We're Glad You Were Born

I get to do a lot of cool things these days. Meaningful things. One of those is sharing a brief word of encouragement at Wear Gloves on Fridays at noon. I enjoy being able to connect with people there and get updates from them, celebrate their victories, and some of them ask me to pray about stuff for them and I write it down in my journal.

Volunteers provide an amazing lunch for the WG clients, a few grocery gift cards are given away, I speak for 5ish minutes, then the birthdays and sober-versaries for the week are announced and we all sing the Happy Birthday song (you're probably familiar), followed by "We're glad you were born!"

A holy experience in 15 minutes or less.

But today is my dad's birthday. It occurred to me in class this morning when I put the date on an assignment. I held it together.

But I forgot that we sing Happy Birthday on Fridays. Today in particular after I have spoken about discovering hope when you feel surrounded by darkness.

For a brief moment, as the song began I felt a rush of sorrow and grief and anger. Instead of dealing with all of that in a room full of people for the second time today, I simply lowered my head and offered up a brief prayer of gratitude for my dad and our family.

Then the song was over.

My dad is not here, but he is present. When I am able to remember that I am beloved by God, I am also reminded of my dad's love for me. His love for my mom and my sister and my niece. For Ashley and Jules and Davy.

We all carry on in this imperfect but powerful love we have for one another, and it leads us closer to the love of God.

"The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it."