Esme (8½) is my oldest grandchild. I love her so much. I made her a silk dress and bought her a paddle for her baptism. We do mosaic projects together, and I’m teaching her to sew. We play games. Our early games included one in which we pretended neither of us knew the name of the big lake we drove along. We had to guess at it—“Star Lake?” “Lost Lake?” “Big Lake?”–until she yelled, “It’s Lake Superior!” and we would both cheer—“Lake Superior!”
Recently we started playing Truth or Dare, asking deep questions about life or coming up with ridiculous dares: “Put a hat backwards on your head and run around the room three times shouting ‘Ketchup!’”
When my next two grandchildren, Tucker and Henry, were born, Esme asked me if I would love these other grandchildren.
“Yes, I’ll love them very much,” I said. “But of course I’ll always love you best.”
She smiled.
“I guess I shouldn’t tell them that, though,” I continued.
“I think you need to tell them,” she responded.
I haven’t.
My grandchildren all call me Babka, a name Esme invented for me when she was just over a year old. The title “Babka” means more to me than any other—who cares about being “Reverend Doctor,” when you can be Babka?
I’ve learned a lot from being a grandma, especially about the love of God. Many/most/all of us struggle to comprehend the love of God. But I believe that grandmotherly love is about as close to that love as human love can get.
Parental love is fiercely protective and runs incredibly deep. But, at least as I look back on my own experience as a mother, it had a lot of ego in it. Although I was hardly aware at the time, I felt my kids were a reflection on me—each some kind of “accomplishment” or magnum opus I would be judged on. Maybe it was because I lacked the wisdom of years or maybe it was because I had more energy than could be reasonably used parenting. My kids still talk—we laugh together— about the wholly enriched life I created for them, with no TV (only books), museums, and mountain backpacking trips. I baked nourishing bread (plenty of wheat germ), and sent them school lunches with organic peanut butter and honey sandwiches. (Only to find out later that they traded them for packets of Oreo cookies.)
God’s love may be parental, but (I trust) not in this way. I don’t believe God’s ego needs propping up by the children’s recognition at school or on the sports field. (Myriad ribbons, stickers, and little trophies cluttering up heaven’s golden streets…) God’s love doesn’t demand we prove something. God just loves.
My love for my grandchildren doesn’t seem to have ego in it either. At a profound level I want them to be good human beings, but I don’t need them to be great at art or music or math or writing or anything… to prove something or for me. I just love them.
The other thing I notice about being a Babka is that I am able to love and encourage them as individuals more than I did with my own kids. Of course this could be because I seldom, if ever, have them all at once. (At least for now…. my kids talk about plans for Camp Babka in the years to come….) But I think it’s deeper than that. With my ego detached, I can see them as they are, and help to encourage growth. Each of them is so different, and my delight is in finding and working/playing with them in their challenges, gifts, and joys.
Seeing Henry (almost 4) wake from his first night camping (on the Superior Hiking Trail) and say to his dad, “Can we camp out again tonight?”
Bouncing on the trampoline with Tucker (four) and pretending I’m going to sleep so he can snatch the ball I’m using as my pillow, while he shrieks with glee.
Chasing little Cameron (2 and a bit) around the yard.
Playing music for Edie (age one 1½) and watching her dance.
Playing “This is the way the lady rides” with Alice (almost 1). Adry is too new to know….
I believe God’s love is more like this—meeting each of us with our own challenges, gifts and joys—and loving us in and through them.
The Bible is full of metaphors for God. Some parental ones are hard for people who had abusive fathers or needy, inadequate mothers. A few of my favorite biblical God metaphors are: God as “Mad mother bear,” “mother hen” and “mother eagle.”
I don’t think there is a grandmother metaphor in the Bible, but I sure know God’s love better for being a grandma. The unconditional love, the longing for each to be their own person—these speak to me of God’s love for us.
Each month a member of the Cook County Ministerium will offer Spiritual Reflections. This month’s contributor is Mary Ellen Ashcroft, Vicar of Spirit of the Wilderness Episcopal Church.
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