There is a song from the Broadway show “The Secret Garden” where the little girl Mary sings about needing a quiet place where she can sit and think and draw “the girl she means to be.” I played this for my then-fiance Josh telling him that if he married me, I would need a quiet place to go and “be.” Like little Mary, I always loved sitting by the pond in my childhood home in Alabama and writing and daydreaming; rambling through the woods and past old barns and forgotten bridges ‘til I knew what I needed to know.

Now, there are not so many times these days to go rambling. My hours are spent sitting at a desk in a bustling office rather than by an idyllic body of water. My rambling has gained pace to a full run through life and ministry spent planning ladies events, counseling, and above all that, coordinating the movements and progress of two active schoolgirls and one junior high boy.

Not much time for reflection.

Yet here I am. Trying to channel my mind back to that old gray log nestled on the bank of that good ole’ southern soil. Through the rush of the day’s routine, a thought begging for reflection keeps persistently tugging at my mind: “Who is the mother that I mean to be?”

Over the past year, I have been learning that life is all about choices. If I choose to do one thing, it will mean not doing another. For example, if we choose to take our kids out of town for a family adventure, something will likely come up in town that they will have to miss- a ball game, a school program, etc. This just gets me right in my gut, because, you see, I’m a have-my-cake and eat-it-too kind of girl. I have even seen this pesky principle in (more…)