disappointment

Last night, the boys laid out fishing poles and lures across the weathered farm table. Bray bought bobbers and fresh line. Grandpa restrung favorite poles.

We’re at the farm this weekend. 

The boys LOVE to fish.  Everyone fishes around here, but they’re particularly obsessed.  Bray and I had both had a long and draining week.  I was looking forward to sleeping in while he was looking forward to waking at 5 am to take the boys out on the boat.  Through the bayous in the little metal boat and into Calcaseiu Lake where local tales were that the water had cleared and fishing was getting good. 

Little bit and I heard them rustling this morning.  Five am alarms.  Clothes already laid out.  Ice chest filled to spend half a day on the lake.  She crawled into bed with me while they headed out in the darkness. 

It didn’t make sense to me when I was wrested out of my sleep by boy noise a little later.  Morning light was dim.  I glanced at my clock.  Not even 7:30.  Yet there a boy sat on my bed.  The motor wouldn’t turn over, he announced.  We didn’t get to go. 

You could see the disappointment etched into his face.  They were all so excited.  The first fishing trip in months that held any promise.  No motor = no trip. 

A second boy filed in.  I’m so sorry, buddy, I said into his forlorn face.  No you’re not, he bitterly retorted and slouched out of the room while I rolled over to go back to sleep.  (I was sad for them, but I was also really tired.)

As I laid there, I started thinking about how most of 2020 our spirits, even if not our faces, have worn that deep disappointment. 

I looked at this little blog and saw the last time I wrote was nearly two months ago.  Not that things haven’t happened.  But it’s like I’ve been trapped in a bog.  What do you write when you’re trapped in a bog?

I’m staring at my desk calendar for August with all these back to school photos from last year – posing in front of signs, hugging teachers…

Now, even though we’re going back, we’re among the very few in our city, I still have dear friends steeling to teach their kids (again) with distance learning through mid-October. 

We all have friends or family who have been laid off or who are struggling with the effects of the virus (or worse) or who can’t sell their house or who can’t decide whether to check the distance or in-person box for their school district. We’re mourning injustices and losses and simply trying to survive another election year.

Our emotions are taking many different forms: depression, anger, sadness, detachment, frustration, impatience…

Deeply rooted under all of this though: DISAPPOINTED.

We are disappointed life does not look like we hoped it would or think it should.

So, now what?

Well, first let’s be really honest.  This next year is not going to look like we hoped.  We will not get to go on that gorgeous vacation we planned. We won’t get to eat lunch with our kids at school on their birthday. The big milestone birthday party or wedding will get canceled.  Things at work or home or with our friends won’t look how we want (or need).

But then. After acknowledging the reality. We have to look forward.  And reconnect to our faith. 

Oftentimes in hard times, I lean heavily on God and my faith.  But I will be honest with you, I haven’t done that lately.  I’ve read a lot of fiction. I’ve watched Hallmark movies.  I’ve cooked new recipes and drank too much wine. I haven’t spent much time in prayer or studying scripture or in stillness to see how God might be able to use this pruning season in my life.  I can’t explain the reaction, but that truth hit me this morning. 

So friend, we’re in this together.  Hold on – to your rope and to each other.  This is a season.  We are all allowed to be disappointed and all the other emotions which flow from that one. 

But then we have to look forward.  We must hope.  Hope even when it seems impossible. This is not Pollyanna, slap a smile on it, find an easy sound bite, hope. This is ugly, painful, crying, not-wanting-to-get-out-of-bed-but-doing-it-anyway, hope. This is mourning while knowing joy WILL come in the morning.

Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. (Romans 5 – NIV)

Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for. By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible. (Hebrews 11 – NIV)

Why would you ever complain, O Jacob, or, whine, Israel, saying, “God has lost track of me. He doesn’t care what happens to me”? Don’t you know anything? Haven’t you been listening?
God doesn’t come and go. God lasts. He’s Creator of all you can see or imagine.
He doesn’t get tired out, doesn’t pause to catch his breath. And he knows everything, inside and out. He energizes those who get tired, gives fresh strength to dropouts.
Those who wait upon God get fresh strength. They spread their wings and soar like eagles, They run and don’t get tired, they walk and don’t lag behind. (Isaiah 40 – Msg)

All around us we observe a pregnant creation. The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it’s not only around us; it’s within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We’re also feeling the birth pangs. …waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don’t see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy. Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good. (Romans 8 – Msg)

It was nearly midnight when he woke up with a screaming fever.  He’d been out of sorts during the day but nothing specific so we went on about our business.  Yet here we were, evidence of what must have been simmering all day.  He wasn’t my high fever kid which meant this first reading over 103 degrees had me worried.

Before I ever got to medicine and cold rags, he started sobbing, “I can’t miss by best friend’s birthday party!”

It was true.  In about 12 hours we had a fun bowling/laser tag party that we’d all been looking forward to all week.  The kids because they adore the birthday boy and his sister, and me because I adore the mom.  We’d wrapped the gifts together and baked the birthday boy his favorite M&M chocolate chip cookies to pair with his present.  My little man knew that a fever so close to a birthday party was an automatic no-go.

I tried to console him, medicated him, and promised we’d find a time for these friends to do something special to celebrate once he was well.

I reflected this morning on the importance of these moments.

It is important our kids experience disappointment.  It’s important they know change and struggle and sadness and failure.  Because if our kids don’t learn how to channel those emotions at a young age, they will be ill-equipped to handle the curve balls adult life throws at them.

The “life app” at my church’s elementary Sunday School this month is perseverance.  This has to be one of my favorite words.  Our tag line is, refusing to give up when life gets hard.  In our kindergarten small group, we went around the circle and told about something hard that had happened that week.  It was everything from the very serious like a grandparent’s cancer to the “smaller” like someone laughing at them, but it all feels hard in the moment.  I told them about my tooth breaking a second time (yes, it broke again on Friday after repaired) and how embarrassed I was to come to church with a big chunk out of my tooth.  It wasn’t anything like the hardship of death or illness or poverty, but it felt disappointing and sad to me.  That they could relate to.  We persevere because of all the founders of our faith endured that was truly hard, and their bravery inspires us to be brave and strong.

I think all too often, I can be the worst offender, parents try to stave off disappointment or sadness or failure (out of love or just fear of a meltdown), and then our kids are really at a loss when something happens beyond our/their control.

We empathize when the hard comes.  And it may not feel hard to us, like missing a birthday party, but it’s huge to them and their current framework in life.  We let them know we understand disappointment and defeat because we’ve struggled with it all too often.  But then we let them experience it.  {===> Click to Tweet}  We try to frame it so there is good at the end.  Hope to look forward to on the other side.

Even as our family deals with many changes in the next few months – saying goodbye to the nanny who has been with us since the beginning, having a different kind of summer, changing schools – we look at the good in the present and the future.  Last night, around the dinner table, each child listed two things he or she loved about the different schools they have attended or have visited.  We are actively looking for the good in the change.  Hopefully, this will make them more willing to embrace change in the future even when it’s scary.  Because without change, we won’t know opportunity or adventure or new beginnings.

My sick boy was sad when we left for the party, but he didn’t cry.  He had good behavior almost all day even though he was trapped inside with a fever and missed the event he’d looked forward to all week.  He was disappointed and sad.  But he was also resilient.  He knew he’d get better and he’d see his friend and there was fun still to come.

There always is.  Hope. Fun. Something different but good on the horizon.