Children - Hearts and Hands of healing our world

My grandaughters' return home today after a week at camp and this week might just on record in the mind of my daughter as the longest since giving birth. Having signed them up almost a year ago, the camp was free to children whose parent has/had cancer. Old school where all electronics were left behind and a phone number for camp in emergencies. Throughout the week, camp would post pictures on Face book of children engaging in different activities. I imagine all parents waited daily to see if their child was in a picture, just a glimpse to fill the days until they returned. Camp also provided therapy which allows the young to express what is deep inside they have chosen not to express to family.

Children take sorrow and tightly pack it into a space where they hope a sick parent will not discover the pain. Smiling and crying at the same time for a parent whose tears they choose not to add their own. My granddaughters know they were blessed for Mom to be alright, not seeing the chemo and radiation which could have been part of her life.Many more have taken those treatments and added each to that special place inside for no one to see the pain. Bless the creators of this camp and many more for a week where children could play, talk and empty those spaces which have been reserved for so long for others not to discover.

I remember being very young, less than five when my own mother one day took myself to a friends house for a week with only myself knowing she needed an operation. I would stand at the screen door and cry to go home knowing my older siblings were at the home. When the day came to return home I saw my mother with a neck so swollen it was frightening and later that day as I walked past the bathroom door I saw her standing at the mirror with visible stitches which stretched from one side of a swollen neck to the other. She turned around and said "Honey, it is nothing to worry about - the doctors say I am going to be just fine!". At the time a large Goiter was removed from her throat, cancer was not part of my vocabulary nor did cancer become part of her life.The frightening image in the mirror on that day , was a blessing staring back at me.

Children are innate protectors of those who watch over them. Throughout all the antics of being a child, when a parent is sick - the child is much more willing to be the jester than allow tears to disturb Mom or Dad. Even when very small, they know crawling up next to a sick individual and snuggling or making them laugh is healing to another, when just for a few moments a smile can make the sickness depart into joy. Healing of a child at work unconsciously as are the times of childhood logic and love.

Children of our world are the very oldest in the very youngest form. Born wide-eyed and knowledgeable, caring/sensitive to a fault. Healing is part of the heart of a child. At times when I have seen the affect of a sick child rather than a parent, the child is still the one who is supreme in the stillest of moments of knowing just how to make the smile of healing depart the sickness of the time. We live in a beautiful world of billions of teachers who are children and by listening to them and observing the way into our future has been placed in wonderful hands.Unconditional love and healing thru the eyes of the child. Bless them all and may all find the times in life to play and express, being the hearts and hands of healing the world.