― One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are
It is May! The stirring excitement readying our seniors to walk the stage, preparing to take the rite of passage to open roads, to next chapters, to forging new paths. I have lived the life of a school counselor for nearly the past 15 years. What an honor, what a gift to have the privilege of speaking into the lives of students and to watch them transform from youthful seekers to resilient young adults learning to write beautiful stories with their lives. For more than 15 years, I have watched them march to Pomp and Circumstance and transfer their tassels. This month has equated to excitement for my family for so many years. And then today I realized that May graduations are now bittersweet.
I worked hard for the first year or two forcing myself to take first steps. I visited the hospital floor and hugged my nurse-family. I walked into the Bone Marrow Transplant unit and thanked the doctors with collages. I sold a home and moved away. I bought a house and accepted this counseling position, walking into another high school for the first time by myself. And God has seen me through, has blessed me beyond my wildest thoughts with a new school family who are amazing at loving me. But then today, after almost three years and thinking I was through with "firsts," another one hit - graduation. This Friday, May 24th will be the first graduation I've been part of by myself.
Grief comes in waves. Sometimes it feels like tremors. Sometimes they feel like undertows and I can't breathe. I wish dates weren't important. I wish anniversaries didn't exist. At least today I do. Honestly, I'm tired of firsts, especially when I thought I was through. So in the waves, the tremors, the undertows I wildly grasp for anything that can steady me. And then I remember...God doesn't waste pain. He's helping me write my story and He always brings beauty from the ashes. He is in my waiting, my waiting for something more. So in my times of tremors, sometimes I write to reflect, to release. I write to give perspective to the pain of this world - it is but a moment. 2 Corinthians 4:17 "For our momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison."
