Little Wren Writes

I have spent a significant amount of time in this series analysing my emotions.

We’ve examined anxiety. Grief. Fear. Identity. Lament. Numbness. Surrender. Rumination. The voices in my head.

So for Y, I thought we might do something a little different. Something lighter. Something that asks a surprisingly fun question:

What would yesterday’s versions of me think about my life today?

Not literal yesterday-me. Yesterday-me mostly wants to know why I stayed up too late and whether I hung the clothes out to dry or not.

I mean the Renee’s of yesterday.

4-year-old me.
Fifteen-year-old me.
Twenty-year-old me.
The versions of myself who had absolutely no idea what was coming.

What would they look at in my life now and say:

YAY!

I don’t know about you, but I think I spend a lot of time looking backwards. Sometimes nostalgically. “Things were so much simpler then.” (Which is usually only partly true.)

Sometimes regretfully.
I wish I’d known.
I wish I’d done that differently.
I wish I could go back.

And sometimes with grief. There are things about yesterday I desperately wish I could bring into today. People. Relationships. Versions of life that no longer exist.

There are photographs I can look at now and realise the person smiling in them had absolutely no idea what was coming. Sometimes I want to reach through the picture and tell her. Prepare her. Protect her. Give her a heads-up. Possibly hand her a detailed spreadsheet.

But I can’t. Yesterday stays yesterday.

Recently I’ve wondered whether I’ve spent so much time thinking about what today-me would tell yesterday-me that I’ve forgotten to ask what yesterday-me might say to me.

Because I reckon some of those earlier Renee’s would be absolutely delighted.

Little Renee would probably be thrilled to discover that adulthood does, in fact, allow you to buy things simply because you think they’re cute. This is dangerous information to give a child…

You mean one day I’ll have my OWN MONEY?

Yes.

And nobody can stop me buying tiny unnecessary objects?

Well. Technically the bank can. And maybe a wise Uncle.
But otherwise, yes.

I think she’d be very pleased with the collection of dice, Lego, trinkets, fairy lights, mugs, games, rainbow cardigans and assorted other nonsense I’ve accumulated.

She’d probably walk into my house with the biggest grin and think:

WE LIVE HERE?! (And honestly, sometimes I still think that too.)

I think she’d be delighted that imagination didn’t disappear.
I still love stories.
I still get ridiculously excited about things.
I still think themed parties are objectively better than non-themed parties.
I still love making things magical for children.
I still think tiny details matter.
I still enjoy the sort of things adults occasionally decide they’re supposed to have grown out of.

And I’m glad.

Because adulthood has enough council rates and paperwork in it. We should be allowed whimsy.

Teenage Renee would have questions. Many questions. Some of them I am declining to answer publicly. But I think she’d be amazed by some things.

She’d probably be shocked by the places I’ve been.

You’ve been to Paris!? And America!?

Yep.

You’ve climbed the Eiffel Tower AND stood at the Grand Canyon?

Yep.

You’ve seen HOW MANY theatre shows?

Let’s not focus on the financial implications.

You FED A SEA OTTER?!

Correct. His name was Bennett. And frankly, teenage Renee, that one was everything you imagine it would be.

There are things I’ve experienced that younger me wouldn’t even have known to put on a bucket list. Places I’ve stood where I’ve thought ‘how is this my life?’ People I’ve met. Things I’ve learned. Adventures I’ve had. Moments that younger me would have thought belonged to somebody else’s story.

And then there’s work. I wonder what younger me would think if I told her that I get to spend my life telling children and teenagers about Jesus. That part of my actual job involves games and craft and Bible stories and camps and teenagers and ridiculous costumes and sitting with young people while they ask enormous questions. That I get to watch children grow up. That I get to see teenagers become young adults. That sometimes I get to be the safe grown-up I desperately needed other adults to be – the adult I needed at 4, 12, 18…

I think she’d like that. Actually, I think she’d really like that.

She might not understand all the meetings. Neither do I, younger Renee. Neither do I.

But I think what would surprise her most is the people. Because younger me had no idea who was coming. She hadn’t met some of the people who would become, quite frankly, some of the most important to her. She didn’t know their names. Didn’t know their faces. Didn’t know the jokes we’d eventually repeat approximately four thousand times. Didn’t know the places we’d go together. Didn’t know the cups of tea we’d drink. Didn’t know whose houses would become familiar and safe. Didn’t know who would sit beside her in terrible moments. Didn’t know who would make her laugh until she couldn’t breathe. Didn’t know the nicknames people would give her. And, as established in V, apparently that’s all it takes to win my heart.

She didn’t know any of them yet. Isn’t that strange?

Some of the people who feel completely woven into my life now were once people I hadn’t met. There was a day before I knew every person I currently love. That’s kind of extraordinary.

Excitedly it also means there are people in my future I don’t know yet. Friends I haven’t met. People I’ll get to love. Children and teenagers whose stories I’ll get to be part of. People who will make me laugh. People who will teach me things. People who might one day become so familiar that I’ll barely remember what life felt like before them.

That’s a nice thought. Not a guarantee about exactly what the future will hold. Just a reminder that today isn’t the end of the cast list.

Of course, there are things younger me expected that didn’t happen. I don’t want to pretend otherwise. If I sat down with her and explained the whole story, there would be parts that would break her heart. Things she’d find frightening. There are things I wouldn’t want to tell her all at once. But maybe I wouldn’t need to. Because she doesn’t need to carry tomorrow yet. Neither did I.

And perhaps neither do I now.

There are also versions of me from much more recent yesterdays. Those are the ones I think about differently. The Renee who sat in seasons she genuinely didn’t know how to get through. The Renee who thought: I can’t do this.
The Renee who couldn’t imagine what life would look like six months later. The Renee who thought a particular pain might always feel exactly as sharp as it did that day.

I don’t want to look back at her and say: See! Everything worked out! Because that’s not true. Some things haven’t. Some things are still tender. Some things remain unanswered.

But I would like to show her today. Not to prove that the pain was necessary. Just to say: Look! Look where we are. There are things here you can’t see yet.

There’s a lovely moment in Psalm 126 where God’s people look backwards at what He has done and say:

“The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.”

I like that remembering is part of faith. I know I’ve talked about it before. Throughout Scripture, God’s people are repeatedly told to remember. Remember who God is. Remember what He has done. Remember where He has brought you from. Not because yesterday was always wonderful. It absolutely wasn’t. But because sometimes looking backwards lets us see things we couldn’t recognise while we were living them.

Maybe that’s one of the gifts of yesterday. Perspective.

From here, I can see prayers God answered that I’d almost forgotten I’d prayed. I can see things I once desperately wanted that are now ordinary parts of my life. I can see moments where I thought: I will never manage this.

And apparently…I managed it.

Not always elegantly. Sometimes with tears. Sometimes with help. Sometimes with an unreasonable quantity of tea.

But still. Here.

And maybe I need to celebrate that more. Not everything needs to become a profound lesson. Sometimes the appropriate response is simply:

YAY.

You did the thing. You survived the awkward conversation. You tried something new. You made the house feel like yours. You laughed really hard today. You asked for help instead of pretending you were fine. You remembered to hang the washing on the line.

EXTRAORDINARY. YAY.

Celebration doesn’t have to wait for enormous milestones.

Jesus was no stranger to celebrations.
His first miracle happens at a wedding. He eats with people constantly. He attends feasts. He tells stories about parties. He uses images of banquets to describe the kingdom.

Christianity has room for lament – and goodness knows I’ve made excellent use of that. But it also has room for:

Look what God has done.
Look at this gift.
Look how far we’ve come.
Come and celebrate with me.

Maybe joy deserves to be noticed too.

I think that’s what I’d want to tell the Renee’s of yesterday.

Not: Don’t worry, everything turns out exactly how you wanted…Spoiler. It doesn’t.

Not: One day none of this will hurt anymore – some things still do. And sometimes, they really hurt.

I’d tell them something more ordinary.

There is so much you haven’t seen yet.

You haven’t met everyone who will love you. You haven’t visited every place that will take your breath away. You haven’t heard all the jokes that will make you laugh until your stomach hurts. You haven’t finished every puzzle you’ll love. You haven’t had every conversation that will change you. You haven’t seen every prayer God will answer. You haven’t discovered every thing you’re capable of. You haven’t tasted every excellent cake.

This last point feels particularly important.

There is more.

And maybe today’s Renee needs to hear that too. Because one day, today will be yesterday. Future-me may look back at this exact version of me with the perspective I don’t have yet. She’ll know things I don’t know. She’ll have met people I haven’t met. She’ll have survived things I’m currently worried about. She’ll have stories I can’t imagine.

Hopefully she will also have developed a reliable system for making sure the washing goes on the line instead of needing to be washed a second time.

I wish her well.

So maybe Y is for Yesterday & Yay.

For looking backwards without only looking for regret. For remembering younger versions of ourselves with affection. For noticing that some of the things we once dreamed about are now so normal we’ve stopped seeing them. For recognising the ways God has carried us. For celebrating progress even when the story isn’t finished. And for occasionally letting joy be joy without immediately analysing it.

Maybe younger me would look at my life and notice things I’ve stopped noticing. Maybe she’d walk around wide-eyed.

You get to do this?!

You know these people?!

You’ve been THERE?!

This belongs to you?!

We became HER?!

And maybe I’d laugh. Because I know things she doesn’t. I’d know the hard chapters too. But I’d also know something she couldn’t possibly know yet:

There has been so much goodness. So much grace. So many people. So many adventures. So much theatre. So much cake. So many completely ordinary days that turned out to matter.

And if yesterday-me could see all of that, I think she’d have something fairly simple to say.

Yay.

And maybe today-me should say it a little more often too.

“The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.” 
Psalm 126:3