Insta Inspiration

Every now and then, my daughter-in-law Ginger (wife of son #2) takes a screenshot of an Instagram post she thinks I would like.

I deleted all my social media accounts at the beginning of 2021, and while I don't miss Facebook and Twitter a bit, I do sometimes miss Instagram.  Ginger knows that I am a recovering Instagram addict who doesn't want to go on a scrolling binge, but that I miss certain people on the site--and I miss them terribly.  So she likes to keep me a little bit in the loop. There are so many wonderful writers on that platform who provide keen insights, helpful advice, and Faith-filled inspiration for women, and one of them is mother of nine, grandmother, homeschooler, writer, and Internet "influencer" Elizabeth Foss.  (If you don't know who she is, you should look her up.)

Here is a recent Elizabeth Foss Instagram post that Ginger texted me a few days ago, with this note: "a little Insta inspiration for this Wednesday morning."  

 

Inspiration indeed!

It's hard for me to describe how much I love this essay on the value and dignity of stay-at-home motherhood.  I remember hurtful comments over the years, even by several people close to me, not-so-subtly insinuating that the only reason I didn’t have a job was that my husband made so much money that I could be spoiled and lazy and “do nothing.”   (I think some pictured me spending my days lounging on the couch, eating bon bons while I watched soap operas on TV.  Seriously!)

The sacrifices my husband and I made were not apparent to anyone on the outside looking in, because we didn't talk or complain about them.  We made them freely and joyfully, believing that our household would not run as peacefully and efficiently as it did if I tried to work outside our home while raising our boys.  I am not judging those moms who do work; some have to, for financial or other personal reasons, and I applaud the sacrifices they make for the good of their families.  But fortunately, we could make the choice to live on what my husband made--in certain seasons, it was paycheck to paycheck, but even then it was doable.  So we did it, and we never regretted the decision we'd made to have me concentrate my energies on keeping the home fires burning.  

My life’s work might not have looked like much in the eyes of the world.  But this gem from Elizabeth Foss says it all: “So much of what is valuable about your life is done in secret.”

Wow.  That is the most profoundly true statement.  Beautifully put. Some people have the gift of arranging words so perfectly that you want to reread them just to enjoy their beauty.  Elizabeth Foss is one of those people.

I do sometimes miss Instagram, especially when I read posts like this one.  Keep those screenshots coming, Ginger!

Have a great weekend, everyone.  

Oh, Hey There!

Remember me?

Testing...testing...is this thing on?  (Lame joke.  Sorry.  Even at my best I was not the most top-notch of bloggers, and now I'm about as rusty as I've ever been.  So bear with me.)

I haven't been here at the blog since Mother's Day, May 9--yikes, that's over two months ago!--which I believe makes this just about the longest hiatus I've ever taken since I published my first post back in March of 2011.

I wasn't really worrying that anyone was missing my blog presence too much, and had actually started kicking around the idea of never coming back at all.  This is hardly a must-read site for many, so I figured I could just let it sort of die a natural death and move on to other things (and other people: my life is so full of grandchildren--lucky me!--that most of my days seem to be as busy as when I was a much, much younger mom raising much, much younger boys).  

I mean, I know that my baby sister misses me when I'm not here, as does my hubby and a couple of my boys and my daughters-in-law (and even some of their young friends!  Ha--that was interesting to find out!).   But I'm not exactly Kendra Tierney, or Jenny Uebbing (a favorite of mine who has also mostly left the blogosphere as of late, but more about Jenny in a bit).  I'm not trying to be self-deprecating here, just stating the facts.

Many--make that most--of the Catholic writers I "met" through their blogs have left this quickly-becoming-anachronistic platform for the more popular online world of Instagram.  These would include talented gals like Grace Patton  and Rachel Balducci.

I can understand the lure of the Insta-posts: they're mostly about the pictures, with minimal writing required; they take a fraction of the time to compose and are easily perused by busy readers. I was on Instagram for about six years and thoroughly loved it.  I found so much inspiration there, so much joy and humor, and even so many facts about our beautiful Faith of which I was unaware.  Actually, I might have loved Instagram too much, and might have been a little too thrilled by the occasional "like" or comment from one of the aforementioned superstar Catholic "influencers."  After our big move from NH to VA in 2017, instead of working on making new real-life friendships, I went to Instagram to visit with my eFriends, and I really did feel as if I had a community there.  I had a hard time imagining an Instagram-free life.  But ultimately, my husband and I both made the decision to delete our social media accounts this past year, for a number of reasons (which I won't go into again, because I wrote all about that here). 

I said good-bye to Facebook and Twitter and Instagram; but blogging was the one thing I felt I couldn't give up.  Not yet anyway.  And apparently, I still can't!

I have so many things I've wanted to write about in the last few months: my mother's three-week visit with us and her many Pearl great-grandchildren in VA in May, when my sainted youngest sister and her hubby dropped her off so they could take a much-deserved extended vacation in their RV; 

our week-long family vacation at our Oyster Haven Vrbo house in Upstate NY earlier this month, when four of our five sons and 12 of our 17 grandchildren were gathered together for fun at the lake;

my husband's and my 45th high school reunion (#highschoolsweethearts) a couple of weeks ago, where I learned that one of my male classmates has been checking in here and wondering why I haven't been blogging (this was a surprise to me!);

some good books I'm reading and planning to read that I'd love to tell you about...

These are all subjects I'd like to tackle, along with some thoughts about detachment as my 63rd birthday fast approaches. I've had a major case of blogger's block since May, but perhaps I can get back into a groove, now that things have quieted down up here by the lake--after a very busy, noisy, and joyfully chaotic start to the month, when so many members of the enormous Pearl clan were sharing this house (my husband's childhood home) with us.  It's just us now, this guy and me.

It's a perfect boating day, so I think I'll sign off now. But before I do, I wanted to share a link to a very moving recent Mama Needs Coffee blog post by Jenny Uebbing.  She has been for many years a prolific writer, blogger, and Instagram influencer, and is indeed a household name in the Catholic online community.  But although she still blogs sporadically, her social media work has taken a definite back seat to her much more important career of full-time motherhood to a brood of six adorable youngsters.  (A thought-provoking post of hers a while back, in fact, was one of the catalysts for my own exodus from social media.)  This line from the post in particular struck me as profoundly true, especially in the context of the selfless, repetitive, seemingly thankless tasks a woman who works exclusively in the home performs daily out of love for her family, without payment or the world's recognition:  Jenny writes, "I feel a little bit like I've discovered the secret to happiness.  But it's such a deep secret that it's possible no one will believe me.  It's this, though, in case you were wondering: give your life away." (Do yourself a favor and read the full, beautifully written post here.)

That's it for today.  The lake calls.  But I'll be back soon...I hope!

7QT: That Papa and Grammy Life

I haven't done a Friday 7 Quick Takes link-up post in a dog's age; but now that I've deleted all of the social media accounts that were taking up WAY too much of my time, I seem to have a lot more time for blogging. Which leads me to my first Take...

Take 1

I'm finished with social media, for a whole lot of reasons.  I was becoming increasingly alarmed about the way Big Tech is tracking individuals and trying to end free speech in America, and that was definitely the primary reason that I wanted to get as "off the grid" as possible.  But I was also just concerned about the increasing amount of time I was spending in scroll mode.  I mean, I had grown really, really attached (read: addicted) to Instagram.  I deleted Facebook first, and then Twitter and LinkedIn; however, I dragged my feet a bit when it came to saying good-bye to my favorite platform.  But I finally did it.  I broke up with Instagram, and it was initially a little painful.  Yet to my surprise, I haven't really missed it as much as I thought I would.

Take 2

Last week, our fourth-born son's wife, Braveheart, and her four little ones (triplets--identical twin boys and a girl, aged 3 and 1/2--plus their little 14-month-old baby sister) came to our house for their weekly playdate. Our other local daughters-in-law were not able to join us, as they have pre-school and kindergarten drop-off and pick-up schedules to deal with.  But so far, the triplets are not in school; and their mom really needs to have some social events to look forward to each week, to give the kids (and her, too) a much-needed change of scenery.  So for her, it almost always works out to come over for lunch and playtime sometime between Monday and Friday while her hubby is at work

Braveheart tells us that just about every day the triplets wake up and ask if they're going to "Papa-Grammy's" house. (They usually just call us both Papa, because to them we are joined at the hip and share one long name, and Papa is easier to say.)  Their eagerness to see us is about the sweetest thing my husband and I can imagine.  And we hope they always love to visit us as much as they do now. 

Take 3

So last Thursday, that crazy little gang of four was at our house from about 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.  At one point, just after lunch, I noticed that Paquita was sitting on the floor looking at some of the children’s books that we keep in a basket just off the kitchen area.   And then much to my delight, I realized that she was flipping through her Grammy's illustrated My Little ABC Book, which I self-published in 2019 as a gift for her and her many cousins.  If that doesn't fit the bill of dreams coming true for me, I don't know what does. 

On my honor, I did not set up this photo.  That really is the book she chose to "read."

Take 4

When we moved to VA in 2017, we didn't want a fixer-upper. Not at this late stage of the game, and not after the more than two decades we'd spent doing DIY projects in the NH home we left behind.  We bought a house that was pretty much move-in ready, with the exception of needing the stained and worn-out upstairs carpeting removed and replaced with a more allergy-friendly wood laminate.  We thought that eventually we would want to finish off the basement and make a big, light-filled playroom for the grandkids.  But we didn't do it right away.  We hired a contractor to put in a full bathroom down there,  but otherwise we lived with it the way it was for a while.

Our older grandchildren did play happily in the basement for a couple of years, hardly taking note of the lack of walls and a ceiling and ignoring the exposed furnace, hot water heater, and many boxes and bins in the storage area. Finally, though, the issue became making it safe and child-proof: with the triplets and a few of their cousins entering the ever-more-curious toddler years, we decided it was time to get the job done.  My husband did all the electrical and lighting work himself, and he was planning to frame and finish all the walls; but we thought we'd hire someone to tackle the ceiling.  However, we weren't able to find anyone available to do it for us, so we decided that my favorite handyman (my husband!) would do it, with me helping out in any way I could.

The former owners had put up one wall (on the right in this picture), and they'd installed a vinyl floor.  But otherwise, the basement was completely unfinished and my husband had his work cut out for him.

Take 5 

We were moving along with the project in late 2019, slowly but surely, whenever my husband had time off from work. But then in early 2020, airplanes stopped flying overseas, and you can't be an international airline pilot and work from home; with all of his trips cancelled, all of a sudden my husband had all the free time he needed to concentrate on our pet project.  I guess I can thank the Covid pandemic for giving us so much time at home together to get the work done (#unexpectedblessings).  By springtime, we had a beautifully finished-off basement with a giant playroom, a storage/sewing and crafting area that could be locked to keep the little ones out, and a small guest bedroom.

Take 6

We are so pleased with the way it all turned out!  The grandkids love it down there.  The playroom is stocked with an impressive collection of toys--many of them vintage favorites kept from when their daddies were little, and others purchased the past few years at thrift stores, Goodwill, and other places.  (I mean, with 9 granddaughters, I needed to get some dolls and dollhouses--two items which we never had in our all-boy house back in the day.)  We still have a vast collection of children's books, too, from when our boys were growing up.  Many of them are about dinosaurs, our boys' childhood obsession.  

It must be hereditary; we have a few grandsons who are completely dinosaur-obsessed these days.

Take 7

Nothing makes Papa and Grammy happier than seeing this new generation of Pearls enjoying some of the same toys their daddies played with and reading some of the same books their daddies read (and oh yes, their Grammy's ABC Book, too!).  And nothing tickles us more than seeing the basement playroom we "made" for them being put to good use.  We know that all the time we spent down there, covered in construction dust and paint splatters, was well worth it, when we see it filled with our favorite little people on the planet.

I guess I'm out of Takes already!  Before I sign off, I'm going to add some recent photos taken of me with a handsome little fella who is the youngest of my 17 grandchildren.  I used to dread my children growing up and leaving me.  I used to fear growing old.  But now I am grateful that those two things happened, because otherwise I would never know the unique joy of being a grandmother.  And I think you can plainly see that joy in these two pictures!

That's all for this Grammy.  For more, head on over to the 7QT party at Kelly's.

Getting off the Grid (Sort of...)

Over the past week or so, I deleted my Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram accounts.

GULP!  AAAGGGHHH!

It's fine.  I'm fine.

The first two, Facebook and Twitter, were relatively easy break-ups for me. Because of the truly scary privacy concerns I have regarding the tech giants who control them, along with all the angry, bitter political back-and-forth that dominates those platforms (at least on my feeds!), it was actually a very freeing feeling to remove them from all of my devices and know that those familiar icons would not be calling out to me anymore, giving me that hard-to-ignore urge to click and "just look for a minute"...which in turn, more often than not, led me to scroll endlessly when I should have been spending my limited time on this earth doing something more meaningful.

I used Instagram stories to announce my departures from FB and Twitter (because I wasn't quite ready to dump Instagram yet!).

LinkedIn was also extremely easy to leave.  I only joined that site a number of years ago to use it as a way to promote my two Catholic novels, Finding Grace (2012) and Erin's Ring (2014); but even at the beginning I rarely posted anything on there, and I never really figured out how to use that social media tool to its maximum benefit.  I wrote my books during the seven-year period that occurred after more than two decades of being a  full-time SAHM to five boys--beginning when the youngest of our sons started high school, and ending when the grandchildren had started to arrive and the rest of our single older boys started to get married in quick succession.  (I mean, really quick: three of them were married in an 11-month period, between Dce. 2013 and Nov. 2014!!) Once I became a grandmother, I moved beyond the novel-writing phase of my life and entered the SAHG (Stay-at-Home-Grammy) era.  (Ha ha--at my age, perhaps I should just call it the "SAG" era?  But I digress.) And the sad truth is that my books are now out of print--although used copies are still sold on Amazon.  (Luckily, I have a personal stash that I purchased from my publisher a while back, so even if I have lots more grandchildren than I already do, I should have enough to give them all a copy of each book.)  Anyway, the bottom line is that I realized I just don't need to be a part of a career networking site anymore, if I ever did, so farewell LinkedIn.

The only site that was painfully hard to leave was Instagram, where I followed some of the most inspiring, talented, funny, faith-filled Catholic writers and "influencers" (most of them former bloggers whom I'd originally discovered through their blogs), along with a number of beloved family members.  I LOVED Instagram, I won't lie.  But Instagram is owned by Facebook, and as a matter of principle, I felt I needed to make a complete break.  That was the one that hurt.  That was the one site that gave me the most joy and the one I'll probably always miss.

HOWEVER, truth be told, Instagram wasn't really all that good for me, no matter how much I tried to convince myself otherwise.  I spent too much time thinking about what picture I could take for my next post. (Never have I taken so many pictures of the food I was cooking or eating!)  I was scrolling through feeds that led me to other feeds, and then to others, and others...and before I'd know it, I had spent over an hour gazing at the lovely pictures of complete strangers...and sometimes, comparing myself negatively with their curated perfection.  Also, like Facebook, Instagram knew what kind of clothes I liked, what kind of books I read, and it was constantly enticing me to buy a cute lace top or a WWII historical novel that looked like it was right up my alley.  In a way, I'll miss those well-targeted IG ads, because they exposed me to some items that I would never have otherwise found on my own.  But then again, isn't it a little creepy that Instagram knew exactly the kind of things I normally purchased?  Isn't it a little concerning that my online activities are being followed, and noted, by some phantom Internet overseer?

So I said my sad good-bye to IG with this post last Sunday:

I thought it was apropos to go out with a photo of a cup of coffee, a good book, a set of Rosary beads, and a picture of Jesus.  This pretty much tells the story of how I'm hoping to spend the extra time I'll have now that I'm not distracted by what's happening on IG.

I guess I'm kind of off the grid--but I'm still here at my String of Pearls (which turns 10 this March!), so that's not quite true.  I've decided that I'd like to get back into blogging (and that right there is a statement that seems almost as old-fashioned as saying, "I think it's time to bring back VHS and cassette tapes").  Hopefully I'll be blogging more, praying more, and reading more good books.  Sewing and drawing more, too.  That's my plan for 2021.

So I'll be back, dear readers.  And if you have a blog that I used to read, before I got so thoroughly entrenched in the IG world, I may be visiting it more often now.  And when I do, I'll most likely be drinking coffee.

(Please note: I am not judging you if you still enjoy all the aforementioned forms of social media; for me personally, the negatives had begun to outweigh the positives, so I did what I felt I had to do for my spiritual and mental well-being.)

A Cautionary Tale about Social Media (Twitter, to Be Exact)

You guys...the online world can be a scary and exceedingly unkind place.  I knew this, and yet something that happened recently really drove that truth home in a big way.

I had fashioned a piece of candy corn into a miniature Donald Trump for the amusement of my husband's family (it's the perfect candy to do this with, as you can see: big yellow hair, orange face!).  And on a whim, I decided to post it on Twitter on Saturday.  (Along with the picture I wrote, "Make Candy Corn Great Again!!  #Trump2020.)

Well, I woke up Sunday morning to find that someone had replied to that tweet by posting a photo of my husband and me that had been distorted into something hideous.  Then as if that wasn't bad enough, another person (with a Twitter handle I can't even repeat here, because it's nothing but a string of obscenities, including the F-bomb) retweeted the ugly photo!

There are a few things about all of this that make it particularly disturbing.  For one, I am a nobody on Twitter.  I'm a nobody in the blogging world and in the Instagramming world, too; but truly, I'm just a complete nobody in the Twitterverse, where the blue check marks rule the roost.  I have a whopping 216 followers there.  I am not even close to being an Internet “influencer” and no one cares what I have to say. (In fact, I say very little on that platform; I mostly use it as a means to find news stories that don't always show up elsewhere or to read the clever observations of the people I follow.) But what is even more concerning to me is that this person actually went to the trouble of finding a nice photo of my husband and me to use as a way of trashing me for tweeting something positive about a presidential candidate they despise. I'm not even sure where they found the photo.  Here on my blog?  On my Facebook page?  I had to do a bit of digging myself to find it online--and it's my photo!  (I did find it on Facebook, in an album of profile pictures I've used in the past.  Do you think this person who is a complete stranger to me went trolling through my FB photos?!)

People can be mean.  And 2020 has really brought out the vitriol.  We are no longer allowed to have differing opinions without cruelty and violence erupting--or at the very least, unkind remarks (and distorted photos!). Even a simple “#Trump2020” is enough to make someone angry enough to scour the Internet looking for a photo to weaponize against you. God help the truly influential people who dare to express an unpopular opinion; they have to endure much crueler retaliations than I, such as doxxing and receiving death threats aimed at them and their families.

As our pastor said in his sermon on Sunday, we are at a crucial point in our country’s history, and much of what is happening on our streets and in our media is reminiscent of Germany in 1939.  Prayer and fasting are more important than ever in these dark days.  God help us all!!  And God bless America. 

(P.S. My husband and I are feeling a little self-conscious about our teeth right now...but we also think the altered photo is pretty hilarious.   So thanks for the laughs, @WhoeverYouAre.)

August 2020 Resolutions

I have decided to drastically scale back on other forms of social media for the month of August, which should make it so that I have more time to devote to this poor old neglected blog of mine.

More time to read, too--not just Tweets and IG captions, but actual BOOKS. (Some of the ones I’ve finished recently and am currently reading will most assuredly make it into a future blog post.)

More time to get in shape, because the past month of too-little working out has not been very good for my stamina (or my waistline!).

July was an extremely busy month for us here at my husband's childhood home by Lake Champlain.  There were get-togethers with many members of our extended Pearl family, including nieces and nephews and great-nieces and nephews.  And best of all, we were able to spend a week at our Oyster Haven Vrbo house early in the month, with most of our own family (three of our boys and their wives, and 11 of our 16 grandkids).  When we get to use Oyster Haven to make family memories of our own, it makes all the work of running it as a rental property for others to enjoy worth it!

We also made a short trip back to VA late in July to reconnect with our kids and grandkids, with whom I got to enjoy some belated birthday celebrations.  (If turning 62 can be considered cause for celebration--ha ha!)  Missing our family--our gang down in VA, and our married son in OK--is the only downside to our summer life up here in Upstate NY.  Because other than that, things are pretty near perfect. Lake Champlain is literally in our back yard, and this is what we wake up to every morning.

I need the tranquility this lake provides, I really do.

We are living in terrifying times, and watching YouTube videos of the chaos and rioting in our cities (which I don't believe always show up on the mainstream media, but I see posted on Twitter) fills me with a feeling of despair.  Will we ever be okay again?  Will people who disagree politically ever be able to treat each other with respect?  With such drastic differences of opinion regarding vitally important issues (many on which we can’t really compromise), issues regarding faith, freedom, morality, and the right to life, can the Left and the Right ever truly live in harmony?   And even this: will the Catholic Church eventually have to go underground--literally underground--so that the faithful will not have to endure physical persecution?  (Because let's face it, emotional/psychological/media-driven ideological persecution already exists, and it's getting worse all the time.)

This blog has never been nor will it ever be a political platform.  But many of the issues some call "political" (such as abortion) are merely a matter of good v. evil, right v. wrong, and I don't even know how they end up being topics for heated discussion.  And I can't help but think that this Covid-19 crisis, like almost every aspect of life on planet earth these days, has been politicized.  I'm not nearly eloquent enough to explain how much I worry about the way this virus has changed the face of human interactions (do you see what I did there?--our faces are all changed via the masks); but I read this post by Melody Lyons at The Essential Mother Blog, and she expressed some of my innermost feelings better than I ever could.  If you have a few minutes, please read it.  She writes so beautifully, and as an individual who would be considered one of those particularly at risk from this virus, her words are exceptionally powerful.

That's it for today.  Just trying to scrape the rust off this blog site and get it back up and running again.  My husband and I are off to Mass now, at the church where we got married (it'll be 40 years ago this December!).  Some of the pews are roped off, and we have to wear masks as we walk in and out of the church and when we are in line to receive Communion; but at least, for now, we have an infinitely better option than watching the Mass live-streamed on TV.

Bye for now!  Happy Sunday!

Social Media and the Thief of Joy

In my last post, I discussed how dangerous the comparison game can be: how it can rob us of peace and tranquility, making us feel inadequate and unlovable; how it can make us forget that each of us is made in the image and likeness of God, with an immortal soul that is unique and beautiful and worthy of love; how we were all made exactly as we are meant to be, warts and all (yes, we all have them--and that's okay!).  Why do we look at others around us and feel like we don't stack up?  Why do we think, If I was just [prettier, smarter, thinner, more talented, more outgoing--you fill in the blank] than I am, I would be [happier, more successful, more confident, a better mother, more beloved--fill in the blank again]?  Maybe you don't do this, but every now and then I do, and I know it's a terrible habit that I need to break.

I've struggled with this off and on throughout my life.  For instance, in this 1978 photo of my husband and me, taken at a friend's wedding when we were going into our junior year of college, I can remember comparing myself to the other females at the reception and wishing I looked like anyone but me.  I'd gained the freshman 10 and then added another 10 my sophomore year, decided to cut my hair short and regretted the change, and was wearing an extremely unflattering dress.  And there he was, my matinee idol boyfriend, so handsome I could hardly look at him without becoming breathless.  What did he see in me, anyway? I wondered.  I could be so hard on myself!  And why?  This guy loved me!  He could have discarded his high school girlfriend for someone "better" when we went off to college in different parts of the country, but our long-distance relationship was still going strong after two years of mostly being apart.  (We had no Facetime, but wrote lots of letters!)  2020 Laura, 39 years into an extremely happy marriage to the good-looking guy in this picture, wishes she could tell 1978 Laura to lift up her head and smile with confidence, secure in the knowledge that he wanted her just the way she was.

At the end of that last post, I hinted that I would be back to explore the topic of comparison further, focusing on how social media has made the habit of comparing ourselves to others even more of a problem than ever before.  So here it is, another post just days after the last one!  (Is blogging back?!  Maybe not, but I am.  And thanks to all the nice readers who left sweet and encouraging comments for me last time I was here.  I was feeling the love--and I finally got around to replying to all of you wonderful people.)

I don't know about you, but I find that I am sometimes left feeling a bit blue after too much time spent scrolling through Facebook feeds.  It's not just that Facebook has become a popular platform for uncomfortable discussions about politics and countless nasty anti-religion/anti-life memes; it has, but there is also plenty of positive news, daily, about family and friends, some of them long-lost before the advent of social media--not to mention all those wonderful photos of loved ones that you might not otherwise see.  There is so much good to be found there, no doubt about it.  But there is also so much bad.  And some of what is bad comes from looking at all the good and worrying that in comparison to what you're seeing, you or your life is "less than."

Jenny Uebbing, one of my favorite Catholic wordsmiths of all time, touched on this topic in her recent Instagram stories, admitting that sometimes after ingesting too much social media she comes away asking herself questions like Why can't I get up early and work out? or Why aren't my kids X,Y, or Z? or Why doesn't my house look like that?  She went on to talk about the danger in this--how social media is really just two-dimensional, and how it gives us a 40,000-foot view of other people's lives (I'm paraphrasing here, trying to remember exactly how she put things), so we're not really seeing the whole picture. I realize that deep down, everyone probably knows this about social media; they know that people usually only post the good and the beautiful, the uplifting aspects of their lives, not the dark struggles they might be going through at the time. (Because I don't care how blessed you are, let's face it: no life is ever lived without trials and tribulations, without sadness, fear, and loss.)  I mean, there's nothing wrong with wanting to share mostly the best portions of your life with the online world.  But this can also lead people to compare, and then to feel down because their lives don't seem nearly as bright and sparkly as those light-filled images and upbeat captions they see--even though they know in their heart of hearts that these images and captions don't tell the whole story.

The other danger about comparing our lives to the Facebook and Instagram feeds of others, Uebbing observed, is that we're not all at the same point in life at the same time, and it's harmful to compare our lives to those of people going through completely different stages than we're going through.  How true is this?!  You might feel like you're drowning right now, with a houseful of crazy toddlers and demanding babies, or a couple of angsty teens, and find yourself worrying about how your children are going to turn out and wondering how things will look 10 or 20 years from now.  Then you'll see a picture of a family you know, showing the kids all grown-up, happy, and successful; and without even knowing you're doing it, you might start to feel like  maybe you're a failure as a parent, even though you're not seeing all the many difficult stages that family went through as they traveled the bumpy road you're currently on to get to where they are now.

You can do this in reverse, too, which is what I sometimes do; I see all the wonderful things young Catholic Instagram mamas are doing with their children, how they're creatively celebrating the different liturgical seasons and the feast days of the saints, and I'll worry that I didn't do enough to help instill the Faith in our boys back when I had the chance. When I do this, I'm comparing a grandmother who is now at a stage decades ahead of these moms, a mother who did her very best at the time and shouldn't waste her time on regrets, and it seriously makes no sense.  Especially because although my husband and I had to deal with our share of challenges and certainly made a lot of mistakes along the way, we somehow managed to raise five terrific sons who are still practicing Catholics, are in sacramental marriages with lovely young women, and have given themselves over to the will of God as far as how many children they will have.  Somewhere along the way, I guess, we must have done a few things right.  (Or maybe we're just incredibly lucky.)  So looking back and wishing to change anything that we did is an exercise in futility.  As my late mother-in-law (who quite successfully raised four sons and four daughters) used to say, "If you change one thing, you change everything."

Who would change this?

Or this?

As a mother, you can't help panicking just a little when your kids grow up and leave the nest for the first time, wondering if you've done all you could to prepare them for life; this certainly happened with me.  Danielle Bean describes those feelings better than I ever could in this Instagram post I stumbled upon recently, written as her daughter was getting ready to leave for college:

"We tend to pause and doubt...Did we say all the things?  Teach all the lessons?  Read all the stories?  Say all the prayers?  Did we do all the stuff?...Was it enough?  I can look back now and see that we did a lot of things, but it was not enough.  It is never enough.   We always fall short.  But God knows what he is about...We all fall short, but the gaps leave room for God.  And he fills them with grace."

I love that!  God fills in the gaps!

It's hard enough to think you're doing a good enough job raising your kids without the added pressure of seeing how everyone else is doing it, all the time, all over social media. I am so, so thankful that there wasn't that kind of added pressure when we were raising our boys!  I think it must be tougher for my daughters-in-law to feel they are "enough" (and believe me, they are MORE than enough!), when everyone is online, over-sharing, presenting a picture that makes it look like they have it all together, all the time.  Some young moms can handle it just fine, taking it for what it is and not letting it affect their confidence and peace of mind; if I was just starting out now in the motherhood game, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be one of them.

I think this post has gone on long enough, so I'll just wrap it up by saying that even when I catch myself succumbing to the dangerous practice of comparison, I simultaneously feel like the luckiest and most blessed woman on God's green earth and know that I wouldn't trade my life for anyone else's.  So why do I ever waste even a single moment of this precious time allotted to me wishing for even one aspect of it to be different?  My mother-in-law was spot-on: if you change one thing, you change everything.  If I had been a different sort of person, or if even one thing had happened differently along the way, I might not be where I am today.  And that is the LAST thing I would want.

So here is what I'm going to strive to remind myself, whenever I start to compare myself to others and feel "less than": You are God's precious child.  You are perfect as you are--which is not to say that you are perfect, because the only human being for whom that adjective is true is the Blessed Mother; but you are the person God meant you to be, with the looks, talents, and temperament He gave you to use to use wisely and well, in order to make your way back to Him and become a saint in Heaven.

Teddy Roosevelt's famous quote bears repeating: "Comparison is the thief of joy."  Truer words were never spoken.  If checking Facebook or Instagram too often leads you to let that cruel and conniving thief rob you of your joy, take a break from social media for a bit.  Instagram is a mostly positive force in my life; but even so, I'm thinking of doing just that for Lent.

Mary's Beauty is the Standard

A few weeks ago, I accompanied my husband on a four-day working trip to Rome.  We flew (or rather he flew, I rode) over on Sunday, January 19, had the 20th and the 21st to explore bella Roma, and then we made the return trip across the Atlantic on the Wednesday the 22nd.  It was a wonderful whirlwind trip, and I suppose I should have blogged about it. But like just about every other blogger under the sun, these days I seem to spend more time over on Instagram than I do here.  (Mea culpa!  But it's just so easy posting something quickly on my phone, no matter where I might be at the time, rather than finding an opportunity to sit in the office at my laptop.  That must be why so many others have made the transition from blogger to 'grammer.)

But just when I thought it might be time to close up shop at String of Pearls, a funny thing happened: a few days ago, I was talking to one of my daughters-in-law about how I never make the time to blog anymore, saying that I was pretty sure no one is missing my blogging presence, and she surprised me by saying that she checks all the time to see if I've posted something new.  I hate to let any of my girls down--so thanks for the motivation, Preciosa.  This one's for you.

Anyway, I'm not going to post pictures from that short but very sweet recent trip here right now (you can see those if you visit my Instagram page, by clicking on the icon over on the sidebar there); well, actually that's not completely true, because I am going to post just one.

The night we got back from Rome, we said our daily Rosary and other novena prayers in our living room (fondly nicknamed "the Rosary Room"), and then we sat on the couch and talked for a while, reminiscing about our little Roman holiday.  My husband started scrolling through his iPhone pictures from the trip, stopping at one to show me and say, "I love this picture.  Now that's a beautiful face."

I looked over to see which picture he was talking about.  "THAT one?" I said, incredulous.  "You actually like that picture?"

"I love it.  You don't?" he said, equally incredulous.

"NO!"  (I might have grimaced.)

"You're nuts," he replied.

I'd asked him to take this picture during our al fresco dinner at a restaurant in the Piazza Navona, after I'd taken one of his handsome mug as he sat across the table from me.  When he'd shown it to me right after he snapped it, my immediate reaction was a silent, "Ugh!  Why am I so unphotogenic?  No filter can fix that one!"  I ticked off the flaws: too-squinty eyes, too-fat cheeks, too-limp and scraggly hair--and too-big glasses.  If only I could have the big wide-set eyes (20/20 vision eyes, without bags under them!), sculpted cheekbones, and voluminous hair of a supermodel, THEN maybe I could see myself as beautiful--in his eyes or anyone's.   So it truly astounded me that he could look at this photo and see beauty there.

This was not a healthy reaction, I realize; why would I want a different face than the one my husband loves?  Why would I think he would want a different--a "better"--face?  I was playing that dangerous comparison game--you know, the one you always lose, because we all know (or should know) that Teddy Roosevelt was absolutely right when he famously said, "Comparison is the thief of joy."

But it can be a struggle sometimes, because we women do long to be seen as beautiful; as Carrie Gress says in The Anti-Mary Exposed (which should be essential reading for all women, I believe!), "The desire to be beautiful is deeply embedded in a woman's soul...Even the smallest girl will tell you she wants to be as beautiful as a princess.  This isn't cultural conditioning; it is something universal that sits squarely in the feminine heart."

The trouble is that the world bombards us constantly with images of feminine beauty that few earthly mortals will ever have, images that focus on the merely physical.  So we get stressed out about our weight, we spend too much on cosmetics, we bemoan the appearance of gray hairs and wrinkles. We all give lip service to the idea that "inner beauty is what counts," but then judge ourselves harshly when our outward beauty doesn't live up to accepted (and mostly unattainable) standards.  Gress points out that every visionary throughout history who has had the privilege of seeing the Blessed Mother has reported that She was "the most beautiful woman he or she had ever seen."  But it's essential to understand why She was so beautiful: "Mary's beauty is important because it is the outward expression of her complete perfection emanating from God's beauty."  We can never be as beautiful as Mary, who was conceived without sin; but we can strive to be as much like Mary as humanly possible.  She sets the standard.

My husband loves my face--because he loves ME, all of me (even when I'm occasionally nuts), and he sees glimpses (infinitesimal ones, but glimpses nonetheless) of God's beauty emanating from it. So it is with God; this kind of unconditional love from my husband is a reflection of the Father's love for me, for all of us.  Despite our sins.  Despite our flaws and failings.  He loves us, body and soul, and wants us for His own. He made me exactly the way He wanted me to be, with these eyes, these cheeks, this hair, but most importantly, this soul.  I am an unrepeatable soul, with inestimable worth, God's very own beloved child.  Whenever I cringe at a photo of myself, I need to remember that in His eyes, I am beautiful. This, then, is the reason my husband sees beauty where I see only physical flaws and features I would make more "perfect" if I could.  He sees his loving wife of 39 years, with whom he shares a sacramental bond that will hopefully help us both become saints; he sees the devoted mother of his five sons, the five precious souls God entrusted to our care; he sees the doting Grammy of the 16 grandchildren he absolutely adores; he sees the woman he is growing old with and whose presence--incredibly--he never seems to tire of.

I will probably never think that this photo from our Rome trip is particularly flattering.  But I’ll always be grateful for the guy who took it and the way he loves me.

I have a lot more to say about that sneaky thief of joy and the way social media has made it almost impossible not to succumb to the temptation to compare ourselves to others, but this post has gone on long enough.  So perhaps I will be back tomorrow--or if not tomorrow, very soon!  (Keep checking, Preciosa!)

Scenes from Grammy's Lap (Episode 1)

My little buddy G-Man hangs out on my lap a lot these days.  Enough that I thought I might run a little ongoing "series" of photos here at the blog during my extended stay in VA, and I think I'll call it "Scenes from Grammy's Lap."

I love today's photo, taken while my adorable grandson was napping sweetly, with his pudgy little hand resting on mine.

I think I'm getting pretty good at snapping pictures with my cell phone while holding G-Man, raising my right hand high overhead while my left arm is otherwise occupied.  (Just so you know, I'm patting my own back right now, with the same right hand I was just telling you about.)

This picture, taken from this interesting angle, is rather artsy--don't you think?  Too bad I'm not on Instagram, where I've heard such photos are found in abundance.  But I'll never be on Instagram.  (However, I was never going to be on Facebook or LinkedIn or Twitter, either, so...)

Stay tuned for future episodes of "Scenes from Grammy's Lap."  (You're on the edge of your seat, I can feel it!)