Pick a Different Toilet

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Every time I go in for meetings at the record label I use their restrooms. I walk in. Check all the stalls for cleanliness.  And then, despite the outcome of my observations, I always pee in stall number two. Always. Why?

I have no freaking idea. I just do. The same reason I walk into church and sit on the same aisle week after week. The same reason I have taken to glaring at the new man in my Starbucks who insists on sitting in my seat. The same reason I eat the same bowl of cereal each morning and pick the same elliptical machine at the gym. The same reason I use the same inflections in my voice as I read well-worn books to Annie each night.

I've been reading to my daughter, Annie, the same books since she was a little baby. So almost four years now. Green Eggs and Ham, Are you My Mother?, Good Night Moon, God Made You Special and Runaway Bunny, just to name a few. Each book's most memorable lines are now a part of our every day vocabulary, etched into our memory banks with their sing-songy rhythms. I have the books memorized, complete with different voices for different characters, and a whole slew of inflections to match the most magical part's of each story. So when Annie recently asked me to "read it different" I was totally taken back.

"Like with different voices or slower or faster?" I asked her puzzled.

"Let's just do the whole thing different," she said with excitement.

And I embarked on a dreadfully different version of Green Eggs and Ham where the vocal punches on "Sam I am!" sounded so awkward and forced that it was sheer torture for the drama-student in me to read. We got to the end of the book and she smiled. She liked it the first way better, she said.

Whew. Thank you Lord. Close call. I almost had to change how I did things.

I almost had to change how I did things. I couldn't believe I had just thought that, but I did. It echoed around a few hundred times in my heart and it dawned on me-

I am so built on routine (me- the free-spirited, care-free, routine-less woman) That I don't even read books differently anymore

Just a tiny moment shared with my daughter but it had the power to send my heart and soul into a tizzy. Was my life really that routine? That structured? That monotonous? That I read the same books with the same character's voices in the same exact way, day-in and day-out? I picked the same cardio machine? Sat on the same aisle Sunday after Sunday?

Had I really never peed in stall number three?!?!?

Routine is not bad. All the experts who know the *real* way to properly parent the children of the world tell you that structure and routine are pivotal to a child's development. I get that. But what about adults? It seems like there should be a book that reminds you in the aftermath of all that structure to change things up a little bit or risk loosing site of the beauty found in the diversity of life outside your own standard mode of operation.

Truth be told, I don't even realize I am making these decisions. It's not like I am making a conscious effort to only use one toilet stall or only sit in one particular seat. As if I am a germ-a-phobe or I cling to tradition with such fierce dedication that I scoff at the stranger-toilet who tries to beckon me to its stall.

It's less a matter of thinking through a decision and more a matter of not thinking at all.

Living, day-in and day-out, without giving life much thought is dangerous.  

It's like getting across town and suddenly realizing you don't remember turning, taking the bridge or entering the freeway. You realize you have no idea how you ended up where you're at except for the sheer, rote habit that got you there.

Sheer rote habit, while incredibly useful and practical at times, can rob us of the beauty, whimsy and random delight that comes with reading Green Eggs and Ham like you are "Elmo's alien cousin who speaks Spanish like Dora."

Sheer rote habit, while incredibly useful and practical at times, can rob us of the beauty, whimsy and random delight that comes with changing it up a bit and seeing what it feels like to do something in a new, fresh way. It means doing things in a way that we feel ourselves pushing up against the old and brushing against something new. That we are forced to think. That we must create. That we must act on the impulses and challenge the status quo and change it up a bit for the sake of our soul. It is the work of those who are trying to live fully...

to drive a new way home fix your kids a truly bizarre afternoon snack stay in a hostel instead of the Ritz or the Ritz instead of a hostel pray in a way that makes you uncomfortable greet a stranger with a kiss listen, don't talk talk, don't listen try a new aisle brush your teeth in a different room buy an album from an unknown artist

pee in stall number three 

It doesn't have to be earth-shattering There is no need to give-up routine and tradition all together

But there is beauty and life-giving joy in re-discovering that there is more than one way, in fact there are millions of different ways, to go about the act of daily living.

 

*Go ahead! Try something you do on a daily basis in a new or different way and tell me about it. I have spent the past month forcing myself to read books to Annie with different inflections, pauses, voices and rhythm. It is hard. It is brain exercise. But I walk away engaged, smiling, thinking and wondering with a hint of awe and excitement- how will I do it tomorrow?- and I feel a little more alive*

 

Look at Her

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I can't remember.

Annie's first words or the way it felt to fall in love for the first time. The Thanksgiving I crawled behind the toy box with my sister and ate enough Flintstone vitamins to make me vomit the entire day, or the Christmas morning that we slept so late my parents thought we might have died in our sleep.

I can't remember.

The songs at my Papaw's funeral or the passages of scripture read in my own wedding. The cruel words I've hurled at my husband or the cruel glances that left me wanting to hurl them in the first place.

I can't remember.

My first roller coaster. My first date. My first "C." Whether I really liked high school or the essay that got me into university.

I can't remember.

What I must have journaled about when I was 16- or if I journaled at all? Conversations at the dinner table. Why I laid in my windowsill as a little girl and cried at the smell of fresh rain. Or if that person I loved and trusted really shut the door and locked it, revealing his gun, counting his bullets slowly, spinning the revolver in front of my terrified eyes, telling me what kind of harm he could do with it.

Some moments are blurry.

What did I really, truly think I was going to grow up and do with my life? Did I really think I was going to be an artist? Have I always loved people as much as I do now? Was I born with empathy?

I can't remember.

Truth is, it's all a bit fuzzy. Foggy around the edges. There are glimmers of memories based on truth. I think. There are things I am certain I did; things I am certain that I said. Stories that pop to into my mind immediately. Emotions paired with songs; longings paired with smells; peace paired with roads well-worn in my childhood. I didn't not exist. There are the remnants of a life-well lived. Stories I know I have been a part of.

But all too often I worry that the stories are simply that. Stories. Versions of folklore told and re-told. Each one added to, embellished and re-hashed with less clarity each dramatic re-telling. Pictures and grainy visions of what I have convinced myself to believe about my past- about the unfolding of a life-

I want to remember the unfolding of my life.

Of my daughter's life. My family's life.

But I just can't remember.

What is true and what really happened?

Annie's first word? Probably da-da or ba-ba. Dad, ball and sheep were her favorite things, so I like to imagine these were her first words. But really- I'm not sure.

I remember the names of certain teachers; but there are entire classrooms I would swear I have never walked into; records prove otherwise. There are people alienated along the way, hurt by my words and my opinions; though I could not pinpoint when I pulled the trigger or what it looked like to watch them fall. Did I really shoot to kill?

I want to remember. First words and first kisses. Moments of defiance and moments of humility. My Grandpa's laugh and the sweet touch of my great-grandmother, who never spoke the same language as me, but always spoke love and gentleness over me. I want to remember every funny, smart, silly, brilliant, empathetic, wild and dreamy thought my daughter ever brings forth into the world. And I want to remember the times that God has shown up.

it's ok.

So another year is ending and a new one beginning and I am face to face with reality once again.

I don't remember. And I want to so badly. I want to remember it all. I want to feel it, smell it, touch it, wrap myself in it. The good, bad, ugly, beautiful, mundane, simple moments

the unfolding of a life

I want to hold onto it and keep it from slipping through the cracks of my mind's memory.

but I can't

and once again I am reminded-

it's ok if I can't remember it all

because

Fuzzy and blurred as it is around the edges- I am the living embodiment of the memory- every moment I have lived has entered me and shaped me.

The very essence of my being is a million moments cobbled together so that all I must do is look in the mirror and I will see tiny glimmers of the very moments I want to hold onto. They are not gone- they are the very essence of who I am- each one there, woven into me.

So I can't remember Annie's first words and I am already forgetting what it felt like for her to breathe on my chest and the funny noises she made after she sneezed and the first time I disciplined her and the first time she told me she loved me back and the first song she sang and the first time she told me she could do it all by herself...

I will not mourn as if these are lost moments that I will eventually forget as they slip through the blurry cracks of my memory-  they are not lost moments. They are present.

I look at Annie now and she is the living, breathing embodiment of a million moments cobbled together.

And though I cannot name them all-

I look at her and I see the unfolding of a beautiful life.

I can feel it, touch it, wrap myself in it- the memories that is. Because they are standing in front of me. Laughing. Giggling. Growing gloriously. And every mistake I make as a mama or every beautiful word I whisper over her- every trip we take and moment we create- it is there- cobbled together in skin and bones and heart and soul on display-

So my specific memories will fade. And I will be tempted to mourn and wonder what is true and what is not- how did the story really go?

And then I will remember- the past is presently alive- the unfolding of the life is on full display- captured in flesh and bone and person-

All I have to do is look in the mirror.

All I have to do is look at her.

 

 

Listen to the Title Track: The Becoming

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To hear the title track of Jenny's new album, The Becoming, please click here. Like her facebook page and have access to free streaming.  

The Becoming 

After the destruction In the wake of every storm The sun reveals the suffering And all I've known is gone Well I can take the rising waves But when I'm washed up on the shore Feeling just like driftwood And nothing makes sense anymore

Jesus meet me Be everything I need In the waiting In the in between Jesus, hold me And keep me from running Cause I don't want to miss The beauty of becoming

Something new is growing I can feel it come alive In the dead of winter Spring is on the other side

Jesus meet me Be everything I need In the waiting In the in between Jesus, hold me Keep me from running Cause I don't want to miss The beauty of becoming

Give me beauty in the ashes of this pain Give me water in the wasteland, let it rain As I wonder, in the darkness, be my guide Oh Creator Oh Redeemer bring new life

Jesus meet me Be everything I need In the waiting In the in between Jesus, hold me Keep me from running Cause I don't want to miss The beauty of becoming

(lyrics by: jenny simmons, ali rogers, ellie holcomb)