My Love Follows You Where You Go

There's a song I can't stop listening to right now. I listen to it every chance I get, and every time I do, I cry. So I listen to it again so I can cry some more.

This world seems like an overwhelming place. There's war, pollution, political turmoil, disease, flu, insurance, job insecurities, national insecurities, moral decay, sex abusers, cyber hackers, disabilities, and on and on.

It's easy for me to fret daily over our budget and what our family gets involved in and what we don't. It's easy for me to stress about paying taxes and keeping up the yard and doing enough to help our church and community. If life is hard now, what's it going to be like for our children in just five years, fifteen, twenty?

These fears are so real to me, and I think that's why I love this song, My Love Follows You Where You Go by Alison Krauss.

(Here's a link to a clip of the song:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004V7FW9W/ref=dm_mu_dp_trk5 )

My oldest is now twelve, going on thirteen. She will be considered an adult in less than six years. Will I have given her what she needs to survive in just six short years? The strength and courage she needs to push her way through what sometimes seems a dreary world? Right now, she is sick, or she's claiming she is sick, I honestly can't tell—I'm a little skeptical because she seems to have no real symptoms, and other kids have had the stomach flu and I'm afraid she just wants some attention. Some love. She's been begging me to read to her all morning, and I really don't have time. Yet, I'm sitting here, writing this post instead of reading to her, which, sick or not, is what she wants right now to feel my love.

Here are the lyrics to this song about a parent saying goodbye to their growing up child:

More wishes than a thousand hearts can count for you
More smiles than a merry-go-round
The sweetest ending to a bed-time story told
My love follows you where you go

More laughter than a kindergarten out to play
One Sunday morning song that says it all
More summer than a California beach can hold
My love follows you where you go

Future like a promise, you're a city of Gold
Stubborn in your bones and Jesus in your soul
Seeing you stand there, staring at the unknown
I won't pretend that it's not killing me
Watching you walk away slow

Take forgiveness, take a prayer, take the deepest breath
Take the answers in your heart
When you wake up and the world is cruel and cold
My love follows you where you go

Future like a promise, you're a city of Gold
Stubborn in your bones and Jesus in your soul
Seeing you stand there, staring at the unknown
I won't pretend that it's not killing me
Watching you walk away slow

More freedom than a field of flowers in the wind
More beauty than a morning after rain
Up the steepest hill, a dark and crooked road
My love follows you where you go

Future like a promise, you're a city of Gold
Stubborn in your bones and Jesus in your soul
Seeing you stand there, staring at the unknown
I won't pretend that it's not killing me
Watching you walk away slow

One day I will watch her walk away from me, hopefully slowly. Hopefully she won't be running. The walking away won't be forever, but there will be a change. Her future is a promise. She does have a city of Gold ahead if she'll take it. She is stubborn, and I pray with all my heart that Jesus will be deep within her soul. She will most definitely be staring at the unknown, and it will be killing me to watch her go.

Will she know that my love follows her?

In the first stanza is one of the only answers I can give her. "The sweetest ending to a bed-time story told." So much of my time spent with my kids is cajoling, nagging, pushing time. This is important. They need to be cajoled, nagged, and pushed, but reading to my kids should be a time of none of that. It should be a time of love and nothing but love, a shared love, a breath, a blink, the tiniest fraction of time where our souls are united around a good book. That love, I hope, will follow her always.

So I have to stop blogging now and get to it. I have to go read to my twelve-year old so that she knows my love truly follows her wherever she goes.