Sunday's coming

I'm weary.
We're nearly half way through this deployment and the weariness has settled in my heart, like a dense Cape Fear River morning fog that mutes all the colors and makes the once familiar road ahead of you seem strange and treacherous.
I'm clinging to the fact that Greg will be home for 15 days in May for his R&R. If it gets cancelled or postponed, I feel like the fog might swallow us.
God knows I'm trying to fend it off. I've put up a mighty fight. Every day, I do the things I'm supposed to do.  I put one foot in front of the other. I keep going. Our clothes are washed and folded, our house is relatively tidy, the dog gets fed, we get fed. We play, we laugh, we snuggle, we read, we sing. I keep busy. I organize and I read and I plan and I tinker and I stay up late most nights working on this project or that project, dreading going to bed alone again.

Last Friday morning, in that space between sleeping and waking I cracked open my eyes just a bit and thought I caught a glimpse of my husband lying beside me. When I say my heart skipped a beat, it is no exaggeration. Instinctively, I reached for him, only to realize it was a mirage created by my fuzzy sleepy brain and a pillow that I had placed on Greg's side of the bed to keep Andrew from falling off during a nap the day before.
Then, last night, I let my thoughts go to a place I rarely dare. I was holding Andrew in my lap, thinking about how perfectly his little body fits in that space, as if he was shaped according to me. I love how he melts into that spot each night as he drinks his milk before bed. I remembered telling Greg something very similar many years ago, when our love was new and we were still making new discoveries about each other. There is a space between Greg's shoulder blades where I can rest my head if I'm standing behind him with my arms wrapped around him. It seemed to me then that space was created for me, as if God knew that one day, my cheek would rest in that very place and it was sculpted to the exact specifications that would make it a perfect fit.
Hot tears fell then and again later as I Skyped with Greg, finally getting a connection that allowed us to see and hear each other after several weeks of maddening spotty service. He was getting ready for work and I caught a glimpse of that place on his back that was made for me to rest my head.
I miss my husband.

One night this week, after I'd already bathed Andrew and put him into mismatched pajamas, my sister who lives just across the road, called to tell me to go outside to see a beautiful rainbow that stretched across the sky over the trees behind my house.
I grabbed my camera and Andrew and went outside. Andrew was so excited, pointing at the sky and jabbering. I told him the word "rainbow" and he began saying "bow, bow, bow." I snapped a few pictures of him toddling around pointing up at the sky.
Later, I sent the pictures to Greg as we chatted through text messages. "Wow, that's a good one, Honey," he said. "It almost looks like he's pointing at the rainbow in that first one."
My poor husband. He has missed so much in Andrew's life that he didn't realize that little baby he left is a little boy now and he WAS pointing at the rainbow.

It's Good Friday. For believers in Christ, it's a day to remember the sacrifice, to consider the price that was paid for us. Here in my neck of the woods, we are mourning the loss of another teenager tragically killed in a car wreck this morning on the way to school.
This was his facebook status, posted this morning before he left home for the last time: "On this day thousands of years ago a man was beaten and crucified for you he gave the greatest love for you so in that one day you can all live with him in paradise for that I am thankful. Just think about that, all of you who think this is just a half day (of school)."
Christians have a saying, "It's Friday, but Sunday's coming." It refers to the belief that after Jesus was crucified on Good Friday, he was resurrected on Easter Sunday.
The phrase is sometimes used when we find ourselves in a dark place, a bad situation, enveloped in sadness or grief. It speaks to the belief that things are going to get better, that salvation is promised, that time will offer healing.
And so I have to remind myself that even though this separation has made me weary and there have been days when I find myself wrapped in worry and longing, I have to lean on the fact that this too shall pass. It's Friday, but Sunday's coming.