Resolutions????

I am bowed down by the weight of my failures and responsibilities this time of year more so than any other. Perhaps it is the holidays, perhaps it is the pressure I put on myself to produce the kind of celebration that the end of the year merits, or perhaps it is the shorter, darker days when I, a Southern girl through and through, need near constant sunlight in order to be happy. Whatever the reason, with each passing year I find it harder to bear up under the force of my own expectations. I have discarded many accoutrements gathered along the way that I think dictate my success as a proper adult who can navigate the holiday season with aplomb. Festive wrapping paper has given way to gift bags with a wrinkled piece of tissue paper stuffed in the top. A delightful Christmas card with artfully posed children has given way to a card covered with snapshots of my kids and the chickens; I don't even bother wiping off Tiny's face before I take her picture anymore. I used to make all my Christmas gifts; I would start in the summer and knit and crochet feverishly, struggling to get it all done. I also made many baked goods for friends: olive salad, fancy breads, homemade cookies in the shape of deformed gingerbread men, homemade kahlua, and homemade vanilla. Hours upon hours of baking and cooking and the commensurate cleaning all for boxes of stuff to hand out to family and friends. I enjoyed it but at what cost? I would lie in bed and fret over my incompetence and inadequacy as a person. If I couldn't even get it together one time a year, what good was I? This year I abandoned a good bit of my unrealistic expectations and made homemade lotions and lip balms with a friend while our combined seven children destroyed the house. We had fun, listened to music, drank beer, and encouraged each other.

Yet still I struggle, pressed down by the weight of 35 years of expectations of myself and what I should and shouldn't be doing. Worse, the expectations do not miraculously disappear with the herald of a new year; I keep my unrealistic views of myself all year long. I gave up making resolutions years ago, since I only used them to beat myself up. Too fat, not enough exercise, dirty house, didn't start that book I've been meaning to write, didn't sew those curtains, didn't paint that room, didn't slipcover that chair, didn't do any number of things that I think should define me as a successful person. My complexion still isn't good, I am never going to be a size six again, I will never own the appropriate shoes for church, my baseboards will stay dusty and the cat hair in my oven is still there. Apparently it doesn't burn.

I try to laugh at myself and my failings, but sometimes I can't. Sometimes I lie awake at night, feeling the weight of my failures squashing me into the mattress, my unmet potential and wasted life and bad choices and countless mistakes rendering me paralyzed. Those are the sleepless nights when I realize that my four kids will be up in just a few hours and I really need some sleep or I am going to screw up even more the next day. I take some benadryl or drink a beer and pray, but my prayers are as pathetic as I am. When I am really down, I want my prayers to take on the formulaic tone that all the people who are better people than I am have told me my prayers should have: praise then petition. Acknowledge what the Lord has done for you and then beg forgiveness for your sins, but above all, be obedient. I try, but I am Job, sitting grief-stricken before my friends, and they, the better Christians in my head, do nothing but condemn my efforts. If only I would pray correctly, if only I was obedient to God's will, if only, if only, if only. My life would be different if only I was different.

So I writhe about under my self-loathing, the condemnation of Job's friends ringing in my ears, and my prayers sound like this: Lord, I suck. Just kill me because I can't do anything. Not anything. It's 2 AM, I've tried everything, nothing is working, I can't do this anymore. I don't do anything right. Can't read my Bible right, can't raise my kids right, I'm a terrible wife, a rotten friend. I quit. I don't want to be me, I want to be different so that I can have a different life.

I wish that the Lord would magically heal me at those times and I would feel all sunny and perky and the world would be glowing and harmonious. Maybe it's like that for some people, the kind of people who get up at 5:30 AM before the house begins to stir and have fruitful and delightful devotion times. The obedient people, the moms who don't raise their voices at their children, the moms who are better than I am. But I am me, that's all I am, and I usually just fall asleep in the midst of my disgust with myself and wake up an hour after my kids have been up, watching TV and eating crackers in the living room. Tiny has taken off her own diaper and thrown it away, replacing it with a fresh one, and I can hate myself again that I haven't done a good job potty training her. And so my morning begins, with a fresh round of condemnation emanating from my brain, and it always looks and sounds like a really put-together Christian homeschool mom whose glowing hair and clean clothes reflect just how healthy she is as I cower in the corner of the couch, my pajamas and gross hair a testament to my lack of hygiene. Her kids, the perfect mom's, have already begun their studies without argument, the older ones helping the younger, the day flowing in delightful harmony with learning practically oozing out of their pores. My kids don't want to start the homeschool day and we no sooner sit down with a book to read than someone hits someone else and I have to discipline one or more kids and then it's lunchtime. My life would be different if only I was different.

But God always wins out, because His love, unlike mine, is always patient, always kind, always enduring, always long-suffering, always forgiving. I never liked that Bible verse very much because when I apply it to myself it just makes me feel rotten. But God really is like that. Because He does love me, failures and poor personal hygiene, repeated screw ups, mistakes and all. I have no idea how or why, and I know that learned pastors and people who understand the mystery of God better than I do could explain. But God loves me. Just me. Not a different me, living a different life, a shinier, happier, less stressful, less screwed up life. But me in this life. Because this is the life He gave me. These four kids, this husband, this life, this homeschool life: these are mine. Whether I think I deserve them, whether I think I'm doing a good job or not, they are mine. God will equip me for this job, even on days when I am at my worst; especially, I think, when I am at my worst. Because some days I feel like a plop of chicken poop on the back porch and no amount of anti-depressants or devotions or obedience to God is going to help. I simply have to abide. Because God abides. He patiently loves me every day, renewing His mercies to me, no matter how many times I have screwed up in the same way.

My resolutions for this new year will be the same as they have been every year: none. Because I will fail at whatever resolution I make, so I won't make any. Let's face it, I'm not going to suddenly develop a passion for housework or be seized with a fever for clean showers. I am not going to be able to control my kids any better than I did last year; all I can hope is that God is working in their hearts the same way that He's working in mine. Perhaps I will abide a little better this year. Perhaps I won't be as sad while I am abiding. That would be nice. Maybe I won't sink so low this year. Maybe I won't wish that I was a different person quite as many times this year.  That would be nice. Because I am worth it. I am worth loving, I am worth knowing, I am worth it. Exactly how I am, flaws and all. Because God has already redeemed me, just as I am. He doesn't want me to be different. Maybe I can resolve to be me this year. Messy and complicated and difficult and loud and bossy me. Just me.