The Confession

We're visiting my mom in my hometown of Great Bend, Kansas. She still lives in the same home where I grew up. This morning, I got up and went for a morning walk around my old neighborhood. I headed toward my favorite street - WIlson - where at one time three of my grade school friends lived right next to one another. I had every crack in the sidewalk memorized between my street and theirs.

But as I passed their houses, another house came into view. The house on the corner - the one with the little white fence and the manicured lawn. Suddenly, I felt the familiar guilt that came over me every time we drove by that corner. How many times had I thought of stopping the car and knocking on that front door. But I never had. And it had been 23 years.

But as I walked by, I noticed a man and woman out in the yard working on a project together. I could walk right by. I could even smile and say "good morning" and they would smile back, never knowing what I had done to them - to their little girl.

After arguing with myself and feeling my heart pounding in my throat, I forced myself to walk up to them and say hello. They smiled, a very kind-looking couple in their 60's. I asked them if they had lived at this house in October, 1986. They looked a little curious and said they did. And then I proceeded to tell them the story.

I was so nervous, afraid that what I had done had scarred their little girl for the rest of her life. I was 17 and easily pressured. I was normally a pretty good kid, hanging out with girls who would never have done what we did that night. But that fateful Friday, I was with the tough girls. I felt very excited that they had chosen to take me along with them. I was a cheerleader, for goodness sake! But for some reason, they overlooked that fact and invited me to spend that Friday night out with them.

We were driving around town, listening to Ratt and trying to find something to do in our small, uneventful small town. Suddenly the toughest girl had an idea, something they thought would be fun and exciting. I started to panic inside. I could never do THAT! Surely they wouldn't ask me to do it, too. But they did. It was the moment of truth: do I prove myself to them or be humiliated as the gutless cheerleader the rest of my life?

They chose the house and pulled the car over down the block. I got out and made my way quietly down the dark street. I hesitated in front of the house, crouching behind some bushes. I could see the silhouette sitting on the porch, lamplight escaping from inside the house, barely illuminating my target. I crept toward the house and then gained speed, grabbing my victim and turning to run. Just then a man exploded from the house, "You come back here!" He was right behind me, chasing me in the dark. I ran, accelerated beyond my athletic abilities by the rush of fearful adrenaline. I barely made it into the car when my accomplices gunned the gas and sped off, the father still yelling at us from the street.

There are times in our lives when we justify an action. Or we picture it ahead of time in our minds and see it turning out not as bad as it could...as it would. That night as we drove off, I looked down in horror. Suddenly I knew that what I had done was far worse than I had expected - that it wasn't an anonymous victim, but a little girl who I had hurt with what I did.

The tough girls had asked me to prove myself by stealing a pumpkin off of a porch. Just a vegetable, nothing expensive or precious. But the pumpkin I had grabbed was no ordinary Jack-O-Lantern. Some little girl had spent much time and effort creating a beautiful princess pumpkin. It had a painted face, real earrings, and an actual wig for hair. And now it sat on my lap, smiling at me with it's beautiful, lop-sided lips.

I kept it in my car for probably a week, wanting to take it back to the little girl. It was like the Tell-Tale Heart, sitting on the floor behind my seat, a constant reminder of my guilt. But I was afraid. Afraid of the man who had chased me. Afraid for anyone to find out I was a thief.

So I never returned it.

I couldn't keep it. I couldn't throw it away. A friend finally took it when it started to rot. I didn't want to know what she did with it.

And the years went by.

Every time I came back to Great Bend, I had to drive by that house. Every time I thought of stopping...but I never did. Until this morning.

And when I told them my story, they remembered.

And they couldn't wait to tell their grown daughter how I had come by to apologize.

And they forgave me.

It was just a pumpkin, but that wasn't the point. It was a matter of character, honesty, and caring about the feelings of another. And, thankfully, 23 years isn't too long to ask for and to receive forgiveness. I thanked them and thanked God as I made my way back to my mom's house, walking a little lighter than I had before.

Divorce and my "sort of" niece

My ex-brother-in-law and his wife just had a baby girl, which makes her my sort-of-niece. Divorce really does make things very complicated. For example, while married to my ex-husband, his sister had a baby - my niece. But now that I am no longer married to him, his brother's daughter is not my niece. So that means that in one family, I am only "Aunt Kim" to a select few.

This may not be an issue for some divorced families because they never see their ex-in-laws ( I like to lovingly refer to them as my "out-laws"!). But in our case, God has brought so much healing and forgiveness to our situation, I am almost as close to my out-laws as I was when we were in-laws!

It was a terrible time when my husband said he no longer wanted to be married to me. My daughter was 15-months-old and we had just learned we were expecting another baby. I made a shirt for our little girl that said, "I'm the Big Sister," and when my husband's parents came over for dinner, that's how we announced the news. Well, that's how I announced the news. I didn't realize what was going on in my husband's heart and mind. He was already on his way out and just wasn't sure how to swing it.

Within a few days, he let the rest of us in on this little secret and thus began the crisis. I was so afraid of being a single mom to TWO babies! "Why, God? You knew he was planning this? Why on earth would you allow me to get pregnant when you knew he was leaving?"

I'm sad to admit that I prayed out of desperation that He would take the unborn child to heaven with Him. I pictured our future - mine and the two babies' - moving from our comfortable, middle-class neighborhood in the city back to a trailer park in my small hometown in central Kansas, me smoking cigarettes on the front deck while the babies played in the dirt in their Pampers.

But that wasn't how God pictured my future. Of course, we would have survived that future. Many families live on very little with only a mom to support them, and He is faithful. But God kept me where I was. He surrounded me with old friends and new ones who stepped up to help me limp through the darkness, trusting His light at the unseen end of the tunnel.

And he also surrounded me with family. Not just my mother, who made the three-hour trip from her house to mine almost every weekend during that time. But extended family, like cousins living in different states, began e-mailing me scripture verses and lyrics from hymns to provide me with strength I couldn't muster on my own.

What amazes people the most, however, is that my husband's family stood by me. What a horrible time for them, trying to love their son unconditionally while hating his choices. It was always awkward, and not always pleasant. But we loved each other through the threshing. Some pieces of the lives we knew fell to the floor to be swept away. But others remained intact, and bonded even more tightly.

Today, my ex-husband is remarried and lives in another state. I, too, remarried when my daughter was 4 and my son was 2. Today they are 11 and 9, and they have two men they call "Daddy" that they love without guilt.

Last summer, my ex's family came to visit us. My ex, his wife, his sister and her family, and his parents were all here, having dinner together in my home. We laughed and chatted. We shared stories about the kids. We looked at calendars to plan future visits and vacations. And then we all went to my daughter's softball game and cheered her on from the same section in the bleachers. It's nice. And it can be that way for anyone who trusts the Lord and chooses to forgive.

But God hates divorce for a reason. It's not His ideal because it's not what's ideal for the children He loves. Although our situation is as good as they could be for the most part, there are still times when the kids ask why we can't all live together. They see us get along now and are confused as to why our marriage ended in the first place. They start to wish that their dad and I had stayed married, but then realize they'd have to throw out the two new spouses whom they love, and that seems unbearable as well.

And then this week, when my ex's brother and his wife had their first baby, I celebrated. I praised God and prayed for their marriage to stay strong and intact during the parenting years. I prayed for healing for the new baby as she experienced some difficulties and had to transfer to the pediatrics unit for an extended stay.

But one thing I wasn't able to do was announce that I have a new niece. I'm not related to her. I will watch my kids call her their cousin, but she will never be my niece. And that is just one of the sad complications of divorce.

The Pressure of Pursuing a Dream

In December, I quit my part-time job as Communications Assistant at our church to pursue my dream. Sounds romantic, doesn't it? And it is! I just wish I hadn't told everyone that's what I was doing!

Everyone has a different dream. For some it's being a mom. For some it's traveling the world. For me it's...well, I told everyone it is to be a writer. That's what made sense to my husband, and it sounded neat and tidy - not too many words to explain to someone who questions why on earth I would quit a job in this economy!

But there is more to my dream than that. It's far more impractical (more impractical than being an aspiring writer, you ask?). Unfortunately, yes. And for the first time, for all my millions of readers to read :), I'm going to explain my real dream.

I believe I was created by God and saved by a most loving friend, Jesus. I believe that he created each of us uniquely, and that sometimes our gifts seem a little, well, useless. That's where my dream comes in. I have always been an idea girl. I love to think of ideas, better ways to do something, or fun ways to communicate an idea - even if no one likes or uses my ideas, the very activity of mulling them around in my brain and sharing them with someone is highly satisfying to me. It makes me feel alive! My problem is that I rarely follow-through with an idea. And why is that? Fear.

I don't remember exactly where I saw this, but for some reason it seems like it was on the show "Different Strokes." There was a young boy who said he was the fastest boy in the world...until someone timed him. I am the most creative person in the world...as long as I never actually produce something outside of my own mind that people could actually judge.

So pursuing my dream requires trusting that God put these ideas, passions, dreams, whatever you want to call them, into my DNA when He created me. I may not be the most creative girl in the world, but I don't have to be. I'm going to brave and crack open this skull and let some of these ideas out on the table for all to see. But watch out. It could be messy, and it may hurt a little.