Peter Pan,...I get your pain!
Andrew (21) , Alison and Elliot (18)I never thought the day they would actually be able to fit into these clothes would come so quickly?
My oldest son doesn't call me as often as I'd like him to....come to think of it he doesn't call me at all unless he is returning one of my many calls I leave on his voice mail. So in all honesty if I am graced with one returned call I am lucky, or should I say blessed.
A little over a year ago he moved out on his own with two other friends and at first I must say, I was sad, very sad,...ok I cried for two weeks non stop and was actually feeling extremely depressed about the fact that my life was changing. There is something about the reality of never returning to never-never land again,...for the first time in my life, I was now feeling Peter Pans pain. I mean, I was actually getting his message. I guess what I am trying to say here is this; I now really get that movie, and I must say, I enjoyed it a lot more snuggled on the couch with my kids in our Jammie's on Saturday mornings than I do now with them all grown up and gone.
I'm pretty sure Dave was doing his best to keep me moving and so busy that I didn't have time to dwell on my sadness when the first one moved out, but I found my self becoming this great multitasker! I was able to keep up with his list plus dwell on the sad reality that the oldest son was now gone. The family dynamics are now changed forever,... as it should be. We take on these jobs raising children knowing that if our job is done right,... that it indeed should end. Our job as parents is to raise our children to be independent of us not dependent on us. So what was my problem?
Being a mom has it's Hallmark card moments...and then it has it's Far Side scenarios. I am feeling like the Far Side is where I am now with the oldest. So what if we don't get the phone calls, the birthday cards in the mail, a call on mothers day or maybe only a 5 minute drop in visit on Christmas day? If I said that it didn't hurt I wouldn't be a mom, but how I respond as a mom is what makes all the difference --- in my mind, heart and my relationship with my child.
So as I was nursing my mom wounds one day I decided to try something different. Something intentionally different, intentionally loving and so far, it works! I call him, I visit him, drop him a message in his email box, send him a note in the mail, drop him off a gift on his front porch, pick him up for coffee, take him a basket of his favorite food goodies, pick him up and take him to lunch on Sunday and I don't expect anything warm and gooey in return. I know I want more; sometimes I even wish I could turn back the hands of time and hold on to him like a little baby. But I know that time can not be brought back, it is gone forever and it is now time to move forward with the new time and in a new direction.
God gives us new opportunities to move on, to keep on giving to keep on loving unconditionally. After all isn't this Gods message to us? Does our loving God sit back and ignore his children just because we don't respond the way He wants us to, the way He expects us to, or the way he desires us to? Have I received more calls, more cards, more drop in visits? Nope. Do I expect more? Nope....do I desire more, yep...until the day I die.
God wants us to keep sending out love because he knows that when we stop, our hearts wither and grow hard. The soil that he longs to keep tilling and planting till the day we die becomes packed down with sorrow and bitterness, and we miss the harvest of all he has yet to bring forth in our lives regardless of our heartaches and disappointments. God is never finished using us moms, nor is he ever finished blessing us either!
I choose to keep our family bound together...the only way I can is through a changed heart on my part,... all the while, using up all the love God has sent our way to share with others,...now that is a lot of love to share!
My final message to Peter Pan is, grow up and move out! Trust in the God of history, who promises that one day soon "all really will be well" and the never never land that God has set up for us really will go on forever!
Now, I need to head on over to the oldest sons house and drop off this coat I found on sale for him, who knows,...maybe there will be time for coffee, if not than another time will do.