In the most tragic sense.

Tonight, I was on the phone

with my dad.

He said that

the older he gets,

the less his career

matters to him.

All that matters

is Mom

and me

and my siblings.

I tried to ask him

how I could make him so happy.

I'm just a person.

I've never done anything

noble for him.

I haven't added to his honor

through my accomplishments

or my virtue

or my wealth.

I've used up his money,

I've cried and screamed,

I've taken up time

in his prayers.

He couldn't explain it

in a way I could accept.

And I knew I couldn't understand

because I'm really just a child,

and I won't know

until I have my own child.

Without a way to understand,

I could only feel angry.

So angry that someone loved me

so much

even though 

I didn't deserve it.

.

.

.

Sometimes it's tempting to think

that you can draw a box around yourself.

There's a little door

through which you let in love.

And you think

you can keep out

the rest of the things

that you don't accept.

Sometimes the thing

that you don't accept

is someone loving you

in a way that you're not

ready to understand.

.

.

.

Almost two years ago,

I heard this quote by C.S. Lewis.

It has stayed with me

and meant something to me

since then.

I think I maybe

actually

understand it

a little bit

for the first time.

[God] has paid us

the intolerable compliment

of loving us

in the deepest,

most tragic,

most inexorable sense.

From "The Problem of Pain"