Kindness

There is nothing more heartbreaking as a parent than to watch your child suffer. Even in the littlest ways. In that moment,  you truly know the meaning of love-- to wish another's suffering upon yourself. And the more aware of, and affected by the world your child becomes, the deeper the love you feel.
Last night we got a glimpse of this heartbreak. Just a tiny glimpse.
We had promised the boys a trip to the playground after dinner, since we weren't able to visit the "too crowded" park after the parade earlier in the day. It was such a lovely evening, and we chose a playground that we knew would not have too many people. When we arrived, the sky was full of beautiful, puffy white clouds, sun shining brightly on them as it was beginning to set. Within a minute or so of arriving, there was a sun shower -- just a minute of spritzing rain that resulted in a beautiful double rainbow arching across the sky. What perfect timing. A sign of God's Kindness.  The promise of Good things. All seemed right with the world.
There were a few other families there, picnicking together, all of the children running around and squealing. Christian quickly introduced himself and assumed his usual role of "cruise director", announcing to the group what they were going to do ('be' firetrucks), followed by his usual, "come on, guys! let's GOOO!"
There were 5 or 6 of them, all boys, and mostly a year or so older than C.  They stood and stared at him for a moment and then one of them said, "Everyone to their battle stations!" ... a concept our little Firetruck didn't quite grasp.  When he tried to reassert himself, the boys were visibly uncomfortable with such brazen attempts at leadership of their group.  One of them yelled something to the effect of "let's get out of here!" and they all began to run away. Now this would have been a fine time for us to step in and console the poor little left out 4 year old. But the problem was, he didn't know he was being rejected. He thought it was an invitation to run away to the adjacent playground with them. So he smiled at us and ran after them. Dave and I looked at each other with identical expressions of "Oh no! What do we do?" on our faces.
 As we watched the scene play out, C chasing the pack of boys, them yelling "ahh! RUN!" when he got close, him running after them, smiling and waving at us as he passed, clearly not taking the hints... we kept cringing, biting our lips, and furrowing our brows at one another, clueless as to how to help him avoid the pain of rejection that surely would eventually dawn on him. The only consolation to our breaking hearts was that our son was blissfully ignorant. But we knew that it wouldn't be long. That whether it was tonight, or tomorrow, or another year from now, the time was coming for his wall of innocence to be shattered by the sticks and stones of hurtful words. Standing there, taking it all in, was like watching little pebbles being thrown at it, nicking the glass, threatening to crack it.  Ironically, a huge storm cloud had begun to move across the open sky, darkening the playground and threatening to spew forth something fierce. Oh good! A reason to leave. But he didn't want to go. He was having too much fun.
A few minutes later, when he was climbing up a jungle gym and one of the boys yelled to his friend with the Nerf football, "take a shot!", I had to step in. I mean, seriously?? I was already standing 5 feet away from them. Were they really going to peg my kid with a football right in front of me??!! With my best Mama Bear glare, I folded my arms and said, "Are you gonna throw that at him?"
The kid looked somewhat bashful, and said, "yeah."
Not having a clue what to say next, I replied, "Is that nice?"
He lowered his arm and walked away. Thunder rumbled overhead, insisting it was time to go.
Realizing this was paining us much more than it was paining him, we didn't want to have a little life lesson moment if it wasn't necessary. But we did encourage him that he did the right thing by being kind to those boys, even when they didn't want to play with him. When he asked why they didn't want to play with him, we fumbled for an answer. But we assured him that even when people don't want to play with us, or are mean to us, we can still treat them with kindness.
And then it dawned on me the amount of kindness being showed to us that evening.... that we were able to be there for that moment in his life. That it was so minor compared to what it could have been. That we felt the brunt of it instead of him. That we were initiated into the world of parental heartbreak so gently. That though the rainbows of life can be followed by more intense darkness, their beauty remains a fresh reminder of hope.... That sometimes we are given signs of God's Kindness before a storm, sometimes during, and sometimes not til the storm has passed. It is God's Goodness toward us that sustains us, reminding us that we are not made for this broken, stormy world. That someday the clouds will part, revealing a beauty beyond fathomable.  Rejection, pain, and the rest of the storms will be swallowed up by the LIGHT Himself.
My momma's heart wishes I could exchange his future suffering with joy. But I can't.  It will continue to break my heart that I can't spare him sorrow. But I am soo thankful that in the midst of whatever pain our boys may face, we can point them to the One who took our suffering upon Himself... The truest definition of Love. The only way by which we can offer true kindness to others.