jack benjamin nash * december 9, 2004

my heart is full tonight. it is full of joy and laughter * family and friends...

and it is full of sadness and ache and missing. 

missing all of the people that should still be here with us.

 

a wise friend, who lost her husband, told me at my son's funeral...there is a fine line that runs back and forth between joy and grief. i find myself running back and forth sometimes daily. 

it comes when i least expect it. 

for me, it can come when olivia asks about jack. she is curious as to "whose hands are in that picture?" 

and, "are they mine?" she will ask, "is that baby me?"

it also comes with milestones. 

there is joy because friends are watching their children take the next step into this milestone. and often i am caught up experiencing the moment, that it doesn't hit me until later...

that we should be experiencing this same milestone with jack. 

i'm thankful, though, that it doesn't hit me until later, 

because i love my friend's children.  they are very dear to me...

and, they bring olivia such beautiful friendship.

i thought when someone was grieving-they were grieving the past. that is such a small part of grief. 

i often find that present and future grief are just as difficult.

life is so very broken...not at all how our Father designed it to be.

when we lost jack, i really believed that i would never be able to experience joy again.

to be honest, i didn't even want to.  

i thought it would mean that somehow i had forgotten or replaced him.

but, we serve an amazing God-who will someday make all of it right...

and in the in-between times-He has given me so many people to share life with,

and experience the joy He longs for us to have.

this joy comes in the smallest packages at times...

it's watching olivia's dramatic dance as she closes her eyes and winds herself around the room,{and i belly laugh because that is all one can do with this type of performance} or, seeing ben teach olivia how to "grease" up her bike and check her tires.  it's playing scrabble with friends and texting google for the correct spelling, it's taking a road trip with my mom and jodi, it's holding my newest neice, it's going to chicago to spend time with ana, it's in celebrating my girlfriends-a wedding, a baby, a new paint color!

it is all around me.

 thank-you jesus that someday i will only know this kind of joy and so much more.

i will see you face to face.

and i will hold my son again.

i cannot wait.