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The throne of God is untouchable, unalterable, universal, unshakeable, unconquerable, and unlimited (Norm Willis, 2009). How does this truth impact how we write fiction? As Pastor Norm has been highlighting the immense power of the throne the last few weeks, I was reminded of the story of Beowulf. In this Old English legend, Grendel, an evil bloodthirsty monster, hunts and slaughters men by the hundreds. But listen to this line from the beginning of the story: So Grendel waged his lonely war, inflicting constant cruelties on the people, atrocious hurt. He took over Herot, haunted the glittering hall after dark, but the throne itself, the treasure seat, he was kept from approaching” (Beowulf, 165-169). Even though Grendel is incredibly powerful, he is unable to come near the throne. The throne cannot be touched or changed by evil.
As writers we must remember that no matter how dark a situation is, good will always win. We are not in a battle were the outcome is unsure. We are sure that evil will be overwhelmingly conquered by good. It is only our perspective that needs to change.
Remember in the Lord of the Rings how evil appears to be an unconquerable force. Frodo, a tiny hobbit, must go on a mission that will most likely fail. While evil appears to be growing greater and greater, good is nowhere in sight. As Sam and Frodo crawl up the side of Mount Doom, it looks like they are about to fail. However, Sam in the face of despair still believes that good will win.
“It's like in the great stories, -the ones that really matter. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end, because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines, it'll shine out the clearer” (Tolkien, Return of the King).
In all the stories we write, we must remember that evil is always conquerable. The throne is untouchable. God cannot be changed by evil. So as we write we do not write from the perspective that God is battling against Satan and the outcome is unclear. We write that good will ultimately overcome evil. The battle is not over who will win but over who the characters believe will win. The battle is over perspective. If one of the characters gives up and decides that evil will win, they are right because through their lack of faith they have joined the enemy’s side. The conflict is not over the final outcome but over whose side we will be standing on when the story ends. If we choose to preserver we will be on the winning side.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Sunday, November 15, 2009
A Very Merry Christmas (based off a true story)
It was one of those rare and magical winters were the first snow came the morning of Christmas Eve and promised to stay until at least the end of Christmas day. During the night Jack Frost had decorated the houses in the neighborhood by scribbling all over their window panes and hanging icicles from their gutters. The air was filled with a biting but delicious crispness that made the boys reluctant to breath out once that had filled their lungs. Tom and Freddy chased each other through the deep snow, hollering and pelting each other with powdery snowballs. Both of the boys had to heave their knees almost to their chests to get their little boots out of the snow and take another step. The neighborhood was filled with their gleeful laughter as they titled back their heads and tried to catch snowflakes on their tongues. They had already erected a snowman in the center of the yard—complete with scarf, stick arms, carrot nose and a grin made of pebbles.
David sat inside staring at the ungainly snowman’s pebbly smile. David’s thin legs dangled from a wooden chair and his feet in their baggy socks barely touched the floor. His back hunched over the kitchen table where he sat as if it had grown permanently into the shape of a letter C. At twelve years old, his body looked as small as a seven year old but his melancholy gray eyes looked closer to eighty. For a moment his eyes fixed blankly on his little brothers wrestling in the snow before he turned back to the bank ledger on the table. David penciled in the amount for the electric bill that month—nearly twice what it had been last month. David scanned the ledger and sighed.
David knew there would be no Christmas presents tomorrow morning. He knew that his little brothers Tom and Freddy would have to go without new shoes to pay the electric bill and his older sister Jane would have to wear her old dress for prom so they could buy groceries. He knew it would take exactly twenty nine years and eleven months to pay off their credit card. He also knew why his mom cried herself to sleep every night. David knew far more than any twelve year old boy should know.
He flipped back a few pages in the ledger and allowed his frail fingers to trace his father’s bold handwriting. It did not seem possible that only a few months ago his dad had sat in this same chair doing the family budget. David has always enjoyed peering over his father’s thick shoulder watching him add the monthly bills into neat little rows. It has seemed like a fascinating game to David. He never would have imagined that it could make him so sad.
“Your daddy is sick” his mother had told him. “He has to go away for a while.” David knew she had been lying but what are you suppose to tell a twelve year old when his father is a schizophrenic? Tom and Freddy were too little to understand. But David remembered all too well what the last few months had been like when Daddy’s mind had finally slipped away forever. He remembered the fighting. He remembered his Dad’s senseless gibberish. He remembered the day his dad had not recognized him. He remembered.... David closed the ledger quickly—too many terrible memories in there that he did not what to think about on Christmas Eve.
Had not been for the snow that covered the ground with a powdery layer of white, David could have almost forgotten that it was Christmas Eve at all. David glanced out the window again at his two brothers who were now stockpiling mountains of snowballs behind their snow forts in preparation for an epic battle of snow war. David smiled an amused smile. He pulled the wooden chair across the kitchen to the microwave, letting it squeak against the linoleum floor. Climbing on the chair, he put the bank ledger back on the shelf above the microwave.
As he climbed off the chair David noticed the Santa Claus cookie jar sitting on the counter. Every Christmas his mom always took it out of the attic, ceremoniously unpacked it from the bubble wrap and filled it with homemade cookies. He already knew without peeking inside that the jar was empty. Something about the fat jolly Santa’s face annoyed him. For an instant David wanted to smash the Santa jar into a thousand pieces. Empty or full, Santa would always have the same rigid stupid grin on his face David thought.
As David stood having a staring contest with Santa, Emma walk out of the hallway from her bedroom. She was already dressed for the Christmas Eve candlelight service. David thought his mom looked like a red and white stripped candy cane. Her red hair, lips, and blouse contrasted sharply with her pale skin. Her eyes, small and gray like David’s, were rimmed with red as well. Emma sniffed once before calling Tom and Freddy from outside. Twenty minutes later David, Tom, and Freddy were all dressed in their Sunday best along with Jane, packed in the family van, and on their way to church.
As Emma parked their van in the church parking lot, David looked at the nativity scene on the snowy grass by the playground. It was one of those plastic and nearly life size nativities that lit up. The plastic Mary, Joseph, shepherds, and wisemen all stood smiling at the plastic baby Jesus. Something about their inflexible grins reminded David of the cookie jar on the counter at home.
Tom and Freddy ran laughing from the car and were delighted to discover that the parking lot was as slick as an ice arena and their black dress shoes were almost as good as ice skates. They ran and slid in short spurts across the parking lot to the church entrance. David walked gingerly behind his mother and sister, watching his feet to keep from slipping.
The candlelight service was a typical assortment of classic carols but something about the music this year seemed to grab David’s heart in a new way. The minor notes of the carols reached inside his heart and plucked at the secrets that David had so carefully hidden. It was as if the music was a special friend who knew all about David’s dad without David having to say a word. David breathed in deeply as the music grabbed his soul. It was so beautiful that is made him want to cry. For the first time that day, David knew that Christmas had come. David sang along with all his might and stood with the congregation as the service concluded with rousing version of We Wish You a Merry Christmas. After holiday pleasantries and greetings had been exchanged with the other congregation members, Emma herded her family back into the van.
It was not until they arrived back in their neighborhood and David saw that their house was the only house on the whole block that did not have Christmas lights up this year that he remembered the loneliness that hung around his heart. David did not want to go inside their little house. It looked too dark and unfriendly.
Tom and Freddy as usual chased each other out of the van and inside. David could hear their delighted squeals from inside the house as he neared the porch steps. Moments later they were back outside on the porch waving their arms and jumping up and down like jack-n-the-boxes. “David! Come and see David!” shouted Tom. “Mommy, Jane come see our house!” echoed Freddy. Both Tom and Freddy both ran whooping like Indians back into the house. David skipped two steps and ran through the open door into the living room.
The whole house smelled like turkey dinner and pumpkin pie. The fire was lit. The table was set with china and there was a piece of chocolate wrapped in bright paper on each of their plates. But the best part was the Christmas tree. David could not remember when he had ever seen so many presents. Tom and Freddy jumped around the tree looking at name tags and squealing every time they found a package with their name on it. Emma and Jane stood in the door way speechless. Emma found a letter from their good friends the Petersons propped against a candle stick explaining the welcome but unexpected Christmas miracle. Emma’s hand covered her mouth and her eyes filled with tears that trickled down her face. David’s face broke out into a goofy boyish grin as he joined his brothers pawing through the presents under the tree. “Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!” he shouted. David danced around the tree and his gray eyes twinkled in the light of the fire. It was indeed a very Merry Christmas.
David sat inside staring at the ungainly snowman’s pebbly smile. David’s thin legs dangled from a wooden chair and his feet in their baggy socks barely touched the floor. His back hunched over the kitchen table where he sat as if it had grown permanently into the shape of a letter C. At twelve years old, his body looked as small as a seven year old but his melancholy gray eyes looked closer to eighty. For a moment his eyes fixed blankly on his little brothers wrestling in the snow before he turned back to the bank ledger on the table. David penciled in the amount for the electric bill that month—nearly twice what it had been last month. David scanned the ledger and sighed.
David knew there would be no Christmas presents tomorrow morning. He knew that his little brothers Tom and Freddy would have to go without new shoes to pay the electric bill and his older sister Jane would have to wear her old dress for prom so they could buy groceries. He knew it would take exactly twenty nine years and eleven months to pay off their credit card. He also knew why his mom cried herself to sleep every night. David knew far more than any twelve year old boy should know.
He flipped back a few pages in the ledger and allowed his frail fingers to trace his father’s bold handwriting. It did not seem possible that only a few months ago his dad had sat in this same chair doing the family budget. David has always enjoyed peering over his father’s thick shoulder watching him add the monthly bills into neat little rows. It has seemed like a fascinating game to David. He never would have imagined that it could make him so sad.
“Your daddy is sick” his mother had told him. “He has to go away for a while.” David knew she had been lying but what are you suppose to tell a twelve year old when his father is a schizophrenic? Tom and Freddy were too little to understand. But David remembered all too well what the last few months had been like when Daddy’s mind had finally slipped away forever. He remembered the fighting. He remembered his Dad’s senseless gibberish. He remembered the day his dad had not recognized him. He remembered.... David closed the ledger quickly—too many terrible memories in there that he did not what to think about on Christmas Eve.
Had not been for the snow that covered the ground with a powdery layer of white, David could have almost forgotten that it was Christmas Eve at all. David glanced out the window again at his two brothers who were now stockpiling mountains of snowballs behind their snow forts in preparation for an epic battle of snow war. David smiled an amused smile. He pulled the wooden chair across the kitchen to the microwave, letting it squeak against the linoleum floor. Climbing on the chair, he put the bank ledger back on the shelf above the microwave.
As he climbed off the chair David noticed the Santa Claus cookie jar sitting on the counter. Every Christmas his mom always took it out of the attic, ceremoniously unpacked it from the bubble wrap and filled it with homemade cookies. He already knew without peeking inside that the jar was empty. Something about the fat jolly Santa’s face annoyed him. For an instant David wanted to smash the Santa jar into a thousand pieces. Empty or full, Santa would always have the same rigid stupid grin on his face David thought.
As David stood having a staring contest with Santa, Emma walk out of the hallway from her bedroom. She was already dressed for the Christmas Eve candlelight service. David thought his mom looked like a red and white stripped candy cane. Her red hair, lips, and blouse contrasted sharply with her pale skin. Her eyes, small and gray like David’s, were rimmed with red as well. Emma sniffed once before calling Tom and Freddy from outside. Twenty minutes later David, Tom, and Freddy were all dressed in their Sunday best along with Jane, packed in the family van, and on their way to church.
As Emma parked their van in the church parking lot, David looked at the nativity scene on the snowy grass by the playground. It was one of those plastic and nearly life size nativities that lit up. The plastic Mary, Joseph, shepherds, and wisemen all stood smiling at the plastic baby Jesus. Something about their inflexible grins reminded David of the cookie jar on the counter at home.
Tom and Freddy ran laughing from the car and were delighted to discover that the parking lot was as slick as an ice arena and their black dress shoes were almost as good as ice skates. They ran and slid in short spurts across the parking lot to the church entrance. David walked gingerly behind his mother and sister, watching his feet to keep from slipping.
The candlelight service was a typical assortment of classic carols but something about the music this year seemed to grab David’s heart in a new way. The minor notes of the carols reached inside his heart and plucked at the secrets that David had so carefully hidden. It was as if the music was a special friend who knew all about David’s dad without David having to say a word. David breathed in deeply as the music grabbed his soul. It was so beautiful that is made him want to cry. For the first time that day, David knew that Christmas had come. David sang along with all his might and stood with the congregation as the service concluded with rousing version of We Wish You a Merry Christmas. After holiday pleasantries and greetings had been exchanged with the other congregation members, Emma herded her family back into the van.
It was not until they arrived back in their neighborhood and David saw that their house was the only house on the whole block that did not have Christmas lights up this year that he remembered the loneliness that hung around his heart. David did not want to go inside their little house. It looked too dark and unfriendly.
Tom and Freddy as usual chased each other out of the van and inside. David could hear their delighted squeals from inside the house as he neared the porch steps. Moments later they were back outside on the porch waving their arms and jumping up and down like jack-n-the-boxes. “David! Come and see David!” shouted Tom. “Mommy, Jane come see our house!” echoed Freddy. Both Tom and Freddy both ran whooping like Indians back into the house. David skipped two steps and ran through the open door into the living room.
The whole house smelled like turkey dinner and pumpkin pie. The fire was lit. The table was set with china and there was a piece of chocolate wrapped in bright paper on each of their plates. But the best part was the Christmas tree. David could not remember when he had ever seen so many presents. Tom and Freddy jumped around the tree looking at name tags and squealing every time they found a package with their name on it. Emma and Jane stood in the door way speechless. Emma found a letter from their good friends the Petersons propped against a candle stick explaining the welcome but unexpected Christmas miracle. Emma’s hand covered her mouth and her eyes filled with tears that trickled down her face. David’s face broke out into a goofy boyish grin as he joined his brothers pawing through the presents under the tree. “Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!” he shouted. David danced around the tree and his gray eyes twinkled in the light of the fire. It was indeed a very Merry Christmas.
Les Miserables
So long as there shall exist, by reason of law and custom, a social condemnation which, in the midst of civilization, artificially creates a hell on earth, and complicates with human fatality a destiny that is divine; so long as the three problems of the century—the degradation of man by the exploitation of his labor, the ruin of woman by starvation, and the atrophy of childhood by physical and spiritual night- are not solved; so long as, in certain regions, social *asphyxia* shall be possible; in other words, and from a still broader point of view, so long as ignorance and misery remain on earth, there shall be a need for books such as this.
Introduction From Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables
Introduction From Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables
The Unseen Kingdom
I close my eyes
And say my goodbyes
To all I see
And all I used to be.
I’ve been told
Before I was old
A world awaited
Those untainted
With fear and unbelief
Who trust through grief
Laugh at doubt
Smile through drought.
Only a few see this world
After they have been twirled by love
And captured by what is above.
They see with closed eyes
What others never espy.
This land lies beyond the visible
Hidden from the cynical
But open to the simple
And unlocked to the truthful.
I cannot tell you the way
But know it you may.
It is something you must find
And not with your mind.
And say my goodbyes
To all I see
And all I used to be.
I’ve been told
Before I was old
A world awaited
Those untainted
With fear and unbelief
Who trust through grief
Laugh at doubt
Smile through drought.
Only a few see this world
After they have been twirled by love
And captured by what is above.
They see with closed eyes
What others never espy.
This land lies beyond the visible
Hidden from the cynical
But open to the simple
And unlocked to the truthful.
I cannot tell you the way
But know it you may.
It is something you must find
And not with your mind.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Everything is Beautiful
A little yellow flower told me the story.
A sad sweet story
like the notes of an aria
Clear and golden
but Broken.
A gloriously haunting symphony
that stalks you long after the melody
dies.
Everyone wants to live this story
But no one wants to live its
Terror
No triumph without struggle
No victory
without possibility of defeat.
Every rose must have its thorns
Just as every life has its pain
A deep sweet pain
That usually stays hidden
unless you are brave enough
to live a good story.
The good stories are the ones
where the pain is most poignant
Before it
finally breaks
And we step through
To what is beyond.
Into the beauty that is revealed
when the crust of this world crumbles.
All the pain is a memory
Fear but a farce
What is death?
What is pain?
But the doorway to victory
Those who walk through
Boldly
Are the true victors
The true lovers
Love that pierces
Grabs your heart
In its vice
Love more ravenous than death
like a bitter sweet sickness
without remedy
Which finally
bursts into a beautiful flourish of light
Impaled with joy
Captivated by beauty
Indescribable joy
Come pierce through the pain
to a land just beyond
Into a place where everything is beautiful
Simply beautiful
So, don’t cry
Please don’t cry from
Here everything is beautiful
A sad sweet story
like the notes of an aria
Clear and golden
but Broken.
A gloriously haunting symphony
that stalks you long after the melody
dies.
Everyone wants to live this story
But no one wants to live its
Terror
No triumph without struggle
No victory
without possibility of defeat.
Every rose must have its thorns
Just as every life has its pain
A deep sweet pain
That usually stays hidden
unless you are brave enough
to live a good story.
The good stories are the ones
where the pain is most poignant
Before it
finally breaks
And we step through
To what is beyond.
Into the beauty that is revealed
when the crust of this world crumbles.
All the pain is a memory
Fear but a farce
What is death?
What is pain?
But the doorway to victory
Those who walk through
Boldly
Are the true victors
The true lovers
Love that pierces
Grabs your heart
In its vice
Love more ravenous than death
like a bitter sweet sickness
without remedy
Which finally
bursts into a beautiful flourish of light
Impaled with joy
Captivated by beauty
Indescribable joy
Come pierce through the pain
to a land just beyond
Into a place where everything is beautiful
Simply beautiful
So, don’t cry
Please don’t cry from
Here everything is beautiful
Thursday, September 17, 2009
What I Found at the Beach
This morning I finished my prayer slot and went to Starbucks for my usual vanilla latte and classic coffee cake. Then I headed to Juanita Beach. Usually I sit in my car and journal until I have to go to work but today I needed a bit of fresh air. So I plopped myself on one of the picnic tables under the shelter. After sitting there for 15 minutes I noticed a piece of notebook paper lying on the ground. I picked it up and this is what it said:
I don't belong
I don't feel right
I cannot be the same person anymore
I'm just not who I am anymore
I'm hurt
I cry
I bleed
and suffer
I don't know how to escape
I just wanna cry
I just wanna give everything up
death is near
its coming closer
and closer.
A few feet away from this poem I found another piece of notebook paper. But this one was crumpled into a ball. I unwrinkled the page. On it was a sketch of a bird. It said "Fly away" and was dated 9-16-09.
I was not sure how to handle that. So I prayed-always the best thing to do when you do not know what to do. Then I left a note on the picnic table with my email just in case the person came back. I have the poem and drawing and I will be praying for this person today. If you read this blog please pray as well. I do not know for sure if the person is suicidal but they are certainly going through some intense pain. My guess from the handwriting and the picture is that the writer was a girl about jr. high age. I remember the difficult things I went through at that age. Even with a supportive family and loving parents, the teen years can be difficult.
Lord whoever wrote that poem, please be with her today. Help her find you. Hold her heart and silence the pain. We stand between her and the enemy. We command him to stop lying to her. We declare that she will know You and discover the wonderful plan You have for her life. Let her find my note and email me. Papa, thank you that You never leave us alone. You are with us in our darkest moments.
I don't belong
I don't feel right
I cannot be the same person anymore
I'm just not who I am anymore
I'm hurt
I cry
I bleed
and suffer
I don't know how to escape
I just wanna cry
I just wanna give everything up
death is near
its coming closer
and closer.
A few feet away from this poem I found another piece of notebook paper. But this one was crumpled into a ball. I unwrinkled the page. On it was a sketch of a bird. It said "Fly away" and was dated 9-16-09.
I was not sure how to handle that. So I prayed-always the best thing to do when you do not know what to do. Then I left a note on the picnic table with my email just in case the person came back. I have the poem and drawing and I will be praying for this person today. If you read this blog please pray as well. I do not know for sure if the person is suicidal but they are certainly going through some intense pain. My guess from the handwriting and the picture is that the writer was a girl about jr. high age. I remember the difficult things I went through at that age. Even with a supportive family and loving parents, the teen years can be difficult.
Lord whoever wrote that poem, please be with her today. Help her find you. Hold her heart and silence the pain. We stand between her and the enemy. We command him to stop lying to her. We declare that she will know You and discover the wonderful plan You have for her life. Let her find my note and email me. Papa, thank you that You never leave us alone. You are with us in our darkest moments.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Because He Loves Me
It has been four years since Emily died—four years and I had never been to her grave...until yesterday. It was a miserable day. The sky looked like slate and the air was filled with a ghostly haze that dribbled a layer of grayness on the grass. The gray wetness seeped into my shoes and crawled up the cuff of my jeans as I walked through the cemetery, peering at tombstone after tombstone. Bare tree branches crisscrossed the sky like black spider webs. I finally found Emily’s grave at the back of the cemetery. A yellow primrose sat on the black marble slab. Everything looked dead except for that yellow flower—like a misplaced smudge of color in the middle of a black and white photograph. I looked at the little flower and I knew Emily was not there. Perhaps her body was decomposing beneath my feet—but Emily, the Emily I remember, was not there.
I met Emily five years ago when she transferred from Inglemore High to Christ Church Academy, a small private school of seventy students. At Christ Church Academy – as in most private Christian schools – it was completely uncool to act Christian. I was very uncool…until I met Emily. Almost every student at Christ Church Academy changed when they met Emily.
I remember the first day Emily walked into school. No…. not walked. She bounded, frolicked, floated…or something akin to it. Emily was a head taller than most girls, with yellow hair and a smile as bright as a million watt light bulb. I was a little afraid of her and purposely avoided having conversations with her. But Emily cornered me on the first week.
“Hi! What’s your name?” she asked with a smile. I pulled my head quickly out of my locker, where I had been rummaging for a textbook.
“Oh um…hi,” I said. “I’m Emily.”
“My name’s Emily too! How cool is that!”
Emily’s smile widened, till she looked like the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland. I thought that would be the end of our conversation, so with a nod I ducked my head back into my locker.
“Hey, what’s your last name?” Emily said.
“Huh?....Oh, uh Hart,” I answered from inside my locker.
“Oh that’s perfect!” Emily giggled. “Mine’s Heiber. You can be Emily Ha and I’ll be Emily He… He ha!”
She took a step closer and gave me a massive hug. With another smile, she turned and bounced off to her next class. I stood stunned in the middle of the hallway, staring quizzically after my new friend. I never had had a nickname before – or been hugged by an almost complete stranger. But that was just Emily’s way.
Over the next year, Emily and I became friends – not close friends – just friends. She was older than me, but you no matter how old you were you had to be a bona fide jerk not to be Emily’s friend. I was not quite a bona fide jerk, but I was the next worse thing – a prude. If you have ever known a tattle telling, stuck up, insecure high school student, I can assure you I was worse. If we were required to write a two-page paper, I wrote three. When we had a lunch break, I spent half of it studying Latin. And if anyone planned a party, I respectfully declined. Eventually, my classmates stopped asking if I wanted to hang out- they already knew the answer. I did not have any close friends and I did not need any.
Emily came to school during my junior year, which was passing as slowly and uneventfully as any year before it. My classmates punted paper footballs across the aisles during lectures and held contests to see how many spit wads they could make stick to the whiteboard before the teacher noticed. The girls gossiped and read magazines during class and most of the guys got themselves suspended. I did my best to remain clueless to all the craziness.
There were only two kinds of students at Christ Church Academy: students who stressed out trying to follow the rules—like me, or students who could care less about the rules and got themselves suspended. Emily was a new breed of student. She was not stressed about keeping the rules but she kept them nonetheless. She was all smiles. When we had a pop quiz—she smiled. When we all flunked a math test—she smiled. Even if a teacher assigned a ten page research project—she smiled. And when Emily found out she had advanced brain cancer...she still wore the same unfading smile. Through chemotherapy, losing her hair, and multiple operations, Emily was unexplainably joyful.
A few months after she was diagnosed with cancer, Emily plopped down at my lunch table.
“Hey guys!” Emily said. She had cut her hair short when she started chemotherapy but now she was wearing a wig. It was a cute wig – sort of a reddish brown and flipped out at the ends like Jacqueline Kennedy.
“Oh...hi Em,” I said. I turned to the girl next to me. “Hey... Anne,” I said. “Alice and Natasha had to go to the principal's office again today.”
“Uh oh...busted!” said Anne.
“I know... I thought the whole thing about the guys getting suspended was all settled.”
“Isn’t it?”
“I guess not. I overheard a teacher say that Alice and Natasha knew the guys were goofing off the whole time...but they never fessed up. Now they are in big trouble.”
“Uh...guys?” Emily said. “I don’t think we should be talking about this.”
I did not say anything. But my brain seethed, I am the butt of this whole school. I get gossiped about all the time. I have a right to talk about all those guys who are finally getting what they deserve. If I was not so shy I probably would have said it out loud, but instead I just sat there sulking as Emily changed the subject.
“So yesterday, I was at the mall and....” I stared at my half eaten sandwich, still pouting and waiting for her to finish. But she did not finish. I looked up at Emily. Her eyes were closed and her body was shaking. I felt frozen. I had heard Emily’s brain cancer caused seizures, but I had never seen anyone have one before. She kept shaking. Her wig slid sideways, revealing a closely shaved head with several bald patches. I felt a lump rise up in my throat. The next moment our science teacher was there holding Emily’s head as she convulsed. As Emily finally started coming out of the seizure she began mumbling:
“Because he loves me...because he loves me...I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.”
She was quoting Psalm 91. She was having a seizure and she was quoting Psalm 91. Finally, Emily opened her eyes. I could tell she did not see any of us.
“Because he loves me...” she said again with a smile. Emily’s eyes focused. She took a deep breath and her body stopped quivering. She gave us a helplessly apologetic look. The teacher helped her stand up and phoned her mom to come pick her up.
Things were different after that. It was like the day I finally got glasses. The whole world looked bright...sharp...focused. If Emily could quote Bible verses in the middle of a seizure and come to school every day with a smile on her face when she knew she could have a seizure any moment – then what was my problem? Why was I such a reclusive grouch? For the first time I wanted to be different. I wanted to be like Emily.
Emily graduated that year but I saw her during the summer. She stopped and asked if I was excited about being a senior next year. I did not really know. I thought my class was not ready to be seniors. Emily invited me over to her house to pray about it. I told her I would come, but I was a little reluctant. There were a lot of things I was afraid of, but there was nothing I was more afraid of then praying out loud.
But I swallowed my fear and went. It was a hot day. I could feel the heat radiating up from the pavement as I walked up the steep driveway to her house. As I neared the top, I heard a bark. The next moment an overfed golden retriever tackled me.
“Chester…” I heard Emily call, “Chester, you bad dog!”
Emily shoed the beast named Chester away from me with a swat on the bottom.
“He’s trying to be friendly,” she said. “He’s just forgets that he is so big and fat…and he thinks he’s a little lap dog.”
Emily made up for Chester by giving me a big hug and flashing a smile. She had changed. I noticed it the moment I hugged her. She was smaller – much smaller and bony. Her wig was replaced by a red handkerchief, tied at the base of her neck. A few thin hairs poked out underneath. Her rosy cheeks had shrunk and her blue eyes looked too massive for the rest of her face. The only thing about her that had not changed was her smile. I can still see it in my mind’s eye, gleaming like a half moon in a clear midnight sky. I smiled back at her.
“I’ve got apple pie and ice cream,” Emily said. “Do you want some?”
Of course, I did. We settled ourselves on the back porch and watched our ice cream slowly melt into the apple pie. This was the most unconventional “prayer meeting” I had ever been to. I imagined we would have to stand with our eyes closed and our heads bowed. But there we were lounging on Emily’s porch, eating pie and ice cream on a sunny afternoon. Emily’s idea of a prayer meeting was a good conversation where God was part of the conversation. She included him in our discussion as if he was sitting right there with us enjoying his own pie and ice cream.
That day Emily let me in on her secret of how she was able to look cancer in the face and smile: she was in love. I could tell every time I looked into her eyes—she was in love with Jesus. I had been a Christian for twelve years but that summer sitting on Emily’s porch I fell in love with Jesus too.
That September, I took a deep breath and prepared to face my first day as a senior. I felt like a different person than the shy junior of last year. I wanted things to change at Christ Church Academy so desperately. To my surprise things were already different. Spit wads and paper footballs no longer flew through the air during class and we managed to do more than stay awake during chapels. In fact, chapels rocked! It looked like a bunch of Emily clones had taken over the school. Sometimes I wonder if Emily had planned “prayer meetings” with each of my classmates.
After one particularly great chapel I noticed Emily in the back. Even though she was a graduate, she still came in occasionally for chapel. She was sitting in a wheel chair- same red handkerchief tied over her head. I felt like my smile was almost as big as hers, as I walked over to her.
“It’s happening Em,” I said. “Everything we prayed for...God did it!”
Emily just looked up at me from her wheelchair and smiled. She understood me but she was too weak to say anything back. That was the last time I saw Emily.
I suppose that was the reason I went to find her grave yesterday. I wanted to see her again and I wanted an answer to a question that had immobilized me for the last four years. Why God? Everything was just changing and getting better. Why did you let Em die? Emily’s epithet was simple, not at all profound, unless you knew the person buried underneath but it answered my question. It read:
The pure in heart shall see God.
Emily M. Heiber
Mar. 9 1985- Sep. 29 2004
I finally realized Emily had already answered my question four years ago during a lunch break. The answer was the reason that she did everything, “Because he loves me… because he loves me...” she had said. Not only did he love her but she also loved him. So much so that she could not bear to be separated from him by the veil of this world. She wanted to see him and now she was seeing him. I kneeled on the grass by Emily’s grave. The gray wetness seeped into my pants but I did not care. The yellow primrose and I cast shadows over Emily’s grave. Then slowly our shadows disappeared as the sun muscled its way through the slate sky and filled the little plot of grass with yellow light. I sat there looking down at the black marble tombstone and whispered, “Thank you Em....Thank you....”
I met Emily five years ago when she transferred from Inglemore High to Christ Church Academy, a small private school of seventy students. At Christ Church Academy – as in most private Christian schools – it was completely uncool to act Christian. I was very uncool…until I met Emily. Almost every student at Christ Church Academy changed when they met Emily.
I remember the first day Emily walked into school. No…. not walked. She bounded, frolicked, floated…or something akin to it. Emily was a head taller than most girls, with yellow hair and a smile as bright as a million watt light bulb. I was a little afraid of her and purposely avoided having conversations with her. But Emily cornered me on the first week.
“Hi! What’s your name?” she asked with a smile. I pulled my head quickly out of my locker, where I had been rummaging for a textbook.
“Oh um…hi,” I said. “I’m Emily.”
“My name’s Emily too! How cool is that!”
Emily’s smile widened, till she looked like the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland. I thought that would be the end of our conversation, so with a nod I ducked my head back into my locker.
“Hey, what’s your last name?” Emily said.
“Huh?....Oh, uh Hart,” I answered from inside my locker.
“Oh that’s perfect!” Emily giggled. “Mine’s Heiber. You can be Emily Ha and I’ll be Emily He… He ha!”
She took a step closer and gave me a massive hug. With another smile, she turned and bounced off to her next class. I stood stunned in the middle of the hallway, staring quizzically after my new friend. I never had had a nickname before – or been hugged by an almost complete stranger. But that was just Emily’s way.
Over the next year, Emily and I became friends – not close friends – just friends. She was older than me, but you no matter how old you were you had to be a bona fide jerk not to be Emily’s friend. I was not quite a bona fide jerk, but I was the next worse thing – a prude. If you have ever known a tattle telling, stuck up, insecure high school student, I can assure you I was worse. If we were required to write a two-page paper, I wrote three. When we had a lunch break, I spent half of it studying Latin. And if anyone planned a party, I respectfully declined. Eventually, my classmates stopped asking if I wanted to hang out- they already knew the answer. I did not have any close friends and I did not need any.
Emily came to school during my junior year, which was passing as slowly and uneventfully as any year before it. My classmates punted paper footballs across the aisles during lectures and held contests to see how many spit wads they could make stick to the whiteboard before the teacher noticed. The girls gossiped and read magazines during class and most of the guys got themselves suspended. I did my best to remain clueless to all the craziness.
There were only two kinds of students at Christ Church Academy: students who stressed out trying to follow the rules—like me, or students who could care less about the rules and got themselves suspended. Emily was a new breed of student. She was not stressed about keeping the rules but she kept them nonetheless. She was all smiles. When we had a pop quiz—she smiled. When we all flunked a math test—she smiled. Even if a teacher assigned a ten page research project—she smiled. And when Emily found out she had advanced brain cancer...she still wore the same unfading smile. Through chemotherapy, losing her hair, and multiple operations, Emily was unexplainably joyful.
A few months after she was diagnosed with cancer, Emily plopped down at my lunch table.
“Hey guys!” Emily said. She had cut her hair short when she started chemotherapy but now she was wearing a wig. It was a cute wig – sort of a reddish brown and flipped out at the ends like Jacqueline Kennedy.
“Oh...hi Em,” I said. I turned to the girl next to me. “Hey... Anne,” I said. “Alice and Natasha had to go to the principal's office again today.”
“Uh oh...busted!” said Anne.
“I know... I thought the whole thing about the guys getting suspended was all settled.”
“Isn’t it?”
“I guess not. I overheard a teacher say that Alice and Natasha knew the guys were goofing off the whole time...but they never fessed up. Now they are in big trouble.”
“Uh...guys?” Emily said. “I don’t think we should be talking about this.”
I did not say anything. But my brain seethed, I am the butt of this whole school. I get gossiped about all the time. I have a right to talk about all those guys who are finally getting what they deserve. If I was not so shy I probably would have said it out loud, but instead I just sat there sulking as Emily changed the subject.
“So yesterday, I was at the mall and....” I stared at my half eaten sandwich, still pouting and waiting for her to finish. But she did not finish. I looked up at Emily. Her eyes were closed and her body was shaking. I felt frozen. I had heard Emily’s brain cancer caused seizures, but I had never seen anyone have one before. She kept shaking. Her wig slid sideways, revealing a closely shaved head with several bald patches. I felt a lump rise up in my throat. The next moment our science teacher was there holding Emily’s head as she convulsed. As Emily finally started coming out of the seizure she began mumbling:
“Because he loves me...because he loves me...I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.”
She was quoting Psalm 91. She was having a seizure and she was quoting Psalm 91. Finally, Emily opened her eyes. I could tell she did not see any of us.
“Because he loves me...” she said again with a smile. Emily’s eyes focused. She took a deep breath and her body stopped quivering. She gave us a helplessly apologetic look. The teacher helped her stand up and phoned her mom to come pick her up.
Things were different after that. It was like the day I finally got glasses. The whole world looked bright...sharp...focused. If Emily could quote Bible verses in the middle of a seizure and come to school every day with a smile on her face when she knew she could have a seizure any moment – then what was my problem? Why was I such a reclusive grouch? For the first time I wanted to be different. I wanted to be like Emily.
Emily graduated that year but I saw her during the summer. She stopped and asked if I was excited about being a senior next year. I did not really know. I thought my class was not ready to be seniors. Emily invited me over to her house to pray about it. I told her I would come, but I was a little reluctant. There were a lot of things I was afraid of, but there was nothing I was more afraid of then praying out loud.
But I swallowed my fear and went. It was a hot day. I could feel the heat radiating up from the pavement as I walked up the steep driveway to her house. As I neared the top, I heard a bark. The next moment an overfed golden retriever tackled me.
“Chester…” I heard Emily call, “Chester, you bad dog!”
Emily shoed the beast named Chester away from me with a swat on the bottom.
“He’s trying to be friendly,” she said. “He’s just forgets that he is so big and fat…and he thinks he’s a little lap dog.”
Emily made up for Chester by giving me a big hug and flashing a smile. She had changed. I noticed it the moment I hugged her. She was smaller – much smaller and bony. Her wig was replaced by a red handkerchief, tied at the base of her neck. A few thin hairs poked out underneath. Her rosy cheeks had shrunk and her blue eyes looked too massive for the rest of her face. The only thing about her that had not changed was her smile. I can still see it in my mind’s eye, gleaming like a half moon in a clear midnight sky. I smiled back at her.
“I’ve got apple pie and ice cream,” Emily said. “Do you want some?”
Of course, I did. We settled ourselves on the back porch and watched our ice cream slowly melt into the apple pie. This was the most unconventional “prayer meeting” I had ever been to. I imagined we would have to stand with our eyes closed and our heads bowed. But there we were lounging on Emily’s porch, eating pie and ice cream on a sunny afternoon. Emily’s idea of a prayer meeting was a good conversation where God was part of the conversation. She included him in our discussion as if he was sitting right there with us enjoying his own pie and ice cream.
That day Emily let me in on her secret of how she was able to look cancer in the face and smile: she was in love. I could tell every time I looked into her eyes—she was in love with Jesus. I had been a Christian for twelve years but that summer sitting on Emily’s porch I fell in love with Jesus too.
That September, I took a deep breath and prepared to face my first day as a senior. I felt like a different person than the shy junior of last year. I wanted things to change at Christ Church Academy so desperately. To my surprise things were already different. Spit wads and paper footballs no longer flew through the air during class and we managed to do more than stay awake during chapels. In fact, chapels rocked! It looked like a bunch of Emily clones had taken over the school. Sometimes I wonder if Emily had planned “prayer meetings” with each of my classmates.
After one particularly great chapel I noticed Emily in the back. Even though she was a graduate, she still came in occasionally for chapel. She was sitting in a wheel chair- same red handkerchief tied over her head. I felt like my smile was almost as big as hers, as I walked over to her.
“It’s happening Em,” I said. “Everything we prayed for...God did it!”
Emily just looked up at me from her wheelchair and smiled. She understood me but she was too weak to say anything back. That was the last time I saw Emily.
I suppose that was the reason I went to find her grave yesterday. I wanted to see her again and I wanted an answer to a question that had immobilized me for the last four years. Why God? Everything was just changing and getting better. Why did you let Em die? Emily’s epithet was simple, not at all profound, unless you knew the person buried underneath but it answered my question. It read:
The pure in heart shall see God.
Emily M. Heiber
Mar. 9 1985- Sep. 29 2004
I finally realized Emily had already answered my question four years ago during a lunch break. The answer was the reason that she did everything, “Because he loves me… because he loves me...” she had said. Not only did he love her but she also loved him. So much so that she could not bear to be separated from him by the veil of this world. She wanted to see him and now she was seeing him. I kneeled on the grass by Emily’s grave. The gray wetness seeped into my pants but I did not care. The yellow primrose and I cast shadows over Emily’s grave. Then slowly our shadows disappeared as the sun muscled its way through the slate sky and filled the little plot of grass with yellow light. I sat there looking down at the black marble tombstone and whispered, “Thank you Em....Thank you....”
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