God Won't Pinch Your Cheeks
I passed through the toddler section at Rich's department store on Saturday. There were hordes of moms buying too-expensive sweaters, dresses, and designer shoes for their children. It struck me that, by now, each of these parents of two-year-olds and three-year-olds must know how quickly their children grow out of clothing. All for what? So their babies don't fall behind what's in fashion? Baby and toddler clothes are definitely more for mommy and all of her swooning friends than anything else.It is always amazing to see how quickly kids gain verbal ability, physical dexterity, height, and weight. We're all familiar with the classic archetype of over-bearing auntie, who must possess certificates and degrees in cheek pinching. Ah, and her famous one-liner: You're getting so big. And questions of this nature: "How old are you now, anyway? Twenty-five?" No, __insert relative name here__, I'm only twelve. And there's laughing and more pinching and calling over other participants and it's grand.
What's more astounding than watching a child grow day by day, sometimes, is going a long while in between visits. Whatever context or understanding of the child you might have had has changed, and you're left to play catch up. And as I think about it, I realise that life is this way, too. Not exactly, though.
Life isn't something we can visit from time to time. But we can treat it like that. It is always happening whether we take the time to notice or not. What's interesting is how easy it becomes to not notice. Our days can be saturated by projects and deadlines and busyness to the point we don't have a clear recollection of what we've accomplished or what amount of time has actually gone by.
Life grows, too. Or at least, we grow in life. New circumstances and responsibilities are like spurts of growth in height and weight. And when these are compounding, one after another, living can feel like something too heavy to carry anymore. I feel as if life is a kid I haven't seen for a while, just long enough to try and pick it up and realise that it's too heavy now for me to hold, and bounce on my knee. The games and songs that used to keep it occupied don't work anymore. And I'm left to speed around the learning curve, praying for traction, precise steering, and no furry little animals in the way.
Perhaps I was naive to think that I could ever carry my own life in the first place. Maybe God was holding me up all the while, and so I didn't feel the weight of living. Now that I am getting married and looking to make a career change (or gain a career, more like it), I know that my arms are not strong enough, my back is too weak. And all I can do now is ask God to take what I'm trying to carry on my own and bear the load. What I understand now is that He lets us feel the weight sometimes in order to strengthen our muscles for living. But, man, does it hurt sometimes.
