palm sunday and the prom

last night was the prom and i have a confession.

i've had my finger hovering over the "like" button on my friends facebook photos of their beautiful, sweet teens all dressed up together, but i've been unable to push it. why? because it's  complicated. because there aren't enough emoticons. because you should be able to click on several - like 'love' and 'sad'.

i knew this day was coming. i've known it for a long time. it is another piece of different. not going to a party. not going to the mall with friends, or the movies. or whatever.

i know different is hard to be around. it's hard to know what to say or do. there are eggshells involved and not walking on them. it's easier to avoid altogether. but for the heart underneath that different skin, those awkward words, what is that world like?

i'll admit that it used to be about me, the loss of things. i would grieve my not getting to go clothes shopping with my daughter because everything was too scratchy. not going to large gatherings because it was too loud. not doing the mani-pedi because it hurts. but i've long let that go. i've learned that it's me that must enter her world. and her world is fun too.

she loves stories and movies with chase scenes. all animals. most sweet things. and anything soft. she loves conversations and asking questions especially questions about people, are they dead or alive, how old they are, where were they born. and she loves music. even parts of music. again and again and again. she's kind to insects and gentle with people, especially people who others aren't gentle with.  most of all, she loves to make people laugh.

today is palm sunday. the day that Jesus began His decent to the cross. it was His high point- there was singing, praising, palms waving, hope abounding- even then His humility spoke as He entered jerusalem on a donkey. His humility, not His humanity- because that is not how humanity would have done it. we would have done it in a gilded carriage- reclining while being pulled through the streets.  we keep getting it wrong.

Jesus hung out with different. He saw through skin and words and money and health and He looked straight at the heart. He called people out for their inability to do this. He saw in the vulnerable, in the different, an ability for them to see things more clearly. perhaps they were already broken by life. perhaps they couldn't hide behind their skin or status. perhaps they were free-er. perhaps they were real.

i know Jesus loves all of us, but during his 33 years wearing skin, i think He would have especially loved to meet zoe. i think He would have hung out with her. He would have defended her inside out shirt wearing (it is less scratchy). He would have welcomed her questioning. He would have laughed at her jokes, let her help with His miracles, let her sit beside Him and taught her to wash feet. He would have appreciated her spirit of looking out for the least of these. He would have loved her then just as He loves her now- exactly as she is. maybe he would have even taken her to the prom.

zoe and friends at 'a night to shine' prom

zoe has broken me of some of my blindness. my tendency to forget the donkey and look around for a gilded carriage. my ease of getting lost in humanity. my challenge to see different with out pity. to see the reality that our hearts are absolutely beating just the same. that the bodies and minds we borrow for 80-ish years are so inconsequential compared to our spirits which bloom and grow forever.

so it is with a joyful heart that i will push 'like' on the pictures of my friends kids. because i do love them and i do love this day for them.  and i will wish instead of pushing both 'love' and 'sad', i could push both 'love' and 'haha' as i imagine Jesus taking zoe to the prom on a donkey, which is of course exactly the way they would go :).

welcome to the world

this morning i woke up and decided to stay in bed, which was exactly what you would have done if you'd been at my house last night.

oh dear.

i arrived home to her sitting paperclip style on her bed in front of the computer, she greeted me with 'what do you want MOM?' nothing new here. we talked for a few minutes much to her chagrin and i left to see the other kids.
the afternoon was going swimmingly. i love fridays. no homework. no pressure. no big deals. a grilled cheese and tomato soup night. rice krispie treats. but then her brother wanted to use the kids computer. it was about 4pm. she'd had it all day. it was reasonable. it was fair. it was his turn.

but to zoe, none of that matters. reason, fair, turns, all go out the window when she is convinced that she NEEDS it, whatever it is, to deal. you would have thought she was 2 years old and i'd given away her blankie. she yelled and slammed and stormed and obsessed. it's the last part that is actually the hardest. because the obsessed part grows worse with time. with each minute that she is not getting what she has convinced herself that she needs.

she did "okay" until dinner. it was a slow escalation. i watched her trying to distract herself with the TV but it was upsetting that her sister was watching too. she demanded to turn the TV off if she couldn't watch it alone, then refused to turn it off when asked to come to dinner. she fought her way through dinner. after dinner she was appeased with the rice krispie treats and engagement with her dad for a few minutes but the obsession kept coming back. an unwanted intruder that would not leave her alone.

we were trying to watch the news. she couldn't stop talking. she couldn't stop herself from insisting that she get back the computer. i tried to explain that her turn was over, but she couldn't take no for an answer. i tried to tell her i knew she was disappointed but that disappointment isn't the end of the  world. except that for her, that is what it felt like.

she was so unreasonable. so loud. so hysterical. we got her to her room and sat on her bed. by now it was 10pm and we were trying to get the other kids to bed too. there was so much drama and emotion in the room that it throbbed.

"i'm going to kill myself if i don't get that computer!"
"i know you're really upset and this feels awful, but it's important to learn to sit with our disappointments."
"I CAN'T!!! I CAN'T!!! DON'T YOU SEE THAT I'M SUFFERING!!!"

our presence was escalating her. our leaving was traumatizing her. it was like a 2 year old who has no idea how to soothe themselves- who wants you to stay and then go- who wants to do anything they can to not feel this bad. at this point the feelings have taken over- hijacked her - reason is out the window. so we put her in the bed and shut the door while she wailed.

the other kids were suffering too as we were asking them to go to sleep as the house pulsed with confusing emotion.
"poor zoe."
"i feel so bad for her."
"what's wrong with her?"
"i hate how upset she gets"
"what is she like this?"
and underneath is a lot of unsaid things. things that kids feel but don't say. things like 'is it my fault?' and 'is home safe?' and 'why does it have to be like this?' and 'where am i in this?' and 'i wish it was different' and 'i feel guilty that i wish it was different'.

i did my best. i tried to sit with them in their beds and answer as best i could and address the undergarments of their questions. but my heart was breaking.

i went back to zoe and sat in the dimly lit room on the edge of the bed and rubbed her bent back. "you know that i hate you right now" she said calmly, " can you handle that?"
"yup. i know." i said, "do you think you could play nicolette larson on your phone?"
"okay but it won't make me feel better."
'i know', i thought, 'i might make you feel worse.'

nicolette larson sang a lullaby album we listened to when zoe was a baby. she loved it.
and there it was. welcome to the world.

And i always knew,
That you were always there.
And i always want to be,
The one to care,
If your heart is broken,
If your feeling blue.
Welcome to the world,
That is here for you.

Welcome to the world,
That is shiny and new.
Welcome to a lifetime,
Of dreams come true.
Welcome to the joy,
Of living each day.
Love is all around you,
And here to stay.

I am here beside you,
I am here to stay.
I will keep you safe,
and never go away.
As you look around you,
Or your fast asleep.
All i have to give you,
is yours to keep.

it was beautiful and painful and true and broken, all at once and i just lost it. zoe and i bawled. we cried and cried- hers masked in her loss of computer and mine wearing the fatigue of the day- but both soaked in the reality of dreams not coming true. 

it was the cry that you cry when someone dies. that cry that knows there is no going back. the cry of a new reality. it felt like a cry of regretful acceptance.

 

the words pounded in our ears. where is the joy in her days? how has the world been there for her? where is the safety? where is the shiny and new? for me it was a slide show of 17 years. i held her shaking body and remembered all of it. the beauty of her birth, the newness, the waiting, the wondering what if, the watching things change from expected to unknown, the worry, the hope, the discouragement, the loneliness, the ache, the guilt, the denial, the breakthroughs, the regressions.

"why does it just keep getting worse?" she said. "it just keeps getting worse."

"it's not getting worse - you just feel it more. i'm sorry it's so hard."

"are you crying for me?"

"yes. i'm crying for you and for me. because this is so hard. zoe, i've done the best i could, i know i've messed up a lot, but i'm doing the best i can and i know you are too."

sometimes that's all you can do. sometimes the love that is beside you is what you have. sometimes you just sit in it together and have a good cry. hopefully you learn slowly that while life isn't fair, it's okay. hopefully you learn to down grade that disappointment from unbearable to bearable. hopefully you learn that when the night is dark, the sun comes up every morning.

and it did. and i got up. and so did she. the unbearable became bearable.  we went for milkshakes.