Just Be Decent

As a mom, one of the worst feelings in the world is standing in a checkout line while rushing quickly through your bags trying to figure out what necessary things you just tried to buy to for your family that you don't need.

Can they go without milk this week? 
Keep the potatoes I can use them for lots of things. 
Veggies are important but expensive, put those back. 
And on and on. 

All of that made terribly worse by those standing around you annoyed that their day is delayed because you don't have enough money in your account.

Guilty.
Humiliated.
Scared. 
Embarrassed. 
Frustrated.
Overwhelmed.

As a mom who has been there, I would like to ask you to please watch for these people. If you see it happen, if you can, buy the groceries. Smile. Walk away. 

Don't stand around waiting for praise. Don't get on Facebook and celebrate your generosity. Just buy the groceries. Just be a decent and kind human being for the sake of being decent and kind. 

You see things for a reason. 

Do something about it.

RLF

I wrote this a couple years ago on my dad's birthday. If you read anything I write at all, you know my struggles with this...

I wish that my dad could have stayed, that he could have found healing, that he could meet My Stephen, the man who continues to fill in all the holes he left.

So many memories twisted up in wanting and needing. 

So much sadness and aching for healing. 

One moment at a time. Memories of me dancing in the kitchen to "Killing Time" or the smell of train tracks as we headed to go swim. Frogs in my bed and sliding down gravel piles to eating at Wendy's one last time before I said goodbye. 

Tonight I realize more than most that he loved me. He loved me how he could. 

Happy Birthday Stubby Freeman. You are and were loved.
March 25, 1952-Oct 3, 1990

And then she was done.

The last few months have felt impossible. Yesterday, the weight of all of it, past and present, aided by my own failures, past and present, and ugly words from people who shouldn't,  all came crashing in on me. I did not handle it well.

Thank you to those of you who wrapped me up tightly until the waves subsided.

Yes,  in the past I have done my fair share of contributing to the brokenness. I have engaged when people were ugly instead of walking away. I'm embarrassed I allowed myself to get to that point. Its also not something I can change.

While the loss of Andreana, was for me, a wake up call, it is clear it was not family wide. I tried having people close while being  aware of what they could and would do. I'm not very good at that. When those who I am close to are hurt and reach out, I react and not always nicely. Please know this isn't a case of me being innocent. I'm not. But, I have gotten to the point where for my own mental health, I have to shut and lock the doors to some people in my life. I can't NOT react and I don't want to be the person I am when it comes to some of my family. Love is NOT enough.

The more I think about it, you know, maybe the wake up call was to find ways to enjoy every moment, to live and be better every chance you get, not to keep trying to pick up the pieces of something that cuts you. I can't be family in a crisis and nothing when it is over, so I am choosing to be nothing. Nothing is better than this awfulness every few months. From this moment forward I'll gladly take the blame. I'm done.

You Don't Know Him

You Don't Know Him
Or not the Him that I know anyway
Not the Him that broke me
Not the Him who left forever bruises and always sadness
You don't know Him.
He is your friend, your cousin, your coworker, your forever
You don't know Him.
Not the Him that laughed when I pleaded for Him to let me go,
Or the Him that held a blank stare as he ripped my everything to shreds.
You don't know Him,
and really, if I'm honest, I didn't either.
Not when I laid on the floor and looked up at Him and begged, "Please stop, it's me"
Not when I kicked and screamed in protest.
Not when I fell silent, exhausted, and broken.
You don't know Him, All of them.
The Hims of my everyday
The Hims you know and I wish I didn't
They, They pretended I didn't exist.
They crushed me and pretended it was my fault.
And then They moved forward, as if nothing happened.
So you don't know Him, and my hope is that you never do.

Being Pro All Life

Being Pro All Life is lonely. It blows my mind how each group somehow thinks the other less, from death row inmates to unborn babies, for me, they all have value. Women's rights go all the way down to unborn women's rights to be born. Pro life extends all the way to welfare lines and inconvenience. It is not pretty but it is beautiful.

You Want Her Whole

You want her whole.
Trust me.
For when she finds her muchness;
when she gathers all the pieces of herself,
all the pieces you have broken,
it will be too late.
She wont just leave.
She will trample every inch of you on the way out,
Every unkind word you spoke,
every stinging touch
will fuel her wrath.
You want her whole,
for the chaos of her brokenness will make hurricanes seem like a lazy Saturday rain and tornados a gentle breeze.
You want her whole because with her beside you the world is yours for the taking,
and with her beneath the very earth will quake with her tears.
You want her whole because no matter how broken she becomes, eventually those pieces will call to one another
and pull close,
becoming heavier than your angry hands
and bigger than your worth.
You want her whole because her broken pieces will shred your frailty.
You want her whole because anything less is the swift ruin of you.


 -Jessica Lynn Freeman

Me in the Charlotte Observer

Me in the Charlotte Observer