Sing to me a melody of angels up above
Let the tune wash away doubt and fear
May my eyes see only what will feed my soul
And if I should be put to death by suffocation and steam
Place upon my tongue hymns of praise
For my executioners know not the joy and ecstasy that await me
It was a simple gesture, but it meant the world at the moment
On a long hallway, well long for one all of two
He stands alone
It's what happens when you drop your loop and decide to conquer the world on your own
For 40 seconds no conquering occurred
Just blank stares wondering how to get back to safety or at least familiarity
Jesus loves his little ones and the separation doesn't last long
So his little prayers were answered, only it wasn't his sweet teacher
But a little girl holding another loop in another class
She offers her hand and tells him in a clear voice of nearly perfect diction, an impressive feat for a young lady of only 3 to take her hand
He accepts
Hand in hand and loop by loop they walk
“Mama.”
A word I thought I would never hear.
Perhaps I mightn’t ever heard it, if God hadn’t thrown cold water on me while I
was sleeping.
You see, for ten years I had been
living in a fog. Working as a payroll clerk in a company I hated was literally
my life. I was spending over an hour a day in traffic; getting home in time to
eat a meal my husband cooked, and then collapsing on the couch watching violent
television shows because they had good ratings. When the show was finished, I
took an Ambien so I could go to sleep and do the same thing all over again the
next day. I look back on this time and think what a waste. Why couldn’t I get
off the treadmill I was on? Meanwhile, I watched family and friends move into
nice homes, get married and have beautiful babies. Watching these women with
their babies, one would think I would want a baby, but I didn’t. I had no
interest.
The cold water I mentioned earlier
came in two forms. In 2012, my mother who was always healthy as a horse was
diagnosed with cancer, multiple myeloma; on top of that I got fired. Many
people could look at this and see only distress without any blessings. I would
say you are wrong. The worst year of my life turned out to be the best thing
that could have ever happened to me.
Being handed a pink slip is never a
good way to end your day. It happened on a Thursday which was exceedingly odd considering
the company I worked for only fired people on Fridays. Firing people on Fridays
made payroll go smoother. I thought I might cry during the process or get
yelled at, but it was a calm interaction. I even got to walk out to my car by
myself. When I took a left out of the parking lot I felt free. Free from the
long nights and payroll deadlines.
The next day on Friday, I went to the
Department of Labor and filed for unemployment. All was good for two weeks
until boredom set in. Now what? I posted my resume everywhere and nothing. Then
on Halloween, I was hired to be a librarian. Halleluiah!
During this whole time my mother was
sick, very in fact. I would go and visit her on my days off and watch her sleep
like a child. When she spoke it was nonsense. It was during those times that I
began to understand how fragile life really is.
I started questioning what would happen to me if I get this disease and
there are no children to watch me sleep.
I started to pray for a child. I even
started to imagine my child, something I’d never done before. In my dreams, I imagined
a little girl with blond hair and blue eyes. I saw myself walking with her hand
in hand and me smiling down at her. She didn’t speak and neither did I.
Six months after I stepped into the
library as the Lumpkin County Information Specialist, I found out I was
pregnant. Even though I prayed for a child, I was unsure I could do this. A
small part of me was mildly resentful of the fact that here I was finding
myself in this great job were I felt valued and I end up pregnant. How could
God do this to me? Naturally in the first few months of pregnancy, I
underestimated the amount of love a mother could have for her baby.
At the end of a beautiful pregnancy,
on Thursday night, January 9th, I gave birth to my beautiful dark
haired, blue eyed baby girl, Carter Frances. I was wrong about the hair color,
but the eyes were right in earlier dreams about her. The moment my husband put
her in my arms time stood still. Placing her at my breast and rubbing her soft
head I knew I would love her forever. More importantly, I now understood how
much God loved me and that every time I was scared, or lonely, or depressed,
God was holding me like a baby.
Carter Frances is now two years old. I
wake up each morning with a purpose, to care for her and to lover her. How
lucky am I? And the sweetest sound I hear each day is her calling me, “Mama.”
