Unexpected Power

11.8.13

      My parents are friends with a couple that live here in Dallas named Rick and Sherry. Sherry had emailed me a few times over the last few weeks to check on me, and offer to go to lunch with me if I needed to get out of the house. We decided to meet at a restaurant on Friday and grab lunch.
      I walked in behind a younger couple with a carseat that had a cover on it. I steadied myself to not lose it as I walked a few spaced behind them and waited while they checked in with the hostess to get a table.
       I stepped up and said, "Table for two, please." The girl behind the desk looked at me and said, "Is it really two? Its not really three? You don't have a baby with you?"


       In this moment, right here, I had a choice. I could seriously ruin this girls day and make her cry. I could yell at her and say, "Why YES, I did have a baby with me, but she's in heaven now. So I won't be needing a high chair for you to flip over and make into a carseat holder." I could scream at her about how insensitive it was for her to ask me that, seeing that I was clearly alone and wouldn't be joined by a man for lunch anyways.

        I blinked a few times and thought about it. I seriously considered it. I was already on edge from walking in behind the happy couple with the newborn, and it felt like the whole restaurant was filled with babies. But at the same time, I couldn't really expect the whole world to know what we had just gone through. I didn't have a t-shirt made that said, "Just suffered a stillbirth, please no comments or questions about babies." This girl that had just asked me about having a baby because she had seen the slew of people coming in with carseats, and maybe she had tried to seat some people at a table that wasn't carseat compatible. But this was an example of what Mike had talked to Alex and I a little bit about- having the power to know that in an instant you can completely ruin someone's day. I could have made that little girl absolutely miserable for the rest of her day, but did I really want to do that? Did I really want to start taking out my disappointment and hurt on unsuspecting people? Not really. That's not who I am, and its not who I've ever been, and I certainly didn't want to become that person. I try to live in a way that makes my words mean something. I don't want to be one of those people who talks about how wonderful God is, but then takes out their troubles on people who barely even enter their story for a moment. That girl will never, ever know how much her sarcastic question challenged me, but I can look back and say I'm glad I didn't give in to my darker side and bust up her day.