11Feb

That Damn Proverbs 31 Woman*

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 15 Comments

The story goes that once upon a time, an aging queen sat her son down for a chat. “Listen, Lem,” she began, “Those girls you keep bringing home? Well, I ain’t saying that they’re gold diggers, but they ain’t messin’ with no broke goatherds, capisce? You’re a king, so let’s cut to the chase: WHAT IN THE HOLY HOLISHKES ARE YOU THINKING? What you need is a virtuous girl, by which I mean one who can knit—designer knitting, mind you, that generates enough income to fund her real-estate business. Obviously, she’ll make all of your clothes too… yes, even those scarlet ski pants of which you’re so fond. She’ll arrange a steady stream of extracurricular activities to keep the kids busy while you’re hanging out with your buddies so she can work her daily shift in the soup kitchen, and it probably goes without saying that she won’t have time to sleep. Ever. Now go find her!” And all the maidens of the kingdom fled in terror. The end.

That’s more or less how the Biblical book of Proverbs wraps up, and it makes for one of the most horrifying Bible study topics I’ve ever experienced. Groups of women meet up to wade in guilt together and discuss how they can start measuring up to Mrs. Proverbs 31, which is kind of ridiculous when you consider that Lemuel’s gal would have had no time for Bible studies herself. Things get desperate, and if you don’t think modern women would start stitching dresses  just to be more virtuous, think again. Even the ladies who go with a more “letter of the law” approach leave the Bible studies with dark circles forming preemptively under their eyes.

I doubt King Lemuel’s mom imagined her motherly advice would ever be construed as God’s Will For Womankind. Furthermore, I doubt that the womanizing, perpetually hung-over Lem ever found a wife to fit his ideal (er, make that his mom’s ideal). The virtuous wife was a fantasy spun from parental reproach, a strong work ethic, and good old-fashioned hyperbole, and there is no evidence suggesting that such a superwoman ever existed. In fact, the latter third of the Bible makes it clear that God is much more interested in our sincerity and love than in how late we stay up knitting.

I guess what bothers me so much about this famous chapter is that King Lemuel’s mother adds one more voice to the chorus telling us women we’re not enough—not productive enough, talented enough, skinny enough, smart enough… fill in the blank. And when the aging queen’s advice is taken as God’s decree because it shows up in the Bible, the not-enoughs take on the full weight of divinity. It’s no longer a simple matter of “I am not enough;” it becomes “God thinks I am not enough.”

Yet Jesus is the one who comforted a housewife flustered over her massive to-do list: “Martha, dear Martha, you’re fussing far too much and getting yourself worked up over nothing.” It didn’t matter that what she was worked up over was Jesus’s dinner; he would forego a feast to enjoy her company. And to another woman who wasted a year’s wages on a perfume bath for his feet (rather than giving that money to the poor as Jesus’s dinner hosts angrily insisted she should have done, as the Proverbs 31 woman would have done), he extended kindness, gratitude, and the grace she had been craving.

I’m not saying that Lemuel’s mom didn’t have some good points—as long as they’re taken with a grain of salt and a glassful of cultural perspective—but I find myself wishing that King Lem had acted a bit more kingly to start with and let that damn Proverbs 31 woman rest as all women should: in peace.

~~

* Title and topic inspired by a dear friend.

10Feb

Love Thursday

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 4 Comments

Anyone remember Love Thursdays? Apparently, the tradition is still alive and well at Chookooloonks, but it seems to have slipped out of vogue elsewhere which is a shame… especially when one finds a wee reminder of love tucked inside a walnut shell on a foggy Thursday morning.

This morning wasn’t the smoothest we’ve ever had. The trouble really started yesterday afternoon when I decided to knock tax filing out of the way during the girls’ naps. Three hours later, I was hopelessly lost inside the labyrinth of IRS form instructions with bad words on the brain and nary a plan for supper. As a result, bedtimes were far too late, and we all woke up unwillingly this morning with only half an hour until school.

I felt like my head had been run over by a nice mid-sized sedan, and patience escaped me within the first minute when one daughter greeted the offer of a tissue with wailing and gnashing of teeth. The other passively protested the not-hot-pinkness of her jeans by taking ten minutes to put on one sock. Backwards. Both girls were crying by the time their shoes were tied, and I was seriously contemplating the benefits of getting a sister wife or two.

At five minutes until school, two overtired girls slumped against their overtired mother in the kitchen, our goodbye hug sagging with defeat. I could still feel the sedan’s tread marks across my skull as yet another signature on my sign-in sheet of failures—my failure to get up early, to respond to this morning’s preschool dramas with grace, to “mop up hurt with embrace,” to finish the taxes yesterday, to ration my time skillfully, to keep up with the to-dos, to be fitter, happier, more productive, to mother effortlessly…

Because it’s not effortless for me, you see. Loving my girls is the fiercest instinct I’ve ever experienced, but mothering them takes intention, sacrifice, trial and error and error again. Looking at how other moms do it is the surest way to convince myself that I suck. That mom enrolls her children in a variety of extracurricular activities; that one takes her children on weekly field trips. That one had each of her children reading by three and a half; that other one relaxes on the academics but gives her children hours of undivided attention. That mom chronicles her children’s growing-up years with breathtaking photos; that one writes books to hers. Each new way of mothering flashes in neon letters until I am dizzy from the should of it and wondering how drastically I am screwing up my daughters.

My mother-in-law doesn’t see it the same way though. When I got to spend time with her a few weeks ago, she reminded me of what matters above all activities and achievements. It’s the one thing that comes to me by instinct rather than effort, and we have so much of it around here that it shows up inside our walnuts. We love each other. We really do, even when the girls have to entertain each other because I got caught up in the difference between Form 2555 and Form 2555-EZ and forgot about supper. Even on groggy, rushed mornings when we hug through tears of frustration. Even when I think longingly of sister wives and sleeping in.

Maybe it’s impossible not to screw up our children, and the real goal of parenting should be to keep their future therapy sessions to a minimum, or maybe parenting just comes less easily to some of us. Either way, a simple shape this morning reminded me of the truth my mother-in-law shared with me—that love doesn’t just cover a multitude of failures; it renders them obsolete.

Duet

7Feb

Wicked

Posted by: Bethany in Sunday Scribblings 10 Comments

“It seems funny and horrible to think of Diana’s being married,” sighed Anne, hugging her knees and looking through the gap in the Haunted Wood to the light that was shining in Diana’s room.
“I don’t see what’s horrible about it, when she’s doing so well,” said Mrs. Lynde emphatically. “Fred Wright has a fine farm and he is a model young man.”
“He certainly isn’t the wild, dashing, wicked, young man Diana once wanted to marry,” smiled Anne. “Fred is extremely good.”
“That’s just what he ought to be. Would you want Diana to marry a wicked man? Or marry one yourself?”
“Oh, no. I wouldn’t want to marry anybody who was wicked, but I think I’d like it if he could be wicked and wouldn’t. Now, Fred is hopelessly good.”

(Anne of the Island)

~~~

When Dan and I started dating, the only thing I wanted to do more than get swept off into our personal Happily Ever After was to break up with him.

It was for his sake, you see. I was a psychological disasterpiece back then (as opposed to the mere social casualty I am now). Though I no longer lived at home and had faced the pain of my childhood pen-first, my mind was still at the mercy of old dogma. The God I knew required sacrifice, so I worked when I should have been sleeping, skipped breakfast, and stumbled through crowded days feeling as valuable to the world as a wad of overchewed gum. I judged people as I had been judged with a persistent, needling criticism that made me want to rip out my own brain. My heart was deeply pitted, oozing dark secrets like tar, strewn with scar tissue like emotional speed bumps. Romance was the last thing I needed. Romance was the last thing I deserved.

It found me anyway. It came as friendship but quickly unfurled into something more, something sweet and affirming and scary as hell. Dan’s kindness threatened my jagged defenses in a way that nothing had ever done before. I tottered on the verge of a thousand nervous breakdowns the first week and two thousand the second. Holding hands sent me into a panic. I was falling for him, yes… but I still wished he had stayed away. He was so good to me, so good, and I was convinced that my true self would be toxic for him.

I also looked down on him for it. I felt like his reservoir of experience was a puddle compared with my ocean; he had grown up happily whereas I had worshipped the divine bogeyman and dreamt with demons. I, the über-sheltered girl from an extremist conservative home, viewed him as naive. The more I loathed myself, the more I resented him for loving me, and I finally decided to come clean. Scaring him off early in the relationship would be a mercy, after all.

Only he wasn’t scared off. He wasn’t even scandalized. He didn’t crumble under the weight of my baggage, and he didn’t bat an eye when I brought up taboo topics. He was deep, strong, and anything but the “hopelessly good” featherweight I had pinned him as. Even neck-deep in the mess of myself, I wasn’t too much for him.

We will have been married eight years this summer, and when a friend asks about our story, I share the light-hearted details of how we met. However, our real love story started for me the moment I realized the kind, thoughtful, respectable man tenderly holding my hand could be wicked and wouldn’t.

Mommy loves Daddy

The wild and dashing part is just icing on the cake.

4Feb

Highland Fling – Part 13 (and the last)

Posted by: Bethany in Highland Fling 3 Comments

February has been a perfectly charming house guest so far. Blossoms are exploding on the mimosa trees, sunshine is beaming the chill into compliance, and our thoughts have turned to summer vacation. There is talk of Belgium, but I’m hoping the other possibility of Portugal wins out. I would love to camp our way through French countrysides and Spanish vineyards, maybe take a ferry to the Azores… or not. Now that I’m looking at the map, I see that the Azores are practically halfway across the Atlantic. It was a nice daydream though. At any rate, this line of thinking keeps snagging on something at the back of my brain… something about our epic camping habit… something I’ve forgotten to finish…

Oh. Oh dear. Seven whole months have passed since our trip to Scotland, and I have somehow neglected to post the last installment of my related letter to the girls. Seven months are an embarrassing amount of time to wrap up a vacation, no matter how many adventures it entailed, and I am appropriately sheepish. I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive me… and possibly even to keep reading. (Even though I’ve done my very best to ensure that none of you will remember what happened up to this point. Egad.)

~~~

(Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, & 12)

Early the next afternoon, we rolled into Munich and the waiting hospitality of our dear friends the G’s. Your dad, the car, and I exhaled a collective sigh of gratefulness that we didn’t need to unload the camping gear; for our last night of the trip, we could luxuriate in home-cooked meals and mattresses, not to mention wonderful company. Don’t be fooled though into thinking this meant we spent the afternoon sinking our toes in the carpet and marveling at our proximity to indoor plumbing. That’s just not our style. Instead, we outsmarted both the heat and Germany’s lack of beaches by spending the afternoon at a local creek sinking our toes in the sand and marveling at how far our water cannons could shoot. You, Sophie, weren’t as keen as the rest of us about the creek… and once I slipped into its knee-deep silt, I could certainly sympathize. (Shudder259103738992.) However, you happily used the hours to collaborate on sand soup recipes with your friend Noah, and I’d venture to guess we all got our fill of pure, slimy fun.

Natalie fires backThe inconvenient thing about shooting water straight up in the air is that it insists on coming straight back down. Of course, that might have been the whole point…

With an indefinable mix of reluctance and glee, we set out the next morning for the last leg of our trip home. To say the drive was noisy would be putting things mildly. You two put on spectacular performances of ‘80s hits (“I’m walking on sunshine, WHOOOOOO-OOOOOOOOAAAAAHHHHHH!”) using your German sausages as microphones and your vocal cords as battering rams. Your dad and I were three-quarters deaf by the time we made it through the Dolomites, but eardrums are overrated anyway… especially when it come to surviving a 51-hour road trip.

Opera singers in the back seat“…don’t it feel GOOOOD!!!!!!!!!”

And survive we most definitely did. I suspect it’s something of a miracle that we all still liked each other at the end of so much concentrated togetherness, but I guess that’s what fighting off hostile farm animals does to a family. (That and blueberry muffins.)  I can’t emphasize enough what rock stars you girls were about our whole crazy undertaking. It would be asking a lot from mature adults (which your parents are not) to expect them to speed-camp across Europe with a fraction of your cheerful adaptability.  You girls weren’t just tagalongs on the trip; you were participants, and you colored each new experience with a shade of delight uniquely your own. True, some of that delight seemed a little like being skinned alive with a pair of rusty nail clippers (*cough*climbingHolyroodHill*cough*), but I will forever be grateful that I got to share these adventures with you… theatrics and all.

Extracting giggles from a tired Sophie
Love,
Mom

~~~

~~~

Fin.

2Feb

Handful of Confetti

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 5 Comments

Culturally, expat life in Italy is the stuff of daydreams; logistically, it can be more of a nightmare. Just to apply for a local driver’s license, one first has to acquire a residence card, a requirement for which is a permesso di soggiorno—permission to stay in the country, for which one must have a visa which must be applied for in one’s native country but with documents that must be gotten in Italy. Each step in the process requires energy, patience, and a therapeutic sense of humor to keep sanity in place.

Say, for example, that you are ready to apply for your permesso. One of the documents you are required to bring is an official form certifying your housing situation, so you go ask your landlord for a copy. Your landlord doesn’t know anything about any such form. You do some research and finally figure out where he can go to apply for this form. Only he has had renovations done on the house that are not yet documented with the government, and what’s more, he doesn’t want to document them with the government because he neglected to apply for his permission to make those renovations in the first place. He stalls. You do more research and find that it is actually illegal for him  to be renting to you without this housing form. He finally relents, finds a way to work around the system (you try not to think too much about this part), and applies for the form. After a few weeks, you are called to the housing office to verify information about how many people are living with you, only when you arrive, you discover the office is on vacation for the month. When the month is up, you return and find out that your American birth certificate needs a special stamp to guarantee its legitimacy before the office will accept it. You mail you birth certificate with fear and trembling to the States where it is stamped and mailed back to you (without getting lost en route, thank goodness), and you return once again to the housing office. All goes smoothly this time, but the form you are waiting on will not be ready for awhile. “Don’t worry,” the housing officials assure you. “We will mail your landlord a letter when the form is ready to be picked up.” And that’s just for one document.

Tobias Jones describes the process of dealing with Italian bureaucracy “like trying to catch confetti: having to race from one office to another, filling in forms and requests, trying to grasp pieces of paper which always just elude your grasp.” I would agree with that except that it sounds like a whirl of activity whereas most of our experience with government offices here has centered around waiting… and waiting… and waaaaaaiiiiiittttttiiiiiiinnnnngggg.

This country has our hearts firmly in its grasp though. We willingly jump through the hoops—or more accurately, wait in the lines—to wake up to the Appennine sun luring fog out of the valley to incandesce with it in open air. We do it for day trips to Etruscan villages, for “Old MacDonald Had a Farm” sung in two languages, for lunchtime chats with our favorite pizzaiolo while he twirls our pizza to perfection in his brick oven. Even Italians think we’re crazy for giving up the American Dream for a life swathed in red tape, and maybe of course we are. But this is home to us. Living here is worth the frustration of trying to do so legally.

And you know, the struggle, the confetti-grasping, and the forced cultivation of patience are exactly what make small victories like this morning’s trip to renew health cards all the more precious.

30Jan

Jet Lag is in the Air

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 2 Comments

Uhhh.

You’d think that after one week of radio silence, I would be able to come up with a more eloquent opening line. In my defense though, “uhhh” is the perfect summation of my brain after these punch-drunk bumblebee days. I touched down on Italian soil last Monday morning just long enough to get my luggage and hurry out to the car where I was immediately swept up in the precious whirlwind of family life. In keeping with time-honored traditions, both girls had cultivated elaborate winter colds, so they stayed home from school all week to kiss my kneecaps while I cleaned. I didn’t mind.

But about cleaning… Jet lag didn’t throw off my sleep schedules this time so much as it did my seasons. Or maybe all those hours spent basking in the 85° sunscape of Miami-bound traffic were to blame. Either way, my spring cleaning instincts jumpstarted, and I was compelled beyond all reason or persuasion to organize the medicine cabinets that first day home. The second day, the oven needed to be scrubbed, and we had company the third evening, so the dust bunnies lurking behind the credenza had to go. If you want the truth, my noble blogging intentions have gone unheeded simply because I’ve been so busy finding inaccessible corners of the house to clean.

Ah well. (No apologizing, notice!) I had promised myself a week to regain my footing here at home, and though I didn’t necessarily expect that footing to take place on a step ladder with a feather duster in my hand and a delighted little girl swinging from each leg, I still say it counts. Plus, what else is a gal supposed to do after toting spring across the ocean in her carry-on?

23Jan

Three Hours

Posted by: Bethany in Uncategorized 8 Comments

Airlines encourage passengers to arrive three hours before their scheduled flight times, but considering the vast emptiness of my gate’s waiting area, I’m the only one zealous enough to do so. I feel like I should be sitting bolt upright clutching a carpet bag and craning my head toward each new marvel à la Anne Shirley. A gingham dress would be a nice touch too; it would look far more earnest than my current getup of hoodie and headphones. I’m on my way home after a long-short time warp of a week, and the threads connecting me to my husband and girls have wound themselves so tightly around my heart that it’s in danger of bursting a seam.

How do parents travel for a living? Or spouses, for that matter? Does that lifestyle grow familiar with time, or does it ache continually like a phantom limb? I know I’m a little pathetic here, but that’s okay. I’ll be home soon smothering my girls with kisses and passing out Nonna’s oatmeal-raisin cookies. Just not soon enough… what with three hours until my flight and all.

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