Closure

Closure. I'm a big fan of it.

 I love when movies end with the rolling credits interrupted up by a tag line "Five years later" and you get to see the characters you just shared two hours of your life with and what they are up to now. Sometimes the producers give you a sneak peak with a stream of family pics peering through the "costumes designed by" and show how that kiss that just ended to the swelling musical score has now five years later progressed to marriage and kids and a happily ever after. Or maybe its a bonus scene and you get one more glimpse at the PG-13 flirty banter that you just spent the last 30 minutes grinning at while your own real life husband made fun of you. Mmmm closure.

I recently experienced this phenomenon with a great book too, My (not so) Storybook Life. It's a memoir of sorts written by Elizabeth Owen that contrasts her life, relationships, and faith with characters like Anne of Green Gables and Jo March. She pens hypothesized scenarios of what happened to her fictional childhood heroines when their pages ended right alongside her own story that is just beginning. It's a laugh out loud and touching read at the same time. One of those where you invest in the people and miss their company when the book is over. But the best part is- I know Liz Owen. Yeah, like a real author. I know her. She and her sweet family go to our church. And after flying through her book in one sitting and obsessing for 256 pages, it was a kick in the gut when it ended. Oh she definitely does an excellent job of wrapping it up. But I needed more, I was obsessed. I needed to know how everyone was doing five years later. And so I asked her. Because I know a real author. Mmm closure.

I love it in real life too. I love senior banquets and graduation ceremonies.  I love circling up to the closing song after a week of church camp. I love that we are planning to move into a bigger rental house next summer-  and how these 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom are not forever, but more importantly I get to know that the goodbye is coming and I better soak up the last fall on my favorite front porch.

And the ultimate in closure,  I even kinda love funerals. Not in a creepy way. But for the closure.
Ok hang with me for a second, but also not in a creepy way,  I've even thought about the way I want to die. You know if I get to choose. I don't want something quick like a car accident or something painfully slow and tragic either like Alzheimers. I want to be like 95 with just a touch of lingering pneumonia that  doesn't keep me hospitalized but is still serious enough that everyone knows the time is coming.  My 6 boys and their families will all come into town to hug me for the last time. In my minds eye I can see it going one of two ways: Either I will have no grandchildren because they've all sworn off kids after the chaos they grew up in. Or what I really hope for and believe in- a gigantic circus of a bajillion grands and great grands of all colors (and that definitely includes a little asian girl named Crs Teen Ah) gather at the foot of my rocking chair and we get to say our closing goodbyes. We will hug and kiss and sing songs like "Had It Not Been the Lord Who Was On Our Side" and "Never Once." I'll go to bed for the last time happy and spooning Cory with my unshaven legs....then together we will stroke out simultaneously in an instant, not feeling anything of course, and I will wake up to the love of my life giving me a flying piggy back ride to meet Jesus. See not creepy at all:)

I've been thinking a lot about closure this week- because next week I am having a hard conversation with two people that I love very much. And I am praying it brings sweet closure. As I hinted in my last post, Judah my five year old adopted son is struggling.  I know this because he is having nightmares and talking a lot about his birth Mom and the painful things he remembers. He told me the other day "Momma I know how you kill yourself." And then proceeded to give a very graphic and accurate description that he remembers seeing on TV when he lived with Mom. He is and has for a long time, been wetting himself daily. And even though right this second he may be creating Galaxy Man and Galaxy Girl paper bag puppets with his brother, Judah is struggling.

And Cory and I have not always done a good job of helping him. That's a confession post that definitely will happen at a later date and will expose our ineptness for those of you who think only super christians are foster parents. But the redeeming part is that I am confident we are doing something right by him now. Next week when we are traveling for the holidays, Judah and I are going to sneak away from turkey dinners and meet up with his Mom. And she is going to tell MY needy, pestering, passive-agressive, struggling, hurting, lost little boy "I'm sorry."

I have an amazing relationship with Isabel. Like amazing. I can be candid and honest and have really hard conversations with her. I can say things like, "We love you and want to help you- but if you want the boys to come live with us again, we will go through CPS and we will adopt them.  It will be for forever. I won't let them go back and forth. They need stability and a consistent family."

I can joke with her about things like what color bride the boys will fall in love with. They have black dads, a hispanic mom, and are being raised by white parents.

I can, and have, hurt her by confessing, "We are going to change their names."

And most recently I can say things like, "I know he was only three, but he remembers so much.  And he has questions for you. He wants to know why you gave him "mean spankings" with shoes and hangers.  He wants to know why he had to leave, but his sisters got to stay. And there's no sense in waiting until he's older to talk about it all because he remembers it now."

Next week Isabel gets to redeem herself to OUR son. She gets to say "I'm sorry and I love you. And you are good and you are exactly where you need to be."  It's going to beautiful. It's going to be the sweetest closure. And it will most definitely change Judah's "five years later" credit roll.  I can't wait.