a sacrifice of thanks
When Riley cries, she turns red, as though her whole body must make up for any failure to express herself clearly in words. This morning as we walk to the car, her eyes, which were already rimmed an angry color, look pink from the press of her palms as she rubs away her tears. The skin on her arms, her neck, the part of her chest visible above the t-shirt “v,” looks splotched and irritated, frustrated with prickly bumps. She’s quiet in grief, but her body screams. I imagine the sparking arc of firing neurons in her brain and silently whisper a prayer of protection over her. Emotion like this, the kind that completely overwhelms Riley’s limping central nervous system, sometimes triggers seizures.
Riley’s feelings have always overrun her capacity for speech, and although I know the problem isn’t entirely unique to Autism, in Riley’s life, Autism bears most of the blame. At three-years-old, when Riley had no words to speak at all, her frustration boiled over at night, waking her in the wee hours and leaving her restless. She wandered through the darkness; sometimes, she fell on the floor in a rage and wept. In young adulthood, it helps that she can more readily give verbal shape to the storms inside, but her limited conversational skills only leave dripping space for what to Riley must feel like a flood.
“I feel lonely,” she says now in a strangled voice, as an unhindered tear drips from her jaw and lands on the driveway. Even so many years removed from the time when Riley pointed and grunted instead of speaking, I don’t take for granted her ability not only to identify her feelings but to verbalize them. I give thanks, though her pain leaves me bruised.
“I know, sweetheart,” I say, opening the car door, feeling weighed down and weak, wondering how it is that someone so full of love for people should feel such scarcity. And then I remember Christ; I remember that all our suffering points back to His.
Autism means that an extroverted person like Riley, a person who loves more and better than I ever will, continually struggles to make relational connections and build meaningful relationships with other people, even her family, even other exceptional people. Sometimes, I look at her and can see clearly that the effort just makes her tired. This is factual brokenness without fault or blame; Autism leaves many people socially impaired, even if they grow to be somewhat socially aware. What’s missing in Riley’s life isn’t love; she has so many benevolent relationships with other people, but what she longs for, what she grieves openly now, is the rarity of real, mutual friendships.
Riley carries her tennis shoes to the car in one hand; her bare feet look pale against the grass as she moves off of the driveway and around the car to stow her bookbag in the trunk. I can’t take my eyes off the shoes, which look tired and battered by miles of walking, the toes permanently curled mid-stride. In pilgrim terms, Riley has reached the borderlands, a place-riddled with thorns, the thin, dry, transitional plain that leads to the next season of her life. Surely the unfamiliar ruggedness of the terrain has heightened her anxiety, but so also has seeing her boyfriend lope on ahead of her, until, on a regular traveling day, he’s mostly out of sight. For years, Josh has been Riley’s best friend, her person, the one with whom love has the most give and take, and although he’s still with her, this year he moved on from school. With so many questions still unanswered about Riley’s future, it’s easy for me to understand why this place feels lonely to her, why she feels anxious to catch up to someone she loves.
“I know it’s hard,” I say, as we pull out of the driveway and away from home, and she nods, swallowing another painful wave. More tears. “I wish I could fix it.”
“I wish you could too,” she says, flattening her hands in her lap, tracing the rips in her jeans with her fingers.
For a few miles, we travel in mutual silence. Please God, I keep praying, how can I help her?
“So, tell me some good things about school,” I say, thinking of the first time I remember God teaching me to make a sacrifice of giving thanks. My kids were small then and so needy I felt as though every breath was advocacy, every step a trip to therapy, every moment about cleaning or feeding or fighting for communication. While I learned how to daily live an exceptional life, I stuffed my grief deep inside, packing it away until finally I had no more room for hiding. One Saturday, I sat in my bathroom floor and cried. I think I may even have told God exactly what Riley told me today. “I feel lonely,” whispered between ugly sobs.
And then Kevin walked in, as he seems always to do in moments when I need to remember I’m not actually ever alone, and gently he embraced my grief–our grief, and encouraged me to choose joy in the midst of it. He said, “This is not a life we would ever have chosen, but it is the life God chose for us. We have to trust His choices. We have to remember the reason for Joy. We have to give thanks.” I knew Kevin was right and that the words weren’t his own, and on that day, I began looking for ways to give thanks in all things at all times, even through painful things, even through seasons of grief. I don’t know how glad my kids have been that since then I’m always passing on the lesson.
“Tell me something good about school,” I say, and Riley inhales sharply and looks out the window.
“But it’s so hard,” she says, her voice gone to water, and I nod. That’s what makes it a sacrifice.
“I know. I know it’s terribly hard.”
She takes a deep, audible breath, almost as though she feels too tired to breathe, and then she decides to try. I sense the shift, the solid moment when she makes the decision to surrender, and I wait, my eyes on the road, knowing the first step toward that altar is the hardest. “I get to see my friends,” she says finally. On any gratitude list, Riley always mentions friends first. And so, it begins.
Almost all the way to school, Riley and I build a platform of Truth, a place for her to stand, or maybe, just to lay down and rest. We use sturdy beams, sacrificial wood, the gifts of God like wide planks, his strength and faithfulness like golden horns on which to anchor. At first my questions feel to Riley like splintering nails; I can see the pain flit across her face, but the longer we talk about what God has done, the lighter she feels, that much I hear in the strength of her voice. She’s still sad, so sad her eyes glisten as her heart fills, but we both know this is the way through the desert. In the last half mile, I turn to prayer, asking God aloud for peace, for the renovation of broken things, for a grasp on joy when our fingers seem to have lost their grip. And beside me, Riley begins to laugh, and it sounds like music, like a song of praise sung right through the veil of tears.
