As I walked past Clothgirl’s bedroom yesterday I didn’t know if I would smile or cry.
Clothgirl has been attending college ten minutes away so I could expect her to walk in the door at any moment to do laundry, eat dinner or spend the night. But last week she moved to Boise, ID to pursue her nursing degree. That’s an eight hour drive from her bedroom which makes me think she’s not going to be sleeping here often.
Her purple room is mostly empty yet overflowing with memories. Its walls are bare yet I see her creative and crazy décor that she changed every couple of months. She’s gone but she’s here crying and laughing through the emotional roller coasters of youth. Her once photograph covered door still can’t contain the beautiful flute practices I listened to with pride from the other side. Her bed reminds me about the 1000’s of nights I told her I loved her, kissed her on the cheek and whispered, “Did I ever tell you you’re my most favorite little girl in the whole world?”
I want to smile as I remember my own launch into life. Holy buckets I was pumped to take on the universe. Like a young bird in its nest, something inside of me just had to fly. I know she’s going to soar. But I want to cry because like our parents and their parents before them, when my siblings and I left home – we left!
None of us moved back home and we’ve reunited as a family only three times for a total of two days since my oldest sister joined the Navy in July 1967 – and one of those occasions of my father’s funeral. This is my family history for three generations; will it become four? Will I ever be as close to Clothgirl as when this was her room, or will the forces of life pull us ever further apart? Will anything replace the emptiness I feel in her empty room thinking these empty thoughts?
What’s wrong with you, I chided myself. Clothgirl moved away, she didn’t run away. I may be done parenting but I’m still her father. The way things were with my generation is not how they have to be with Clothgirl’s. Who says I can’t actually become closer to her because she moved away.
It dawned on me afresh why Jesus chose the metaphor of a parent to help us understand God. He said, “Soon I’ll drop the figures of speech and tell you about the Father (God) in plain language. Then you can make your requests directly to him in relation to this life I’ve revealed to you” (John 16:25-26). I can’t see or touch my father in heaven any more than Clothgirl can see or touch her father in Montana, but that doesn’t mean I’m not close to him. Through letters, prayer, cell phones, internet video, etc., Heavenly fathers and Montana fathers can not only stay in touch with their distant children but they can become closer to them.
I’m not going to lie, I still have an achy lump in my gut; but I now have an exciting goal in my future. I can’t wait to love on my daughter now that she’s is no longer in her room. I may not know how to be a long distance father, but I didn’t know how to be a short distance father the day the doctor handed Clothgirl to me after her birth. I learned then; I can learn now.
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