Brian and I were talking tonight about how you really can't recognize the important moments of your life as they are happening. Births and deaths announce themselves, obviously, but the others - the ones that decide who we are going to be - slip right past us. Brian didn't know, when he and Nick joked about singing in the Huntingdon talent show eight years ago, that he was joining a band, much less choosing a career path. I didn't know, when I took a job as a youth minister for a summer rather than working as a camp counselor, that the two years I would spent with that youth group would be my favorite time of my life so far. I met people that I still know and love, I met and fell in love with Brian, and I grew tremendously spiritually. The life-altering moments are so quiet, so anonymous at the time. Their significance is only seen in hindsight.
Another significant moment, one worth documenting for all of the little band family to read: standing in Mary and Lane's (and Jon and Mechelle's) living room on a Sunday afternoon in Nashville, having a crisis of conscience. I felt like I was in an impossible situation - if I did what seemed to be morally right, I was going to alienate - and ultimatley lose - one of my closest friends. And Mary, whom I love dearly, though we have been known to have, um, intense conversations, changed my life. She said, "God judges your heart. I'd rather stand before God and have him say, you loved people and did stupid things, than have Him say, you did the right thing, but at what cost?" This statement has become a measuring stick for me. Am I motivated by love, or am I trying to be right?
So this is what is on my mind tonight. Tonight, by the way, is the anniversary of my grandmother's death. It is a blessing to remember all of her life now (at least, the parts that included me), and not just the end of it. I have a great picture of her framed on the bookshelf beside me. She - I am not making this up - has on glasses with huge swirling eyes, she's doing this silly silly thing with her hands, and she's laughing - really laughing, not just smiling for the camera. She looks completely ridiculous. I love it. She could not have possibly known that twenty years later, this picture would be what her grandchildren framed and remembered about her life.
The really important moments slide right past us. Sometimes we never recognize them for what they are.
2 comments:
Yeah, most important moments are only clear in hindsight.
I totally agree. Some of the most defining moments in my life have been the simple ones; baking an apple pie at your house, walks around campus or your neighborhood, accepting a waitressing job... These are the thing that, unsuspecting at the time, are the moments that I can see now as moments that have molded me. I am so glad that you were a part of most of them!
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