We made it to the fair, but that was about it. The kids returned to school today, and we didn’t even slip-n-slid. Didn’t run through the sprinklers. Didn’t go to the mountains to bid farewell to summer. I’ve frozen a lot of peaches this month, but haven’t made an August pie. And in less than a week, Anna’s birthday arrives. Her first birthday in heaven.

Do people even have birthdays in heaven?

What will we do here on earth with Anna’s birthday? What will we do with no slip-n-slides because of the drought? What will we do with California’s mountains on fire?

“Though the fig tree should not blossom, and there be no fruit on the vines.Though the yield of the olive should fail. And the fields produce no food. Though the flock should be cut off from the fold. And there be no cattle in the stalls, yet I will exult in the LORD, I will rejoice in the God of my salvation.The Lord GOD is my strength, and He has made my feet like hinds’ feet, and makes me walk on my high places” Habakkuk 3:17-19. 

“Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed,” says the LORD, who has compassion on you” Isaiah 54:10.

“In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express” Romans 8:26.

When life doesn’t go as planned, when we groan in our pain, we need to remember God.

“I don’t like change,” said 12 year old John yesterday as we delivered fruit to Raley’s in Lincoln. He’s starting seventh grade on a new school campus. Maybe John was talking about that. Or maybe, like me, he was thinking about life without Anna. Forty Mile Road was just ahead of us on the highway. The scene of the accident that took Anna from us.

“What do you mean?” I asked John with my eyes on the golden grass where Anna’s family’s SUV rolled half a dozen times. Unbelievable that Anna’s dad and sister Emily walked away from the crash and Anna died right there. Driving by Forty Mile Road rearranges my insides.

“This summer has been different,” John said softly, looking away from the spot where the accident occurred.

The sadness in his voice left me aching. “It has been different,” I acknowledged. “I don’t like change, either.”

“If you could have one super power what would it be?” John kept his eyes on the highway right in front of us. He’d loved Anna. When he was little, Anna was it. Out of all the cousins, Anna was his favorite. After she died, he didn’t eat for weeks. We had to make John eat. It really scared me.

“I think I’d like to see the spiritual realm. See the angels around us. See God fighting for us.”

“I wouldn’t want to see the future,” John said, his leg tapping the seat. Like me, John fidgets when he’s anxious.

“Me, neither. That’s the last power I would want.” I blinked back stinging tears.

It’s been a hard summer. A hard couple of years, really. But not without moments of joy. Not without bursts of laughter. Not without a whole lot of love. We still call my breakdown the gift that keeps on giving. Our family still laughs about me losing it. It still humbles me down to my bones. And I’m still paying for it. Two hundred dollars a month to the hospital. If I could give my breakdown back, I wouldn’t. The hardest things in my life have made me richer. Not in wealth. In character. In gratefulness. In love. Everything bad that has happened to me, I wouldn’t change. Except for Anna. I’d take Anna back in a heartbeat.

Last night, I balled like a baby while reading Choosing to See, by Mary Beth Chapman, the wife of Grammy Award winning singer Steven Curtis Chapman. I was in the middle of working a slow farmers’ market, wiping tears away when a customer walked up. “I’m sorry I’m crying,” I told the customer. “I’m reading a sad book.”

“I hope it’s fiction,” the customer said.

“No, it’s a true story,” I told him. He looked at me like, why put yourself through this? 

Why indeed?

I’ve avoided this book for years. In May of 2008, the Chapman’s 17 year old son ran over their five year old daughter in their driveway. Little Maria bled out in her daddy’s arms. A parent’s worst nightmare. I’d followed this story in the news, praying for this family, hurting for this family, horrified by their tragedy. And I’ve marveled that Steven Curtis Chapman’s music has only grown deeper for it. Blessing millions of listeners with a refined faith that reassures us God is good.

This summer at a dear friend’s house as we talked about losing Anna, how difficult this has been for our family, there was Choosing to SEE sitting on my friend’s coffee table. “Was that a good book?” I asked her.

“Life-changing” she responded.

“I haven’t been able to bring myself to read it,” I confessed.

She handed it to me. “Read it,” she insisted.

So I’ve been slowly reading it this summer. In little doses. In tender moments. Last night during the farmers’ market, here’s what got me. Steven Curtis Chapman speaking to friends and family at his daughter’s funeral:

“You guys, help us live differently because of this! We don’t know what “normal” is or will ever be, but we don’t want to go back to it, because time is short. We’ve looked into eternity… we’re doing it today. This is the kind of thing we need to spend our time doing, just seeing and celebrating the glory of God where it shows up, in the pain and the joy He gives us in this life. You know, I think Maria would say to us today, “Taste and SEE that the Lord is good.” Maria loved tasty things. She loved to eat. And she would say, “See, just see the glory of God today!” If you’ve never seen it, if you’ve been afraid to see it or too proud to see it or whatever, just see the goodness of God in the midst of this.”

When I read “Taste an SEE” I about lost it. “Taste and See” has been my summer mantra. It was as if God himself was saying to me, “Taste and SEE my goodness. Even in tragedy. Even in drought and fire this August. Taste and SEE I am good.”

And then another customer came to our stand. A cranky customer. She asked to taste our peaches. When I cut her a slice, she wasn’t impressed. “These don’t have much flavor,” she huffed.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “We really need the heat to pack the sugar in our peaches, and it’s been cooler weather lately.”

“It’s been hot,” she said, as if I was lying to her face.

I smiled. She frowned. “I’ll take six peaches,” she said as if she was taking poison. I gave her twelve, charging her for just the six. “Let them sit on the counter a day or two. They’ll soften up and get sweeter,” I promised.

Then I went back to my book and cried some more. The Chapman family has chosen to taste and see God’s goodness. God’s amazing plans and purposes in the midst of their family’s great tragedy. Everyone should read, Choosing to SEE by Mary Beth Chapman. It reminds me of Rare Bird, by Anna Whiston-Donaldson.

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” John 10:10-11.

This summer the thief has come to our house. The battle for truth has been wild in my heart. Is God really good? the thief has whispered repeatedly.

“There is wisdom of the head and there is wisdom of the heart,” said Charles Dickens. In my head I know God is good, but my heart has a closed door. I’m not even sure it’s the Anna door. Maybe it’s a door of doubt and fear. I fear God. And I’m a big Bible reader. The God of the Bible is majestic and fierce and wildly jealous. In the Bible, God even puts children to death when his wrath is on display. I’ve heard again and again, “God didn’t take Anna from you. God doesn’t do those kind of things to people. God just loves us,” my compassionate Christian friends have assured me.

Then I read the Bible. Reality check. God does those kind of things. God takes the lives of little ones in the Bible. God takes children from their parents in the Bible.“Then the LORD said to me, “Son of man, on the day I take away their stronghold–their joy and glory, their heart’s desire, their dearest treasure–I will also take away their sons and daughters. Ezekiel 24:25.

Or sit with the book of Job for awhile. God takes so much from Job. “But that’s old testament,” Christians say. I don’t care what book of the Bible it is. It’s God. The Living God who doesn’t change. The God who crucified his own Son for sinners. A perfect Son. A beloved Son. Job says in the Bible, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart.The LORD gave and the LORD has and taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised” Job 1:21.

Have you ever wrestled with God? Wrestled with the truth? Wrestled with your own heart? This has been a summer of wrestling for me.

In the book: Rare Bird, Anna Whiston-Donaldson (who has become a friend to me since our Anna’s death) says, “After Jack died, I needed a bigger God.”

I’ve come to the conclusion I need a bigger God. I need to taste and see how good God really is. In all his glory. In all his wrath. In all his mercy. Nothing has gone as planned this year. Last year I wrote a blog post titled: Sweet August. This year, if I was really honest, it would say: Hard August. Or hell of an August. I have no desire to make peach pies right now, something I’ve done every August for years. A slip-n-slid is out of the question. No wasting water. I’m afraid people are going to get mad because our farm is too green already. Sometimes I close my eyes and dream of running away to the mountains. We used to take our horses to the mountains in August. Ride for miles into the wilderness, and if we found a place remote enough, beautiful enough, wild enough, Scott and I would slip away by ourselves, strip off our clothes, and swim naked in lakes so blue you could see all the way to the bottom.

I know. I’m sorry. Probably too much information here. But I really miss those pie-eating, horse-riding, skinny-dipping people. One August, I lost my bra because of a bear. We were swimming in a crystal clear emerald green lake surrounded by willows. Our clothes we hung in the willows. When we got out of the water to get dressed, Scott noticed a pile of steaming bear scat right where we’d undressed. We threw on our clothes and ran for our horses. My bra still hangs in the willows. Or maybe the bear is wearing it.

I didn’t plan for that. But it’s a good story. The bear made it a good story.

That lady who complained last night about our peaches didn’t plan to get double what she asked for. I could tell by the look on her face the extra peaches I put in her bag made her happy, though she did her best not to show it. As she walked to her car, I said a prayer for her. How sad to be such a grumpy bear.

I want to see all the way to the bottom. Look past the pain and past the drought and past the fires and smoke this summer and see God as clear as a mountain lake.

But maybe those lakes seemed so clear because I was naked.