Making Faces

So, Loralai's making faces.

Ash called me this morning to tell me that Loralai will start with the lower lip out like she's gonna baul, and does a complete 180 in to the biggest smile.

Well, when my mom was in town, Loralai made some faces for her, and she caught them on "film".

To be honest, the only time I ever get some good faces from this little stinker is when I'm changing her diaper and the only thing she can do it look at her daddy. I think she's either threatening a blowout, playing, or flirting. I don't care which one, really. I'm just stoked to get a laugh out of her.

She's up to something, we just don't know what.

Humility

Let me tell you, I think I'm dramatic.

See, that's dramatic. Announcing youre dramatic is the pinnacle.

Okay, here's why:

I cannot seem to grasp the feelings Ashley is having right now. I think I can, and I even sit down and try to understand it all, and I think I get it for a little while. Then something else happens and I lose it. I lose perspective or compassion or both. (There's a lot of "I's" in that, which is pretty telling)


This weekend was a good example.

We're looking for a new house. And while the search is fun and it's fun to think about living in a nice new house with quiet floors and plenty of privacy and storage, it's hard to imagine not living here in "my" first home.

At least it is for me.

And it finally came to a head.





I got upset with Ash for being tired. That was my excuse. But the reality is, I don't want any more change. I want to stay here in this house and learn to live with it. There are people in worse situations than we have and they're completely content and happy where they are. Why can't we do the same?

I don't know the answer to that question.

So, here comes humility.

I need to stand before God and ask that question. It's all in His time.

The beauty of it all is that we can put our house up for sale. if it's not in God's will, it won't sell. And we praise God for it and realign our expectations to that change. If it does, we praise God for it and realign out expectations to THAT change.

Seems pretty cut and dry.

After a Long Wait...

So...

It's been a while, but after watching Ashley post stuff to her blog, I thought it was time to post something.

I'm not the writer she is, but there are very few people who are. All I can do is put down what I'm thinking -- what I'm thankful for, what I'm observing -- since Loralai was born.

I'm thankful for Ashley

Sure, that's easy for a guy to say. Gee, I'm thankful for my wife, the woman who bore and birthed this child I get to call mine. I didn't do anything. I just held a hand or two, sang a song here and there, and more often than not said something so entirely selfish and ridiculous I should be flogged with a frozen sand shark.

It's easy for a guy to be thankful that he didn't have to go through all the physical changes, all the hormonal peaks and valleys, all the comments from people who don't really know what they're saying (like, after Loralai was born, Ash and I were standing outside the nursery at the hospital, just looking at all the new babies, and some poor hapless dork looks over at Ash and says, "Looks like you're next, huh?" Poor fella).

It's easy to get up in the morning and go to work. The only thing going through my mind is getting enough work to support 3 people and 2 dogs. Am I billing out enough? Does anyone owe me money? Who needs a website? Will they pay on time? What to the waves look like today? What kind of houses are on the market? Can we afford to move? How many times does my name come up on Google?

Stuff like that.

I've got it easy.

Ashley thinks about -- Will the train wake the baby? When will she wake up? Will I be able to take a nap today? What does 8 hours of sleep feel like? Is the baby okay? Are the dogs getting too close to her? Have they eaten? This stupid laundry room is too close to the baby's room. (It is, it's not even a laundry room, it's a hall closet with a stackable loud-as-a-747-taking-off-in-a-bathroom washer and dryer shoved into it).

And all I think about is -- when will all this be normal?

When will all this make sense?

Right now, nothing really makes any sense, least of all me.

I'm really trying to want to be a god Christian. Read my Bible, journal, walk the talk, all that. But I'm not. I'm like a surfer who has a broken leash. I went into this knowing that God was right there. I never thought He wouldn't. It was expected.

So I stopped worrying about everything. Really?

The fact of the matter isn't that I stopped worrying.

I stopped caring.

Leash or not, I was going to surf.

What I needed to do was swim in, find my board, get a new leash, breathe, and paddle back out.

THe waves are different now. The consequences are different now. There's 2 people and 2 dogs that matter now. They're not helpless without me, but life would sure suck if I wasn't there.

It's a big deal.

God's a big deal.

Being happy with your decisions, your life, what you have, who you have it with -- that's all a big deal.

Don't let anyone tell you any different. Because as soon as you buy into the lie that you're missing out or you messed up -- as soon as you give into the world's view -- yo uwill start wondering "Is there something better out there for me?"

And that's a place you cannot go. Under no circumstances. You can't flirt with that harlot. Not a good thing.

God's got you figured out. He knows that as a dad, you're going to want ot fix everything. If something's bugging your wife, you want it to do away. You don't listen long enough to her to hear that she's really happy, just annoyed with a couple silly things.

It's fine to be annoyed with a couple little things. It makes you appreciate everything else.

But if you don't stop and evaluate the gravity of the situation, you'll jump to the painful conclusion that life sucks and it needs to be different.

The only thing that needs ot be different is your perspective.

Your wife is the most beautiful woman on the planet. God made her for you. She's someone's daughter, mother, friend. She's your wife. That's huge.

Your decisions might have been "bad" or hasty, but God works everything out for good. No where in the Bible, or in common sense, does it say that everything works out when you go back in time and make better decisions.

You make better decisions based on past decisions. Better is based on lessons learned, NOT regret.

So, that's that.

Life is good.