He'd get up in the morning and make 20 comments about frogs--wondering how they were feeling that day, speculating that there might still be one or two that hadn't yet gone to sleep, fuming about the onset of cold weather, postulating about what month the peepers would come back in the spring, snapping at siblings, and moaning about his extreme boredom.
He brought out his plastic frog collection and set them up and stared at them, moved them around and stared at them again.
He read books about frogs.
He made frogs from Play-doh, and beamed when I drew frog eyes on his waffles with syrup.
Then he asked me to draw frogs on paper.
Then he started drawing them.
Suddenly a new world opened up to him. Before this fall, he only held a pencil as a last resort. (As in, "Here's a notebook. You can either sketch during your quiet time, or take a nap.")
But once he learned how to draw a frog, he discovered that he enjoyed the feeling of watching the pictures in his head come out the tip of his pencil.
He started drawing cars and trucks, farms, airplanes, monsters, fish, football players, family members, epic battles, natural disasters, bugs, and of course, lots of frogs.
He has pursued his new interest with the same singular focus as his previous passion--often stumbling straight from his bed into the school room before any of his brothers are up, quietly and contentedly burying himself in piles of markers, pencils, and notebook paper until he is called down to breakfast.
His Daddy has a wider range of interests at this point in his life, but he shares Jude's tenacity and focus. Last night I helped Jamey write up a "brief life history from high school to the present" for a banquet at which he will soon be honored.
In seeing that telescopic view of his life, I realized how wonderful it has been for him to have the opportunity to pursue medical science for the past 25 years, working primarily with his mind to discover how and why the body sometimes reacts against itself and how to help it start functioning properly again.
He reads, studies, and listens, and then reads, studies and listens some more, and he is good at what he does because of the fact that after 25 years he is still intrigued and inspired by the vast and beautiful universe of the human body.
Nice stories. So what's the point?
Well first, on a macro level I hope to inspire gratitude in you for what we have here. With all its imperfections, the United States is the ideal culture medium for people like Jamey and Jude.
Because of the time and place in which we live, Jamey has been able to use his specific interests to pursue the research and develop the skills necessary to help push back the devastating effects of arthritis and other auto-immune diseases in his patients.
Jamey is brilliant at wrestling down tricky problems and a bulldog at following ideas to their logical conclusions, but I'll tell you what he can't do.
He can't use a power tool to save his life.
He has no instinct for fixing broken things that aren't human (unless it can be done with duct tape). In fact, he has a deadly effect on electronics of all kinds.
He doesn't grow things that live in dirt (except children), or raise animals (except children), and his own body is affected by the very disease he has spent his life fighting in others, leaving him with substantial physical limitations.
If he had lived in almost any other time or place in history, he most likely would have been crippled or dead long ago. Certainly, he would have struggled to build and maintain shelter for his family, or grow crops, or raise livestock, or work grueling hours of hard, physical labor of any kind.
And thankfully, he hasn't had to. Because of the system we have here which allows people to capitalize on their strengths--and make a living doing so--he has lived a dream which so many others have never been allowed to experience.
I can't help but think of the slaves who would have made brilliant writers or musicians or statesmen or scientists, who were (and still are) instead ground into the dust by stronger wills.
I think of the beautiful minds and hearts silenced under the relentless crush of tyranny and despotism--in culture after culture, century upon century.
I think of numberless little boys through countless ages, born with Jude's same, singular tenacity and focus and sense of wonder, pulled under and absorbed in the inexorable grind of child labor and subsistence living.
And I am grateful, that for all of its faults, and all of its inequalities, we have a system here that allows people to at least make a stretch toward realizing their lovely, God-given potential.
A society that encourages and facilitates specialization allows folks like Jamey and Jude to laser in on a narrow field of interest without being distracted by a thousand things they are not good at and have no interest or ability to accomplish.
In turn, Jamey does that for others (and hopefully Jude will too one day:), when he hires a stonemason to build his patio in an artistic and durable manner, or pays a farmer and a grocer to grow and sell food to our family, or buys a car which has been thoughtfully engineered by a team of experts.
The freedom to pursue one's interests and talents provides humans with an escape from the scratch and scrabble of subsistence living--something to remember as we continue to slide toward a "command and control" system of government.
On a micro level, I want to bring something up with you well-meaning, earnest, industrious, over-achieving mamas out there.
I have seen more and more of you lately. I have been you more recently than I like to admit.
It is time to be OK with the fact that we cannot do everything.
Not well.
Not without risking a break somewhere.
We are not gods.
And yet, we women put that pressure on ourselves.
And on one another.
"You mean you don't make your own bread?"
"Grow your own organic, non-GMO vegetables?"
"Grind your own wheat?"
"Write your own curriculum?"
"Refinish your own furniture?"
"Raise your own free range, slow-grown, foraged, pastured, soy-free, corn-free, fish-free, wheat-free, anti-biotic free, gluten free, hormone-free, heritage chickens/cows/pigs?"
"Knit your own socks?"
"From your own sheep's wool?"
"While homeschooling your children, running a successful Etsy shop, and working weekends in the PICU?"
What are we doing to each other?
I will never forget seeing a young, struggling mama come into a conversation at one recent ladies' gathering I attended. Week after week I had watched her sitting at the feet of other well-meaning mothers, who were telling her what she should be adding to her family's diet, what she should be purging from her pantry, where to buy (very expensive) environmentally and ergonomically proper toddler shoes/lunch pails/cloth diapers/water bottles.
She was a new, eager, earnest, but overwhelmed mother of several young children, and I could tell by the questions she was asking and the look on her face that these suggestions were adding to the list in her head of what she needed to do to be a "good mom".
All of the advice didn't come from one person, and I am sure it was well-intentioned. These other moms each had their passions and convictions and hot-button issues, but without realizing it, they were conferring their personal lists onto her. And it was a burden.
So she came in one day with shy, expectant look on her face and announced, "I made my own chicken broth yesterday! Meijer had a sale on whole roasters and I made and froze enough for five or six meals."
"Not grocery store chickens!" was the immediate, horrified response from one listener. "Oh, Girl! I need to tell you where to get birds that aren't full of vaccines and antibiotics!"
And I saw my young friend's face fall in disappointment over yet another perceived failure, and an opportunity to encourage a fellow mother go up in flames.
Now, we all have our own personal passions and interests, and that is as it should be. I am not against learning about yours and I like sharing mine, but is it possible that they don't all have to be the same?
That we don't all have to be involved to the same degree in each other's pet causes?
My guess is that all of you don't scroll through photos of abandoned children on the Michigan Adoption Resource Exchange website every week and cry and pray over the photos.
I do.
Because God has burdened my heart that way, and so those little ones have become precious to me.
But how would you like it if I made you feel guilty over not sharing my heightened level of concern over the plight of orphans?
(Maybe I have, and if so, I am sorry. Last time I checked, I was not the Holy Spirit, and I no doubt need to leave the more of the work of conviction to Him.)
Yes! We should all care about orphans, but maybe your real fire is lit for elder care, or politics, or the arts, or post-abortive ministry, or family counseling, or earth stewardship, or meeting the needs of refugees, or eradicating sex slavery, or serving in your local church ministries, or homeschooling, or being a good neighbor or an involved PTA mom.
The truth is, we can't all be ignited to the same level about the same things, or we would burn out. Or go crazy. Or both.
As a Christian, I desire to live with an open-hearted attitude toward God's will. I want to be moved if He is ready to move me, and I trust that He will enlighten me on the direction my passions should take me. I do want to know what other women are doing to live out their callings, but I do not want to be buried in impossible expectations.
There are no extra points given to ladies who "do it all". While it is true that some women seem to be "Janes-of-all-trades", I think many of us are "specialists", with hearts designed to care for the specific needs of a finite number of causes and creatures.
Now, if you want to (or need to) grow and make everything from scratch and trace the source and content of every bite of your food and every stitch of your clothing all the way back to the Garden of Eden, by all means, do so! I personally love eating the food that my "cooking from scratch" friends make! (Keep it coming!)
And I fully support you ladies who are front and center at the Capitol Building, or putting in long hours at the homeless shelters, or building orphanages in Guatemala, but right now, if I spent more time in those areas my house would be in shambles, my husband would be wearing Ohio State t-shirts and sweatpants to work, and my kids would be filthy and ignorant. At this season of life, I know I need to use my time in other directions.
I think God gives us the GIFT of specialization--or narrowed vision--so that we can best utilize our unique talents and energy. We have limited hours and years, and yet there is so much pain, and so many to care for, how else would we avoid becoming paralyzed by the enormity of the task?
Only God can comprehend the true immensity of the need, but every one of us can catch hold of a small part of the vision--slender thread here and there, where we see it--and pull together in the same direction for the good of one another and the glory of God.
**************
1 Peter 4:8-11
Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.
Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.
Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.
If anyone speaks, they should do so as one who speaks the very words of God.
If anyone serves, they should do so with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ.
To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever.
Amen.
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