Last weekend was jammed full. Darrel and I, once again, took part in an Arts & Crafts show to try and make some money. Then Darrel had a photo shoot on Sunday for two high school seniors. And through it all, we’re potty training Jed.
The biggest thing that filled this weekend, though, was Blessings and Kindnesses.
Darrel and I were initially discouraged at the Crafts show. Two days of selling, and I only sold one necklace. Darrel sold 4 prints, which might have been the biggest sales of the whole show. We had foot traffic; people simply weren’t buying anything from anyone!
Before we left, though, we had ample opportunity to chat with the other vendors. We received several Blessings and Kindnesses from all that chatting.
One vendor was a Native American lady who helps rescue wolves and rehabilitate them (very cool). After looking at his photographs, she booked Darrel for a photo shoot; a four hour photo shoot he will be paid well for. That was a Blessing!
She also, upon hearing of our childrens’ medical issues, gave me a Native American Medicine Pouch that she’d made.
These pouches are made to be filled with items to give you strength and healing, and this lady’s sweetness and generosity touched my heart. This was a Kindness.
Another lady at the show also exchanged “mama stories” with me. She shared that she raised two boys with Cystic Fibrosis. Her “boys” are now 43 and 46 years old, and have far outlived the life expectancy given to them as children.
I was in awe; this lady raised two boys with a life-threatening condition in a part of the country with, shall we say, not the primo best in medical care, and she raised them to full adulthood and beyond their expected lifespans.
THAT is one awesome Mama, folks!
I told her as much; I hugged her and told her how amazing she was, and that I could only hope to do such great things with my boys.
Later, I passed her booth and had to laugh. The whole show, I’d thought that booth belonged to a different lady! Somehow I switched the booths in my head. So I told her “Wow! I complimented the other lady about those hats – they’re really cute! You are so talented!”
She laughed, too, and when I passed by again, do you know what this sweet lady did?
She said to me “You like the hats? Go pick one out. A gift from one amazing Mama to another.”
I tried to refuse, but she insisted. Initially I looked for a hat for Zac, as he doesn’t have a winter hat right now (I just need to make one for him, but I haven’t done so, yet), but she didn’t have any that would fit him. It was a “Goldilocks” thing – they were either too big for him or too small.
So I picked one out for myself.
And we both had tears in our eyes as I hugged and thanked her.
Another Kindness.
A cute little cloche. With a flower, of course! My new favorite hat.
The BIGGEST Blessing and Kindness we received this weekend came on Friday. A friend of mine from my Mommy Group here in Arkansas put together a fund-raiser to help our family.
Friday afternoon, a passel of Mama’s and their kiddos went to play at the gymnastics place where we have our Halloween Party each year. Each family brought $5 to donate to our family, and a few even brought diapers as well.
Two big ol’ boxes of blessings!
My heart feels like it is going to explode from the Blessings and Kindnesses these local Mama’s gave to us! It’s not just the money and the diapers. Those are wonderful, but…the fact that these women care, that they were willing to expend themselves for us just blows me away.
Especially considering that we’ve basically dropped off the planet the last year and a half and have not been participating in anything except the Halloween Party; even being inactive, even being so distant, these women still rallied for us.
Blessings. Kindnesses.
To be honest, I’m not always comfortable with receiving gifts. Oh, not Birthday or Christmas gifts – those I expect from my loved ones! But gifts from friends or acquaintances – and strangers – sometimes make me feel like I now have a debt in the “I owe ____” column of balance in my head.
Not because of anything the gift-giver does, mind you; this is strictly my own issue! Funnily enough, I love to give to people in this way! It makes my day to pass on some little gift that perks someone up or helps someone out. (Yet another thing that stinks about being so broke…I can’t do that very often any more.) But when I’m on the other end of it? I’m often slightly uncomfortable.
This weekend, though, I remembered two things that helped keep me from feeling too awkward. First, I once had someone say to me “Why would you deprive someone else of the pleasure of gift-giving? Being grateful and happy makes them feel good – so accept gifts graciously!” in response to my saying that I felt uncomfortable with receiving gifts.
That resonated with me; if I enjoy giving things to people, surely other people feel the same, right? Since I know I never expect anything in return when I give, why should I feel like I’m now indebted when I receive?
So keeping that in mind helps with my own neurosis.
The second thing I remembered, though, was the big one: these weren’t really gifts for me. Not even the hat and the medicine pouch. These were gifts for Jed and Zac’s Mama. *I* was incidental; it was because of my boys that I was being showered with Blessings and Kindnesses. It was in honor of THEM.
These Blessings and Kindnesses served to boost my spirits in a huge way…a way that makes me feel this was all Divinely Inspired in some way. I’ve been struggling, lately, and have felt off kilter for a while. After this weekend, though, I feel myself coming back to even keel: confident, hopeful, faithful, and self-assured.
My boys need me to be that way for them. So these Blessings and Kindnesses were, to me, a way for God and His Angels on Earth to tell me “Keep going. You’re doing a good job. Don’t lose faith. Your boys need you to be strong and resilient. Don’t forget – you’re not alone.”
And I needed that SO MUCH, I can’t even begin to tell you how much I needed to know that.
I would LOVE to name names in here, to give proper public accolades to the sweet Angels who Blessed my family this weekend and showered us with such Kindness, but I didn’t ask permission to share names so I won’t.
But you know who you are.
THANK YOU. From the bottom of my heart, THANK YOU.
__________
What Blessings and Kindnesses have YOU received that blow you away?
I have been so VERY blessed over the 20 years of my illness … many things, mostly small but some have been enormous:
Somebody that I barely knew – an acquaintance who knew me only from an online support group I ran – had a brother who was an air conditioner installer. He raised money to buy and install a split-system air conditioner for me!! At that time I was completely bedridden and getting really really ill every summer because of the heat, and the air conditioner made such a huge difference. I still use it every summer and think of the guy and feel grateful every year.
In the “small but immensely meaningful” group, my local pharmacy pack my pill box every week for free. It’s usually $5 a week now – they keep insisting that mine is free because I’ve been getting them to do it for 10 years and when I started they didn’t charge anybody for it, but they could easily have insisted that everybody has to pay now and they haven’t. My pill regime is enormous and complicated and changes every single week, and as well as packing it for free they drop it off to me as well! It’s one of those little things that makes my life better 🙂
My Mum taught me that receiving gifts graciously is the receipent’s part in the deal. It can be hard – especially when the gift is something I feel is “too big” or when I feel undeserving, but I try to remember how nice I feel when I can be the giver!
Hang in there 🙂
Wow. WOW!! Those are some serious blessings! The AC thing is stupendous! I don’t think I could survive without AC. I’m a wimp. 😉
That pill packing thing is tremendous, too. I remember my Nana had tons of medications she had to take, and filling out her weekly pill package was an hour long task requiring serious concentration. That is a wonderful thing they do for you! I’d probably bring them brownies and cookies frequently to say thanks. 🙂
What your Mum said – exactly. And why on earth do we always feel a gift is “too big” or we’re undeserving? We women these days, I think we has some issues. LOL I love to give gifts, and I’d hate to think the recipient was feeling discomfort because of whatever I gave them. I’d rather hope they felt relief and joy. So I try to give that to the people who care enough to give to me, you know? Because she’s right: that’s my part in the deal.
Everything you’ve said about your Mum, by the way, makes me think she is a really cool lady. Guess that’s where you got it! 🙂
Definitely agree that women are socialised to think we don’t “deserve” things. I try to think about it the other way – when I’m the giver, I’m almost never thinking “does this person really deserve this?”, because I’m much more likely to be thinking “oh wow this is fun to give!”.
My mum was very awesome with giving – both to friends and to strangers. One of the things we used to gleefully do together when we were out shopping was grab all the loose change in the car and feed the parking meters of anyone we passed whose meter was getting low – this was back in the 1980’s when I was growing up, so parking meters weren’t computerised or using tickets or anything yet. It’s much harder to do that now!!