Look At
the Beamer!
(F)or the
joy of the Lord is your strength.
-- Nehemiah 8:10c
Our new little bundle of joy was
nestled in my arms, just weeks old, with her two older sisters looking on, when
she broke into the biggest, cutest, most radiant baby smile in the universe.
"Look at the beamer!" I exclaimed. I
was thinking of the rays of sunshine that we see sometimes, beaming down from between
high clouds. This was either the happiest little person you ever saw . . . or
she had a little gas.
"Beamer" it was, though. And even
though the nickname was occasionally mistaken for crass materialism (no, it has
NOTHING to do with a BMW) or the semi-famous Beemer Standpipe in fabulous
Beemer, Neb., which, ironically, was fabricated by my husband's steel company many
years ago, the nickname has grown up along with Eden Elizabeth.
In fact, the senior class recently
voted her as having the "best nickname." They see what we see. There's a light that comes out of this young
woman, and that light is joy.
She graduated from high school last
week. During the whirl of festivities, I watched her interacting with others.
What do you know: she got through chem, calc and Advanced Placement classes, and
is STILL a beamer!
It's striking how much of a sunbeam
she really is: bright, light-hearted, and warm. She exudes personality. She's a
character. She just makes people smile. Always has.
Beamer has a special calling, a form
of leadership you don't see every day. She showed it in school, and on the
elite softball teams on which she's played. She's one of those people who just
knows how to be happy. She chooses to be. Happiness is a fading art. But hers
is an example we all should embrace.
Her secret: she has never been
afraid to be herself.
As a first-grader, she did a
stand-up comedy routine for the school talent show. She wrote her own jokes,
and came up with a zany costume. It was also a ventriloquist act, and involved
a finale with her jumping down into the audience from the stage with a barrage
of water-gun squirts. This would never pass in the post-911 world; back then,
it was high humor.
She told her first joke, looking
tiny on the stage. It had to do with a pregnant butterfly with stomach
flutters. Nobody "got" it. They murmured, but nobody laughed. There was an
awkward silence.
All of a sudden, the wackiest, most
delightful laughter you ever heard came roaring out of a little boy who was
mentally handicapped -- beloved at that school because he was good and kind and
sweet.
He "got" the joke! His laughter was
so infectious, pretty soon the whole gym was laughing with him.
Beamer was on a roll. Her act was a
rousing success. Saved by another little beamer - another person who knew
enough to choose joy.
Now Beamer is all grown up, and setting
out for college in Minnesota, where she is going to play softball and pursue
her dream career in communications. It's an adventure, and a challenge. But
we're not scared for her one bit. She's ready.
One recent Saturday night, her dad
was out of town, and Beamer and her friends were grouped around our kitchen
island having a snack.
I was up in bed. As I lay there, I
could hear the sound of Beamer's musical voice, saying something funny, and
then the other kids would roar with laughter. Rapidly, she would say something
else, and they would respond again, in hysterics. This went on and on.
It was like she was the choir
director of joy.
I got a little teary-eyed at how little
she'd changed and how much I loved her. I went to sleep with a smile, too.
How we need the Beamers of this
world. How desperately important they are.
My prayer and my hope is that she
can stay true to herself, and yet grow. May she find her place in the world,
and continue to make it a little brighter, a little happier.
May she always be our Beamer, a
joyous heart that reflects God's love from above - and beams it back again. †
