We've Been Robbed!

My husband wheeled up the road, pulled close beside me, and yelled, “Hop in! Someone broke into our house, and I’m on my way to report it!”

Quickly, I jumped into the truck, upset and shocked. I’d only been walking 30 minutes. “What did they take?” I asked Ian, preparing for the worst.  The pharmacy across the street had been robbed several times in the past few months, but our neighborhood is usually safe and quiet.

“The M&Ms are gone from the Trail Mix!” he cried! “They’re all gone!”

And he was convincing, too, my husband. He scared me. The idea of someone rummaging around in our home was disturbing. I think Ian missed his calling.

Yes, I had eaten the M&Ms out of the Trail Mix, but seriously?

I like M&Ms, and it doesn’t matter if they are green, blue, red, brown, yellow, or orange. Yes, I even like the orange ones! They all taste good to me. A little crunch and a little chocolate. Yummo!

I don’t ever buy them, however, because I like them so much. But they’re in the Trail Mix and sometimes…. Well, I pick them out and leave the raisins and the peanuts and the rest for someone else.

Mmmm….I think it’s a pattern of behavior for me.

When Ian and I married, we wrapped the top tier of our wedding cake in foil and froze it, leaving it in the freezer for our first anniversary. However, during the year, whenever I opened the freezer, I would peel off some of the foil and scratch off some of the icing. When our anniversary wheeled around, Ian wondered why the cake was so messed up. “The foil, I guess,” I said before I confessed. I had eaten most of the icing; I left the rest behind.

Recently I gave a draft of my book – Like a Sweet Fragrance – to someone who wanted to read it. I was so excited when she told me that she couldn’t go to bed until she finished the book. Wow! I was pumped! But then she admitted, “I’ll go back later and read the rest. I just picked out the parts about our family!” Ha! I’m not the only one who picks what she likes and leaves the rest!

Each year on Christmas Eve, our family plays a gift-exchange game that has become a tradition. The wrapped presents are piled in the center of the room and everyone draws a number. Then we take turns choosing a gift or stealing one from the person who went before us. The person who goes last steals the best gift of the night and leaves the rest for everyone else.

Maybe we shouldn’t. Take the best gift, that is.  Maybe we should leave the best for someone else. Maybe we should leave the good stuff behind.

“Among the best things we can give each other are new memories: kind words, signs of affection, gestures of sympathy, peaceful silences, and joyful celebrations,” Henry Nouwen says. I think he’s right. Those moments when we share a kind word and laughter, the quiet sorrows and peace are the best gifts we can give. They become a memory. The best of ourselves left behind for someone else. The moments become the memories.  

Ian and I, like so many others during this Christmas season, have whisked and waltzed and eaten our way through parties as we’ve celebrated with friends, family, colleagues, and even strangers. Yet as the time wheeled around for another festivity, I found myself eager for home. My goal was simply to go, visit quickly, express my appreciation, and then return home and curl up in my comfy chair with The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult.

When I got home, though, I began thinking about all the people I did not meet that night. Those whose eyes I did not make contact with. Whose hands I did not shake. The strangers that I didn’t greet with Merry Christmas. I didn’t leave my best behind; instead, I hurried home.

We break into each other’s lives all the times. We enter into each other’s world whenever we make contact -- a slight glance or a handshake or a smile. And each moment becomes a memory for someone else, an opportunity for God to impact the world in ways we can’t imagine.  

The moment & the memory.

We live one, we leave the other behind.

“Among the best things we can give each other are new memories,” Nouwen’s words resonate within me. In other words, let’s not rob each other of the good stuff.

I needed to go visit someone the other day, and I was too tired and cranky to go. So I began filling my mind with a massive to-do list for the holidays. But in my heart, I heard God speak: “Don’t let an opportunity go by without showing other people how much I love them.”

Mmmm….. “Don’t rob someone of my joy, Becky. Just don’t.”

To be fully present in the moment is to leave the gift of ourselves behind.

Moments & Memories -- How is it that God speaks even through M&Ms? Amazing, really, all the ways God grabs our attention!

Before Jesus was crucified, he reassured his disciples that one day their sorrow would cease. “I will see you again,” Jesus says to them. "And your hearts will rejoice, and no one will rob you of your joy.” (John 16:22).

In the meantime, we live the Moments & make the Memories for others to cherish after our time wheels around and God carries us home.  

Mmmm…..yet one more thing to ponder this Christmas season.