"It's Snowing!"

I've just now finished watching a movie I've come to put on my Christmas list each year.  It's a family during the holidays, all grown children come home to celebrate and the dynamics of bringing new people to the mix and how that plays itself out; all misunderstandings and the brittle awkwardness of trying to fit in and get used to one another, to something that's different from what it's always been.  There's pain and humor.  Just like life.  The thing that was going to be kept hidden until after Christmas, though, slips out during a confrontation.  The mom is dying.  She wanted it not to color the holiday, the last one she suspected she was going to have.

The thing is, the tremble that went through everyone when it was spoken out loud, shifted Christmas day hard.  It brought a sharp focus.  It forced the moment to be noticed differently.  It cost more all of a sudden.  The brittle new was still there; to some almost resented like an intruder.  How dare you get to be be here while I hear this news.  What do you know about it?  What if it's all your fault, this new you bring, like somehow it made the old start dying right then?  It's irrational.  But it's real.  

Christmas evening, the family is in the background while the mom is staring out the window in the kitchen.  One of the family sees her and comes alongside.  There's always one, isn't there?  One that notices what others don't.  You expect her to cry or to say something about dying.  She blinks and smiles....."It's snowing!" she says, like a little girl happy.  You pay more attention when you think it's your last.  I like that she says that.  

The scene fades and it's a snowy morning, Christmas a year later.  The babies are now toddlers, the "new" people from last year are now an easy part of the mix.  It's time to turn the lights on on the tree, just like always and everyone gathers round.  "It's a good tree, dad," says one of the daughters and they all nod wordlessly.  "Are you okay?" asks her boyfriend?  She looks at him with tears in her eyes and nods yes.  The camera pans to a framed picture of her mother on a table nearby, the lights from the tree reflecting on it to let you know she's gone now.  In the reflection, you can see the family begin to trim the tree and remember the ornaments together, smiling and laughing.  There's a tender joy there.  The kind that living and loving and losing bring.

The picture of the mother, taken when she was young and pregnant with one of her kids, always makes me think of my Noah.  He was 18 months old when I almost died.  I think now that he would have no memory of me and thank God for the chance to raise him.  He would have been alright.  I am just so grateful for the grace.   But this time, as the movie ended, I thought back on this year  and all that God has taught me about life and loss and sorting that out; about noticing when somebody falters under the weight of it.  Thanksgiving Day this year was spent in the company of a young one that has experienced loss I can only begin to touch.  As the credits rolled it suddenly occurred to me; I had been the "new" in his holiday that day and I had forgotten to ask him if he was okay; to tell him that I remembered.  to acknowledge what he must have been struggling with.  I regret that.

I wanted to be the one who came up beside him at the window.  And I forgot to pay attention.  I pray I won't do that again.