Reach Out

“In every seed to breathe the flower,

In every drop of dew

To reverence a cloistered star

Within the distant blue;

To wait the promise of the bow

Despite the cloud between,

Is Faith–the fervid evidence

Of loveliness unseen.”

~John B. Tabb

~~~~~

The night after I found out my birth name was supposed to be lucky, I was lying in my twin bed, with the weight of the quilt adding to my burden.   The changes of my name baffled me.   I thought of my middle name and wondered about it.  I whispered “Elaine” into the darkness.  Then I said “Jennifer Elaine.” Then “Jennifer Elaine Tirrell.”    I got up for a minute and took four steps to my dresser, quietly lifting the lid to my white jewelry box.  I took out the charm bracelet that I received when I was adopted and rubbed the round charm with my thumb.  I couldn’t see it, but I knew another name was etched into the gold: “Jennifer Tirrell Fay.”  

The charm bracelet got stolen by a thief who broke into my house years later.  The thief broke the glass on our back door and I found it shattered across our wide pine floors one day.  Confused, at first I couldn’t understand where the glass came from and what I was seeing.  Insidious fear slithered up my body, warning me to proceed carefully.  It is interesting how your body knows first what your mind cannot conceive at times.  Even after noting the panes of glass in a couple sections of the french door were now just jagged edges, I remained aloof to the idea of a thief breaking in and stealing.  But as much as I rejected the truth, it was still the truth.  It was a fact I would have to face.   That, and the knowledge that he wanted to steal the most precious things in life.  

Even as an adult, I still had the same white jewelry box, with the same red velveteen lining.  In it lay a bunch of cheap earrings, a little cross my grandmother had cross-stitched with white yarn and a little pink ribbon, another cross – this one flat and silver with the words “Jesus is Lord” stamped into it, a necklace with five pearls given to me during the first five years of my life by a sister, and my adoption charm bracelet.  The thief took the whole box.  He took it all.  I never saw it or any of the contents again.  

Rubbing my thumb across the engraving as a little girl helped me understand my new reality a bit more.  Feeling the strength of the gold links from which the charm hung, pacified me for a moment.  Putting the treasure back in its red-lined compartment, I padded back to my bed and slipped under the covers again.   After a while, the tears came.  I got going so hard that my Dad heard me as he passed by our door.   “Jenny, what is it?”  he sighed, crossing by my sister’s twin bed and settling his 6’1” frame awkwardly onto the edge of my bed.  Thankfully, she was a sound sleeper.  It felt good to have the weight of him there.   I wanted to tell him what was wrong, but I couldn’t.  I didn’t know, myself.  He sat there, letting me cry until I choked out one word.

“Why?”

My new Dad looked up to the heavens for a moment, folded his hands, and let out another long sigh.  “Jenny, we don’t know why.  But we trust.”  Then I heard his voice start The Lord’s Prayer, and I knew I should join in, so in a wobbly voice, I did.  I felt better after he gave my head a pat, and left.  This simple action was typical of my new Dad.  He was not demonstrative, but we knew he loved us.  He was steadfast, and so was his faith.  Much later, when he was almost 80 years old, and was failing, I was able to tell him that there was not one day that I could remember that he was not all a father should be to his children.  He loved us as his own.  He wasn’t perfect, of course, but he kept “the main thing, the main thing.”  Insight came much later, but when it did, my heart was swollen with gratitude for this solid beginning.

Alone again in my little bed, I remember taking my arms out from under the covers and reaching them up into the air, my pajama sleeves falling away to my shoulders.  I reached and reached and reached, hoping that my mother would reach back.  I knew she was up there, somewhere, in the heaven I had just prayed about, and so I kept reaching, and silently crying.  My arms ached with the outstretching; pleading for a response.  

My hands were taken that night.  I felt a touch that comforted me.  It was not my mother.  I knew with certainty I was held by Jesus.