a day not to remember
The best thing I can say about today is that, when my kids are adults, well adjusted and thriving in their adult selves, they will not remember it. Today will be forgotten. They might remember the party at Grandma's house two days ago. They might remember playing with their friends at bible study last night or with their other friends at small group tomorrow. They may remember Zion's birthday party on Saturday or our trip to the Zoo next week. But Thursday May 1st 2014? It will pass unseen into oblivion.
My children will not remember this uneventful Thursday sandwiched between so much busyness, when Mama complained of a migraine and told them over and over to be quiet. When Zion screamed "I'M MAD AT YOU MAMA" before falling asleep in my lap. When Harvey sat at the bottom or the bed and whined, "I don't know what I want to dooooo!" because lying in bed and being quiet was the best entertainment plan Mama could come up. No one will remember this day, thank God. It was not good enough to plant seeds of multi-genrational contentment. It was not bad enough to sow traumas that will later come up in therapy. It was just a day.
And in this life where so many days compete to COUNT for something, I am grateful for mediocre days that silently slip into forgotten.
But God will remember. And when I stand before him in that place of reckoning he will say, "Remember that day when you had a migraine? Thursday May 1st, 2014? You put two meals on the table and brought upstairs a picnic snack, and you refilled six cups of juice. I remember that. When all you wanted to do was sleep, but instead you read a chapter of Winnie the Poo and smiled at your baby through blurry eyes? I remember that. When Harvey stubbed his toe on the door and Zion threw a lego at your head and Elijah had to nurse over and over again? For Harvey you were the face of comfort, and for Zion you were the face of mercy, and for Elijah you were the face of abundance.
"I remember that," Jesus will say. "I WAS that comfort, and mercy, and abundance when you had none."
And may also say, "Remember how you tried to solve your headache problem with chocolate? An intemperate amount of chocolate? An over-the-top, food-is-my-idol sort of amount of chocolate? Yeah, I saw that too."
And tomorrow is another day...