We look in the mirror not believing what we've become

As a child we'd thought we be someone

We sell our dreams and potential so we can

live the life that "they" call grand

-Words of a twelve-year-old scholar who wears too much eye makeup, my own Hallie Burden.  This is an excerpt from a poem she wrote the other night. Her words strike me with unfathomable force.  "This" is what I've been trying to tell her.....And "this" is what I'm still trying to tell myself.

With big brown eyes and wild hair, Hallie at age six, was a mustang in spirit. She even tried to convince us that she was turning into a horse because she was starting to notice hair on her legs and arms and she "thought her neck was growing longer".

Her dreams of the future didn't include the words "trained" or "tamed" or becoming the best work horse.

But the "ideal" girl is what we all somehow become sold on.  Too often we unwittingly pack up our simple enjoyment of life along with the Barbies and white drawing paper.  We're told a grand life means trading in our individuality for a canned version of lady-ness.   We drive our SUV's at dizzying speed to make the next appointment or practice.  Our girls see us fret in front of the mirror when we view our slightly more plump figures or the small lines that have invited themselves underneath our tired eyes. Jills of all trades, we try to do it all, be it all, while the "us" God intended lies buried beneath the busy effort.

Just the other day, I looked at one of the pair of earrings I wear.  And I saw irony at its best.  The earrings are broken; both of them.  Of course they didn't start out that way.  A couple of weeks ago, at church I think, one of the silver scrolled circles went missing off of the earring in my right ear.  Instead of trying to find the missing piece, I had Jason take the complete earring and break it to match the other.  So now I have two broken earrings.  And I wear them just as if being broken is fine and dandy.

I see women who are worn out and defeated; but still accepting of the heavy load society lays squarely on their shoulders.  Already worn as I am, I tell myself that if they're ably and somewhat nobly spinning their physical and literal wheels, what am I but an incapable woman if I'm not doing the same.  It doesn't seem to matter if I'm not designed to cook like they are or sing like they do.  I don't seem to care if its purposeful and necessary to emulate their load.   The world needs one more PTA mom, right? Regardless of the plans God has for me, I'm attracted to the "all women invited/losers need not apply" Rat Race and Super Woman contest that I hate.

And all the while I root for young girls; that they will be who God created them to be.  I expect them to listen to the voices that tell them that they are enough. It's not all about making the grade, I expect my twelve and eight year old to know. I pray that my son chooses a girl that is all wrapped up in who God wants her to be. I want Hallie and Rylie to trust me when I tell them they don't need to be, or dress, or dance like someone else.

You're whole and loved as you, I tell them.  And I smile.... wearing my broken earrings.

I feel it in my tired old bones and my made up face.

This is the assigned moment for Him to move into the center, while I slip off to the sidelines.  John 3:30

Me, or "another her" isn't who my girls need to see.  I want them to see Him and the over the top, unique, and fabulous plan he has for me, and for them.