Stay calm in the meantime

Last year the trees outside our window were smaller and newer.  The leaves turned and fell off nonchalantly in a week.  This year they are so bold!  So confident! 

I made a "post partum peace" mix recently for a new mom friend.  I've been listening to it a lot.  It's a mixture of sad songs, quiet songs, and a couple hymns.  The theme line is by The Innocence Mission.

Stay calm, stay calm in the meantime.

Other key lines throughout the mix:

Love comes to you, its your hands your heart your lips, that is all.

Come ye sinners poor and needy, weak and wounded, sick and sore (nothing like a vaginal birth to make that song relevant!!).

Now my heart stumbles on things i dont know, my weakness i feel i must finally show.  Awake my soul!

And ending with

All we can do, in this deep summer hour, with the rain, the taxis and the flowers,
walking between the dear ones holding on, is shout, shout for joy.

It's not summer rain anymore, I guess. It's the most fallish day yet actually. cloudy with a chill, bright leaves, dim sky, pumpkins sagging on wet porches.

And today on my bed with the new trees outside glowing in the rain, I feel deeply thankful. Don't get me wrong, the gratitude is brewed in depression, in listlessness and anxiety about how to balance my little daughter's needs with everything else in my life. Thoughts of inadequacy as her mom, as Samm's wife, as host of Shabbat, as seminarian. I have these glimpses of what I want, mostly wild and free gardens, pies, a small ancient future church community and a brilliant phd dissertation...do I ask for too much?

Meanwhile Mary Lou just wants her diaper changed and maybe some mashed potatoes for lunch.

And I really ought to take a shower before she wakes up.

Stay calm in the meantime. These are beautiful days.

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