In Memory

It's hard to explain exactly what I've been feeling the last few days. I found out that a classmate of mine, from middle & high school, died unexpectedly.

As I began writing, in her memory, I tried to think of specific memories I have of her. They are few and scattered. In middle school, when we met, she was the support necessary to get to the top of cheerleading pyramid and laughter as we tried to learn new dance routines. In high school she was a timid, but friendly smile in the hallway between classes. In recent years the memories consisted of facebook status updates and changes of profile pictures.

But I get it. While my interactions with this woman were limited and just a small piece of the picture of who she was and who she became, to some she was everything.

For the little girl that will sit across from an empty seat at mealtimes, she was everything.

For the man that now sleeps in his marriage bed alone, she was everything.

For the sister that no longer has someone that understands every part of her past, present, and hopes for the future, she was everything.

For the parents that were there for her first breaths, and tomorrow will be there to place a lifeless body in the ground, she was everything.

Everyone is everything to someone.

Mended fences & swinging gates

Many of my childhood memories of my dad and his dad have to do with farming and fields, cows and crops.

The memories come at different times and in different ways...

Driving paved neighborhood streets in suburbia with the windows down is somehow deeply connected to the feeling of bumping across a field in the back of a pick-up truck with wind blowing loose braided pigtails.

The first sight of fireflies in summer will always remind me of sitting beneath pecan trees shucking corn until after the sun set.

The quart bags of blueberries and pecans in my freezer and a couple of dozen small jelly jars of homemade blackberry jam seem paltry in comparison to the freezers full of okra, beans, corn and beef, or the pantry filled with canned goods from my grandparents' gardens that I remember so clearly.

My dad spent hours, days, and probably years of his life in a field, on a tractor, mending fences, counting and caring for livestock and I'm certain the habits he developed in his younger years continue to guide his behavior today.

Just as he helped break loose soil to plant seeds, then watched to keep weeds at bay, he tended three children to adulthood. I'm certain that he recognized, that once a seed is planted there is only so much you can do, then you just have to wait for it to grow on its own and bear fruit of its own kind. Maybe this is why, at times, he seemed to step back, but he was always nearby, waiting and watching as his seeds grew.

Just as my dad and his dad would repair broken fences while the cows were in another part of the pasture, I'm certain that he created boundaries, without us even realizing it, to keep us safe.

Just as he held the key to unlock the gate, then let us "ride" it as it would swing open, I know that his hard work and dedication opened many doors of opportunity that have since brought me as much joy as the swinging gates of my childhood.

Daddy is not a perfect man. I am far from a perfect child. Yet still I'm glad he is mine and I am his.

Why Mommy Cries at a Parade

To my children,

It has become a tradition each year to return to the small town where I grew up and attend the Memorial Day Parade.

You are always excited to see "princesses" (pageant winners), "karate heroes" (local martial arts classes), soldiers and "the horses that come at the end and poop all in the road." The highlight for you is probably the extraordinary loot of candy that you always bring home, tossed from classic cars, trailers full of sports teams being pulled behind trucks, and tractors.

There comes a time in the parade each year when a hush falls over the crowd and no candy is thrown. Somehow, even though you are all still young, you know to wait quietly while this group in the parade passes. You can't read well enough to understand yet what this group represents. If you looked behind you during the moments, when the only sound is shuffling feet on asphalt, you would see me wiping tears from my cheeks and you might ask, "Mommy, why are you crying?"

If you turned and ask me that, my loves, I would answer:
The signs that they hold as they go quietly by are the names of the recently fallen from our state. They are names of soldiers, warriors, mommies, daddies, sons, daughters, sisters, brothers, and friends who have given everything in the name of freedom.

Some were boys recently graduated from high school, going to see the world and make a difference.

Some were fathers and grandfathers who devoted their adulthood to serving our country.

Some were sisters keeping a commitment they made to help pay for school.

I'm sure each one had a different reason for joining the fight to ensure freedom, but they all had the same commitment to give whatever was required.

These tears come for many reasons.

They come for the families and friends left behind.

They come for the soldiers who fought alongside these in their final moments.

They come because there is still a need to fight.

But most of all, my love, they come because you and I have been protected by these.

You fall asleep at night without fear of attack.

You don't know the sound of mortar fire or machine gun.

We worship when and where and how we please.

We come and go, buy and sell, speak and think, learn and grow in freedom because of those who are willing to fight on our behalf.

So the tears are tears of gratitude; a quiet offering of thanks to those who are willing and able to do what I cannot. These are the reasons that Mommy cries at a parade.

I Wonder About You

Sometimes I wonder just who you are, bumping around inside of me.

I feel like I know you, and yet, we've never met.

You are mine and I am yours and we'll always somehow be a part of each other.

There are others, here on the outside, that belong to you, and you to them.

There is your Daddy. I'm pretty sure you know him already, because each evening as we lie in bed and he reads or we talk, you seem to do a little dance, or at least a series of calisthenics.

There are your siblings. They may be rather indistinguishable right now, but theirs are the voices you hear, muffled by my belly, calling greetings, "Hey, baby. It's Nicholas/Mackenzie/Annie. I love you." They ask me often what you might be doing "in there" and they regularly rub, poke, and push my belly to see if you'll reciprocate from within. Sometimes you startle them, when they're sitting close and we're reading a story, then suddenly you stretch or begin rhythmic hiccups. They giggle and wait for more, begging me to "get the baby to do it again".

I hope that you know just how much we look forward to seeing your face, hearing your voice, feeling your grasp. You are already ours, and we are already yours, but what we've shared so far is only a tiny part of what our stories will be together.

Different

"You are a unique person, just like everyone else." -Warren Miller

I value what makes you different.
I appreciate it.
I'm amazed by it.
I wouldn't have you any other way.

You are not me.
You should not be me.
You are you and that is the way it was always intended.

The way you talk, the way you look, the experiences you've had and will have, the way the world looks through your eyes, those things are all yours and part of you.

If I try to make you me it won't work. If I try to be more like you, it won't work.

We are us, here together... learning from and with each other, sharing strengths and weaknesses, struggling, working, toiling, and grasping for victory--the ability to overcome.

We are different, you and I. Different isn't better or worse. Different is often exactly what we need to fill in the gaps and make the rough spots smooth.

Early May

I love Georgia in early May when the sweet smell of honeysuckle and magnolia in bloom finds its way into windows left open to let cool evening air move through the house.

I like sitting out under a starry sky and hearing what my grandmother would have described as the "lonesome sound of a whippoorwill" calling out into the darkness.

I treasure the excitement in my children's eyes as they come into the kitchen with dirty hands full of clover and dandelions, begging for a glass of water for "the flowers we picked for you".

The Weight of Motherhood

It is mother's day and I've been thinking about how being a mother changes things.

During my first pregnancy, I remember being overcome at times with a variety of new feelings and the extraordinary weight of motherhood. Of course I gained pounds and inches as my body became the primary residence for someone besides me, but that's not the kind of weight I'm referring to.

I'm talking about the weight of knowing that another being was completely and utterly dependent on me. Every choice I made had a direct impact on someone's health and survival. And this was all before my baby breathed his first breath.

Once he was born, there were more questions, more choices, and more decisions. Is he getting enough to eat? Is he crying too much? Is he not crying enough? Should I let him sleep until he wakes up? Should I wake him to feed him again? Does that cry mean "I'm in pain? I'm hungry? I need a diaper change?" Does he need more stimulation when he's awake or less? And they go on and on.

I survived the newborn stages, gaining confidence and comfort with each child, but there's always something new to navigate and there are always more questions and doubts.

I listen to my own mom, having done this "job" for more than 35 years, and she still voices questions about whether or not she did the right thing at the right time. I think of my grandmothers during their final weeks of life and how I heard each of them express, in her own way, concerns about if she had done well and "been a blessing" to those she held most dear.

And today, on mother's day, I sat in church and watched a video of a mother who contracted HIV when she became pregnant. She didn't know that her husband had the illness and once her baby was born, she learned that both she and the child were HIV positive.

I sat, in tears, and thought, "Lord, this is too much to bear. The weight of all these things is much too heavy a burden for me."

The video continued. The mother began to smile as she described how she went to the local church and "by God's grace" they helped. She and her daughter have been provided with medicine, proper nutrition, the assistance they need, not just to survive, but to reinvest what has been invested in them.

And that's when it hit me. This weight of motherhood that we bear was never intended for us alone. "By God's grace" we have the help we need.