a time to laugh
At the end of a day that feels like two, Riley greets us laughing, bouncing can’t wait on her heels. She can barely get out the words. “While you guys were gone, Adam told Alexa to add seahorse to the shopping list.”
Catching the story from somewhere upstairs, Adam runs down now, his feet beating staccato against the risers. I hear his laughter–tumbling joy–before I see him. “Seahorse,” he says. The word rises, then crumbles into a chuckle. The sound takes me back, that wild happiness, to a time when my brothers and I were young, when one allusion to humor could dissolve all seriousness. I could not put reigns on that laughter, which always eventually spilled out in tears on my cheeks.
“And then,” Riley continues, “I told Alexa to add ‘Mom Jones‘ to the shopping list.” The sentence breaks apart at the end; she laughs so hard her cheeks turn pink. She bends at the waist; she slaps her leg. And suddenly life feels a little less broken. Oh yes, there’s time to laugh (Ecclesiasties 3:4).
Adam wanders around the kitchen table into the living room and back, lifting his arms like wings, his grin genuine. When Adam feels good, he moves. Giddiness trills from his throat and lights his eyes. He spins closer and touches Riley’s ear. It’s not just that Adam’s joke is funny, but that they have shared it, and everything shared knits us together.
“Adam Jones and I told Alexa to put random things on the shopping list.” Riley nods a little toward Adam, leans in to him, then glances expectantly toward Kevin and me. We laugh openly now for all our weary reluctance, exchanging a glance, feeling full because our children find delight in each other, because God hasn’t left them alone. Oh yes, there’s a time to laugh. There must be. Jesus came to give us all the fullness of life (John 10:10); He longs, by way of love, to make our joy complete (John 15:11). And this joy our children share, it rounds at the edges and overflows, carrying away the heaviness of the day, even for us. Their laughter sounds as our welcome home.
Our Amazon Alexa looks like a nondescript cylinder dressed casually in business-like tweed. The ring of lights at the top comes to life now, and the digital voice brightly says, “I’ve added ‘random things’ to your shopping list.”
At this, our children howl, exploding again into knee-dropping laughter, nearly losing their breath over the unexpected response. And I smile a gladdened Mama smile that my challenged children have not lost the innocence that also makes them riotously silly. Despite all the needles and pills and trouble expressing their hearts, in spite of all the weeping times, God has yet reserved for them these times to laugh. And now we’re all laughing–Adam, wandering into the dining room and back out and around the table; Riley, bent over and chest heaving in the kitchen; and Kevin and me, dropping the burdens of the day with all our bags.
Laughter is a divinely gifted thing from a celebrating God with a heart fathoms full. And somewhere deep, I know God laughs with us too, our Father–so much better a parent than me, watching his children taste the abundance of Him right out of loving each other.
