A kiss to make it better

Tommy is at the age right now, where if he has a little fall or gets any kind of "boo-boo," that my kisses have some kind of magical power to make him feel instantly all better. I love that he comes to me with a little pout on his face showing me his latest ailment. He will say to me, "A kiss all better."

Pretty much melts my heart every single time.

So I give him a little kiss and he goes on his merry way. I love that he comes to me and asks for what he's needing. I love that he wants me to know of his pain, even as little or insignificant as it may be. I love that after I've given him a kiss, he has felt comfort and can return to playing and his little world feels okay again.

We all grow out of that at some point. I'm curious when it is we don't need mommy's kisses to make things all better anymore. I know it's a phase that most kids go through (and thankfully we grow out of it, because if my son were 13 and asking for my kisses to make his boo-boo better we would have a problem), yet I'm curious why it stops and when it stops.

And I've been curious about pain lately; what I do with it when I begin to feel it. My fleshly and almost natural reaction is to go to some kind of soother and find a way to cope with it. And this is where I have become caught up in addiction after addiction, time and again. My desire is to feel it, be alive to it, acknowledge it, and sit with it instead of trying to just cope with it. That's what I've done for years and it hasn't worked well for me.

This morning my heart is aching. Some dear friends of ours told us that they are moving away. And though we kind of knew this day was coming and there is much joy surrounding all of it too, I am still sad at the thought of one of my best friends not being here anymore.

Tiffany left. And now them. And my cousin will be gone next year. It feels like some of my closest friendships are being ripped away from me and things are changing. And I'll admit that I'm often all for change, until change costs me something like this. I'm sad at imagining life without all of these people here that I love so much. And it feels too gross to imagine or hope for what other relationships could look like yet. Because right now I just want to sit with what their absence will mean.

I guess as we grow, pain just looks different and it has to. We have to deal with it differently because pain goes beyond scrapes or scratches. Pain goes deep to the heart. It has a ripple affect on our lives and how we live and what we do when no one is looking. So for me, it means sitting with my sadness and just feeling this loss rather than running to something to help me cope. Pain continues to reveal my desperate need for God and it feels like He is all about wanting me to see that right now.

Though, I am kind of wishing there was a way a kiss could make it all better again.