“I’m going to have to call your mom.”
It was the phrase that every fifth grader would give close to anything not to hear. Her voice was gruff from years of saying that very phrase over and over again for the last 30 years. Her crooked wrinkly finger wobbled in my direction.
I silently put my head down in shame, praying that my mom wouldn’t be home and that the answering machine would pick up. Oh let my brother have a good day at school, I silently plead while twirling my number 2 pencil with my sweaty fingers. Let David be good so she could go grocery shopping or out walking with our neighbor friend. Please, God, anything to make her stay away from home. That way I could maybe rush off the bus, press the answering machine, and delete the message before she even saw the red blinking light.
When I ran off the bus, I saw her car and my throat instantly closed up. She also wasn’t on the porch, which was her per-usual place to hang out each afternoon waiting for me with a smile. My pace began to slow as my heart began to beat faster and faster, pounding in my ears with each step I took toward the house. It took everything in me to steady my shaking hand long enough to twist the doorknob and enter in.
Upon entering the house, David was happily playing computer games but my eyes barely saw him. They focused on the answering machine hanging on the wall of the kitchen where no blinking light flashed. As my vision began to take in the rest of my surroundings, I saw her. She was sitting on the left side of the kitchen table, which was filled with folded sheets of loose-leaf notebook paper, emptied binders, opened notebooks, and there on top of all the mess is where it sat. The math test that had kept me inside recess for a week. There it laid with a sparkling black “D” etched over the top of it. Being my 3rd D on a test in a row, there was a sentence requesting mom’s signature at the end of the test and a line where she was supposed to sign. Her signature would be my golden ticket out of the “No Recess today” list of students on the chalkboard but the shame of having a D boiled inside me forbade me to ask for it.
For 5 long days, I chose to spend my favorite part of the day staring at nothing but the chalkboard. Because even back then, the worst thing in the world, in my opinion, is failing at something.
Underneath the test in question were other papers. Quite possibly over 100 bright C’s and D’s on tests, homework assignments, and reports alike sat in front of my mom staring up at me. My cleverness and humiliation led me to find ways to hide those failures in book covers, under my bed mattress, and some even stuffed in my doll’s clothes. Too ashamed to tell my parents I was drowning, I hid them. Too ashamed to tell the woman who got all A’s in school, I stuffed them into the corners of my mind and room. But that day Mom found them all. I found out later, she answered the phone and went through my entire room looking for the test. What she found was even more. And there they sat, staring at me in the face, yelling and screaming silently to me what a huge failure I was.
The days that followed were what every 11 year old would call the worst days of their lives. Since I had broken trust with my parents, the only way my mom found to remedy and reconcile that was to do was homework checks ushering in what is now known as the “Homework Check Era” in my childhood. She bought me a planner that came with instructions that reminded me of a judge reading the sentencing of a convicted criminal. I had to write down each homework assignment and after each class have the teacher initial that it was indeed written down correctly. Then after completing my homework each evening, I had to share the list of assignments with my parents and then the completed assignment. Mom would make sure it all lined up and there was no sneakiness going on.
While being grounded from reading and internet/Neopets ended after a week or two, these background checks continued till the last day of the fifth grade. How she had the patience to endure all of this while David struggled with transportation issues I will never know, but these homework checks held me accountable to my parents, to my teachers, and to myself.
I often think back to that time and shudder. But I wonder how many of us view God’s love like this because I know I did. While I am sure my parents told me they loved me and reconciled the trust broken, I often saw God a lot like this growing up. Obedience and doing good equaled favor and blessing, bad behavior was to be punished. Even on my worst days, I find myself having this visual when I hear about God’s love. Even though the Bible I believe in screams the complete opposite.
But now, as a mom, I see God’s love like a mother’s arms or a father’s lap. Warm, inviting, tender, and big enough for me and my problems both good and bad. It’s he who holds me up and chases me down; not the other way around. His love does not rest on my ability to love him in return.
“While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us”
Romans 5:8
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Matthew 11:28-30
