Another Beautiful Day

I went over to visit my dear friend Pom Pom and she had pictures
of her class room for this year. I think they are the dearest pictures
and I wanted to go sit in her class room. Then I remembered when I was in sixth grade
I couldn't make my mind want to go back to sixth grade.

I will give you a warning here so you can stop and go to another blog.
I think this will be a sad post. Not to mention it is one of those many stories
I tell.

The summer of 1969 was a hard summer as my Mom was getting sicker and sicker.
My Mom wouldn't let anyone tell us that she was going to die but that she would get
well soon. She tried very hard to do the normal things she has always done like keep
the house clean and dinner cooked. By this time in August though, she was spending
more and more time in bed sleeping. We had people who would come and stay.

I spent more and more time outside. Never once, did I ever entertain the idea
that she would die. School started that first Tuesday after Labor Day, and I was in
sixth grade. It would be the first time I had a man teacher. I want you to know, that
he was a fair and just man. He was a good teacher. He had a thing he did and we
sat in the class room according to our grade point average for the week. We would
work all week and then the last 30 minutes of the following Friday we would move
our desks around the class room. Ending that first week in September, my desk was
in the one of the first two rows next to the teachers desk. That was the rows for the
smart kids and as you moved across the room to the back side was the slower more
troublesome students. Kind of like classroom no man's land.


I went to school on Monday, and my Mom was in the hospital when I got home from
school. I expected her to be home later, like all of the times before. That night, my brother
and sister and I slept in my parents bedroom, I know some adult must have been with us
but I don't remember. During the night, I had this dream. I want you to know, that I don't
do dreams and visions but I do believe that in times of great distress they can happen.

In my dream, there was this voice, and it called my name, He said, because it was a mans voice
" Kim, I have to take your Mother now to live with me. " I was crying and saying " No, no, you can't, you can't, what will I do?" " He very lovingly and so kindly said, " It is time for her to
come to live with me now, but you will be okay, will you trust me?" The love that washed over me was so compelling and so gentle and so complete, that I said, " I would."


Then I woke up. I looked at the clock on the dresser. It was 7:10 A.M. I knew we wouldn't be going to school that day. I knew we were going to miss the bus. As I laid there, I knew she
was gone. But I kept telling myself, I would be okay. I could hear voices talking and
crying in the living room. I heard the bus come to the house and someone go outside
to tell the bus driver. I kept waiting because I knew what was going to be coming.
Then my grand parents and my Dad came in and woke up my brother and sister,
I told them I already knew and told them how. I think my mind is pretty blank or
there is so much pain I can't talk or write about it very much. I will tell you riding in
that hearse was a big disappointment. I thought we would get to run red lights.
We didn't.


The following Monday I had made up my mind that the sooner I did normal the better off
I would be. My grand parents and my Dad didn't want me to go back to school but I needed
to get away from home.
As I got off the bus and walked towards where all of my friends hung out silence fell over the
playground. Kids stopped what they were doing as I walked. They turned and watched me,
and I could hear the whispers of, " Her Mom died." As I walked, one of the girls I had known
all of my life broke out of the crowd and came to me and grabbed my arm and led me away
telling me how sorry she was, I still remember that one act of kindness and it was so huge.

Class started, and as I walked into the class room, my desk was not where it had been the
last time I was there. My eyes traveled and my desk was now all of the way across the room
with the kids that were different from me. All boys. Mean boys.

The teacher got up to explain because I had missed a week of school and I was a week behind
because of no school work that was where I had to sit. I was so mortified. I know now that
as a verse says, " Iron entered my soul." So for a week, I worked as I had never worked
in my life. I still remember how dirty the floor was over there and how my shoes would scape
across sand. Maybe even the janitor didn't even clean over there. I would get off the school bus
and go to a empty house, and begin to make beds and clean as my Mother had done.


By that Friday, when it came time for us to rearrange the class room according to grade point
averages, I received accolades from the class and the teacher. All of the class wanted to help
move my desk back. I learned something that was bad though, I only did enough work after that
to keep me with my friends. I didn't want to move to the front of the class because then
I would be at the teachers desk and I didn't want that. So I stayed were it was safe.

My legacy was I think from my Mother, three verses.

Revelation 3:20 "Behold, I stand at the door and knock, if any man hears my voice and
opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him and he with me."

Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding
in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight.

1 Thessalonians 5:18 In Everything give thanks, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.

I would repeat these to myself over and over. But it wasn't until I was almost 40 that I understood, that God didn't make a mistake by wounding me as He did. He did it for my good and His glory. When I finally understood that He never did leave me, nor did He ever forsake me
and it was part of a beautiful plan. I was finally at peace. Then I understood, what
true joy is and how it can come out of some of the hardest trials.
It helped me to see beauty in the smallest things in life. Something I might have
overlooked if not for the loving hand of God in my life.

That is why Pom Pom's class room spoke to me today. How I wished it had been like
that but it wasn't. I know too, that kids today, have it 10 times worse than I ever did.
They need that kind of class room, because so many kids today don't have that kind
of life at home.

Now if you have made it to the end, thank you for letting me share today.
This story wouldn't shut up today and I have lots to do so it had to be written.
I hope you have a lovely week next week, as I am going back to school too.

Blessings,
~Kim~