Entering through the door, she held up a wrinkled Ziploc bag containing a five-dollar bill.“You know, once I go back home, my uncle won’t take me back out for the weekend. Could we stop at the thrift store later? I’d like to get some clothes.”
It was an unusually warm February evening, and we had a few things planned, but I assured her that we could fit in a short shopping trip. Serena was entering that stage where girls become aware of the fact that clothes are suddenly more valuable than toys to them, as they awkwardly try to hang on to childhood while reaching for a more grownup identity.
We sat around the table eating pizza and talking about our day, as my daughter began to describe an all too familiar experience for kids her age: A clique of girls at school had shot nasty looks at her and her friend, gossiping and saying mean things about them.
These kinds of episodes are pointedly painful for my daughter, as her people-pleasing instincts and fear of being alone cause her to internalize even the slightest hint of rejection. In a moment, the raw vulnerability that had been expressed opened the door for Serena, and a flood of advice and sharing of her own experiences came pouring out.
As Serena viscerally described the names that had been ascribed to her and the ways in which she had been bullied, sorrow welled up in all of us.
I wondered, how it is that we’ve allowed the experience of poverty or condition of obesity to serve as justification to treat others as objects to be beaten down? If any justice could be found in the situation, it would be in the fact that a caring and no-nonsense principal was doing her best to foster a culture of affirmation and accountability among all members of the school -- teachers and students alike.
Still, no system can mandate love and even though her peers were forced to ‘behave,’ Serena knew what they really thought of her. After a bit of encouragement, the kids moved on to less weighty subjects and activities.
The evening was passing, yet we had one last thing on our list to do. Nothing must be worse to a thrift store clerk than three hyper youth with a handful of dollars, streaming into the store just before closing. I quickly stepped into the role of sergeant, trying to keep the kids focused on what we were there to get. Then we began sorting through a pile of larger-sized clothes that seemed to be fashioned more for a 50-year-old than a young teen.
Making our way to the back of the store, there were a myriad of random items sitting on a shelf. As a minimalist with a strong aversion to clutter, I couldn’t help but think how awful all of this stuff was. Perhaps of the same mind, one of the clerks came back our way, putting an old candle on the shelf. Trying to make conversation, she said, “This candle is really ugly, isn’t it?!” And then...a magical thing happened.
Without missing a beat, Serena looked stone-faced at the clerk and, calmly but clearly, said,
“Nothing is ugly. Everything has purpose.”
It was as if the voice of God had just spoken to us. For a brief moment, all the clerk and I could do was look at one another, knowing we had been called out.
Youth have no use for cliches. What Serena said was a glorious truth that by grace had been revealed to her in her pain. And at that moment, the truth was not only meant to bring redemption to her own experience, it was also redeeming the clerk...and me.
For all of the times I had arrogantly claimed beauty for some parts of my community and ugliness for others, I needed that truth. For the times I’ve looked at others with suspicion, contempt or didn’t even see them at all, I needed that truth.
And in that moment, I was grateful for the profound truths that children have to share with us when we are present enough to listen.
Marlo Fox for Think Tank, Inc. — to learn more about Marlo’s work, please visit thinktank-inc.org