Forgiveness

I received an email from an old friend this past week.

It was a friend who had walked out of my life many many years ago. As in, met with me after packing up all of his belongings, had a hard conversation with me, and then never looked back.

At the time it hurt.

A lot.

It was a deep wound that made me question my ability to have normal friendships and wonder where things went awry. It also added to the long list of reasons I don't open myself up to people easily.

Openness = ability to hurt me. Therefore, I will let you in to my life just far enough so you feel like you know me, but in actuality, few know the deep dark places of my soul (and the joys that are also there).

This friend was asking me for forgiveness. Forgiveness for walking out of my life, and forgiveness for not being able to be a good friend to me.

In actuality, I hadn't thought much about this person for awhile. I figured that circumstances made it so we shouldn't be friends anymore, and I had come to accept that.

It made me sad, but I had honestly moved on.

Really.

But, when I saw that familiar name in my inbox I stopped and took a deep breath. I wasn't sure if I wanted to open up the email and open up the wounds that I had so carefully put back together. But, I clicked and started reading.

His email made me weep. Not because he was asking me for forgiveness, that in itself was beautiful and freeing. It made me weep because of the purpose he was emailing me.

Apparently someone close to him had told him that the impact of him leaving my life had rippling effects that caused all sorts of problems for me.

I won't go into all of the lies told about me to this person, but basically someone else had caused me a lot of strife and instead of owning up he passed the blame.

 All of this was hurt I had dealt with in the past and had moved beyond.

But...because of the false information passed to him, my old friend had struggled with guilt. That guilt has affected his spiritual life. That guilt had made him feel unworthy in other relationships, and like he had no right to be considered a friend. It made him doubt things. And so...I wept. I wept for the harm done to this person in my name.

You see, he's not the first person from my past who has come forward to ask for forgiveness from a certain time period. He's probably the 3rd or 4th.

One name keeps coming up of how they were either used by this person to get information about me or about how they judged me based on false information. (Sorry, I'm not going to go into specific details. Those details are not important).

And so...I have a choice. I once again have to choose to forgive this person for the deep wounds he caused, not only in my life, but in so many other people's lives. Do I choose to forgive? I do. But, how do I deal with this? Do I confront this person who has never come to me to ask for forgiveness? Do I tell him how many people he harmed with choices he made that were (in hindsight) extremely immature? Do I let him know how deeply he has hurt multiple people, while he clearly is unaffected?

In reality, no. I know that there is nothing I can say that will impact him. He will probably go through life, blissfully unaware of the wounds he caused. I'm sure in his mind he did the best he could, given his resources, his lack of support, and what-not. I'm also sure that, given how many years ago this all went down, that in his mind it happened exactly how he said it did.

But, it has made me more aware. It makes me aware of my own words and how powerful they are. Words can hurt people, whether said in jest or spoken to make myself look righteous, when in reality I play a part as well.

It has also made me aware of how deep wounds can go, and how even when I think that I'm "over" something, it simply takes one email to remind me of those hurts. But, it's how I choose to react which is important. So, while I'm sad at the negative impact this person had on so many people, I also had a good giggle at the skewed view people had/have of me.

I think this is a bit disjointed. That's what happens when I try to blog deeply while toddlers climb on me, children whine at me and my husband keeps telling me it's dinner time. :) But, it's what has been rolling around in my brain as of late. Take it for what it is.

Hindsight

I don't know if I've ever fully been honest with people about the struggles I had growing up in a family full of boys.

Now, mind you, in my immediate family it was my mom, my brother and I for much of the time, so there my brother was out numbered (even the dog was a girl, and the cat was neutered so...).

But, on my dad's side of the family I was THE girl. Born smack-dab in the midst of a VERY male-centric family. I was also the sister of the first born great-grandson, born to the first-born grandson, so I kind of got a first row seat to the grandness that was all things boy.

Whenever we went to visit family I was surrounded by boys and all things boy. Army men, toy guns, camouflage, etc. I also had 4 boy cousins who were very close in age to me. Along with Uncles galore (and one very cool Aunt, who was also the only girl with 4 brothers...).

Sometimes, it felt like instead of being treated special because I was the girl, I was treated as an after thought. I remember pictures being taken of the boy cousins together, and being left out (but eventually let into the pictures). I remember the boys getting to go and do things together and one Uncle (who I'm sure was trying to be nice to me, but my sensitivity got the better of me) telling me that I couldn't come because it was a boy thing and I was a girl...

It made me a stronger person, I know it. I was very Tom-boy a incredibly competitive. It made me strive to be faster and stronger because, let's face it, I needed to be able to keep up with them if I wanted to be included.

But, as I grew into womanhood, it made me incredibly self-conscious and self-doubting. I was not a typical girl. Dresses and make up and other "girly" things did not interest me AT ALL. I would rather hang out with the guys watching Army of Darkness and Monty Python movies than watching chick flicks (Seriously, a guy friend actually introduced me to the Princess Bride...). I was also drawn into leadership roles in ministry, and was told that those were reserved for "the menfolk", which made me doubt my womanhood even more.

I have journal pages filled of doubt. I thought that God had made a mistake when He created me. I wondered, for the life of me, why I was made a girl instead of a boy.

Now, none of this had anything to do with sexual preference. I was never a closet lesbian, or secretly bisexual. Of course, knowing the way that some people think, I probably would have been encouraged to "investigate" that side, but I always have been attracted to men.

Once, I even looked my name up in the baby name book in the book store, thinking that perhaps my name meant something really cool.

Nope. Carrie, short for Caroline. A feminine form of the name Charles, which means, "Strong and masculine."

Talk about your ego blow! Even my name was wrong!

Fast forward 12 years to 32 year old Carrie.

On Tuesday I went in for my regular OB appointment to check the baby's heart rate, pee in a cup and have my weight and BP checked. I also am super lucky to have an OB who does an ultrasound at every appointment just because. I asked her if maybe we could have a peek to see if we could see anything gender-wise with this baby. She was skeptical because I'm only 15 weeks, so it's kind of early to tell for sure.

Within 30 seconds I saw it plainly.

I'm a mom to 4 boys. :)

Relief flooded my veins as I was super nervous about changing things up with having a girl (another post for another time).

As I was processing this whole thing, I realized, everything I experienced, all of my feelings of short comings, it was all preparation for things to come. God knew that I would be a mom to boys. God knew that I needed to be strong and low maintenance to be able to keep up with my amazing brood of boys.

So, if I could go back and talk to my 20 year old self, I would tell myself to buck it up, that the best is yet to come.

Trust.

I happened to be at my son's school when I heard about the shooting in Connecticut this morning.

It took every ounce of self control to NOT go run to him as he played tag with his friends on the playground, scoop him up and take him home. *Please note that I LOVE our school and have never once felt like my son has been unsafe*

I did, however, scoop up Benjamin and kiss him a ton and squeeze him tightly. But, that's not that out of the ordinary.

As I hear more and more details about what happened, I just want to throw up. A 20 year old going and shooting up his mother's kindergarten class?!? No words. Absolutely nothing.

I happened to have the radio on while I was driving, and I purposely changed it to Air 1, which is a Christian radio station (much better than The Fish, in my opinion. Normally I listen to NPR while driving, but they were going into a TON of detail, and I didn't want Aaron to overhear). Of course, they were talking about the shooting, and discussing it vaguely but from the back of the van I hear my sweet little Aaron say, "Mommy, I don't want to die!"

Oy.

I've been watching Facebook blow up with people processing this tragedy in their own ways. It's been interesting to watch the people who believe that we need better gun control (Most shootings happen by people who obtain weapons illegally so it wouldn't do much), need better security in schools (that costs money, and right now our public schools are so strapped for cash that there are 30+ kids in a class plus teachers are buying supplies from their own pockets), and people who have the initial response of wanting to home school their kiddos.

I've been thinking a lot about the last part.

Every last mommy instinct in me makes me want to wrap my children in bubble wrap, enclose them in a box with holes poked in it, and protect them from any sort of bad thing that could happen.

We refused to buy a house with a pool because I'm terrified of drowning.

We have our kids in the safest car seats possible, with the 19 month old still sitting backwards because studies show it's the safest.

Grapes are cut in half, food is not allowed in the car (for the littlest ones), hands are held while crossing the street, helmets are worn, etc.

But, the truth is, I simply cannot protect my child from every single "what if" scenario.

I wish I could, but I can't. I can bet you that every single one of those parents who lost their child today is wishing that they had called their kid in sick, that they had home schooled, that they had been there to protect their child. But, I can also bet you that this morning when they dropped off their children that this was the furthest thing from their minds.

We do what we can, but in the end the goal of parenting (at least, my goal in parenting, and I've said this all along) is to produce well rounded, functioning adults. I can't do that by protecting my child from every little "what if" out there. To do so would make my child grow into a paranoid adult who doesn't trust a soul, has no social skills, and is fearful of everything.

And we know fearful. Nathaniel still has a hard time talking to someone he has known his whole life. We are working on that.

So, when I pick Nathaniel up from school in a few minutes I will give him a hug and ask him how his day was (knowing full well that his teacher probably didn't mention anything, unless they prayed for the situation, but even then it will have been age appropriate). I also know that on Monday morning we will once again walk to school and I will drop him off as I usually do.

Because I have to trust that God has a plan for our lives. Even if that plan is not the plan I have in my head (knowing full well that it probably isn't).

And when my kiddos ask me about this tragic event (because I'm sure they will hear something, Aaron did), I will talk to them about how sometimes people decide to do horrible things, but that it is highly unlikely that anything like that will ever happen to them.

Why worry them?

Being present and intentional

The past few months I have done a type of social experiment.

I've observed people in group settings, I've watched people in one on one situations, and I've observed my own interactions with people.

My conclusion? Social media and having technology at our fingertips is turning us into a rude, narcissistic, and absent society.

I'm guilty of this (or, I was more guilty of this before making my observations. I'm much better now, but I'm sure I was pretty awful before).

Here are some examples of things I've seen.

1. I'll be at the park or playground with my kiddos. Around me are kids playing and having fun. While the kids are playing, the parents have their phones out and are simply not present. While their kids are begging for mom to "look at me!", they get unenthusiastic "That's nice" without even a glance up. That's super hard to observe, and even harder when I realize that sometimes I'm that person. I'm sure that whatever is going on on Facebook is simply not as amazing or interesting as the fact that our kids are experiencing life right in front of us.

2. Date night. Sam and I haven't been great about date night lately. Part of it is simple busyness, part of it is tight finances (do you know how much it costs to get a sitter for three kids? Yikes!!), and part of it is just how fast things are flying by. The other night I was out with friends and I saw a couple sitting at dinner. They were young, probably in their late 20's/early 30's and it was a nicer place. But, this couple both had their phones out and weren't even talking to each other. No conversation at all. I am super blessed to have a hubby who puts his phone away and looks me in the eye on a regular basis. But, the more I see, the less people are actually engaging with one another. We prefer to be online, passively living life.

3. Finally, group settings. I am noticing more and more that people don't interact with each other face to face. I teach Junior High regularly, and the students that have phones will sit next to each other and text other people. They don't talk to each other, they don't ask how each other are doing, they sit on their phones or listen to their ipods. But, it's not just Jr. High students. I went to the movies the other night with a large group of women. We were there early (about two hours early) and a friend and I observed the the majority of the people in the theater were sitting on their phones and not talking to the people who were sitting with them. It was actually frustrating because the whole reason I went to the movie was to hang out with people I don't normally see, but most of them were disengaged).

It's sad. It's sad because I'm noticing that we (as a society) are becoming satisfied with shallow relationships. Facebook gives us a small glimpse into someone's life, but we think that by looking at their short updates we know everything about what is going on. Not many people are willing to go deep with people, and we don't let people in to the deeper, gross parts of our lives.

Plus, when people try to speak into those gross parts of our lives, we push them away and think that they are judging us, when really we are trying to be genuine friends.

Or, we do what is called "vague-booking". Where we put something on our status such as, "I hate the world. You know what you did wrong to me. Why can't you grow up?" And then tell people to mind their own business when asked what's wrong, instead of saying to someone's face, "Hey, you know what, when you said that thing you did, you hurt my feelings." We don't know how to have real relationships anymore!

All of that to say. Lately I have been very intentional about how I spend my time. I have been present with my kiddos, I've been present with my hubby, and I'm trying to be present for my friends. I realize that friendship is more than liking something on Facebook or writing a quick note on a wall. Friendship is getting in the trenches with our friends. It's listening to their hearts, learning what makes them tick, and being there for them.

It's putting the phone down (even texting during face to face conversations), and listening. It's being present and intentional.

I feel like this is a bit disjointed, but it's a blog post that's been rolling around in my scattered brain lately.

On another note. The rumors are true! We are currently expecting our 4th little one, due the beginning of July, 2013. I believe this will be the final installment of the Grummons family, but we are excited. I was hoping to tell people before it went on facebook, but Sam outed me before that could happen, so I hopefully got everyone. I did tell people at the movies, which was nice because a lot of my favorite people were there that night. :) I'm currently feeling super tired and slightly sick, but the heart beat looked great and everything else is on par for the course. The older boys are excited, and Benjamin has no idea that his throne as the baby is going to be overthrown. :)

He loves deeply

My children are passionate about life. They play hard, sleep hard, and love each other fiercely.

So far, Aaron is the epitome of loving deeply.

This kid is passionate. I always joke that if he had a font it would be caps lock because everything is SO EXCITING!

For example, Aaron is a fan of one of my youth leaders, Derek. He has been known to stand up in a crowd when he sees Derek on video and yell, "I WOVE Derek!!!" (We're working on the speech issue).

Of course, he also has his moments of shyness and will hide his face in my arm when Derek walks up and refuses to look him in the eye. We're working on social skills too. Give him a break, he's 3.

For some reason Aaron has been fixated on death lately. I'm not sure if he's just trying to wrap his head around the idea, or if preschool has emphasized the death and resurrection of Jesus a lot lately, either way, he is very distressed with the idea that someday we will all die (I don't believe in lying to my kids about the realities of our mortality. I do keep it age appropriate, but I won't tell my kid that Sam or I will never die, I feel like that could come back and bite me in the butt). So, last night he was lying in bed while we were getting ready to say our prayers and he became so very sad that someday I would die. We moved past it pretty quickly though.

This morning, though, we were driving home from our annual Monday trip to the Happiest Place on Earth when I heard sobbing from the back seat. I asked Aaron what was wrong and he said, "I miss Daddy! I love him SO MUCH! I love him to the sun and back!"

He calmed down when I reminded him that Daddy works in the kitchen now, so we would see him in 5 minutes. Sure enough, the minute we got home, Aaron ran into the house and I heard his little voice, "Daddy! I wove you to the sun and back!"

I love that my children have yet to become jaded. I love that they haven't yet gotten hurt to where they feel the need to guard their hearts from being broken and destroyed. I know that part of life involves being hurt, either by friends who unintentionally hurt our feelings, by bullies who use the words that will wound them deeply, or by the reality that sometimes life just stinks.

But, for now, I enjoy that my children love deeply. I love that when I sit next to Aaron he immediately covers me up with the blanket he's using and says, "Oh! You want to cuddle with me, Mommy?" I love that Benjamin gives kisses and hugs and does so without any prompting. I also love that even though he's big now (6 is OLD!), that Nathaniel will still give me hugs and kisses in the privacy of our house.

Not to mention my rockin' hubby!

I'm blessed. :)

An explanation

I feel the need to explain why Sam is getting out of the Army now.

Since he's been in for nearly 14 years, we get a lot of, "Why aren't you retiring? It's only 6 more years! You really are missing out!" Mostly from people who either don't know everything that is involved in Sam staying in the Army, people who don't know what we've experienced in the Army National Guard and people who just don't know how Army benefits work.

Even though Sam has been on some sort of Active Duty Orders (meaning that he's worked full time for the army as his Monday through Friday job, plus 2 deployments and schooling) for about 4 1/2 years (give or take some) he would only be eligible for a National Guard retirement check when he reaches retirement age. That is a small amount of money that he would receive in 30 years for 6 more years of service. That could possibly be three more deployments. It's not worth it.

Last night we had the Division Dining Out. This is where everyone dresses up in their dress blues (and the women wear formal wear) and we all eat dinner together and listen to high ranked people give speeches. This year was the first year I actually wasn't bored to tears because the two men who spoke were actually interesting. One was retiring, and the other was being promoted. What was most interesting was listening to Sam's peers (all men who he worked in the office with the past two years and a few people he deployed to Kosovo with). They kept giving Sam flak for getting out, but they were all super impressed and incredibly supportive of him. They realize that IBM is a great job for him, and they are all still playing the bureaucratic games of the Army which is royally screwing some of them over. For example, one officer really wanted to be transferred to a unit in San Diego because he felt like that would help him advance. Instead of giving him that transfer, they picked a guy who wanted to stay put and transferred him instead. As a bonus, they are sending that unit to Afghanistan so...there you go!

I've never been a fan of Sam being gone. I've hated every single drill weekend, every month he's been gone, and loathed deployments. I've never been a "rah rah rah!" kind of Army wife. I appreciate the benefits, but at the end of the day I've always said that I would rather struggled and have my husband home than not be worried and have him gone. So, I have always chalked up my complaints of Sam's experience in the Army as me being a baby.

At least I did until last night when one of Sam's former office mates told me that Sam was getting out at a good time and that the Army really stuck it to him while he was in. Apparently two deployments like Sam had is unusual.

For the record, I have appreciated the benefits. It was nice having really great health insurance that was inexpensive for us. I also really appreciate the good car insurance and the pay checks. But, when people point those things out and say that we owe the Army for that, it doesn't compute for me. Sam has health insurance through IBM right now, but that doesn't mean that we owe IBM our lives, it simply means that IBM appreciates their employees and so they provide them with benefits. It's part of the perks of having a regular job. To say we don't want to be a part of the Army culture any more is not saying I didn't appreciate those things.

Here is the list of things that Sam has missed because of his Army National Guard duties.

• My undergrad graduation.
• The deaths of multiple family members (along with funerals because unless it is a direct relative, you aren't allowed to leave).
• My whole entire pregnancy with Nathaniel.
• Nathaniel's first 3 months.
• The last half of my pregnancy with Aaron.
• The birth of Aaron.
• Aaron's first 9 months of life.
• My graduation from Seminary.

That is just the big things. Not to mention birthdays, anniversaries, recitals and other things of the boys. He didn't get to see Aaron learn how to sit up or roll over or begin to crawl. He even missed the golden moments of Benjamin's infancy due to the trip to Australia last summer.

So, when we do the happy dance for Sam getting out of the Army, we have our reasons. When people ask me if I'm ready to have my husband back full time I look at them and say, "I've never HAD Sam full time. So, I am looking forward to having him full time for the first time in our relationship."

Does it mean we hate the Army? No. It just means we are done. And boy, are we happy!

(As I finished typing this, Sam walked in, finishing up his final Army thing. His timing couldn't be better!)

Seizing the Day

 Life is crazy.

Between school, music lessons, church stuff and life, we are going a million miles an hour. I generally don't see my kids between Tuesday morning and Thursday morning (minus dinner, that is our sacred family time that no one is allowed to interrupt, and time in the van going from home to school and back). That stinks when I think about it, but I also then focus on the fact that my Mondays and Fridays are spent solely focusing on house work and playing with the kiddos and it makes me feel blessed and happy to get more than a lot of people.

Because of the busyness of it all, time is flying by. I can't believe that Nathaniel is already in first grade learning sentence structures and Aaron blew me away yesterday morning as he told me what words were on a sign that we passed ("Mom! That sign says Kapow!") and then correctly picked out his friend's cubby at school. Plus, Benjamin has so many words, teeth and hair. Isn't he still my baby? No? Whatever.

Due to the nature of my job I am constantly thinking of future events, so in my mind it's already Christmas.

So, this school year we are seizing the day. Every day is going to be lived to the fullest and every moment is going to be savored. I will NOT wish my days away because there is joy to find in every day. When some helpful child spills salad dressing all over the freshly mopped floor, I will not freak out, I will use it as a teaching moment. When the freshly bathed children go and play in the dirt, I will take the pictures that I will laugh at later, bite my tongue and send them back to the bath. And, when my 3 year old wants me to play a game with him, I will finish my task up and then take the time to play with him (he does have to learn patience and see that life isn't all fun and games).

I know that all too soon I'm going to long for the days of diapers and cutting up grapes and sippy cups (okay, maybe I won't miss diapers).

I encourage my Mom friends (and my childless friends as well) to take the time to enjoy the moments. Don't wish away your days.

So, my question for you is: What was your favorite moment this week? What are you going to choose to enjoy today?

I'll go first. My absolute favorite moment today was with Aaron. He was pretending to be a dog and was barking. He then went to lick me. I told him, "Don't lick me!" He said, "But I a doggie!" I told him I don't let dogs lick me. He then looked at me with the straightest face and said, "But I not lick my butt or eat poop!"

I died! He is so funny. :)