During the difficult parts of this Vietnam adoption journey, I reached out to God to show me a sign that everything we were doing was good and right and that, in the end, everything would be okay. And, in each request, He has shown me His answers, in often blunt, always unambiguous ways.
That’s why today, when I asked Him to send me a sign that all will be well, and that we will bring our little boy home, I wasn’t surprised at His response.
On the way home from dinner at Mimi’s, I turned on the radio. This is not something I ever do these days, since Little Boy G requires my constant attention and I am more than happy to oblige. However, this time, he was otherwise engaged with a book in the back seat, and so, for the first time in a very long time, I tuned in to an FM radio station.
I think it was the first words that struck me in the song….”Let it go…Let it roll right off your shoulders. Don’t you know…The hardest part is over …”
And then it was the melody. Beautiful, sad, gentle. As I listened to the words, I knew it was the sign and so I listened intently to the rest of the song. So many things have happened during this adoption. The uncanny delays in finishing our paperwork that left me crying in the middle of the night. The looming shutdown of the Vietnam program. And then, just when we thought there was no hope left, we were told the story of a boy. The unexpected boy whose own heartache eclipsed, by far, our own. As if it were fate. As if we never really had control of where we were going…we were just along for the ride. And then, these words…”Our lives are made in these small hours. These little wonders. These twists and turns of fate…”
I listened to the song again when I got home. I found out that it’s called Little Wonders by Rob Thomas. I’m not sure what God is trying to tell me, but He is trying to tell me something. All I know for certain right now is that I feel better after hearing this song. And that, after all, is what I was looking for, now isn’t it?
The first video I saw with this song was from Meet the Robinsons. Just after the opening scene, is what got me. You’ll see why…and please read on after the video… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mT6EVIIcLLo
One final story to tell. But it’s important. I was looking online to find out the background on this song. I found something better. I found a quote by someone who had watched the movie in the theaters when it first came out. I copied the following passage below for you. I think his thoughts reflect something more profound than I had imagined. And that message from God is so much more clear to me now. My confusion about what He was trying to tell me is now cleared away–The message was not meant for me…it was meant for him and me…
“When I saw the movie in theatres, this song cut to the heart of me and made me cry. I have a tendency to be easily depressed, and I know that’s wrong because I know (intellectually) that God has a future and a hope for me. But depressing things had been happening in my life lately, and I felt like Lewis, like I had no real parents or anyone I could trust, and like I had nothing to look forward to but worse division in my family. I felt like God was speaking to me this whole movie, and especially during this song, that although it looks awful right now His plan for my life is rich and beautiful beyond what I’d ever hoped for. Things will not stay this bad, and he’s promised a beautiful future, with wholeness. All of that came right at me during this song, and I cried in the theatre (managed to hide it before anyone noticed :). I still find the song really encouraging, especially if I start to get an unrealistically pessimistic view of my future. Thanks, Rob.”
I knew nothing about the film, Meet the Robinsons, until last night. According to Wikipedia, the film begins by showing a young woman leaving her baby boy on the steps of an orphanage, where he lives thereafter. Twelve years later, this boy, called Lewis (Daniel Hansen and Jordan Fry), is a brilliant inventor of fantastic devices, but has yet to be adopted and fears that he will never do so. Convinced that his birth mother abandoned him against her will, he attempts to invent a memory-scanning machine that will allow him to remember his mother in the hopes that he can find her. His roommate, Michael “Goob” Yagoobian (Matthew Josten), becomes his assistant during long hours of building, which causes Goob’s Little League baseball team’s performance to suffer. Goob attempts to be supportive, but eventually tires of it.
And there you have it. Coincidence? It think not.
A Table for 4 