On This Day

Tomorrow morning is my little one’s first official day at preschool. It’s not even her first day of actual school, and I’m already thinking about it so much; it symbolizes so much growing up for both of us. A will always be the person who taught me the most about God. She is and was the bright light shining onto the path of having an actual relationship with God, instead of thinking He was angry rule-giver father up in the sky who was just so darn disappointed and disgusted with me and my behavior (He’s not).

She is sometimes my last reason for trusting God to break me free from destructive thought patterns which I have carried on since childhood; on some days, she is my last resort for remembering why God chose me and why He will be faithful to hold my hand on the hardest days. I was talking with my amazing wise friend Nancy, who was once a single mom, and it went like this:

Me: “A’s first day of preschool is tomorrow. I don’t think I can handle even walking in there.”
(Nancy’s eyes start filling with tears.)
Me: “Motherhood really messes you up.”
Nancy: “Yes it does because 30 years from now you will STILL remember walking her in, what she wore, how she acted, and you will never, ever forget it."

Anyways, I just wanted to say, the marvelous invention of the “On This Day” Facebook thingy has led me to have some bursts of faith and things to share:

5 years ago, I was 2 days away from making one of the worst decisions of my life..I no longer wanted to live “the Christian life” if it meant faking a smile and faking the rules to fit in. I officially broke free and made a decision which initially devastated me, but I can now say with total joy and healing, God has used it for good times, one hundred!

3 years ago on this very day, I was shaking in my flipflops, swollen cankles and all, after being told I had to be “induced” (The word carried power, I tell ya what! But it was fine and beautiful and wonderful and marvelous!).

2 years ago (yesterday), I was 22 with a 1-year-old, literally shaking in my boots as I was handed a full ride scholarship to college.

Today, I’m still shaking in my boots at the prospect of the word TOMORROW. Tomorrow is preschool, tomorrow is change, tomorrow my little girl is going to grow up one more day, tomorrow is another day of unknowns and faith exercises, of schoolwork that threatens to extinguish my light completely, of work, of meeting new people who are experiencing hard and painful things, of feeling compassion for the lost ones, the hurt ones.

Once again, the quote that I taped to the maternity home wall, across from the chair where I would nurse and rock  Avalon, is still perfect:

"I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them all; but whatever I have placed in God's hands, that I still possess." -Martin Luther

Go fly, little girl. You belong to Him.