LineaLanoie's Weblog

She did it!  She evicted her roommates!  Mind you now she has to live with the consequences of that and look for a new roommate.  But they lied to her, basically stole her car for a day and have not paid their share of the expenses.  So tomorrow she has to give up her phone and the internet.  And she has some other utility bills that were not paid that she has to pick up all on her own. 

Not only did her living arrangements fall apart, but she got turned down for her student loan.  Because of her learning disability she was only allowed to carry a reduced course load and all the necessary documentation was sent.  Somehow the case for a reduced course load did not get communicated to the loans officer, so now there is a lot more waiting and explaining.  This in itself is hard for a person who has an attention defficit.  There is so much frustration that it just about destroys their ability to cope and she wants to give up and begins to lose hope of ever making it in life.

This is my daughter that knows how to reach bottom and then dig a bit deeper till she hits bedrock.  I sometimes wonder when she will reach that point.  She is trying so hard to make it but has so many obstacles to contend with – learning disabilities and her own difficult to live with self.  I wish she would learn how precious she is in my sight and more importantly in God’s sight and learn to like herslf as well.  She gets pretty down when her life starts to disintigrate in front of her eyes. 

I can’t “fix” it all.  Really all I can do is try and listen.  And not reinforce the feelings that she is “too dumb” to try to do what she is doing.  And not get angry and tell her that she is responsible for most of her own problems.  And try to be patient and then try again when I’m not.  And pray and pray and pray.  Then help her pick up the pieces and glue them back together with what little love I can muster at the time and hope that life doesn’t deal her another blow too soon.

I wish I could go back to when she was little and try and do this whole life experience over!

My weekends are usually an oasis in my week – I don’t have the same old routine and the responsibilities change.  I am beginning to think that my week of work is my oasis, not the weekend.

This weekend went from crisis to — I don’t know what.  Last night was good.  We had a good time sharing together at our study.  We were looking at the temptation of Jesus in the fourth chapter of Yancy’s book The Jesus I Never Knew.  I do not like “free will”.  However, that said, if I didn’t have free will, I guess I wouldn’t even be able to rebel against it.  Anyway, the reason I hate free will so much right now is that my kids and I get ourselves into all of our troubles because we are so self willed and I wish I had someone right now who would make me do things right – ’cause I don’t seem to do a good job on my own.  So even after sharing my difficulties as a parent with some other parents who also shared that they make just as many mistakes as I do, I came home and ended up being unnecessarily harsh on another one of my kids. 

And I am supposed to be the adult with self control!  I am going to have to do some appologizing today because I care about her even when it doesn’t look like it or sound like it.  And I want her to learn that becoming an adult(growing up) is not about being(or becoming) perfect but has more to do with asking forgiveness and trying again.  I don’t want her to see me as a hypocrite thinking that I am perfect when it is so obvious to her that I am not.  I don’t know how obvious it is to her that I know I am not perfect but I hope it is obvious to her, or becomes obvious, that I love her – even when I blow it as a parent and have to appologize to her.  

So, off I go to my work oasis where I won’t have to deal with my kids till … 

This afternoon all but one of my kids were at home.  Eric and Michelle came up to help celebrate their nieces 5th birthday.  Since it is Eric’s birthday on Monday, Dave and Annette and Kieran as well as Rachelle were here too and we ordered in some Chinese food to celebrate.

There are some birthdays that are significant in that they make you feel really a lot older.  No! I don’t mean the person having the birthday who should rightfully feel a bit older.  But having a child who is suddenly out of his twenties and into the 30’s.  Now I feel my joints starting to ache just thinking about that!  It really doesn’t seem like 30 years since we took that little guy home from St Pauls Hospital.  At least he is still not too old to give his mom a hug.

This afternoon I went and shared in the celebration of a 50th wedding anniversary.  The couple have been friends for a long time. Their daughter is a very good friend so it was a great way to spend part of the afternoon.

I also got to watch some volleyball.  There was a tournament on and my daughter was in it playing for St Mary’s grade 9 team.  I had never seen her play volleyball before – usually just soccer – so it was fun to see her in a different sport.  I like the way she serves.  She looks very smooth and powerful – spins the ball a few times and then wham!

I had a big procedure to do this morning.  It went well and I was done in time to sneak home for a short lunch break.  On the way, and it is just a few minutes to my office, ( I can walk it in 20 minutes ) I was surprised to see an eagle soaring above the river.  I don’t think we have them this close to town that often.  Huge black wings with white tail feathers – magnificant to see.  On my way back I am taking the camera but I don’t know if it will still be around.

The sun is just coming up reflecting gold on the leaves and grass.  The moment will be short lived. Just long enough for the sun to rise over the horizon and the low clouds.  It’s too bad that my kids and maybe kids everywhere aren’t up to see the beauty right now.  Do they notice it?  Or are they too busy with the stuff in their lives to take time to see the beauty God has created around them?

As I write the golden few moments of the sunrise have changed into the light of day – less golden but making everything more clear in general.  I think I like the moment of sunrise best, fleeting as it is.  We need the brighter light of day to get stuff done, but the really glorious moments of sunrise and sunset showcase the beauty of the earth and sky.

We have those moments in our lives that we showcase too – the births and the deaths.  Yet they are just that – moments.  We celebrate them with great joy or great sorrow.  Yet in between there is the long stretch of plainness that makes up most of our lives.  We need to learn to live through these dull periods of life searching out the beauty that is there – there but not highlighted.  We need to take the in between moments and create beauty out of them too.

Maybe learning to see the beauty in life is one of the gifts we need to learn to pass on to our children.  We pass on the cynicism and complaining easily enough.  We take great pains to pass on the need to make a living but we don’t teach how to take what they are given and make the living happen.  Because real living involves seeing our world and our lives as things which God has created for his glory.