so i'm at the thrift yesterday morning - a little solo excursion in search of hidden treasure. and as this amazingly beautiful woman is ringing up my small collection of pillowcases and drinking glasses, she looks at me and says,
"you look real cute. your little vest and all your cute brown, real cute. you're like that mom on TV who bakes her kids cookies and makes her kids clothes and does arts and crafts with them."
and in her absolutely perfect face, i could see that she was being genuine, that her comments came from a place of warmth and kindness.
but somehow, despite whatever personal growth i may have made these past 4+ years, insecurity rose quickly to the surface and there i was explaining myself, talking about my years as a teacher and how i was ready to shift gears when the girls came along. my knee-jerk reaction had me rationalizing my at-home-ness and defending something that not only was not in need of defense, but something that she was simply complimenting. even as the words crossed my lips, i knew my insecurities had taken over. after about 15 seconds of blathering on, i finally was able to mute myself and assess the situation. as soon as i got back to the car, i wrote it all down. and i've read it at least a dozen times since.
what i should have said was, "THANK YOU!"
hello, reality check. you see, one thing that really stuck with me from graduate school was studying maslow's heirarchy and coming to terms that we pretty much never achieve self-actualization, rather - if we are lucky - we may reach a state of self-actualizing. from time to time, i feel like i really am there, in the moment, comfortable with it all. but what i am learning is that is easier to look around - to compare and contrast. succumbing to contentment and embracing the peace of any given moment in one's life is a tremendous challenge - and it looks like i still have some work to do. i'm up for that. xoxo
