Scarred By Love

At first glance, my demographic can be sized up pretty quickly - middle class, suburban, modest, white woman. Labels have always defined me. But as Kierkegaard said, "once you label me, you negate me." I think that's why I love my tattoo.

My crowd would assume I must have had a roaring drunk moment in my youth, or that I am a loose woman prone to impulsiveness, not giving much thought to permanence.

But my tattoo is not a novelty. It is holy ground. It was etched by one worth dying for; it symbolizes one worth living for. It hails a four year old child, my grandson Parker, who died two years ago from a tragic fall from a two story window.

My son and I were stunned in grief. I needed a way to touch that place; to touch it together with him. We had danced around his profession, a tattoo artist. I had come to accept his artistry and vocational community, but I hadn't yet found a way to embrace it that said, "bless you my son."

A few days after Parker's death, steeped in sorrow, aching the loss of my grandchild and the brokenness of my son, I found the touching place. Stroking the inside of my wrist, I knew I had found the place to meet my son, the place to connect in a combination of ink, tears, and hearts.

He designed it for me; he etched it as we clung together in love and loss, remembering a precious little boy who giggled his way into our lives and left his mark in our souls.

Yes; I am scarred with an eternal stain - the stain of Holy love.

Bless you my son(s).

Truisms

I love some of the lines my youngest son comes up with....I plan to steal some of them. Like, the one about his brother - "I'd rather have him Jewish than a junkie." Priceless. A truism.

Late last night he sent me a text. He was aching through another layer of pain - grieving the loss of Parker, his four year old son, my grandson; wrestling with a new tumult - a baby girl, possibly his daughter, my granddaughter, due in February. My dear boy, I have been troubled too. Submerged feelings, that had been trickling up and were once manageable, containable, will not stay put. For some powerful reason, they've started rolling in, through memory triggers - smells; the way light falls; a laugh; watching a child walk down the street. And time and again, irrational as it seems, what erupts with the raw loss and confusing hope, is guilt. Right or wrong, appropriate or inappropriate, it's there. It demands a hearing, insists upon examination. It has something to say - it's an emotion attached to some kind of truth.

Kind, meaningful platitudes and scriptural proof-texts do not help, not really. They are a temporary comfort, but can easily become anesthetize-ors, like wine, work, food, or altruism. The temptation to ease the agony, rather than face the irrationality, the insanity, only postpones the process toward truth. I believe the truth does set us free, but here's the rub. What is the truth for me, in this? What is the guilt trying to tell me? What is it I don't see that enslaves me, that keeps me from being?

My son's text reaffirmed the necessity of this process, of this journey into the messiness of self. He expressed the conflicting nature of his struggle with loss, hope, pain, absurdity - that he wasn't sure if he was cracking up, or finding himself. And there it was......a truism.

Maybe it takes a little cracking up, to find yourself.

It was too late to text him back. So hugging my pillow, I rolled over and prayed for my boy. And me. Let us not get stuck here; may we become.