The Jean Dilemma

I stared at an old pair of jeans for a good five minutes this morning. My laundry is billowing and there was one lonely pair of cute designer jeans left on a white hanger.

I didn’t want to put them on. The last time I put them on (6 months ago) I came to a sad realization that I should have NEVER bought jeans after I had been nursing the little guy for 6 months. Nursing him helped me lose my baby weight plus about 15 pounds.

It was awesome. I felt cute, sexy and curvy. I went on a shopping spree!! What was I thinking? I loved asking for clothes in a size I had never been before.

So I stared at the jeans some more. I cried the last time I put them on and was nervous about doing it again. Six months ago I couldn’t even get the zipper up. And it was a tragedy.

With no one in the house and big breath I reached for the hanger.

Those jeans represented to me a time when I felt better about myself. Being thin(ner) was the one thing I seemed to have during a time when I felt like I did not have control of anything. I was unwed, had a 4 month old, no professional schooling, no goals, no hopes, no dreams, living at my moms house, no money to my name…Big fat Nothing.

But I was skinny. And to me that was something.

I slid the jeans off of the hanger and stared at the patchwork on the pockets. There were no rips in the jeans, no tears, no strings hanging off the ends. They had probably been washed a handful of times…ever. Like somehow I bought them to be reminded of what I was capable of… not to actually wear them.

They had been sitting quietly in a corner of my closet and the Lord had a lesson for me that he had been waiting to show me.

Mackenzie…the closet is your heart.

I have kept a pair of jeans that do not fit me (and unless I lose 10 pounds they probably never will) and I have pushed them aside not wanting to address them. I feel that I have failed.

I sat on the floor jeans in my lap and began to cry. Often times the notion of what was good is in fact a very dark dreary time of our life. Through my rose covered glasses I saw a time when I physically had a presence. My hope of fitting into a pair of jeans that simply won’t fit is like wanting a life that was never good for me to begin with.

Your life then is not now. And this is a good thing. You are well…so start acting like it.

I didn’t put on the jeans. It didn’t matter anymore if I fit into them or not. I folded them up carefully and put them in a box of old clothes.

Always remember the hard times of your life…but do not glamorize them. Let God be glorified through them.

Besides… I like skirts better.