Can We Talk?

Ohhhh....how life happens. Precisely 3 days after posting the previous entry, I was talking with a friend at the park. I told her about this ambitious project I had come up with to involve our family in weekly service projects for the whole year. She told me I was being overly ambitious. My innocent reply: Really? Okay, it wouldn't be the first time I had been naive. Or bit off more than I could chew. In fact, I think I am kind of an expert on that...but that's beside the point. I thought if it were something REALLY worthwhile and something I was REALLY passionate about I could commit... Well, the truth is reality doesn't work that way. Life happens. Babies get sick. A teenager needs more love and teaching. A daughter is ready to learn about some of the harder facts of life. A six year old needs help with Girl Scout cookie sales. In a family, I realized, service is actually the order of the day. Not a day goes by without it. It is the steel girder that holds up the framework of a family. So for all the missed opportunities to serve in our wider community, for all the posts I missed on our blog (holy cow! was it really two months?), I really can't admit to a lot guilt or frustration over missing a goal. Because in actuality, we were still serving. Everyday there were boo-boos to kiss, a baby brother who wanted a trip to the park, a little sister who needs help with homework, a son who needs to talk until late at night. This is service. This is family. All the same, maybe I will change my goal to two big projects a month. Overly ambitious? Really?

Dave, the Anchor

I mentioned in our previous post that since the kickball event didn't allow little ones, we decided to divide and conquer for this particular service Saturday. I had hurriedly run out the door that morning, calling back to my husband who was staying home with the little ones, "Why don't you guys make some muffins and visit the elderly couple around the corner?" Smile. Door Slam. Car Starts.

Of course. I should know better. Dave is many things, and he is not many others. But one thing he most DEFINITELY is, its selfless. And service-minded. And handsome. :) He needed absolutely no suggestions or guidance from me.

After an eventful and humbling morning playing kickball, my daughter and I came home to a nearly spotless house. Dave had enlisted the tiniest minions in our household in full scale, hands-on service: do the jobs that Mom and Sister would be doing if they were home. That way, when they got home, they're jobs would be mostly done.

Two things:

First, Dave is the genius here. While I think of teaching my children to reach outside themselves to forgotten corners of our city and world to help others, he remembers to teach them to look at who is standing next to them. He teaches them that it doesn't matter one lick how nice you are to a stranger if you are not nice to the person who lives in the bedroom down the hall. He teaches them that "no success can compensate for failure in the home." Who we are as individuals, as humans, has its roots in how we relate to those who know us best: our family. He remembers this, and teaches them that serving each other, in a family, is one of the noblest acts on earth.

Second, maybe you have to be a full- time stay-at-home-mom to appreciate this, but coming home to find your to-do list mostly done, is like Christmas morning all over again. Its BETTER than Christmas.

I love that man.