I left work early today, and I was home before Mom brought Thor in from their excursions.  I was more than two hours earlier than I ever get to the house.  When I heard them coming in the front door, I told B, “I’m going to hide.”  So, I threw a blanket over myself and sat on the sofa–hiding in plain sight works on 7 year olds.  It works on Grandmas, too because I had to wave at Mom to get her to notice me, and put a finger over my lips to keep her from exclaiming.

Thor was standing not 3 feet from me, and B said, “Hey, I think there is a lump over there on the sofa that might want a hug.” Thor paused, then walked over to me and started laughing.  And he laughed, and laughed, and laughed until he had tears in his eyes, hugging me, then leaning back to look at me and laugh some more.

It’s amazing and wonderful how something so simple and silly can bring so much joy.

My mom called me later to tell me how happy it made her to see how much the boy and I love each other, and to say, “And that’s how much I love you, too.”

You guys…I am humbled and grateful every day of my life.  It isn’t possible to do enough to deserve the love I’ve had around me, and it pricks at the most latent parts of my spirituality.  Critics talk about how the desperate and the downtrodden invent gods to make themselves feel better, but it is when I am at my happiest that I most want one.  I just want to say thank you and express my gratitude to someone–I need to say thank you*!  I’m after God’s heart because mine gets so full.  I miss my old zealotry and surety the most when I am bursting to say thank you.

Thor wanted to show me one of the Bibles my mom has bought him–it’s verse style, not story style, so he’s very impressed.  I asked if he’d like to see my favorite verse, and he said yes, but he certainly hoped it was in the New Testament because the Old Testament sure is boring.  He was in luck.

Romans 8:38, 39 reads, “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,^[k] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

He read that out loud in whatever translation his was, and I said, “That’s my favorite verse, and that’s how much I love you.  Nothing can ever separate you from how much I love you, or change that you are mine.”

It’s always been the “because He first loved me” aspect of Christianity that attracted me to the faith.

At this point in my life, I have a thousand more questions than I will ever have answers regarding God, but that’s okay.  Because if the god I chose  loves me anywhere near the way I love Thor–anywhere near the way my mother loves me, then the questions and uncertainty won’t bother him at all.  Not even my disbelief could separate me from that love.  (Sacrilege!  I know.  But not even his willful refusal to acknowledge me would make me turn my back my son, and I am an imperfect being.  It is possible [I think not probable, since he doesn’t show any tendencies toward serial killing or despotism] that he could do things to horrify and make me not like him, and possible that he could distress and disappoint me, but there is nothing that could quell the love I have for him.  Maybe that’s part of the imperfection of humanity–if it is, I prefer it to deity.)

Anyway…it is in every sense of the word a blessing to be married to my husband and into his family, and to belong to the family I was born into, and to have the family of friends I’ve made, and especially to be the family that we became when we had Thor, and I want to express my gratitude to everyone who has made even an ounce of it possible.

 

*This is a real issue for me.  I have sat on hold for 15 minutes waiting for a store manager, just to say thank you for good service.  I have a compulsive need to show gratitude that can manifest in a slavish devotion depending upon the level of thanks I am giving.  I guess there are worse compulsions?