I am sitting in my room which overlooks the runway at the airport. I watch the toy planes take off for worlds unknown to me. I think about the tiny people in those planes, people who have families and friends at home. They have jobs, and lives, and I wonder where they are going and why. Soon my daughter and her friends will be those people. They will take off into the sky beginning the adventure of a lifetime. I sit and I ponder. What will it be like for them? What will it be like for me?
I have walked this letting go road before. Maybe not exactly like this, but I have opened my hand numerous times for each of my children. No one tells you how often you have to let them go when they are born. I mean you know that they are not yours for long, but the letting go starts almost immediately, and I find that with each leaving of my children I am forced into change. Sometimes I want to scream, “Stop. For just a minute…can we just let things stay as they are for a minute?”
Of course the answer is no, we cannot. And so I ride the roller coaster called parenting and try to let my hands go and put them up in the air. I try to figure out how to take joy in plunging full speed on a downhill slope while my stomach is in knots. I have done this enough times to know that I can do it. I have done it enough to know that the changes it brings are invaluable, and they are as much for me as they are for my kids. I do not live in a vacuum. My life is affected by those in my circle and the closer they are to me the more I feel the effect of those changes. I guess I could be a person who stays the same; we all know some of them. They do the same things, they live the same lives and on days like today, I sometimes wish I were one of them. Ultimately, I don’t really want that because, as comfortable as it appears, it does not allow for growth. It doesn’t allow for healing, or stretching, or discomfort, or empowering. So as many tears that will flow on this day as I once again say goodbye to my daughter, I welcome the changes they bring. I trust God once again, and I open my hand as my act of worship. I give him this offering of my daughter, but also of my own heart so he can do his work there.
The runway is full now. The day is underway, and the tiny people are so very busy going where they have to go. The planes outside are jetting away into the overcast sky, filled with human cargo which have important places to be. I watch them, from my window and I know that soon those planes will be carriers of grace to the nations. Soon they will carry the enthusiasm, and energy of young adults who desire to change the world; who believe in a God that is big enough to do great things through them. They are right. He is going to use them there, but he is also already using them here, to change me and my world. I am preparing my heart for this ride, as my girl prepares hers to fly.