Bitter and Sweet

How can one day contain this much emotion?

Yesterday, the Saturday before Father’s Day, I spent several hours with two people I haven’t seen in years, people who were two of my best friends throughout the 1990’s. One was my roommate and sharer of clothing, my shoulder to cry on, partner in prayer, and the melody to my harmony as we careened through the NC Mountains in my little white pickup truck or gripped microphones at church. The other was my concert-going, head-bangin' buddy, my “little brother,” with whom I was honored to walk as he loved and supported his first wife through her valiant fight against cancer, and then while he grieved in agony for her when she left him, much too young, to be with the Lord. These two remarkable people helped make me the person I am today; few others have shared such influence on me. We enjoyed a wonderful time together at his home, talking and laughing and feeling the years fall away.

A few hours later, I was standing over my mother’s grave, stricken again by her name on the stone and feeling intensely the loss. You see, in the misty and secluded southern Appalachian Mountains that my parents’ families have called home for generations, we have a tradition called Decoration Day. It generally falls on Father’s Day, and consists of family reunions and some sort of memorial for those who’ve preceded us in death. So the early evening found me helping my father’s sister carry and place flowers on the earthly resting places of my paternal grandparents at the family cemetery. A half hour later, quite alone now, I was tending my mother’s grave, as well as her mother’s and father’s, carefully placing flowers and preparing them for tomorrow’s visitors to the cemetery. Performing this task by myself was difficult, highly emotional, and left me feeling very lonely and very alone. I drove away with a heavy heart, experiencing her absence afresh.

A few hours later still, finally back home, I signed into Facebook and learned what I had missed when I couldn’t answer my phone when it rang in the early afternoon. My lovely friend in Chicago had called me but she didn’t leave a message. I guess she figured that telling me she’d gotten engaged was too much for a voicemail! I would have to agree. My happiness for her overflowed; she has patiently waited for God’s perfect choice for her, and He has proven Himself faithful once again. 

Throughout the day I alternately laughed and cried, and I welcomed the tears: tears of happiness, of missed years regained and friendships renewed, of joyful milestones, and of continued grieving. God is sovereign and He is good. He gave me precious friends, people who love me as much as I love them, and he gave me a mom who for 50 years made me feel as if I were the most special person in her world and who treated me as both her daughter and her friend. I am grateful to Him for all of these incomparable people who have enriched my life.

A current song by Wes King is playing in my mind: “Life is precious, life is sweet.” Sometimes it is bittersweet. And sometimes it is just bitter. But it is always precious.

Youtube video of Life is Precious by Wes King

Regrets

Frequently over the past months, I’ve heard people talking about regrets. Mainly they talk about not having any, not regretting anything you’ve done because it’s helped shape who you are today. It’s a good argument, at first glance, but it doesn’t hold up under pressure, at least not for the serious believer in Christ, and I would venture not very well for anyone with a conscience.

I regret a lot of what I’ve done over the years, from the time I was a little girl until now. Some things I’d do over if I could for my own benefit, like ignoring the outside influences that ruined the piano lessons I loved with all my heart, causing me to finally stop playing altogether. I would love to go back and change that; I am so musical, but it has very little way to manifest itself outside of singing, and I’m only a fair singer. Others are choices that caused a lot of pain for me and often for others. Two failed marriages scream to the top of that list. If I had married wisely, or not married at all, how very different my life would be now. I might be working in Spain or NYC, or I might even have children, for goodness sakes!

Some regrets are more painful, mainly because of the way my actions have hurt others. When my mom’s mother, my beloved Mimi, died in 1994, I immediately regretted not having spent as much time with her over the course of the preceding year as I had prior to that. It was all because of a stupid romantic entanglement that stole my attention away from her when she needed me. She had been so incredibly important to me, even living with us until I was about five years old, and when she died I deeply regretted having spent so little time with her over that year. Those choices haunt me still.

You would think, with that experience behind me, I would’ve made different choices with my mom. For a long while, I did. Then my career began to fail, and I finally had to take a job that moved me farther away from her. As a result, I didn’t get down to see her as often as I had before. When my aunt, her sister who lived with her, died last June, Mom started simply refusing to let me come. I think it was partly because she was depressed but also because when I came, I worked rather than just visited with her. She had so many things around the house that needed doing, and I wanted to clean out my aunt’s room.  Mom really didn’t want me to do that; it hurt her too much to even consider, so she simply wouldn’t let me come. The last six months of Mom’s life, I spent almost NO TIME with her.

Finally, last Thanksgiving, I decided to go see friends in New England instead of seeing Mom. I don’t usually do “family things” on that particular holiday. You see, I love the concept of Thanksgiving; I am very grateful for all the myriad of blessings I enjoy. But Thanksgiving has been marked in my life by unhappy events, from my paternal grandfather’s death in the 80’s, which resulted in my dad’s family’s relative denial of the holiday, to my mother’s drinking in the 80’s and 90’s that ruined several Thanksgiving celebrations on the maternal side of the family. So when Mom began getting sick, I was in Massachusetts. I returned just in time to fuss at her over the phone, try to get her to go to the emergency room, make her promise to go to the doctor on Monday, and then get the call, at school, that she had died at 6:00 in the morning, just hours before she would’ve seen her doctor.

I don’t know how to process all of that without regrets. It seems a hard-heartedness would be required, and it just isn’t in me. My heart is soft. I feel everything keenly. And so I live with a profound regret over having neglected Mom in the last months of her life. I wish I had coaxed her to let me come down by promising to just visit, or take her to lunch, or go with her to the doctor. I wish I had chosen to spend Thanksgiving, her last Thanksgiving, with her. I wish, I wish, I wish.

You can’t go back. You have to go forward. So I face front and lean into my future, but not without regrets.