The Crippled Lamb

I got my Easter Blessing early this year.  Funny how things happen.  I was sitting in the jewelry store having myself a good old pity party.  I'm absolutely exhausted from all this insurance stuff and continual studying.  I don't sleep well at night and during the day I'm like an 80 year old in a nursing home...I find myself dosing off in my chair.  I'm also feeling very lonely in life. 

A family came in with a young son...about 8.  He had glass, braces and was all gangly legs and elbows.  He looked very fragile.  He came right up to the counter and started asking me about my day and the book I was reading.  I was reading a true crime serial killer novel so I tried to turn it into a Nancy Drew type mystery so his parents wouldn't think I was a freak.  He had a wooden bunny that GiftCrafts (a shop down the row) had given him and we talked about that for a while.  His mom and dad shopped.

He was very smart.  Told me he was from Georgia and they'd travelled from one end of NC to the other for Spring Break.  Next stop was Dillsboro where he was going to be in an Easter Bunny parade.  He asked to feel my hair....which I let him do.  Then he told me he had Aspergers Syndrome and asked me if I knew what that was...I did but I let him tell me......  He also has Trichotillomania, which is a form of anxiety in children that manifests in them pulling out their eyelashes one by one.  He said you know people make fun of me alot in school.  I asked him what school he went to and it seemed to be a mainstream public school.  He said it's not fun to be made fun of.  He said he didn't like being different.

My heart absolutely broke and I shook off my pity party.  I walked around the counter and sat down and told him that people made fun of me when I was younger for being fat and that  it had really hurt my feelings but it had made me strong.  He said "strong like a super hero" and I said yes.    And that I have an anxiety disorder and I sometimes scratch my skin till it bleeds.  He said so "you are weird like me".....I laughed and said that yes, I guess I am.  But I like to think that it takes "all kinds of kinds" to make up this world....and we are just two of a kind. He liked that a lot.  The little boy that doesn't like to be touched or to touch threw his arms around my neck and hugged me close.  I looked up to see tears streaming down his mom and dads face. 

Michael left me with tears of my own and a wooden bunny that he insisted I have.  I can't imagine what he's going through at 8 years old that I think is killing me in my 30s...I have nothing to complain about.  God works in mysterious ways and today He sent a crippled lamb to me to remind me of what I do have in life.