Apparently I'm 'nesting'. Although I have to say it's entirely my husband's fault. I could totally have managed to put it off another couple months but he decided to clean out his closet, then started suggesting I clean out mine, then pressured me to start organizing a storage closet packed full of all kinds of nonsense... Ah, yes. He flipped my internal 'nesting' switch prematurely. And now my adorable little reading room is a total disaster with piles and piles of junk strewn about in every direction. However, we've already gotten rid of loads of stuff and are almost ready to take an entire truckload of random odds and ends to goodwill. I have to admit, purging is SO nice! Organization makes me feel like I can conquer the world!
While I was going thru crate after crate of craft supplies and old notebooks I came across a little gem, one of my very first journals. Welcoming a distraction I started flipping thru it, marveling at my adolescent concerns and notions. A few pages in I was stunned to read a page dated June 18th, 1994, just a few days after I'd turned 12.
"...I think I want to become a writer. I'll write from home because I want to get married and have children. Yet there's also an urge to travel, meet people..."
I went on to note that I'd recently been notified that a poem I'd written was going to be published in Boodles children's magazine in June of the following year, 1995.
I was amazed. Barely 12 years old and I already envisioned myself writing, traveling, getting married and having babies, even though I had absolutely no idea or knowledge of how that lifestyle ever actually could/would come togehter. Profound. That speaks volumes to me.
With my own little one on the way, reading that journal entry so affirmed my heart. One of my many prayers for our little girl is that from the moment she enters this world, she'll have a deep, innate knowing of who she is, who she's called to be. That she'll know beyond all else that she's been destined with power and purpose, placed on this planet for a very specific reason. I pray that though she walks in a natural place, she'll know she's called to a supernatural place, that her life has great and profound meaning. I want her to know without question that she was knit together in my womb by the very hand of an adoring God, fearfully and wonderfully made, her each and every day ordained. (Psalm 139)
More than who she becomes when she enters this world, I pray that she know, undeniably, who the God of the universe has purposed her to be, that she know Him first. That matters to me more than anything else.
Perhaps my own mother prayed a similar prayer. Perhaps that's why at barely 12 years old I already knew with confidence what my strengths and passions were. Or perhaps... perhaps it was entirely the whisper of God to a tender young heart that already trusted Him deeply. Who knows. What I do know, looking back, is that He has always been with me, ever near. And that confidence gives me the greatest assurance that He'll do the very same with my little girl. He'll never leave her side, even for a moment. Because though I may already love her beyond words, she was His first. His creation, His daughter, His love. And she always will be.
There's more comfort in that knowledge than anything else I can possibly fathom.