Doing the Right Things for the Wrong Reason

I think I reek...

The sad, sour smell of a girl abandoned by her daddy.

It catches the attention of other little girls, disguised as women, and it causes us to sniff each other out and open up and talk about losing that first love of our lives.

Sharing such tragedy is like febreze -- somehow, it neutralizes each others' odors, and we feel fresher for all the airing of our dirty laundry.

Some of the precious women I've been blessed to discuss our daddy-drama with actually had the physical man in their home their whole lives, but he failed to fill the role of father. Other girls have had to deal with the death of their father. In my case, when I was five, Dad just up and left, rarely to be seen or heard from again.

In all of these situations, we got a hole torn in our hearts that we tried to mend in other ways.

THANK GOD IN HEAVEN (and I mean that literally, as a reverent prayer, not a vain catch-phrase) that *most* of the time, I tried to fill that void with positive, happy, enriching, constructive hobbies, events, people, and pursuits.

I loved my teen years!! I remember when I realized that I would be turning twenty and losing that term "teen" off my age. I mourned a little, and promised myself to keep marching forward in victory, never looking back with longing at the glory days.

I've kept that promise, I think, pretty valiantly. I love to look at my present life and consider its awesomeness, what with my phenomenal husband, my beautiful children, my loving extended family, my loyal friends, my comfy home...

But sometimes, a thought, a word, a whisper -- something causes me to glance back for a second... And, well, those teen years actually were glory days of their own kind.

When I'm among my fellow fatherless friends and we're in the midst of sorting out our losses, we can recognize together how our lives have been influenced by the impact of our injuries. That's when I realized that I wasn't really interested in being the drum major or getting the highest grades or being voted most likely to succeed or win a spot on the homecoming court or be awarded the most scholarships.

I was just trying to attract my daddy back into my life.

I have come to see consciously how my subconscious was conniving to be so amazing that he could no longer ignore his bright-shining-star of a daughter.

And I had so much fun! I'm so glad that I did all those things and exerted all those efforts and enjoyed life to the fullest and kept striving for the best within me!

It didn't work.

Even now, after years of pleading in my own way -- sending him pictures of his gorgeous grandchildren, offering to buy him a plane ticket, asking him questions about his life so I could get to know him better -- his pitiful efforts to stay in touch could be viewed as a slap in the face.

But I choose not to let those slaps cause too much pain. I choose to let my husband's abiding and near-perfect love soften the blow. I grasp the hand as it sweeps toward my cheek, and I turn the smack into an arm-wrestle. I hug my children extra tight with arms that have been strengthened this way.

My lemons really have been turned into lemonade. Sure -- the squeezing sometimes hurts... but God saw fit to add plentiful sugar, and the results are sweeter than I could have imagined.

Wanna sip?