I had coffee with my younger self…

I had coffee with my younger self.

I told her that life is going to be so, so hard.

That there would be many times she would think of giving up.

I showed her the tattoo on my hip, now a bit faded and threaded with silver stretch marks.

“See it? It’s a wave. It’s because you never know what the next wave will bring. Just like life.

Notice the semicolon? It’s because one day, you try to quit, and the police officer who saves you tells you that the waves don’t just beat you down. They don’t just bring pain. They bring something new every day.

He was so sincere. He didn’t even know how much we love the beach. But he understood the mystery of the waves.”

She nodded. Staring at the ocean in solitude has always been our thing.

She kept trying to remind me of the trauma we had recently gone through. She was so focused on that one act of violence that it was coloring everything else. Others saw a rebel and judged her. She hated herself and what she was doing but she didn’t see another way to staunch the flood of guilt.

But I saw broken. I saw hurt. I saw despair. And so, so much shame.

And I knew it would get so, so much worse.

I’m afraid she saw it in my eyes. The knowledge of what was coming couldn’t be disguised.

“Will the wave ever bring happiness?” She was afraid to know the answer. Happiness can be scary too, when all you’ve known is self-loathing.

“The wave will bring so much,” I told her.

Successes and failures. Love and loss. Trauma and healing. Tragedy and restoration.

And above all, it will bring hope. Because the wave is hope. The cross is hope.

She knew of Jesus, but she didn’t know him. Not yet. Not truly.

But she held on to that hope. She remembered the wave. And it carried her to the cross.