neighborhood Archives - Kristina Lunde

Dear Neighborhood Mom,

“Someday I’ll be able to take a leisurely walk with my husband in the morning,” you commented wistfully as Craig and I walked by the elementary school bus stop that first week of school.

Having made lunches, read the Bible, seen my high schoolers off, and loaded the dishwasher, I was glad to walk out the door with my husband and dogs. A peaceful walk counterbalanced our usual morning whirlwind of irritated-at-life, crabby-during-devotions, storm-out-the-door teenagers.

We saw your oldest son whiz by on a bicycle earlier, the radiant grin under the helmet not unlike your husband’s when he rides. As you walked your two boys to the bus stop, preschooler Elizabeth boldly tried to keep up with big brothers, all the while maintaining a clutch-hold on mom’s pants. Dear neighbor mom, your coffee in one hand and the other arm draped around Elizabeth at the bus stop with your boys, you are the epitome of a supportive mom. Your love for your kids is obvious and precious. Strolling past you and hearing your comment took me back to my harried young mom days.

I remember the loads of laundry, dutifully thrown into the washing machine early in the morning, as the rest of the dirty clothes mounded up in dune-like ridges across the floor. The dishes piled high and spills congealed on the counter waiting for me to clean in my “free” moments, as little ones demanded help and guidance getting ready for school. Brushing hair, wiping milk off of sweet little faces, and grabbing backpacks was all part of the rush to leave. Toys lay strewn across the floor, dropped mid-game in the hurried frenzy to get everyone out the door on time.

Household maintenance, job responsibilities, family paperwork, and all the other non-parenting duties get pushed to lower priority in the midst of the pressing immediacy of young children’s needs. Please know that this busyness is a season of stages and challenges in life that will change. Someday you will again sleep in, have uninterrupted conversations with your husband, and be left alone in the bathroom!

I used to hate it when older women told me to savor this time of young children “because it passes by so fast.” I remember one woman chased me down to speak those words to me as I held a baby in one arm, balanced a tantruming toddler and a diaper bag with the other hand, and tried to open the car door. It had been a long morning and a tough wait for a pediatrician appointment, and I needed to get the saturated-diaper baby and starving toddler home. I know I growled at the woman, if not literally, then figuratively with a dismissive comment. I resolved then to never say anything like that to other young mothers, even on the chance that her words would eventually prove true.

Instead, I want to encourage you in your mothering. Someday you will have the luxury of completing breakfast chores while older children dress themselves. They will learn to brush, groom, and toilet completely on their own. Hard to imagine from where you are parenting now, I am sure. This morning, I read from the Bible as my teenagers foraged for their own breakfast – a level of independence I never imagined when my kids were your kids’ age. Your hard work will pay off, and they will have learned, and applied, the many lessons you are teaching them, day after fatiguing day.

Thank you for contributing so much to our community in your church and job roles, but I want to especially thank you for loving your four little ones as your main role. May God bless you with strength, patience, and parenting wisdom as you meet the daily challenges of raising little children.

Dear Mama Deer,

As a safety conscious mama, I want to have a few words with you about how you teach your little ones to get across traffic lanes. Although we live in a low-traveled area, I think you need to pay more attention to how your family gets across the street and how you train your fawn-babies to do that.

When I moved here from California, I remember hearing the clomp-clomp-clomp down my street for the first time. Expecting to see horses on my small town street, I ran to the window and gaped in surprise. There you were with your herd, crossing the road after coming up the ravine trails. Little did I realize how much you own this neighborhood! Since then, I am always amazed when you cross the street in single file. Slowing my car for a deer to cross the road means an inevitable halt as your brood wanders across the street one by one. My Minnesota friends warned me that the fall deer hunting season was the worst for car collisions with deer, understandably because your kind are skittish and on the run.

To your credit, you deer seem to look both ways with that twitchy neck movement that scouts out danger. I really haven’t seen the proverbial “deer in the headlights” look; usually I see jerky, swivel heads as your group crosses in front of my car. Kudos to you for teaching your fawn-babies to look both ways, but why start this procession when cars are coming?! Please give a thought to the size of your parade before scampering across the road, leaving your less-experienced little ones to follow right into oncoming traffic.

One day, heading down the big hill, I saw an animal lying in the middle of the road. The size of a medium dog, the animal appeared to have a long, crooked tail. After realizing that the animal was not going anywhere, I stopped my car and got out to take a look. Here was a sweet, spotted fawn-baby of yours, looking very frail and very young. I thought it was dead, until I approached and noticed the heaving of its chest. Backing off quickly, I got back in my car and thought of whom I could call. Cops? Humane society? Game warden? Then, as I picked up my phone, I saw the little one stretch up onto wobbly scrawny legs and lope off clumsily into the woods, presumably to where you were watching from.

Interesting how the Creator God had the whole situation under control. Perhaps that is how you handle things in the woods, letting your little ones get up on their own under the Creator’s watchful eye. (There is probably a great parenting lesson in there somewhere for me.) It just seemed to me that you were abdicating your motherly duty by leaving him stuck in the middle of the road. Would you please keep your birthing in the woods and far away from the road next time?!

And about my neighbor’s flower boxes . . . Yes, it was hilarious to drive down the street and see you and your kin eating the beautiful flowers right out of her living room bay window boxes, as if they were your personal feeding troughs. But would you please lay off her house decorations? At least start on the stuff in the yard first.

So please, keep your littlest ones out of the street, look both ways before you cross, and go easy on the flower boxes. I will do my best to drive safely and watch out for you.