I love it when one of my sons echoes back to me words that originally came from my mouth. “Help a mama out” is what I often say to Connor when I want to get his attention and get his help with something.
I shouldn’t have been surprised when he looked at me after school yesterday and said, “Help a brother out.” This was after he had asked me for some Cheez-Its and I was slow to respond! You better believe that when he repeated my words back to me, I heard him! I smiled and grabbed the Cheez-Its.
Christopher Robin had the 100 Acre Wood populated by his imaginary friends in the popular tales of Winnie the Pooh. Many women, myself included, have our very own 100 Issue Woods! We’ve got some pretty interesting characters living there too.
Last time we visited the 100 Issue Woods, we observed Winnie. Shaky self-esteem, self-control issues when it came to food … just some of the Winnie issues we deal with too, right? If you didn’t read it, you check it out here: Are You a Winnie the Pooh?
Today’s character is … Piglet!
The tip of his index finger feels light against my skin. He taps, blends, and smears ever so gently.
“I love you and I think you’re beautiful,” he says.
It’s yet another black eye. This one, courtesy of the six-foot-tall bedpost in our bedroom. The arrangement of the furniture in the room hadn’t changed, but evidently, my brain had. I’m older. It’s hard to remember everything all the time. Where am I walking? Which way am I turned? What wall am I facing?
So, into the bedpost I walked. Another black eye. This one, though, just seemed to heal more slowly than the ones before. Another change of aging.
As his fingertip swirls the beige putty that hides the blueish reminder of my memory lapse, I realize one thing has not changed. He loves me gently. He loves me well. He loves me in ways that no one really could imagine.
When we’re hurting, often our heads are cloudy and our hearts are so heavy we can’t bear the weight of our next decision.
We often feel stressed and fearful and disappointed. And, we don’t always feel capable of the small things we need to do — much less the big things that our soul really needs, like trusting God and praying. I know, I have been there.
When I was facing all the unknowns that go with a lumpectomy, the simplest tasks felt complicated; the most ordinary decisions seemed to take extraordinary effort.
