What Happens When You Get Lost

My Oldest. Almost eighteen.

Years ago, I attended the memorial service of a man who had changed my life and the lives of many others. He had been a sage: someone to whom individuals in crisis had turned for words of wisdom and encouragement. He had been among the most powerful representatives of Jesus I had ever known, and the day of his memorial service, I was devastated, knowing the future would hold many occasions in which I would miss his counsel and his love.

I considered that same day, however, the possibility that members of his family hadn't experienced him in the way I had. Some of them seemed puzzled--surprised, even--by anecdotes and testimonials shared about him. I surmised that they hadn't been able to forget and/or entirely forgive the younger, foolhardy version of this man about whom I'd heard but whom I'd never encountered...and by whom I'd never been wounded.

As years passed, I came to understand that my parents are that man. They, too, have active relationships with Jesus and are being sanctified, i.e., they are learning, growing, and becoming more Christlike all the time. Despite the fact that I live states away, sometimes I witness their ministering to others in a way that feels puzzling and surprising (among other adjectives). This is not to imply that they were bad people or parents years ago, but like everyone else, they had their share of shortcomings, and--over the years of our being physically separated--they have changed. 

It can be challenging to try to see people for who they are (who they have become) as opposed to who they once were. This is especially true, I think, when there are unresolved issues or when there is hidden/lingering emotional pain.

On some level, I've known for awhile that I'm no different or better than my friend or my parents. I've shared Stafford's "What Happens When You Get Lost" with literature students and talked about the poem specifically in the context of parenting. Even older parents are relatively young, I've posited; by the time they start to figure things out, their children are grown and either repeating the parents' mistakes or overcorrecting from them. This is why it's so hard to break negative, behavioral patterns in families. Stafford says: "Some things cannot be redeemed in a hurry," and: "Mistakes have consequences that do not just disappear," and: "If evil could be canceled easily it would not be very evil." I believed Stafford from the moment I first read his poem, but

I've come to believe him on a different level over the past few weeks. I can't really write about it, yet (or ever), but I've truly had the most terrifying experience of my life. The insides of my bones hurt. The insides of my eyeballs hurt, and I don't mean the pupils; I mean the cores of my eyeballs: a new sensation. I've been on my knees in a hospital; I've been on my knees in the altar of my church; I've had panic attacks in a hallway, my bathtub, a parking lot, my minivan, a restaurant. I've had a panic attack in front of medical and legal professionals.

And I've taken a good, hard look at the years I've spent in the figurative mountains, ill-equipped, trying to survive and making a tremendous mess of so many things. It's been so painful to look at this situation as a consequence, in part, of my sins and shortcomings.

I called my dad at the outset of this crisis. I only called him because my mom didn't pick up, as he had been a miserable failure in crises of this nature all my life. But there he was, my dad, on the other end of the line. We were both in so much pain. I was crying hysterically, and he was coughing incessantly, which is what he does when he's upset or anxious. It was terrible but also beautiful: I expected him to run for the hills, and he didn't. He absolutely did not. He chose, instead, to sit in the tension and be the dad I needed.

So? Jesus. And may He redeem, even if not in a hurry.

May He see us. May He watch us. May He know our names even and especially if we don't deserve it. Amen.