On the way home, my husband said to me, "Levi kept saying, 'I don't wanna die. Dad, I don't wanna die.' I kept telling him, not to worry and that he wasn't going to die, but it made me wonder why would he think he was going to die." I pondered this along with my husband until I realized I knew why he had said it. I said, "I never think he's actually listening to me, but I guess even when he is he misunderstands me anyway." Mark asked what I meant, and I explained it this way: A few months ago he said, "I hate you," to me when he was mad at me for not letting him do something he wanted to do. I took him by his hands, looked in his eyes, and I said, "Do you want mommy to die?" He said, "No." I said (as my parents had once told me), "When you tell someone that you hate them it means that you wish they were dead. If you don't wish I was dead, then you shouldn't say that you hate me." It would seem that in Levi's mind this translated to the incredibly scary and markedly morbid, "If someone says that they hate you, you're going to die," which, I'm sorry to say, does sound similar to what I told him the other day and which also, incidentally, accounts for the presence of tears earlier that evening. It's a shame they can't get in your head and understand what you're actually trying to communicate. I have a tendency to say things without thinking - probably a lot more often than I imagine. In fact, I'd say I'm either on one end of the spectrum or the other with that... I either think too little before I speak or think way too much before I speak.
Earlier tonight, as we were sitting at the kitchen counter at my friend's house, Levi looked up at me lovingly and said, "Mom, I love you so much." Then he puckered up for me to give him a kiss, which I happily did. I wondered what brought on such a burst of unwarranted affection. Then I began to overthink all of it, and, as I was in thought about how much I'm learning about males and how they seem to take a woman totally for granted and then pour out short bursts of affection for seemingly no reason at all, and just when I thought I might be on the brink of solving an age-old mystery, Levi interrupted my musings with, "Mom, people love people that love them first." Simple, succinct, and true. Don't you love how kids give you easy truth upside your head?
1 John 4:19 says, referring to God, "We love Him because He first loved us."
Jeremiah 31:3 says, "The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: "I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness."
I guess the Bible agrees with Levi. "People love people that love them first." Love is a remarkable thing - that we love at all... in this ugly, fallen state. I tend to believe we can't unless He first loves and lives in us. In human terms, somebody has to start the love, right? I mean, God loved us first, but sometimes we have to step out and choose to love another person first. If you're a parent, you know who loved whom first... and who always will.
As I write this, my world is in critter havoc. My son is outside skinning his first raccoon - which he treed earlier and is now skinning. The thought makes me lose my stomach, and I am as disgusted as he is thrilled. He came in a few minutes ago to ask my help learning how to tan the hide. I did my best to find the information he needed despite my sincere belief that the tail hanging over his bed will remind me of the fact that he probably killed a mommy raccoon whose babies are starving somewhere. In addition, my girls' hamster has, once again, managed to escape his living quarters. He has a new, plush living quarters with little colorful plastic tunnels that lead a dozen different directions. This, however, is not enough for Nibbles. He likes the wide open spaces of closet-land and laundry mountain. He likes the lush landscape of carpet and ceiling where, around each bend, awaits a hungry dog, curious toddler or some other menacing, life-threatening adventure. In fact, the dog managed to chase him out of the laundry room and he literally scampered over my feet not three minutes ago and is hunkered down under my oven as I type. He is a fiendish rodent. No matter how much the children love him first, he cannot love them back. Now I'm off to love them by figuring out how to get Nibbles back from under the oven. Wonder if I turn it on and toast his buns if he'll run out to accept the peace offering of grapes I put tantalizingly close to the front of it? I doubt it. From the looks of it, he's spent his day eating a variety of new offerings, including hair pretties, Barbie clothes, and some delicious cardboard boxes. He may not have the stomach for grapes. But, if my dog is any judge of that, he can spend all day eating underwear and still have room for a couple grapes.
