Are my days better or worse?

My mom asked this question earlier this week and it made me think.  I don't know.  Sometimes I feel like it was all just a bad bad dream.  Until something reminds me.  The beautiful candle made from casket flowers arrives in the mail, an aquaintance asks how the baby is, the freaky stalker-like Target baby coupons arrive in the mail or a stranger asks how many children we have.  That is when my reality is no longer a dream.

I recently went to a friend's house that I visited the weekend before Charlie was born.  I realized that when I was there for the Christmas party I wasn't really mentally or emotionally in that place.  It was surreal to sit in her living room and remember what a different person I was then.  Not better or worse just different.

I have read blogs and books that would mention something was a "sign" and the skeptic in me would believe they were making the "sign" fit their situation.  I'm still a little cynical but I do believe over the last few months God has demonstrated his love is simple but moving ways.

For instance, I recently started running, okay jogging, alright technically a very, very brisk walking pace with a little bounce :) At about the 30 min mark my feet would fall asleep.  Not fun to run on that pins and needles feeling.  After a little research, I decided I needed new shoes.  I have always bought the same pair of shoes from Run On.  I just show them the old ones and they ring up the newest model.  It probably isn't a suprise that the last year has done a number on our finances.  We are clearly on a budget which doesn't include fancy running shoes.  However, Jared had received a $100 gift card and he generously offered to split it.  So we headed up to Academy and I tried on almost all the shoes under the $49.99.  None of them fit well.  I casually went down the more pricey aisle and a red tag stuck out $52.99.  Wait! Those were MY shoes!  I am sure they were the 2011 model but really "Who cares?!"  Amazingly there were ONE pair of the shoes and they were my size.  Jared found a pair he liked and when we got to the checkout stand our total was $100.52.

I know it is silly but in that moment I felt like God was patting us on the back saying, "The finances will work out just trust in Me."

Matthew 6:25-27 “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?

One Month

It has been one month since we met and said goodbye to Charlie.  I have dreaded this day for a while now.  I wish I was putting that cute one month sticker on his white onesie and posting it to Facebook or even that I might be in the NICU by his side as he was about to have heart surgery.  Instead I will place flowers on his grave.

I have mixed feelings about visiting the cemetary.  It is a place to reflect and remember yet I don't want to envision him in that tiny casket.  I know that only the shell of his sweet broken body is buried there.

Andrew rarely talks about Charlie but this morning on the way to school he said, "Mom, if Charlie would have lived I would have given him ALL my stuffed animals." The only words I could muster were "Me too buddy. Me too."

Lord be with us all today.  Stay close to Andrew at school.  Watch over Jared as he takes down Christmas lights.  Be near me and Mckinley as we travel to cemetary.  In your name.

The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. Psalms 34:18

Tears

Over the last few days the topic of crying has come to mind. Mostly how to prevent myself from doing it. 

I think about being invited to look at Christmas lights in a limo a few weeks ago and Jared jumping at the chance. But me? No way! The thought of being trapped was too overwhelming. What if I lost it?

I think about our minister, who performed the graveside service, calling a few days later to check in. He said he had to debrief with another minister after the service because it was overwhelming.  He mentioned looking up and seeing the tears streaming down my face and then glancing behind me to see the same in my Dad.

I think about the many times Andrew has "pretend cried" about Charlie.  The boy can bawl because his sister rips his art work but his brother dying. That's a different story.  And yes, I know this is completely normal. 

I wonder why I sat through Le Mis and The Impossible and didn't shed a tear.  I loved the movies and felt the pain and sadness but not one tear.

During the holidays, I rarely had to hold it together and I could always walk out of the room or leave the event if it got to be too much.  But with the start of school and activities this week that won't be the case. I worry about making others uncomfortable or breaking into the ugly cry?

Why can't I cry like Monica Potter? "Kristina" bawls through every episode of Parenthood and somehow looks cute doing it!

All this concern about crying made me think what does God say about tears? Okay I didn't really come up with the question on my own. As a good southern woman would say, " God placed it on my heart." He did so through a book my Dad recently brought over...on his Harley. 

book of Hope by Nancy Guthrie is a one year devotional and so far it completely speaks to me. I guess it wasn't a coincidence that he just "felt" he was supposed to buy it after seeing it out of place several times in Costco.

I didn't realize what scared me so much about crying until I read this passage.

I used to rarely cry, but now tears are always close to the surface, just waiting to be released.  It is as if there is a broken place inside me where tears are stored.  Letting them out has been the only way to release the pressure of the pain. Along with relief, there is also the uncomfortable loss of control that is a companion to tears, isn't there?

Bingo that's it. Control. I need it. I thrive on it. But I no longer have it. Charlie taught me that and these tears reinforce it.

Andrew cries over a ripped paper but I can see a bigger picture and I know his sadness is temporary. I think that is how Jesus felt when He saw the people crying for Lazarus. Yet, he didn't belittle their pain or tell them to get over it or even try to distract them.

He wept.

I think He cried for the hurt Mary and Martha felt and because He could see what they couldn't.

I believe Charlie is being loved and cared for in a perfect place.  I have faith that he is happy and healthy.  But because I am human I don't comprehend the way He does and so I grieve.  And because I cry so does He.  My God doesn't tell me not to cry or to hide it but that He will cry with me and collect my tears and someday wipe them all away forever.

So if I cry when someone speaks to me, it will be okay.  They shouldn't feel guilty for making me cry because they didn't.  Losing Charlie did.  It isn't comfortable to be the one that everyone feels uncomfortable around, but I can't change it. 

So I will take a deep breath, say a prayer and get in the carpool line...with God wiping away the tears.

You keep track of all my sorrows.  You have collected all my tears in your bottle.  You have recorded each one in your book. Psalm 56:8

And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.  Revelation 21:4
 
Jesus wept. John 11:35