Our middle daughter, Naomi, is a pretty special kid. Actually, she’s a 19 year old woman and a junior at Nyack College in Nyack, New York. She is studying youth ministry as well as being in the honors program. While Sue and I certainly know that all our three daughters are special, and we love them all, Naomi’s growth and maturing over these last two years of college is becoming so very evident now that she’s home for the summer.
She broke up with her boyfriend last semester. He was a very good guy who cared for her well during the worst part of her battle with depression. She saw that their lives were going two different ways with different priorities,, though, and she knew what she had to do. Break ups are always hard, but in some ways breaking up with a good guy is actually a lot harder.
Naomi is a natural for youth ministry, especially in the area she wants to focus on, which is at risk youth. She sees herself in a residential program like Teen Challenge, or perhaps serving as a chaplain in a youth - correctional facility. She has always had the capacity to love the hard-to-love. Her best friend in Kindergarten was a non-verbal autistic boy. Years after he left her school, she would go visit him at least once a week.
She always makes it a priority, when she’s home, to get together for coffee with a younger teen girl who, although currently renouncing the Christian faith, respects Naomi’s Christian worldview enough to speak openly with her about boys, friends, parents and all the major themes of a high school girl’s life. Another younger girl, also a high school student, came over today so that Naomi could do her hair and make up for her high school banquet.
Recently we were visiting with some family, and this household has a particularly rebellious teenage girl. While tales of the rebel teen girl’s escapades were being whispered about behind her back, Naomi got talking with her. The teen voiced a desire to work at Dunkin Donuts for the summer. Naomi walked her down to the store to pick up an application, then helped her fill it out. No big production; No seeking thanks or attention; just a small act of kindness for a kid who knows that it was about so much more than just a job application. It was about the hope Naomi sees in her.
Naomi’s most recent treatment for depression, a combination of medication and counseling, has been very helpful, and she is pretty much the Naomi we knew through high school. Right now she and two friends who will be working with her at camp soon are laughing hysterically at something they’re watching together. And, while I hate to see my kids in pain, I have to wonder if some of this growth in maturity and compassion I’m seeing in her may not be, in part, due to the struggles she’s had over the past year.
Forgive me if this sounds like a proud dad coming to grips with his little girl becoming an adult. I can’t deny that might be exactly why I’m blogging this, and for that I make no apology.