I was four and a half years old when (I'm told), I made the above proclamation to our entire family, standing upon a strange piece of furniture that we called "The Big Box"! It was, I believe, originally a wooden box that had held a coffin for shipping--whose? I wouldn't know; we used it as a gigantic storage container for all manner of things. At that moment it served as my "soapbox" for announcing to the world that I was no longer disappointed not to have a baby sister!
The day's excitement had started that morning when Grandma and I were alone in the big old farmhouse. Dad and Mom had gone to furnish music for a church service which Grandpa (a retired pastor) had been asked to conduct in a small church somewhere in the area. It didn't occur to me to wonder why we didn't ALL go. What I didn't know was that my grandmother was staying home to listen for a very special phone call that might come--that DID come, it turned out.
The big old wall phone rang our ring. Grandma answered, talked briefly to someone, and hung up.
"Who was that?" I queried eagerly.
"That was the hospital up in Salem," Grandma explained. "They say they have a little baby brother for you!"
That afternoon, I rode with Mom and Dad from Corvallis to Salem to bring home this baby boy who would be adopted into our family. A clothes-basket had been carefully lined with soft blankets; on them lay a long-legged, bright pink baby! It was in the days before seat-belts; I rode in the front seat on my knees the whole journey home, gazing in fascination at this little speck of humanity who would become my six-feet-four bachelor brother and the best Uncle George our three children could ever have had to take them on fishing trips, carnival rides and you-name-it!
George is gone now. If anyone ever walked on "into the Light," he did, when God called him home. He wasn't just adopted into OUR family; he had that "spirit of adoption" the Bible talks about, whereby we become children of the Kingdom through Christ our Lord. So it isn't goodbye, George, it never was; it's so-long, "till we meet at Jesus' feet"!
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Thursday, September 8, 2011
"They Grow up too Soon!"
Since I've been communicating with many wonderful friends on Facebook, reading people's comments about the seasons of their lives, I've been mulling around in my mind (especially now as school starts) the reactions of mothers/grandmothers to kids' GROWING UP.
One time when our Max,Jr. was in Mexico still with the Mission, I had the neatest dream about him--or rather, about the baby boy he'd BEEN. There he was, sitting up against a pillow on the bed, smiling delightedly at me! He was 6 or 7 months old, and wearing his little white terrycloth pj suit. I was so glad to see him! I looked into his twinkling blue eyes and exclaimed, "MAXIE! I haven't seen you in such a long time!" That was the whole dream.
I told him about it later. Somehow, I said, it had seemed I was communicating with him on a level of his consciousness where that little boy still lived. I sensed a spiritual connection, as though this child were included in my prayers for my grown-up missionary son. That's too deep to go much farther into, isn't it? But there was truth there, and it was beautiful. When we were all praying up here for the young orphanage director with a burst appendix, we were praying also for little Maxie-boy! Psychologists talk about the "inner child" in each person; it's there, a part of us. In a way, we are all we've ever been. And if that "all" is redeemed, God can use every bit of it for His glory!
But I have something of a problem with saying, as our "young sprouts" shoot up, "They're growing too fast"! No, they are growing according to God's perfect timetable. We need to affirm that, and them. We need to enjoy who they are at every turn of the road, not wish they were babes playing at our feet again. For if indeed they were, even at age fifteen or twenty, our sorrow would know no bounds! That person's development would be warped and stunted, and we'd always wonder what he/she might have become if
things had progressed normally. So when we see them at one more milepost, let's cheer them on, as I saw one mother recently do, with "Congratulations! I'm so proud of you!"
One time my little mom was asked, "When was the happiest time of your life?" And she answered, "I think it was when I had my two children small at home." I remember being a little disappointed to hear that response. It sounded as if she hadn't wanted us to grow up and live our own lives. But later on she wrote a poem that corrects my one-time misapprehension. I can't quote it all, but the last quatrain goes like this:
The loving father slipped away;
The mother is old and bent and gray.
She draws from her children strength and joy--
Her wonderful, grown-up girl and boy!
Well, thanks up there, Mom! George and I were truly blest kids!
One time when our Max,Jr. was in Mexico still with the Mission, I had the neatest dream about him--or rather, about the baby boy he'd BEEN. There he was, sitting up against a pillow on the bed, smiling delightedly at me! He was 6 or 7 months old, and wearing his little white terrycloth pj suit. I was so glad to see him! I looked into his twinkling blue eyes and exclaimed, "MAXIE! I haven't seen you in such a long time!" That was the whole dream.
I told him about it later. Somehow, I said, it had seemed I was communicating with him on a level of his consciousness where that little boy still lived. I sensed a spiritual connection, as though this child were included in my prayers for my grown-up missionary son. That's too deep to go much farther into, isn't it? But there was truth there, and it was beautiful. When we were all praying up here for the young orphanage director with a burst appendix, we were praying also for little Maxie-boy! Psychologists talk about the "inner child" in each person; it's there, a part of us. In a way, we are all we've ever been. And if that "all" is redeemed, God can use every bit of it for His glory!
But I have something of a problem with saying, as our "young sprouts" shoot up, "They're growing too fast"! No, they are growing according to God's perfect timetable. We need to affirm that, and them. We need to enjoy who they are at every turn of the road, not wish they were babes playing at our feet again. For if indeed they were, even at age fifteen or twenty, our sorrow would know no bounds! That person's development would be warped and stunted, and we'd always wonder what he/she might have become if
things had progressed normally. So when we see them at one more milepost, let's cheer them on, as I saw one mother recently do, with "Congratulations! I'm so proud of you!"
One time my little mom was asked, "When was the happiest time of your life?" And she answered, "I think it was when I had my two children small at home." I remember being a little disappointed to hear that response. It sounded as if she hadn't wanted us to grow up and live our own lives. But later on she wrote a poem that corrects my one-time misapprehension. I can't quote it all, but the last quatrain goes like this:
The loving father slipped away;
The mother is old and bent and gray.
She draws from her children strength and joy--
Her wonderful, grown-up girl and boy!
Well, thanks up there, Mom! George and I were truly blest kids!
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