Abby Rosser is an author and a mom of three. Her first novel, Oh to Grace, just released and we are happy to have her visit us here at Grace for Moms. Oh to Grace is a story of love, redemption, and grace. We enjoyed her book so much, we wanted you to have a chance to enjoy it too, so we have are giving away 2 copies. Scroll down to enter. To find out more about the author, visit her blog, Blessed in the Boro.
During my ascent to adulthood, I earned pocket money doing the occasional odd job and extra chores. Though I didn’t dig out septic tanks or try my hand at pig farming, I did have some dirty jobs.
Like most girls of a certain age, I spent a lot of time babysitting. By the ripe old age of fourteen, I was watching a trio of girls who lived across the street from my grandparents. The two younger girls were toddlers at the time and required the majority of my focus. They loved to dance to the albums I played for them on the record player designed to look like a jukebox, complete with flashing lights. They also loved to swim in the backyard pool. It was an in-ground rectangle with a steep drop-off, sloping down to the deep end.
On one occasion when the girls woke up from their nap, I changed their diapers and slipped them into their swimsuits. I negotiated their little legs into the cutouts of their swim rings so they could leisurely float the length of the pool. Eventually, one of the girls drifted back asleep. I waded and paddled alongside both of the girls until I noticed a neat pile of brown rocks on the bottom of the deep end. Upon further examination, I realized the sleeping mermaid floating next to me had unloaded her now ginormously water-logged diaper which had been chock full of “sinkers.” I hastily pulled both girls out of the pool and tried to imagine how I would clean up this Adventure in Babysitting. Both of the diapers exploded with sticky bits of waxy plastic. There was no other recourse but to tidy up the girls the best I could and confess when the parents returned home.
For a time in college, I held three jobs at once. I was a Resident Assistant in my dorm, I watched kids in the After-School Care Program at a nearby private school, and I worked at the china department of Castner-Knott, a long-gone department store in Nashville. If you made a list of all the people who should handle fine china and expensive stemware, my name would be somewhere near the bottom of your list, maybe just above your crazy uncle—the amateur juggler. After an adequate number of champagne flutes were broken, the good people of the Castner-Knott china department realized my skills were needed elsewhere and I became the head silver-polisher. I was given the rags and cleaner, then I was pointed in the direction of the trays and bowls that now gave my life purpose and my evenings and weekends meaning.
I assumed the sooty, black residue I rubbed off the silver would transfer to the cloth and that would be the end to that transaction. I didn’t have any work buddies amongst the staff, so no one told me that a portion of the marks I rubbed off eventually made their way to my face. (Dirty fingers + itchy nose = Charlie Chaplin moustache)
Years later, my main job is to be a full-time mom to my three kids. It’s days full of to-do lists, lost to-do lists, guilt for too many unchecked items on recently found to-do lists, and adding completed items to the to-do list so it looks like I’ve accomplished more than the towering pile of laundry would lead you to believe. I’ve held back hair and rubbed backs as they cried over the toilet during bouts with stomach bugs. I’ve changed diapers that made me review what had been eaten the previous hours. “What did she eat that was blue?” I’ve dug mud out of dirty nails and removed head lice with a fine toothcomb. I’ve convinced myself that rocking my kids will actually heal every ailment but I am equipped with an impenetrable force field never yielding to any virus or germ. I’ve scrubbed and wiped and dried and clipped and bandaged.
Of course I have. I’m a mom.
And moms know the blessings of servanthood and dirty jobs better than just about anyone, with one exception. When it comes to loving through the dirt and grime, Christ is the master. After he washed the Disciples stinky feet he told them:
Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.
Christ knew, just as we moms have known for millennia, with sacrifice comes authentic blessing. Nothing ties us tighter to those around us than bearing one another’s pain and perfectly loving in spite of the imperfections. Being a mom can be a dirty profession, but it’s the best (scariest, most heart-breaking, most important, hardest, most natural) job I’ve ever had.
Abby Rosser
How have you gotten dirty lately?
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