"Grace on the Fly"

So a few posts back -- the one with the crocheted rainbow blankets -- I talked about how thankful and hopeful I have felt lately. It always seems when I make a post on here about such glad things, I invariable have one, two days, or a week of awfulness. I mean, where I am just buried in worry, anger, frustration, staleness, what-have-you. Yesterday was a Nadar Day -- The boys just fought and groused and broke things and injured each other. I couldn't keep up with dishes or laundry or floor crud. I was annoyed at Brad from something from the night before. I was worried about Atticus going to kindergarten in the fall. I was mad at the dirty, torn upholstery on every piece of furniture we own. I wanted my dog to die (a painless) death -- more than usual. There was poop strewn across my upstairs rooms -- dog or human I still haven't determined. At one point I was so overwhelmed by all of it -- having tried praying with all four of the kids on the floor, having locked the older ones out in the back yard and trying to pray in my bedroom -- I got so emotional, I threw up in the bathroom (sometimes that happens to me -- my youngest brother has a similar weakness -- we are weird like that). And Brad couldn't answer his phone due to meetings. Then I called my mom. She pulled me up out of the morass -- gave me an emotional hug across the phone and made me think I should maybe go on living. I knew that I needed to fight this sin trying to take over me -- fight, to the death. But I was just so exhausted. And, really, even when I am not saying it "out loud", sometimes the popular thoughts start creeping in "This is really exceptionally difficult, Sarah -- You should be allowed some self pity. You should be allowed to get all yell-ish and freak-out every once in awhile -- it's just a necessary release valve thing. I mean who can humanly handle this situation graciously, gently, kindly, self-controlled. No one can do this day after day. Especially on 4 hours of sleep (bad night with insomnia and Thea). And, really, there is just so much a person can take. I NEED quiet. I NEED my children to be kind to each other. I NEED my children to not be idiots and know that they shouldn't destroy furniture and smash crackers all over the floor and throw baseball bats up onto the garage and so on and so on. And, really, I am just sick of the color scheme in my living room and I NEED to repaint and reupholster. Is that so much to ask. Blah, blah, blah..." Just all this sewage of self-loving easement and self-righteous anger and lazy apathy toward what is right and good. I needed to repent and do what was right -- right then. And not just refrain from crying in the bathtub or yelling into a kid's face. I needed to do what was right and clean up the next mess and soothe the next kid who got hurt (doing something stupid) and calmly, deliberately arbitrate and train in the next argument/fight that broke out. And then after that do it again. ("Do the Next Thing" -- Elizabeth Elliot always wrote in her books...). But I didn't want to. Well, I pulled myself together enough to open the bedroom door, pick up Thea, unlock the back door, and carry on with the afternoon and get through dinner and bedtime (when Brad arrived from an uncharacteristically late workday). 

Then that night, while nursing Thea Belle before her bedtime, I opened up the Wilson Women's blog Femina. Lizzie Janks posted this entry that belted me across the spiritual hiney -- so hard that I had to wait until naptime today to re-read and think it through. If you have time, go read it -- one of those horribly awesome call-to-arms/exhortations from someone else in the trenches.