Cherish Your Childrens' Friends

Moms, we know we should cherish our children. It's not always easy to do when they are running us ragged, testing our patience, or depriving us of sleep. Yet they are our children, and so we do cherish them.

I want to tell you now to also cherish the friends of your children. You don't have that mother-love connection with them, and as other-people's-children, you probably sometimes wish your child didn't even know them.

Cherish them anyway. You never know what the future will bring.

The morning of July 14th, a 20 year old friend of my kids was in a very bad car accident. He was airlifted to the major hospital nearby with multiple injuries (collapsed lung, broken jaw, damaged kidneys, head wounds, I don't even remember the whole list). For days, the doctors fought to stabilize and save him. On Thursday afternoon, he was finally stable enough to go through cat scans. Unfortunately, the test results were not favorable, and the diagnosis was that this young man had suffered brain damage so severe that he would not be able to survive if taken off of the life support he'd been on since arriving at the hospital.

His parents had to make the agonizing decision to pull the plug.  Friday evening, he passed away. Immediately, as per wishes he'd made clear many times throughout his short life, his organs were harvested and donated. As shortly as an hour after his death, one of them was all ready on it's way to a matching person in need.

I've known this young man since he was seven years old. He was a fairly good friend of my DS2, my 19yo son; they went to each other's birthday parties, they had sleepovers, they were in the church youth program together all of their schooldays. Did I necessarily appreciate him during those years? No; sometimes I saw him as annoying.

Now, however, I mourn his passing. I think of the hours he spent with me just six weeks ago, in my dining room pitching Cutco knives--his summer job to earn money for college where he was studying Criminal Justice. I'm glad I (grudgingly at the time) gave him my evening so he could practice his sales technique--and sell me a boning knife and some steak knives I really did need. I'm glad I fed him a sandwich made from pork leftover from DD1's graduation open house that he hadn't been able to attend a few days previous. That young man sat at my table more recently than my own sons. Yet, I will see my sons again, speak with them again, hug them again. I won't be able to do that with him. At least, not here on earth. My comfort is that he was a very stronger believer in Christ, and now resides in Heaven.

Cherish your children's friends.