what I'm reading: being a grandma - or older woman - from Melbourne's Child

What does Titus 2:3-5 mean when you're a grandmother? What does it mean when you're an 'older woman' caring for younger women with babies? I think this model (from Rose O'Reilly's article Time to Care in June's Melbourne's Child*) is really helpful (and it includes some interesting reflections on retirement too):

The matter of how much grandparents can or should help out with the new generation always requires sensitive negotiation. When my eldest grandchild was born, I didn't help enough. It was only after the difficult early weeks were over that I realised that a couple of hours a week minding the baby was not all that the new parents had needed. They'd needed advice and reassurance, and an extra pair of hands when the baby wouldn't feed properly, or sleep, or stop crying. They'd needed me to be there; but I was off chasing a passion of my own...

Many older people have a lot of freedom, and we tend to think that we deserve it after so many years of working and raising our own children; but life doesn't work like that, and neither does family. There may be a few years that are all our own,** between when our children become independent and when their babies start to arrive. Then the new family demands begin - and they are demands of the nicest kind.

All too soon those gorgeous grandbabies, those miraculous little cooing bundles of brag material, will grow up and be gone. Then we'll be able to spend the rest of our lives shopping for screwdrivers or going on cruises.** I for one will find these things a poor substitute.

* Or Sydney's Child, or Perth's Child, or...
** Or devoted to serving Jesus with all our energy - which I hope goes for all of life, retired or not!

what I'm reading: reflections on emotions and moods from Joe Forgas

I read an interesting article by Greg Bearup in Good Weekend the other day, about psychologist Joe Forgas' studies on emotions and moods - which, it seems, are not the same thing at all.

Emotions are usually short-lived and intense, and we're usually aware of them. There are 6 basic human emotions: fear, anger, disgust, sadness, happiness and surprise (try fitting all your emotions into these 6 categories and it will twist your brain a little...). Emotions are the extreme peaks and troughs in our emotional landscape.

Moods, on the other hand, are less intense than emotions, and we're mostly unaware of them. They fluctuate many times during the day as we swap between happy and sad, positive and negative. Moods are the gentle undulations in our emotional landscape.

We live in a society that pursues happiness with dedication; but it seems that sadness (not depression, which is intense and long-lasting) can be good for you. When we're happy, we're more free-flowing and creative. When we're sad, we're more perceptive, our memories work better, and we think more clearly. We might also be more interesting:

Being a bit glum can make you a more interesting person. 'I think most people worth talking to are slightly depressed...It is part of the human condition. It may be that people who are a bit on the negative side see the world as it really is...It tends to be these people who see the world clearly.'

In a world filled with real sorrow, all this emotional navel-gazing seems more than a little self-indulgent. 'Just go and put on a sad movie and you'll be a more interesting person.' But at least it might make us less impatient with feeling sad.

The article was by Greg Bearup, the quote-within-a-quote by Joe Forgas.

Sarah Wilson on reading, writing and other fine stuff

There's a column in Sunday Life magazine that I find oddly appealing. Oddly because it's on a very different page to me spiritually. But I like reading it anyway.

Every week Sarah Wilson talks about her "experimental journey" to "make life more meaningful, happier, sweeter" - from decluttering to mindful eating to Random Acts Of Kindness. I enjoy it because it isn't solemn and earnest (ugh!), but cheerful, self-deprecating, chatty, and written with a light touch.

It also helps me understand people. My hairdresser does yoga and "cleanses her space" with crystals. My fellow school mum is rediscovering her faith. This column gives me a window into the hodge-podge of "spiritualities" that pass for religion for many Western women, who don't have Jesus but long for meaning.

Which makes my motives sound far more worthy than they are. Actually, I read with Sunday-morning laziness, waiting for something to jump out in a oh-really-you-too! way. Like the time Sarah discovered slow reading and the "Very Fine Art of Sitting on the Couch on a Saturday Afternoon with a Pot of Tea and a Good Book". You go, girl!

I, too, battle "Perfect Holiday Syndrome", which means I have to let go of my holiday ideals and learn to rest. When Sarah rediscovered her whiteness -"going out for breakfast, yoga, Moleskin notebooks" - I realised why I'll never be stylish in a "liberal, upper middle-class" way. I even liked (some of) what she said about the Dalai Lama, because he, too, can't silence the chatter in his head. So there.

This week, I realised Sarah writes like I do:

This column generally emerges from a walk around the block. Paragraph by paragraph, it unfurls as I lap the ‘hood. As Nietzsche wrote: “All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking”. Henry Thoreau once said: “Methinks the moment my legs being to move, my thoughts being to flow”. Which is not to imply my column is a work of great thoughts. Just that it probably wouldn’t exist at all if I didn’t walk.

Lots of my blog-posts come together while I'm walking and staring at the clouds. Paragraphs form themselves while I drive and listen to music. The perfect sentence pops into my head when I'm asleep.

The best writing doesn't happen when I'm thinking; it happens when I'm not thinking.

So here it is, my very own life-tip with capital letters: A Relaxed Mind Is A Creative Mind. If you're having trouble getting something right, get off the chair, go for a walk, let your thoughts drift - and it will come to you. Sweet.

so much better

As you may know by now, I read 2 magazines: Sunday Life and Good Weekend, which come with our newspaper. The other morning I woke up and (on some strange impulse) grabbed the nearest magazine before I picked up my Bible. I read about

• the couple who pledged to create themselves "by the grace of God and Goddess" into "soul partners", who "felt the polarity with all the starving people in the world" as they waited hungrily for their meals in an expensive restaurant (oh, dear)
• the blog where men and women share stories of losing their virginity, and the emptiness of most of the stories (apparently, first-time sex is often a let-down, which is unsurprising when it's reduced to a rite of passage with a stranger)
• the sadomasochism and lesbianism which have become an inseparable part of many pop videos, thanks to Lady Gaga's "extremely empowered" sexual aesthetic (apparently great news for women, who are no longer sex objects shaped by men but are freed...for this?!).

Feeling a little revolted, I put down the magazines. I looked out the window at the gum trees, listened to the birds chattering, watched the sunrise lighting up a nearby building, and soaked in the spaciousness and stillness. I picked up my Bible and turned to 1 Peter. After all that sordid, empty reading, God's word was like a well of clear water. As Peter says,

...you have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do—living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry. They think it strange that you do not plunge with them into the same flood of dissipation, and they heap abuse on you...The end of all things is near. Therefore be clear minded and self-controlled...
(1 Peter 4:1-11)

Sometimes the world seems dangerously attractive, with its promises of freedom and pleasure. But when you look deeper, what you see is emptiness and foulness. It's hard to believe that I'm ever attracted by the ways of this world, for they have nothing to offer me. Against this sordid backdrop, it's clearer than ever that God's ways are wholesome, good, loving and true.

images are by en.en from flickr and from stock.xchng

in celebration of female friendship

I enjoyed Mia's article "When Girl Meets Girl" in Sunday Life on the weekend (you can read it here). It's about how, when you're married or in a relationship, you can't date guys (well, fair enough!) but how it can be just as much fun to date girls (in a platonic sense, that is).

While it's not really "dating", it's true that there's something about a new female friendship that feels a bit like falling in love: exhilarating and a little scary. An evening with a girlfriend, or a group of girlfriends, can be a lot of fun. Best of all is time spent with a good old friend, where you know each other inside out, but still have more to learn.

When I go out with a female friend, my (very supportive and happy to look after the children) husband calls it "escaping back to singleness" (which was so long ago I'd have to squint to see it) but it's not really. It's just the joy of getting to know a new friend or re-connecting with an old friend, far from the world of dirty socks and crumby carpets and rumpled beds.

Female friendship are easy because, let's face it, we don't have to navigate past all the landmines which litter male-female communication. There are no romantic complications, and we get each other with less explaining. We can talk over and under and around and through a problem without boring anyone, and no-one tries to "fix it" and tell us we should just stop worrying.

Nothing can replace an evening out with my lovely man, and nothing's better than a good talk where he takes that finely honed male logic and gently cuts through my anxieties. But it's also good to talk around and around an issue with a girlfriend, to get a woman's perspective and sympathy, and just to chat and pray with my besties.

It's true that female friendships can be complicated by ugly realities like gossip, envy, clinginess and oversharing. But female friendships can also be loving, rich and selfless. At their very best, they help us to be all that God wants us to be.

So let's stop for a moment and celebrate female friendships, old and new. Because - praise God! - female friendship can be very, very good.

image is from lanuiop at flickr

another reason for having kids young?

I see my friend going straight from 9 years at home with young children to caring for ailing parents, and I wonder how she does it. I look at my own 12 years at home with young children, and worry about whether I'll have energy left to cope with the stresses of the next stage of life.

It never occurred to me before that we're reaping one of the results of having kids at 30 rather than 25 - and that's without full-time work on top of motherhood. As I read the article "Shades of blue" in last weekend's Sunday Life, about women juggling careers and motherhood with apparent ease while they battle depression in private, it was this paragraph that stood out for me:

Allison Pearson [author of I Don't Know How She Does It] went on to describe herself as a "sandwich woman", one of a generation who had children in their 30s and then, just as their offspring were "sleeping through the night, one of our parents fell ill". The stress of this situation - and a job on top - took its toll. "Is it women who are mad, or is it the society we live in?" she asked. "We always suspected there would be a price for Having It All, and we were happy to pay it; but we didn't know the cost would be to our mental health."

Yet another good reason - on top of the extra energy! - for having children while you're young, if that choice is open to you. It certainly seems a better option than squeezing all your "fun" and career advancement into your 20s, and only thinking about having kids later.

image is from Wondermonkey2k at flickr

not a reason to have children

I was happily reading a lovely little article in Sunday Life a few weeks ago* by a broody man writing about how socially unacceptable it is for men to be broody, when he explained his reason for wanting children:

Having a family would probably be a significant trade-up on my lifestyle.

While I'm all for broodiness and the blessings of having children, it seems to me that this statement has several flaws. Can you spot them?

* Yes, this is a slightly out-of-date post.

image is from Enigam Photo at flickr