I Am

This has been a terrible week for me but I am not going to focus on that here.

Instead I am going to look at two very small words said by my oldest today.

I AM.

She looked at us and said, 'that's what artists do and I AM an artist.'

I teared up. She is so sure of part of what she wants to do. I didn't have the confidence to say anything like that till much older than her. In fact I sometimes struggle with the idea of saying I am a writer.

She doesn't see how tough it is to be creative and prosper in that, she just wants to do it. She spends a lot of time drawing, making, colouring and painting.

When I'm down at my worst I fleetingly wonder if we are doing her a disservice in encouraging her to pursue things like this. I wonder because it has been so hard for us to even get where we are. I can't not encourage her though. It means so much to me that she is free to become the person she wants to be, no matter what course that takes.

There is power in words, I spend so much time around them I shouldn't forget that.

So I am going to take a moment to just say this...

I AM A WRITER.

Sometimes the lessons we need to learn are the ones the young can teach us.

The End is Closing In

We finally got our final store closing notification this week.

It has been a mix of good and bad days recently. Some people are really nice about it, understanding even, others however are rude and obnoxious. When I couldn't tell a person if we had a particular book she retorted that 'it was no wonder we were closing'. I tried explaining that our systems were no longer accurate but well people just don't understand. They don't care to understand.

The other thing is I am finding it somewhat difficult to get motivated to apply for other jobs. I have managed to do so though. A couple of interesting possibilities so I guess we'll see what happens.

There has also been a lot of prayer but to be honest it has felt one directional. I don't feel abandoned by God and I feel stressed that I don't feel stressed. I know that sounds silly but it's how I feel. It's as if I should be more worried about the future yet I can't be. It takes me back to that verse 'who can add a day to their lives by worrying', or words to that effect.

I feel it will all work out I just don't know how and I'd really like it not to go down to the wire. Especially with lease renewal coming up and rent increasing.

Sometimes it's nice to day dream about what I would really like to happen and that includes having a house of our own and the money to study the courses we would like to.

I'm happy to keep working, though who wouldn't like to have the money to just write and make films and music (fill in your own great fantasy here).

Stayed tuned to this station.

Ends and Beginnings

This has been a tough week.

It's no secret that I struggle with church, but we have started going fairly regularly, the girls finally have found a place they feel comfortable and I enjoy a place that teaches things I haven't heard seventeen times before. So I find it a little annoying or frustrating that an opportunity for hubby has gone south (though there was peace that came with that decision along with the frustration that we don't know when or if another door with that potential will open again). On top of that, my work finally announced this week that it is over, it's doors will be closing. Not unexpected but sad none the less.

With sadness comes uncertainty. They haven't told us when we will be closing, they've announced in a press release the definite final day but if we sell through our stock before then, then we close earlier. We have been told very little. I'm hoping on a proper redundancy but that doesn't seem very likely.

In all this uncertainty I've been trying to be positive and view it as an opportunity. To hold on to God, even push in closer. It would be nice to have more time at home to write, but I'm really going to miss my books. I found a job I was really good at and now it's no longer there. I have to trust. I've been repeating like some sort of mantra, 'I trust you with my family God'. At the moment it's all I really have the strength to do.

I know this is an opportunity but that doesn't mean I can't be sad for what I'm losing.

Hoping things will be more positive next week.

Parenting the Minefield

Three weeks since I last blogged here and on my writing blog, of course I have been really busy with the review site TheKylieVerse.

Miss 3 has recovered well from her surgery and is very glad to be back at school, now other issues have surfaced. She is getting quite physical and has been told on more than several occasions to not hit her sister. We've gone down the 'not bullying' path and the 'it's not nice' path and yet sometimes she just goes back to that default setting. It's at times like that when I really wonder just how bad a parent I am.

Then I remember that parenting is a bit like walking through a minefield. You can never quite always know where the problems are going to explode. It would of course be so much easier if we did. She is strong and stubborn and won't be cowed by anyone which will be great traits for her to grow in to, if we can encourage her the right way.

This of course is also one of the joys of parenting - watching them grow and finding the little things they excel at and then hopefully finding ways to encourage those traits. Having said that Miss 8 has just decided she is going to be a tattoo artist. We went out and added different colours to her tattoo pen collection - I wonder if that makes us good or bad parents?

Thankfulness and Hard Times

This week has been intense for me for various reasons. In fact the last few weeks have been tough. Rejection (a constant in two areas I'm passionately pursuing) has been there, as well as struggling with the play I was rehearsing (we opened last night), and the looming surgery for my baby, as well as a bunch of junk going on with work.

The biggest thing without question has been the surgery. My daughter has been waiting for it for 18 months - they messed up at the hospital which set us back twelve months. Sure the surgery is pretty standard but there is always a risk with any surgery. It was hard walking out of the surgery once she had been put under but that was nothing compared to seeing her post-op with blood around her mouth and ear. She looked so tiny, so fragile. I was hopeful but still in the back of my mind I was worried, I guess most if not all parents would be. Any way she seemed to cope well and she definitely had more sleep that night than I did, I have no idea how anyone sleeps in a hospital.

Fortunately the next morning the Dr took one look at her overnight obs and said she could go straight home when she was ready. Awesome news and a great start to her recovery. She is doing so well that apart from a bit extra tiredness you would never know she had had an operation a few days ago.

So with her recovery looking alright and me sitting in a semi-dark hospital room watching tv on my computer something came and reminded me how fortunate I was and how thankful I was to God for how Miss 3 came through her op. A little girl was bought into the ward. She was tiny and her mother almost hysterical. Probably past it only due to exhaustion. She didn't even look 2 and had had to have her appendix out in an emergency op. The mother had previously been told not to worry because her daughter would be fine, it couldn't possibly be her appendix because she was too young. Of course that was a misdiagnosis and I'm sure if I had been in her shoes I probably would have been at least that stressed if not more so. In that moment I just had to pray in thankfulness that we had finally had our surgery, that it didn't get to the point of emergency and that even in those moments when delay and even the initial diagnosis had me wondering if God was even looking out for my girls, he obviously was. It also reminded me that there are people who always have it harder and they need our prayers even more than we need to pray for ourselves.

See God sees a picture I don't and sometimes it is very hard to remember that. When everything seems to be coming apart at the seams I try to hold on and pray and believe. Even then it feels pointless sometimes, that I'm barely holding on by my fingertips. Now though seeing things from the other side of the op, I feel more relaxed and thankful and somehow in amongst everything else I found my character and when I got on stage last night I nailed it. This reminds me that sometimes prayer feels a little ineffective, a bit like going through the motions but even in those times God knows our hearts and He hears, He just answers in His own way and on a very few occasions we are lucky enough to see the why later.

Gets My Goat

Okay yes it's a silly saying, especially seeing as I don't have one or want one but it's much more polite than the words I'd prefer to use.

You see this week a person I know admitted to suffering from a mental illness, at the same time they said their partner had been cheating on them for months. And that is all the details you will get for this isn't a gossip column, but the details are pertinent.

In the aftermath of these disclosures things have been said, yes there were plenty of encouraging and supportive things but the thing I am going to focus on is this, 'oh well I'm sure God will bring restoration to your marriage'.

WHAT! Hello?

Seriously of all the things that could be said. If I was in that situation and someone said that to me I may plant my fist in their face, and yes I know that response isn't very christian, but I'm not at all convinced what they said to this person was all that christian either.

Someone going through something like that doesn't want to hear that. Or at least I can't imagine they do.

This made me remember the time I called my dying mother up on the phone, she sounded very unhappy. I asked her what was wrong and it came out that people from her church had been saying to her that she needed to 'look deep within for she must have sin she refused to admit to or God would have healed her', or words to that effect. I was irate. Now I may not be a picture perfect christian but my mum was a lot closer to that than I was. I wanted to go down there and smack them out.

So this brings me to my thing for today, what makes christians feel the need to spout such utter rubbish sometimes? Do they simply not think before they open their mouths? Or are they so drowning in the rhetoric that they can't come up with something genuine to say?

And let me make it clear that these people are certainly in the minority but that it happens at all really bugs me. (And yes I know that sometimes God does bring about restoration though I'm sure if you ask those people it's not without some hard work and miraculous forgiveness first) Sometimes it seems to me that those that don't go around professing their goodness and relationship with God get it more right, you wouldn't hear one of my non-church going friends suggesting you hope for restoration of marriage, nor blaming some hidden sin for sickness. In fact they would probably help kick the cheating so and so out and be the first to ask 'hey sucks you're so sick is there anything we can do?'

Decisions, Decisions

Last week we went to church. We haven't been very regular about going for a while now, but we think me may have found somewhere we can be okay with. And yes okay is a deliberate word choice. I'm not looking for somewhere I will be happy or content or feel at home. Sad but true. There is too much water under that bridge. I am okay with the fact that the messages we've heard has quite a lot of biblical content and they aren't the same messages I have heard a hundred times. I'm okay with the fact it is close to home. And I'm hoping people won't expect us to fit in with their programmes only to be put out when we don't.

It all boils down to the fact I can still believe in God (even though I struggle with the form my faith takes a lot) but my girls are young and don't have the grounding I do, I want them to be informed, I want them to know the love of God and the friendships that are possible when you share a faith. I don't want them to not have that because I really struggle with the way the church has seemed to developed.

Yes I know I'm cynical. I know I can be abrasive - I've been told often enough. I know I don't play well with others. I like my space and I don't like being boxed into certain categories. Part of me wishes it wasn't that way. Part of me longs for the times when I felt really close to God. I have the feeling though that that trip will be a fair way back. So meanwhile I have decided to take baby steps. To once again say to God I love you please show me the way and what you want me to do. I can't promise that I will be able to go that way. At least not at first and I must confess to hoping the foundational things that I believe God placed in my life will stay solid and the focus for the future.

I can tell you one thing though I think I'm done with acting for a while. Not for faith reasons. Just because. One rejection too many for the moment and to be perfectly honest I'm really wishing I had more time to devote to my writing. My on-line life is booming as I try to manage three blogs, reading books to review, my social networking obsession and I really need more time to write my stuff.

The other thing I need to do is try and spend more time with my kids. With so much going on and having to go to work the girls are starting to ask if I will spend time with them. It's not that I don't love them, just that I have so many things I'm doing. Today I told them we would have a girls date night - a movie after dinner and I would make popcorn. I told them that early in the day so I would stick to it. If I just think these things I have a tendency to get sidetracked into other things. My girls are so patient with me. I am so blessed to have kids that play fairly well together and understand my drive to write. I love them and I need to make sure I show them so not just tell them so. I think sometimes I fall into the trap that if I say 'I love you' than that's enough. Quite obviously when they are asking me to play fairies with them, or whatever their game of the moment happens to be, then I'm missing the mark with making them feel loved. Actions sometimes really do speak louder than words.

I guess next week will be interesting, not that I'm sure my life can handle much more interesting.