Grief

At one time I may have imagined that love at first sight was a preposterous idea, a result of the wishful thinking of hopeless romantics.  But now that it has happened to me, I no longer doubt its possibility.  She made a believer out of me.

From the moment I first met that girl, our spirits connected.  It was almost like magic, the way she reached down deeply into my heart, tapping into emotions I didn’t realize I was capable of.  A powerful sadness for her lost childhood and stolen innocence.  A fierce desire to protect her.   A pervasive sense that we belong together.  She gave me the courage to say yes to something I had never thought possible: giving my heart to a teenage foster child.  She taught me how to dream.  

Dream

We are just finishing up the busy morning of errands, loading the back of the car with all of the items we had purchased.  “Why don’t you take the cart back to the store entrance,” I suggest, “while I get the little ones buckled in.” 

A few minutes later I pull the car around to the front of the store where she stands waiting, and as she settles into the seat beside me, she pretends to be getting into a taxi.   “If you would be so kind,” she says in a fake British accent, “please take me to the corner of 5^th and High Street.”

I laugh at her sense of humor, and then ask, “Have you been to London?”  I cringe inwardly for being so insensitive.  What a stupid question to ask!  Of course she has never been to London!  What foster child has ever been to London?

“No,” she responds with a sigh, her shoulders drooping slightly.  “I haven’t been anywhere.  I’ve never even been on an airplane.”  I am humbled, reminded yet again of her painful childhood, a childhood that was spent, not traveling the world, but just trying to survive.

In an effort to lighten her spirit, I ask, “So if you could travel, where would you want to go?”

“Paris”, she answered instantly, the light in her eyes returning.  “I’ve always wanted to go to Paris!”

“Paris is beautiful,” I agree.  “I do hope you get to go there some day.  If they offer French classes at your school, you should take them.”

“No, I probably won’t,” she mumbles.  “I probably won’t ever get to travel anyway.  I probably won’t do anything.”

Alarmed at this attitude of defeat from someone so young, I ask, “What do you mean?  You have your whole life before you.  You can do anything you want.  You can be anything you want!”

She stares at me as if I am speaking a foreign language.  As if she has never heard such nonsense before.  “Not really,” she says.  “I’ll probably just end up like my mother.”

My heart breaks for her.  Where are the people who were supposed to encourage her to follow her dreams?  Why hasn’t she been told that the world is full of opportunities and possibilities for young ladies like her?

Let the Little Children Come

But Jesus called the children to Him and said,

“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.

-       Luke 18:16

I almost didn’t come to church today.  If you had even an inkling of how difficult it is to get children with special needs out the door in the morning, you would understand my hesitancy to come.  However, my soul’s hunger for spiritual food, along with my thirst for fellowship and encouragement, or at least a little adult conversation, compels me to pull it together.  Timing the g-tube feeding so that it finishes before we need to leave.  Drawing up all the right doses of medication.  Getting spaghetti-like arms and legs into a dress shirt and pants, praying the whole time that he doesn’t choose this moment to vomit (pretty much a daily occurrence).  Making sure all of the emergency supplies and medical equipment are packed.  (Never again will I complain about packing “just” a diaper bag!)  Folding up the wheelchair and loading it into the car, making sure there are enough seats for the rest of the family.   Getting the other kids and myself dressed and fed.  By the time we are ready to leave, I have already worked up a sweat and feel like I have put in a full days’ work.

In Search of Ordinary

When we see the look of sheer panic on the teacher’s face this Sunday morning, we almost laugh.  We stand in the doorway, bringing in our assortment of children, trying to wrangle their energy and herd them inside.  She reacts as if we are bringing wild animals into her tidy classroom instead of spruced-up, shiny-faced, Sunday-best little boys and girls.

We have a rainbow of children between us, my friend and I, all of them close in age, all of them different colors, some of them differently-abled, not one of them quiet.  We do make quite a spectacle when we are out, two white mamas with red and yellow, black and white little ones following close behind.  We wish people didn’t feel the need to stare.  Or look at us like we are from another planet.  We just want to be ordinary mamas with our ordinary families enjoying an ordinary Sunday at church.

Mama Duck

I’m a Mama Duck, I will admit it.  I live in a beautiful pond with lots of other ducks, and oh, how I had dreamed of having a fine row of perfect little ducklings following behind me.  Ducklings that look like me, swim like me, quack like me.

So there she was, a tiny, helpless, fragile little thing.  Motherless, alone and afraid.  I eagerly welcomed her under my wing, thrilled at the opportunity to love and nurture this precious creature.  She was the duckling I had dreamed of!

It wasn’t long, however, before I began to realize that this youngster who had been entrusted into my care was, well, different.  And in the pond where I live, different just won’t do.