His confession came unprompted and unbridled
"Mom, Dad - I've been tempted to say bad words at recess"
We braced
"What words buddy?" we asked
Guarded,
"I can't say them" he replied
Finally,
"The d-word and the s-word" was all he could bring himself to say
So we braced again
And pushed
"You have to say the words buddy, so we can talk about it" we prompted
With eyes downcast
His lips formed the word
And just above a whisper
He spoke the first four letter word
"dumb"
We held his hands and he gave up the s-word,
"stupid"
Six letters!
Thank Heaven...
Utter relief
My eyes met J's and
I had to stop myself from giggling
I could breathe again
And we talked about it...
How those are words we never use for people
And how God gave us a brain with an incredible capacity to learn and grow our vocabulary and speak life-giving words

For the Love of  innocence, opportunities for conversation, reflection and the capacity to learn and grow to speak life-giving words, always,
ME

THE Plan

When I was little I made plans;
I planned
What I would be
In vauge beautiful generalizations
A wife
A mom
And Happy
I planned
My family
In specifics that hold no true meaning (except for laughter and butterflies)
The color of  my husband eyes
His features
How he'd make me laugh and feel butterflies
What age I'd be when we said "I do"
How many kids we'd have
And what their unique, but not weird names would be

Then...
Llife happened
Pain was never a part of my plan
I didn't factor in my head-strong nature
Or selfishness

I didn't plan on seeking the Lord
He'd just always been there

When I was little
I didn't know my own faith
When life happened
And Sin derailed
I needed Him
I needed forgiveness
And
A new plan

Grace gave way to trust
And I started to understand
His plan was the Garden
A real-life experiece of community with Him
He knew we'd mess it up
People, we're messy
I
Am
Messy

So He made a new plan
It couldn't be perfect with us in it
There would be pain
But there would be forgiveness
And fulfillment
And hope
And a future...

I am a wife
I'm also a mom
Most of the time I'm happy
Really, truly happy
My husband does have brown eyes as I planned
He still gives me butterflies, eight years after saying I do
And we laugh
A LOT
I was blessed with two children, not three as planned
And they have great names
None of which came from my middle-school notebook

I'm still head-strong, and selfish
But I'm growing in submission,
Learning to get over myself
And relinquish control
I can't control if my friend has cancer
Or if another is moving half-way across the globe
I couldn't control my miscarriage
Or Ethan's stay in the NICU
I can't control my children's choices
Or keep their heart's from breaking

But I have faith
And forgiveness
My hope is eternity
And while I'm here living my messy life
He listens to my prayers
He cares about what I want
He loves me
He gives me more grace
And He is good

For the Love of less planning, more trust, looking forward to eternity and faith that's real in the middle of this messy life,
ME