He is in the eighth grade, and he lets his mom kiss him goodbye at the bus stop.
Anyone who has even known a single 8th-grader understands how peculiar that is. Most 8th-graders do anything to put physical distance between themselves and parents. Emotional distance, even. Demanding to be dropped off at the mall out of sight of anyone who might-gasp!-see their dependence on Mom or Dad for a ride. The horror. The horror.
Any public display of affection is anathema. May cause trauma. Irreparable damage.
I've watched him for a week, wondering why he lets Mom hug him, why he wraps his arms around her rather than stiffening up in the resistance that kids learn is a passive-aggressive defense against parental affection, lets her smooch him in plain sight of all his peers. Why no one teases him about it. That, too, if you know any 8th-graders at all, is even more peculiar. He doesn't seem to be a fragile kid, or particularly needy, he sits in the back of the bus and cuts up with his friends about as much as normal.
Today I got my answer.
Every day since the start of the year, his mom has worn a big floppy hat and big movie-star sunglasses to keep out the sun. Today, with an overcast sky, she had traded in the big hat for a pink do-rag with a pattern of tiny pink ribbons.
Tiny. Pink. Ribbons.
Oh.
The realization was like being stabbed in the heart. I pulled my hat brim lower and fished my sunglasses out of my bag not to keep sunshine out of my eyes, but to hide the big hot tears which immediately flooded my eyes. Wouldn't do to let a bunch of tough junior high kids see me red-eyed and teary.
It's hard enough on people my age to deal with such words, "cancer" and "death", to contend with a mother's or father's dying. But in 8th grade? What is that, thirteen? What do you even say to someone going through that?
I know nothing about her prognosis or their lives together other than what I see every day. But I am astounded at their love which has punched through that wall of reserve in such a visible and profound way. And at the respect shown him by the rest of the kids, who never tease him for being a "momma's boy".
It is terrible, just awful, that this affirmation has such a high price. But how many times have we heard someone bemoan missed opportunities to appreciate family or friends far in the past, how many of us have wished for just one more day to spend with mom or dad or husband or wife?
They, mother and son, don't seem to be missing opportunities.
One of God's promises is to transform us, to change our hearts "of stone": And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. (Ezekiel 36:26).
What does having a heart of flesh rather than a heart of stone mean? Here's the picture I get in my mind's eye when I think of "heart of flesh" and close my eyes:
He is in the eighth grade, and he lets his mom kiss him goodbye at the bus stop.
