’s no rhyme or reason why these songs wouldn’t leave me alone. I tried to listen to music and watch movies on the tiny screens mounted on the back of the headrests, but nothing worked. I also started thinking every fellow passenger was a celebrity. There was singer/actor Lenny Kravitz just across the aisle. And is that master magician David Copperfield sitting in front of him? Of course not. I was just experiencing airplane cabin fever. It is now almost midnight on Monday in Kinshasa. In just a few hours, we’re supposed to meet our son at his orphanage. It feels like I’m getting ready for the most important blind date of my life. Will he like me? What will we talk about? What should I wear? My greatest source of comfort, other than my belief in a God who created the Sahara desert and jet streams strong enough to hold up an Airbus while you fly over the Sahara desert, is the people who have chosen to walk this journey with us. When we started unpacking at the hotel tonight, Brent showed me a package Mary secretly gave him before taking us to the airport. It’s from the beloved girls from my Bible study group. Inside was the most beautiful leather journal with Africa embossed on the front. I started to read the many letters also included in the package, but I had to stop. I’ll ration them out along with the letters my friend Amy had our kids write to us and another bundle of letters from friends who came to Betsy and Robert’s house to pray for us last Saturday. What a great cloud of witnesses! My cup overflows.

In the morning, Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait expectantly. Psalm 5:3 On Monday morning, after the safe delivery of my kids to school and before I started my errands, I paused for a moment of prayer. I sat on the lonely end of the loveseat in our living room where no one usually sits because of the poor angle it affords to anyone trying to watch television. I closed my eyes, and spread out my hands—palms up—ready to catch any blessings that might fall from the heavens. I said, “Lord, today the parliament in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is set to return from their summer break. According to rumor, they’re supposed to approve the laws already written that will lift the suspension that has prevented us from bringing Ezra home. As you will no doubt remember, it has been just shy of twelve months since this suspension was put in place. We are ready for action. Brent and I have decided to pray boldly, to expect you to listen and act. We’re begging for your intervention. We need to see you in this. In Jesus’ name, Amen.” As soon as I had finished, the phone rang. My breath caught in my chest and my hands grew cold. As I walked to grab the cordless in the kitchen, I calculated the time in Congo. Could it be? Is this the embassy calling to tell me we can go and get him? Impressive turn-around time, Lord! Imagine my disappointment when I realized it was the dentist office, calling to confirm the kids’ appointments for their cleanings the next day. Now, I’m not one to tell the Lord how to do his job (For who can know the mind of God?), but that would’ve been pretty cool. Recently, a friend told me how much she admired our family’s waiting during these years of trying to rescue our African son. I mumbled some words of humble gratitude in reply, but what I really wanted to say was “what choice do we have?” Waiting is our only option. Later, I considered the truth of waiting. It seems like the most passive way to spend your time, but there’s more to it. When all the facts point to God’s dormancy, He’s still spinning the planets and granting favor to us in ways we don’t realize or acknowledge him for. Last Friday, a new friend poured out the story of her son’s drowning, coma, and resurrection just outside our workout gym. She didn’t know about our adoption struggle but God does and he sent her to tell me that God is listening. She told me that saying “if only…” limits my belief in his power. As soon as I got home, our neighbor called me to her backyard to tell me that she and her husband will soon celebrate their fiftieth wedding anniversary. She told me, “God is faithful, through the good times and the bad. He’s always there.” The next day, a salesperson at the hardware store asked Brent if he knew Jesus. The elderly man told Brent he had tried to kill himself three times but God had miraculously prevented him from dying every time. He said God was real and powerful and he wants to bless us. Granted, we live in the South, and there are churches on every corner but the undiluted presentation of these testimonies had to be the result of God’s faithfulness. He knew we were worried and anxious for news. He sent us these three ambassadors of encouragement because he could read our thoughts and analyze our deepest emotions. Our modern, western culture works against us when it comes to waiting. There was a time, not so long ago, when a wife or mother would send her husband or son off on a voyage that would take months or even years to complete. Often, all of that time would be spent without knowing anything. No letters, no phone calls, not even a fax. Now we have no patience for having to wait. Our desire for immediate gratification has created a slew of problems but my biggest is what to do with this downtime. When was the last time you stood in a line? Try not looking at your phone and see how awkward you feel. What do I do with my hands? Careful with the people-watching, stalker! Okay, now I’m so bored, I’m getting sleepy. It’s ridiculous. So I’m challenging myself to spend this “waiting room time” praying expectantly. When I read James 1:6, 7: “But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord,” I was kind of like “Shut up, James…” but then I started to see his point. If my faith is wholly dependent on favorably answered prayers, then it’s not faith at all. It’s a hypothesis being measured in columns of YES and NO. I don’t want a business relationship with the All-Mighty where I send in a grocery list and he sends it back with the requested goods. If that was my intention, I’d worship at Target. After so many ups and downs, I question why we are called to pray expectantly. Does God delight in watching us get our hopes up only to see them crash to the floor in a million pieces? Surely not. That isn’t the way he is depicted in the Scriptures. There I see a Father who wants good for his children. He’s just and firm, but he’s also compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in love and faithfulness. This is the Lord I serve. He is the One who knows all and sees all. And I will pray expectantly (and humbly) for a 3-year old boy in an orphanage in the Congo to be allowed to come home.

In June of 2012, our family was matched with a beautiful African boy to be his forever family. Wait, let me back up… In July of 2011, my husband and I began the process to adopt internationally, choosing the Democratic Republic of the Congo as our future child’s birthplace. Nope. I’ve got to go back a little further… In August of 2010, our youngest child was preparing to head off to kindergarten. I asked my husband if he would consider adopting to add to our family. He wasn’t ready so I waited and prayed, and I did the thing I’m horrible at doing—nothing. I didn’t nag or scheme or guilt him into agreeing with my plan to adopt. I waited. And we continue to wait. Our son was 15 months old when we were matched to him. Now at 3 ½, we can’t point to any concrete prospects for his imminent release to us. We feel foolish at times. We play the “what if” game nearly every day. (What if we had started earlier? What if we had picked a different country?) We pound our fists on the floor when we cry out to God during the low times and we smile and sigh when we get new pictures of our boy. But, no mater what, we still wait. This week, I was reminded of Noah. You know the story: God looked around at the wickedness of His people and decided to start over. He told Noah to build a boat for his family and the animals because a flood was coming. He followed God’s instructions and made the ark. The rains came down and the floods came up (wrong Sunday school song but it works here), and they were saved. Cue rainbow. End scene. Then I got to thinking about how it took Noah 120 years to build the ark. That’s about 43,000 mornings of Noah waking up, dragging his 500-year old body out the bed, and starting another day of carpentry with his sons. And you know how difficult it can be to work with your children. I’m sure there were days when Shem gathered the wrong kind of wood. (I asked for gopher wood! Gopher wood! Is that so difficult?!) Ham was acting like a…well, a ham, trying to walk across the upper beams like a tightrope walker. And don’t get me started on Japheth! The baby of the family was always complaining about a splinter in his finger or his sandal was rubbing against his ankle or the male and female tigers had attacked him. Always something with that Japheth! Even though it took 120 years to build the ark, the Lord held off the rain until they were finished. He told Noah when to begin and then He watched Noah & Sons Building Co. as they were faithful to his word. He watched them measure every cubit and round up every animal. They continued to work without a definite sign the world would be destroyed by flood and God saw them. This Bible story I’ve heard countless times was a blessing to me, a boon to my sometimes flagging spirit. I believe God gave us a charge, not to build a boat but to save a child. He gave us a start time and I believe He’s watching us as we wait for the finish. It may not end the way we’re expecting (Could Noah have ever imagined he’d see something as glorious as a rainbow?) but I’m trusting God knows how it’s supposed to end. I’m praying we’ll get to bring our Ezra home soon, the same prayer we’ve said every day for two years. And I’ll keep on praying, even if this lasts 120 years. Cue rainbow. End scene.

Like anyone in her mid-thirties, our house has been undergoing a lot of changes. In the past five years since we moved in, we’ve converted a basement garage into five rooms: bathroom/laundry room/bedroom/craft room/storage space. We had new kitchen countertops installed and had all of the wood floors re-stained. Thanks to those consistent Middle Tennessee hailstorms, we traded out our green roof, white aluminum siding and white garage doors for sage green Hardie board, a brown roof, and faux wood garage doors. While we were at it, we had a year-round sunroom built, taking up part of our patio. In addition to all of this, figure in the extensive landscaping, front porch redo, and new carpet. And don’t even get me started on all of the interior painting we’ve done. (Paint chevron zigzags on a couple of walls and see if it doesn’t push you right up to—if not over—the edge. If chevron goes out of style—which of course it eventually will, just ask someone with a Jennifer Aniston haircut wearing stirrup pants—please, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.) Our latest adventure has been renovating two of our existing bathrooms: the hallway bath (a.k.a.- Knox’s bathroom) and the master bath. When you move into a house that needs some updating, you find yourself making lists with column titles like: Most Urgent, Next Summer, When The Kids Are Older. The column for the master bath redo was “No One Ever Sees It But Us So Who Cares.” But the unreliable, rusted toilet, the cabinets and drawers with the “weird smell” and the mildew stained tub/shower combo finally grossed us out one too many times. It was time to say good-bye (or tear down the entire house like the Book of Leviticus advises homeowners with mold problems). Just like the stages of grief, a homeowner experiences a series of emotions during the renovation process: Stage 1 – The “Wouldn’t it be nice?” phase. You lie in your bed at night and dream with your husband about how your lives would be different if you had a shower stall with cream subway tiles and quartz countertops. Hmmm…maybe, someday… Stage 2 – The Estimate. Your husband gives you the go-ahead to get a few estimates, because you have NO IDEA how much redoing your bathroom will cost. When you get the estimate, you use all of the poker face skills you can muster to make the contractor think this is exactly the price you were expecting. You fight the urge to say, “Are you sure that’s where the decimal point is supposed to go?” Stage 3 – The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. The work begins but its progress can be measured in fits and starts. Workers don’t always show up when they’re expected and when they do they don’t bring the right _______________ (tool/pipe/trim/wire/glue) because no one told them to. At some point every day, you stare at an empty room which only a month ago gave you the privacy—even if you were a little grossed out by it—to do your business and move on with your day, but now it’s dry wall dust and dirty foot prints. All you can do is curl up in the fetal position and sing Negro spirituals about the coming of the Lord. Stage 4 – You can see the finish line. It’s almost done. It’s been a solid month of wallpaper removal (should be a punishment for Al-Qaeda terrorists at Guantanamo Bay), scrambling for another box of tile so the shower can be finished before the tiler goes on to his next job, your kids writing their names in the dust on your dresser, and waiting for people to show up. It looks like the contents of your bathroom threw up in your bedroom and there’s a giant piece of sheetrock leaning against your wall, blocking all of the outlets. You’re itching to lay shelf paper in your drawers and start finding the perfect place for your toothpaste. Soon, little grasshopper, soon… Stage 5 – It was all worth it! It’s done and it’s the most luxurious bathroom you’ve ever seen! (Aw, who am I kidding? I’d just settle for a place to pee, poop, and shower at this point.) I’m not to stage five yet, but I have hope. I’m still waiting on mirrors to be hung and the gaping hole in the hall bath to be repaired so I can paint that wall. The sheetrock is still standing against my wall like it’s waiting for a bus and it has “all day, thank you very much.” The Wallpaper Removal Fiasco of 2014 has left a very literal mark on my bathroom and a metaphorical one on my psyche. After googling “wallpaper removal repair” I tried to patch the wall with drywall mud. After sanding and more mudding, it’s definitely not perfect and it makes me want to rip every hair out of my head when I run my hand along the bumpy surface but Brent tried to soothe away my frustrations last night. He said, “Who cares if it’s not perfect? No one is going to see it but us anyway.” No! I haven’t endured this month so that we can return to that column! Repeat after me: “This bathroom is beautiful and should be featured in Southern Living.Very good.” Denial is the only way to survive a renovation.

When we moved into our current home about five years ago, we got 4 ½ acres, three bedrooms and three bathrooms, a partially finished basement, and a pool. (For more inside information about our house-hunting experience and general illustrations of how easily I can embarrass myself, read this.) Since neither of us grew up having a pool (unless you count the plastic kind that is stacked outside of the Walmart garden center), we were skeptical if we could handle it. It didn’t help that when we saw it for the first time, it was a brilliant lime color with lovely, foam blobs floating freely in the deep end. This was way out of my expertise. Now that we’re starting our fifth summer as “pool people,” it’s become part of our family identity—for good and for not-so-good: It’s easy for an impromptu get-together but some mechanism breaks every year, costing at least $600 for a new whosie-whatsit that fits the whatsy-doodle and keeps the pool running perfectly (for about a month and a half). We inherit lots of left-behind swim goggles and diving toys but—despite our efforts to encourage toweling off before going inside to use the bathroom—the floors are always covered in wet footprints. Listening to the soothing sound of the pool fountain is a pleasant way to end the day but pulling dead frogs, moles, and mice from the skimmer basket is a depressing way to start a birthday party. Even when it’s over ninety degrees, our kids spend hours outside swimming with their friends and cousins but I have to buy sunscreen by the gross ton. Our kids’ friends enjoy hanging out at our house but sometimes those friends need instruction on how to use a tampon for the first time ever. (Side note: It didn’t bother me one bit to explain this technique. I love to teach things that I truly know how to do, probably due to the fact that I’m not an expert in many areas. It was just difficult to have to describe to a sweet tween friend the certain outcome when a maxi-pad is submerged in a swimming pool.) Swim noodles are cheap and fun pool toys. You can float on them, hit your sister with them, and even use them to blow a large amount of water at your friend like you’re a whale with an overactive blowhole. The downside, other than the fact that pool water quickly disintegrates them if they are left outside too long and you’ll find pieces of neon pink, green, and orange in the skimmer basket for weeks afterwards, is that they are too often used by boys to imitate the male anatomy. You can’t make it that easy for them, folks. Like everything else that has to do with owning and maintaining your home, we have learned a lot of things about the care of a pool, often from doing it the wrong way first. If I had a nickel for every time Brent or I ended a conversation with the phrase “Well, now we know…” I’d have enough nickels to buy a new whosie-whatsit or maybe even an entire whatsy-doodle. Okay, come to think of it, maybe this pool stuff is still way out of my expertise.

For the second year in a row, a couple of blackbirds have built their nest in the gutter just outside my bedroom. (Disclaimer: I don’t know if they are actually blackbirds. I just know they are black birds. I tried to look up what kind of big, aggressive nincompoops like to build nests in gutters but the search engine fairy failed me.) We built a sunroom onto our house a few years ago creating an L-shape with our bedroom. Apparently, the resulting corner gutter is prime real estate. As I sit in my room, I hear birds fighting for this property. I can imagine every awkward movement of their large wings in such a confined space. They squawk and snap at each other. It is in all respects ANNOYING. If it’s true what the naturalist John James Audubon said that “hopes are shy birds flying at a great distance seldom reached by the best of guns,” then these not-so-shy birds are the exact opposite of hope—misery maybe. And the gun thing is questionable. Being a pacifist and non-gun owner, I’m surprised by my growing desire to see their birdy bodies riddled with bullets, feathers floating slowly to the ground after the smoke clears…I digress. On days when I want to sit and write in this private sanctuary of my bedroom, I’m frustrated by the constant noise. “Cut it out, you morons!” I shout at them. “There are about forty trees within seconds of here! Why did you build your stupid nest in my gutter?!” For some reason, my yelling doesn’t make a difference. Perhaps they don’t know English. I’ve even resorted to sitting on the floor by the door to the patio with my laptop in front of me trying to get something done. Every time I hear them clattering around, I open and shut the door quickly to send them flying to the nearby pine trees only to hear them return in a few minutes. (Another disclaimer: Seeing as how this is the second year of this nesting, we would have been smart to place some sort of deterrent in the gutter during the off season. My husband Brent and I discussed this plan of action: What kind of material should we use? Who will stand on the ladder and who will hold a broom to swat away possible attack birds? Unfortunately we never got past the “planning” stage. I’m definitely regretting my laziness now since it’s illegal to remove bird nests that are being actively used unless they are home to an invasive species like house sparrows or European starlings. I’m not sure if these black birds are officially registered as invasive but they have certainly invaded my gutter.) If this year turns out to be like last year, another sound will soon be added to the thrashing and squawking. Soon I’ll hear the cheeping of baby birds and a new emotional conflict will plague my soul. Instead of just being annoyed by the pesky adult birds, I’ll succumb to my maternal feelings of cherishing anything newborn, even if it cries a lot. And this is all by design. The birds nest by design so that their eggs will have a safe place to hatch. No one teaches them what materials to gather or how to scout for possible locations but they do it every year. By design, mothers are compelled to love the fragile and tiny so that they will nurture and care for those too weak to care for themselves. I’m designed to see even the annoying aspects of nature around me so that I can be in awe of our Creator. Although I’d love for them to leave, I’m grateful for these stupid birds. I’m grateful to live in a place where I can witness wildlife—even if it’s just a squirrel drinking from a puddle in the middle of our pool cover or an over-sized groundhog pushing an imaginary friend in our porch swing (yes, that actually happened). Life and living things are a blessing and if I have to be reminded of them by squawking then that may be by design, too.

“My name is Abby and I am the mother of twins.” “Hello, Abby.” “Welcome to the mothers of twins support group…” It’s just in my mind, of course. I don’t go to any such meetings. Early on, I had plenty of opportunities to join groups when my girls were babies but I honestly couldn’t imagine using precious baby-free time to sit in a room with other moms every other week and eat light refreshments. There was so much I’d rather be doing, like sleeping. I got through their baby years the way our early pioneer foremothers did: I circled the wagons and held off the barrage of poop, pee, and spit up until the savages retreated to their naps. I’m just kidding. My daughters, now almost twelve, were never really that bad, although I’d have to be hypnotized to remember the majority of their first two years of life. It’s all a blur. I do remember feeding them with a special nursing pillow (“My Breast Friend,” Boppy’s odd cousin, with sharp angles and a fabric slipcover featuring psychedelic, dancing bears and giant, building blocks that spelled words like CAT and DOG) that allowed me to feed them at the same time. None of this nursing discreetly in a parking lot stuff for me, no sir. I had to be in bed and shirtless for everybody to be hooked up correctly. I also remember long walks pushing their stroller. We lived in an older neighborhood with wonderful, tree-lined sidewalks so we’d make the circuit around the block and head back. We had a double stroller but for the first several months the girls were too small to occupy a seat alone. Instead, they were tucked in together like they were still in the womb…but with straps. When they were a little older, their personalities began to emerge. Ella loved to sing and dance around in a dramatic fashion. A somber ballet was playing out in her head, no doubt. Lucy on the other hand was all about the facial expressions: Anything for a laugh. They were both bossy and very verbal, so there was nothing quiet about our home. They liked to debunk the stereotype that girls are dainty by wrestling each other at some point every day. I liked to debunk the stereotype that moms break up daughters who wrestle by sitting on the sofa and watching. They giggled and giggled until a pigtail was pulled or an arm got scratched then it was over. I would pull them into my lap and say, “That’s what happens when we wrestle,” as if I didn’t think it was a great form of pre-nap entertainment. They crawled then walked and their teeth came in but unlike better moms, I didn’t write anything down. I don’t know what their first words were but I do remember Ella saying “Maybe so, Baby Ho” so I knew their intake of Dr. Seuss books was more than adequate. They played together and were each other’s best friend/worst enemy. I stopped dressing them alike somewhere around kindergarten. For some reason, we’re expected to keep them identical (even if they’re obviously not) at all times. So if one poops out the back end of her striped onesie do I have to change the other one too so that both of them now have matching polka dot onesies? That sounds like too much laundry and maybe a level of hell. (An eternity of rolling a huge boulder up a hill with Sisyphus would be better than trying to remove breastfed baby poop stains.) I still got a few matching outfits out of them on Sundays but that eventually ended too. They wanted to be independent of each other, their own woman. Deep down, I suspect they felt comfortable loosening their reliance on each other because they knew the other sister was never going to be that far away. This year, we decided to put them in two different schools for 6th grade. It was a difficult decision but an attempt to preserve the fragile ecosystem of twin sisters. I get it. I understand being compared to a sister, only mine was two years older than me. Teachers met me with certain expectations, often unrealistic. Having a twin is even worse. As a parent, when I try to praise one, I end up dissing the other one. Everything is political when it comes to vying for pecking order with your siblings. So we’ve decided to do the only thing we know how to do, keep going. Keep making mistakes in spite of our best intentions and start saving for their future therapy sessions. The most I can hope for is that they will someday enjoy the benefits of having a sister. They will do as I do with my sisters, complain about their childhood and bemoan their parents’ parenting. They’ll be so grateful to have another person who completely understands their crazy family. At least, they’ll bond over something!

Like most people, I have a love/hate relationship with public restrooms. How many times have I heard one of my kids’ panicked screams break the calm reverie of a long car trip (thank you very much, inventor of the DVD) to tell me they “HAVE TO PEE NOW!!!”? We pull into whatever is the next available pee receptacle and do what needs to be done to save the car upholstery. It’s usually something that hasn’t been cleaned this millennia but it solves the problem and isn’t that why God created hand sanitizer? I’m grateful it was there but grossed out until I can shower. Recently, I went to a middle school swim meet at a very nice private school. The facilities were clean and mostly plentiful, but I had one issue with them: They were too quiet. After downing my large Coke Zero with vanilla from Sonic, I found the nearest restroom to the indoor pool complex. This particular restroom was only a two-seater, which meant several ladies waited in line behind me. The bathroom was as sound proof as a recording studio. Nothing from the hundreds of people just outside the restroom could be heard, only the tinkling from within. Talk about humiliation. I didn’t know anyone in line but I felt the need to small talk. Unfortunately, the sounds I couldn’t help but hear only made me need to go more. I couldn’t think of anything to say. “How about the weather? Looks like it might rain.” No good. All talk of precipitation was off limits if I wanted to get out of there without making a puddle. At that moment, I wished for two things: 1.) Some kind of music piped in to mask the bathroom noises. Macaroni Grill even plays “Learn to Speak Italian” CDs. Brilliant. (Dove posso trovare? Where is the bathroom?) 2.) To make as little sounds as possible when it was my turn. I was suddenly grateful I didn’t order any food from Sonic when I got my coke. Had I eaten a breakfast burrito there would have been sounds aplenty. There are so many examples of love/hate relationships. Usually, we prefer to say bittersweet. When our kids tackle the next hurdle towards adulthood, it’s a bittersweet moment. We want to see them grow and mature but we also want to keep them little and adorable and taking long naps. Some experiences are more bitter than sweet and vice versa, but I have realized most experiences have both. It may seem clichéd to look for the silver lining in every dark cloud but finding the love amidst the hate is the only way to persevere through some tough times. Finding things to be grateful for makes the low points seem more temporary. So I salute you, public restrooms! You have saved me countless times! Thank you or as my Italian friends would say: grazie molte!