When Jay and I were first married, we perfected the art of
lingering. We would linger over dinner,
even sit and have dessert. We would
linger on the couch, holding hands and talking.
We would linger in bed in the mornings, holding each other until the very
last second before getting up and facing the world. And we would linger in God’s Word. From the moment Jay and I met, he’s been my
favorite person to discuss the Bible with.
We would have long talks over the words of Jesus, what they meant, how they
impact our lives. It was treasured time
for me.
Eight years into our marriage, Hurricane Micah entered our
world. And even though things were
disrupted for a time, we got our groove back.
After all, there were two of us and only one of him. We even taught him the fine art of
lingering. He learned to climb into our
bed on Saturday mornings. We took our
time with bath time and bedtime (Jay – THIS is why he STILL stands in the
shower letting the water run over him for 30 minutes every morning and why he
STILL makes a million excuses to stay up late.
Case solved!) We played music
during dinner. We strolled through the
grocery store. We had picnics in the park. I even found time to start this little
blog. We were pretty chill.
Those days seem like a lifetime ago.
We’ve added three people to our family in three years. With the addition of two miracle babies and
Pop, we have filled the Spalding family to capacity, and to keep everyone fed,
clean and happy, things have to stay on a schedule. I, the keeper of said schedule, most of the
time feel like a dictating, bossy, killjoy.
You can turn the world from order to chaos by missing one day of
laundry. Don’t check the big kid’s
agenda the second he gets home? You
might find yourself making a midnight run to Walmart for supplies for a project
we knew nothing about. Don’t keep a
careful diaper inventory? You may be
pulling out those very well intended but very seldom used cloth diapers at 3:00
a.m. – which adds to the laundry you don’t have time to do!
And lest you think that you can rest easy when you’re all
caught up… beware! Spalding’s Law (like Murphy’s
Law!) will come into play. Like the rule
that if you have a great morning, a flat tire is awaiting. Or
on the day you wash bedsheets, someone will vomit (that’s an exaggeration –
last week no one threw up. Asher did
pour an entire sippy cup of apple juice on my bed though)
My day basically goes like this: I wake up in a state of
terror because I hit the snooze button one too many times because one (or two
or three) of my kids have been up through the night several times. We begin the delicate, frantic dance to get
everyone dressed and ready and where they need to be at the time they need to
be there. No one can be out of step or
the morning will just implode. Jay and
Micah have to leave by 7:30. The little boys and I have to be out the door
about 8:15. No one can be lagging. Almost Teenager, you can do without your Axe
body spray cloud today, we are out the door! Silly Potty-Training toddler,
there’s no time to go to the bathroom now!
Nursing Infant, don’t be crazy, no one has time for that!
Jay rushes in one direction, I rush in the other. When I finally land at the office, I fall down
in my chair and tear into my annoyingly color-coded to-do list, which I must subconsciously
set up for failure since I’ve never, not once in fifteen years, crossed off
every single item. I try, at some point,
to be in God’s Word – usually using some aptly named book, like “Devotions for
You Slackers Who Think You Don’t Have Time to Do Devotions.” At about 3:45,
Micah arrives at the office from the school bus. I nag him to start on homework. He rarely does. I try to tie up loose ends and finish a few
things so that I can bolt out of the office at 5:05 so I can get to the littles
by 5:15. One minute later and I’m the last parent there… and no one wants to
harbor that guilt.
We roll up to our house at about 5:45 (unless there is
grocery shopping to do, church programs or basketball practice). One of us (usually Jay!) starts dinner while
the other one tends to the kids and gets Micah started on homework. It’s our goal to eat before 7:00 on “regular”
nights so that we can start bath time before 8:00. The kids go to bed at 8:30 (ish) for the
little ones and 9:30 (ish) for the big one.
Then Jay and I start on our night – picking up, dishes, laundry,
lunch-making, and then trying to watch some TV (although I make him clean
during commercials – sorry, sweetie) before stumbling to our room a few minutes
after midnight – just in time for Silas to wake up for the first time to eat.
I end most days knowing there was so much I didn’t get to,
and yet feeling like I couldn’t have possibly given anymore.
Even at times when lingering is forced – sick kids, waiting
rooms, long drives, food taking forever at lunch (I’m looking at you, Chilis!),
the thought of not doing something productive makes me so anxious.
This inability to stop, this crushing guilt of what I couldn’t
get done, this exhausting feeling of failure has been weighing heavy on me this
last year. I keep telling myself that in
another month, when XY and Z happens, I’ll be back on my game. But the reality is, the game has
changed. And it may never be the same
again.
After some middle-of-the-night reflection and prayer earlier
this year, I told my husband that he and I need to figure out a time to Sabbath. To just stop.
We need some linger in our lives, some dawdle in our days, some idle in
our existence. So we pulled out my
annoyingly color-coded day planner and blocked off the next Friday
afternoon. And the next. And the next.
We have decided to come in on Friday mornings like normal.
Check emails and messages, deal with any pertinent issues, make sure Sunday is
planned, and then around lunch time, we leave and we are free until Micah gets
home from school. The “rules” of the day
are simple. No work, no chores, no
grocery shopping. Just linger. Some days we go out to lunch… and have
dessert. Some days we go walk around a
store we don’t usually have time to go in.
Some days we go home and watch a movie or even take a nap. Some days we spend time talking about the
things we like to talk about with each other – old times, future vacations,
politics and current events, and most importantly, God’s Word. It is our time. It is a gift.
It’s four measly hours in the week… and it has been a game-changer for
me.
I’m not going to pretend that we are perfect at it. Obviously there are a lot of times we are out
of town (like last week and the upcoming one), but we do our best to guard that
time. I block it out in my planner so we
can’t schedule meetings or appointments.
It’s sacred.
This busy life we have created is not showing signs of
getting any less busy, but I am determined to no longer wear my busyness like a
badge of honor. The
I-did-more-than-you-did martyrdom that has unwittingly set itself up as such a
point of pride in my life is no more. It
is time to unplug and reboot. To revisit
the lost art of lingering.