Brave, Anyway

Tag: brave girls

  • Solidarity

    Solidarity

    I support strong women.

    I do not have to agree with everything a strong woman believes in to support her.

    I do not have to agree with everything a strong woman believes in to know she can do her job.

    I do not have to agree with everything a strong woman believes in to vote for her.

    This is not just a statement about Kamala Harris or Elizabeth Warren. This is about all women. My family, my friends, my colleagues, my neighbors, my fellow church-goers.

    I do not have to agree with everything a strong woman believes in to love her.

    I have great affection for and deep love for many strong women with whom I disagree on very big topics – abortion, guns, health care. And yet I think those women are fantastic mothers and grandmothers and aunts and cousins and lawyers and doctors and students and educators and artists and caregivers and professionals. They are fantastic women. They are fantastic humans.

    Some vote red, some vote blue. Some don’t vote at all. Some have children and some don’t. Some have faith and some don’t. Some have had an abortion. Some have been the victim of violence. Some have battled disease. Some cannot be alone and some prefer to be alone. Some like men, some like women, and some like both. Some are wealthy and some are poor and some are in the middle. Some are seemingly always lucky and some are seemingly always struggling. Some have great regrets about choices they’ve made in their lives and some live with more acceptance and love for themselves.

    I can disagree in very key areas with a woman or have very different life experiences from her, and still recognize that she is a good person and stand in solidarity with her.

    I expect more of women than I do of men. That has been a truth in my life since I can remember. I don’t know that I even understand all of the reasons why. But I know it’s not just me. As a nation, we are “harder on” women than we are on men.

    We are especially “harder on” female candidates than we are on male candidates. And that’s because, at least in part I think, of our expectation that women must do what women are supposed to do in addition to the stuff of the job/office they want to earn. We expect men who run for office to do their job if they get it. We expect women to do the job if they get it, on top of all the womanly stuff we feel they must keep doing in order to really be a woman.

    But it has got to stop. Strong women need to support strong women, especially in this time when women are being called nasty simply for having the audacity to have an opinion. Especially in this time when people are questioning one another’s faith because of how we vote. Especially in this time when our nation is led by a man who has mistreated women, and that man is supported by millions.

    I choose to support strong women, focusing on the ways in which we agree instead the ways in which we don’t. Because one thing I have found to be true of all strong women, regardless of their background or beliefs: they get stuff done.

    P.S. I also choose to support strong women who have a little sass. I have no idea if AOC is good at her job or represents her district well – I don’t live there. But I do know she knows how to stand up to a bully like a boss.

  • What Spills Out

    For every awful thing I can name that’s upset our world, there are at least a dozen related things for which to be thankful. For every negative way our lives have been impacted, at least a dozen positives or silver linings. For every mean girl, at least a dozen kind girls. For every disappointment, at least a dozen people or things to make us smile.

    The changes heaped on the girls were all unfair. And it’s a lot sometimes.

    A lot a lot.

    Especially on the night before a holiday, beginning a new holiday season, when the worry in little minds about how things will go is at its peak. And there’s only me to take it out on. And only me to help deal with it. Only me to help try to focus on the positives while acknowledging the not-so-positives. Only me to say “things aren’t the same but they can still be great.” Only me to try to figure out a distraction. Then only me to listen to the confusion caused by people who think everything should be ok by now. Only me to offer understanding for why it isn’t. Only me to help everyone wind down. Only me to say “you’re right, it’s not fair.”

    And only me to bite back the commentary in my head. It’ll continue to be unfair for literally the rest of your life because even twenty years from now when you’re an adult you’ll be trying to figure out how to get to four houses during Thanksgiving weekend while the people who wreaked all this havoc in your lives will still be oblivious to or not care about the impact their choices had on you and they’ll be somewhere focused on themselves, watching TV or decorating something.

    Deeeeeeeeeeeep breath.

    And yet, my relationships with the girls are stronger, I think, after navigating many tough moments together. Even the ones where we’ve all been super shouty. (Maybe especially because of the ones where we’ve all been super shouty.)

    I get to hear my children giggle with their friends at all hours of the day and night. And I get to see my children with their friends and see the whole “them,” because kids are different with their friends than they are with their parents.

    I get to enjoy impromptu after-dinner dessert creations. And then I get to listen to them argue and snap at each other, only to awaken to the alarm they set so they could get up together at 4:45 on a school day to do hair.

    I get to listen to their go-to music choices, and realize that at tough moments they both ask Alexa to play worship music. I get to see that they rely on God to help calm their storms, which makes my heart happy and also reminds me that I need to rely on Him more.

    I get to see – I am privileged to see – the good times and the bad times and the blah times and the working-through-something times, and the moments of discovery and the moments of frustration and the moments of trepidation followed by the moments of triumph and even the moments of punch-drunk silliness. In part it is simply being present in all of those situations and moments that strengthen our bonds. Sometimes it is really, really hard to be the only one present in those moments but I am so grateful to be present.

    I’m thankful for dozens and dozens of things. My Aunt is in town for Thanksgiving. My parents are all healthy and celebrating another holiday season. Home and car and food. My church. Laughter with old friends. My work family. All of our helpers. Teachers who really care. Veterinarians who work you in at the last minute. Chocolate covered raisins. Extended time off this week – time to read, time to prepare for the holidays, and time to watch an episode of The Crown. Photographs. Memes my daughters text or share. Forgiveness. Tender little hearts that want to see the best in people. Conviction. Snuggles and declarations of love when eyes are too heavy to keep open just before sleep sets in.

    My cup runneth over with things just from today.

    I saw a long post on Facebook recently about “what’s in your cup?” and it really stuck with me. Paraphrasing…If someone bumps into you while you’re holding a full cup, what’s in the cup is what spills out. Tea or coffee or hot chocolate. When life happens, what’s in our heart is what spills out of us.

    My cup runneth over…And yet what spills out in a bump is still a bit of a work-in-progress.

  • Brave Girl Wannabe is Angry

    The bravest people I know are children surviving the behavior of selfish adults.

    The bravest people I know are children who try to offer forgiveness in scenarios where “adults” like me simply cannot.

    The bravest people I know are children who admit they are afraid and ask for help.

    The bravest people I know are children who run out of cards before they run out of things for which they’re thankful, even when their life is not what they expected or what they deserve.

    Brave Girl Wannabe Thursday Truth: I got really, really, really angry today and I was a complete bitch. And I don’t even regret it.

  • Brave Girls ARE the storm.

    Brave Girls ARE the storm.

    Urban Dictionary has some very interesting – and some pretty hilarious – definitions for family.

    • It’s not necessarily about who’s blood you have, or who you’re forced to spend the holidays with. It’s about people you love and they love you back.
    • A bunch of people who hate each other and eat dinner together.
    • People you love who love you back, not necessarily blood or biological, but you trust them and they trust you, and they take care of you and you take care of them.
    • People who get into your business.
    • Family is not defined by shared DNA. It is defined by the people who love you as much as you love them; they are the ones you call and the ones who will never let you fall. They are the ones you trust with everything and anything, and you know that you will never let each other down.

    I lucked out big time in the family department. I grew up in a household with parents who loved me, who worked hard to provide for us, and who spent their time with us and their energy on us. I came home from school to parents who asked me about my day and then we all sat down to dinner together every night. My Dad is a prankster who can make Grace seem longer than any Catholic mass, my sister is a donut thief, and my Mom has a super-secret personal Scrabble dictionary that allows her to spell balloon with one L and win by 142 points.

    My family isn’t perfect, but we love each other unconditionally. We are a unit, we can trust each other, we can count on each other, and perhaps most importantly we are ourselves with each other.

    It never once occurred to me that my girls would not have that family unit – that home with Mom and Dad and those secret inside jokes and shared experiences only the 4 of you know. That complete trust in their parents and that freedom to be themselves at any and all times. And more than everything else that I’ve fretted about and worried about and been sad about in the last 8 months combined, I have mourned that.

    I have mourned that my girls will not have the family unit they should have.

    The family unit they deserve.

    Frankly, it really pisses me off because it was stolen from them. It was stolen from them by people who made very selfish choices and thought nothing of the impact their decisions and behavior would have on two innocent children. But as the anger has subsided a bit, I’ve thought a lot about the fact that roughly half of all marriages end in divorce and so at least half of our nation’s children grow up without that intact family unit. Why is that? How does that happen? Is it that people in our time have turned away from faith, that we’ve normalized divorce on TV, we play too many video games or spend too much time on our phones, we’ve sexualized everything on all kinds of media, or we’re smoking pot legally in all kinds of states? The list of possibilities seems endless, and yet it seems like none of those things are it.

    And so I began to wonder…if we don’t come from a “whole” family unit or our family unit is broken in some way, do we really value family as much as others? Because how can you really know what you missed out on when you never had it?

    And are you then more likely to grow up and enter into relationships which are more likely to end in divorce? Statistically speaking, you can find numbers to support the Yes and the No sides of that question. But as I’ve rolled all of these things around in my head over and over and over again, I’ve started to think that I am not sure that people who are raised in a “whole” family unit and people who are raised in a “broken” family can even really understand the life of the other. And if that’s true, can someone from a “broken” home really even grasp what people and children will miss out on if they don’t grow up in a “whole” family unit? Maybe not?

    Maybe not.

    Maybe. Not.

    And if that maybe not is true, then I can’t be as angry about something that people don’t even have the ability to understand. It’s like being mad at someone for not understanding Spanish when they have never read or heard Spanish before. And suddenly my sail has less angry wind in it.

    That’s how this process works – the divorce/grief healing process. It’s a repeated assessment of an angry wind in your sail, until one day you’ve been through all the reasons for angry winds and all the angry is gone.

    Brave girls don’t run from those reasons. Brave girls think about those reasons one by one. I can do that. Brave girls get through all of the reasons for the anger and then the anger is gone. I’m not there yet.

    My aunt and my cousins visited us this weekend. I absolutely love time with family. I love sitting and talking for hours. I love overeating and telling old stories and taking photos and laughing at bathroom jokes. I love getting to know the children of my first cousins – the girls I was so excited to see each Christmas that I would stand at my Mama’s front window and count cars until theirs pulled into the driveway. They have children now – boys who are almost grown – who love history and games, who have jobs, who are kind and thoughtful, and who giggled with my daughters in a pew at the back of my church. I love that we worshipped together.

    We are a unit. We have shared DNA running through all of us. I may no longer be able to give my girls a “traditional” home with a Mom and Dad and board games after dinner. But I can give them family who love them and who they love back. Family with whom they have shared experiences. Family with whom they can look at angry waves and stand surrounded by angry waters as they feel angry winds hit their faces. Family that makes them feel so loved, they can face that anger and then turn away from the chaos and smile.

    “Fate whispers to the warrior, “You cannot withstand the storm.”

    The warrior whispers back, “I am the storm.”