April

I awoke this morning to my husband's arms wrapped around me and the feel of his warm breath in my hair. This is not something I ever take for granted.....especially lately. We have not gotten along very well at all. But he was trying, even though I am the one who forgot.

"You know what today is, don't you?" I am sure I would have thought of it eventually, but this is the first time I haven't thought of April 7 approaching for a few days beforehand. I'm not sure why.

Twelve years ago today, our lives changed. Two weeks before we were expecting the most drastic alter in our life's direction - marriage - IT happened first.

April 7, 1995, Greg's dad passed away from a stomach aneurysm while pouring concrete for a new residential neighborhood on the far north side of our metro. He had been given a clean bill of health from a complete physical just four months before. It was sudden and it was shocking.

And it was part of life. We understood that. What has made it still so difficult after all these many years, besides the obvious loss suffered (and their was much; this was a DEARLY loved man) has been the events of Aprils since. We are not superstitious and we do not claim there is any magic in this certain time frame. It has just become our experience that God seems to administer some sort of spiritual SAT to us all at various times in order to test our faith, and very often our time slot for the "Super section" of the test seems to fall in this month.

Not all of these tests are so negative. Take 1996, for example. The occasion was a happy one. I was pregnant with our first child and we were very happy about our impending arrival. But we also were very broke, trying to make it financially not only as newlyweds, but also helping Greg's mother and her two dependent sons, who were left widowed and orphaned by the previous year's events. Plus he was working so much to make ends meet, we pretty much NEVER saw each other.

In April 1997, we were stressed out brand new parents of a four-month-old when our pastor died. Our pastor who led me to Christ. No, LOVED me to Christ. Unconditionally. My Grandpa after mine had died.

Other years brought other deaths - an old childhood friend of my husband was murdered. One of his employees was electrocuted. That big teddy bear of a guy had a young wife and two year old baby when he passed. Once in April, one of my husband's employees was falsely suspected of a heinous abduction and murder of a young girl in Texas, a national news story, because the description of the truck so closely matched that of my husband's, which the employee had borrowed that weekend. It all got sorted out eventually, but it wreaked havoc on business and reputation for a few long days.

Anyway, I hadn't thought much about April approaching this year, except to eagerly anticipate Easter and our Anniversary. Until my husband's comment this morning. And I thought back over the last week. It was horrible. I didn't decide this upon my revelation that it was April. I've been very aware of how my week has gone since it began last Sunday.

Our identity was breached again. I only discovered this, of course, AFTER having spent three hours at the grocery store and then being unable to pay. And going out to lunch with a bunch of other moms I was just meeting for the first time on a school field trip and having to have them buy my lunch. Embarrassing. I spent the past 8 days with no access to cash at all. Nothing but a single credit card we use only for emergencies. We decided no food to eat probably constituted an emergency, so now we have racked up a bunch of finance charges just as we head into tax time. (And tax time for a business is way more hairy than tax time for personal income!)

Oh, and I wrecked my car. It is fine. Everyone in the wreck was fine. But it is a sickening feeling knowing that my brakes failed after discovering only a few months ago that the brake pads had worn off COMPLETELY after only 24,000 miles. We suspect that must be the case again - at only 33,000.

And then there are interpersonal problems. These hurt me the worst.

And the house, which I should be used to after three years. But living out of boxes for three years somehow doesn't get any easier with time.

And my niece is having her worst bout of illness since coming home from the transplant center last month.

I could go on and on. But I'm not going to. This is the day that the Lord hath made. I will rejoice and be glad in it. And if it sounds like I'm trying to convince myself as much as you, that's O.K. I am. And that's better than being stuck where I don't turn to Him and His promises.

He made April 7, 2007 just like He made April 7, 1995. He made them both to teach us to trust Him. Just like He made April 22, 1995 to give me a partner to face it all with. And April 19, 1995 three days before to teach us we are not alone in our trials - through the Oklahoma City bombing 15 miles away from where we wed. And five dates on the calendar set aside specifically to celebrate the important existence of a particular member of our family in this world.

Tomorrow is such an important day to celebrate as well. But it isn't here yet. And really, we do not have a promise that it will be. So just in case it never comes, THIS DAY, I will rejoice!!! Today, this day is most important.