A Beautiful Thing: In Memory of Our Aunt Judy

I am sad today, having heard that my Aunt Judy passed away this afternoon after a long battle with cancer and other health issues. Long is a relative word. While she has suffered over the course of a few years, it doesn’t really matter. A few weeks or a decade with cancer is too much. Too long. Too painful. Too hard. Too mind-bending. Too hope-raising and then hope-dashing. Too expensive. Plus an infinite amount of more.

My younger years were full of family time. Weekends and holidays were spent with grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. We knew too much about each other. Good families usually do. I can tell you that my Aunt Judy suffered her share of demons. And heartaches. And she made her share of bad choices. Haven’t we all? Maybe some, more so than others. But people are messy. Life is messy. And God knows this. That’s why he gave us families to hold us up through it all.

The thing I get to remember today though is the beauty in Judy's life. Beauty is a big deal. First, Judy was the mother of Shannon. A dimpled little pigtailed thing, she stole hearts throughout the family. The first child, first grandchild, and better yet...first precious little girl...she was more than enough. (And you still are.) Little cousins came along who idolized her and the family grew in size and in heart.

As hearts grow, after finding Judy's love of her life, Art, they decided to have a baby. As couples do. But things didn’t go well which led to more heartbreak. Thankfully, she and Art had the strength to think outside of the box. To think globally. And by globally, I mean that quite literally. One spring day Judy flew to the Philippines on her own and came back with a four month old baby boy. Her first time on a plane, she crossed the world to do a beautiful thing.

Andy, the love and sacrifice made by your mother and father to bring you here is nothing less than inspiring. Not only because it was expensive and hard and confusing…but because it was visionary. Overseas adoptions were not unheard of during the 80’s, but they were not the norm. Especially not in a little town in Virginia that was nearly as vanilla as a bowl of pudding. Your grandfather thought you were Indian. And he meant well. “Beautiful people, the Indians,” he would say. “Philippino,” we would correct him. But when he held you, we saw teeth. Whenever he flashed those, we all knew he was happy. He loved you, brown skin and all.

Father of orphans, champion of widows, is God in his holy house. God makes homes for the homeless, leads prisoners to freedom...  ~Psalm 68:5-6 (MSG)

And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me. ~ Matthew 18:3-5

I have no doubt that she was welcomed into Heaven today.

Shannon and Andy: Your mother, my dad’s sister, our Nanny’s daughter…did a beautiful thing in this world. I know that you are thankful. But also know that we are thankful. All of us. Because we can always look back and say, “She was so strong.” For that moment in time, she was powerful enough, she listened to God just enough, to change the trajectory of a life. Yours, yes. But also ours. Tonight we can celebrate that and remember her.

LOVE CHANGES LIVES.

The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit. ~ Psalm 34:18 (NIV)

Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. ~ Lamentations 3:21-23 (NIV)

Elsa

Little girls desire little more than to be real, true princesses. Or so it seems.

This morning I watched my princess flip through Disney Roku to the same little video clips she's watched dozens of times now. Elsa singing 'Let It Go' in 25 languages, Demi Lovato belting out a not-as-good-as-the-original version, and a DIY tutorial on how to make your French braid look just like Elsa's.

Finishing a novel that just may be blogged about next, I sat and let my little Elsa impersonator do nearly painful things to my hair. Telling her in between pulls and ouches that perhaps I might buy her one of those Barbie heads that little girls can practice hairdos on. And I may, but I didn't fully mind her tangling with my hair. 

My love for the more recent Disney princess movies goes even deeper than hers. At sixteen, I was very much taken by the G-rated musical perfection of The Little Mermaid. I still have the well loved cassette tapes. This was followed by Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin. Wonderful, until grown-upness heaped alternate interests on my plate. And someone probably told me I should act my age...and then I did. Thank goodness I don't buy into such nonsense as acting my age anymore.

For a few seconds this morning I worried though. My little girl is not just playing Elsa. She IS Elsa at the moment. Oh gosh, what does this mean exactly? That she likes high heels and a very blond braid swung over her shoulder? That she enjoys fancy dresses and ice powers and the drama of it all?

Simply put...yes.

Frankly, while it's so adorable and entertaining, it's a little discouraging for this nearly-nerd mom to watch my
incredibly bright little girl be so much less than she is capable. I'm reasonably careful with what I offer her for toys. Blocks, tools, legos - she plays with them all. Plus she has an older brother, whom she idolizes.

However, she likes pink. She likes fancy. She LOVES drama.

I started to think back on all the things I've tried to be in my life. I'm a bit of a mix when it comes to people genres. I suspect we all truly are, although most of us lean more towards one than another. I thought about all of the proverbial outfits I've tried on. Imitation is the highest form of flattery, it is said. 

I suspect this little one will try on all kinds of hats over the years. She will choose some and I will encourage some, and people she hasn't even met yet will encourage others. All this trying on will make her who she is. Or maybe, more accurately, it will reflect who she IS.

And if she turns out to choose tiaras (literal or not so literal) over a scalpel or a computer then that's ok. As long as she's using her Gifts. By that I do mean her capital G Gifts - the ones God has given her that make her the ever so unique (and honestly, quite entertaining) person that she is. Blond wig and all.

I love her dearly and am so thankful that I have this lifetime to encourage her to be herself.

But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.   ~ 1 Samuel 16:7

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. ~Ephesians 2:10 

Dr. Junior

"Mom, why did Dr. Junior have a dream?"

I had already seen the paper in her take-home folder, so I knew exactly what she meant. Her class has been talking about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in school this week. She is a sharp cookie for her age, but this is a tough concept. I went on to ask her about the investigation her class had done with a brown egg and a white egg. The idea is that you talk about how on the outside, the shell is hard and protects the inside. The only difference is the color of the shell.

Then, you break the egg open and show that the insides are identical. One yolk, one albumin, nothing else. They're both the same. That prompts a discussion about how people are no different from each other on the inside.

(If you'd like to do this activity with your child or students, you can get a FREE printable here: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Martin-Luther-King-Jr-Egg-Activity-191824)

She could tell me verbatim what she had done, what her teacher had said, and recounted it with the usual enthusiasm of a child who has an amazingly gifted kindergarten teacher. (We love her dearly, if you can't tell.)

But she wasn't really getting it.

I went further. She is bright, so I felt that I could tell her more. I explained that a long time ago, people weren't always allowed to do the same things. Things like going to a certain school or going to a certain restaurant. Sometimes people with peach skin (as she calls it) didn't even want to be friends with people who had dark skin.

"They didn't?"

"No, they didn't. And sometimes they were very mean."

"That wasn't very nice of them." "Mom, why do people call our skin white instead of peach?"

My answer - "Probably because peach looks close to white."

 But this set off a momentary rage within me. I don't know this for sure, but I imagined for a second that somewhere back in time, someone decided that Caucasian skin should be called white because it would sound the most opposite of black that it possibly could.

When really, we're all just the yolk and the albumin on the inside.

Our conversation ended and I realized...She still didn't understand. Not really. 

Her teacher's lesson and our conversation will now be a part of her schema to help her answer the questions her teachers will ask in years to come. She'll be the one raising her hand. She always is. But really, she just does not get it.

And I am SO glad.

She will never know a world where she cannot hug her friends with dark skin. She will never know a world where it is not ok for the Hispanic boy in her class to teach her how to say Spanish words. She will never know a world where there are no dark skinned baby dolls.

This world is not perfect. It never will be. She will learn things later that will break her heart like they break mine. But for now, there is a little peach girl in North Carolina who will hug your neck and talk your ear off no matter the shade of your skin.

GOD MADE US ALL.

Galatians 3:28 (NIV)

There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.