There You Are

'Cause I'll always remember you the same . . .

With your big brown eyes, knelt over the noisiest toy fire truck in the county . . . With your long, curled eyelashes as you made 'tractor' sounds up and down, and up and down, the faded blue carpet of this childhood home.

As you walked to get your diploma all I could recall was the incessant motor noise you insisted on making, all I could recall were the faded brown of those infant-sized Carhartt's you eventually wore out, all I could recall was that you were once small - and now you are not.

'Cause I'll always remember you the same . . .

Shouting payday! at the top of your lungs in a bedroom where Pepto-Bismol exploded . . . Sitting on my front porch step painting over another layer of nail polish and talking about young boys at school that were cute.

I look at your pregnant belly pictures - counting down the months until you get to hold perfect, precious life in your hands and I remember the ache in the side of my stomach from laughter with you, I remember the "voice" we spoke in more often than not, I remember that language - so far from here - from where we both are.

'Cause I'll always remember you the same . . .

With your bright blue eyes - always eager. And you were always waiting for me, weren't you? With your curly, blond hair - It was your hair that first pulled me in, if I'm being honest.

I catch a sneak of engagement pictures - you're wearing that brown sweater I bought for you on our last Christmas together . . . And I see you holding your sweet, sweet baby girl with a bow in her hair and all I can remember is that hand-drawn tattoo on your undeveloped bicep on that first night we danced together, and all I can remember is the way your chin always rested just so on the crown of my head, and all I can remember is the life we attempted to build - before we ever knew it was going to break.

'Cause I'll always remember you the same . . .

Your raspy voice - calling out Aunt Yoosha's name, your raspy voice - calling out hello to me down a hallway that has known so many of my secrets . . . your raspy voice.

I see the number 40 anywhere and I'm back on the sidelines in a skirt that is too short, listening - waiting for your name to be ricocheted across the velvet, black sky, I see snowfall and I remember how the cold air bit at the tip of my nose - I remember how the tears must have crystallized right before they hit the ground.

'Cause I'll always remember you the same . . .

A first kiss, a first love, that time I swore I was just breathing for the very first time. A first loss, a first realization, that time I finally knew what not being able to breathe actually felt like.

'Cause I'll always remember you the same . . .

Oh, eyes like wildflowers . . .

Maybe when God is looking at our lives He always remembers us the same - that first breath of air after the immersion of a baptism - that first whispered prayer of feverish desperation for forgiveness and love, love, love - that first declaration that this path is not our own, it is not of our own making.

'Cause I'll always remember you the same . . .

A child. We were babies. What did we know? How could we have fathomed the brokenness of this world? How could we have fathomed the repair we are provided to find . . .

{Keep your head up}

{Keep your heart strong}

{Keep your mind set}

Keep your head up

'Cause I'll always remember you the same . . .


*Italic words are song lyrics from "Keep Your Head Up" by Ben Howard*