noticed the way it drives us .
Several days ago , I walked through my house as if watching unedited movie footage . Room to room , I scanned without editing .
What a sight this would have been for my thirty-year-old self . Laundry heaped a foot above the top of the basket , the lid cockeyed and merely ornamental now . My cozy rocker — the one we painstakingly selected years ago , delivered days before Virginia was born — now stained by nursing babies and chocolate-fingered toddlers and holding four bags of clothes to be shipped back to the store .
Two thoughts vied for my attention .
The first wanted to scold me , to turn my eye into a microscope . It wanted to coach
me into better habits , ones I knew I couldn ’ t reach with seven kids , and to shame me as I considered them .
The second gave a moment ’ s lift to my heart . She ’ s different , I thought , comparing myself with the thirty-year-old version of me . A full hamper meant a full life — so much life to be lived in the woods behind our home that the tykes couldn ’ t stay clean of the mud in between meals . It meant teenage daughters trying on multiple outfits and asking their mama ’ s opinion . Sure , the hamper held clean discards that would have annoyed me years ago and did occasionally now , but my girls crowd their mama ’ s room for outfit changes . What a delight , what a gift to scan this room with wiser eyes and to feel full and satisfied . This season limits just how tidy my home can be without driving myself and my family crazy , and it ’ s not like I enjoy the clutter or
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