Gap year – Marilyn R. Gardner

When you become a mom you don’t have the luxury of seeing a future film about the twists and turns your life is going to take. You don’t know what joys, trials and tragedies may be awaiting you. You become a mom on faith.

Faith that you will weather the sun and rain that is a part of raising a child.

Faith that you will have strength for the long haul.

Faith that you will have the grace it takes to love a child more than you love yourself.

In faith we get pregnant. In faith we give birth. In faith we cry tears of joy as we look at our newborn, awed by tiny hands and feet, puckered mouth, and newborn wrinkles. In faith we adopt. In faith we see our child for the first time at an orphanage or foster home, and from eyes to heart we know this is our child, given to us at this moment for this time. In faith we find out that something is not normal with our child, in faith we move forward learning all we can about children with Down Syndrome, or Muscular Dystrophy or Autism. It’s a journey, a journey of faith.

And there are moments when you see results of your faith. First steps, first word, first prayer, first day of school, completion of kindergarten, healing from a first heart ache or broken friendship, healing from a first wound, graduation…the list is endless.

It’s a long journey; A journey of faith.

Yesterday I saw a result: I received a text from my youngest saying “It’s all good!” – he had completed all the course work required and is graduating from high school. Next Wednesday he’ll pick up his cap and gown at four in the afternoon and go over final steps of the program. We will be there, celebrating with proud grandparents who will quietly cheer as their 17th grandchild graduates.

As youngest of five kids Jonathan came into the world with instant family and no need for play groups. He was adaptable and flexible, rarely displaying a temper and willing to go with whatever was happening. He is one of those kids that is comfortable to be around, even in adolescence. (Well. Mostly.) We can sit for hours discussing life topics, things that matter.

I’ve written before about Jonathan and academics. It’s been a long journey. He is smart, loves reading and is a critical thinker. But. He doesn’t fit with the main stream learning process that demands sitting at a desk, fitting in with the status quo, and writing one hundred ‘P’s’ across the paper in cursive to show you have it “right”. Wow. Good for us. We have a bunch of kids in this country who can write ‘P’s’.

And until this year, Jonathan did not have teachers that encouraged. He had teachers who were type A personalities whose teaching careers seemed defined by the results their students achieved. He has had teachers who follow the book to the minute details and struggle to find room for the “Jonathans” in their classroom. He has had teachers who are more concerned about standardized tests than true learning. He was a statistic, caught in a bad system.

Until this fall. And this fall, by faith, we were able to move him into an extension program where he was surrounded by teachers who love teaching and love the students. He is now affirmed for who he is, not who they want him to be. He has excelled as he has inhaled Dostoevsky and Mark Twain, Kerouac and Nietzsche. It has not been easy and he has worked hard.

We celebrate the results of his work as he graduates a year early. This child who didn’t want to go to college (ever) is now excited about learning and looking into colleges and universities. He has applied to do a gap year in Oxford at an advanced studies program. He boasts a reference letter from one teacher that had me in tears with her affirmation of him as a student, of him as a person.

We become parents with no guarantees. Whether biologically birthing or adopting, parenthood is a journey of faith. Today I get to celebrate. Tomorrow I may have to cry. But that’s what this is: A long journey, a journey of faith.

“Very disturbing and certainly deeply effects the “beauty” of the city as just experienced. You can know about something but not really know. It is very convicting. The wounds …… the pain……. so much work of healing to be done” these were the words of my sister-in-law, Carol Brown, after viewing this special last night on PBS.

She sent the link to me immediately after my initial publishing of this post and it is powerful. She and my brother Dan have just returned from speaking at a conference in Istanbul.

Istanbul, with a sky-line that makes one think they have died and gone to Heaven and a grand bazaar where legends are made, is currently home to my daughter Stefanie. Taking a gap year, she first traveled to Milan, Italy for 3 months, moved on to Sicily for a month and arrived in Istanbul a week after her 19th birthday.

Stef is loving döner kebap, bargaining, and exploring this amazing city. She has also learned more about a troubling issue: that of human trafficking. Working with a group that assists women who have escaped from forced prostitution and gendercide, she inspects jewelry they have made, ensuring it meets quality control standards in order to be sold abroad. Through the art of jewelry-making women develop relationships, skills, and the comfort of community and safety as they gather around a table. As they craft beautiful and unique pieces the slow healing process takes place and my hope would be that they are reminded that they aren’t cheap costume jewelry to be used and thrown away, but rather the real deal – gold and diamonds.

My daughter’s unexpected involvement in this work has convicted me that this is an area that I know far too little about. As a woman, who believes deeply in the value of people made in the image of God, I need to know more. Stef’s work has challenged me to learn more to be able to do more.

*The Victims • The majority of trafficking victims are between 18 and 24 years of age • An estimated 1.2 million children are trafficked each year • 95% of victims experienced physical or sexual violence during trafficking (based on data from selected European countries) • 43% of victims are used for forced commercial sexual exploitation, of whom 98 per cent are women and girls • 32% of victims are used for forced economic exploitation, of whom 56 per cent are women and girls

But it’s the rare person burdened by statistics alone. It is usually the compelling narratives that bring us along and force us from a place of complacency to a place of action – and action can mean anything from buying a piece of jewelry to support women, to getting heavily involved through organizations who are working specifically in the area of human trafficking. A fellow blogger and third culture kid wrote a post in December that I am linking here. It is just one of the 1.2 million and counting stories but at least it is one. Called “My First Hooker” (don’t be put off by the title!) it tells the story of the bloggers trip to Mali and meeting with a Dutch mission worker who weekly visits a brothel to counsel prostitutes. Take a look and watch the accompanying video.

I am thankful that my awareness of human trafficking as more than an NPR news story came in an unexpected way – through the eyes of a 19 year-old and her gap-year.