Musings on life and nature
Life, like nature, has its seasons. We may know this intellectually but to experience it is an all together different matter. And experience it we must. In early spring, sunlight warms the cold, barren ground and the earth goes through a wondrous transformation. April showers cause life to shoot forth from a bleak landscape and creatures great and small bear their young playing their part in the great circle of life.
Summer comes and the intense heat challenges all that arrived in the pleasant time of Spring. The new creation meets the season. It prospers and thrives in the midst of change and produces fruit that grows in abundance.
Fall arrives and the days begin to shorten and the air begins to cool. The harvest of what spring and summer brought about is at hand. We rejoice over what the seasons have produced.
Winter brings a bleak and barren landscape once again. The short days and frigid nights bring to an end all that spring, summer and fall brought to fruition.
Most of us are blessed to be able to observe and participate in the seasonal changes that occur year after year in nature. Most of us live a life that sees us through to Winter and lets us produce some fruit along the way.
Yet what of those who are taken away in the Spring as their fruit is just beginning to bud. What purpose do they serve in the great circle of life? If they do not reach maturity and make it through the summer and into Fall what purpose has their life served?
Life to most of us is a mystery. It is filled with experiences common to all men and yet it also contains unique, unexplainable variances. My experience is unique yet it is understood at some level by most members of the human race. As I near the completion of seven decades of observing the seasons, let me tell you about one bud taken in the Spring.
She arrived on time in the winter. She struggled to make it through the season and gave us much cause to wonder if she would survive. She sucked her fingers and wanted to be held. She clung to a silky blanket that she kept nearby all the time. She gradually worked her way through her health problems and grew into a quiet tenacious young lady.
She loved to skate and put on plays. She was the best hugger. She could not see well and when she got glasses she was amazed by the detail she had never knew existed in the world around her.
She was happy-go-lucky and would rather play than study until one day in middle school she saw her older sister receive some academic awards and she came to understand “Knowledge is Power.” When I shared that idea with her I could see a light come on in her adolescent mind and she was a different, more focused young lady after that.
She loved her family, her church, her youth group and her school. She played the saxophone and wanted to be the drum major in the high school band. Most of all she loved Jesus. I still have her copy of Oswald Chambers “My Utmost for His Highest” which she read from nightly.
I so enjoyed my times spent with her discussing life and its purpose as seen through the eyes of a 15- year- old. Her depth of spiritual understanding was amazing for one still so young.
Two weeks before the accident that took her from us she was helping her Uncle with his resume.
We had a computer with a word processing capability which was new at that time and she was good at using it. She was helping him and as they worked he asked her what she wanted to do when she grew up. She told him she might want to spend some time on the mission field after college. Just the week before two missionaries in Central America had been killed and stories surrounding their murders were all over the news. He pointed out that might be a dangerous thing, citing the recent murders of the missionaries. He expressed concern for her safety and asked her what if something were to happen to her. She said it would be alright. “I’ll be with Jesus. God is in control.” He pursued the thought a bit farther and asked what about your parents. What if something happened to you? What about them? With a smile on her face and with an air of certainty she said “Oh, they’ll catch up.” Today is Dec. 5, 2020.
She arrived on this day 40 years ago. Her arrival brought us great joy. Her sudden and unexpected departure caused us great pain and deep sorrow. Although it has been 24 years since she left us, time has not completely erased the grief we felt because of her untimely departure nor has it diminished the recollection of the great joy her life brought to us for the 15 years and 11 months and one week she was physically present with us.
I still do not have a complete answer to the question posed in this short column and I doubt that I ever will but I know without a doubt her life had meaning and purpose because she had meaning and purpose to me.
I believe my life is richer and fuller because I had the joy of being her daddy. Her life and death has been a part of the fabric of my life and hopefully that experience has helped me be a better man.
I resolved long ago to be better rather than bitter. I know that any fruit I bear in the summer and fall of my life in part has come about because I had the great good fortune to be the father of a young lady name Rebecca Leigh. When the winter of my life arrives, whenever that may be, I look forward to “catching up” with that budding flower taken in the spring who’s short life made a difference in me.
To my sweet Rebecca on your 40th birthday!!!
Love you, Daddy