Let it Snow

            I’m watching the snow fall for the third time this winter as I attempt yet again at regularly scheduled blogging.   Maybe I have been transported to a northern state in my sleep— perhaps back to Maryland, or even somewhere I have not lived yet, but romanticize about… maybe Portland, Maine.  I wish I could say I am enjoying the white fluffy view.  I am not.  Last week I began running in the morning—just a 25 minute “wake me up and jostle the soul side of me” run.  It has been wonderful.  But I’m not going to risk slipping in the snow this morning for 25 minutes of fresh air…. So I guess my children will have to suffer with coffee-cleared only mommy, as if that is such a new reality for them.  Hmmm—maybe romanticizing about Portland, Maine isn’t my answer.

         Too much time has elapsed to try and update the life of Team Dragovich from the last post to this one.   I am left with only my memories of the 2010 holiday season and the impressions and ponderings left within me, compared to last year.  Probably the most prominent recognition I have of this holiday season is of normalcy.  I can’t remember the last time we’ve spent Christmas without some eminent life change either having just happened, about to happen or in the midst of happening—preparing for a move, recovering from a move, transitioning from student to resident, resident to professional, professional to administrator.  Deployment, adoption, post-deployment, post- adoption—endless swaying in the seas of transition.  This year was marked by nothing.  And that is exactly how it has distinguished itself in my mind. 

         JB and Risa ate up every Advent and Christmas tradition with grand eagerness and excitement, constantly reminding me of how it was “last year”.  It was as if I could see the roots growing from their feet, imbedding themselves more firmly into the garden of our family, securing themselves in our soil and enlivening their souls as they experienced traditions with which they now had familiarity and could appreciate.  Security.  Contentment.  An evenness of emotions pulsed through me.  Oh Joy! 

What struck even deeper, was an amazement that a year and a half which had seemed so traumatic and often tragic to me, somehow produced in them love, security and belonging.  How is this?   When I look back on the short time JB and Risa have been home, I still can barely bring the depth of my experience to  surface.  Like when Wyatt wants to reminisce on the months of Tony’s deployment or ask endless questions about Iraq, Tony’s experiences, our fears, traumas (my grandfather’s unexpected death, for example, or seeing pictures of JB and Risa for the first time, not together but over thousands of miles between us) and just remembering daily life—there is a point at which the veil is let down and we can go no further.  The capacity to surface and unwrap such powerful emotions is not there yet.  Our adoption carries the same level of emotional sacredness for me.  And yet, this Christmas and New Year were testaments to God’s personal love for our family, His unwavering commitment in spite of my soul’s seemingly endless struggle against depression and the truth of His Word lived out in us: 

“And we know that in ALL THINGS God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.”  Romans 8:28

“Trust in the Lord with ALL your heart, and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.”  Proverbs 3:5-6

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD.  As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to the it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

So is my Word that goes out from my mouth:  It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.”  Isaiah 55:8-12

Maybe the snow isn’t so bad after all.

Grace and Peace,

Shari