A PLACE BEYOND THE HILLS
Natalie and I took our kids to the park last November to enjoy one of the last mild evenings before winter took hold of the sky. Change was in the air and we could feel it in our bones. We both had a sense that more than the season was about to change but we didn’t know exactly what or how … if only we knew how much things would change. If only …
But there was a quiet whisper tugging at our souls. It wasn’t obvious to us at the time, but looking back we can see it clearly now. We weren’t alone.
It was on this evening Mitchell sat on the edge of a skate park and watched other young kids do everything he longed so much to do. He commented how much he wished he could be like regular kids and do the things they do. Even though I wished the same for him, I loved him any way I could have him … he was awesome just the way he was.
In an effort to lift Mitchell’s spirits, Natalie pushed him in his wheelchair across the grassy field to play tag with his siblings. Together, Mitch and his mother chased our kids as they ran from him. Mitch laughed and laughed. For a moment he forgot about a world that seemed to always leave him behind, the world was his. And for a moment my wife and I forgot about a world that was collapsing in on him. Everything about this moment was a gift. It was a perfect moment ... a moment that mattered.
Last month I printed this photo on canvas. It now hangs in my office as a reminder that beyond the hills is a place I cannot see … a place that my little boy waits for me.
I run to him.