I turned 50 last Friday.  I’ve been excited about it, loving every minute of it…until Sunday.  Informal church gathering Sunday afternoon.  Talking with a 3 year old and his parents.  Cute little guy.  Together we were exploring the intricacies of the plot of the movie Frozen.  Things were going along just fine…until he called me….

Grandma!

What?!  Grandma?  I had been thinking about how the 50s are about wisdom and settledness and the joy of having figured out a lot of things about life.  I hadn’t been thinking about how most folks who enter this decade do so as…

Grandparents!

After my initial shock, I thought about it a bit.  Many grandparents in the world are people of wisdom, compassion, and unconditional love.  Watching people become grandparents has been one of the great joys of pastoring.  And I’ve met both of my young friend’s grandmas.  They are terrific women…wise, compassionate, and full of giddy love for their grandson.

So, maybe being called Grandma–even without any children or grandchildren of my own–isn’t such a bad thing.  Grandma can mean old, but it means so much more, doesn’t it?  And because I have no children or grandchildren of my own, I won’t be called Grandma a whole lot in my life…

…but now I have been.  Oh, I know.  My young friend wasn’t thinking about his words; he was just talking in the midst of his play.  (Earlier he’d also said, “Pastor Kim doesn’t look like Pastor Kim with clothes on.”  🙂   But in the moment, immersed in a high level discussion of Frozen, he called me Grandma….and my heart melted.