TJ Hirst

I was given a questionnaire at my doctor’s office recently that asked me to fill in the blanks on my lifestyle and health conditions. One of the questions caused me to pause, as usual.

What is your occupation?

Although my current activities and those for the past number of years do not provide a monetary livelihood, I am learning to write with growing confidence MOTHER in this empty space.

I am growing used to the blank stares I receive when I fill in the blank in this way. However, I was unprepared this time for the blank pause in conversation that occurred when I explained what I meant by filling in the blank this way:

What is your occupation? Mother and writer

Writing has occupied a good deal of my life, every day in various ways. I received a college degree in journalism. I have recorded and published my writing, albeit not to large audiences. Most recently, I am writing daily on this website.

While I do fill most of my time with mothering and writing, neither is a vocation nor an avocation. What I mean is that neither serves as my source of income nor as just a hobby.

Upon seeing my answers to his questionnaire about occupation, my doctor was curious about what kind of writing I do.

“Do you write fiction or nonfiction?” he said.

“Mostly nonfiction,” I said, “but considering some fiction.”

Then he wanted to know where I write (or was I publishing). When I explained to him that I write every day on a website, his line of questioning went blank.

Now, to be fair to him, I don’t know why he stopped there.

However, I have since wondered if my occupations are valued (and thus interesting for conversation?) by the pay that I receive.

I was inspired to learn something about Margaret Bayard Smith, a woman writer in Washington City during Thomas Jefferson’s presidency. Her husband Samuel Harrison Smith, headed the first newspaper in Washington, The Intelligencer.

Under her own name and under pseudonyms, Margaret was a prolific journalist as well as a popular novelist. . . Her most significant writing, however, was the huge body of letters she wrote to her sisters and sister-in-law over four decades.

^{A Perfect Union:
Dolly Madison and the Creation of the American Nation
by Catherine Allgor}

The fact that Margaret’s letters were a significant contribution is a meaningful example to our day. She was writing to her own family about the life she was living, and she was actually writing history.

I draw several conclusions from her example:

First of all, what we write and how we write is important, even if it is simply well-expressed insights about the life we live and it is only published from our word processor to our family.

Secondly, we may not (and probably will not) know the real value of our most significant pursuits for many, many years to come.

Certainly, I know that in pursuing the meaningful and purposeful activities of motherhood and writing I will not just be filling time with empty occupations.

The good of one self
is to be the good of another.
_{definition of love from
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis}

I have discovered the most appreciated feature in our new home is the built-in babysitter whose frequent use brings renewed love to a 17-year marriage. For payment of a recent day out, our children requested we bring home Krispy Kreme from our date.

After a full day together we left the comfort of the Ikea meatball dinner and turned toward the inevitable two-hour drive home, contemplating whether to fulfill their glazed over dreams. We did. We pulled off the interstate at the exit and stopped. When we drove back on the interstate again, my husband looked at the clock and announced, “Eight minutes.”

Those minutes, or maybe just a sugar rush, created delighted eyes. Their delight captured feelings of giving and receiving love.

In the busyness to do things for those I love, sometimes my exhaustion tempts me to bypass both doing for love and feeling love altogether. This is most difficult to admit because I am generally well-rested. My youngest child is nearly nine and way beyond middle of the night wakings that leave me hallucinating without sleep.

That is why I was surprised by her knocking at my bedroom door at 3:59 a.m. “Mom, I threw up on the bathroom floor,” she said.

“Is it all over or just in a little spot?” I asked, wondering if she could just throw a towel over it until morning. She reported the multiple locations. Out of practice with such episodes, I took over a minute to react. Then, I cleaned the bathroom, I cleaned myself and I went to her room to clean her.

Cozy in her covers, she peeked out at me and said, “I am sorry I made a mess.”

I cupped my hand around her face. Her cheek was soft and warm, and again, for the second night in a row, love filled her eyes. When I returned to my room, it was 4:08 a.m. Only eight minutes.

Right there I stopped counting the eight-minute interruptions of the weekend and relished another eight-minute connection. Eight minutes to listen to a daughter on a car ride home. Eight minutes for a romantic goodbye while packing with my husband for a business trip. Eight minutes for a cherished hug and chat with a friend. Eight minutes to remember and encourage someone who was struggling. Eight minutes to love.

To know true love is to feel throughout these minutes as they evolve into stages, each beautiful and fulfilling in its own way. Seeking and receiving the attentions of a parent. Affirmation from friends. The dizzying depth of first romantic love. The passionate yet intelligent bond in truer commitment. Adoration and awe at the birth of a baby. Maternal sacrifice of self. Expanding compassion beyond an immediate circle. New faces and friendships awakening old feelings. Seeing beyond imperfections to offer or accept a forgiving heart. Maturing familiarity. Rediscovery.

Love develops in time. And filling fleeting minutes with love creates an abundance of eight-minute chapters in life’s love story.

This post is an entry in Scribbet’s Write-Away Contest; see her site to read other entries.

^{_{lovesymbol image copyright by Paulus Rusyanto, at freestockphotos.com}}

“Have I seen the hand of God reaching out to touch us or our children or our family today?”

I baked bread in the evening for my family. It didn’t finish cooling until just before I went to sleep, so I was standing in the kitchen in my robe and slippers at 10:15 packaging bread into bags. Of the four loaves, I would put three in the freezer and keep one out for making school lunches in the morning. My friend M came to mind. I was going to her house the next day and the thought came that I could bring a loaf to her.

But another thought came into my mind, disagreeing with this one. “No, that’s not necessary. Besides, then you would need to make bread, again, sooner,” it said. This mental flip flop consistently occurs as I make choices, even though I usually always end up following the thought that inspired my ideas in the first place.

Finally, I quieted the contradictory thoughts in my head and just set aside a loaf for her, reasoning, “Even if there was no reason to bring one, everyone likes to be remembered. I can make bread again soon.”

I had tightly scheduled the next day, especially in the afternoon, with some returns to make, the visit to M’s, children to pick up and a stop at the grocery store. Normally, at the end of days like these I am worn out and feel depleted. However, that morning, I found time to prepare myself for later. My youngest sister called unexpectedly, but I was able to make dinner ahead during her call, saving myself the work after I got home in the afternoon.

I arrived at M’s house right on time and rang the doorbell. Her children let me in, and I quickly realized that she was sick. She had been sleeping and seemed feverish to the touch when I hugged her. Although she was embarrassed to be “caught”, she settled herself into a big chair and wrapped up in blankets with a slice of the bread, some butter and a cup of herb tea. We had a wonderful heartfelt conversation like true friends.

Had the bread been necessary for all that? No, but it created a setting for both of us to recognize the core of friendship: generosity of self and spirit.

Generosity prompts us to cheer for a friend who gets to take a nap (or has any success, even if we aren’t currently having one). It is seeing beauty in each other even when we are rumpled. Generosity closes our eyes to the crumbs on the counter or dirty dishes and opens them to the joy of being in a friend’s home. It freely allows us to not think less of each other (or not retain feelings of embarrassment for our humanity and imperfection). Generosity opens our mouth to uplift and encourage. Most of all, generosity overcomes our thoughts of self.

Thank you, M; you helped me answer the question this day.

Generous: adj. 1. Liberal in giving or sharing. 2. Characterized by nobility and forbearance in thought or behavior; magnanimous. 3. Marked by abundance; ample.

The importance of memorials and finding meaning in them and all aspects of life came to my mind as I read the Old Testament stories of Joshua. I wonder how much influence one of these stories has in our heritage on the reasons why we erect memorials.

Before the the battle of Jericho, a less dramatic but significant story of faith occurs. Following the Lord’s word, Joshua leads the people to the banks of the Jordan River and tells them that “as soon as the soles of the feet of the priests that bear the ark of the LORD, the Lord of all the earth, shall rest in the waters of Jordan, that the waters of Jordan shall be cut off from the waters that come down from above.” Joshua 3:13 Indeed, when the priests walked forward and dipped their feet into the Jordan River, the water stopped flowing and they stood firm on dry ground.

What really strikes me about this story is not just the miracle of the Lord’s help or even the incredible faith of the priests to walk into the river without a sure knowledge that it would stop, but that afterwards, the Lord asks Joshua to have his people create a memorial with twelve stones from the river as a sign.

And he spake unto the children of Israel, saying, When your children shall ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean these stones? Then ye shall let your children know saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land. For the LORD your God dried up the waters of Jordan from before you, until ye were passed over, as the LORD your God did to the Red sea, which he dried up from before us, until we were gone over: That all the people of the earth might know the hand of the LORD, that it is mighty: that ye might fear the LORD your God for ever. Joshua 4:21-24

As I did a quick mental and Internet search, I recognized lots of references to the crossing of the Jordan and the 12-stone memorial in our popular culture and our recent history. Some references have trivialized or diminished the meaning of this Biblical story. Others help us gain appreciation for new memorials in the same thoughtful way as the original memorial of the crossing of the Jordan. I especially like the example of the Trail of Twelve Stones at the homesite of Abraham Lincoln’s youth.

As a society in general do we look on each of these memorials and figuratively ask ourselves this question, “What mean these stones?” My children and husband probably think I am obsessed in trying to find the meaning to everything, even that which seems ordinary. Why do I do this? I have a deep longing for the richness that symbols bring. I often feel that as a society, we have been overloaded with information on the surface, but in the process, we have lost the depth.

Simply asking ourselves, “What mean these stones?” (or monument or garden or picture or words) and prompting our children to ask that of us can return true meaning to our minds and hearts.

Personally, I find spiritual meaning daily by asking myself this question, “Have I seen the hand of God reaching out to touch us or our children or our family today?” suggested by a leader in my church, President Henry B. Eyring. By pondering this question and then making a record of it, I am laying down a spiritual memorial for my children and our family. My memorial is like those twelve stones as I recognize the spiritual manifestations of God’s miracles and our faith in Him that occur daily. And I “know the hand of the Lord, that it is mighty.”