Alone

                                                             
  I am tired.  Tired of feeling alone.  Where are all the moms that stay at home in my neighborhood?  My children have no one to play with, and I have no one to talk to.  I can't do it alone anymore.  If you live nearby, can you call me? Can you come over and hang out?  We can chat about God, about life, as our children run and play.  I don't know about you, but I cannot sit in the house alone anymore.  My children grow tired of their mommy being too worn out to play another game of hide and seek.  If I draw another shape for them I may lose it!  If I have to slide down another chute in chutes and ladders I may just go crazy!  Where is that other mom at her wits end?  Where did you all go?  I know we have busy lives, but I need someone to hang out with.
  I feel alone.  I am raising 7 children with a husband who works full time.  On many occasions his job calls him to travel spending at least one night and two days away from us.  I know that this job is a wonderful blessing, but there are times that it aids in my loneliness.  The only one vying for my time is Facebook.  A fake companion that doesn't fill in the emptiness, but somehow makes the hole larger.  To Facebook reality, everyone seems too busy to visit, too busy to get close.  
  What do I do?  How do I remedy this?  Where did the love of ones neighbor go?  I know I have relied on Facebook to help me escape, to indulge in something I feel has meaning.  Why?  Because I feel I deserve solace, peace, and quiet.  Instead I get a child who clings to me even more because I did not spend enough time with them.  One that wants to stay up a little longer to be near me(ok, maybe it has more to do with truly to NOT wanting to go to bed).  Children who God gave me to teach them about Him, but instead I have been busy teaching them to long for comfort in a post on a smartphone.
  So, to all those mothers at their wits end, if you are home can you give me a call?  Maybe together we can collect our wits, regain control, and edify one another?  I am not going to let my loneliness get me down nor am I going to let it take away my hope.  Why must we feel lonely and worn out? We don't! So, as it says in Hebrews 10:23,
 "Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful."  Even more so it goes on to say, "And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.  Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another- and all the more as you see the day approaching." Hebrews 10:24-25
  Knowing all this i determined that God needed to find me a friend.  How wrong am I!  I have to drag myself out of the slump!  I admit being a wife to a husband that works a lot and a demanding schedule was taking its toll on me, but I had let go of something so essential.  I know it's hard to find time for friends.  It's hard to walk to the neighbors house, to intrude on their schedule.  Yet, I was the one making my own walls.  I was the one isolating myself out of fear, shyness, and embarrassment of not measuring up to a standard I created.  The walls, I admit, are still erected. I wanted the companionship, but not the bareness is exposes  Do you see my dilema?  I have not let them in.  I have given into that doubt, that feeling of isolation.  So, it is time to break through these barriers.  It is a struggle everyday!  I have muted facebook(you can never really get rid of it, it has become our new email!).  I will not allow my barriers to get a foothold and keep me here.  I will grow-I will let people in.  I will find that friend, but please could you call me?  I am a little shy. ;)