The Messy In My Best

I slept well but woke tired with a cat by my side. When I stirred, the feline ran across my form, insisting I get out of bed. Familiar with my routine, she followed me to the coffee pot. But when I ignored my messy kitchen and unmade bed and dressed early instead, she curled up on my bed and pouted. 

Today was not a stay at home day and she knew it.

About the time caffeine worked its way into my system, I pulled into Sue and Gordon’s driveway, ready to sing for an hour. 

Gordon, a former pathologist, struggles with severe memory loss. Unable to converse with ease, he belts out Danny Boy, The Sound of Music, Edelweiss, and many others songs stored on the hard drive of his brain. Together, we clear our heads.

Wanting to expand our repertoire, I brought a few extra books along today. When I flipped open the folk song one, I recognized my scribble on the inside back cover. There I read,  

“Do you really believe they’re going to think you’re a bad mother just because you accidentally shaved my head? What’s wrong with you?”

I read the words twice before registering their meaning. By then the memory had come crashing in with a vengeance. One of the worst.

Sam, a rising junior in high school at the time, wanted a buzz cut. Having trimmed the year-round swimmer’s hair countless times before, I pulled out the clippers with confidence. Sam took his place on a stool on our back porch and wrapped a towel around his neck. After plugging in the device, I stood in front of my youngest son, held up the clippers, and buzzed from the middle of his forehead, straight back. 

When I cleared the thick hair that covered my progress, I gasped in horror. A reverse mohawk glared back at me. Forgetting a guard—or comb attachment—or whatever you all it—I’d shaved a stripe straight down the middle of his head. 

My sixteen-year-old handle his plight with a grace that still amazes me. While I shed tears and delved into bad-mom speak, he took it in stride.

“You have to cut the rest, Mom.”

“I can’t, Sam,” I wailed. “There’s got to be something we can do.”

“Mom, there’s a stripe down my head. You can’t glue the hair back.”

“I’m soooo sorry,”

“It’s okay. But you have to cut the rest... now!”

Mortified, I finished the job... and saved the hair. Someday I’ll do something creative with it. In the meantime, a zip lock bag full of blonde locks remains buried deep in a dresser drawer.

For now, it reminds that no matter how much energy I expended trying to make my son feel good about himself, in one hurried moment, I turned him into a bald spectacle that garnered attention until his peach fuzz grew back.

The messy in my best shone from his bald head.

So much time has passed that Sam and Don have let me buzz their hair again. And more importantly, sometime last fall I finally accepted there will always be a messy in my best. All these years later the truth went deep and settled more of the perfectionist in me. 

I'll never get it all right. I'm not supposed to get it all right. And the more I understood the perpetual problem of my mess, the more I valued and rested in the life-giving sacrifice Jesus made. Or... the more I valued and rested in the life-giving sacrifice Jesus made, the more I relinquished the perpetual problem of my mess. 

The result? I finally grew tired of the negative self talk that accompanies mishaps. 

The best I have to offer pales in comparison to the enormity of what God has done for us through Jesus. Which is why I'm grateful for Sunday mornings when a church service ends with everyone singing the same song twice... especially like the one I'll post below. 



All photos courtesy of pixabay.com