Today I'm a little emotional.

Today is a day I have a tendency to be a bit more emotional than other days. Most would say with good reason. I fight it, though. Usually as this day approaches each year a battle begins within me. Do I acknowledge the hurt? Is there really hurt or am I being dramatic for the attention? I was healed of this long ago, why do I still think this day will be different? versus This day did happen. I cannot deny that it is a part of who I am. I will live today as I do every other day, but as the emotions come, I will embrace them. I will allow this day to affect how I view all the others, to see them even more clearly as gifts from the Lord Almighty.

This battle tends to make me even more exhausted by the time the dawn comes.

And come it does in all its glory, proclaiming the risen Lord, reminding us that life goes on each day with potential for change, renewal, and giving.

So I receive the texts, "Praying for you." "I love you!" "You're the best" and the facebook messages, "Peace be to you, Carey" and read the statuses of others and their testimony as to God's faithfulness in the past 11 years. Hallelujah! We serve a great God.

These things make me weep. I weep because I am here, I am loved, I have purpose. I weep for the brokenness I still see in others over this day. I weep because the high school girls I work with, especially I think of the seniors, finished their school day today without a hiccup. They will go to school tomorrow. They will finish their senior year like any normal person. They will graduate with only happy tears.

Tragedy affects who we are, how we see the world, and how we interact with it. Jesus is the reason I have hope and anyone who knows Him should know that each day is a gift, life is not something you waste, but I believe anyone who has encountered tragedy in their lives must acknowledge and never fall into forgetting that we are called to affect the world. We must acknowledge the tragedy itself as a gift, a magnifying glass, as it were, to be able to see God's gifts more clearly. Here I stand. Breathing air. The Holy Spirit within me and the world before me. What am I going to do about it?

Weep. For my own forgetfulness and fear. For languishing in comfort. But I know I cannot waste my life. April 20, 1999 is simply one reason I can point to as to why. One among many.