Rear View

Divorce can be devastating. It can take decades to heal, and it impacts generations for years to come. I truly believe no human power can heal that kind of pain. It takes a lot of time and something far greater. My experience is God has been with me during my chapters of pain and failure, even when I wasn’t necessarily seeking Him. He is in the suffering and He loves unconditionally. However, wounds from the past can be sneaky. They can resurface no matter how much work you do to process and heal.

A counselor of mine once described the following analogy when it comes to pain from the past. It’s like a luggage set. You have your carry on that might include some pain from childhood. Then you have your medium sized suitcase that carries pain from your teen and early adult years (I made a lot of mistakes in this chapter). Finally, you have the large suitcase that carries the pain from failures in your adult years (including, but not limited to a failed marriage). This counselor encouraged me to stop carrying all that luggage around. She encouraged me to unpack it (let go) so it was lighter, and eventually I would have less luggage. Experts say that the failure rate for second marriages is even higher than first marriages. That the cards are stacked against you when you are blending families. So I had to ask myself, what luggage am I carrying into this marriage? Fitting question for our first vacation following our wedding and the blending of our families.

I grew up going to Lake of the Ozarks most summers since I was a newborn. Some of my best childhood memories are from trips to the Ozarks. Last July several of us took a trip together and I was reminded that one family’s idea of a vacation might be something entirely different than another’s. Sometimes there are traditions, expectations, and varying degrees of what qualifies as relaxation. What you see in pictures on social media are usually the best parts of vacation, but sometimes not everything goes as planned. Kids are tired. Adults want to relax. It rains. The pontoon boat you rent almost sinks.

Our trip to the Ozarks fell one week before we were moving into our new house. My husband and his kids had already moved once, and all of us were preparing for a huge move when we returned home. I realize in hindsight this was a great recipe for crazy making. A great place to unknowingly take luggage from the past while trying to vacation in the present. We made some great memories that week, but we also had some pretty big disagreements. When it was time to pack up we were ready to come home.

The best part of this story is the ending. As we were driving home exhausted and on each other’s last nerve…BANG! Our rear view window shattered! We were on a country dirt road trying to avoid a traffic jam when a rock flew up, ricocheted off the boat, and hit the rear view window. So there we were in the middle of nowhere with no rear view window and still three hours from home. So what next? Yell, blame, get scared OR pull together as a team and find a solution. It wasn’t until we got home that we realized God was there with us on that country road. We just started to work together, picking all of the glass out of the rear window and clearing the luggage space. We called the insurance company, grabbed some snacks, and drove home. With no rear view window. It was hot and stinky, and we heard the occasional complaint from the back of the car. However, the kids really did make the best of a crazy situation (air straws was one way). My husband and I shared some pretty great moments of laughter. At one point he blasted “Crazy Train” by Ozzy Osborne and the kids rolled the windows down and screamed. We came together as a family, we embraced the chaos, and we will remember that drive home for years to come.

“I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.”

Philippians 4:13