My Truth // I am a maker of things

The dog needed to go out for the second time in 20 minutes. It wasn't even 7:30 am yet. I had my husband's breakfast sizzling on the stove while he was hustling to leave for work. My three year old was hounding me about his breakfast and getting his trucks out. I was starving and had to pee but there was no time. I had a moment of near breakdown. "Could this really be it for my next 8-10 years?" With another boy just three months from his estimated arrival, I had a brief moment of panic. What kind of woman am I right now? There are times I don't even recognize this person I've become. I'm more fulfilled in many ways than I was years ago but something is still just a bit off with me. There is something just not me about me. Then is hit me, "What kind of woman am I teaching my boys to admire? This? Oh heavens, no!"

God created me for more than just motherhood. Don't get me wrong. I love being a mother but that is not who I am. I am a woman who is just trying to understand her own truth while also mothering a young boy and his brother (in the oven).  All mothers were women first and they will be continue to be long after their babes leave their nest. So what kind of woman was I created to be? I have allowed myself to be lost in all the daily tasks and the mom guilt. How dare I turn the TV on for my son to watch for a simple moment to myself? What kind of mother am I? The guilt of wanting to get away for some time alone is real, ya'll. He'll only be little for another minute. Surely, I can ignore my own needs to play trucks again. I'll have time for myself when he's in school. Maybe. 

Truthfully, I'm afraid. 

What if I try to put myself and my "talents" out there and people scoff? To this day I cringe when someone describes me a 'creative.' I feel so much pressure with that title. I do not live up to my own standards of that definition. After all, I look at who I'm surrounded with and the talent is strong. I'm little old me. Who I am next to them? Nothing! My friends have always been incredible musicians, song writers, painters, photographers, crafters, authors, and visionaries. I have no particular creative skill. I always played it save and stayed behind the scenes.  My singing is average. My photography is just OK. I can't play a single instrument. I cannot paint. I do not draw. My grammar is terrible. Me? Creative? Nah. You have me all wrong. I'm just a mom.

Bullshit, Amy!

I am nothing if not a woman who creates. I know with full certainty that I was created to make things beautiful and to make beautiful things. The urge to make things haunts me. It follows me around like a shadow. It's been what's missing within me. I've stopped creating. Not entirely though. I dabble, and when I do, it feels a little magical. It feels like I'm tapping into something a little sacred inside myself. I look at all these woman I admire and think that's what I'm supposed to be doing. I'll do it some day. That someday has come and gone hundreds of times. Today is the day. "The action is here." Today I must start believing that I am to make things and then make them. If I do not, I will die. This morning I heard Elizabeth Gilbert share this quote and I felt the spark.

"It's the most important thing in my life, making things. Much as I love my husband and my children, I love them only because I am the person who makes these things. I, who I am, is the person that has the project of making a thing. And because that person does that all the time, that person is able to love all these people." -A. S. Byatt

I make things. Yes, yes I do. I am certainly not a writer but I can write well enough. So for now, until I have uncovered my full passion, I will write because I am enough. I must believe that although I am pregnant, barefoot and have my hands in a sink full of dirty dishes most of my days, that it is not who I am. I am still a beautiful women full of love and creativity and I am a maker of beautiful things. The projects may look different day to day but it is apart of who God created Amy Gorenca to be. So, I shall honor Him and be a maker of beautiful things.

Thank you Liz and thank you Madam Byatt for sharing your light.