Stained Socks

Originally uploaded by laundrylessons.

These were Paige’s socks after she ran through the freshly cut lawn and hurled herself into a round-off, back handspring. Nice. Well the gymnastic move was, but the socks, they are another story - into the soak bucket. Paige hasn’t done cheerleading or taken any gymnastic lessons in over two years, but the moves came back to her. All those years of lessons have stained her.

Last week I saw a friend who I hadn’t seen in many months. We had raised our babies together, but then she moved. But the intensity of our friendship stained us, and we quickly reconnected. People, skills, trivia facts about the Amazon, come into my life and leave their impression. Some encounters are brief, but intense, like the friends the kids make for a week at camp, while others take years to leave their mark.

Merritt, our youngest daughter, has the capacity to stain lives. Born with a degenerative mitochondrial disease, she hasn’t progressed beyond about a three month level. Although the doctors said she may live two years, this summer she turns six. She still needs to leave her impression on a few more hearts, so I think God’s keeping her around to do her job. When I view her life as one full of potential to touch others, I don’t feel as sad about her inability to touch her nose or tumble like Paige.

My kids are developing at an exponential rate. I get about eighteen years to make sure I’ve stained their souls with the stuff I want to stick. But now all this other gunk, and dirty dancing, and language and junk food is leaving an impression too. I know the kids need to absorb stuff from the world to be well rounded and fit in, but I hope my staining power works like grass, or blood or red wine and that they don’t find a soak bucket to get rid of my mark.