Through clinched teeth and deep breathes you somehow get through breakfast. The tension continues in his bedroom over getting dressed, and you know there's still making the bed, spelling words, brushing the teeth, finding the coat and gloves, and cold lunch still to pack.
You walk into your bathroom and are met by the pile of dirty laundry. You pick it up in an angry huff and mutter to yourself "Why in the world am I the only one in this house that has to do all the the laundry?!?" After starting a load you walk into the kitchen and see the stack of dirty dishes on top of the dishwasher. The little green light indicates it's clean, but obviously not emptied. You fling the door open and bang and crash dishes around putting them away and reloading in an attempt to clean the off the counter, again muttering "Why in the world am I the one in the house that has to empty the dishwasher nearly every time?!?"
The struggles with the grumpy eight-year-old continues and soon I hear my husband from the bathroom where he's getting ready. He's yelling at us to to stop yelling at each other. I know in approximately seven minutes he will walk out, completely dressed and ready to go - he will give us a kiss goodbye, and simply walk out the door for the day.
I give him a curt kiss with angry eyes and my mind screams at him "Why in the world am I the only one in this house that has to do all this crazy crap every morning?!?" I don't say it, but I make it clear he knows it.
Soon I'm juggling the laundry that was still in the dryer from the day before, which I discover when I go to change loads. I plop it down on the bed and start folding. I see socks sticking out of dresser drawers that aren't closed all the way. I see closet doors sitting wide open. I see piles of clean clothes on the floor still not put away. I see the decorative bed pillows thrown down haphazardly. Buttons - all little buttons being pushed causing me to nearly explode.
I make a mental note of the thirteen things that I need to still get done over my lunch hour. My husband will probably be going out to eat somewhere while I will be swapping laundry, making appointments, prepping for supper, and replying to emails from school.
After twenty-seven more "get your shoes on!" we finally get in the van and are on the way to school, where I will have to endure the dreaded "drop off zone" of crazy cars. I won't even go there to try and describe this frustrating task. By the time the van door shuts, I wave my ten good bye waves and kisses, somehow manage to pull back into traffic and not get hit by the other vehicles dropping off kids, and arrive five minutes late to work - I am left feeling like a complete and total pile of crabby poop.
I seem to have "those mornings" every single morning. They are typically followed by "those days" and "those nights" every single day as well.
Why in the world is this? How have I managed to almost daily destroy my happiness, hope, and self-worth before 8:00 a.m.? Why do all those stupid little things, those little buttons that cause the crazy to kick in inside us, get to take over and decide the quality of my worth and the happiness within my home? When did the bar of expectation get raised to a height no one will ever be able to achieve? And why do all these small things matter to me to such a large degree?
Do you even love your husband you're probably wondering with a gasp under your breath? Absolutely. Without a doubt. I can't imagine life without him. Yet some days I can hardly stand daily life with him, and I'm fairly certain the feeling is mutual. We do not speak the same love language and we most certainly do not speak each others love language well, sometimes if at all. It's a never ending battle of grace. And yet at the end of the day, we just have this odd thing, this kind of relationship I can't really describe, one I know is maybe different than most, or at least I assume not everyone is like us behind closed doors, but who knows, maybe I'm wrong on that. We're two opposite individual mixed with an incredible dose of crazy, sealed with just enough glue to somehow keep us all together.
But I digress... back to the original question - why is this? Why are so many of us continually battling the life sucking insanity of unattainable perfection and expectation? Why do we let this invisible demon rule and run and direct and dictate so many of our feelings, responses, relationships, and ultimate worthiness?
Our houses do not need to be perfectly kept, our to-do lists do not need to always have everything crossed off, our spouses and families do not always need to do everything perfectly and immediately for us. Who is telling us they have to be, and more importantly why are we believing them? I am not perfect. They are not perfect. So why do we keep killing each other trying and expecting to be?
I need to learn to find a way to live in a better peace amid the mess. I need to learn to find greater patience and grace amid the chaos. I need to learn to grant forgiveness and greatly lower my expectations on both myself and everyone around me, especially those within the walls of our home.
It's time to starting taking out all the "Why in the world am I the only's" and insert a whole lot more "Who in the world am I going to bless today's..." And who knows... maybe in my attempt to bless them better, I will in turn allow them to bless me better.
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