Time to Soar

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Earlier this month, I was so proud to fly home to New Orleans to cheer on my daughter Jeanie who walked across the stage to receive her diploma for her Master’s degree in Elementary Education. Jeanie is a wife and mother of two boys. She has fought through many challenges and conquered untold obstacles to accomplish this milestone.  I am as proud as I can be because I know her story and all that she has overcome to meet this goal.  

Graduation season is a magical time of year.  Today I will tell a graduation story that stretches back several decades.

I remember the day we drove our oldest daughter, Jenn, to Virginia to visit what would soon become her college. My husband was driving our Suburban and all four of our children were riding in the back, napping.  I remember wistfully looking at them in the back seats and thinking that we might never be all together in the same way again, and I wasn’t completely confident that our daughter was fully ready to be on her own, without us. 

As we traveled down a tree-lined highway, I noticed a mother bird sitting on the edge of a large nest in a tree. Though I could only see the tops of their heads, I imagined that the mother was feeding her baby birds.  My melancholy mood lifted as an interesting thought occurred to me. You never see a bird's nest perched in a tree, weighted down by a bunch of full-grown adult birds.  At some point the mother bird watches as her little ones hop to the edge of the nest, lean into the wind, flap their wings for the first time, and take a fumbling flight into the air. She doesn’t call them back, or even seem to flinch, though I like to think that she loves them as fiercely as we do our own.  As her babies first start to flap their wings, the mother bird watches over them, knowing that baby birds are born to soar, as are our children.  

It wasn’t too many years later that our beautiful Jenn, while newly engaged and in her mid-twenties, was diagnosed with cancer.  Though brave, strong, and determined to soar, her life was soon filled with treatments, surgeries, wigs, a leg brace, and long hospital stays. Having been active and athletic all her life, as her condition progressed, Jenn chose not to let the world see her traveling about in a wheelchair. Her family, close friends, and caretakers were her trusted companions.

During those challenging months, I was able to complete my Master’s program, though I had decided that, in light of Jenn’s condition, I wouldn’t take part in the graduation ceremony. Life was too sad at the time to think about celebrating. My sweet, determined girl was not having any of that. From her hospital bed, she challenged me to walk across the stage for my graduation.  When I declined, she pushed me again, this time with a condition I couldn’t refuse. Jenn offered that if I would walk across that stage, she would come to cheer me on.  This meant that she would attend and watch from her wheelchair.  

I will never forget walking out onto the stage on graduation day. The ceremony took place in the university’s massive sports arena.  When the hundreds of graduates processed out we could see ourselves on a giant jumbo screen. My heart fell as I realized that there were thousands in attendance, and I would never be able to locate my family.  The cheering crowd was overwhelmingly loud. As my eyes searched the stands in vain, for my family, my husband’s unique whistle pierced through the noisy confusion and landed in my ears. His was a whistle that made each member of our family stop and turn wherever we were, whenever we heard it. I looked to where that welcome whistle came from, and my eyes latched on to those of my family members, all cheering and smiling down on me.  There sat Jenn, alongside her siblings, waving happily from her wheelchair. She had an unforgettable smile that radiated with love and pride that day. 

Now it's Jeanie’s turn to walk across that same stage almost twenty years later, another of my baby birds, soaring out into a blessed future. God has blessed us all.  We can count on HIs love to carry us forward on wings, like eagles.

Happy graduation to all who are taking to the sky, and soaring!

Thank you for reading! Until next time!

Merry

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