I’m not sure if you know what it feels like to deep clean your home at a moment’s notice with a screaming banshee toddler strapped to your calf, but it feels exactly like deep cleaning your home at a moment’s notice. With a toddler strapped to your calf.
I’ve been dancing this waltz for more than my fair share of weeks now and each night I go to bed and ask God the same question: “Why won’t somebody buy our house?” (I also stick with my go to prayer that I’ve been praying since I was twelve: Dear God, please make make my chest bigger. I’ll let you know when He hears me).
But I deserve a tiny break, right? I hopelessly return the clean laundry from our baskets back into the dryer. I throw Ava’s toys into plastic bags and bury them in the linen closet closet. I spray enough air freshener until I’m absolutely sure I’ve developed some form of asthma. I do everything you’re supposed to do for a house showing and still, nobody is whipping out their checkbooks and even worse, sometimes the potential buyers don’t even show up.
You do not even want to see me on a “buyers didn’t show up” day. I’m usually out on our back deck carving a string of gibberish into the planks. In all seriousness though, it hurts knowing that we’re stuck in a home we’re outgrowing and to feel like we don’t even have an out.
But then I remember, we might not have an out, but at least we still have a home.
There are people that live on the streets in our cities. People that are bunked up in shelters and asking for nothing more than a bite to eat. There are people who are losing their families and can’t remember the last time smiling wasn’t a huge feat. There are people who would kill to be stuck with a warm bed let alone an entire house.
I’m going to stop my sniveling and count my blessings because even though I sometimes think God’s not listening to me, I fail to realize it’s because He’s speaking to me and I’m not taking the time to hear Him.
Whole
Though I stomp and whine and moan
for my own idea of completion,
I see that You have already made me whole.
And so I praise you
for the body that sustains me
and the spirit that fills me,
for the friends that support me
and the family that guides me,
for the work that challenges me
and the play that thrills me,
for the knowledge that grounds me
and the faith that centers me.
- Abigail Wurdeman
