A letter to explain (Letters to)

 

Before you come into my house, please let me explain. I was just in the middle of doing the dishes...that's why there are dirty plates on the kitchen sides. Oh and please excuse the floors, I was planning to sweep them later today.
Please take a seat and I'll get you a drink...I'm afraid I don't have much at the moment, the shopping is being delivered tomorrow.
I know my hair is a mess, and I probably have banana mashed into my leggings...the baby just had his lunch, I don't usually look this unkempt. Please relax on the sofa, I'll just clear these empty mugs away, oh and you don't mind if I quickly put a load of washing on do you?

Please let me explain, as I feel I must.

I feel I must.

Every day my mouth pours out explanations and excuses for one thing or another. The order of my home, my appearance, the tidiness of my car, why my baby is crying and doesn't want you to cuddle him. But this is my home, and you are welcome to enter, you are welcome to sit in my space, you are welcome to drink tea and talk and laugh and cry and spill crumbs on the floor. Your children are welcome to drag out toys, to mash their lunch into the sofa, to parade sticky hands up and down hardwood floors.

Why am I making excuses as though I am ordinarily the perfect host and housewife and mother and homemaker? Why am I explaining things away as though they are not the normal. I do sometimes have a messy house, but dishes are less important than my child wanting me to plant raspberries on his tummy. And sweeping floors comes second to a friend who needs an ear to listen. When I am old, will I look back through my life and remember that I didn't always have a perfect home, perfect hair, dust free sills, or will I remember the memories created in the spaces that weren't filled with cleaning and grooming and trying to appear perfect?

So please come in, sit and have some cake, this is my home and it is lived in, and it is loved in.  No explanations. 



Linking up today with the delightful Ruth at ruthpovey.com for the fabulous new 'Letters to' link up!

Present (five minute friday)

I'm a girl with her 'head screwed on'. I'm a girl who is 'sensible'. I'm a girl with 'my feet on the ground'.
These are the things I hear about myself, the things I sometimes even feel about myself. When I hear these words I don't feel proud to be the 'sensible' one. I don't feel grateful for the labels bestowed upon me.
I am well aware of my realistic approach to life. My head is never in the clouds, I am not frivolous, I do not impulse buy, I am happiest when I know I have savings stashed away for emergencies.

For all these things I am both grateful and resentful.

For all these things, I do not live in the present.

My life is endless planning, saving, worrying, dreaming of the things I want that will take me years to achieve. I am forever planning for the next catastrophe, always on the edge of my seat waiting for the next thing to happen.

When will I be content? To not worry about the future or revise the past.

To just be present.

'Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?  Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?  Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?'

 Matthew 6 25-27

Letter to the brave

Where are you now brave girl? Where is the girl who lived fearlessly in the moment? The girl who was afraid of nothing?

I remember the days when you would sing your lungs out, dizzying yourself as you twirled around the house in your little red leotard. Those were the days when you would perform for anyone, breakdancing to Tracey Chapman with no care of who might be watching. You were the girl who helped build a den with the boys in the woods, your hands grubby and hair matted with soil. You went on rollercoasters that threw you in the air, the faster the better, again and again. Remember the days of playing goalie with the older boys? You were willing to take any position to just join in, to be a part of it.
You were the girl who could so easily talk to strangers, sparking conversations as though you were already friends.

 I don't know where you are anymore little girl, perhaps you got lost on the way to adulthood, when reality became a lot scarier than the bubble wrap of youth. Maybe you are still in there somewhere, that little voice that says 'go on...you might enjoy it!' and is more often than not ignored.

 How I wish I could be more like you child, to be brave again, to be carefree...to sing as though the world is my audience.



The next 'Letters to' will be held at ruthpovey.com on the 16th July and the prompt will be 'Letters to explain', I hope to see you all over there in a fortnight!


For now though, it's over to you! :)