Everyday Life: When Empty Needs to Stay Empty

My day begins with blue eyes starting me in the face.

I'm startled from the rest of sleep into the fullness of day, and I'm pretty sure this is what being born must feel like.

One moment, safely nestled in the peaceful bliss of warm and safe and cozy and full and then not long after emerging into a world where there is cold and hunger and need and empty.

I am born every morning into a life full of need.

Mommy, I need you to hold me.
Honey, I need you to fill his book bag.
Mommy, I need you to sign this line.

There's the needs that don't cry out in voice but still sing out just as strong.

Load the dish washer.
Fill their bellies.
Fold the laundry.

And then there's the needs that are rapid-fire shot into my email inbox, dinging at each round emptied.

The website isn't working.
There's a mistake on page four.
We could really use your article a few days early.

I am born into the neediness of everyday.

And here I am needy myself.

After days, weeks, months and years, I'm finally coming to realize that it's impossible to fulfill all of the need when I myself need so much.

I'm hungry (in more ways than one).
I'm not working well.
I'm a hot mess.
I'm empty.

Empty. Every morning I am born into neediness and empty that needs to be filled.

In more than one way.

And in realizing that I can't fill all of the empty, I realize Who can. And how He fills me with what I need right now.

Right now.

In this season.

And right now, in this season, I'm reminded that there's empty that needs to remain just that  -- empty.

Right now the inside of my life is much like my garden -- there is harvest happening. And harvest requires tending. Some things that are empty right now -- the dresser drawers and the dish cabinet and the blog posts -- they have to wait when the fruit is ripe and needs to tending.

Right now -- in this season of mothering a preschooler and kindergartener -- there is a high need to be present, to tend to them as they mature and ripen.

Maybe the dishes go from table to dishwasher and bypass the empty cabinet.
Maybe the laundry goes from bodies to washer and dryer and back to bodies instead of inside dresser drawers.
Maybe the article only exists as an empty white screen void of black type.

Maybe in this season of harvest all of those things remain empty amidst the need while the hearts slowly learn what it means to be

full

fuller

fullest.

Creativity: On Writing and Relevant 11

"We give inspiration too much weight. If you're a writer, you have to write even when you don't feel like it."
-Lisa Jo of The Gypsy Mama

It was the first session of the morning. I'd not procured caffeine, breakfast offered only the hope of a carb-coma and I was pretty tired from engaging in late-night conversation. Hungry, under caffeinated, over-tired and generally grumpy, Saturday morning at the Relevant Conference was, erm, a stretching experience for me.

Also, there was a nor'easter bearing down on Harrisburg, and fat snowflakes were coating the ground, making the lights flicker. If you've been around for awhile, you know I'm not a snow person. {Read: I cannot believe I don't live in Hawaii I loathe snow so intensely.}

So there was that, too.

I wasn't in the mood to write. I was feeling at a loss for the words that normally so easily come to my mind and spill from my fingers and lips.

So when Lisa Jo dropped that little gem of truth --

"We give inspiration too much weight. If you're a writer, you have to write even when you don't feel like it."

-- I was particularly challenged in that moment. And then she asked us to write for five minutes straight without worrying that it's just right.

With the prompt "becoming" I just wrote, and this is what came out.

Outside, white fat flakes blanket the ground,
covering it with the heaviness of the
first footprints of winter.


Yesterday, sun, streaming through the
thickness of gray-drenched skies,
reminding that there is warmth
beyond what meets my eye.


And, I am,
too,
being coated
in the heaviness of grace,
of hands, fingers stretched
across the blades of my shaking
shoulders
of whispered words being
gifted to my ears.


The snow coats the streets,
and morphs from flake to slush,
making a mess of the roads.
There is mess in the becoming.

The other outcome born from this session was a burst of creativity, a fierce rush of ideas coursing through my veins and running through my mind.

I simply cannot wait to share the creativity-sharpening idea Melissa, Lenae and I brainstormed while munching on lunch together. We'll hopefully be sharing soon after talking with Sarah and Alita.

I also cannot wait to share other truths I gleaned from the whispers of wise women while at the conference

In the meantime, if you need to just write without worrying if it's just write, check out The Gypsy Mama's Five-Minute Friday prompt this week and link up.

Disclosure: Our trip to Relevant is being generously sponsored by Chevy’s Driving the Midwest who has given us a tank of gas and a Traverse to get there. Our ride is also being fueled by Kawa Japanese and Asian Cuisine, Dr. Reena Jacobs of The Healing Groves, Curves of Lake County, Bigger Picture Blogs and Little Lake County, each of whome have provided one tank of gas for the trip. All opinions expressed are our own.

Writing Me: Where I'm From

Over at Bigger Picture Blogs, we are sponsoring Writing Me, a community writing project. Based off of the Where I'm From prompt, we're tapping into our creativity and memories to poignantly craft snapshots of the places from which we each hale. We'll be posting a long-standing link up soon so that we can each link our posts and read about where we each have journeyed in our lives. Join us!

I am from amber waves of grain as far as the horizon stretches, from John Deer tractors and garden-fresh, vine-ripened tomatoes shooting out of the fertile black farm soil in my grandparents' backyards.

I am from more houses than can be counted on two hands but most memorably and most longstanding, I’m from the creaky stairs descending to a basement bedroom of a quaint white house flooded by both morning and afternoon sunlight, always drenched in song lyrics and laced with harmony and melody ...

{To read more about where I'm from, click on over ... and then pretty please consider sharing where you are from!}