One of the songs on my playlist at home is the following from Aida. Sometimes, it makes me laugh. Especially when I'm serving lunch and I hear the following words:
Aida! Aida!
All we ask of you
Is a lifetime of service, wisdom, courage
To ask more would be selfish
But nothing less will do
I don't know, something about that stanza just strikes me as downright hilarious when I'm involved in the "I want water/a spoon/a fork/a napkin/more/less/something else" tasks of mealtimes.
But, when I'm not laughing, the following stanzas remind me that my responses to my children's all encompassing needs/desires/want should probably be addressed a bit more differently than I currently deal with them.
Sometimes it confuses me. I am supposed to serve others, but dealing with home-life can exhaust me by the end of the day, it keeps me from stepping outside and acknowledging that other people exist.
People? There's people out there?
And home-life, despite being for "them" - all those people in my house - is also intrinsically selfish. I mean, children in these years are almost appendages to their mothers. They are me. So taking care of them is really just taking care of myself. Doing their hair, dressing them. And so many of the other things I choose to do are not completely necessary. They are things I like to do, but they do not save any souls or solve any world evils. My house does not need to be as picked up as I have it, it's just that I go slightly crazy if it's messy. I do not have to teach ballet, but I choose to. And the girls hair does not have to be done, or - gasp - their teeth brushed.
And somehow, suddenly, even those other things that are "service" to the people in my home are also somewhat selfish. So there I am - tired by my "selfish" homegrown tasks - unable to serve those outside my home. And yet, didn't I just spend the day doing things that I seriously would never have done in my pre-family truly self-centered college life? You know: diapers, wet-sheets, breakfasts/lunches/dinners (meals are a hate for me... I mean, I'd rather starve than cook or do all those dishes every day - and I'm completely serious).
The never-ending question of what I should be doing is exhausting in and of itself. What is necessary? What is good? What is service? What is fitting? What is productive? What is the needful thing now?
I am supposed to know this?
Says Aida:
It's knowing what they want of me that scares me
It's knowing having followed that I must lead
It's knowing that each person there compares me
To those in my past whom I now succeed
But how can whatever I do for them now
Be enough
Be enough
But, these are not really questions I find myself capable of answering presently, and so it all wanders 'round and 'round my head as I go on, task by task. I think, however, I should be thinking a little more about the last stanza. That somehow the energy in it, the purpose in it would help the rest fall into place.
I know expectations are wild and almost
Beyond my fulfillment but they won't hear
A word of a doubt or see signs of weakness
My nigh on impossible duty is clear
If I can rekindle my ancestors' dreams
It's enough
It's enough
At least, in the magical world of musicals where problems appearing at the beginning of songs can calmly be solved by the end.
2 comments:
What you are doing is all about saving souls and solving world evils. The service you give in your own home counts for more than anything. There are seasons in our lives when we need to focus our time, attention, and service inward on our own families, and when we need to reach out and teach them to look outward as we serve those around us together. I think it's okay to look at our lives and evaluate from time to time what is necessary and what more we can do to serve, if that's the Lord's will for us at the time, but the food we feed our families, the time we spend brushing their hair, brushing their teeth, changing diapers, those things can be consecrated acts of love and service, and that kind of love can change lives. If there is anyone on this earth whose lives I hope to touch and change for the better, I would choose my husband and children. Is that selfish? Perhaps. But in a world of limited time and energy, when tough choices have to be made, I believe it is also right.
Great post. Someday we will be older and spend all of our time serving people outside of our homes. That's what I tell myself anyway.
Besides, I am sure you help a lot of people around you, and of course your family, and everyone that reads your blog. It helps me!
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