The Extraordinary Ordinary

I have now experienced 10 Mother’s Days as a mother.  I smile as I look back at past Mother’s Days.  There were Mother’s Days where I sighed with relief, smiled big at the gift of an afternoon without little ones around my feet, a few hours of silence, a coffee shop with a corner just for me.  There were Mother’s Days fraught with tears.  Tears over my insufficiency, tears over dreams for my children that needed to change, morph into something new and drastically different.  Mother’s Days with so many cards and crafts and funny little interviews of my preschool babies written down by their teachers, laminated and now preserved in memory boxes.  And every Mother’s Day with breakfast served syrupy, barely contained on the rectangular tray precariously balanced on my lap.

10 Mother’s Days create a beautiful mosaic of the soul-sanctifying work of motherhood.  This Mother’s Day was an example of the glorious ordinary of motherhood.  We stayed close to home, spending most of the day outside.  The day afforded brief snippets of alone time with each of my children.  Going for a walk, chalk painting, swinging in the hammock, snuggling in the chair.  Mother’s Day 2017 was ordinary in agenda but extraordinary in the company of my children, in the company of my husband.  

There is a popular trend nowadays of memes and videos featuring sarcastic, witty mothers complaining about motherhood under the guise of humor.  These bring the comedic break we all need to our day.  Motherhood can be so outrageous, you have to laugh.  Yet I wonder if these  somehow take away from the awe and beauty we should find in the vocation of motherhood.  Children are a GIFT and motherhood - however unattractive it looks and feels - SACRED.  When I truly ponder my role as a mother?  When I stop complaining about motherhood and stop counting what it takes away from me?  When I look into the innocent eyes of my children and see myself reflected back?  Well, the responsibility brings me to my knees, causes my breath to catch in my throat and my eyes to shut in prayer. I spend most of my days feeling like I make little difference in this world.  I fail constantly as a mother.  I yell.  I never seem to have the bag packed with the right things.  I spend fruitless hours cleaning the house.  The children’s noses are disgusting most of the day.  I don’t read to Grace as much as I should.  Special needs mothering? It’s a black pit of inadequacy.  And yet on Mother’s Day I remember - it is the extraordinary ordinary that counts in the end.  I am here.  I offer a smile.  A gentle touch and the words, “I love you.”  “You are important to me.”  “You can rest right here with me child.”  “I will feed you.”  “I will pick you up when you are scared.”  “I will try to order your world.”  “You are not an inconvenience to me.”  "You were created by a loving God."  This is the extraordinary ordinary we offer our children in our mothering.

Tomorrow mothers will return to work, work from home, work inside home, whatever label you want to put on it matters little.  The point is tomorrow we will quietly continue in our mothering while fulfilling other roles.   While the chores and routine of motherhood may be ordinary on Monday morning, let us not forget our influence is extraordinary, our children - a GIFT.  Keep on.  Keep on.  Keep on.  One foot in front of the other in this extraordinary ordinary role of motherhood….