Five Years Later

A letter to my youngest children regarding the lockdowns of 2020

Remember that spring when everything stopped? Remember when your older sister and brother came home for a week of break from collegem and just... stayed? Remember when first speech therapy and occupational therapy disappeared, and then your music lessons took place in the living room, where Momma tied the iPad to the stand next to your Suzuki book to make sure it stayed put?

Remember when you couldn't go to co-op anymore, but instead watched videos of your tutors on the couch and made up your own class, which you called the Masterjourneyprentices? Remember when we pulled out the big t.v. every Sunday morning so that our pastor could preach to our little audience of 10? Remember when Mamaw and Papaw couldn't come to your End of Year Celebration, and Wednesday lunches with Grandpa and Gramma were put on indefinite hold?

Remember when we waved to the UPS guy instead of opening to the door to chat a minute? Remember when spring came, but our weekly Tuesday night community dinners didn't? Remember when Good Friday communion service was held around our coffee table?

I know you remember all of this. I know it sank into the fiber of who you are, and it became part of you. I see reflections of it now, five years later, and have to remind myself that it this thing that caught me (and the world) so totally by surprise was always supposed to be part of your story. It was always meant to shape you. God meant for it to do just that; His economy wastes nothing, not joy or pain, chaos or calm. That time was meant to be etched into your soul. Never forget— Genesis 50:20 tells us that God uses even the worst for His glory. I don't know why. I would have never chosen that season for you. I know it was confusing. I know the fact that Momma and Daddy weren't sure what was going on either was unsettling. But, just like we kept telling you then, God knew. He wasn't surprised. And He had a plan and a purpose that He was bringing to bear. Maybe you’ll know what it was some day. Maybe you never will. But either way, I hope when you look back, you see His fingerprints, His hands holding it all.

And I hope you remember other things. Equally important things that God intended for you to treasure up, to shape you, as well:

Remember when Daddy took you on walks up into the neighborhood after dinner, and you looked for teddy bears in windows? Remember when we had so many fire pit sing-alongs we burned through a whole stack of wood and many large bags of marshmallows? Remember when we strung a zipline from the deck to the ground and timed your stuffed animals in their descent? Remember when the Great Blue Heron came back to the creek every night? Remember when you found that fully intact bluebird egg and we candled it to see inside? Remember when we uncovered three tiny baby rat snakes in the side bed when we were weeding and mulching? Remember seeing the asparagus bed come alive, and marveling at how each stalk grew inches overnight? Remember FaceTiming with family on Sunday afternoons? Remember when you read so many books you couldn't decide which was your favorite? Remember tying up hammocks and rocking in the wind? Remembering climbing into the pen with Napoleon the rabbit and spending a warm hour hand feeding him grass clippings? Remember watching the irises, the blueberries, the tulips, the strawberries, the dogwoods all bloom, day by day, and taking stock of each tiny step in the process because there was nowhere else to go and nothing more important that this?

I know you remember the disruption. I know you remember the hard parts. I know you’ve been marked by the chaos and distrust and frustration that grew out of those weeks where nothing was as it should have been. I know you’ve grown up in the shadow of all that came next for our community, our nation, our world. But, I hope you remember all the good as well. There was beauty in the spring of 2020. There was a calm, quiet unfolding that we took special notice of, even in the swirl of the strange separations and uncertainty. I pray that all of that was sown into the soil of your memory as well, right alongside the turmoil. God had a purpose for those seeds, too, you know. One was never meant to be greater than the other; He allowed both. When you think of one, I pray you think of the other—and maybe even smile.

In Christ,

Momma