every year on new year’s eve, andy and i (and some of our dear friends) set personal intentions for the year ahead by giving it a name.  perhaps the most significant year-naming for me was “the year of rearranging,” which resulted in this proud post.

but the year of rearranging is over. i am now 19 days into “the year of gratitude.”

if you are rolling your eyes with associations of new-agey, blissed-out, shallow pronouncements of happiness, designed to mask all that is wrong with this world, STOP RIGHT NOW. if you were thinking more along the lines of  the dalai lama, you can stop that too. sadly, he and i have little in common.

i simply found myself, during those last few days of 2011, on my knees (not praying but scraping already-chewed-gum off of the kitchen floor); having a mountain top experience (wherein i observed my children happily eating greasy goldfish crackers, on the couch, in my bedroom, under a two-weeks-high mountain of clean laundry); in the wake of a come-to-jesus-talk with my husband (that didn’t involve jesus at all but rather another baby, the third one that we won’t be attempting to have due to our divergent viewpoints about how many people we want in this household); and i realized that much of what enrages me about my life has to do with the way that i form, internalize, solidify, and live by GREAT EXPECTATIONS. and by “great” i mean sometimes soul-killing.

my friend, erika, gave me a little ledger for christmas where there is a space to name what i am grateful for each day. i confess that i have no idea where i put that thing. but it (and she) inspired me to spend the year taking an honest look at the beauty and bounty that is instead of the beauty and bounty that is not.

the best thing about the year of gratitude is that it does not come with any presumptions of forward progress. all i have to do each day is name one moment in which i witness a spark of the divine outside of myself and one moment in which i witness a spark of the divine inside of myself (the latter is the more difficult). i send these brief musings to myself in daily emails, which, unlike all of the other emails in my inbox, i do not expect myself to read unless i want to.

so far i have been grateful for things as shallow and profound as yoga, the bird’s third birthday, trader joe’s dark-chocolate-pistachio-covered toffee, our new montreat house, and this song. andy’s year-naming has given me much to celebrate as well, but more on that later.

this is less about an attitude change (though one might say that i need one!) than it is about clarity. both of my vocations, motherhood and ministry, take place where great expectations meet mixed messages about the value of tradition and the right way to do things. i cannot distill any of that into something that makes sense, but i can intentionally notice the good in my life.

it’s about doing something daily that is positive, not overwhelming, and just for me.

what do spinach linguini, cherry tomatoes, turky kielbasa, leftover marinara sauce, and basil have in common?

they were all part of andy’s pantry week  pasta perfection.

last night’s chef would also like me to mention that he ran six miles on the greenline before he whipped up this tasty assemblage.

for those of you who have lost sleep pondering the fate of our seven cans of pumpkin, you’ll be interested to know that our supply is now down to six and a half cans. i used half a can yesterday to make these starbucks pumpkin scones.

the scones turned out okay, which is to say that my kids loved them. but then again, my kids also love dora gummies and ketchup-covered-quesadillas. i don’t think they taste as good as they look, perhaps because i used skim milk instead of whole milk and a combination of white and wheat flours.

i’m hoping to try a pumpkin soup before this little experiment is over, though i have not excavated the pantry to the point of uncovering any sort of broth, which would be necessary for such an undertaking.

thawing as i type are three more ingredients that are bound for pantry week promised land:

• half a pound of ground beef
• half a pound of ground lamb
• half a pound of ground sausage

what will come of them is anybody’s guess.

i married a mama’s boy. this is mostly a benefit because andy’s ongoing affection and respect for his mother has translated into affection and respect for all of the women in his life and chiefly me. my mother-in-law gets drop-in visits, flowers, lunches, and phone calls. she receives some of the rewards for her efforts to raise a compassionate, good-natured human being. but i receive so many more. 

on the other hand, marriage to a mama’s boy has had a few drawbacks, especially at the beginning. for example, there was that time during our first christmas season when our respective families were adjusting traditions and plans to accommodate each other. i felt the need, somewhere in the midst of all of that, to call andy “a titty baby.” i meant it as a joke, but nobody found it to be funny.

now, the joke is on me.

yes, now i have two mama’s boys of my own. it is not guaranteed, of course, but if karma has its way, i will be a mother-in-law, myself, someday. someone else will receive most of the fruits of my current labor.

i suppose it’s good that the letting go happens gradually. in my increasing uncoolness, i will be dropping these boys off a few blocks from their school long before i am having thanksgiving dinner on friday morning so that all of my adult children can attend.

but for now, while i am still the main gal in my sons’ lives, i’m going to savor those sloppy kisses and curly hugs. and for the future, i’m going to take some cues from andy’s mother, who has gracefully shared her son with me since he was 17 years old.

[this post was inspired by a chapter in ayelet waldman’s book, bad mother, entitled, “my mother-in-law, myself.”]