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If I’d been paying attention, I would have known long ago that I was destined to live in a house full of creative individuals. These individuals leave their half finished projects strewn on every flat surface in the house; hoard craft supplies and stash them around the periphery of the living room, like giant piles of trash; and, in the case of my youngest, scatter miniscule electronic components resembling nothing more than small, dead beetles across the floor and hope no one steps on them.

My children have been releasing their creative energy since they were very young. When my oldest child was in pre-school, he would happily meander through the aisles of the craft store, picking up all the “treasures” he found on the floor and tucking them into one of the various pockets of his cargo pants. When it came time for laundry, I would methodically check each pocket, removing sequins, buttons, wads of thread, feathers, petals of silk flowers, the list goes on. It wasn’t long before these items, and many more, littered my floors, the kitchen table, the living room couch. My “Come clean up the table for dinner,” would be met with a disappointed, “But we’re not finished with our projects yet!”

I am no stranger to creative energy, having been a crafter, writer, and artist for as long as I can remember. I was the kid who could make something from nothing and find the inherent beauty in items others would toss aside. My mother would dispose of trash on the sly, stuffing promising items deep into the wastebasket under the gross, gooey garbage, in hopes I wouldn’t discover them in the morning and declare them my newest “treasure.” I made holiday ornaments out of walnut shells, paper, egg cartons and cotton balls. Plastic separators in packages of fruits and vegetables were useful for crafts, as were toilet paper tubes, the netting used for onion bags, uncooked pasta, and pretty much any other discarded objects. I was forever finding uses for trash, and I’m famous for saying, “Don’t throw that out! I can make something with it!”

And now, I am reliving the reality my mother lived, and I have dubbed it “pay down”—the things I imposed on my mother which are now being imposed on me by my own children. Together, we figure out how to manage the energy—and the stockpiles of stuff that are necessary for true creativity—as we carve out our own creative space in our small house. But there is a plus side of living with others with so much creative energy. We share our often chaotic life, our ideas, our art supplies, and ultimately, our inspiration.

Every now and then, I find myself a unique position, a position from which I can choose to be the Good Mom or the Bad Mom.

Let me set the scene. My daughter is in the school play, and this weekend is the production. Practice has been running late this week. Very late. Couple that with the time change, and we aren’t seeing much daylight these days. The other night, I went to pick her up, but she needed money for her cast t-shirt, something we hadn’t paid for when we ordered it because I always think I might have more money next month.

She had reminded me via text after school to bring money, so I texted her from home before I left. “How much?” She texted me back with the information.

When I arrived at school, she sent me another text: Are you here?

Me: Yes

Her: Can you come in to pay?

Me: Can you come out? I can’t park here.

And so, she came out. It was dark, and all mini-vans look generally the same in the dark, right? She came running out the door, took one second to get her bearings, and ran off toward a mini-van. But not my mini-van. Nope. She ran off toward the first mini-van that looked like ours.

There I was, suspended in that moment where I was watching her run. Away from me. Toward the vehicle of who-know-whose-parent. Do I call to her? Do I let her open the other car door? I hesitated. It would be humorous, both for me and for the other parent, if she actually opened the door of the other car.

I rolled down my window, still uncertain, pausing. But then, as she reached for the door handle, I called to her. In that split second, I chose to be the Good Mom rather than the Bad Mom. Oh, to be the Bad Mom just once. We would have laughed about that for years to come (but not right away….)

This piece is one that emerged as a journal entry several years ago as I was beginning my journey of healing. I often turn to this piece when I am facing a challenging time in my life:.

The Puzzle

It is as if I am sitting on the floor working on an elaborate puzzle that is my life. It is a process, but it seems to be coming together nicely. There are a few false starts in some sections, but I rearrange some pieces and make sense of it. My puzzle is just becoming comfortable, and seems to be moving smoothly.

But then someone walks through the door and hands me a small package wrapped in rough brown paper, tied tightly with feathery twine. Stamped on the top in red ink that has bled around the edges are the words, Handle with Care. What could this be? I wonder, and I gingerly hold it in one hand while I pull at the twine with the other. The knot pulls free and the paper falls open, revealing a puzzle piece—a new one that I haven’t seen before. Its colors are deep and vibrant, making it appear rich as velvet.

I look from this piece to my own puzzle, its colors pale and washed out from years of working. I look to the messenger, still standing over me, gauging my response. I hold the piece out to him. “This isn’t mine.”

“Yes,” he replies simply. “The package has your name on it.”

“I know,” I answer him. “But look at it. It is beautiful and untouched. Its colors are too bold to fit into my puzzle.”

“True, it doesn’t look like it fits. But it’s yours. Perhaps you need to re-examine the work you have done.” With that, he bends and waves his hand over my work, sending the pieces skittering across the floor. He winks, turns, and is gone.

I stare at the piece in my hand, its beauty alluring, pulling me to see the finished whole. I look to the pieces now scattered across the floor. Apart, and framed against the bland white of the tile, they seem to have gained a vibrancy that I’ve previously missed. I feel suddenly energized, and I begin the painstaking process of locating the pieces that might join with the one I am still holding in my hand.

Broken. We are all broken in some way. Some of us experience more broken-ness than others. Some of us, less. I have worked hard to rebuild what was broken in my life, ultimately coming out stronger and less broken than when I started. Living an unbroken life is a process. For me, it took many hours of journaling, talking, painting, and creating to get to the point where I realized: the moment I thought my life was breaking was the moment I began my journey to become whole again.

And so, I challenge the idea of BROKEN. I share with you my broken-ness. I ask you to think about society’s labels—“broken family,” for one—and whether or not these labels are realistic and true. For me, raising my children in what has traditionally been seen as a “broken family” allows me to redefine family. The quintessential “broken family” is actually providing a better role model for my children than a whole family could have. What is important—always—is the love. And the happiness. Neither of those things should go missing in a family.

Examine the idea of BROKEN. Challenge it. Fight for what is broken in your life because chances are, it is not broken at all, and there is happiness and strength to be found in our broken places.