My views and opinions regarding the home and biblical
manhood and womanhood were greatly shaped during a 5 year period during and
after college while I served under a good mentor and teacher who was also my
pastor at the time. Before that time I had no real conception of any
distinction between men and women in regard to how to play house together
– should the wife work outside the home, should she stay at home, should the
husband stay at home while the wife works? What about when children come along
– is daycare an option? What do you do about schooling? Home school, public
school? There are good arguments for most of these questions on either side of
the aisle, and one could spend a great deal of time debating back and forth,
and indeed I think that there has been a great deal of debate on this. My
intent in this post, however, is not to definitively and finally settle these
arguments and convince society of the one right answer (my answer) – I’ll get
to that in a later post. (A much later post.
I do, however, want to bring special attention to mothers who have a child at home, a toddler in particular, and even more so if there is an “s” at the end of toddler. See, I thought I got the short end of the stick, having to get up e v e r y morning, go to work, make a living for my single income family (by choice – sometimes by making painful choices, like working two jobs), while my wife got to stay at home and relax with the kids! I mean, MAN! Or… WOMAN! That is SO UNFAIR! And all we did was eat an APPLE and we get stuck going out into the field to slave away all day and coming home with thorns and thistles stuck in our backsides. And when we come home, there’s no dinner on the table, our wives aren’t wearing perfume and decked up for our arrival, our children aren’t singing our praises as we walk through the door, rose pedals – er uh (in a more manly voice) donuts aren't floating around in the air – I mean – WHAT DO THEY DO ALL DAY, ANYWAY?
Yeah, and then I stayed home from work last Monday to give my wife a needed break from the kids and let her get away for the day (and she got AWAY FOR THE DAY! VERY FAR AWAY!), and I mean I didn’t see her not just for hours at a time, but for just about the whole day! But hey, that’s cool, I get to stay home and relax with the kids, right? Let me preface this next statement with I have a HUGE S at the end of that word up there in the previous paragraph. WRONG!!!!!! I mean – we just got done with one little girl going through the terrible twos, and the next one just entered – and… I really don’t think the terrible twos ever end, and when teenage years hit, it’s just the terrible two MATURED – that’s all, so consider “2” training for the big two digits when they hit – not that I know from experience… yet. So, I stayed home to get some R&R and WOW! R&R at our home stands for Rambunctious and Rowdy – at least that’s in my two-year-old’s dictionary for two-year-olds. And it is NONSTOP R&R! No break, I mean, you settle one down and the next one is getting into something else – you put out the fire in the potted plant and then you gotta dig a donut out of the toilet – WITH YOUR BARE HANDS, the whole while with your kid laughing thinking it’s the greatest fun they’ve every had! And once they are on the couch smiling like the little devils they are eating their yogurt and quietly watching Blue’s Clues (which I’ve suffered an irreversible mental break of becoming a fan of Blue’s Clues since then – I mean, if you can hear the word Magenta and the first thing you think of is a purple dog… you’ve got issues, man – or you’ve got toddlers – pick your poison), the 3 month old starts crying like she got to the end of the rainbow and there’s no skittles!
I told my wife, “I’m here for you, babe, but I take break at 2:15, lunch at 4:00 and my last break at 7:30.” She missed the memo on every single one of those break times – and my girls did, too. So the next day I took a vacation and went back to work to get some R&R time. I told my wife that night, and I write this to tell her again, and all of you crazy awesome moms who stay at home with your kids (whatever their ages are) – you guys (er, gals) are amazing! I told her that I thought she was unbelievably amazing to be able to do what she does with the girls every single day with no break at 2:15, lunch, and then a 7:30 break (my schedule keeps me at work until 9:00) – and then not kill the meat salesman at the door when he shows up to sell the cow that died in his back yard the day before. She is amazing. You moms are amazing to be able to go through hell and back with your kids every day and tuck them in at night, kiss them, pray with them, and love them with all your heart. SURE you have bad days – man alive – I had a bad day, and that was just the first (and last… kidding) day for me, and sure you lose it sometimes, sure you yell and punch a few holes in the wall and tear fluffy’s head off and stuff it down the garbage disposal (the toy bear that the kids are relentlessly bickering over), and not every day is like that, I know, but to get to the end of every day, and then to have a husband (sometimes) come home and not get that you’ve just been in the thick of World War Toddlers all day and ask, “So what have YOU been doing all day, I slave away at work and no dinner when I get here?” (You might want to lock away the frying pans on such nights – cause I don’t think they’ll be for cooking.) you guys rock, you have my deepest respect, my wife has my highest admiration. How do I put it except to say… you’re amazing.
So – from a husband to his wife, and to all the women out there, kudos, MAJOR KUDOS (and I don’t even know what kudos means). Keep up the fight – without the frying pans – you are some of this world's greatest unsung heroes as you invest your lives – your hearts – every ounce of your being willingly and unwillingly into and for your kids. May your husbands receive the wake-up call that I did and find ways to be a helper to you and minister to your hearts as you faithfully minister to your little ones every day. There is no more difficult task, in my opinion, no more immediately thankless task (sometimes, other times there are beautiful exceptions – like when my daughter just comes up and kisses me for no reason and says, ‘Daddy I want you.’), than to do what you do every day without a lunch break. I wish I could be more inspirational and thoughtful and motivational with this post, but here it is. (Now to go lock away those frying pans before my wife finds the de-potted plant…)
I do, however, want to bring special attention to mothers who have a child at home, a toddler in particular, and even more so if there is an “s” at the end of toddler. See, I thought I got the short end of the stick, having to get up e v e r y morning, go to work, make a living for my single income family (by choice – sometimes by making painful choices, like working two jobs), while my wife got to stay at home and relax with the kids! I mean, MAN! Or… WOMAN! That is SO UNFAIR! And all we did was eat an APPLE and we get stuck going out into the field to slave away all day and coming home with thorns and thistles stuck in our backsides. And when we come home, there’s no dinner on the table, our wives aren’t wearing perfume and decked up for our arrival, our children aren’t singing our praises as we walk through the door, rose pedals – er uh (in a more manly voice) donuts aren't floating around in the air – I mean – WHAT DO THEY DO ALL DAY, ANYWAY?
Yeah, and then I stayed home from work last Monday to give my wife a needed break from the kids and let her get away for the day (and she got AWAY FOR THE DAY! VERY FAR AWAY!), and I mean I didn’t see her not just for hours at a time, but for just about the whole day! But hey, that’s cool, I get to stay home and relax with the kids, right? Let me preface this next statement with I have a HUGE S at the end of that word up there in the previous paragraph. WRONG!!!!!! I mean – we just got done with one little girl going through the terrible twos, and the next one just entered – and… I really don’t think the terrible twos ever end, and when teenage years hit, it’s just the terrible two MATURED – that’s all, so consider “2” training for the big two digits when they hit – not that I know from experience… yet. So, I stayed home to get some R&R and WOW! R&R at our home stands for Rambunctious and Rowdy – at least that’s in my two-year-old’s dictionary for two-year-olds. And it is NONSTOP R&R! No break, I mean, you settle one down and the next one is getting into something else – you put out the fire in the potted plant and then you gotta dig a donut out of the toilet – WITH YOUR BARE HANDS, the whole while with your kid laughing thinking it’s the greatest fun they’ve every had! And once they are on the couch smiling like the little devils they are eating their yogurt and quietly watching Blue’s Clues (which I’ve suffered an irreversible mental break of becoming a fan of Blue’s Clues since then – I mean, if you can hear the word Magenta and the first thing you think of is a purple dog… you’ve got issues, man – or you’ve got toddlers – pick your poison), the 3 month old starts crying like she got to the end of the rainbow and there’s no skittles!
I told my wife, “I’m here for you, babe, but I take break at 2:15, lunch at 4:00 and my last break at 7:30.” She missed the memo on every single one of those break times – and my girls did, too. So the next day I took a vacation and went back to work to get some R&R time. I told my wife that night, and I write this to tell her again, and all of you crazy awesome moms who stay at home with your kids (whatever their ages are) – you guys (er, gals) are amazing! I told her that I thought she was unbelievably amazing to be able to do what she does with the girls every single day with no break at 2:15, lunch, and then a 7:30 break (my schedule keeps me at work until 9:00) – and then not kill the meat salesman at the door when he shows up to sell the cow that died in his back yard the day before. She is amazing. You moms are amazing to be able to go through hell and back with your kids every day and tuck them in at night, kiss them, pray with them, and love them with all your heart. SURE you have bad days – man alive – I had a bad day, and that was just the first (and last… kidding) day for me, and sure you lose it sometimes, sure you yell and punch a few holes in the wall and tear fluffy’s head off and stuff it down the garbage disposal (the toy bear that the kids are relentlessly bickering over), and not every day is like that, I know, but to get to the end of every day, and then to have a husband (sometimes) come home and not get that you’ve just been in the thick of World War Toddlers all day and ask, “So what have YOU been doing all day, I slave away at work and no dinner when I get here?” (You might want to lock away the frying pans on such nights – cause I don’t think they’ll be for cooking.) you guys rock, you have my deepest respect, my wife has my highest admiration. How do I put it except to say… you’re amazing.
So – from a husband to his wife, and to all the women out there, kudos, MAJOR KUDOS (and I don’t even know what kudos means). Keep up the fight – without the frying pans – you are some of this world's greatest unsung heroes as you invest your lives – your hearts – every ounce of your being willingly and unwillingly into and for your kids. May your husbands receive the wake-up call that I did and find ways to be a helper to you and minister to your hearts as you faithfully minister to your little ones every day. There is no more difficult task, in my opinion, no more immediately thankless task (sometimes, other times there are beautiful exceptions – like when my daughter just comes up and kisses me for no reason and says, ‘Daddy I want you.’), than to do what you do every day without a lunch break. I wish I could be more inspirational and thoughtful and motivational with this post, but here it is. (Now to go lock away those frying pans before my wife finds the de-potted plant…)
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