Perennating...

I found a new word in the dictionary last night.  But more on that in a minute.

Wow, it's been a long time since I last wrote...so long in fact that I've started a whole new chapter, where we move again, this time to St. Louis, and start life over.  Again.  With moody teenagers.  And it's not easy. 

I shared a link a few weeks ago on my facebook page about "the Silent Years."  (If I was savvy enough to figure it out, or even find it again, I'd share it again here.)  In it, the author talked about the teenage years, when parents inexplicably (or maybe not) disappear from facebook.  And I totally get it.  When you have young kids, you share their every little cute saying, action, and thought.  And you share the poopy ones, too, because they're funny, at least in hindsight.  And they're not on facebook, so how will those cute little ones know that you're telling all their stories anyhow?

But suddenly they're teens.  And nothing is private anymore (except everything they do, because they tell you nothing)...And there's no way you could post on facebook without them somehow finding out.  And they still haven't forgiven you about lying about Santa and the Tooth Fairy, so you know they'll never forgive you about telling one of their secrets online...and you don't really know what they would consider a secret. 

And besides, what do you tell?  I mean, sure, you can post about their time on the Dean's List, and the winning play they made in the varsity game, and all those great, positive things, right?  But what if they're barely scraping by, and the only Dean's list they make is one you don't want to be on, and they're not starters on the team, (or maybe don't make it at all), and nothing is coming up roses (except maybe whatever that is growing in the pile of dirty clothes in their room)?  What then?  These are things you just don't write about.  Thus, the silent years.

Well, that's where we're at.  And life's not pretty.  And no one wants to read a blog that's depressing.  And really no one wants to admit that they're living that life, at least not in something as public as a blog.  And we're just trying to keep our heads above the rising tide.

Which leads me to the word I found in the dictionary last night.  No, I don't just sit down and read the dictionary.  Although maybe I should.  And I really enjoy the physical dictionary versus the dot.com world. So here's what happened:

I was writing the dedication for my book (Mirror, Mirror...due out this spring...how's that for slipping that in to the conversation), and I had written about people I was struggling through life with.  And Mark said I shouldn't use the word struggle.  He suggested "journey", but I found that kind of boring, and didn't really capture what I meant.  So I looked on dictionary.com for a synonym to journey and found "peregrinate."  And I was like, "what the heck does that mean?"  So I got out my huge Random House dictionary and looked it up.  And it means journey...which was still not what I meant, even if the word was fancier.

But as I was looking up that word, first my eye landed on this one: perennate.  And this is a word that exactly describes what I'm trying to say: to survive from season to season for an indefinite number of years.  (and doesn't it almost sound like "parent"...and isn't that what parenting is all about?)

And I'm so thankful for the people God has given me to perennate with (which btw comes up underlined in red in spell-check)...the friends who are with me season after season.  Together we have raised toddlers, muddled through middle school, sent a child to college, and navigated life-changes and moves.  We've re-written friendships through long distance phone conversations, texts, and the occasional 1000-mile journey. Between us we've survived divorce, the death of a parent, and even the death of a child.  I'm grateful for the friends who've helped me survive, and thankful that I have been allowed the privilege of being there for them, too. And I'm sure we will perennate a while longer, through all the bumps and twists and turns of the teenage years.  And beyond. 

So, here's to the next chapter...won't you join me in it...