Digging out of the snow

We've been buried in what seems like ten feet of snow. Snow high enough to cancel your playdate. High enough to give away your dog. High enough to nap without shame - daily. But we're digging out. And I'm finally digging through what's keeping me from this place here on the blog. And digging through unposted pictures from the last couple months.

If you're like me you have one or two blogs that you read pretty frequently. Blogs by women you've never met. You don't know how you stumbled upon them or who first sent you a link to a post. But now you know the names of all these woman's kids. And you know what she gave her husband for Christmas. And you know their feelings on faith, design and what's for dinner.

Well, I have one of those. She writes about her sweet family of four. And gives mad tutorials on sewing. Anyway, her little toeheaded son is off to elementary school. And a good few months ago she wrote about this sudden awareness that perhaps his stories and his words and his pictures aren't hers to share with the world anymore. Maybe he's not just hers anymore, but his own. (Maybe - definitely - he was never hers, but Gods.) Maybe this seven year old boy doesn't want a random girl in Kansas City knowing that he was so nervous for first grade that he wet the bed for the first time in years.

So she began leaving things unsaid.

But more than the dialing down of her kids' personal stories, she wrote about how this shift toward not documenting every movement revealed a belief she didn't know she held. The belief that if she didn't photograph the snuggle, then the snuggle didn't happen. And if she didn't write about a lesson learned, then it wasn't really learned. And if she didn't blog about the curtains she just hung that it was as though they were still sitting in a pile on the floor.

Because if you didn't facebook it, you didn't do it.

But I'm not writing to say that I think we all overshare. I don't know. To each, his own. But here's my own. I maybe don't overshare. But I do sometimes share for the wrong reasons. And I do often covet what others have shared.

Sometimes I video Annie dancing on my phone but the whole time she's dancing, I'm watching her THROUGH my phone. And by the time she stops, I realize my only memory is now of the phone. I watched a three inch screen instead of watching a three foot kid and now all I'll ever have again is that three inch version of the dance.

Sometimes, I scroll through my Instagram and wish I had more kids. NOW, God. Because a chaotic life seen through a photo filter looks awfully appealing. And I wish that my wardrobe was a little hipper. And I wish I'd actually done my hair that day, because if I had, I would take a picture of Annie and I right now, cozied up on her bean bag. But I didn't, so I don't. People would know the ugly truth about my unmade up state, and I seek approval too much for that to happen.

...I think I'm probably being too honest. But roll with it...

Sometimes, I scroll through Instagram and wish that I was living in Brooklyn and working a desk job with a view. I'd actually have a salary and I'd meet my friends for brunch at places who bake fresh scones and grab take-out before I hopped on the subway to go home.

Sometimes, I leave somewhere - a night out, a dinner out, a date out, a friend's house - and I think man, that was fun. I wish I'd taken a picture to post on Instagram so that I could remember just how good my outfit was today (because I finally, actually got dressed) and how fun my friends are and then I could put it on the Interweb and people would see how cool I am, too.

But, no. Now it's like it never happened. No one's going to know that we did that really cool thing.

People need to know that my life is covet-worthy. 

No one's life is, but let's fool each other nonetheless.

If I had a bigger dining room table, the food would taste better.

If I hadn't gotten that damn degree in French, I might actually know something of value.

If I hadn't spent the money on that desk that fell apart within the first year, we could've bought that sectional.

If we'd just noticed the f-ing leak under the sink, we wouldn't be paying for our downstairs neighbor's new ceiling right now.

Paul says in Phillipians 4:12 I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.

Someone pointed out to me last night that he says I have learned to be content. He doesn't say that he naturally is. Or that it just happens. He learned it.

I don't know what this post means entirely. I think I thought I did at the outset. It was supposed to be about how I stopped blogging because instead of being a guardian of memories for my family I was more interested in how many people saw my memories.

And this trading of memories - me showing you our evening of cartoons and you showing me your night at the club - well, it was just too much for me. I'm not whole enough to not covet. And the part where I participated - where I posted the pics and the posts - it became too much about me. About trying to impress. About trying to make the day after day, long, lonely time slot of 3-5pm with a toddler more manageable by seeing new likes on Facebook.

I'm a mess. If you didn't know it before, you know it now. I look for validation in others before I look for it in Christ. Never content. And so sometimes, I have to rip away the obvious temptations. The writing of posts. The posting on Facebook. The faces on Instagram.

And the funny thing is, it doesn't even help that much. They say that it's why monasteries fail. It's not the world that is the whole problem. It's not social-media that's going to kill me. It's ME that's going to kill me. It's my rotten heart. My covetous heart. My approval-seeking heart. My greedy heart. My jealous heart. My bitter heart. My very selfish heart. The problem isn't you and your night on the town. It's me. The blog isn't the problem. It's what I sometimes do with it.

Ah, Jesus' grace. His mercy that abounds. His mercies that are new every morning. His mercies that heal. His mercy that I don't deserve. His grace that is the only answer. The only way I'll make it. The only way to be content. 

So I'm going to try to get back to blogging. But blogging differently. Not trying oh so hard to be charming or cute with what I write. Not trying to sugar-coat the mundaneness of life. Not always trying to impress. Or to validate. Or to seek affirmation. And maybe my posts won't look any different than they used to. But hopefully the heart behind them is drastically different.

Here's to blogging for His glory and not my own.