May 19, 2008 | Mama Smith

snails pace

To put it ever so mildly – it has been a shit year. Not that there haven’t been sweet moments woven in to it, just on the whole, it has been a very difficult, very trying year for our family.

Since last spring we have…

1. Had a new baby, just 18 months after having baby #1…neither of whom were “expected”. And now we are pretty sure we’re done.

2. Matthew has started his own web design firm. Small business owners, can I get an amen here to the insanity stirred up by that huge undertaking?!

3. We moved 3 states away. Bought our first home. Sold our first home. Bought our second home. And are now preparing to move a little under 9 months after packing and unpacking all our belongings.

That’s enough of a taster for how crazy and upheaved this life of ours has felt lately.

I had the courage – or gall – to ask Matthew for a breather. A night away. Free from any social, relational, or emotional responsibilities. He graciously seconded the notion, even with all the projects he has hurling towards him at work and all the packing we have yet to complete, and sent me off to The Snail’s Pace yesterday morning with a vow that I would not return for 24 hours. No argument from me on that one.

My dear readers, I never could have anticipated what a simple 24 hours of aloneness, stillness, and freedom from all responsibilities could do for an exhausted, frazzled, soul-weary mama.

After getting settled in my room by the sweet owner, I never saw another soul until I left. It was pure bliss. No one to talk to. No one to expect me to do anything. I could just sit and watch the leaves flutter in the breeze.

Which is what I did. For about the first 2 hours.

I didn’t move from this porch swing for two full hours. Pre-mommyhood I would have been way too antsy for such a thing. But yesterday, I just sat and felt the breeze, smelled the peonies, and watched the clouds move across the sky.

I wrote and read and prayed and cried. It was so healing for my achingly tired soul.

Later I wandered through the woods, looking at things I’ve rarely taken time to do so before. The moss. The delicacy of flower petals. Centipedes. You young mothers can attest to the survival mode we quickly fall in to most days jumping from feeding session, to playing session, to diaper changes, to more feeding sessions, and then falling into our own bed exhausted at the end of the day. The only moss I look at are the clumps I pull out of Brighton’s pockets after they’ve already gone through the wash and dry cycle unnoticed.

I spent the rest of the day here…

Then here…

And finally here…

Where I sat and watched 5 cardinals digging for worms and two rabbits munching on grass. Later a little fox wander by.

I had asked a few friends to pray. That Christ would meet me here. That I’d find some sort of healing and restoration from what’s been a long, weary year. And He really came. He sat with me on that swing and reminded me how wild He is about me and how much easier it is to rest than “do”.

I actually wanted to return home to motherhood, “wife“hood, and the chaotic season we’re in currently. People, that is a miracle.

As spiritually sweet as this time was, there was one sin I committed involving a peony.

I stole one. And I actually had the gall to hide it in my shirt when I went back to my room that evening. And sneak it out to my car this morning, bumping in to the sweet older woman who tends the grounds on my way out. I am sick.