Calloused Knees December 15, 2009

When I first started taking photos, I never thought of it as a physically taxing job. But it is.

I am always on my knees talking to children. I’m always on my knees eying them through my viewfinder. I’m always lifting blocks, dragging and rolling backgrounds, or jumping up and down to get kids attention. It’s insane.

As one lady said to me the other night, after attempting half a session with her four children, “You must go home every night exhausted from this job.”

It’s true, I do. But I love seeing the kids in their cute outfits, and catching those occasional quirky smiles between moments of hysteria makes every moment worth it.

Having worked in the photo studio for a couple months now, I have begun to have pretty calloused knees. I was warned toward the start that I’d deal with the knees of my pants being worn out, but I never imagined my actual knees would begin to be worn. Maybe I should have invested in a pair of knee pads to put under my pants.

Growing up, I always heard about how people who had calloused knees from praying so much. I just thought it was an expression, not something that could actually happen to a person’s body.

I feel a bit ashamed that I’ve never realized it until now, when I’m being paid to be on my knees all day. As with any callouses, your knees are rough, and they catch on material that rubs up against them — in this case, your pants. And no matter how much lotion you scrub on them, your hands end up ten times softer than your knees.

That makes me wonder: how often do Christians really physically exert themselves in prayer? Sure, we’ll get down on our knees if we’re paid or if it’s something fun to do like play with children, but we’re pretty quick to curl up nice and comfortably in prayer. Even churches that do kneel on a regular basis have kneeling pads so as not to cause callouses on the knees of their parishioners.

But even with those kneeling pads gone, everyone knows that a decent workout isn’t going to impact you if you’re only doing it on the weekends. What about every day of the week? Is prayer really driving us to our knees in focus, or has it become a passing thought? Should prayer have more of a physical impact on our lives?

Flapjack Fiasco December 3, 2009

I am the world’s greatest babysitter. Especially after having the fire department called based on my cooking skills. (And no, they weren’t called to come join us for lunch.)

On Monday, while I was watching my regular rowdy rascals, I went to the kitchen a little later than normal in search of ingredients for peanut butter & jelly sandwiches. Much to my dismay, after already telling the kids I was making what I thought would be a quick lunch, I discovered a lack of bread in the house. While rummaging through the cupboard for something that sounded tasty, I came across a box of Bisquick.

Oh, how I love Bisquick pancakes. I like to think I’m okay at making them. My dad’s the master at making ones the size of your plate or larger. His ability goes so far as to our giving him a giant pancake flipper for Christmas a couple years ago. It looked a lot like this.

So, in honor of my father, and in full knowledge that the children like eating pancakes, I set about on the adventure of making lunch with two kids banging on the table and yelling that they’re hungry and a third screaming just to prove she could be as loud as her older siblings.

The first pancake went well. I would say it was perfect. Round in shape, a wonderful shade of brown on either side, yummy smelling. In order to calm the storm, and not to start a fight, I split the pancake in half and cut it up so that the kids couldn’t notice quite as easily.

I’d thrown the second in the pan to cook while I was getting the first ready for the kids to eat. Unfortunately, I’d had the heat on just a little (or a lot) too high, and by the time I looked back over at the batter, the top was hardly cooked, and the bottom was smoking just a lovely shade of, oh, black.

Having run into this issue on occasion before, I decided to at least cook the opposite side in order to scrape off some of the pancake to eat. It was mine anyways.

I looked around at that time, searching for a smoke detector to wave smoke away from in hopes it wouldn’t go off. When I didn’t find one, I thought it odd, but I figured I just didn’t recognize it. I didn’t, however, have the common sense to open a window.

As a result, the little smoke there was floated and found the ADT smoke alarm, setting it off in an awful screaming beep and alerting the security company to my follies, who in turn called the fire department before calling the house. After I explained the situation, they called off the alarm to the fire department. An inside source told me they even announced to everyone listening that “the babysitter burnt the pancakes.”

Great, now everyone in town knows of my mad cooking skills.

It wasn’t for another hour that I had the opportunity to eat my own pancake, once all the kids were in bed for their naps or “rest times”.

On the upside, the kids and I made a fort out of a giant blanket and the kitchen chairs later on that afternoon to make up for the lunchtime chaos. It was a hit, and even I momentarily forgot about the stress.

Looking back, I find it amusing that the kids continued to sit quietly at the table, munching away at the first pancake while all of this went on. The only time any of them seemed distressed was when they ran out of pancake, not when they heard the alarm go off. I wonder if Mommy has this issue often.

Fruitless Envy November 1, 2009

There are certain people in my life who seem to have exactly what I want:

• the comfort of a great (non-temporary) job they are passionate about,
• the adoration of a loving husband,
• the creativity that can spark awe in the dullest of imaginations,
• impressively productive will power,
• the cute kids,
• means to support so many different good causes,
• world-wide travel,
• an adventuresome nature that goes beyond “what if”.

And those are just a few of the things.

Sometimes those people spark me as inspiration, like when Katie came up with the reason and the means for us to dress as ninjas and slink through the night to spy on a suspected statue thief. There’s no way I would have done that on my own, and that’s become one of my favorite memories, largely for that reason alone.

There are other times, however, when I become envious of the people I hope would have inspired me. For instance, I see no relationship or children in the near future. Yes, I steal other people’s children on occasion, but I’m repeatedly told that it’s not the same as having your own.

I’m fully aware of the fact that the Bible describes envy as “unclean” (Mark 7:22) and “meaningless” (Ecclesiastes 4:4), and that it says it “rots your bones” (Proverbs 14:30). It’s true. No matter how much motivation envy brings about, you never really achieve what you were aiming at. You never truly are satisfied with what you have.

Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary puts it this way:

¹en·vy

Pronunciation: \ˈen-vē\

Function: noun

Date: 13th century

1 : painful or resentful awareness of an advantage enjoyed by another joined with a desire to possess the same advantage

Clearly, that pain is not going to be comforted by some sort of effort on our part. The pain only leaves when “the desire to possess the same advantage” leaves. We need to learn to be thankful for where we are in life and for what we have. As I’m repeatedly telling the preschoolers in my Sunday school class, we have many, many things that God’s given us to be thankful for. We just have to take the time to think about them.

So, as I sit and look at that list, I wonder, How can I turn that around?

• the comfort of a great (non-temporary) job they are passionate about, I have a job, one that has potential to become permanent.
• the adoration of a loving husband, I’m not so old that this could never happen. I know someone who found love at 80 years of age.
• the creativity that can spark awe in the dullest of imaginations, God has given us resources to inspire us on our not-so-creative days.
• impressively productive will power, God gives me the strength to get done what needs to be.
• the cute kids, I steal everyone else’s kids . . . and I get to give them back!
• means to support so many different good causes, I can pray, and I know firsthand that God answers those prayers.
• world-wide travel, I learn something new about where I live on a regular basis, and I have traveled far more than the average Joe.
• an adventuresome nature that goes beyond “what if”. I am inspired and challenged by friends around me, even if those friends are only two to five years old.

How can you take your list of things you envy in others and turn them into reasons to be thankful?

Birthdays & Broken Toys October 5, 2009

My birthday is this week. One of the little girls in our church turns four today and is having a big birthday celebration. As a result, I’ve been thinking about gifts and children’s toys. Considering I’m twenty years older than my little friend, I don’t anticipate receiving the party and gifts like she will be.

The only gift I’ve received this year was a cute little notebook in the shape of a purse and two cute candle holders from my secret sister. Being the youngest in the whole thing, I tend to get gifts that, well, clearly point out that age difference. But that’s okay, it makes me smile inside every time, knowing that whoever my secret sister is understands I’m still just a kid in many ways.

Thinking about kids’ gifts, though, I came to realize that there are two days in every typical child’s year that tend to be much more tragic than any other day: the day after Christmas and the day after their birthday. Those are the days that most of their toys tend to break. That is, unless you have an extremely particular child who never breaks anything. (If you do, I’d like to meet your child because that’s not normal.) Many even consider the day after Christmas National Whiner’s Day due to this.

Last month, I had the privilege of watching two birthday children the day after their birthday party. By lunch time, a crown, a drumstick and a drum had busted. Who knows what other new toys I missed as they were dismembered while I was off making pb & j sandwiches for lunch? The mother of these kids likes to claim that they are “curiously destructive”. I like that term.

That brings me to ask a few questions about children’s toys:

(1) Why is it that the annoying ones are the ones that never seem to die and the other toys just fall apart within a day’s time? I think toy makers intentionally do this to parents and childcare providers. Batteries seem to last longer on the obnoxious toys (and, thankfully, we can never seem to find replacements once they do).  As for the trinket-type toys, they break by the end of the day from either being stepped on or torn apart by children who wonder why they don’t make the same obnoxious noises as their other toys. I’ve decided that someone needs to make sturdy, non-obnoxious toys before I have kids.

(2) Why is it that people always think that they’re giving kids something fun when they give them a cheap $.25 toy that’s going to make them cry when they break it the next day? I have to confess, it’s easy to do. You think to yourself, “Oh, little Johnny will like this” even though you’re simultaneously thinking, “This toy is a piece of crap with a price tag.” Sadly, it’s too easy to let that sentimental side convince you that, while you know the toy is going to break soon after the child receives it, the smile on his or her face is worth that measly $.25. But is it really? Maybe, if you’re not the one who has to deal with the broken toy later.

What do you think? Are toys made sturdy enough for kids? Or do we just buy the cheap ones because they’re inexpensive?

Did you have a favorite toy when you were a kid? Was it prone to breakage, or did you know to keep it out of harm’s way?

Chillin’ With the Children August 17, 2009

A friend of mine once told me that he thinks children are much more fun than adults any day and that he’d rather hang out with them any day. I can almost agree.

One of my favorite things about really young children is the fact that they tend to be wholly willing to accept who people are, where they are in life. At camp this year, I spent nearly as much time with kids as I did adults, partially for that reason.

When you walk up to someone you haven’t seen in a while, the typical greeting is, “Hi! How’s it going? What have you been up to?” Right? Well, at least it is if you’re an adult. The only thing children care about is what you’re going to be doing with them right at that instant, “What are you doing here?”

Greeting so many old friends at camp proved much more difficult than I imagined this year. After about a day and a half of meeting up with everyone, having to answer that dreaded question of “What have you been up to?” with, “taking care of children,” “looking for a job,” or “trying to keep up with loans.” Having to say that over and over started to chip away at my self-esteem, no matter how much I tried to joke about it.

Whenever I was hanging out with the kids, not one of them asked me how my job search was going. Sure, they were some of the kids I watch back home, but still, not one of them asked if I had found a job yet. Not one of them asked why I still live with my parents; they just think, Why wouldn’t someone live with their parents? None of them make me feel as if I lack in potential compared to the person sitting next to me, they just run up and hang off of every one of my limbs (quite literally at times). More than once during camp, I was invited to stay for dinner or stay to play when I was just walking by a lot. I sometimes stayed or took the kids on a golf cart ride to the “Ark Park” to play, but sometimes, I had places to be, and the look on their faces just about made me cave. In contrast to the feeling that I sometimes overwhelm people my own age with my presence, it’s rather touching.

In a way, the Little Prince in Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s book was completely right. The things that “matter” to many adults (counting money, doing something constantly just to feel “useful,” getting drunk, having a job just to say that you have a job, etc.) are not the things that really matter in the long run. Being passionate about life, caring for the ones you love, those things are important, not worrying about what you do for a living.

While I am not saying that wasting away one’s life doing nothing is something notable, I do think that it is important not to lose sight of the important things that we deal with, the important people in our lives. I know that chillin’ with the kids gives me a boost of self-confidence that I don’t really find anywhere else because they haven’t been bogged down by all the worries and cares in life yet. They generally don’t have loans, jobs, pressure, stress or money issues to worry about yet. They just worry about what toy we’re going to play with next or what new adventure life has in store … and if their friends or “buddies” will be there with them.

And on the other hand, when it comes to thinking like an adult, I think the best part about it is that I sometimes get paid to hang out with these kids.

The Follow-Through June 25, 2009

One of my biggest pet peeves is when someone says that they’re going to do something, and then there is no follow-through. I take people at their word, and I expect them to take me at mine.

The worst part of this, I think, is when I find myself doing exactly what I hate most. (Romans 7, anyone?) It’s an awful cycle. I’ll give you an example:

Sunday nights I generally reserve for watching the children at my parents’ small group. There are usually two kids I spend time with, occasionally three. We have a lot of fun playing in the backyard on the swings or in the basement with blocks.

But early last month, I had a Sunday afternoon bridal shower to attend. I had figured in the length of time that the shower would take, but I had forgotten that there would be about an hour drive in each direction, not to mention time I’d spend after the shower talking with friends from high school. By the time that we were on our way back home, I was already late, so I canceled on them.

The kids were devastated, and the small group didn’t accomplish near what they normally do due to my absence.

My guilt drove me nuts that next week. At first, I felt awful that I’d told the parents (and the kids) that I would be there later that evening and wasn’t. Then, after realizing that I complain most when people do this to me, a new wave of guilt washed over me as I began to see myself as this horrible hypocrite.

I’ve found that I guilt others in the same horrible way. If someone promises me something, I expect it. I take people at their word. If it doesn’t happen, if there’s no follow-through, I become angry and unforgiving. I don’t leave room to consider for miscalculations like the one I had or for confusion or a just plain change of the mind. You would think I would be more understanding, but that’s not usually the case.

This recently happened with a friend of mine. I’m trying to decide if I should just let it go or if I should stop trusting this person. I watch as just about everything this person says to me falls through, and then this friend wants to shrug it off as if nothing happened.

So, the question is, is it time to no longer believe anything this person says anymore? Or do I forgive and pretend as if nothing happened?

Wordless Wednesday May 13, 2009