The pretty girl in the room

I started my diet today. Bleh. I was very, very tempted to gorge myself on chocolate and carbs this weekend, knowing that Monday was looming ahead-- but Wayne couldn't understand it. It's kind of like Mardi Gras, I explained, when you just stuff yourself before the Lenten Fast. Ridiculous, he thought. Oh well.

So instead I tried my best to be positive and not allow myself to feel deprived. The hardest part is going to be not having stuff in the house to cheat on even though I normally do keep some "just in case" sweets around.

Anyways, keeping things in perspective over here. It's not like I need to lose fifty or even thirty pounds, which would be even harder. I need to lose fifteen to twenty. So.... off we go.

I'm so glad I'm a Catholic! I am able to offer up my suffering, now to the Lord, for specific intentions throughout this diet. So that everytime I want to put sugar in my tea but cannot, I can say... lord, I offer this desire up to you for Amanda to have a stronger relationship with you each day and to hear your voice, and the angels will swarm around my prayers and bring them to God and I KNOW I will see them answered in a way I've never KNOWN before. Not by my work, of course, but by my willingness to unite my suffering to Christ's. God's mercy and graces are available to me through my willingness to suffer with Christ. Amen!

I SO wish I had been a Catholic when giving birth--- having intentions for my suffering then would have TOTALLY transformed the way I looked at what was happening-- my suffering would not have been useless. I knew, inherently, that it meant something, but I just couldn't put my finger on what. Now, my suffering has a purpose, and so I can embrace it, really embrace it, and call it a friend.

I saw this woman talking in a Rav thread today about how she disciplined her 8 year old son for downloading a Hooters girl from the calendar to his cell phone. She mentioned giving him the "Real girls don't look like that," talk.

I bristled. Literally, the hair on the back of my neck stood straight up. I can't stand hearing stuff like that. First, because I'm sorry to say that some girls DO look like that. And that's ok. But secondly, because in saying something like that, you are trying to teach your child that the "heart" only matters-- that you don't actually care about the way they look. But if that were true, then if they really DID look like a hooters calendar girl, you wouldn't be saying they couldn't possibly. You would have ceased to judge them. REALLY ceased to judge them.

It's hard being not so pretty. It's hard being pretty. Our bodies DO matter. There is meaning in them and they are a part of who we are. To dismiss people's bodies as "good" or "bad" is so terrible..... and such a natural tendency. Likewise, to IGNORE people's bodies or judge them based on how WE feel about them is twice as bad.

Ani DiFranco says better than I ever could...

And God help you if you were an ugly girl.... of course, too pretty is also your doom
Cause everyone harbors a secret hatred for the prettiest girl in the room
And God help you if you were a phoenix, and you dared to rise up from the ash
A thousand eyes would smolder with jealousy while you were just......
flying.

I had a really cool experience last night.
Father Tony took us out to eat at this wonderful restaurant. We weren't able to enjoy it as much as we should have because the kids were a little bit... difficult.. having not napped. But we did have fun. After dinner, we decided to swing by the rectory and pick up a movie on JP2 called Karol, and bring it back to the house so the kids could sleep.
As usual, we didn't actually watch the movie (we're all talkers--- it's not uncommon for us to find ourselves having talked from 6 to 1 am... and forcing ourselves to bed!) but chatted endlessly about all sorts of interesting things.

At one point, Wayne left to allow us to say evening prayer together. I had never prayed the liturgy of the hours with him before, but it was a very moving experience for me, particularly when he started chanting the Magnificat. There is nothing like uniting your prayers to those of a holy priest to awaken you spiritually. It was a total God moment, and His presence was thick in the room.

Later on, towards 10 pm, I forced myself to go to bed, knowing that I had a five am wakeup call coming, and Father and Wayne stayed up to chat. I settled into my bed for night prayers with the very thin wall between our room and the living room practically vibrating from the excited chatter going on in there. But as I drifted off to sleep, I felt a warmth so envelop me that I hardly know how to describe it.
I was lulled to sleep in the safety and security and love of God, evidenced to me by the knowledge of my beautiful children sleeping soundly in the next room, the voices of my wonderful, loving husband and my kind, loving, holy priest melting into the walls of my house. Storms could have raged outside. The world could have ended. But I had the presence and the blessing of God under my roof. I wouldn't trade that moment for the world.