Home

Here's the deal:  We write for 5 minutes from our heart.  We write unedited. We write for the joy of it.  We write without rewrites. We write and we link up and we share with each other.  Pretty neat idea. Come with me and join http://www.thegypsymama.com/ for 5 minute friday!  You won't be sorry, I promise.

The Prompt:  Home
Timer set for 5 minutes

Go:

Home.  I used to think it was a house.  Where I grew up.  Where my parents were.

No longer.

Home. It became the house where my children were.  Where we laughed and sprawled and crawled and it was a vast array of different houses, as we were a military family.

No longer.

Home.  It turned into a place I didn't want to be because it was as empty as my soul when their father left and the children scattered and I was facing a dark and uncertain future...alone.

No longer.

Home.  Now it  is that place where I handed my very wonded and bruised heart to a man whose heart was so tender and also war-worn.  Home is where he kissed me and in that kiss I began to believe that my heart could heal.  Home is where he put his arms around me and they have stayed.  Home is where he brushes my hair from my face and whispers, "God Bless my Molli and keep her in His care" in the middle of the night when he thinks I'm asleep. Home is where he intentionally works out to stay strong should I need him to lift me and carry me up the stairs on days I just can't make it myself.   Home includes all of our children and grandchildren and extended family, but mostly, it is that circle of unending, undying love of a union born from hurt and pain, cemented with grit and determination, blessed of God and nurtured with love, care, tenderness and laughter. 

Home, for me, is in the presence of the Rocket Man of my dreams.  Where he is, where we are togehter...that is home. My forever love.  My heart...Ed Massey

Stop

{Picture added after the timer}

~Mollianne

Somehow

Somehow, I thought I'd have more anwers than questions when I reached my {clears throat loudly} mid-fifties!  Silly me.


Somehow, I never really believed that I'd have to exercise more and eat less as I got older to maintain a size 6 body.  Ooops!  That one is in the rear view.  Silly me.


Somehow, I thought that once I was no longer listening for babies needing to be fed, children who might be ill or having a bad dream, teenagers sneaking in after curfew, or a husband who worked shifts...I would sleep deeply and soundly all night long.  Silly me.


Somehow, I thought that my energy levels would always remain high and I would be able to clean house all day and go dancing all night...forever.  Or at least long past this age.  Silly me.


Somehow, I thought I would magically become disciplined in all aspects of life when I attained midle age.  Silly, silly me.


But you know what?  Where I am...still full of questions, size larger than 6 body, insomniac, less than energetic and still not as disciplined as I would like to be...I'm mostly okay with most of that.  Because what I have somehow gained over the years is more grace. 

Grace to learn to trust God more fully for all my needs. Grace to become friends with me.  Grace to give myself a break.  Grace to linger over the good things and try to forgive the bad.    The grace of being loved wholeheartedly by a good man.  Grace to enjoy my grown up children and their spouses, my stepchildren and my adolescent grandchildren.  Grace to embrace my aging parents in new and poignant ways.  I find new graces daily and cling to them.


Somehow, in all that grace, I've found that I sort of like me.  Lots more than I ever thought I would.  Silly me! 

~Mollianne

Cranky!

It doesn't happen often, or at least I don't recognize it if it does, but I woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.  Feeling cranky.  Really mean cranky.  And I don't know why.

The first person I talked to was Chef Phil at work.  When he asked me how I was, I said, "I'm cranky."  He kissed me on the cheek and told me I might be cranky but I smelled nice.  Instead of saying, "Thank you!" as my Mother and Neenie taught me to say when someone said something nice, I said (maybe snarled), "Better to smell nice and be cranky than to stink and be cranky."  But I smiled after I said it.

When another co-worker asked me how I was feeling, I said, "Cranky!"  We went on to have a nice conversation, in fact...we laughed about it.

Rocket Man called to check on me, as he often does, and I told him I was feeling cranky.  He asked why and I had no answer.  I told him I was just cranky and that was that.

Even my Mother called and I told her I was cranky and she laughed. She told me, as she has for years, "You have the same pants to get glad in that you had to get mad in."  Wisdom from Ruby Jean, a dear friend.  We then laughed about my crankiness.

As the day wears on, I find that the more I say I'm cranky, the less cranky I feel.  And the more I am inclined to laugh at my earlier assessment that I'm cranky.

Seems that my crankiness abated a bit once I was in a nice, air-conditioned building that felt cool. 

I'm anxious to see if I feel cranky when I go out in a few minutes. 

I'm not much of a mathematician.  But I have come up with a formula.  It goes like this:

Ho + Hu + SRDMB = CM

{Hot + Humid + Sweat Rolling Down My Back = Cranky Molli}

I'm afraid its gonna be a lo-o-n-g summer!

~Mollianne