Channeling Jesus Is Hard…

Let me set the stage…

I arrive home from work and Thing 1 is at the dining room table doing homework.

Thing 2 is in the living room doing homework.

A beautiful sight I tell you… both of them doing homework and me not having to hound them.  I think it’s going to be a good night.

I head to the kitchen to start dinner.  We’re having something new.  Rachel Ray said it was quick and easy.

Silly me.

I believed her.

I carefully tried to read the directions when Thing 1 asked for help.

“Whatcha need buddy boy?” I asked as I wiped my hands on the dish towel and headed into the dining room for a look see.

“I can’t remember how to divide decimals.”

Crap. I suck at math.  And that was the math that I learned how to do… not this “new math” that they are teaching them.

I try to point him in the right direction and head back to the kitchen as I hear Thing 2 calling for me.

“Mom! I need help.”

I head into the living room and guess what she’s stuck on?

Math.

Again.  Suck.

I help her and head back to the kitchen.

(I know that you’re already thinking, “why doesn’t she put them in the same room?”  Well I could… except they would fight and vie for attention.)

I grab the eggs from the fridge and one falls on my foot… so there’s egg everywhere.  I clean that up (or so I think) and go to open the tuna.  Now there’s tuna juice everywhere.

“Mom,” Thing 1 cries.  ”I just don’t remember.  I’m so stupid.”

“No you’re not.  Give yourself some credit.  It’s just day 2.  You haven’t done algebra all summer.”

“Mom,” Thing 2 calls, “Why did you put me in advanced math.  This is hard stuff.  I’m dumb.”

“No you’re not,” I reply.  ”You’re a math genius.  Hang in there.”

Meanwhile my onions are burning and I play math helper ping pong through the house beefing up my children who, bless their hearts, are truly trying to do a good job and struggling.

Then my phone dings.  The sound means my beloved hubs is sending me a love note.  Except he wasn’t.  ”I just messed up big,” he wrote.  ”I’m an idiot.”

My fingers were quick to the keys to respond with “look, I’m in the middle of math hell, the kitchen is a disaster, there’s egg in between my toes, and the rest of the house thinks they are idiots too,” but I didn’t.

I was halfway through when I deleted it and simply wrote, “no you’re not.  What did you do and how can I help?”

Now, I tell you this not because I want you to think that I’m some amazing saint.  I’m not.  Fortunately for me, about that time, my friend arrived and since she’s an accountant… and likes math, stepped in to help the kids while I finished getting dinner in the over and the kitchen back under control.

Because I wanted to continue channeling Jesus.  I felt good after I responded with caring and compassion and my initial response wouldn’t have done any sort of good.

I made it to the mall to help Thing 2 pick out her birthday present and pick up the last remaining school supplies.

We got milk and cereal.

And then I walked in the door to chaos… kids here there and everywhere.  Books and supplies strewn from one end of the house to the other.  Papers from school on the table, sorting to do, and while the hubs was working on getting the younger ones down and had started the dishwasher, I lost it.

No one seemed to care that I had walked in the door carrying all the loot that I shelled out for others.  The demands were quick and no one really wanted to go to bed or the shower.

And all of a sudden I lost my connection with Jesus.  I was channeling no more.

And then I might have laid it all out there to my husband like a snotty little brat that didn’t get her way.

Sometimes I wonder how in the world Jesus could do all He did and be cool with it.  How could He not look at people and go, “suck it up and get over it?”  I’m in constant awe of the way He lived His life.

“Be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.”

Yeah, right.

Perfect.

I am not.

But praise God for grace.

Because I need alot of it.

Until next time…