Found Wallet

knowing, losing, and finding

Good morning, Blue Roomies! As I continue to work on the book, today I welcome my friend Frances Wattman Rosenau of Almost Named Grace to the Blue Room. Frances is a pastor in the greater Los Angeles area whose writing I love and read each week. She has a passion for the global church and has lived in India, Scotland, Arizona, Upstate New York, Paris, and Chicago. She’s a parent of two, a runner, and, as of recently, a scuba diver.

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When MaryAnn asked me to fill in on The Blue Room as she works to finish her book (can’t wait to read it!), I knew exactly what to share: something that’s been rolling around in my insides for quite some time. And somehow this has been just the right opportunity to put down in words a story I’ve been holding on to and that is finally ready to come out.

I come from a matrilinear family. My grandmother and her sister were very close. They both had daughters who then had daughters – you see where this is going. The women in my family are the glue, the story tellers, the driving force as well as leaders in the community.

My parents spent the first several months of their marriage in Japan. They brought back a small wooden doll with gentle pink decorations and carvings that I treasured as a child. I asked them once why they had bought the doll when they didn’t even know they would have a daughter. They just knew, they said. They knew they would have a daughter. 

So I always knew I would be a mother to a girl.

Imagine my surprise many years later when my husband and I cut into our second blue cake revealing that our second child would also be a boy.

Let me pause here because I know how this sounds. I have resisted sharing this story, because well, it’s just kind of embarrassing to admit I had an existential crisis over this. Even I think it’s kind of petty and selfish (not to mention all the weirdness about gender roles and identities). But, please stick with me because that’s not where things end up.

Who will I be?

As I sat with it a while longer, I realized my feelings had nothing to do with the children or their identities; it had to do with my identity. I was enthusiastic to have my children exactly as they are and loved them then as I do now. I had just always pictured mothering a girl. In fact, I didn’t know who I would be if not a mother to a girl.

I had pictured dressing alike or being a stage mom at ballet recitals - basically having the same relationship with my daughter(s) that I had with my own mother. I wanted to be the mother I had, in fact, I had always known that’s the kind of mother I would be.

And I do mean known. There had never been a doubt in my mind I would have the same mother-daughter relationship as I had had with my mother. And so when I found out I wouldn’t be a mother to a girl, my brain just couldn’t compute. Who would I be now? What does a mother with only boys do? Who is she? I had no idea.

And let me be clear, I have always celebrated my children and been glad for who they are. From before day one, I have loved them wholeheartedly. My sense of loss was in my identity as a mother – I was grieving the loss of a potential future that would no longer come to pass.

Equal Measure

One day in the midst of these ruminations, I was struck by a realization that comes only from prayer. What if I did have a daughter? Would I be spending as much time and energy in gratitude and celebration as I’m spending now in emotional unrest? Would I have an equal measure of appreciation to match the mixed emotions I felt instead?
Or would I simply take things for granted?

Come to think of it, what do I have now that I am already overlooking? What is in my life that I’m truly grateful to have every day, but I don’t always feel it or think about it?

Just about everything!

A few months ago, I took a deep dive to become friendlier with death. The most significant benefit I received is being just so grateful to be alive every day. I look at leaves changing and don’t know if I’ll be around to see them change again. But, I delight that I’m alive today to see them.

And of course when I look in the faces of my children, I am overcome with gratitude that I’ve had so many years with them already. While we do not know what the future holds, I am more present now to those moments when we put on silly music to do the dishes together, or search under furniture for lost cleats, or curl up under a blanket for one more snuggle.

Found Wallet

We all walk around with wallets in our pockets or bags. I bet you know where yours is right now. (or at least now you’re double checking)

We’re never more grateful to have our wallet than when we thought we’d lost it and then found it again. Ditto phones. Ditto just about everything and everyone we love.

Just one trip to a country with limited plumbing makes me swear I will never take an indoor toilet for granted. Guess how long that lasts.

What if we walk around not just with wallets in our pockets, but found wallets? What if as much as possible we look at those things around us as the everyday miracles they are?

I want to cultivate found wallet syndrome about so many things in my life. I want to be delighted to have a car that runs and dishes other people bought for me almost two decades ago. I want to look at shoes that have carried me through many miles of training with amazement at what we’ve accomplished together. I want to hear the breeze through the trees mixed with the honking on the freeway and feel awe that we aren’t alone in this world.

Lost and Found

So what does a mom of only sons do? While I was still pregnant and processing these emotions, I saw a mom with two teenage boys jogging down my street. Oh! Now that is something I can picture.

And the reality of motherhood has been just like that. I have gotten to know way more about baseball than I ever thought possible. (It’s called a “force out” not a “forced out”) And I do still casually work ballet into the conversation every now and then, just to see if they’re sure they still aren’t interested.

And the truth is, I’m still the mom I thought I’d be: silly, honest, firm, cranky, enthusiastic, trustworthy, curious, present, and caring. Because it’s not just my dishes, toilet, and children that are found wallets, but it’s me.
I’m found.
I thought that a part of me was lost, and it wasn’t.

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Thank you, Frances! And steady on, friends.