When Darkness Lifts
Today when I woke, it had lifted, like sunshine peeking after rain.
And as my toddler clicked on the lamp beside my bed to see her Mama,
I saw me too. I got out of bed and I walked down the hall. And
the coffee pot sat there waiting for me, as always, like my husband at the kitchen table with his books.
He smiled at me, and I think he could tell- as I took my medicine and I took down a mug, and poured my coffee.
I opened the secretary desk and pulled out the chair and my Bible, like they weren’t a hundred pounds- like yesterday.
Like my toddler wasn’t behind me with her little hooks around my neck, as always,but she was.
And I rolled with the punches, as if I always do, as if yesterday never happened-
when I was in bed and the kids got to watch movies. They rejoiced when I said yes to ice cream at a random time of day. (And one girl took me literally when I said yes to as much as she wanted.)
When I texted my husband and he said he was “Sorry, babe. I know that’s a hard place to be.” And he Instacarted us frozen pizza for dinner, like it was no trouble at all to care for his wife.
The children were sick anyway, and so they didn’t suspect a thing when
Dad came home and he moved all the multiple furnitures that had been irrationally stressing me out for days. He said he knew I would ask again someday, and he was okay with that. But anyway, back to this morning,
when I woke, like the sun after rain.
When I smiled and kissed my husband,
and went out with the recycling and the cold air that smelled like Christmas.
When I kept my phone in my room on the charger all morning. And, swatting the fruit flies that had been calling me a bad Mom for days, I unpeeled the brown bananas.
They smelled sweet as I mashed them, and cracked the eggs from our Amish neighbors. I filled the muffin tin with liners; poured in the buttery batter. I made my sick kids more toast, and
I said unto my soul, “be at rest once more”, for the Lord has been good to me. “He inclines His ear.” “He cares for those who trust in Him.” The joy really does come in the morning, and I think for the first time I can see it so clearly.
I see it so clearly in my heart, and so that’s why I had to write it down-
On Earth, the darkness will come; the days like yesterday.
But there is beauty I can’t see like He can see.
Like presents under the tree, or the Baby in the manger.
Like Easter eggs, or His Body in the tomb.
Like cold air like Christmas memories, like frozen pizza;
like old bananas mixed into muffins.
“Return unto thy rest, O my soul; for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee.”
________
PSALM 116
1 I love the Lord, because he has heard my voice and my pleas for mercy.
2Because he inclined his ear to me, therefore I will call on him as long as I live.
5Gracious is the Lord, and righteous; our God is merciful.
6The Lord preserves the simple; when I was brought low, he saved me.
7Return, O my soul, to your rest; for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.
12What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits to me?
13I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord,