There Is No Spoon

I’m crying because we’re out of spoons.

OK, I’m actually crying because my kids and husband have been sick all week, I’ve been trying to take care of them all at the same time, and I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop and my own illness to appear. I’m crying because my house, which was fairly respectable a week ago, has descended into utter chaos. I’m crying because I thought I was made of tough enough stuff to be a Nebraskan, but I keep having to beg favors from friends and back out of commitments because my family has been sick TWELVE TIMES since the beginning of the school year. And I’m crying because we’re out of spoons, which is the proverbial straw that breaks this mama’s back whenever it happens, because it means the dishes, the laundry, the papers on the kitchen table, and every other thing that can pile up has done so.

I know you have a spoon problem, too--maybe it’s not spoons, but it’s something. No clean underwear, no milk in the fridge, no white space on the calendar...everybody has a trigger for their breaking point, and when that fourth horseman rides into town, whoever’s in the vicinity better clear out, because it ain’t gonna be pretty.

I remember when I was seventeen and my grandmother died. She had struggled with Alzheimer’s for years and finally died from an infection that the doctors had a hard time pinpointing. I took the news of her death pretty calmly, because my initial emotion was actually relief and gratitude that she was no longer suffering. But a few days later, in the hotel room where we were staying before the funeral, I had a knock-down, drag-out screaming match with my brother over who had to sleep on the rollaway bed. Guess what...it was not about the bed. My sweet, gentle grandma, with fascinating cabinets of home-canned goods and a nurse’s heart for caring for others--she was really, truly gone. And that was worth crying over.

At the end of the day, I know no one is holding it against me that I can’t keep a perfect house while trying to take care of my family and keep myself vaguely together and functional. But when we run out of spoons, it’s right about the same time I’ve run totally out of patience and turn into a person I don’t like to be: a screaming, frazzled, psycho-mommy who makes her toddler burst into tears because of the way she’s yelling at her preschooler. No one else may be holding it against me, but I’m holding it against myself.

So tonight, at the end of this day, I had to let it go. (Sadly, I haven’t seen Frozen, but that song is incredible, as everyone else in the world already knows). Bedtime was not going well, and I was opening my mouth to whisper-scream (you know, the scary kind you do when you don’t want to wake the child that’s already sleeping) at Noah, who was throwing a fit over something ridiculous, and I just stopped. Took a breath. Turned his light out and laid down next to him. Breathed and put a hand on him while he finished his tantrum. Breathed and waited. Breathed and prayed.

And a verse (a voice?) came into my head: “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me.”

I breathed peace onto my sweet son’s head. I rubbed his back and stroked his hair. I said I was sorry for yelling so much today and asked his forgiveness. I let it go.

Everything is not all better. There are still no spoons. But Mike came home, and he brought me a donut (which, unlike ice cream, requires no spoon.) I think we’re going to be ok.

Breathing peace to you,

Alison