Every Friday my syndicated column appears in a bunch of newspapers in southeastern Ontario. Here's this week's!
When I was in elementary school, I would drift off to sleep listening to a top 40 music station, because that’s what cool kids did.
When I became an adult and realized I’d never be cool anyway, I hit the “seek” button on my car radio and came across a song about how the good stuff in life is all the memories you build with those you love. And as I drove along the highway, tears streaming down my cheeks, I knew I had found the music of my heart. I may have grown up attending the ballet, but I’m really a redneck woman who loves country.
Perhaps you’ve never been that enamoured with country, since you don’t need to listen to songs about losing your truck, or your dog, or your wife, but then you’re missing out on its power! Believe me, country music has power. A study done about a decade ago found that of all forms of music, country music is the most linked to suicide. So if you ever had a sneaking suspicion that there was something not quite right about Willie Nelson or Billy Ray Cyrus, you’ve now been vindicated.
But perhaps it’s the most linked to suicide because it sings about the stuff that really matters, and pairs it with music that’s haunting (though it may haunt you in a very different way than it haunts me).
Music does that. After watching a movie marathon for a weekend, I’ll start to imagine my own life with a soundtrack, since nothing ever happens in a movie without music to go along with it. Have you ever just been walking along the sidewalk and a shiver runs up your spine, because you feel like there should be creepy music playing? Or perhaps you’re not so morbid, and you hear an upbeat guitar during the happier parts of your life.
It’s hard to imagine life without music. I’ve heard it said that God created music so that we could worship without words, and I like that thought. Music itself creates a mood and speaks to us and through us. It’s painting pictures with sounds.
I live in a house with teen girls, so for the last few years I’ve been inundated with Taylor Swift. Swift has a rather clever tune entitled “Our Song”, where she describes what comprises the soundtrack of her romance. Their soundtrack isn’t a particular song, but it’s the slamming screen door when they run out for a date, or the way he laughs, or the whispered phone calls late at night. These things encapsulate their relationship.
Summer is filled with that kind of music to me. It’s the music of the breezes as I type outside on my deck; the screams of thrills as little children put their toes in the water at the beach; the sound of the overloaded camper backing up out of the driveway as we leave for vacation, and the children querying, “are we there yet?” It’s the campfire crackling as my daughters and I sing in a round, and my husband sits back to enjoy the melody, rather than joining in and wrecking it. It’s woodpeckers and splashes and even the buzzing of mosquitoes.
Soon the soundtrack will change to school bells and football practice and alarm clocks and times tables being recited. Each new season and stage of life has its own soundtrack, and its own songs. And so, as I head to the store to buy new fall clothes for my ever-sprouting teenager, I’ll flip on the radio, hoping to hear another song that will express that excitement I feel watching my girls grow up, tinged with just a little bit of melancholy. It’s country time. And if you like a good cry, and you’re not overly depressed already, why not join me?
Don't miss a Reality Check! Sign up to receive it FREE in your inbox every week!
Every Friday my syndicated column appears in a bunch of newspapers in southeastern Ontario. Here's this week's! Even if you're not Canadian, I think you'll say "my husband does that, too!"
Last week, as thunder rolled and gray clouds threatened, I performed the female mad dash better entitled “frantically bringing in the laundry from the line before the storm hits.” I assumed my husband felt the same reticence about the weather. “Can you still barbecue in this?” I asked him, quickly running through the alternate dinners we could make if burgers were off the menu. He sneered in reply. “Of course I can,” he said. “I’m a Canadian man.”
Canadian men barbecue. I suspect this attachment to the gas-powered device is largely because it comes with big tools. These aren’t wimpy tongs, the kind you use to mix up spinach and mandarin salad. Barbecuing is primitive, masculine stuff, even if his top of the line appliance cost $800 at Canadian Tire.
With barbecues, too, you get to stab meat. My husband loves cooking roasts, spearing them onto the metal spit. What’s more manly than roasting meat on a spit? When I cook a roast in the oven or the crockpot, I surround it with terrible things like carrots, or even worse, turnips or parsnips. Vegetables aren’t manly. And barbecuing on spits avoids them all together. It’s the perfect masculine endeavour.
And yet men, when barbecues are near, will condescend to wear clothing that they would never wear anywhere else. They are so proud of their ability to turn meat on a grill that they will don an apron, and, in the case of large parties, even a big, fluffy hat adorned with a message admonishing all present to “Kiss the Chef”. When one is near a barbecue, one’s manliness is guaranteed, so that wearing what would normally be considered feminine attire is perfectly acceptable, sort of like the way football players pat each other on the behind.
I also find it curious how barbecuing males will claim credit for the meal, even if it’s the woman who bought all the food, mixed the Caesar salad and the potato salad, sliced the pickles and the tomatoes, made up the lemonade, set the table, and prepared the dessert. He flipped a few burgers and everyone thanks him, rather than addressing their gratitude towards the woman and the kids who were scurrying around getting everything else ready.
But I don’t begrudge my husband the accolades, because if truth be known, I have never actually even turned our barbecue on. It is so much his domain that I’m lost if he’s on call and doesn’t come home when I’ve planned to have steaks. A few weeks ago my oldest daughter and one of her friends decided they would try to cook the chicken burgers, despite their lack of testosterone, since Keith decided not to grace us with his presence. But they didn’t know how to turn the barbecue on, either. So they called him, and he told them how to turn the knobs. And turn them they did.
A few minutes later Rebecca asked me, “isn’t there supposed to be a flame? I hear a hissing, but no flame.” Even without testosterone I know that’s a bad thing, so I quickly turned off the dials and forbade anyone from going near for at least fifteen minutes. My mother-in-law, who had received frantic phone calls from the girls asking what to do, continued to call our house at frequent intervals that night to ensure no one had actually been blown up.
And so we leave the cooking meat over a fire to my husband, who does prepare a very juicy roast. I may complement his offering with a bowl of vegetables anyway, and serve it with some salad, but it’s still his meal. He’s a Canadian man, and he’s proud. I think I’ll go kiss him.
Don't miss a Reality Check! Sign up to receive it FREE in your inbox every week!
My girls and I are just back from Calgary, after a Bible quizzing competition for a week. What an amazing time! I learned a lot about them, and about teens in general. But picture this: 120 teenagers, from all over North America, who are all incredibly bright, who have spent this year memorizing 1 & 2 Corinthians (that's right; the whole books). I'm going to have to post a video of some of the quizzes or you won't believe it, but it was so amazing to see these kids who are so alive, and self-assured, and in love with Jesus, all in one place. They weren't nerds, either! In fact, I spent far too much time checking out the guys on the Western Canadian teams (and some of the Pennsylvania teams), because I figure that eventually my girls are going to have to marry someone, and better it be someone I choose for them! :)
Anyway, I walked in the door this morning at 4 a.m., after our plane was late flying into Ottawa. So I'm extremely tired. I've written a bunch of blog posts to automatically publish over the next few days, but I'm hoping that I can intersperse them with some of our great pictures of Banff and some videos of quizzing!
And my oldest daughter placed 15th (she was the #2 rookie) out of thousands of kids who do Bible quizzing with the Alliance church around North America. So we were really proud!
Until now I have felt a bit like summer hasn't begun, because the girls were studying (even if they were doing it while lying in the sun), and we were driving back and forth to practices. But now we're home and that stress is over, and we have a little more than a month to go of summer.
While we were gone my husband booked us into a campground. I told him we absolutely have to go camping, even if we only can snatch a few days (after I wrote a post about memories from previous summers it became imperative to head out in the trailer!). And Keith booked a weekend away, just him and me, for later this month, too. My girls are going to stay with my younger cousin and help her paint her new house, which will be so exciting to see them get to know each other better.
So now I see this next month stretched out in front of me, and I am so relaxed and happy! I hope that I'll write some more posts for you all other than the ones I have scheduled, but I do plan on taking some time just to enjoy the sun. While at Internationals last week Rebecca had a boy from Ohio ask her how she got so tanned, since Canada doesn't have heat. Becca thought that was pretty funny, since before we left we had had two weeks of 100+ temperatures (if you factor in the humidity). Thankfully it's cooled down to the mid-80s (or the high twenties, for my fellow Canadians who think in Celsuis), and it's absolutely lovely. Unfortunately, we don't get that kind of weather very often, so I am going to make the most of it.
I'm going to bike and play tennis and take lots of walks and sit in my garden and type in my porch. So if I don't get as much written as I normally do, please forgive me. I have to snatch what sunshine I can! But keep coming back, because I'll have a Wifey Wednesday up tomorrow, and my columns every Friday, and lots more stuff to keep you thinking!
I have a daughter who is very talented at figure skating. She pretty much taught herself, watching YouTube videos of famous skaters and then practising during our homeschool skate times.
We've been trying to put her in lessons, but the clubs near us are always full. I'm going to make the effort next year, though, because she is very committed to it.
When she was younger she had the opportunity to do competitive gymnastics. She's always been really flexible; she often sits in the splits while she reads.
And we said no anyway. My cousin was in competitive, and she had a great time, but it's not that she ever got to the Olympics or anything. And so she spent 15 hours a week doing a hobby that made her parents rush her around everywhere. I'm not saying my aunt and uncle were wrong; I don't think they were. It's just that for our family I didn't want that. And maybe I could have handled the lessons during the week, but the kicker for me was the summer. They expected you to be there for 75% of the lesson times anyway, and we like to go camping and get away in the summer. I just couldn't give that up.
I think children should have the chance to do well at sports, and pursue hobbies and dreams. But too often today these things take on a seriousness which I don't think they warrant.
I was browsing some blogs lately, and I came across one woman at the United States of Motherhood who was bemoaning her child's competitive swimming. He had actually made it into the top 38 in the nation, and so he was on his way. But listen to their schedule:
He loves swimming. His friends and social circle are there. It's his thing. But he used to love to read? He used to get great grades? Where did that boy go? .... Was I wrong? Am I wrong to let swimming take over our life?
Swimming seven days a week. Some days we leave for swimming at 3:30 and get home at 9 PM.
Dinner is eaten on the run most nights.
Homework is done in the car, in the stands of the pool, or at the nearby library.
She ended up threatening to take away swimming this summer because of his grades, which is a worry. But I think there's a bigger worry. Here's my take, and what I would say to her:
When your son is older, what will ultimately matter is not swimming lessons or swim team, as beneficial as that may be. What will matter is that he has a strong relationship with you which grounded him in his identity, his faith, his integrity, and his character.
Swimming is fun, but it is not the main thing in life. The main thing is your character and what you will become. Swimming can play a role in teaching discipline, but what he really needs is to anchored in his family, and for that you need time to be a family--to eat dinner together, to play together, to walk together.
Seven days a week is just too much, even if he's Olympic material. The Olympics are not worth sacrificing your family over.
So you need to find balance. The thing that is most correlated with academic, relational, and emotional success in life is eating dinner as a family. If you have no time, that's a problem.
I look at some of these girls who have won Olympic medals in gymnastics or skating, and I still think it wasn't worth it. So they've got a medal. They've wrecked their childhood. And it's your relationship and stability with your family that you only get during those childhood years that helps them form the morals and values, and acquire the faith, they need later in life.
I know that sports teaches you morals, but it can't replace a family just hanging out together.
So my advice to you this summer: don't overschedule it. Now's the time to quit a lot of outside involvement. Hang out together. Escape together. Talk together. Read together. Be together again without having to nag about homework, or piano practice, or getting to bed early. This is your chance just to have fun and rediscover family. Don't waste it!
Last year we moved into our new house. We bought some new furniture. We put new floors down upstairs; next week we're finally putting hardwood on the main floor. Everything is put away.
Except the pictures. I never did get around to putting them on the wall. So most of them were in a corner of our living room until yesterday, when a cleaning frenzy hit me 1 1/2 hours before company were due for dinner. It was rather stupid, but I ended up sifting through them all.
I have 8 x10 family photos of us for just ages. Some of them are downright embarrassing. And most of the little photos in the frames on our tables are old, too. Those ones are downright cute, and I still love them. But I don't have a lot of pictures of my girls from the last 4 years out around my house. I would like to.
So here's my question: what do you do with the old photos? Do you keep them, and just keep adding more? Or do you eventually weed them out? And if you stop displaying some 8 x 10s, what in the world do you do with them? Throw them out? Keep them? I do have wallets of everything.
Along the same vein, here are some great pictures I took with my new camera on Friday. I already have these up and framed and on my wall. Here's a sampling, from a day at my brother-in-law's pool:
Lucy, of course, is from The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, along with Prince Caspian and Voyage of the Dawn Treader, though she also makes an appearance in The Last Battle.
And yes, I loved Laura, too, as another commenter asked!
Now for some housekeeping: I'm taking off for camping for a few days, but I'll be in and out because we're not going too far from home so I'm hoping to post for Wifey Wednesday tomorrow. But it might not be first thing in the morning!
Wish me luck, because they're forecasting four days of rain. I really don't know why I do this to myself!
About Me: I'm a Christian author of a bunch of books, and a frequent speaker to women's groups and marriage conferences. Best of all, I love homeschooling my daughters, Rebecca and Katie. And I love to knit. Preferably simultaneously.
Stumble It!
