Beth Troy's Blog, page 9

Day 14: Monday Soundtrack

Thinking of how now, with much of the busyness gone, Monday mornings still feel like the wind blowing against my house this morning.

Two weeks ago, I couldn’t do anything about that. There were morning alarms and boys who didn’t want to wake up (though they early bird on Saturdays and Sundays). School lunches needed packing. Even though we’d spent the weekend picking up, there was still something invariably missing on Monday morning – matching socks, for example. It’s on Monday mornings I usually remember I forgot to get something at the grocery, or I forgot to make one of our food staples for the week.

I’m not so far into quarantine that Manic Monday doesn’t start playing partway through the early hour, but I’m getting better at turning down the dial (visualizing my hot pink boombox right now. Actually, I think it was my sister’s. It’s okay. What’s hers was always mine!)

Today, the boys will wake up when they wake up.

After they eat breakfast, we’ll stick in the kitchen. Jess can help with the bread, Ez with the granola, and Tom with hummus.

Then, I’ll ask Jess to build a fire. We’ve gone through more firewood in these past two weeks than we did all winter because we’re home all day to enjoy it.

I’ve been ripping through The Read-Aloud Family. I have a copy of Tom Sawyer. I want to try to read it to all three boys at the same time. Maybe this morning, in front of the fire, I’ll have the guts to do it.

After that we should get to school. I’m not going to treat the basement mess as an undone weekend task, but a Monday morning task to wrap our heads around what we’re learning this week. Then, it will be lunchtime, and I can already hear Tommy demanding a hot dog, Ez demanding tuna, and Jesse demanding … anything so long as it comes in a large quantity (I caught him finishing a bag of chips in his bed two nights ago).

There’s plenty of ways for this plan to take a toilet dive – all very plausible. But on Monday, March 30, two weeks into quarantine, I’m getting better at dealing with disrupted plans, too.

*Let’s not leave the 80s so fast. Tiffany might have been a prophet with this one. Maybe some of you need the inspo only Wilson Phillips can provide. This one will be good for recess.

Day 13: Shelves

Sometimes – not often – I dust how my mother taught me.

I take everything off the shelves. I fill the bucket with medium-hot water and a couple tablespoonfuls of Murphy’s Oil Soap. I dunk the rag, squeeze out the excess water, and wipe the surface to the corners. I put the rag back into the water, take the towel from my right shoulder, and dry. The towel, now a little damp, is set to dust the items that go back on the shelf. I do that before putting them back in place (or not, depending on my mood). Then, I move to the next surface.

Today, I noticed the oval, nesting Shaker boxes. Matt’s aunt and uncle gave them to us as a wedding gift, and they’re one of the very few items we’ve kept through all the moves over the last 18 years.

I noticed what I need to do after I’m done dusting, like polish the silver candlesticks and coffee service from my grandma.

I saw what I’m good at – keeping things relatively uncluttered – and what I’m bad at. Every surface has a ring, courtesy of my inability to use our coasters.

So much of what we have has been given. There’s the funky radio cabinet from Matt’s grandparents, the yellow couch from my grandmother, the piano from Matt’s parents, and the leather couches from my parents. I dusted the shelves of the cabinet my great-grandfather built for my grandmother to host her teacup collection. I shook out our orange wall quilt, the top pieced by my great-great grandmother in the 1930s and quilted by me in 2008 before Jesse was born.

Thank you.

I’m grateful for the plants that survive my benign negligence. I need to replace the dead ones, and I will do this, lying to myself that this time, this time, will be different.

Time for me to sign off. Matt’s made waffles. After I eat, I will vacuum. I will polish the silver. Then, I’m going to do one of my new favorite things – open all the windows and build a fire.

Day 12: From Another Time

There was a boy sitting on my lap when the email came in. We were co-learning long division, which takes all of me.

Then I had virtual office hours. No, my course wasn’t switching to credit/no-credit. Yes, I still need you type your work instead of upload pics of your handwriting.

Two hours had passed, and I was finally ready for the email. Then the boys started running the living room and kitchen like a circuit. I told them to go outside. Then the dogs started barking at pedestrians. I told them to keep quiet. Then I caught a boy eating hot fudge from the jar, one finger lick at a time. I told him to go outside, too.

I needed 5 minutes and a hiding place. I snuck up to my bedroom with my phone.

The email was worth the wait, in one sense the wait of an afternoon, and in another sense, the wait of three years.

There’s a group of people who have turned their reading hobby into a reviewing platform, creating pockets of online reading sub-cultures. In exchange for a copy of your book, they’ll review it for their audience. It’s a relatively affordable and effective way for a local author to reach new communities.

I’d asked Carrie Schmidt of Reading is My SuperPower to review Lu when I published in Summer 2017, and that would have been great, but how much more grateful am I that it worked out now?

It’s a good review, but I’m sharing it here because it’s a sweet reminder of something other than microbes today.

Happy reading!

Day 11: Speed

10 Signs that you’re moving too fast through life*:

IrritabilityRestlessnessCompulsive Over-WorkingEmotional numbnessEscapist behaviorsDisconnect from identity/callingUnable to attend to basic human needsHoarding energySlippage in spiritual practices______

And … This always happens when I listen to something, and they tell me I’m in for a list. Even when I try my very hardest, I miss one, minimum.

When I first listened to this sermon a couple months back, I was 6.75/10 (presumably). The math was immediate and sad, so maybe it’s a grace I couldn’t hear No. 10. I saw the need for change and helpless to change (beyond an earnest sprint).

Change has been made for me these last couple weeks, and I’ve been revisiting this Unhurry series from Bridgetown Church. It hasn’t been an easy week. There’s some mourning. There’s my temper.

And I’m 2/10 (presumably).

What’s your Now & Before?

*Courtesy of The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry sermon. Someone please listen to this and tell me No. 10.

Day 10: Analog Grocery

This post was supposed to be titled ClickList Order #2, but when I put it in on Saturday afternoon, it spit back the first available time as the following Tuesday evening. We’d run out of milk on Friday and half-and-half on Thursday – a milk-fat emergency.

Clicklist is my favorite budget line item. I’ve barely been in Kroger since its advent and not once for a full grocery run. I had to check store hours to see when the store opened on Sundays, and when I rolled into the parking lot at 7:15, it seemed full.

“What’s everyone doing at Kroger during my grocery shopping time?” a friend called from across the chip aisle.

I remembered then that I shouldn’t be surprised to see her because she shops for kale before church – back when church happened at a time and place – and blue tortilla chips, apparently. She plucked a bag from the left shelf while I loaded my cart with standard-issue wavy potato chips (BOGO!) from the right.

Some areas were untouched – the produce aisle, mainly, except for cauliflower, again – and others, quite apocalyptic* – places where powdered milk used to reside. My friend told me there had been a run on chicken, but I hadn’t trolled that aisle. I was here for the dairy.

Butter – $1.99! Half-and-half and whipping cream – here for the taking! Whole organic milk was harder to find, but I finally snagged some in the bottom left shelf of the 4th refrigerated case to the left. There were 3 gallons. I took 2 and then circled back from the hand soap aisle (one dispenser of Method hand soap left) to take Gallon #3 because I’m back to making Crock-Pot yogurt.

“We only allow 2 gallons of dairy, ma’am,” Check-Out Guy said.

I don’t like being ma’amed. I explained that my third gallon of milk meant I wasn’t ravaging the ghostly yogurt aisle.

It didn’t work. He took Gallon #3. It wasn’t until I got home that I realized Check-Out Guy also took my buttermilk. Bread baking foiled, again!

*In continuance of “Beth’s Sociological Understanding of Grocery Shopping Choices in COVID Quarantine – Week 2,” apocalyptic shelves included chicken (hearsay), flour, sugar, pasta, rice, beans, toilet paper, and paper towels – except for the brand, Sparkle. There was still plenty of ice cream. People make no sense.

Your grocery wins and losses this week?

Day 9: Cashmere

Homeschool is no longer shiny and new.

I had a convo about it with my cashmere sweater after my first shower since Saturday.

“Plus, I can’t wear you anymore,” I sighed.

Why not?

“Hoodies feel more utilitarian in these COVID days.”

But I’m soft.

It did look soft.

“I am a little tired,” I admitted. “I could use something soft.”

You should wear me.

“I should wear you.”

I did. I thought I might make it a group chat with my eyeliner, but Ezra called up the stairs about whether “disintegrates to ash” is a complete sentence. It’s not.

*Inspired by a headline about wearing our dangly earrings in these days. Earrings make my ears itch, but cashmere looks pretty and feels like a hug. Any fashion choices you’re maintaining?

Day 8: Birthday

A few minutes before we lit the No. 7 candle on Tommy’s waffle brownie birthday sundae (Smitten Kitchen, you love), we got the lockdown news. It’s what we’ve been doing this past week, but a personal choice is one thing and a state measure, another. They’re different in my mind, though I’m not sure how or why.

“What’s with April 12? How are they setting that date, and does it mean anything?” I asked Matt as he poured the brownie batter into the waffle iron.

Dates are hedge-y things. Tommy’s due date was early March 2013, but he kept to the womb, unmoved by the number of people who came from out of town to help with the birth and then left because they couldn’t put their life on hold for his birth.

Then of course he came in a flurry on March 22 and life paced up, but I’ve never forgotten that wait. There was a lot of noise and a lot of fear as “late” stretched from 1 day to 7 to 10 to 19. People made their views plain about what I should do, which was anything other than wait.

But God’s blessings come with weight, responsibility. As God gives, God directs, and with Tommy, who has been unexpected from the start to now, God’s direction has remained clear. I am to be present. I am to seek direction from God, not consensus. Until I receive it, I wait.

In the last 7 years with my baby (who does not let me call him baby), I’ve waited and continue to wait for many things. I’ve also realized some things – one of particular importance for a woman who often moves through life like a dog tugging at a leash.

I am a woman who can wait. I am a woman who will wait.

I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits.

In his word I put my hope.

My soul waits for the Lord more than watchman wait for morning, more than watchman wait for morning.

Psalm 130: 5-6

I am holding watch now as I did 7 years ago. There’s fear now as there was then. I hold my watch knowing God is good. From my watch, I will see God’s goodness rise like the sun. Until that day, I will wait.

Day 7: Pressed & Released

My favorite pizza place in Cleveland is offering a roll of toilet paper with delivery. My favorite brewery in Cincinnati went ice-cream truck, adult style this week – trolling streets with a jingle, a brew, and pizza (until crowds got too big – COVID!) My Bible study went to Google Hangout this morning, allowing me to talk about Isaiah while I hiked with my dog.

It reminds that pressure comes with release. New obstacles allow for new freedoms and now is a time to try something new.

Funny thing, I wrote an article about this before any of this hit the fan. It’s about one of my creative heroes – Grandma Barovian – and how she didn’t use her limits as excuses but as opportunities. I hope this encourages you today!

Creativity is my grandma saving two bucks a week.

The example always takes my entrepreneurship students by surprise. In a class on Creativity + Innovation, they’re thinking Steve Jobs and Apple. Elon Musk and Tesla. Inserting Virginia Stella Kowalczyk Barovian and her 1940s frugality into this start-up paradigm is a plot twist.

But it catches their attention for an essential component of creative work – our limits. The boundaries we work within. The little we have to work with on any given day, and the thriftiness required as those days tally from Year 1 to Year 5 and whatever Year it is when we become an “overnight” success and start to recoup our investment.

Limits are a creative’s special sauce.

READ ON …

Day 6: Weekly Recap

Woke up to 60s, thunder, and lightening. It’s never felt like more of a Fri-Yay, and I’m calling our first week of COVID a success because 1) No one else is awake to call it otherwise 2) It was!

Some thoughts:

I like being home with the boys, and I would not have been able to say this before now.We need to clean the house. And that’s a “we,” my children. Your bathroom is on you. Maybe you’ll start aiming for the toilet.Schedules are good and schedules can change. I made two. This is not like me. Matt’s super impressed. I’m giving myself a gold star. I need to re-learn long division. This is unsettling (not that I completely blocked it, but that I have to re-learn it).I’m losing my reading competition with Jesse. I think it’s because I pitted my 11-year-old self against his 11-year-old self. I would have smoked him at 11. At 39, I’m 100 pages to his 500. I’m pretty low maintenance in the appearance realm, but I’ve downshifted even further into a daily uniform of running tights, a fleece over a hoodie, a knit cap, and glasses. No make-up, obviously. I’m calling it COVID chic.People circumvented the COVID blockade to deliver much-needed supplies – toilet paper, yeast, homemade cookies, workbooks for the kiddos, and wine and coffee for Matt and me. Angels, the lot of you!I’m about to place my next ClickList order and wondering how many variations of dessert ingredients I need to order for Tommy’s birthday on Sunday. Maybe all will be available! Maybe he’ll have 3 cakes, 2 kinds of brownie, and 1 massive ice cream sundae to assuage that our party is just us and a FaceTime with the grandparents.I don’t mind cooking every day when I’m home every day to do it throughout the day. I feel community in the isolation. My neighbor and I had a nice shout across the yard yesterday. I learned things. He roasts his own coffee. He’s going to bring us some!Spring makes for muddy hikes, adding a brown veneer to our minivan daily. It’s fine. I’m not going to wash it until the summer drought. We’re in a Matthew 6:25-34 world right now. There’s every opportunity to freak out. I’m choosing not to take them. I do this by flipping the question of “How long?” to “How can I help, right now?”

This week, helping looked like using my freedom to sequester our family and flatten the curve. It looked like setting a structure for our days. It looked like observing and writing. It looked like gratitude.

Friyay #1 and I have a lot to be thankful for. How about you? If you’re not feeling it, I get it. I’d like to help! I found a cache of stamps in my desk drawer, and I’d like to send you a note. It doesn’t matter if I don’t know you. I talk to strangers all the time. Just contact me with your name, address, and concern. I’ll pray for you and write to you. Take me up on this!

Day 5: Now & Before

There’s a lot I don’t like about “now.” My university announced a hiring freeze, which affects whether I’ll be rehired come August. Matt’s moved his law practice online, which disrupts current cash flow. The boys seem healthy, but are they? Our parents are at the cusp of where COVID effects spike.

There’s a lot I didn’t like about “before.” February was not a good month, and the glut of responsibilities wasn’t a one-off, but a pattern of mine that circuits a few times a year. See, I think I have things handled, but really, the to-dos are just accruing and then quarterly, they come calling. I keep my mouth shut, I keep my head down, and I set the alarm earlier to get the work done. I tell myself that I did this, so I’ll be the one to take the hit.

That’s a truth for a hermit. I am a wife. I am a mom. I am a writer and a teacher. I am daughter, a sister, and a friend. I am designed to be useful to more than my work, and I am designed for more than work. When I give myself over to work alone, everything takes a hit.

I’m not here to spin the stress of “now,” but I do see how it has paused the pressure of “before.” Now, I see an opportunity for honesty and change.

Enter the Unhurrying with a Rule of Life series from Bridgetown Church. I’d listened to the podcast a few months back, a part-desperate maneuver to add a spiritual veneer to my 3AM dish duty (Seriously. Beth.) It makes a case – we’re more busy than bad – and it drops a rope to guide a busy girl out.

I’m taking in the series again, at a less frenetic pace and a more palatable time of day. Anyone else want to join? I’m not talking anything formal, but more of a “if I know you’re listening to this then when I text, email, or see you from safe distance of 6+ feet, I’ll talk with you about this instead of the weather and toilet paper.”

If you’re interested, leave a comment or contact me, and we’ll get something (chill) going.