Joy and Sadness brings Light

It is the rare person who,
looking back over his life
and seeing what he has done to it,
hasn't sighed for a chance to redeem
what he has cheaply used
or carelessly ruined.
~ Samuel Howard Miller (The Life of the Soul)

This is a woeful tale of great sorrow and sadness. A child alone in the world counting on the kindness of strangers.

I really didn’t know what was going to happen when Tina entered my son Donald’s life. I thought just another fling or ships passing in the night. He has always had a tendency to have these experiences. I was rather shocked when talking with Tina when she said that Donald was the kindest, most compassionate man that she had ever met. To myself, I thought she must have really known some bad boys in her life to think that of my son who has always been rather a bad boy himself.

Donald told me little bits and pieces about Tina. And mostly they enjoyed sitting around in the evening watching TV together and just being together. Lost souls helping each other find solace and comfort in a world that had been cruel but that is like so many of us.

It was on Thanksgiving. Donald had been drinking so Tina was driving. They were stopped by the police for having a tail light not working. When the officers ran Tina’s name through the computer system they immediately arrested her for an outstanding warrant from another state. Thanksgiving and it appears that a major problem has ruined the day. However, as the tale unfolds we discover that it is often the darkest night of the soul that brings us our epiphany and leads us back to redemption and the light.

Thanksgiving and alone in a jail cell is not something one would be thankful for. And at home Donald felt the loneliness descend as it had before Tina entered his life. There was a knock on the door it was Justin, Tina’s son. Justin had been visiting a friend where he would often go to stay as teenage boys like to do. Justin, age 15, was alone. He had no one to turn to except his mother. And she was locked down in jail.

Donald called me and said: If I love the mother, how can I not love the son.

I then had my realization that my son truly was the compassionate caring person that Tina had described. The real son that had been hidden by circumstances had been reborn by his need to help another. My heart was a mixture of sadness and joy. Sadness for this young boy who was all alone except for the kindness of a stranger and joy that my son was truly a compassionate and caring person.

This awareness of the depth of his ability to care, renewed my faith. I suddenly felt that perhaps just perhaps the mistakes that I had made when Donald was a child had not destroyed a heritage of caring for others that had been my gift from my mother.

What will be the resolution to the story, I do not know. I only know that one Thanksgiving night, a tragedy gave me hope that if we continue to demonstrate unconditional love to our children, no matter how wounded they might be, the time will come when they too will be able to share this compassionate and unconditional love with others.