Labels

I am reading a book called take a closer look for women (yep, no capital letters in that title, and yep, the editor in me cringes). In this book, Jan Kern, one of my favorite writers, offers up a bundle of devotional studies. She writes with gentleness and compassion, two qualities I admire and long for.

After presenting a homily about the Samaritan woman at the well originally told in John's gospel, Kern asks, "Jesus sees the beautiful person you can be, not the labels you're hanging on to. When you shed those, what do you see?"

Ouch.

I've spent the last few days updating my various online profiles. I often use a tag phrase that goes something like, "wife, teacher, reader, friend" (seems I, too, can be a bit cavalier about capital letters). As I backspace over R-E-H-C-A-E-T, I wait for a deluge of tears, or at least a sense of panic.

What I feel instead is absolutely nothing. Perhaps I'm in the shock stage of grief.

Yet Kern's question niggled. Strip away all the labels I attach to myself, whether ones that fill me with pride or shame, and what's left? I sat back at the kitchen table, closed my eyes, and tried to picture that woman.

What I saw instead was a little girl.

I ran across a box of photos the other day. My aunt sent me these after my grandfather died. After sorting out the ones meaningful to her, she mailed me the rest in hopes I would find treasures for myself and my brothers. I put the task off for nearly two years, not sure that what I'd find would result in smiles or grimaces.

All smiles. My brothers with 80s big-hair, my mom as a fat cheeked toddler clinging to a doll, my beloved Boxer Mandy curled up next to me on the couch in the era before I started plucking or waxing. Sweet sweet sweet.

And this: a little girl, maybe four or five years old, wearing bell-bottomed jeans and a white rain coat embellished with red, heart-shaped pockets. Her head is cocked to one side as she twirls a red and white umbrella over her head.

Melissa. Not yet a wife. No teacher in sight. A bit of reader already. Surely many friends.

Ah, here come the tears.