Monday Meme: Not Qualified

If you are a Marie Bellet fan, you probably know this line from her song "How Do I Look to You," and you're probably singing it now. You're welcome. :-)

I discovered Marie Bellet's music seventeen years ago, when I was pregnant with my fourth. She was performing at the NACHE conference in Manassas, Virginia, but I was tired so we left early. The second day of the conference, everyone was talking about how wonderful she was, so I bought her CD. I listened to it and cried the whole way home. Seventeen years and four CDs later, I still cry when I listen to her.

Marie sings about motherhood, especially being a mom of a large family, and she sings about Catholicism. She sings about grocery store lines and not perfect marriages and exhausted mornings and welcoming another baby later in life. And she sings about failure and redemption. She is a step or two ahead of me in life and each new CD has been perfect timed to help me through each stage. (Pretty sure baby #9 was a result of her song "Nine More Months, One More Time"! 😉)

When I was a young mom and trying to figure it out, she sang "Does it Make a Difference?", asking God what difference the daily life of a stay at home mom with lots of little people could make. And God answered, "have some patience, teach my children, be a light for all you see. Life is loving, so mind the details, wrap it up and send it to me. And what a difference there will be."

When I was a little more confident, but busy and maybe a little discouraged, she sang "there will come a time with no constant interruptions, confusing all my senses, my reason, and my rhyme, and how my heart will leap to find one backpack in the hallway, and the promise of a face and a story just for me" in "Ordinary Time".

When I was really tired, she encouraged me with A New Springtime. And as my children were growing and began leaving, she sang about that too. She sang about letting go and getting older. She has one song about a son deployed to the Middle East and while my son was there (and even now) I cried and cried through that song, relating to being a mom, waiting and worrying.

All through her music is self-examination and refocusing on God. But don't think her music is somber or depressing. It can be fun, and it's always inspiring. The most important thing is that what she shares as her struggles, is what we moms go through, maybe not all of it, but enough, and it is a validation that we are not alone. We aren't the only women who cry in front of the sink at night, or spend our time saying "if only". She admits to buying books she won't read and having clothes in her closet that don't fit. She admits to being cranky and not be able to keep up with her life. And she admits to thinking others are probably doing it better. And often, she looks up and asks God why.

Ladies, we aren't alone. You may be a great homemaker, and I'm a lousy one, but I may be able to stand constant chaos and chatter and you just can't. We are different but we are the same. Our hearts burst with love and concern, and often some guilt thrown in. We all have our times when we call out to God and say "Does it make a difference?" And our times when we are done and all we can say is "Thy Will Be Done."

I cannot encourage you enough to buy her CDs, listen to them until they are part of your thought process, cry and be comforted. She has been an light through this journey for me. And I just want every mom to have that in her life!

(The song from the meme is "How Do I Look to You?" Marie does this wonderful thing in her songs...repeating a phrase but changing the meaning. So she starts by asking God how she looks to Him, but ends by realizing that she needs to look TO Him, and asking how she can do it. I could quote her all day, but just get the CDs! Lol!)

One more thing, my children have grown up singing her songs, and I know that will be a gift in their adult lives.

Marie Bellet CDs at Amazon