Finding the "New Normal"

When I first heard the now common phrase, "'such-and-such' is the new ______", I had no idea what it meant. (I'm a little slow with these kinds of things.) But now it's a very familiar saying for me. For example, in my vocational industry (commercial real estate), "flat is the new up". In other words, we're just happy that we're no longer in a free-fall, so if things will just stabilize, it's as if it were improving.

For us Kruggel's, we have lots of "news" in our family now that Xiao Qian (Piper Joy) is here. Let me share just a few:

1. Chaos is the new organized.
2. Loud is the new moderate.
3. Asian food is the new American.
4. Busyness is the new steady.
5. Physical contact is the new distance.
6. Crowded is the new spacious.
7. Community is the new solitude.
8. Talking is the new silence.
9. Laughter is the new serenity.
10. Games are the new leisure.
11. English is the new Mandarin.
12. Change is the new normal.

Depending upon how one views these things, they may either be welcome or disdained. For us, they're welcome (at least most of the time). There is one "new" that really seems to stand out to me, however, and that's "Margin-less is the new peaceful." (Being surrounded by people brings contentedness.) We Kruggel's (at least in our household) are relative isolationists. What do I mean by this? We're naturally inclined to keep to ourselves, rarely letting people into our "space" and preferring a distance when hospitality is an option. We loathe this about ourselves and recognize it for what it is - selfishness. And because we know ourselves all too well, we need to fight against that which defines the core of who we are. We do that by surrounding ourselves with others, but when people easily come into and out of our lives within the context of our transient and distant culture, it's too easy to cocoon into our sorry estate of selfishness without too much resistance. So to come full circle on selfishness, we find that increasing the size of our family forces us to lay down that which entangles our heart away from holiness. Of course, our motives for serving children have varied fingers that spin off the hand, but in our attempt to give away what doesn't belong to us, we invariably find that it also squashes that which we wish didn't belong in us.

One of the greatest joys for me about this first week of transition with Piper Joy and finding our new normal has been watching Victoria's spirit blossom as a mother. She's always been, in my estimation, one of the best mom's any child could wish for (although she'll be the first to admit that she often doesn't feel that way). Let's face it, being a parent isn't easy. In fact, I was recently telling my son Austin that getting married, having children and adopting have been the hardest things I've ever done in my life. But there's something that seems to come alive in most of us when we sacrifice for the sake of one another. That aliveness is love. And when love comes alive, when love takes you in (as Steven Curtis Chapman so eloquently sings about), everything changes. Now, in spite of that ugly thing inside of me that wants to run away from love, I find that love captures, it enraptures me while in the midst of others. Just when I think that loving myself is the best thing I can do for me, when placed in places where sacrificial love is inescapable I am now fulfilled as I was designed, just as God fashioned me. I see this happening to me, I see it happening to Victoria, and I see it happening to my other children. It's all unfolding right before our eyes and it's a wonder to behold. The more the merrier. And the reason it's merrier is because love outside of ourselves is happening whether we want it to or not. I only wish I had figured this out long before now. Most of you reading this already knew this, but as I started in this post, I'm pretty slow.

Listening to Victoria tell me about running to the doctor's office, picking up food, making meals, putting the girls down for a nap, doing laundry, calling her other children that are away, helping with homework, making school lunches, dropping the kids off for school and speech therapy, struggling through language barriers, navigating through a disheveled household, on so on and so forth, brings out the best in her (and my children and me too). I can hear it in her voice, "This is so good, even though I'm exhausted."

If there was ever a doubt in my mind before we started this family and allowed it to grow as it has, there's none now. This is how it should be for us Kruggel's. "Thank you O dear God for showing me and giving me these gifts that are so elementary, and yet so You."

Loving this "new normal",