Author: Sharon

Categories
Inspiration

Good Friday Meditation

Today was one of those days when minor annoyances accumulated until my outlook was as bleak as if there had been a death in the family, rather than what had actually happened—a cranky, feverish baby, a sweet but exasperating toddler, and a special meal that didn't turn out right and took so long to prepare that we were ready to eat it raw by the time it was served. (In fact, we weren't sure it was fully cooked, but we were so hungry that we couldn't think straight, and we ate it anyway. I'm still praying that we don't get food poisoning.)
 
It's Good Friday here in Ukraine, but I've been so preoccupied trying to cope with this day's woes that I have yet to contemplate the suffering of my Savior. That puts my suffering into perspective. It's not that bad, after all.
 
See from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down;
Did e'er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?
 
Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.

                                   ~Isaac Watts

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Categories
Laughter

The Missing Cookbook

We have long noticed that Samuel is an organization freak. He knows where everything belongs and can get upset when things are not in their proper place.This trait is a blessing when it comes to getting him to clean up his toys. He has been doing this at our prompting–and enjoying it–since he was at least a year and a half old.
 
I remember one evening we were putting his toys away as a prelude to getting ready for bed, and some friends were over at our apartment. I was in Samuel's room telling him to bring me his toys from the living room, and one of our friends decided to help him. He collected a variety of small toys, put them in the bucket portion of Samuel's shape sorter toy, gave it to Samuel, and told him to take it to me. Samuel just stood there looking at him, and it took a bit of coaxing to get him to comply. When Samuel finally handed me the bucket, I understood his reluctance. A few of the items inside did not belong in Samuel's room; they were toys that we kept in a drawer in the living room. Samuel knew this and could not understand why he was being told to take them where they did not belong.
 
Now, at 25 months, when he's finished with a toy, he sometimes puts it away without me saying anything. When he's done with his bath, he usually drains the tub and puts all of his bath toys by himself. He has also become a surprisingly good little helper. One day several months ago I came into the kitchen with a double armload of dirty laundry to put in our front-loading washing machine. Not knowing if he would understand me or not, I said to Samuel, "Can you open the washing machine for Mommy?" He trotted right over and opened it for me! Today when we got home I said, "Oh, Mommy needs to use the potty!" He went straight to the toilet, turned on the light, and opened the door for me!
 
Given that he likes to put things where they belong and he likes to be helpful, his behavior yesterday was bizarre. While cooking lunch, I was referring to my favorite cookbook, which I had sitting open on the kitchen windowsill. When it was time for me to make dinner, I decided to use another recipe from this cookbook. Since I was pressed for time, it was the perfect meal. It was quick to prepare and used ingredients that I had on hand. There was just one problem: I couldn't find the cookbook. I immediately suspected that Samuel had something to do with its disappearance and started to look in all the places where I thought he might have put it. My search included the bookshelf in his bedroom, but my cookbook was nowhere to be found. I finally gave up and made banush, a Ukrainian version of grits and cheese, for dinner.
 
Later that evening, after Samuel was in bed, I carried an armload of dirty laundry into the kitchen. As I squatted down in front of the washer and opened the door, what should I see inside but my missing cookbook!

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Categories
Laughter

2-Year-Oldese

Samuel is a communicator. In the months leading up to his 2nd birthday, he started using sign language extensively to let us know many of his needs and wants. Baby sign language, where parents teach a baby signs so that he can communicate before he is able to talk, is a growing trend right now, but that's not what we were dealing with.
 
When Samuel started to eat at the table with us, I tried to teach him the sign for "more," just to make our mealtimes peaceful, but he didn't seem to catch on, and I gave up. Then one day about a month later, Samuel finished his food and sat quietly signing "more" until George noticed. We were impressed, and we were even more impressed when he began to use the sign for "all done," which we had taught him inadvertently by putting our hands out to the sides when we would ask him if he was "all done." These two signs greatly simplified our lives, letting us know if Samuel was hungry or full, and we were so happy that he was using them.
 
But before long we began to notice other signs. There was "telephone," an open hand held over his ear, "chapstick," signed by tracing his lips with his index finger and thumb held together, and "hairbrush," indicated by stroking the top of his head. Every week or so he would create new signs, using them consistently until we figured out what they meant. We learned that tapping his chest meant "bib," knocking on the table meant "egg," and moving the tip of his tongue back and forth between parted lips meant "toothbrush." There were a few signs that we never did figure out, but I suppose that was due to a lack of imagination on our part, rather than a lapse of intelligence on his.
 
Now, at 25 months of age, he is talking more and more and abandoning the use of signs, but even with speech, he prefers to make up his own language. So bits is pants, and ditz means "music"–and "egg" and "clap" and perhaps "hand," depending on the context. (We think the word ditz originally evolved from the word dance, which is something he loves to do to music. However, he understands the word music when we use it; he simply refuses to use it himself.) Juice means both "juice" (or any liquid, for that matter) and "shoes." I admit that these words sound similar enough that a 2-year-old may be excused for pronouncing them alike. But what about using deedee for "kitty" and "guitar"? In this instance, Samuel's language seems to be tonal, as deedee for "kitty" has a rising then falling intonation, whereas deedee for "guitar" is flat.
 
As with signing, his strategy with speech is to use his chosen word consistently until we learn what it means. His newest one is nerny, which we're still trying to figure out. When pronounced in a whining tone, it seems to mean "an item of food on my plate that I don't want" (as in the sliver of bell pepper on his slice of pizza the other night), but when said with excitement, I think it means "an item of food, not currently in my possession, that I want" (as in the cucumber that I was slicing for a salad the other day).
 
Sometimes we get so absorbed in trying to understand his unique language that we even start to use his vocabulary. I was taken aback one day to hear George say, "Samuel, do you want to go juice on the potty?" How is the child ever going to learn how to communicate if we speak like him? Oh, that's right–he has no trouble communicating, and if English proves to be too much trouble for him, he can always go back to signing. Though he relies mostly on speech now, just last week he added a new sign. Whenever he hears a piano playing, he reaches forward with one hand and wiggles his fingers.

UPDATE, August 18, 2012: Eventually we figured out that nerny meant a fruit or vegetable. And here's another bizarre word from Samuel's 2-Year-Oldese: for many, many months, dub-duh meant "pizza."

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Encouragement

The “Impossible” Journey

For as long as I've been old enough to contemplate it seriously, good parenting has seemed a mystery to me. How do you impart all the life lessons, the wisdom, the values, and the myriad other things that your kids need to know? I suspect it has much more to do with consistently being the type of person you would like your kids to become than with anything else. However, I'm sure that deep conversation and occasional confrontations are called for as well. But I'm discovering something that I never expected: parenting is something that you grow into.
 
When I was pregnant with my son, I would sometimes wonder if we were ready for this awesome responsibility, but as the last fourteen months since his birth have gone by, I've realized that the demands of good parenting come in stages, so that one can master the simpler skills before more difficult things are required.
 
When you first bring that newborn home from the hospital, your life revolves around it–feeding it, burping it, changing it, bathing it, feeding it . . . you get the picture. There will never be a time when this child is more dependent on you to meet all of his physical needs. But though the demands are constant, they are straightforward. Babies need lots of love and cuddling, but the maternal instinct makes meeting this need a no-brainer, and not much wisdom or creativity is required to figure out how to put the diaper on, what temperature to make the bath water, when the baby wants to eat, versus when he just wants to sleep, etc. The basic skills needed to care for an infant can easily be learned in under a week, and after that, it's just a matter of following the routine.
 
But babies develop quickly, and soon after you've mastered the baby-care routine, you find that your little one starts to be able to grab some things, then roll over, then crawl, climb, and eventually walk. Each of these developmental milestones requires extra vigilance on your part, but the amount of wisdom needed to keep your baby safe is just at the level of common sense. However, as they develop physically, babies also develop mentally, and at some point the wise parent needs to begin to train the child.
 
I've been involved in this training process since Samuel was about four or five months old. At first it was simply a matter of setting boundaries ("Let go of Mommy's hair") and enforcing them until he understood and obeyed. But as his mind has developed, so has his will, and now he's starting to challenge more frequently the boundaries that I've set. I recently realized that I'm starting to need to draw on the wisdom of other parents whose examples I had stored away for future reference.
 
And so the difficult, crucial aspect of parenting deepens, that of helping to form the character of the little life that has been entrusted to your care. But, as I observed at the beginning of this post, it comes in stages. Each new challenge leaves new wisdom in its wake, which in turn, is available to help you meet the next challenge. It's like a series of stepping stones that gradually ascend to a distant peak. Seen from the plain, the heights look unattainable, but taken one step at a time, the journey, though difficult in places, is not only possible, but infinitely rewarding.

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Inspiration

Confessions of a Housewife and Stay-at-Home Mom

I really wish someone would debunk the modern feminist notion that the roles of homemaker and mother are degrading, so I guess I'll take a whack at it.
 
I worked until shortly before my son was born. I enjoyed my work and took great pride in a job well done. Leaving the professional world as I prepared for the arrival of our firstborn was bittersweet. But I haven't looked back once since little Samuel came into our lives.
 
As with anything worthwhile, being a full-time wife and mother requires sacrifice. It means putting the needs of my family before my own, being on-call 24 hours a day, and having less time to pursue personal interests. But to say that these sacrifices are degrading or personally impoverishing is a lie.
 
As I was feeding lunch to my adorable 13-month-old today, the laughter and smiles we exchanged gave me such fulfillment that I thought I would burst with joy, and I had an epiphany. Although Samuel can be trying at times, although he requires constant monitoring except when he's in bed, and despite the fatigue that comes from almost never getting a night of uninterrupted sleep, there is nothing I would rather be doing than pouring my life into him. And this means being present for all his waking moments, being the one to applaud all his significant "firsts," and constantly teaching him, through my words and example, how to be the best version of himself that he can be. How grateful I am to have the privilege of being a full-time mother!
 
And for the record, the argument that stay-at-home moms stop developing intellectually and otherwise for as long as they focus on rearing their children does not have to be true. I find that with a bit of determination and creativity, I can make time at least weekly to read enriching books, play musical instruments, and write. So take that, feminist myth!

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Baby Joys Inspiration

More Than Fun

Today I am twenty-seven weeks pregnant and have officially entered the third trimester. This is the first pregnancy that I have ever carried past the first trimester, and it is the first time that I have ever looked pregnant or been able to feel the movements of the little life inside me. I feel lavishly blessed.
 
My sisters-in-law all have very difficult pregnancies with severe nausea and vomiting throughout much or all of the nine months. My mother-in-law says that she could never understand women who claimed to gain a wonderful sense of satisfaction and fulfillment from being pregnant. “I always thought I was going to die when I was pregnant,” she says. “I did it for the baby.”
 
I find it unfortunate that pregnancy must be such a trial for some women, because I’m learning that it can be a uniquely magical and enjoyable time of life. I’ve been blessed with an easy pregnancy. Except for bedrest and debilitating fatigue during the first trimester, I’ve had little about which to complain. Of course, there are the usual inconveniences (back problems, muscle cramps, heartburn, intestinal upset, clumsiness, poor memory, and so on) but they all pale in comparison to the miracle taking place in my womb.
 
I never feel alone anymore, because the baby is right with me—making his presence felt most of the time! I can talk with him, sing to him, dance around the room with him, and even give him a loving massage that I’ve read he can actually feel. My changing shape alerts everyone to my special condition, and suddenly I find that complete strangers are kind and considerate toward me! This is a welcome change after nearly four years of rough treatment at the hands of strangers. It is true that the whole world is nice to pregnant women, even in Kyiv, Ukraine.
 
Beyond these advantages, I find that pregnancy has another, more profound, aspect, that of motherhood. Although people call me “an expectant mother,” in so many ways I have already become a mother. There will never be another time when I will be as connected to this child. Never again in his life will he be so dependent upon me to meet all his needs. We share a bond now that nothing else will ever fully imitate. So I look forward to those times when my decreased stamina demands that I put my feet up and take a break, because then it’s just me and Baby as I contemplate the new and growing joys of motherhood.

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Inspiration Kitchen Joys

A New Hobby

I have recently discovered the joys of baking bread. Ever since I was old enough to contemplate bread baking, I've regarded it as an arduous task requiring the better part of a day to complete. My grandmother taught me to bake when I was in junior high school, and anytime I needed a break from studying, I'd go to the kitchen, where I happily turned out cookies, pies, and brownies. But bread intimidated me.

Since I got married, I've frequently told myself that I should start baking bread, but somehow I never managed to find the time. That's not surprising, given that keeping house, my editing job, and church commitments kept me busy enough that I never had the six or so hours free that I thought were necessary for baking bread. But recent changes in my job have lightened my work load, and last week I found myself with a whole day free of pressing obligations.
 
In my opinion, the French make the best bread in the world. It's been difficult for me to find comparable bread in Ukraine (although the bread here is far superior to the American Wonder Bread variety). So, I decided to make French bread. Contrary to my expectations, the process was not at all arduous. It only took about three hours (not the six I had imagined), and it only required about thirty minutes of labor on my part. The rest of the time the dough was rising on its own or baking in the oven. Halfway through the baking time, the apartment filled with a wonderful aroma. The loaves turned out picture perfect with beautiful golden crusts, and the taste of fresh-baked bread hot from the oven was enough to get me hooked!
 
This afternoon I made onion-herb bread, and it was even better than last week's French bread. Of course, for those experienced bread bakers reading this, my former misconceptions about the process are probably humorous. You already knew that the effort was minimal compared to the rewards, and that the rewards included far more than a delicious treat. For the rest of you: there is something intensely satisfying in working with the dough, shaping it, and seeing the amazing metamorphosis of yeast, flour, and water (plus a few other ingredients, depending on the recipe) into wholesome loaves of bread. It gives one a tremendous sense of satisfaction and delight. If you enjoy doing things in the kitchen but have never baked bread, do yourself a favor and give it a try!

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Encouragement

I’ll Be Home for Christmas

"I'll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams." What a nostalgic phrasing of the Christmas spirit. But what if one's situation makes it more accurate to say, "I'll be home this year, but Christmas is only in my dreams"? That's how I feel right now.
 
Although Ukraine has a long Christian heritage, seventy years under an atheistic dictatorship destroyed much of what once was. I'm told that Ukrainians have rich traditions for the celebration of Christmas, and while I'm sure that's true, I have to say that all I've seen of Christmas in nearly three years of living here is commercial. All of Kyiv's shopping centers put up Christmas decorations and begin to sell Christmas cards and wrapping paper early in December, but sadly, most of the city's inhabitants see all of this pageantry as preparation for the New Year, not as a celebration of Christ's birth.
 
Christmas has always been my favorite time of year. When I try to define what it is about Christmas that touches me so deeply, all I can say is "atmosphere." Even though the majority of Westerners have also lost sight of the true meaning of Christmas, enough of the message of, "Peace on earth, good will toward men," has remained to make it a special time for believers and non-believers alike. We've all noticed how people tend to smile more easily and be more considerate in the weeks preceding Christmas (unless, of course, they're trying to find a parking space at the mall). The spirit of giving our best to bring joy to those we love–just as God sent His Son to give salvation to the world He loved–is infectious, and it makes the whole Christmas season warmer and brighter than any other time of year. I miss this general spirit of good will. If I'm honest, I also miss many other things, but in my mind, they all combine to create the Christmas atmosphere that has always been so dear to me. I miss Christmas caroling, hot apple cider, people dressed in festive clothing, Christmas music everywhere you go, Christmas parties with friends, houses decorated with lights, the smell of Christmas baking, gift exchanges (white elephant and otherwise), the cozy ambiance of homes lit only by the glow of the Christmas tree, and–what goes along with each of these things–the laughter and special times shared with loved ones. I know that none of these signs of Christmas is directly related to the true reason for the season, and many Christians feel that they actually detract from it. But somehow, without them, I feel like I'm skipping Christmas. The birth of Jesus was such a momentous event that I feel it deserves all this celebration. Although most people may not remember Him in the midst of the festivities, I always have, making the signs of the season that much more precious to me.
 
A friend of mine in the States recently told me that she is planning a Christmas party and expressed regret that I wouldn't be able to come. The sudden force of my desire to be there surprised me. I couldn't explain it away by the fact that I miss her and my other loved ones in the States. After all, I just saw them six months ago. I also knew that my response was not because I wanted to "be home for Christmas." I've lived in so many different places that if someone were to ask me where I considered to be home, I wouldn't know how to answer them. No, what I was missing and wanting so desperately was this Christmas atmosphere that I've been describing.
 
My husband and I decided to move our life to Ukraine, so by choice, this is home. Neither of us wants to be anywhere else for Christmas. But at the same time, I feel that Christmas doesn't really come to Kyiv. So what am I to do? I will work to make our home a place filled with enough Christmas atmosphere to give us all we need for the whole season. And since people are so central to the celebration of Christmas, I will fill our home with family and friends during this time. Maybe I'll even throw a Christmas party for our closest friends–who are all Ukrainians–and, despite the seeming cultural inappropriateness, work in many of the traditions that are so dear to me. This year, I'll be home for Christmas–much more than I ever dreamed!

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Uncategorized

“You Can’t!” — Culture Shock, Ukrainian Style

It seems to me that "culture shock" is an expression that many people use far too casually without understanding what it actually means. I used to be one of them.
 
Earlier this evening I was a dramatic and alarming picture of culture shock. When my husband found me, I was sitting cross-legged on the kitchen floor beside a voltage transformer (our big one that I never bother to lift onto the counter when I need to use it because it weighs about forty pounds). I had my American-made electric beater plugged into it; the cord is too short to reach up onto the counter without coming unplugged from the transformer on the floor, which was why I was sitting on the floor. My left hand held the electric beater, on high, in the middle of a pot of fudge that I had just finished cooking that was sitting on the floor in front of me. My right my hand covered my eyes, supporting the full weight of my head as my elbow rested on my knee. The steady whir of the electric beater nearly drowned out the sobs that shook my body. I say "nearly drowned out" because George must have heard something to make him come to the kitchen at just that moment.
 
I was aware of his presence but was too distraught to respond. He knelt awkwardly on the other side of the pot of fudge and took the beater from me. I just cried harder. I needed to scream, but as a rational adult, I kept telling myself that was out of the question. But my mind felt as if it was about to shatter if I didn't do something quickly, so I shrieked. George jumped, but he managed to hold the beater, still on high, steady in the pot of fudge. I continued to cry, now with the pathetic, gasping breaths that afflict small children when they can't get control of themselves. I felt the need to vomit from the force of my sobs, and the rational part of my mind interrupted again to suggest that if I didn't get a hold of myself quickly, I would start to hyperventilate. That did the trick, and I gradually forced myself to regain control. Within a few minutes, I was frosting a tray of freshly baked brownies with the fudge frosting I had just made.
 
An outburst of this nature could only have been provoked by something earth shattering like the sudden death of a young child, a rape, or a murdered husband. Right? Not if you're a woman suffering from chronic culture shock and something jarring happens to you at the wrong time of the month.
 
What happened to me? Not much.
 
Earlier today I went grocery shopping. I started to enter the store, but then I realized that I needed a shopping cart, which I could only get outside of the store. So I turned on my heel to walk out and grab a cart from the row sitting conveniently about three feet from the entrance. Before I could get out, however, a security guard, who had been standing there watching me, blocked my path and said, "Nilzya!" a Russian obscenity that literally means you can't. (It's not actually an obscenity, but I've come to perceive it as such, because 85% of the time, the tone and spirit in which it is used makes you feel as if you're being cussed out.)
 
Baffled by his incomprehension, I pointed at the row of shopping carts and stuttered in Ukrainian, "But I need … I need …" Since shopping cart doesn't frequently come up in conversational speech, I didn't actually know the Ukrainian word for it, so I stumbled to a halt, frustrated and helpless.
 
"Go around through the cash register line," he told me, still in Russian.
 
I know what going through the cash register line is like, because once I had the misfortune to enter this same store looking for one item only. When I failed to find it, I had to choose between waiting ten minutes in line behind customers who were checking out or forcing my way past them. I chose the latter. The cash register aisles are very narrow, and if I carried a few more inches on my hips, it would have been physically impossible for me to squeeze past a loaded shopping cart. Other customers were paranoid that I might be trying to cut in front of them, because cutting in line is as natural as breathing for about 25% of the population. On top of all this, the cashier was suspicious that I might be trying to sneak out with stolen goods. All this flashed through my mind as I faced off with the surly security guard. But what could I do? I briefly contemplated either speaking a mixture of Ukrainian and French, trying to reason with him in English, or shoving him as hard as I could so I could get to one of the carts that were within arm's reach.
 
In the end, I simply growled at him, an inarticulate, animal noise, and spun around to find the closest cash register line . . . and then I came home and shrieked while making fudge frosting.
 
This sort of drama is not an everyday part of life in Ukraine for me. In fact, in nearly three years of living here, this is only the fourth such incident. The other three were prompted by minor slights like the one that set me off today. But culture shock is like a succession of time bombs. The steady ticking that colors all the seconds and minutes of your days sounds innocuous enough, but it's propelled forward by an unending series of small shocks until the inevitable, but unexpected, explosion occurs. And then the process begins all over again.
 
Today was the worst explosion yet. Hours later, my mind still feels brittle. I shan't go mad, at least not tonight. I'm sure of that. In fact, I'm reasonably sure that I will survive the interminable culture shock stage with my sanity intact. But at what cost? In order to survive, must I become an insensitive, unfeeling brute like the people who keep pushing me over the edge? I refuse.
 
As George gently pointed out after my second explosion after moving here, the reason we've chosen to live in this country is to make a positive difference. We want to see the love of Jesus transform lives and change the society. And one of the ways to pursue our goal is to display this love in all our actions. How should I have responded to the security guard today? I honestly don't know, but I'm sure that growling at him was not the best thing I could have done. So I take a deep breath, say a prayer of repentance, and ask God to help me do better next time.

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Uncategorized

A Beginning

This is my first blog. I decided to start one because I’m entering a phase of my life where I would like to write more. This seems like a logical place to start, especially since I haven’t done a very good job of keeping in touch with many of my friends in the States since my move to Ukraine two years and eight months ago. So this is for all of you who are dear to me and for anyone else who cares to read, but mostly, it’s for me. There’ll be more soon, I promise, but for now, this is just a beginning, as the title says.