Learning and Healing Through Nature and Creation

Seasons Always Change

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Dear Lacey,

After entertaining the idea of moving last year, Dad and I decided to settle in and get you and your sister graduated before leaving our beloved home of 15 years. Then the first week of March, just after my sycamore tree finally sprang back to life, a house came on the market tempting us to change our minds. We made an offer and went under contract that weekend. Three weeks later our own house was packed and purged, and a for sale sign was placed out front.

Two months after that we handed off our keys to the new owners. I said goodbye to my sycamore tree while you said goodbye to the house where you’ve lived your entire life. As we drove away one last time, you asked me if I was ok. Of course, this is not the first time you’ve asked me if I was ok lately, and chances are it won’t be the last. And this is because change is hard and transitions are messy, and these sudden changes are always the hardest and messiest of all. Even when they are for the better. Somehow (like your Momma) you always know when someone is not ok, and your tender heart has been burdened for me these last several months, even as you are processing your own changes and losses associated with leaving the only home you’ve ever known.

The hardest part of the last three months for me has been the weight of every sudden change and transition we’ve lived through over the last 15 years feeling as if it is all crashing down on me at once. As I’ve gone through long forgotten cabinets and closets overflowing with boxes of our family’s collected memories, my heart and mind have overflowed with more joy and grief than I am able to hold in. I realize my emotions continue to spill all over the place, splashing everyone I love, and while my grief makes me feel a little crazy and a lot guilty, I’m thankful for the way you notice and are determined to make sure I am ok.

Fifteen years ago when we first moved in, life looked very different. I was in my late 20’s with three adorable children four and under. I was married to a man I loved, worked at a school I loved, served at a church I loved, and was raising a family I loved with the help of two doting grandmas. Two grandmas who adored us and regularly fought over whose turn it was to get the grandchildren.

Then suddenly, just as we were moving into our new home, my mom (your nana) was diagnosed with cancer at the age of 49. This began a long journey filled with trips to the medical center, surgeries, chemotherapy, remission, scans, and eventually hospice. Somewhere in the remission stage of Nana’s journey, you were born. But when Nana’s cancer came back with a vengeance just before your first birthday, instead of my mom helping me keep my children alive, I was daily passing my four children off to others- desperately hoping and praying the doctors we were visiting could help me keep my mom alive.

It was almost twelve years ago now when your Aunt Kellie had a spontaneous wedding in the backyard of our beautiful home days before your Nana took her last breath in our dining room. That was the same year your other grandma suddenly got sick and took her last breath, making us primary caregivers for your deaf grandpa suffering from severe dementia. I remember that first Easter standing in our kitchen boiling eggs for coloring (something Nana had always done) and realizing at the ripe old age of 33 I was the lost and lonely matriarch of our family. I now understand why you would cling so tightly to me as a young child. It was your way of making sure even then, I was ok.

One of our backyard trees also died the same year as your grandmothers, and that too broke your Daddy’s heart. Little did I know the new tree we planted would not only mark the number of years we have lived without your grandmas, but it would also mark the seasons of my survival, growth, and healing.

Without Grandmas around to take care of us, and with a Grandpa needing constant supervision, I had to significantly cut back my hours and eventually leave that job I loved. We settled into our new normal which included lots of homework help, dance parties, game nights, and family dinners during the week. And theatre performances, soccer games, and birthday parties on the weekends. You were an expert at just being along for the ride as we incessantly chauffeured your older siblings around town. As you kids grew, the house seemed to shrink, so we eventually decided to add on a playroom hoping to contain the many friends over the years that have made our house their second home.

Then suddenly, almost 6 years ago now, right in the middle of our major home addition, Hurricane Harvey dropped by and left behind six feet of stagnant water inside our house for a full 14 days. We were rescued by boat and then our family of seven (including your grandpa) couch surfed for weeks until we found a house to rent. When the water finally subsided, friends and neighbors came to help us throw most everything we owned onto our front lawn.

Recovery from the storm was impossibly slow, painful, and messy, and looking back I realize I struggled to get back on my feet mentally and emotionally for much longer than the 11 months it took to get back in our home. It was during this season you faced your own mid-elementary school crisis.

I distinctly remember the parent teacher conference halfway through second grade that led to pulling you out for the remainder of the school year. Ms. Cooper gave us a glimpse into the intensity of your school days as she described a child longing to do well but consumed by absorbing every emotion in the room. She would let you stay in from PE or lunch with her on your hardest days, so you did not have to endure the chaos of the cafeteria or gymnasium. You would amaze her with the depth and intensity of your intuitions, questions, and observations. Ms. Cooper described you daily seeking out students who needed an advocate or extra help, and then on days when she was struggling (as all adults sometimes do) you seemed to magnetically be drawn to her side eager to somehow help her as well.

I know all too well how easy it is for us intuitive and empathetic types to lose ourselves helping others, and how hard it is for us helpers to notice or acknowledge when we need help ourselves. During that season, I knew you needed help, but I had no idea I needed help too.

All of a sudden, I was crisis homeschooling you. And then shortly after that COVID-19 hit, and I was unexpectedly crisis homeschooling all four of my children. Now three years later, your two oldest siblings are technically adults, Hallie is halfway through high school, you are in middle school, and the sycamore tree we planted the year your grandmas died is now over 40 feet tall- providing shade to more than half the back yard.

Post-Harvey home during Snowstorm Uri with my Sycamore in the background.

This tree has also provided shade for my soul as I’ve intently watched it survive and grow through some of the harshest storms and seasons we have ever had in Houston. Hurricane Harvey of course, but also Snowstorm Uri. I never even knew snowstorms were named until this one shut down our city for weeks. Despite harsh droughts and hard freezes, the sycamore continues to burst into life each spring, reminding me, even when winter lingers and I look like I am dead, the spring will always return.

Every fall, once the large asymmetric leaves of the sycamore fall off, a loblolly pine tree just over the neighbor’s back yard fence comes into full view. The evergreen needles remind me all through the winter that things are not always as they appear. Some trees look dead half their lives, and others seem to flourish all year long, but really, they are all just doing their best to survive the current season and grow wherever they have been planted with whatever resources they have been given. Last spring, I discovered my sycamore had not only survived another brutal winter, but a sycamore sapling had spontaneously sprouted in my butterfly garden right near a brand-new pine sapling.

A friend once told me the real miracle is not when full grown trees survive harsh conditions and changing seasons. The real miracle is that a seed becomes a sapling at all. I looked it up for myself and it turns out less than 1% of all germinating seeds survive to become seedlings in natural conditions. And this says nothing for how many seedlings survive to become full grown trees. This miracle of two saplings surviving in my butterfly garden was discovered not too long after I’d stumbled across Isaiah 41:19 which tells us the Lord places the plane and pine trees together in the desert. The plane tree (which happens to be the technical name for my backyard American sycamore) and the pine tree are of course not the kinds of trees you usually find in a desert. The very next verse says it is created this way on purpose so “that they may see and know, may consider and understand together, that the hand of the Lord has done this.” I love how the spiritual, the natural, the human, the statistical, the relational, and the scientific parts of life all mirror each other. And if that was not enough, the Lord still gives us His living Word connecting all these reflections in more complete ways.

At the beginning of May, when we first got the keys to our new house, we invited some of our closest friends to celebrate with us by taking a dip in our new pool and ordering pizza to our new address. Sitting there surrounded by our new forest and our closest friends, I was only half engaged, dazing off into the night, trying to make sense of all the “suddenlys” we have faced in the last 15 years now packed in boxes waiting to be loaded onto moving trucks arriving the following morning. Nana’s wigs I could not bring myself to throw away, Grandma’s wedding dress our dear friends rescued from the refuse pile after the flood and then paid to have cleaned and restored. All the board games and puzzles begging to be reengaged, and way too many legos, costumes, and American Girl doll accessories begging to be donated to children much younger than you. And then there’s the fifteen years of artwork, poetry, writing, notes, and math equations (your brother’s of course) found filling notepads, journals, and sketchbooks throughout the entire house. You were swimming in our new pool when you noticed me lost in these memories. You quickly dried off and came over to ask me if I was ok. You and I both knew I was lying as I reassured you.

The moving trucks came and went, and then Daddy headed to the old back yard with a shovel and wheelbarrow to pack up one last treasured possession- my sycamore sapling which has quickly grown to over three feet. I knew this was the wrong season to transplant a tree, but I also knew this tree’s chance of survival was much better coming with us than staying put right where the new owners are planning to add a swimming pool.

The transition did not go so well. By the time we loaded her up into the back of Dad’s trusty old truck and drove the half mile to our new home just on the other side of the bayou, several leaves had withered. As we lifted the tree into its freshly dug hole, all the dirt fell away leaving her roots vulnerable and exposed. For the next several days, no matter how much I watered or prayed, every leaf started to brown and my pile of leaves around her base began to steadily grow. Death by transplant shock seemed inevitable.

I recruited your brother to help me do some research and look for signs of life as I continued to water, watch, and wait. He assured me it takes a tree as much energy to shed a leaf as it does to sprout a leaf, so the falling leaves should encourage me more than they discourage me. He pointed to the wilting, discolored, wrinkled leaves still clinging to the branches and assured me they too were not evidence she was dying, but further evidence she was working hard to stay alive. It has been a month now and she still looks pretty awful. I have resolved myself to the fact she is going to look like she is dying until next spring, but I no longer need your brother to see the evidence of life and growth in my young sycamore. This week she sprouted a tiny new green leaf to accompany the three large lonely multicolored leaves she has held tightly to through her transplant.

The pine sapling, which has grown ever so slowly and still measures less than a foot in height, was planted just on the other side of the fence in the front yard behind the bench swing. I have diligently watered him as well, however he has never shown any signs of shock or stress giving me no way to really know if he is also just surviving this transition, or if he is already thriving. I tend to think it’s the former.

A friend noticed the tiny pine in the yard and asked if I was planning to pull it out or let it grow. I did not mention to her I had planted it there myself on purpose, because like the rest of the world, she would never understand why these baby trees are so important to me. Especially when our new home is literally surrounded by a forest and our front yard is already home to two holly trees, a full-grown loblolly pine, two sago palms, a fig tree, several crepe myrtles, two large oak trees, and two full grown bald cypress trees. Oh, and miracle of miracles, one tiny bald cypress that has beat the odds and made it from seed to sapling in natural conditions far away from a water source.

All that to say Lacey, I know it does not always look like it, and frankly it does not always feel like it either, but I really am ok. Yes, I promise! And thanks to a few saplings growing out on the side and front of our new house, I can tell you why I am so confident.

  • I am ok because things are not always what they seem. Sometimes we look alive while we are dead on the inside, and sometimes we look dead just before we burst into full bloom. While things are not always as they seem, if we look hard enough we will find signs of life and evidence of growth and grace in every season or storm. Even when the grace looks like just barely surviving another day.
  • I am ok because even on days or in seasons when we do not have the strength to search for grace, we can rest assured the seasons will again change even as we continue to grow. That’s what it means to be alive- facing constantly changing seasons along with unexpected storms interrupting the predictability of those seasons. Droughts, freezes, and floods are difficult, but no matter how long the harsh winters last, spring always comes. And then summer. And then fall. No matter how long we stay dormant or how dead we look or feel, we know we are ok because we, like the trees, are slowly growing just as surely as the seasons are slowly changing.  
  • I am ok because it is normal, that like trees, people also wilt, wither, and shed when they are in shock, stressed, or sick. They suffer when they are faced with unexpected storms and harsh seasons that linger. Your momma still struggling as she processes all the sudden losses and changes she has faced in this last year as well as in the last 15 years, is not evidence she is dying, but evidence she is working hard to stay alive. Evidence she is ok, even if she sometimes looks and feels like she is not.
  • I am ok because I know shedding and letting go takes as much energy as growing and grabbing hold. I know my falling leaves can be messy, but the falling leaves are simply more evidence of grace as I continue to let go of the past and embrace new seasons of change and growth.
  • And I am ok because I am assured the Lord holds my life in His hands in the same way He places trees together in the desert. Last week when your brother was helping me search my transplanted plane tree for evidence of life, I felt the need to defend my sanity by explaining to him why these baby trees were so important to me. I pulled out my Bible to read him Isaiah 41:19, but was unable to speak as I noticed for the first time a third tree had been planted in the desert alongside the plane and the pine. A tree abundant in swamps, creeks, and rivers. So not native or abundant in Houston, and certainly not ever found in a desert. The exact words read “I will set in the desert the cypress, the plane, and the pine together that they may see and know, may consider and understand together, that the hand of the Lord has done this, the Holy One of Israel has created it.” The tiny cypress tree that has made it from seed to sapling in natural conditions spontaneously sprouted almost equal distances from the plane and pine we transplanted from our old house, forming a triangle of baby trees. The cypress, the plane, and the pine together.

Life is hard Lacey, and no doubt one day you will find your self in a season or storm that has you convinced you are not ok. But hang on, because the seasons will inevitably change, things are not always as they seem, and remember that the Creator holds you in His hands and has planted you right where you are meant to be. I sure am thankful you have been planted as the Spaulding baby sister, and I’m thankful for all the storms and seasons we get to continue to go through together in our new home.

Love,

Mom

 

It’s Not That Deep

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Dear Hallie,

Today is Mother’s Day and just like every other second Sunday in May for the last ten years, I find myself experiencing a tidal wave of grief mingled gladness. It’s difficult to believe I’ve survived ten Mother’s Days without my mom around to share in the joys and burdens of my own motherhood journey, or without being able to thank her for the legacy of sacrifice and joy she has left for her daughters and her seven grandchildren. While my heart overflows with gratitude that I get to be the “Spaulding Mom”, it sinks with sadness that there are no grandmothers around to share in the indescribable joy that comes with watching you all grow-up.

After a lovely breakfast and worship service with all my favorite people this morning, I retreated to my butterfly garden as I often do lately when tidal waves of emotion threaten to knock me down. It was in my garden just now that your current slogan for life (the one we are all trying to eradicate from your vocabulary) kept interrupting my thoughts. Your throaty, monotone, unimpressed insistence that “it’s not that deep,” is your current way of reminding us all to lighten up a little and soak in the sunshine. Of course, we are all pretty sure you mean these words to annoy us as often as you mean to make us lighten up and laugh.

You were born an optimist, so during your fifth year of life when both your grandmother’s died, it’s not surprising you didn’t hold tightly to the painful memories of suffering and loss that surrounded both of their illnesses and deaths. When you share memories of your grandmothers, they are always full of playgrounds, presents, and dance parties. True to your nature, you held tight to the sunshine despite the years of caregiving and grief that consumed our family (especially your mom) during that season. I know it was as difficult for you as it was for the rest of us, but you rarely shed any tears. You have always had your own way of making sense of and dealing with your losses- mainly avoiding tidal waves of grief at all costs, either by distracting everyone with your antics or by spreading around your contagious sunshine. One evening not long after we’d said our final goodbyes to your grandmas, I was tucking you in for the night when your Nana came up in conversation. You looked at me with somber insistence and said, “can we please not talk about Nana anymore so you will stop crying.” Pretty sure that was just your five-year-old version of, “it’s not that deep!”

Nana died ten years ago at the end of March. Aunt Kellie and I were the only people in the world who realized ten years without her here came and went. I marked it by taking her memory with me on errands she’d have enjoyed. I walked through an antique shop and bought a necklace reminiscent of the heart one she always wore, and a small original Rudyard Kipling poetry book. She didn’t necessarily love poetry, but she did love old books still wearing their dust jackets, so she’d have approved. Next, I went to “Wild Birds Unlimited” to stock up on seed for my feeders in hopes her red cardinals might join in the chorus of bird songs soon. Lastly, I spent a bunch of money at my favorite gardening store. I love the wildflower seed mix in full bloom out back, but every year it gets trickier to know who’s a flower and who’s a weed. After four years one invasive weed officially took over my beloved butterfly garden which had previously been teeming with a beautiful assortment of pollinators and host plants. This spring I have chosen to limit the wildflower mix to a smaller confined space in the garden, and I’ve intentionally planted specific flowers in defined areas making many of the intrusive weeds easier to spot and remove.

Just now in my Mother’s Day gardening therapy session, I set to work watering, pulling weeds, and replanting my Pincushion Flower plant. The first time your words “it’s not that deep,” came to mind was while I was filling the bird bath with fresh water from the garden hose. I rolled my eyes as your annoying mantra was nothing more than a restatement of the obvious. The thirsty ground drinks in the cool water on contact so the only chance for my birds and butterflies to find a drink in this Houston heat is to keep the shallow cement bowl filled. It’s a good thing the bowl is “not that deep” or else we might be unintentionally creating space for those cursed mosquitos to breed. I detest those mosquitoes as much as I detest the invasive weeds that threaten to kill and destroy all that’s meant to blossom, live, and grow.

I considered your infamous words a second time as I began pulling the unwanted weeds out at the root, and I smiled with gratitude for weeds with roots “not that deep.” It really is easy to identify the unwelcome growth on the cultivated side of the garden where boundaries are clear, and every flower is known by name. In no time at all I found and removed any new growth that might be a threat. On the side of the garden teeming with interwoven wildflower sprouts of all sorts, it’s much harder to know who is a friend. I’ve learned to identify the Mercury weed that wreaked havoc last year, and today set to tearing any trace of it out at the root. I’m thankful the Mercury weed does not have roots that run deep, and as long as I’m diligent in tending the garden that weed will never be able to destroy this sacred space again.

Once more your insistence “it’s not that deep,” entered my conscious mind as I discovered the little Pincoushin Flower plant did not look so great. Upon closer examination it was clear the hole I’d originally dug for this plant was not nearly deep enough, and the dirt I’d packed around the top of the plant had been washed away by last week’s torrential downpour. I set to work digging a little deeper and packing the topsoil a little tighter, making sure all the exposed roots are now safe and secure underground. That poor plant was “not that deep”, but it should have been!

Please keep reminding us that we are all so prone to make too big a deal out of things in life that really are “not that deep.” Keep making us laugh, keep reminding us to be grateful, and keep spreading your sunshine everywhere you go; even as you trust the Lord to daily fill your cup to overflow with living water and satisfy your every need.

But sometimes realize there are weeds growing in and around you that are important to tend to. If you let them take root and grow out of control, they can kill that which the Lord means to blossom, flourish, and grow. A choice that seems small, insignificant, and shallow might end up destroying everything you love and have worked hard for (or at the very least landing you in another Saturday detention!)

And finally, you need to know there are some things that really are that deep. Grief, friendship, love, joy, family, faith, justice, truth, beauty. Dig deep, and then let these things take root down in your soul. Let them matter to you. Let yourself feel them. Let them blossom, grow, and flourish. Let them change you.

I realize I can be a little too sentimental sometimes, and you are not the first to try to convince me “it’s not that deep!” Your Nana would regularly tell me to “stop making a thing out of nothing,” even as she’d strive to make the hard things in life feel light and spread her optimism and sunshine around everywhere she went. If she were here today, I’d want her to know I’m learning to hold lightly the things that really are “not that deep,” but other things, (like my love and gratitude for her) run far deeper than she ever knew. I would want to tell her that her brief beautiful life did matter, and it matters still as her legacy lives on in the lives of her children and her grandchildren. Hallie Lousie, you share much more than just your name with your grandmothers. Their legacies of hard work, sacrifice, joy, and gratitude live on in you, and their connection with you really is “that deep!”

Love,

Mom

Sycamore Trees

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Dear Hallie,

I feel sorry for everyone who has never discovered the intense magic and utter delight of a soak in a hot bath. There is nothing for me this side of heaven that quite compares to the sensation that spreads as I sink down and let the water engulf me.  And then even after the initial sensation subsides, I feel refreshed as my adrenaline levels are reset and the surface worries of the day are washed away.  My mind begins to process all the burdens, conflicts, happinesses, and joys that have been keeping me rushing around. It is also a chance to focus on all the things in life that really matter…that is until one of the things in life that really matters come crashing into my bathroom with a new crisis that needs solved, a new creation that must be shared, plans that need approved, or just to ask me if I know where they might have left their shoes.  The same conversations will often follow.

“Mom, how many baths are you going to take today? Are you almost done?”

“5 more minutes, and I’ll be out.”

“Please hurry, this is important.”

And depending on how many baths I have already had that day or how many thoughts and worries need processed and washed away, I might respond with a bellowing declaration that “THIS IS IMPORTANT TOO” or I might grab a towel and tell you I am on my way even as you continue to knock.

Just yesterday you found me lost in my haven, and after I asked you to leave me alone, you once again reminded me that “baths are disgusting.” 

Oh Hallie, you of all my children could benefit from finding a haven of your own.  I say this because you of all my children are the most like your mother.  It is perhaps one of the reasons that we have such a deep understanding of one another, while at the same time such little patience for one another.

I admit that I am often harder on you than I am on your siblings. I do see so much of myself in you, for better and for worse.  Many of your personality traits, your gifts, and your passions I am beyond proud to claim as being passed down from my side of the family tree, but many of your struggles and weaknesses were no doubt also from my genetic line. There is something insufferable about seeing your own weaknesses and quirks reflected back to you in the form of one of your children, and there is something deep in me that longs for you not to struggle in all the same ways I continue to struggle even to this day. 

Yesterday when you interrupted my bath, I was in the depths of self-reflection.  And when you urgently demanded my attention only to once again ask a question that you had previously asked (hoping that this time you would get a different answer), I was moved to realize that I too was once again asking God questions that He has already answered for me.  We really are cut from the same cloth my child.

Of all the things that I should like to keep you from struggling with, I should like to keep you from struggling to believe that what God says about you is true. I want you to have a deep abiding knowledge that you are fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God, meant to be a gift to other people, and meant to reflect the glory of your Maker. I long for you to fully embrace your uniqueness from the tips of your toes to the tops of your nose.

If you ever do decide to try a bath, I don’t mind sharing the tub in my bathroom that Daddy had built just for me, as long as you clean it when you are done! As you lay there be sure to look out that small window that was perfectly placed to provide total privacy while also giving me a peek into our back yard. In that tiny frame is a world of treetops that I have come to know intimately.

Right there in the front is the Sycamore tree that your Daddy and I planted not long after we moved in. We were told by many that we would regret ever planting it as it is generally regarded by most as too large and too messy. In fact, the reason that we chose the tree is because of its extremely fast growth, promising that we would be able to enjoy its shade while our family was still young. And my how we have enjoyed the shade and the beauty of our Sycamore Tree over the last decade.

Those treetops I’ve explored during my baths have taught me many things, but most importantly I’ve learned that people are a lot like trees. I am still learning to accept and love my kind of tree, our kind of tree perhaps. 

I believe we are the Sycamore trees Hallie. For starters we are big (in personality and passion) and, we make a lot of mess (both literally and figuratively). Known to be one of the most identifiable and distinguishable trees means of course that we do not get lost in a forest, but rather tend to stand out in the crowd even at times when we desperately desire to fit in. And no doubt, middle school (that insufferable season you find your self in at the moment) is a place where there is no space allowed for those of us who do not fit in.

Sycamores are an unusual and quirky species. They change with the seasons and they change quickly. I think that’s what some would regard as unpredictable and impulsive, but I’d rather like to think of it as spontaneous and creative. Sycamores produce huge, beautiful, and interesting leaves and unusual pendulous fruit that hangs on barren branches through the winter waiting to drop in the spring. Once the leaves have all fallen to the ground, Sycamores may look dead for much of the rest of the year, especially due to the fact that they also shed layers of bark as they grow, magnifying their unique unkempt appearance much of the year. And to be certain, Sycamores are the only trees that shed. The flakes of brown, grey, and green bark fall off revealing what lays beneath the scaly peeling surface, which is a tender, smooth layer, white like ivory. Sycamores are actually known as The Ghost Tree because of the appearance of death in the winter against the backdrop of the rest of the forest.

But just as suddenly as our leaves and bark fall off, we will once again burst forth in rapid growth showing outward evidence of the life that has always been inside. We briefly produce inconspicuous flowers in the Spring, but no one remembers those in comparison to the unusual quality of our massive leaves, crooked branches, peeling bark, and hanging fruit. I do sometimes wish people would notice the flowers hidden beneath the mess, but I’ve learned to be content knowing that the Creator sees them; that He glories in them but no more than He glories in my leaves, branches, bark, and fruit.

There are not many climates that the Sycamore can thrive in or even survive in, and we deeply feel the impact of the wind and the rain in ways that other trees do not. We are soft on the inside becoming more and more hollow with age. We allow birds, bats, insects, owls, and even bears to burrow into our hearts and find shelter within.  Our sap can be a source of clean water for the passerby that needs refreshed, and many find nourishment in our leaves and fruit. The impact we have in the lives of others is significant, but as we give much of ourselves away, it can often leave us looking bedraggled by the end of the season (or even by the end of each day). But we are a resilient tree, often growing back after being cut or damaged, and surviving circumstances and situations that would kill others. Then we just go on creating magnificent leaves and fruit, shedding our rough edges and providing food and shelter to refresh and sustain others that God sends our way. 

You won’t likely find any fine furniture or wooden masterpieces created using Sycamore wood, but our wood has been used to make many useful things- a bucket, a cutting board, or even a canoe.  We are simply too busy tending to the needs of others or flitting between the next idea or passion to bother with the fancy things of life. I’d love to be able to wear mascara without it smudging or white pants without getting them stained.  I’d love to make it a whole day without throwing my hair into a messy bun, to have shoes that aren’t scuffed, painted fingernails without chips, or lunch without spills.  While Sycamore trees are both soft and strong, their most beautiful qualities lie far within their hollow trucks.    

If you look to the left of the barren Sycamore in my bathtub window you will see branches of the mighty Oak tree.  While its growth is certain, it looks much the same as it did the day we moved in- steady, stable, and faithful. I believe that your father is the mighty Oak. His foliage is much less messy than our own albeit much less interesting as well. His changes with the seasons are more subtle and he almost always shows signs of life.  He grows more slowly, but his roots are deep and his shade is refreshing both in and out of season. He is strong and the storms he endures seem to barely bend his branches if at all. It’s the best kind of tree to climb, and the tree in our yard where we have chosen to hang our backyard swing. While his leaves are smaller and more uniform than ours, they are predictable yet beautiful.  All year long the faithful Oak tree provides acorns for the squirrels, invites the children to play among the branches, and offers his shade to both friends and strangers alike.

Still further out the window towering over both the Sycamore and the Oak, you will see the Pine Tree from the neighbor’s yard looking down in wonder at the trees below. She looks mostly the same in every season and even as her needles fall new ones are taking their place. She thrives in much colder climates where the Sycamore trees cannot grow, but she survives in any climate because she is strong and determined. The Pine is also faithful, dependable, and mighty but in much a different way than the old Oak. She wonders at the shorter trees below- especially the Sycamore who is so easily tossed about by the wind and the rain, and who seems to look dead much of the year. She wonders why we don’t stay green in every season, and why we leave such messes in our wake. You won’t often find a tree swing or a fort in a Pine because they are so tall, and their leaves (usually called needles) might poke you if you get too close. 

I’ve managed to get close to a few Pine trees in my time, and for the most part it is worth getting poked to be close enough to smell their sweet refreshing aromas, touch their sticky sap, and marvel at their unusual cone shaped fruit.  I’ve also known some Maples, Weeping Willows, Elms, Birches, Pecans and Apple Trees in my time.  Each one beautiful in its own way producing a unique fruit in season, but each one also perplexed by my peeling bark ever revealing a bit too much below the surface for anyone’s comfort. Perplexed by my asymmetrical gigantic leaves leaving messes in my wake, and my dark winters followed by sudden changes with each passing season, strong wind, or torrential rain.

I admit that I too am sometimes perplexed by my too muchness and too messiness. I understand how the other trees might mistake my crooked branches and hollow trunk for flaws, as I have struggled at times to see the beauty in their purposeful design.  Like you, my teachers were always especially confused by the inconsistencies in my behavior and performance, and particularly annoyed by the distractions that I seemed to accidentally create. Daily I’d spill a drink, loose a pencil, or trip over my own foot.  Sometimes I’d get lost in an idea and completely miss the entire lesson, and even more often I would drag a classmate into my idea and again be scolded for talking too much.  While I knew in my heart how badly I longed to make my teachers happy and fit in with my peers, I was never able to quite figure out how to make my leaves smaller, my branches straighter, my bark tougher or my trunk more solid. I spent much of the first few decades of my life trying to be a little more like the Oak or the Maple.  I even consulted with some friendly Pines who’ve encouraged me to stand straight and tall, fight against the wind, and not be so easily moved. I’ve tried and tried to be a different kind of tree, believing the lie that my kind of tree was wrong.  But I finally learned that being someone else’s kind of tree is not only a miserable business, but it is also a fruitless one.  I was created to be too much and too messy for some people’s liking.  God meant to make my trunk hollow and my branches crooked, and every time I am tempted to ask Him to help me be more like the Oak, He reminds me once again that I have been fearfully and wonderfully made by Him just as He meant me to be. Sure He wants me to be the best Sycamore Tree I can possibly be, but He has no interest in me trying to become a Pine Tree or even a faithful old Oak.

Sometimes I am hard on you Hallie, because I forget that Sycamores are beautiful, but sometimes it is because I don’t want you to still be learning to love yourself when you get to be my age.  I want you to see the purpose and beauty in God’s design for you now, and I want you to be the best darn Sycamore around.

My bathtub American Sycamore tree is not technically a Sycamore tree at all, it is technically a plane tree. To be precise it is a Platanus Occidentalis, also known as the American Plane, the Western Plane or the Occidental Plane. Here is what God says about His purpose for all the trees- even the plane.

“I will put in the wilderness the cedar, the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive. I will set in the dessert the cypress, the plane, and the pine together, that they may see and know, that they may consider and understand together, that the hand of the Lord has done this, the Holy One of Israel has created it.” Isiah 41:19-20

When you interrupted my bath yesterday, I had just noticed the very first bud open on my bathtub Sycamore- the first tangible evidence of Spring. The first sign of life that this tree has shown in months.   It gave me hope that this long middle school winter that you have been stuck in, a winter full of isolation, fear, a pandemic, political unrest, injustices, racial tensions, conspiracies, divisions, and rejections- that this long winter has not killed you.  Perhaps us Sycamores really do feel the burden of the storm more heavily than most.  Perhaps this winter has seemed especially dark, cold, and long, but my child, you are not dead.  Indeed, you are very much alive evidenced by the fact that even is distress and trial you continue to refresh others with your flow of clean water.  In and out of season you give shelter and nourishment to anyone in need, and more often than not you notice someone else’s needs long before they ever need ask for help.

Perhaps you will one day find that you are not too old or too cool for soaking in a bath of your own, but if not I hope that you will find some means of processing and washing away each days thoughts and worries.  After all us Sycamores feel many things deeply even as we willingly carry the burdens of others.  No matter how long, dark, and cold this winter might feel, you are not dead, you are loved, and you are fearfully and wonderfully made.  Go stand tall right next to the Pine, considering and understanding together that the hand of the Lord has created you just exactly as He meant you to be.

Love,

Mom

 

Teenagers!?

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Dear Lacey,

About six weeks ago you turned nine years old!  Almost double digits!  For months I had been planning to sit down on the 30th of September and write you a lovely birthday letter about how precious and unique God has made you.  I even started it at one point but never got past the second paragraph.   This should not come as a huge surprise to you since all nine years of your life you’ve gotten the leftovers and hand-me-downs, and you learned early on that it is up to you to keep up and make yourself heard!  So is the life of the baby of the family- especially an eccentric, creative, busy family such as ours.  Thankfully you have no problem keeping up or being heard.   

So here I am writing some words to you on Thanksgiving Day which also happens to be the week of your sister Hallie’s birthday- it is not at all the words I have been composing for you in my mind the last several months when lying in bed at night.  It is not the words that I have prayed for you over and over, nor is it the things I’ve treasured about you in my heart that my mind has not yet found words to express. 

Nope- sorry to have to tell you this, but it is a word about your siblings- Kori Jane age 16, Cade age 14, and Hallie who turned 13 this week!  And now that Hallie is a teenager, we are on our own kid.   There are now officially three teenagers sharing a roof with us.    That means we are surrounded!  Surrounded by a swirl of activities and events, football games, school dances, parties, friends, extra loads of laundry, theatre rehearsals, SAT prep, tutoring, and mountains of homework.  We are surrounded by competing sounds from various technological devices- tic tocks, youtube videos and Netflix shows- as well as the sounds of moods swinging, feet stomping, doors slamming and music blaring.   In many ways it is very similar to having a house full of toddlers except the smells and sounds have changed dramatically.  The music is much more tolerable for one, but the parenting hours are actually much expanded.  They do have a bedtime, but it’s more of a goal and not a rule which means that the last words I speak before I climb into my own bed are often- “go to bed.”  And the first words I speak are “get up- you are late!”  There are the sleepless nights too, however it is not due to teething, croup, a wet pullup or a monster under the bed, rather it is due to wishing you could mend a freshly broken heart, wondering if they are safe at that new friend’s house (while tracking them on their phone), knowing they will make mistakes but hoping it’s not a mistake of the lifechanging sort, and praying that they know how much you love them even though that very day you spoke a plethora of words you wish you could take back.

I know that being a kid surrounded by teenagers is not always easy although you must admit it has its perks!  Like the fact that Kori was not allowed to watch SpongeBob until she was 7 years old, but it was your favorite show at the age of 7 months!  And maybe you are exposed to more colorful language than I’d like with so many of your sibling’s friends coming and going, but how many kids get to have a bunch of teenagers dressed up like the Descendants show up to their birthday party.   So, you’ve never been to the weekly library story time (or been to a library at all for that matter) and you were not in dance, gymnastics, soccer and t-ball by the age of 3.  You have however always had someone to teach you how to do a cartwheel, read you a book, kick the soccer ball around the yard, play pretend with you, go on a bike ride or snuggle up with a movie.

One thing that has not been easy for you recently is that there are a growing number of times that you feel alone in our house which is always full of activity and people.   A growing number of times when you realize that being the baby is no longer enough to guarantee the attention and affection of your older siblings.  I distinctly remember a couple years back on your brother’s 13th birthday when you burst into tears at the realization that he was now a teenager.  One teenager was more than enough for you after watching Kori and her entire world grow and change.  Your exact words were, “he’s never going to be home anymore, and he won’t ever want to play with me.”    We tried to explain to you that your oldest sister has always been ready for the next adventure, and even as a child was always on the go.  As she was growing up and becoming more independent, being on the go meant being busy with friends and activities more often because she had more freedom to do so.  We assured you that while Cade was most certainly growing and changing, we doubted very seriously if your introverted brother would suddenly cease to be a homebody.  But still there were and are changes happening in your brother- his body is clearly changing, his voice is changing, his interests and moods are changing and there are certainly an increasing number of times that his bedroom door is closed and he is not ready and willing to drop everything to play with his sisters. 

The reality is that there are physical changes, chemical changes and emotional changes going on inside of all three of these complicated beings called teenagers that live in your house.  And believe it or not these changes are even harder on them than they are on you!     So, I have a few words to share with you sweet Lacey as our home is now being overtaken by teenagers.  Afterall, I have a feeling that we are both going to need each other to survive!

Have grace on them!  There are a ton of changes happening that we can see, hear and smell- we can easily observe them growing taller, stinkier and hairier all the time!  But these are nothing compared to the changes we can’t see.   Think about the happy caterpillar who is content to explore the safety of his little butterfly weed, happily eating aphids and leaves day after day while never once thinking about the world beyond.  That’s what its like being a kid content to explore the tiny world that has been set before you, and never bothering to question what lies beyond the safety and security of the home where you were born.  Then suddenly everything changes- the caterpillar finds itself in the most awkward and uncomfortable of circumstances- suddenly trapped in a cocoon and completely out of control, going through miraculous changes both internally and externally, having no clue what lies ahead or what they will be, and finally realizing that the world is much bigger than they had ever fathomed.  As much as you want to spend all your days on milkweed journeys with your siblings, they are no longer caterpillars.  It is not that they do not love us or the homes where they were born.  It is just that they are in that awkward and uncomfortable stage of life- a stage where they are rapidly changing, constantly feeling out of control, starting to realize how big the world is and wondering what they will be when they finally spread their wings.  True they are no longer caterpillars, but they are not quite butterfly’s yet either.  And just as we see Kori Jane fighting to emerge from her cocoon and open her beautiful wings – we see Hallie at the beginning of her transition.     I know it is hard to not take it personally when they appear to be ignoring us all locked away in their cocoons, or when they suddenly seem more interested in the world and the people beyond our cozy little milkweed plant.  It’s hard not to get angry and annoyed when they respond to us in unexpected, unusual or unkind ways.  And it’s hard not to be confused when they suddenly begin to question and contradict all the things that you continue to cling to with childlike faith.   But they will not always make you so sad, angry, annoyed and confused, and I promise you that they still need us more than they realize and love us more than they show. So have grace on them Lacey-lots and lots of grace!    

They’ll be gone before we are ready! Your nine-year-old brain can’t yet fathom how quickly years fly by.  Your nine-year-old brain is not thinking about the world outside our milkweed home, or where butterfly’s go when their wings are fully formed and strong enough to fly.   My 40 something brain is actually still struggling to fathom that in less than two years’ time the first of my babies will be taking flight.    I still remember with clarity the day each of you were born.  Kori Jane’s appearance into this world is one of only a few times I’ve seen tears in your Daddy’s eyes.  When Cade was born, I immediately fell in love with that cone-head even as Daddy whispered in my ear “you just gave birth to an alien.”   Hallie made her arrival 13 Thanksgivings ago and took us all by surprise when she came out a girl.   And Lacey, the looks on your siblings faces the first time they laid eyes on you will be forever etched in my memory.  It seems like only yesterday that you stole their hearts in a moment but in reality, that was nine years ago.  Yet in nine more years you will be the one spreading your wings and taking flight.  So let’s make the most of the years to come as together we treasure each moment- even the stinky, confusing, and frustrating ones- knowing that all of the moments are fleeting.

You’ll be a teenager before I am ready!  And as much as I’d like to believe that my sweet little Lacey Bug will never need deodorant, wear a bra, take drivers ed or the SAT, be embarrassed by her mom or roll her eyes in disgust at Daddy’s rules, the reality is that you will be one of those alien teenagers long before I am ready.   Before we know it, you will begin growing wings of your own.  You will feel awkward and out of control and you will need grace- lots and lots of grace. Ideally, we will have made most of our parenting mistakes on your siblings, but realistically we will just be too tired to reinforce all the same rules.  I just hope when that time comes that you will remember that you need me more than you know, and that I love you more than you can possibly imagine.

Don’t forget to have grace on me!  If you think that having teenage siblings is hard, just wait until you have teenage children.  You feel things you have never felt before- you hurt in ways you have never hurt and experience a deep joy you never knew possible.  Some days you want to kill them and the very next day you are begging God to keep them alive.   You helplessly watch them learn things the hard way and fight the urge to help them struggle out of the cocoon.  You find yourself saying and doing all the things you swore you’d never say or do when you became a mom.   And then you wish you could take half those things you have said or done back.  It’s hard and the very hardest part is yet to come.  So have grace on me Lacey as I watch your siblings learn to fly.  Have grace on me when they start flying away and have grace on me when I’m not quite ready to let you spread your own wings and fly away one day. 

I love you Lacey!

Mommy

 

The Rain

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Dear Kori Jane,

Twelve years ago almost to the day, you and I  were  heading to a little neighborhood carnival right by our home that we had passed that morning on our way to church.  It was nothing fancy, just some hand painted wooden games set out on card tables and a bounce house or two, but no party no matter how big or small has ever escaped your notice.    It was a couple of weeks before your fourth birthday and you were long overdue some fun quality time with your mom. When you noticed the gathering again on our way home, and through excited squeals begged to go play, I couldn’t say no!    After dropping your Daddy, your baby brother, and your baby sister off at home we headed back to see what exactly all those balloons, tents, and bounce houses were inviting us to. 

I circled some field a few times and ended up parking a good bit further than I wanted, but the joy and anticipation on your face as you bounced towards the crowd told me that nothing was going to ruin this day for you- certainly not a long walk to the entrance. Well almost nothing. Just as we finally crossed the threshold of the carnival (or the fair-never did find out for sure what it was) the first rain drop fell. I looked up and timidly kept walking forward, but when we reached the first booth the skies which had been completely clear just moments before opened up and a torrential down pour began. Within seconds people everywhere were running for cover. Booths, tents and bounce houses were being taken down at record speeds, and without a thought I grabbed your hand intending to start the long trek back to the car but at a much faster speed. You pulled in the opposite direction, and began to adamantly insist that we stay and play. It didn’t take me long to convince you there was no more fun happening as we were both standing in the middle of an ever-thinning crowd completely drenched to the bone- the rain had changed everything- in a moment.

When we finally got to the car, I could not tell where the raindrops ended and where your tears began.  It would not be the biggest heartbreak of your life, but I’m pretty sure it may have been the biggest thus far.  Or at least it is the first big heartbreak I remember, but that could be because I was struggling with processing a heartbreak of my own that day.  Well, as we joined the other cars in a race to get out of the crowded, wet field that had been transformed into a parking lot, your questions began.  You have always been full of questions.  Not the “but why” or the “what happened” questions but the deep, thought provoking, meaning of life kinds of questions.  There has always been a deep hunger in your soul for beauty, truth and meaning.   A passion for life like no other child I have ever known.

Through your tears you asked me “Mommy, why did God let it rain today?  Didn’t he know that we were going to have so much fun?  Didn’t He know that there was so much to do?  Why did He let it rain? Why?”

I tried to give you a little pre-school theology lesson and explain just how much God loved you, and how rain is one of the ways He shows His love and His strength.  I started to quote some bible verses about how He “provides rain for the earth” and how He is “a refuge from the wind and a shelter from the storm.”   I desperately wanted you to understand that God is good, and that He can be trusted even when the rain messes up our plans. That in fact He is the only thing this side of heaven that can be trusted.  But I quickly realized that you were still too young to understand all that quite yet.  You were not mature enough to see beyond your own little reality, and your ideas and plans for that moment were the only ideas and plans that you could fathom being good.  So I opted instead to let you ask why, while I started making promises of greater joys yet to come- other fairs and carnivals and even a world where all the princesses live that would blow those old bounce houses and wooden bean bag toss games out of the park.  And then we stopped and adopted a baby-doll who needed a new home from our favorite thrift store, followed by sharing a snow cone at the little blue snowball shack that sits in the parking lot of said thrift store.

By the time we got home you were back to your creative, passionate, playful self and ever ready to make up a game or put on a show for any willing audience.  The only hint of sadness left was the sadness you felt for the other baby dolls at Family Thrift who had not yet been adopted.  But for me, it was time for my daily visit with my sister.  Aunt Heather, diagnosed with terminal cancer eighteen months prior, had been moved to a hospice facility near our home.  Because she was so young and otherwise healthy, it took the cancer much longer to destroy her body than any of the doctors expected.  It was an impossible 18 months watching her slowly die, and the last two months were especially difficult as she desperately tried to hang on for dear life.  That day when I got to her bedside, she was in a particularly deep sleep.  When I pulled her beautiful long black hair out of her face and straightened her covers she did not even flinch.  So I sat down in the large arm chair by her bed, looked out the window and ever so quietly whispered the word “Why?” 

“Oh, God, why?”  “Don’t you know how young she is, don’t you know that there is so much fun still to be had?  Don’t you know how busy I am with three kids under the age of 4 that need me- why do I have to be here watching my sister die when she should be helping me teach them how to live?”

“Why cancer? Why suffering? Why sadness? Why death? Why?”

And even as I was still gazing out the window, asking my questions- the pelting rain started again just as suddenly as it had at the fair several hours before.    And with the rain came the reminder that He is “a refuge from the wind and a shelter from the storm.”   God is good and He can be trusted even when the rain (or the cancer) messes up our plans, and in fact He is the only thing this side of heaven that can be trusted.  And then I knew that like you, I too am not yet able to understand the whys.  I struggle to see beyond my own little reality, my ideas of what is right, and my plans for today.  I knew from my earlier conversation with you that asking why was just part of the grieving, but even in my asking and grieving the Lord too has made promises of greater joys yet to come. 

Two days after the rain ruined our plans, Aunt Heather got to see the promise of greater joy completely fulfilled as she took her last breath on this earth at the age of 31.

When I was a young child I remember thinking that real people don’t die.  People on the news or in movies sure, but not people you know in real life- and especially not people you love.   When I was in the fifth grade, my Uncle Jimmy died, and I remember that was my first funeral and the first time I felt real genuine grief.  Like the tangible grief that you carry around everywhere you go, even though no one else can see it.  By the time you were in fifth grade, you had already grieved the loss of four people that you loved.  Your Aunt Heather, a teacher at your school, and both of your grandmothers.   I do not have to tell you that you had two of the most amazing grandmothers that ever lived.  My mom was more like a second mom to you, and no doubt your favorite person on the planet.  We would laugh because most of your friends mom’s were closer to Nana’s age than mine, and often people thought she actually was your mom.  She was young, beautiful, and never ever lost her child’s heart.   Daddy’s mom was the perfect Grandma- broke all our rules and was the only other human I’ve ever known to have as much energy as you- which meant that she would get on the floor and play with you until we demanded you both go to bed.  She spoiled you rotten and loved you to pieces. 

Nana- age 53- and her four grand babies, two days before she went to Heaven.

Eventually in the midst of all the rain and storms that kept disturbing our family’s plans, you stopped asking questions and started writing journals, poems, and stories instead.  In fact, when you woke to learn the news of Nana’s death you did not ask a single question or shed a single tear.  You went to your room and you wrote a poem.  In the days and weeks that followed, I could not contain my tears and your lack of tears made me wonder if you were even sad at all- that is until I would stumble upon your writing.  I realize now that even at the age of 8, your thoughts were far too deep and your pain far too real for you to express without the help of a paper and a pen. 

Probably by Kori Jane age 8

Probably walking on water.

Probably walking through walls.

Probably laying on clouds.

Probably already bowed to Him.

Probably shaking His hands.

Definitely loving Heaven.

While I am walking on land.

While I am swimming though waters.

If you were me you’d understand- RAIN.

Not the kind of rain that falls from the sky.

It is when tears fly by.

Once again the line between the rain and your tears was blurred.  But your words even then assured me that despite your grief you were trusting in the promises of far greater joys.

There is no doubt that you understand rain.  The way it changes everything in a moment, the way it hurts and heals, the way it grows us and grieves us. How it can be both devastating and beautiful all at the same time.

You have certainly watched as it has changed me.  It’s no wonder that your tears no longer easily flow when you have grown up watching your mother’s tears flow far too easily.  In many ways you’ve had no choice but to grow up quickly. That first Christmas after both of your grandmas died, I was still trying hard to pick myself up off the floor, and figure out how to do holidays as the 32 year old matriarch of our family. But you were determined this would be the best Christmas ever starting with a spectacular lights display in our yard.  With your usual passion and flare you were tearing into the boxes that Daddy had dutifully brought down from the attic which were filled with decorations and lights.  You were handing out jobs to each of your three siblings and both of your parents, ensuring that not a single part of the yard was left bare.  As I was watching the lights go up, it became obvious to me that like usual, your big, bold, bright ideas were being executed without much planning or forethought.  That coupled with Daddy’s lack of designer instincts was stressing me out. The tree he was wrapping ran out of branches, so he decided that he would stretch the lights to a neighboring tree leaving a single strand of lights floating in mid-air between them.    I snapped and I said some unkind things to Daddy. I won’t go into details about the volume or tone of my voice- or the specific unkind words that came out of my mouth as that is not the point of this story!   The point is that you followed me to the wooden bench swing in our side yard and without speaking a word, gently sat down and placed your hand on my knee as I stared out into space allowing my tears to flow freely.   When one your siblings came to ask me a question you would answer for me as I continued to just stare off unable to find words with which to respond.  And when Daddy came over to kindly inquire as to what exactly he had done to upset me so much, you intuitively answered him by saying “Daddy, don’t you remember that Nana always hung the Christmas lights.”   After a while you drug me inside and insisted that we get busy on the Christmas Tree.   You were ten.  Wise and compassionate beyond your years-no doubt a wisdom and compassion that only can grow where there has been a lot of rain.

This month you will be sixteen and last month you went to yet another funeral.  I was so thankful to hear you mumble the question “why” when we told you that Grandpa was so near the end.  I worry sometimes that all the rain will make you angry or cold.  That you watching me through all my years of grief and tears will just be another storm for you to endure on your journey.   But when you asked why you had to loose someone else you loved- why you had to go to another funeral- why you had to be the only teenager you knew without grandparents.  I knew that all the rain had only made you stronger and more alive.  I knew that you did not really need an answer- just time and space to grieve and maybe a reminder that there are promises of greater joys yet to come. 

Thank you Kori Jane for helping me understand rain, for teaching me to dance in the rain, and helping me find the rainbows and flowers that the rain leaves behind.  Flowers which include your profound wisdom, tender compassion, intense passion and gentle strength.

I love you forever!

Mom