Children say the darndest things. Though I suppose that could be said about anybody, but it pertains particularly to children. "I just wanted to let you know you are such an inspiration to me," the voice that spoke to me now was not a child at all, but a woman in my Zumba class. I stood there in warm leggings and a skirt I use as pajamas most of the time. I was in the middle of grabbing my belly skirt and putting on my hoodie as her soft voice spoke. I did what anybody would do in that situation, I looked around for the person she was talking to. "Me?" I questioned with doubt edging in my voice. This girl, or rather this woman had been in this class nearly as long as I had and while uncoordinated as a three legged dog, she tried so hard. You could tell too, she was shrinking, slowly, but if you'd seen her as many times as I had, you'd notice significant change in her body, she was shrinking and I am in awe of how well this class was working for her. "Yes, you," she continued, "you are so good at this, you are an inspiration to me."
I was stuck dumb as my friend Brittany who was standing with me, smiled and nodded. "Wow, thank you," I managed to stammer out. The large blond woman, pushed her glasses back up her nose and walked away. I, in the meantime, was suspended in a momentary state of disbelief. Nobody had said that to me since I'd had cancer. This woman said it now and why? Because I happen to find a niche in dancing as a form of exercise and I am pretty good at shaking what my Mama gave me? I love Zumba class, while the changes in body are not nearly as noticeable, they are there. My friend Brittany it would make sense to be called an inspiration. She inspires me because she has worked hard and is losing weight so quickly and I'm so glad that I dragged her to try the class with me. Now her siblings come too and having people I know there makes me happy. Zumba is something I've found that I'm good at, good enough to be an 'inspiration'? I don't think so. To be honest, I don't know why she said it. Personally, it makes little if any sense to me. I was flattered and honored, don't get me wrong. It struck me as...well, odd and to be honest, it was a little frightening. People notice me. The very notion is strange. People watch what I do and whatever I do, it causes a response in them, whether that is positive or negative, it is a response. It reminded me that we have eyes on us all the time. Our attitude, the way we carry ourselves, the light that either shines from within us or is dwindling in the dark echoes in the lives of people we never knew we affected.
This brings me to Lily. Lily is the young daughter of a friend of mine that used to be in a small group with me. I adore Lily. She is the embodiment of a precocious little girl. Her Dad, my friend Daniel stood over next to his beautiful wife Samantha as I was arranging the drinks in the case below our pastry case at good old Starbucks. Lily runs over to me. "Hi Alicia," her little voice pipes. It's one of the only time she has managed to remember my name. "Hello Lily," I respond with a smile, remembering the time she looked at me with sleepy eyes as dinner was being made. "Are you tired Lily?" Lily nodded and looked up at me with a question in her eyes that I'm not sure she was sure she could ask, but I knew that look. "Do you want me to hold you for a little bit?" Lily nodded and I picked her up and held her, feeling her little heart beat through my shirt and her breath slow as she fell asleep in my arms. Lily was not tired now, she was full of questions, "What is that?" Lily points to a glass container. "That's green tea." "What's that?" "That's orange juice." "What's that?" "That's chocolate milk, like what you had earlier." "Oh...I like chocolate milk." I chuckled as Lily ran back to her Dad.
I grabbed two trash bags and went to change the trash in the cafe. Picking up the outer container, I noticed Lily look at me in an odd wonder and Daniel, spotting me, came over to talk. Lily snuck up behind him and started to try to lift the trash can on her own. After nearly falling over and several tries she asked, "How'd you do that?" Lily's voice was strained as she was trying to lift up something taller than her. "I eat my fruits and vegetables and I got strong enough just to lift it right up," I replied. The good old eating that stuff will make you strong. Classic. Daniel chuckles. "Do it again," Lily requested. I lifted it up and her eyes get big. Lily stays there as I talk to her Dad, but it is the conversation that happened next that put such a smile on my face that it...inspired me to write this.
"All right, I have to go now. I have to put the trash up," I declared to Lily in a sing song voice. "Where you put it?" Lily asked and I caught Daniel shaking his head. "You see that space back there?" I pointed to our back room and getting on tippie toes to see the door frame, Lily nodded. "That is a special back room you can't go in and in that room at the very back we have a big trashcan that we put all of our trash in," I explained. Of course, like any child she caught the one rule in the whole statement. "I can't go back there?" Lily asked sadly as though I had denied her access to Disney World. "No ma'am," I replied with an odd smile, "only people who work here and have a green apron can go back there." Lily looked at my apron, looked at that back room and smiled as she turned to her Father. "Daddy, can you get me a green apron?"
I laughed outright at the little girl's question and her Dad laughed with me. I don't remember what I said after that, but as I told Lily goodbye and walked into the now slightly more magical feeling back room, what just happened hit me. I looked around me, this little back room was nothing to me. I pass through it every day I work, it was profane at best. However, to that little girl, the room was sacred. It was a place that was special and somewhere she wanted to go if only for the sake that somebody told her she couldn't. Aren't our dreams like that? Isn't Heaven like that? We wear green aprons where I work to identify us as someone who belongs there, someone who supposedly knows what we're doing. Lily wanted to have that identity, of course she could have no idea of what that entailed, of the hours we spend wishing we were somewhere else, of how difficult the identity of the green apron can be to us. Lily could care less about that, Lily wanted to take on our identity so she could go into that back room. I wear the apron and in explaining that the apron is the key to my entry into the room, Lily sees me. Lily wanted what I had. Can I say the same about Christ in my life? Is my light something people notice? Is it something they want? Do I explain with my life how to get where I am going? While our back room at Starbucks is nearly the polar opposite of Heaven, it was the vehicle of my understanding. As much as this was about Lily, it was also about the little girl inside of me.
Some time ago, I reached that point in my life where I realized something was...off. I was missing Heaven by the eleven inches between my head and my heart. I knew what it was to be a Christian, I could do all the motions, say all the right words. Unlike Lily, I knew exactly what my new identity would be, what came with it, I knew what I wanted and I knew how to get there. So I looked up at my Heavenly Daddy and asked Him a question in the same fashion that Lily asked her Father. I asked for the identity of belonging. I wanted to put on the symbol to show the world who I belonged to. The eleven inch gap was closed. I remember feeling like a little girl and I couldn't stop giggling. It was an odd and beautiful freedom. I got to go home at the end of my life and I knew it, for the first time in my life, without a doubt.
Maybe I read far too much into a conversation with a little girl who isn't even as tall as our trash can. Maybe. I tend to do that. God uses weird things like that to teach me the greatest lessons. Maybe it was because I identify with God most as a Father. God is Daddy to me, it is my favorite facet of Him and the one I suppose I cling to the tightest because until the day I die, a part of me will always be the little girl asking to crawl into His lap so He can hold me and I can hear His heart beat. Even when I've made a mess of things, completely botched situations that do not come without their consequences, I can run back to Daddy like the prodigal I am. Daddy takes me in His arms and holds me close and we talk. God is the provider, God is the healer, God understands my every quirk and oddity, He hears the cry of my heart when I too often let it weep in the silence. I am just the little girl that needs her Daddy.
It is that little girl I see reflected in Lily as she lovingly looked up at her Father. "Daddy, can you get me a green apron?"
