Am I a Weaker Vessel?

This blog is necessary to my mental health and I must say, I need to stop myself from writing a treatise on the evangelical church and its view towards women. I will just stick to the "issue" for as long as I can, although this is so multi-layered for me.

My Mom and I got into an argument the other night about women being "weaker" vessels. She complained because at 58, she is having to work more than ever (my parents are getting divorced and she has to go from being at home to working almost full time), and that she was really tired. I expressed empathy for her, because I DO know it is a tough transition and physically she is older, etc... but I also said to her that a lot of men are still working at that age, and full time. She replied, "Yes, but women are the weaker vessels." When I asked her to explain what she meant, she said that it is a Biblical concept that God made women with weaker "constitutions" and that they are "weaker". I told her that of course I realized most men could beat me in an arm-wrestling competition, but that physical strength may be the only way that men are consistently "stronger" than women. She then proceeded to tell me that she has heard it "preached" on many times and she went and looked up the verse (I Peter 3:7) and told me to make an appointment with a pastor out here and that he would explain to me that that is what the verse meant.

If I could describe her condescension in a more tangible way, I would be doing so now, but when I again replied to her that I believed God made both men and women in His image, and that though they may possess different tendencies and be drawn to different roles, that there was no "weaker" vessel between the two. The conversation got me really fired up. I was laying in bed unable to sleep as I realized why the issue had stirred up so much within me.

My Mom is the typical example of the evangelical Christian who lives in a completely black and white world. I do believe in black and white on some issues (it is probably NEVER a good idea to cheat on one's spouse, for example), but I always TRY to approach life with an open heart and mind to what God has to teach me or what others show me through their lives, stories, and wisdom. I realize that my views on many things may be wrong, but the fact that Jesus loves me and I love Him is most definitely right. It angers me how the evangelical church uses the Bible to try to justify everything from how children should be raised (Is Growing Kids God's Way really His way? If I don't follow it, am I then growing my kids Satan's way?), to how people should date (correct me if I am wrong, but nowhere in the Bible does it say that a potential date should call the girl's father before asking her to Starbucks--especially if she is 35, Bill Gothard), to "traditional" roles within the home, to even eating certain foods. My Mom's quickness to say that something is "Biblical" is evidence of her training that one cannot refute anything "Biblical". Evangelicals throw out that word like it is the trump card, the supremely irrefutable piece of evidence that something is truth and if I don't believe it to be truth, then I am clearly living as a backslidden sinner.

She told me that I was wrong because I was falsely interpreting the Bible. How, then, is it that she is correctly interpreting it? It seems to me that much of what we all believe is filtered through our own eyes of interpretation. The evangelical church, or at least my mother, believes that everything in Scripture is black and white, and for me to see anything else but those clear parameters makes me spiritually lukewarm. My Mom's world would be shattered if she were to ever step outside her safety box of her brand of Christianity and view it from a different perspective. My Mom has attended some of the churches I have called home these past few years. She views them all as entirely "New Age-y" and not filled with people willing to speak the truth of God. Yet, I believe the truth of God is found in broken people, surrounded my candles or homemade artwork, trying to grapple with what we are called to do as people who have chosen to follow a man who left some very confusing words for us. Growing up, I heard that God was a God of "consequences" and that we all reap what we sow in life. There is some truth in that, surely, but I never heard God was a God of love, grace, infinite mercy, and complete safety. If I did, it was quickly caveated with judgment, brimstone, and a re-telling of Sodom and Gomorrah, in case I had forgotten and thought God had actually spared the city.

I want my children to hear the message I now hear: that God is a rescuer, a lover, a saver, and a friend. Throughout the Bible, He rescued far more than He ever destroyed. He loved adulterers, prostitutes, murderers, thieves, and the self-righteous. He saved children, the lost, the poor, and the "least of these". He was a friend to men, women, animals, and his family.

Most of all, He is a friend to me and I do not think He cares if my mother thinks I am a weaker vessel.

Minnesotans...they're everywhere!

When I wrote my last blog, I had no idea it was interlinked with Jimmy's kissing extravaganza--I am just sad I wasn't at church Sunday to experience all the love.

On an entirely different note from kissing, but one that still involves the mouth area, my daughter Eva almost choked to death on a bead on Sunday morning. Now, maybe it wasn't choking "to death", but to a scared mother, that is exactly what it seemed like.

I was driving Eva to church alone because Dan took the other kids earlier for a kid-festival thing. I STUPIDLY let Eva hold one of my beaded bracelets in the back seat, thinking to myself that surely an 11 month old child can't rip apart a bracelet...as I am stopped at a light, I hear her choking/gagging in the back seat and I instantly knew what was happening, "Ohmigod she got the beads." I reached back and fished one out of her throat, and I took the ones out of her hands, and then reached my finger down her throat (later the paramedics told me that was a no-no, but what was I going to do?) to clear it. I then put the car in park, ran outside, screamed "HELP ME!" and the people behind me got out to help.

At this point, Eva is crying/choking pretty hard, but there was no bead in her mouth/throat, so she was just residually choking. The people behind me called 911 and the paramedics came and looked her over, but said we should go the the ER in case the bead was lodged in her throat. At this point, I was crying from the adrenaline, the fear, and the fact I was certain I deserved the "STUPIDEST MOTHER OF THE YEAR" award. At the ER, she was X-rayed, and they couldn't see the bead, but the doctor said that it was small enough to pass in her poop if she had swallowed it--although the bead was probably 3/4-1 inch in circumference. Thank God Eva was and is okay, but the fear of losing her, the terror I felt when I heard her gasping in the back seat and feeling so frightened that I wouldn't be able to save her was one of my most emotionally exhausting moments as a mother.

Speaking of mothers, the story gets more interesting. If you were my mother, and you drove by 2 police cars, an ambulance, and your daughter's blue minivan with her BUSH/CHENEY '04 sticker on the back, would you stop? Even if you're a Democrat, I still ask you, would you stop?

My Mom was on her way to work when she passed the scene of our family drama, and she went on ahead to work and then called the police to ask them what happened. HUH?

I asked her when she got home that night why she didn't stop--for all she knew, I may have been breathing my last breath--and her response was, "I was in the far right lane, so I couldn't turn around, and I couldn't tell for SURE if it was your van." O-kay.

At least the people who were behind our van when I frantically ran out to help Eva had a parting message that was too good to be true. They saw my license plates and as we walked off towards the ambulance, yelled out after us, "It will all be okay. We're from Minnesota, too!"

A different kind of kiss

At church on Sunday, a woman I had met the week before came up to me and gave me a huge kiss on the cheek. It was weird because it is SO uncommon, but also very nice and friendly. She was so natural and warm about it, that I began to think about why I didn't kiss more of my friends. It is such a cultural thing in America only to kiss family/kids, or our significant others. I obviously don't mean on the lips or anything with tongue, but why don't we kiss our friends on the cheek more? It is such an intimate, loving, way to greet or to part with friends that I think I am going to start revving up the ol' pucker.

Those of you in Minnesota got nothing to worry about until my next descent upon the city, but I may try my new experiment on my friends out here and see how they react. I will make sure to pop an Altoid first, although that is the beauty of cheek kissing--the breath is not nearly as vital to the success of the kiss as it would be for a plant on the lips.

Sleep Deprivation, Life Deprivation

I have an 11 month old newborn. For 11 months, I have never slept through the night. Now, before all you parental units and non-parental units tell me that I need to just let her cry it out or that I am spoiling her, let me tell you, I have tried it all. So, tell me, tell me, what is there left for me to do? Besides invest in a really good under eye concealer, I think my options are all out. I have let her cry it out, I have tried patting her back, I have nursed her, I have done all variations of all of the above. Short of slipping a nubain into her food, I am exhausted, tired, fatigued, and all other synonyms that might explain my haggard spirit.

I will often lie in bed (like this morning) after she goes down for a nap and pray, beg, and plead with God for her to sleep for at least a full hour, if not a glorious two, and yet I think He is all backed up with requests that are far more important. I can't believe that this issue has affected my life so much. I have little interest in anything other than sleeping, I have little energy for relationships and people, and I certainly am doing a less than great job around the house.

Yes, I DO still have the energy to blog. Though it is work, I muster up the strength each day to lift my fingers high enough to apply JUST the right amount of pressure onto the keyboard, and to pound out some rational sentences. Semi-rational, maybe.

On another note, we tried a new church last week. It meets at a hotel (not a seedy one, mind you) and is sort of trying to market itself as a seeker-friendly community using lots of different creative mediums. It was VERY contrived, in my opinion. The music was solid, but they played movie clips from Braveheart, Gladiator, and Robin Hood while the words "What is the cry of your heart?" flashed across the screen. A few years ago, this might have moved me a bit, but now, I just think it is so forced, so contrivedly put together, and so "Ra, Ra, Let's get fired up about our passion, our hearts, our purpose!" that it puts me off a little bit. The pastor was a good ol' boy from Georgia who moved here with the sole intent of planting a church in the south Denver suburbs--which is so overchurched it is insane. I did not care for him or his trite message about how we commit to a church: "in pencil, in ink, or in blood". Not sure about the blood thing... His intentions were solid, surely, and his message wasn't theologically wacky or out there, but it was just very simple, formulaic, and blah. To speak of the "cry of my heart", I would say it is cynical and pretty bored. I am trying to be open as we visit different churches and try to find a community, but thus far, it is definitely no SP. I am trying my expectation lowering technique when it comes to marriage, churches, and everything else right now. If I just lower my expectations, then I won't be disappointed....a bad idea, I realize, but there is so much longing and desire right now that is brewing for me, for my family, and for our lives that I do not know what to do with it.

My Mom's house will be ready November 5th...which will be a good thing for her, and for us. Her living here hasn't been too bad in many ways (the extra help with the kids, the house, etc...has been swell), but when she told me this week that "it doesn't seem like I clean the house or that I enjoy cleaning" it wasn't a bright moment for me. Or, that when I forgot to turn in Eli's hot lunch form for school that "I wasn't a very organized person". No, I do not enjoy cleaning, and at times, I am not organized.

But, I am, however, happy it is Friday and that Carla Barnhill's new book is supposed to arrive either today or tomorrow.

I know I have good friends when...

...I feel so loved by the responses and encouragement to my blog yesterday. I think I sometimes blog and just "put it out there" and don't really think anyone will read it (I know, contradictory to the point of blogging), but then I am reminded that people do read my thoughts, comment on them, and encourage me in my life in ways that make me most thankful.

I do think that Saturday was this "purging" experience for us. We put it all out on the table--how bad it really is, how miserable we have been, and how we want things to change. Much of our conversation hurt deeply, but it was so freeing to finally SAY what has been eating away at our hearts. We have already been through a 4 month separation a few years ago, and we realize that we do not want to go down that road again--that there is so much to salvage, repair, cling to, and ultimately love.

In many ways, I am angry that we left Minnesota--it was very idyllic for me--quiet culdesac, amazing church community, great school for Eli, friends who loved us...and so it feels like we left a place that was peaceful, healing (it was where we had Eva and learned for the first time to be a family without our other "families" being involved), and restful and went into a place that was chaotic, noisy, and crazy. Our neighborhood out here is loud--our house backs up to a street, our neighbors are so close to us we often feel we are living in an apartment complex, and the emotional noise in our lives matches the external. Someone told me recently I needed to "get over the past," but I do not think that is fair to my heart or to the 2 years I spent in a place I loved. I DO need to try to figure out how to remember the past but feel propelled into the next chapter of my life which does not include the many things I loved about Minnesota. What do I love about Colorado?

-mountains
-mountains
-mountains
-limited mosquitoes
-mountains
-mountains
-mountains

At least it is a start...and of course, if Colorado goes W in the election and Minnesota doesn't, I can add one more thing to the list.

Ahnold, I'm back...

It has been a while since I have blogged. Depression, fighting with Dan, and busyness have all played a role, but I think some of the fog has lifted and I feel like hitting the keyboard again to write down whatever the heck comes to mind. Today, I am thinking about...

The Republican National Convention--Yes, feel good rhetoric is characteristic of politics in general, but I have been impressed thus far to the point one can be impressed by such an event. I disagree that the Republicans are trying to pass as moderates or anything else--I think they are being true to the party, if not for a bit of a Reagan-esque slant, which is more than fine with me. I can't wait until tonight...Michael Reagan, Zell Miller (yeah, a Dem!) ...should be interesting. Though I may not agree with everything W does or says, I really respect him for taking a stand and then sticking to it--and for talking like a good ol' Texas cowboy. He is SO not a politician in the polished, Clintonian sense of the word. John Kerry has been so all over the map during his entire political career, and it is difficult for me to really see him nailing down any issue. I detest panderers. I detest poll-following politics. He is a walking contradiction. He is falling behind in the polls, although I think polls are worthless. And, I don't know what to think of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, however my Dad fought in Vietnam when Kerry did, and he told me a fascinating story of his friend who scratched his arm on a barbed wire fence during a battle and was thus awarded a Purple Heart. He told me the government was practically throwing Purple Hearts at soldiers. I will say that any person who serves in the military earns my instant respect, but I do think there is massive room for elaboration about that time served. I applaud the freedom in this country for people to voice their opinions about Kerry's service in Vietnam or even reprobate Michael Moore's film with all its propagandic editing.

On a different note entirely...I am thinking today about Saturday night.

Dan and I went to the Prince concert, which was okay...honestly, I thought it would be amazing, but it was just solidly good. The part that was more noteworthy was the fight that Dan and I had on the way home where we both pretty much admitted we were hanging on to our relationship by a thread and that thread was pretty much the vow we took and our children (worthy threads, mind you, but nonetheless still saddening). It was a deeply tragic conversation because we both finally voiced how difficult things have been and how despairing we have felt. It has turned out to be a cathartic moment for us, because I think we have both been moved towards some real change in our relationship and some tangible growth and healing. Only time will tell, but I am hoping that Saturday night was the breaking point we needed for our heart and guts to spill open and for us to have nothing left but our raw, bleeding pain that can only heal now that the blood has spilled freely.