Waiting

Part of my strategy to cope with a life that increasingly seems too hard involves making the kids take a little more responsibility. Previous attempts to turn the boys loose on the bathrooms have been disastrous, so I’ve turned my attention to another hated chore: putting away the laundry.

I’ve labeled the drawers in their room. I’ve shown them what to put where. I bring the filled-to-overflowing upstairs and set it right outside their room. They know they have to sort the clothes. Violet’s clothes go in a separate pile for me to put away. The rest need to be in drawers, and the drawers need to close when they are finished.

Most recently, this chore took approximately one hour and forty minutes.

You read that right.

There were screams. Children fell prostrate onto the ground, weeping. There were promises that they could not go on and accusations of terrible unfairness. Caleb quit fifty-two times before the job was declared finished. Also, almost none of the drawers closed on account of clothing that was bunched up and hanging out. I found Violet’s shirts in the boys’ pj drawers. I found underwear with Caleb’s shirts. At least four items of clothing were declared to have no home at all and left strewn on the carpet.

This is why I don’t make my kids do more chores. Once the clothing is put away, I spend the next week proving to Caleb that he does, in fact, have clean long-sleeve shirts. He just needs to look in the sock drawer where he put them.

Then, of course, I have to factor in Violet. For every bit of weeping and gnashing of teeth that her brothers manufacture, Violet possesses an equal desire to “help”. What I can’t get her to understand is that not all “helping” is created equal.

She swoops in on the dreaded chore and starts grabbing articles of clothing. She’s pretty good about taking her clothes to her room and leaving them on the floor. But when she pulls out one of her brothers’ shirts? She likes to toss it across the room for someone else to find. Or she tries to force it in a drawer while Eli and Caleb scream that it isn’t the right spot. (How do they even know? They aren’t doing so great themselves.) Sometimes she hides things under the bed.

The fact is that Violet’s well-intentioned actions turn a chaotic and frustrating experience into a big old mess. The most helpful thing she could do would be to wait – like I told her – until the clothes are sorted into her room. THEN she can help me divvy things up into the right bins and everyone can be happy.

I’m not unlike Violet. Right now, everything in me screams that I need to “do” something. Something more that the editing work I’m doing. It screams that I need to move back to Ohio and look for teaching jobs, because at least I’ll know my babies will have food on the table and medical benefits. It screams that I should definitely hold onto my tutoring gig in our co-op, even though I feel a definite nudging in my spirit to give it up. It screams that I should spend my hours scouring job boards – looking for both myself and my husband – instead of reading God’s word, praying, and fulfilling the already massive pile of responsibilities I face.

Just like Violet, I’m trying to be helpful. Heck, I’m trying to prevent disaster. But none of my efforts will help anything if I haven’t listened to what God wants me to do. Right now, all I know is that I’m supposed to keep writing these thoughts and feelings rolling around in my head. Writing them down helps me process and remember what He’s doing in my heart. I also feel called to continue teaching my kids, to the best of my ability. To being present for them in the best part of their days.

I know I’m supposed to be poring over God’s word, treasuring these words of promise and hope. Other than that, the only directive seems to be “WAIT”. I’m not sure if it’s actually a directive, or if it’s the absence of any other directive…but waiting is all I can do.

Can I tell you how hard it is to wait when your husband hasn’t handled the things you asked him to handle three weeks ago? When you haven’t had any income in two months. When you’re acutely aware that the savings will go fast. When the husband throws a fit every time you spend a penny, and then throws around hairbrained ideas like selling the house and living off the land. When he’s sleeping in, taking naps, watching TV, and going on long runs? I do not want to sit and wait – especially not on him. I’ve spend more than a decade waiting on him to step up and take responsibility. Things do not look any better this time around.

But I watched Violet swoop into the laundry like a tornado and make a huge mess when she could have waited just a few minutes and been very helpful. I don’t want to do the same thing to God. I want to wait until he says, “Now. This is what you can do.”

So I’m waiting. Because waiting on God is better than all the action in the world.