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What I Learned From an Earring

by Blair Bailey in Faith on Tuesday, August 04, 2009 6:00 AM

My husband has been without full-time work for 4 months now. We’ve had our ups and downs, our good days and bad, and during this time we’ve experienced both sickness and health in our little family. These are the days when I’m left in awe at what a challenging vocation we face as husbands and wives, mothers and fathers. What an incredible duty we have to provide for our children and to make a happy home.

I feel inadequate.

I spend many hours each week helping my husband with his job search. It’s no easy task these days, to find work with this unstable economy. For every job application filled out, there are probably dozens or maybe hundreds of others who are filling out that same application, seeking an income for their own families. There is some comfort in knowing that we’re not the only ones experiencing this hardship. But still many days we do find ourselves feeling alone, despairing, and abandoned.

This day was no different. There were outside circumstances which were making me feel anxious and frustrated, so I retreated to the computer to read some blogs and search for jobs. My children were entertaineing themselves about the house, playing dolls and dress-up, creating houses with cardboard, and making toy guns with tinker toys.

At one point, one of my daughters came and sat on the armrest of my chair and started playing with my earring. I warned her, “Please don’t take off the earring!”

Almost every day I wear one pair of small loop earrings without a back, so they are easy for the girls to remove and put back on my ears. But on this day I was wearing little stud earrings, small gold balls with even smaller gold earring-backs.

Curiosity got the better of her, and my daughter disobeyed. She took the gold backs off the small gold earrings and before I could take them back from her, she dropped the earring-back onto the carpet.

I could feel my body heat up. My feelings of anger were rising, but I tempered myself by requesting her help in locating the earring-back.

Over the course of a few minutes we lost and found the earring-back twice. But in the end, it was lost into the abyss which is our multi-shaded tan shag carpet. I was frustrated with my daughter’s attitude during the search and her disobedience in losing the jewelry in the first place, so I sent her to her room while I was left scouring the floor. On hands and knees I came face-to-face with crayon bits, a dead fly, and pretzel crumbs.

I was angry. I realized that I was feeling especially angry because I had been searching for something very important for four months. Searching for something that was starting to seem like a needle in a haystack. I was searching for a job for my husband, an income for our family, a hope for our future. I started crying there on my hands and knees, sobbing in frustration at what my life had felt like the past few months, and begging in prayer for God to help me.

After a few minutes I felt Him helping me to stand up. And there I faced a framed image of the Divine Mercy on the wall in front of me.

I felt Christ telling me to look at this situation from above. Scouring through the carpet threads is not getting me anywhere, just as my hours upon hours spent scouring the Internet and ignoring my home is not helping me or my family.

But God can see the “big picture”. He knows just where that earring-back is. He knows which thread of carpet it’s hiding underneath and which little piece of shiny metal I’m going to pick up, thinking it’s my earring-back. He knows when I’m going to find it, just as he knows when my husband is finally going to find that job. He knows every hair on my head and every thread in the carpet.

For my part, I have to trust Him. I have to let him calm my fears and let Him be my hope. I have to step back from the job searching when it is time to care for my family, and I have to encourage my husband when He needs affirmation. I have to assure my children that God always provides and that He will help their father find a job. We can read the stories of God’s provision in scripture, and we can read the psalms that express our feelings of fear and remind us of God’s love.

Once I realize who is in control of this situation, I can act on it. I can stand up and face this Divine Mercy image once again. Then I can read those all important words at the bottom of the image, “Jesus, I trust in You.” Because when I can’t find the words to pray, when to me all seems lost, those words will give me comfort.  These words will give me hope.

Jesus, I trust in You.

—Blair Bailey is a Catholic wife and homeschooling mother of 3 who lives in Texas.  She chronicles her family life at Blair’s Blessings.

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