I Think What I Think

Evening slanted her slim, wispy form across our little farmette, her skirts catching on the brambles that grew in the hedgerows and creating little pockets of dusk that the local small wildlife creatures scuttled for safety. The spring peepers emerged and began their calls. The soft country air became a cacophony of noise and surreptitious movement from wings, feathers, and fur.

Inside our home, the lights were bright as we sat in our living room with plates of food on our lap, our friends at our side. On our Tuesday night date night, we called them. Every Tuesday night we shared a simple meal, and talked, and laughed as we skipped from topic to topic, from our children to the effects of stress, to relationships, to marriage, to politics. My face gets a little redder and I start getting very involved in this conversation. I love politics, secretly I read the latest news and making my own deductions about all of it. But I do not talk to B about politics because he hates them as much as I love them.

Ooops, now my husband’s hand is on my knee gently squeezing. It takes a moment to register, he doesn’t want to embarrass me, but I am my Grandpas daughter and I turn to him and say impatiently “what am I doing wrong”. He gives me a look, it’s a stern look. I melt back into his side and say “Fine, but I will think the things I want to think”.

“You do that,” he said.

Now I feel silly. “I am sorry” I whisper. He smiles back, “that’s why I love you so much” he whispers back. My fire and sass are one of his favorite things about me.

We turn back to our guests and the evening continues.

That hand on my knee though, after eighteen years of marriage, when that hand squeezes, I know. I don’t just know, I know. It happens almost exclusively when I get into politics, or theology debates. He has made the decision that in our home we absolutely do not talk badly about the president. Sometimes that is very hard for me and I have to swallow so many words and clever things that it almost chokes me. But I obey him even though I think the things that I think.

In the eyes of many people, I am hopelessly oppressed. Being limited to raising children, making food, washing clothes, and obeying my husband. What miserable drudgery. I could be so much more. I could be writing best sellers and changing the world through my keyboard. I could be standing on a stage bringing people to Jesus. Oh, miserable wretched, oppressed soul that I am. Forced to live this domesticated lifestyle, working my fingers to the bone, and for what?

Oh, how I draw myself indignantly to the very tallest my shortness can get. First of all, I have no writing talent if the Lord does not give me words. Why do you think there have been no blogs? I had no words. He took my words, and he allowed me to recognize without a doubt that without him I do not have my words. For the past year I have floundered, reminding God regularly that I am waiting on him to show me what I need. I felt empty and often defeated. Those were only feelings though, I may have felt empty, but never did God stop allowing the oil of grace and mercy to run dry. Always what I needed was enough. So I just patiently waited and reminded him occasionally in case the Father of the universe had forgotten about his El down in Ky, not feeling like she was living her best life.

I didn’t know that I needed to suffer. I needed to push up against the fire and let it burn all the chaff off of me. I didn’t realize that I would lose flesh on the doorposts as I walked the narrow way. I suspected that was what would happen, but I didn’t know for sure. I was not afraid. I knew where my safety lay.

August seven my covid car came to take me to heaven. Happily, I got on it and tapped my driver to tell him we can go now when the door was wrenched open, and my husband reached out and yanked me out by the arm just as the car started to leave. “You aren’t leaving me with these seven children,” he said.

“Darn it” I was so close!

“I am glad that you and the children didn’t have to lose wife and Mama,” I told him sincerely, and “someday I will get over it that you snatched me out of my heaven shuttle.” How exciting it would have been to wake up in heaven.

But I think the things I think.

What is seen as my kitchen of oppression, I see as the heart of worship itself. It is where my daughters and I make pillowy cookies that our family and guests wash down with big gulps of raw milk. It is where we create soft loaves of bread, delicious warm food that nourishes the soul. Our kitchen is where my husband slips up behind me and wraps his arms around me. I know my lady lumps are making him very happy. I am a little chubby at present, and he ain’t gonna lie, he doesn’t mind how soft I feel. He kisses my neck and tells me how good I smell. The children groan and shout “gross, Dad, disgusting” I just smile and keep washing dishes in my kitchen of oppression, using my hands to worship my creator in action.

What good would a stage do me if my children are on the ground becoming bitter because they know who Mama is at home, and it certainly is not who she is making herself out to be. What if my sons are meant to be preachers, and by raising them with all of my attention, I am making the way for ten thousand souls to be saved? My daughters are not mere little girls I am raising. They carry the seed of the next generation and even the next. By raising them well, I am bending the trajectory of the whole world.

Do not tell a mother she is wasting her life. We won’t hear it. We know what we know, and we will think what we think. In a world that tells us to sit down, we will stand up and collectively roar in her face.

The world does not scare us. We were made for such a time as this. Our power comes to a full boil when faced with tragedy and terrifying world events. Shame us, and we will laugh in the face of that shame. We know things. We have been quietly doing things for many many years. We have been passing information to each other for generations. We have common sense by the bucket fulls.

I remember the day I realized that covid was a real genuine threat. I knew it all the way down to my bones. I briskly gathered resources. A box of antibacterial, big bottles of Vit D, Vit C, Zinc, Quinine, even a case of tissues. I didn’t only get enough for my household but enough that I could freely share to those who needed it around me. When the shortages came several months later, my husband laughed. Our bathroom closet was fully stocked. I didn’t over-buy. I just got what my gut said I would need to also share. I’ve been accused of not taking covid seriously, but I assure you, I took it deathly seriously. You mistake my lack of fear for not taking it seriously.

Why would covid scare me? Father in heaven told me it was coming and told me how to prepare. When my husband got covid, I did not have to scramble for anything. I simply went to my bathroom closet and reached out my hand.

I recently felt Holy Spirit nudging me again. Winter is coming, preparations need to be made. I listened, and soon my bathroom closet will be fully stocked again. I have vitamins, herbs, minerals, medicine, and even a precious oxygen concentrator that I had to buy under the tagline “scented drawer liners” and it was called a “low-level warm air generator” from Amazon.

When you have been educating yourself and listening to your gut instinct, you are well-practiced to see what is coming and you won’t be afraid.

If you have spent your mothering career depending on doctors to lead and guide you at every turn, you will probably be afraid and feel helpless. Medical Doctors are wonderful resources, but we should never have put the weight of our health into their hands. Doctors shine in the face of emergency medicine, but in our sue-happy American world, their hands are tied to FDA regulations, and they must protect themselves and the organization they work for. It’s not a fault of theirs, nor is it something they can easily change.

I am excited to be working on a very practical list of ways you can start learning how to keep your family healthy, happy, and safe. God has given you an entire pharmacy in your backyard, and that knowledge will not be lost. Some of us old-fashioned mothers carry the seeds and we want to freely share them with you.

“Why would you even have children in such a wicked world”. We get asked this occasionally, and I wonder, why wouldn’t we be having children, especially now. The salt is losing its flavor. There isn’t much salt. What if we raised salty children for God?

Mothers, rise up. It was for a time such as this that our power in Christ truly shines.

It was for such a time that we support and nurture our hardworking husband who returns home, battle-worn and tired. When we wrap our arms around them and offer ourselves as a willing and eager warm body to take comfort and pleasure in, we worship God with our hands. That is not selfishness, although what it brings is heaven on earth.

When we change diapers, wash dishes, and shape loaves of bread, that is not drudgery. It is the very work of God.

Let the knowledge of your honorable profession fill you with power and might.