A BETTER DAY

I’ve always loved Father’s Day because that’s when I get to do so much fun stuff, like eating every wrong thing on my low carb diet because I get to choose the menu (and Pam can’t say anything). I especially love forcing each chipmunk to sit with me for at least ten minutes so they can nurture me and I can tickle them, kiss them and be overwhelmed by the joy their long hugs bring. Oh yes, it’s also a time when they can lie to me and tell me how young I look and that I’m so wonderful…(I really love that part).It occurred to me this morning that there are others to remember on this day. I think of some families who don’t have the same opportunity to be as happy. I think of those whose partners have passed away, and on this date there’s a longing and a melancholic cloud. There are those too who’ve been abandoned by partners whose narcissism and inability to comprehend the word commitment make this occasion just one more dark remembrance. There are father’s who have lost children, and so many more stories to be sure. I certainly don’t have the ability to speak to every circumstance, but these are just the situations that came to my mind this morning. 

I have often prayed for, worked at and contributed to shelters that support abandoned moms left financially bereft, homeless, with no family support system. When you live comfortably, it is nearly impossible to fathom the weight of stress on a mother or father of children who are looking for work, just looking to catch a break…not even so much for themselves…but for their children. For them this day just becomes another day to survive.

So on this Father’s Day I’m celebrating the woman or man who in desperation cries out, “I can’t do this anymore ….I’ve got nothing left in me”…but if only for love of the children, they do it anyway because something inside them is prodding them and whispering, “keep going”…..and so they press on thru their day, hoping and praying till they can’t pray anymore ….and then cry themselves to sleep.. It’s a hard life, it’s a troubling, exhausting, sometimes emotional and explosive existence…but they keep on because there’s this voice…this unseen presence that keeps whispering to them…. ”Hush now child…there’s a better day a comin’…God is near”. …and so they wait.