Boy 9-10

[Brad Fox]

Boy 9-10

Grace from another world.  I had a bittersweet day yesterday.  When I picked up my 61-year-old disabled younger brother Kim at his board and care home yesterday he was pretty agitated as he handed me a small post-it note.  Written on it were the words “boy 9-10.”  Kim was brain-damaged at birth by a then-unknown blood incompatibility between my mother’s blood and his.  He has cerebral palsy, epilepsy, developmental and cognitive impairments.  He functions at about the age of a third grade child.  Cruelly, his first experience with neglect had happened on the weekend he was born.  His personal pediatrician, a colleague and friend of my dad’s, was off “call” and another doctor was responsible for his care.  Between the nurses, the attending pediatrician and the relaxed atmosphere of the weekend shift, nobody noticed that Kim was jaundiced; his blood was disintegrating while under attack from my mom’s antibodies.  He was undergoing slow brain asphyxiation.  All that needed to be done to save him was to give him a blood transfusion!  My parents were encouraged to sue the hospital and medical staff for this monumental mistake, but being the practicing Christians they were, they decided that enough damage had been done; that there was no purpose in condemning others of guilt.  Their actions personified an indescribable grace lesson that I’ve never forgotten!  At nine years of age, Mom and Dad had reluctantly yet hopefully sent Kim to the Wichita Institute of Logopedics for the school year to see if the educators there could help him with his speech and cognitive development.  It was a heart-wrenching decision for all of us, and the longest period of sadness and emptiness in our lives.  Regarding the note, he told me through gestures and "family language" that his housemother at the Institute had apparently threatened to damage his genitals with a scissors and had hit him with a shoe across the face!  What to do...?  I had heard from my parents that he had complained in those days that the housemother had done some abusive things, but they had decided not to open up the matter.  Those were the days (early '60's) when you just didn't pursue those kinds of matters legally.  Now, after so many years, with both parents dead and me the lone witness to his complaint, how was I to respond?  I was reminded of Simone Weil’s/Philip Yancey’s quote at this point:  “Revenge perpetuates evil; Justice punishes it; Evil is overcome by good only if the injured party absorbs it, refusing to allow it to go any further. And that is the pattern of otherworldly grace that Jesus showed in his life and death.”

Although I was nearly brought to tears as we drove to the restaurant, I composed myself and “signed” to him that I was sorry for what he’d gone through.  What else could I say?  As we progressed through the day we breakfasted together, he sat patiently letting me attend to his nails and calloused feet, we went to see the latest version of the “Meatball” animated movie, and we dined together having his favorite:  fried shrimp.  Make no mistake; our times together are pretty quiet.  There’s very little dialogue.  But there’s a brother-brother bond there that is profoundly deep and filled with life-changing meaning.  He knows I love him through my loving actions and attentiveness to his needs and aspirations.

I take this from Kim’s experience:  that no matter what evil has been poured into his life, his spirit is always indomitable.  He is well known among his family, friends and community for his bright, happy personality.  He “lifts” everyone in the room!  It is his gift and privilege to reflect this perfect image of God.  He may be physically broken, but he is a spiritual paragon; a bright-shining beacon in a dark world of unhappiness.  And so, as I start my busy work-week I take this lesson from Kim with me.  It isn’t what has happened to me that’s important; it’s how I respond to it that is.  How will I respond when someone does evil to me?  How will I respond when I am unjustly broken and seemingly cursed?  I have no excuses.  I need to respond with evil-absorbing grace.  My wonderful baby brother has shown me the way!  I guess I’m the disabled one, after all…