Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Tuesday's Tears: My Weekend to Remember

Traffic was light on my blog this weekend.  I live in a fantasy world where that means everyone was gone doing a no-computer thing like I was.  It wasn't intentional - I was just busy having fun with my family doing things we don't normally get to do like the zoo and the museum and two sleepovers, a trip to the pool, snow cones, and a family get together.  And dodgeball.  And a visit with the new kiddos.  Yep.  That kind of stuff.  Welcome back from vacation everyone and welcome to summer!

Yes, we finally were able to visit our new kiddos this weekend.  It was just a short visit but it went much better than we expected and we're looking forward to our next one later this week.  It is a bit strange though.  We're waiting for the next call - another shoe to drop - letting us know that these kids are in fact not coming as we thought they were.  I think we both fully expect that call even though there is no reason to believe it will come.  What we do know and believe is that there is a good chance the kids will move in with us and then be ordered to leave only a few days later.  I guess we'll see.

In any case - everything about this weekend reminds mie of our journey now "3 years ago, today".  In case you haven't been around that long I recommend checking out my "1 year ago today" blog series, a real-life tale of complete chaos and sufficient tradgedy in my home.  This weekend there were plenty of reminders about it all besides the celebration of Memorial Day.  I silently remembered, day by day, what happened in our lives.  To add to it though there was the friend on Saturday who was wearing his new boot - the result of a broken ankle with torn ligaments.  There was the visit with our new kids and subsequent discussion about someone's plan to have them leave immediately after they arrived.  There was a relatives car troubles and my best friend's nephew's very serious motorcycle accident.  Really.  It was all there (and actually I didn't fully realize that until I started typing it out just now). 

3 years ago today my life was definitely hit by a hurricane that caused massive destruction and took a long time to recover from.  I'm still recovering.  For the most part I'm grateful for the experience as we learned a lot along the way but if I'm honest there are still parts of mie that suffer from long-term traumatic effects.  That season was very hard.  It's hard to believe I'll ever be at a point where I'm fully grateful for what we went through.  There's still bitterness and fear in my heart.  I know perfect love casts out all fear and I pray that will become evident here over time as well, sooner rather than later. 

Memorial Day is not about mie.  Corporately it is about celebrating and remembering those who gave their lives for our freedom and we outwardly paused as a family to acknowledge their sacrifice.  Personally though it has a new meaning added to it and I pray the inward pause that now brings fear and pain will eventually fully be replaced by one that glorifies God for His provision and healing.

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