Silver and Gold I Have None

Silver and gold have I none,

but such as I have, give I thee. 

In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth

rise up and walk. 

Walking and leaping and praising god.

In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth

rise up and walk.

 

The other day, I heard my 5 year old niece singing these lyrics of a children’s hymn.  To boot, she was singing them in Korean.  It seemed strange, yet adorable since she doesn’t speak Korean and if you asked her what she was singing, she wouldn’t have a clue as to what the words meant. 

 

These words remind me of my grandfather and through him, they mean sadness, then hope, then peace.

 

My grandfather passed away when I was very young.  Of all my grandparents, he was the first one to pass away.  I think I was around 10.  In the last few weeks before he passed away, all my aunts gathered all of us cousins together to visit him in the hospital.  He was deteriorating pretty quickly from a losing battle with brain cancer. 

 

When we went to see him, he was unable to move and could barely speak.  But he was still alert enough to know all the 10 grandchildren who had come to see him.  Most of us shuffled in and were unsure of what we should say or feel or how we should react.  One of my aunts suggested that someone sing a song…one of his favourites.  So, our youngest cousin, Stella, who was probably barely 6 years old, stood up in front of him and sang this song.  In my mind, I can still hear her high pitched voice, her little body standing on twig legs, singing these words in Korean.  My grandfather’s eyes were wet with tears, but smiling.   Not sure if it was because this song rang true to his heart; maybe realizing that material possessions were useless unless you were spiritually rich.  Maybe he saw hope in the littlest of all his children and grandchildren singing to comfort and love him. 

 

Recently, someone I had known suddenly and unexpectedly passed away from brain cancer.  When speaking with his mother about his death, while I imagine she was grieving, she smiled at me with wet tears and said that there was a reason he passed on so suddenly and God knew that he would suffer less this way. 

 

I am cynical of religion and not sure what category of Christian I would fall under, if at all.  But I believe there is a higher being and something greater than us in this universe.  It goes by many names, God or Buddha or Allah or The Tree in my Backyard, but when faced with moments of loss and grief, whether it is for the person dying in the hospital or for the people who are left behind after their loved ones pass away, this belief in this greater power provides hope and gives peace. 

 

When I hear this song, I like to believe that my grandfather is in his heaven “walking and leaping and praising his God”. 

 

 

Sweet Dreams

When I found out I was pregnant, the first thing I did was go out and grab as many books about pregnancy and baby care as possible.  There were so many resources with many different approaches to everything.  Some of the advice was conflicting, some of the advice was troubling, but all of it was downright stressful.  And to make matters worse, they would put out a disclaimer saying that ultimately we should do what our instincts as mothers tell us to do.  The reason I went to these resources in the first place was because I was not yet a mother and I did not possess any “mothering instincts” to rely upon. 

 

One of the things that fascinated me most was the topic of sleep. Yes, we were going to be sleep deprived when the baby was born.  Yes, we were going to have uncomfortable sleeps in the later part of our pregnancy due to our huge size and all the aches and pains.  Yes, we will never really sleep as deeply again. 

 

But beyond that, putting a baby to sleep became a dark 8-10 hour tunnel of despair and exhaustion, the only light of  hope being the sun coming up over the horizon and the sound of the chirping birds. There were books solely dedicated to how to put our children to bed.  Soothe them, not soothe them.  Let them share our bed, do not let them in our beds.  And if our child didn’t sleep well, they were labelled as fussy, cholicky, or “not textbook”.  I lost a lot of sleep just trying to implement all the practical ways to put our children to sleep: cluster feeding, using soothers, putting our children on their back, putting our children on their tummies, swaddling them, letting them cry it out first in intervals of 5 minutes to whole 45 minute periods.

 

Up until I was 13 years old, because of my father’s business ventures, we moved almost every year.  For every different housing situation we ended up in, be it a tiny apartment, a sprawling rancher or a temporary seedy motel room, I always shared my bed with either my parents or my sister.  As babies, my sister and I would sleep with our parents in one bed.  Even when we got older and my sister and I had our own bedrooms and had separate beds, we would always end up sleeping together in one bed.  One of us would always end up crawling into the other’s bed.  I didn’t think it strange.  We were not fussy or cholicky children.  We were happy and felt safe.  We laughed and shared stories together.  We would drift off into dreamland together, my sister and I. 

 

That bed that my sister and I shared became my reference when deciding to let my toddler climb into bed with my husband and I.  My children do not need a reason or have to be ill or require soothing in order to sleep with us if they want.  In fact, there is nothing more comfortable and peaceful at the end of the day than our family bed.  We share stories about the day.  Sometimes we talk about things that scare us.  Sometimes we end up laughing about a funny secret.  There are no sweeter dreams.