As we approach the register, my boys are chattering rapidly to each other.
Clerk lady: Are they speaking English?
Me: Yes, they are just talking really fast.
Youngest child: Why didn’t you tell us we were so incoherent?
Clerk lady, to me: What did he say?
“People make fun of pushy mothers,” Isabel once observed to Jamie. “But if we didn’t have pushy mothers, we wouldn’t have anybody–anybody at all– who could play the piano.”
The Sweet Remnants of Summer, by Alexander McCall Smith, p. 109
What do platypuses identify as?
my 10-year-old
These 12×12″ paintings by my son are for sale for $5.99 plus shipping. The pink one has already been claimed.
He said, “You can post pictures of these and claim you did them.”
What he didn’t know was that I’m actually prouder to be able to say, “My son did them.”
Drug use, at least in its early stages, feels spiritual — there is a sense of getting to the heart of things, of transcending the petty and mundane irritations of ordinary life, of entering something large and beautiful and peaceful. There is a sense of being insiders in a world to which square, conventional people are excluded. Drugs heighten interior perceptions, open windows and doors to what seems like transcendence.
And so the first thing that parents must understand about drugs is that there is almost always a spiritual element in adolescent drug-taking. We can never comprehend it if we view it simply as a matter of … rebelling against parental or societal standards. …
Only by firmly establishing this appreciation and understanding of spirituality as a context is it credible to then assert that drugs are fraudulent spirituality. Initially, they provide the illusion that matters of soul, meaning, love, destiny, beauty, and cosmic connections are being dealt with, but they always, sometimes soon and sometimes late but always, turn out to be the cruelest of illusions.
Like Dew Your Youth: Growing Up with Your Teenager, by Eugene H. Peterson, pp. 92, 94
“If your self is the problem, how can your self also be the solution?”
Allie Beth Stuckey is a podcaster who speaks mostly to Millennial and Gen-Z aged women from a reformed Baptist perspective. She wrote this book to counteract the essentially Gnostic messages that are constantly being sent from all quarters to this demographic.
When Allie became a mom, it became obvious to her that young moms struggle with feeling inadequate as mothers and as people. There are a lot of reasons for this. One is that in our culture, motherhood is denigrated as a calling. Simply being a mother is not considered enough to make you an interesting, capable, intelligent person. Mothers are criticized no matter what they do. Another reason is that they are, in fact, inadequate. No one is really adequate to care for small children well while also maintaining a good relationship with a husband, and this problem is made worse by the fact that young women rarely receive any training in the domestic arts. Finally, we tend to feel overwhelmed when we are hormonal and sleep-deprived.
In response to this, a cottage industry has arisen that exists to affirm moms as follows: You are already doing great! This message comes from both secular and Christian sources. (Nominally Christian, though of course their theology leaves something to be desired.) Obviously, it’s a good business model to tell people they are already doing great. People like to hear that, and when the dopamine hit from the message inevitably wears off in the face of reality, they will come back for more, sometimes several times a day.
Allie uses her own experiences (being a mom, before that struggling with bulemia, and talking with hundreds of women) to apply some good Reformed theology to the following five myths. (She calls them myths, which is sort of polite. I would call them lies.)
Obviously, these lies are not directed only at young women in our culture, and it’s not only young women that they are damaging.
Allie systematically shows how each of these creedal statements promises comfort and power, but ultimately, if we buy into it and try to implement it, delivers despair. She does so in her signature kind, personable way that is perfectly suited to her target audience. She quotes pertinent passages of Scripture (of which there are many) and shows us how the belief that we are enough in ourselves will trap us in an endless cycle of self-improvement and prevent us from turning to the one who is enough and who has the power to save and transform us, namely Christ.
Adolescence is a time of expanding spirituality; parents must never underestimate its authenticity or its intensity. But adolescent spirituality is not wise, it is not well formed, it is not mature. We accept the witness of our adolescents to the emphatic presence and necessity of spirituality at the center of our lives, but we do not to look to adolescents to guide us in matters of spirituality. It is essential to distinguish between the two elements. We are completely attentive to the witness of their lives; but we are detached and discerning regarding whatever they have to say on the matter. Like the canary to the miners, they are a signal that we notice, not a model that we imitate.
Like Dew Your Youth: Growing Up with Your Teenager, by Eugene H. Peterson, p. 89
This Indonesian phrase means “the only beautiful one in the house.” It’s what Indonesian ladies would say to me when they found out I had a husband and sons but no daughter.
Stay chantik, ladies!
As the next contraction starts building, I grip onto Kate again. I’m starting to feel overwhelmed by wave after wave of pain, each one getting bigger and longer and stronger.
An eternity passes, then [labor nurse] Ann comes in again, this time accompanied by a male student midwife.
“Hmm. Still only four centimeters dilated,” she says to the student after examining me. “Minimal progress. Of course, there’s a much greater risk of a long and difficult labor with older ladies. The muscles of the womb don’t work so well.”
“Is everyone deliberately trying to undermine me?” I shout. “Has anybody got any positive words of encouragement here?”
“You’re doing a great job,” Ann says, unsmilingly.
The Cactus, by Sarah Haywood, p. 361
(most of the time)
Hi everyone! Welcome back to Out of Babel! My particular off-the-grid August brought a lot of changes: I’m starting a new job.
This new calling is one that should blend well with my other job of being a (still partly home schooling) mom and all-around housekeeper. I’m not sure what impact it’s going to have on blogging, since blogging is down on the priority list, below momming, Christianing, and supposedly below novel writing.
I’m well on my way to having posts scheduled for September and October, so that will be taken care of at least for a few months while I learn the ropes at New Job and how to integrate that with taking care of Old Jobs. There’s just one exception … I don’t have links lined up for Wednesdays.
Heretofore, I have posted a link on Wednesday. Usually they have to do with archaeology, but sometimes it’s psychology, theology, or humor. Well, no more. Something has to give, and this it. I might still throw you guys a bonus Wednesday link if I stumble upon one, but for the most part, all you’re going to get is regional or art pics on Monday, quotes on Thursday, and rants/writing updates/book reviews on Friday.
I’ll still check Out of Babel and respond to comments, and I still demand that you guys go out and buy my books. That’s it for now! Love you all … bye!
Out of Babel 