- Jun 27, 2003
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Putting Mother in the Picture
by Sue Monk Kidd
"Ma-a-a-ma! Come look!" Ten-year-old Ann is shouting at the back door.
Now what? I am huddled in my favorite chair, enjoying a small oasis of quiet in what has been a frustrating day with my two children.
It is a week since school ended, and suddenly the kids are home behaving like two wild ponies let out of a corral. They jump on the beds; chase the dog through the house, turning over a trash can; spill soft drinks; grumble over who gets the remote to the television, and whine that there's nothing to dothe perennial woes of summer vacation.
This morning, while watering my marigolds, they drenched each other with the garden hose. Soggy tennis shoes, dripping clothesit was too much. "Go to your rooms!" I yelled.
And that's how it's been all dayall week. My face has taken on a certain grimace. Several times a day I stand the children before me and give a lecture about their behavior, but nothing gets through.
"Mama, come see!" Once again Ann's voice cuts into the quietness. She glides to a halt beside my chair, breathless. "There's a chipmunk outside."
I look at her. A chipmunk? "I'm reading," I explain.
"But Mama"
"Not now." I try to think of something to occupy her. Then I remember. Why don't you do your Sunday school assignment?" I ask She had come home last week with an assignment to make a little booklet illustrating four ways to love someone: a teacher, parent, neighbor, friendanyone she wanted to choose.
"All right," she says, but her voice is so quiet I barely hear her.
In the late afternoon I go looking for her. I peer into Ann's room. She says she has just finished her assignment. "Can I see?" She twirls a lock of brown hair around her finger. "Come on," I prod. More hesitation. Then she relents, dropping the booklet into my hands.
Four Ways to Love a Child by Ann Kidd. I read the title twice. At once I see. The booklet is meant for me. I start to tell her the idea was for her to show ways she could love someone, not ways I could love someone. But I keep quiet. Is she feeling so in need of love? I manage a feeble smile and turn to page one. I have the funniest feeling about this.
"Go see chipmunks and stuff like that with your kids," it says. Beneath is a picture of a smiling mom and a little girl peeking around a tree at a chipmunk. I gaze at it, aware for the first time since summer vacation began that I've treated the children more like interruptions than family members whose lives I want to share and enjoy. Her picture of togetherness rearranges something inside me. I look up for Ann, but she has slipped from the room.
I turn to page two. "When kids mess up, give them some hugs." I smile at her sketch of a mother and child reaching to embrace each other, Hugs had been rare this week, especially when the kids "messed up." I recall the angry banishment to their rooms earlier in the day, and I thinkmaybe the moments they mess up are the very times I should embrace them with the assurance they are loved.
"Give kids a chance to talk" is scrawled on page three. I look over her crayon drawing, thinking of the lectures I've delivered all week and of my tendency to run on about some grievance while the children stand there unable to squeeze in a single word. And I ask myself, shouldn't my children have the fight to invoke silence from their parents long enough to get their own thoughts and feelings across?
There is one more page. "Laugh a lot," it says. I wonder if Ann is referring to the water follies she and her brother had with the garden hose this morning. Could laughter have unwound the tension and shifted things into perspective, helping me to see that it was, after all, only water?
I close her little booklet. Yes, the children have been difficult this week. But so have Ihoarding time without sharing it, disciplining without loving, lecturing without listening, even forgetting my sense of humor! I sense God telling me that it isn't just the children's behavior I should be trying to change, but my own. In that moment, I know that the love I show in the small, nitty-gritty moments of whines and water fights, grumbles and interruptions, may be the most elusive love of alland the most important.
Ann saunters back into the room, chewing her lip. She gazes at the booklet still in my hand. I give her a hug and a wink.
The next day I am puttering in the kitchen when through the window I spot Ann's chipmunk beneath the oak in the backyard. I dash for her room where she's dipping a brush into red tempera paint. "Come quick!" I cry. "The chipmunk's back."
She whirls around so fast that she tips over the paint. As it runs across her desk, she reaches for the jar and drags the sleeve of her blouse through the red puddle.
For a split second I forget the chipmunk. I am about to give in to one of those small wear-and-tear frustrations of raising children. But just in time I remember Ann's Four Ways to Love a Child and I laugh instead, it is, after all, only paint, and outside there is a fleeting moment for us to capture and tuck away in a little girl's heart.
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Submitted by Richard
by Sue Monk Kidd
"Ma-a-a-ma! Come look!" Ten-year-old Ann is shouting at the back door.
Now what? I am huddled in my favorite chair, enjoying a small oasis of quiet in what has been a frustrating day with my two children.
It is a week since school ended, and suddenly the kids are home behaving like two wild ponies let out of a corral. They jump on the beds; chase the dog through the house, turning over a trash can; spill soft drinks; grumble over who gets the remote to the television, and whine that there's nothing to dothe perennial woes of summer vacation.
This morning, while watering my marigolds, they drenched each other with the garden hose. Soggy tennis shoes, dripping clothesit was too much. "Go to your rooms!" I yelled.
And that's how it's been all dayall week. My face has taken on a certain grimace. Several times a day I stand the children before me and give a lecture about their behavior, but nothing gets through.
"Mama, come see!" Once again Ann's voice cuts into the quietness. She glides to a halt beside my chair, breathless. "There's a chipmunk outside."
I look at her. A chipmunk? "I'm reading," I explain.
"But Mama"
"Not now." I try to think of something to occupy her. Then I remember. Why don't you do your Sunday school assignment?" I ask She had come home last week with an assignment to make a little booklet illustrating four ways to love someone: a teacher, parent, neighbor, friendanyone she wanted to choose.
"All right," she says, but her voice is so quiet I barely hear her.
In the late afternoon I go looking for her. I peer into Ann's room. She says she has just finished her assignment. "Can I see?" She twirls a lock of brown hair around her finger. "Come on," I prod. More hesitation. Then she relents, dropping the booklet into my hands.
Four Ways to Love a Child by Ann Kidd. I read the title twice. At once I see. The booklet is meant for me. I start to tell her the idea was for her to show ways she could love someone, not ways I could love someone. But I keep quiet. Is she feeling so in need of love? I manage a feeble smile and turn to page one. I have the funniest feeling about this.
"Go see chipmunks and stuff like that with your kids," it says. Beneath is a picture of a smiling mom and a little girl peeking around a tree at a chipmunk. I gaze at it, aware for the first time since summer vacation began that I've treated the children more like interruptions than family members whose lives I want to share and enjoy. Her picture of togetherness rearranges something inside me. I look up for Ann, but she has slipped from the room.
I turn to page two. "When kids mess up, give them some hugs." I smile at her sketch of a mother and child reaching to embrace each other, Hugs had been rare this week, especially when the kids "messed up." I recall the angry banishment to their rooms earlier in the day, and I thinkmaybe the moments they mess up are the very times I should embrace them with the assurance they are loved.
"Give kids a chance to talk" is scrawled on page three. I look over her crayon drawing, thinking of the lectures I've delivered all week and of my tendency to run on about some grievance while the children stand there unable to squeeze in a single word. And I ask myself, shouldn't my children have the fight to invoke silence from their parents long enough to get their own thoughts and feelings across?
There is one more page. "Laugh a lot," it says. I wonder if Ann is referring to the water follies she and her brother had with the garden hose this morning. Could laughter have unwound the tension and shifted things into perspective, helping me to see that it was, after all, only water?
I close her little booklet. Yes, the children have been difficult this week. But so have Ihoarding time without sharing it, disciplining without loving, lecturing without listening, even forgetting my sense of humor! I sense God telling me that it isn't just the children's behavior I should be trying to change, but my own. In that moment, I know that the love I show in the small, nitty-gritty moments of whines and water fights, grumbles and interruptions, may be the most elusive love of alland the most important.
Ann saunters back into the room, chewing her lip. She gazes at the booklet still in my hand. I give her a hug and a wink.
The next day I am puttering in the kitchen when through the window I spot Ann's chipmunk beneath the oak in the backyard. I dash for her room where she's dipping a brush into red tempera paint. "Come quick!" I cry. "The chipmunk's back."
She whirls around so fast that she tips over the paint. As it runs across her desk, she reaches for the jar and drags the sleeve of her blouse through the red puddle.
For a split second I forget the chipmunk. I am about to give in to one of those small wear-and-tear frustrations of raising children. But just in time I remember Ann's Four Ways to Love a Child and I laugh instead, it is, after all, only paint, and outside there is a fleeting moment for us to capture and tuck away in a little girl's heart.
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Submitted by Richard
