When no one was looking – and shhh! Don’t tell anyone! – I closed the door to my bedroom and put on the dress. No, not my dress. My daughter’s dress. And yes, the red ball gown. I couldn’t leave it on the hanger. It was calling, calling to me. Wear me! Put me on! Dance in me! And so I obeyed it. The gown and I were friends already.

I swayed to and fro watching the material billow on either side. Then I twirled and “snap!” My husband took a picture of me. I laughed and continued dancing. I was a young girl again. Possibilities were endless. Who would I become?

A few minutes later, it was time to return the dress to the hanger. To give it back to its rightful owner: the one with a future stretched out so far in front of her, the horizon is still a blur. Don’t they give scholarships and opportunities to the youth?

Aren’t “they” searching for youth to raise up, to hold their hand on the giant escalator roaring into the sky? “There are opportunities for you”, the dress reminds. “Who you are is much more beautiful than what you recognize in yourself on an ordinary day”, the dress said to her.

So I went back to the dishes. To the laundry. To scrub the floor. (Wait – I never scrub my floor but don’t ruin the effect).

I surrendered my identity, the identity that God was whispering to me to remember when I took off the dress. “Gracefully surrendering the things of youth,” I thought stoically. I am mature now. Time to pass on the torch to stronger runners, to those without back pain.

Maybe it’s time for me to get out the TV and to stare numbly for the next few decades (Wait – I don’t have a TV either, but again… keep the mood!).

The point is, who am I? Am I the young girl, dancing in freedom, wondering what new doors of opportunity will open for me tomorrow? Am I catching hopes and dreams wherever I wander, storing them in a basket that I carry with me, overfilling with possibilities?

Or am I me? The has been, has gone. I had my opportunities. Am I the flower, wilted, with a bit of brown at the edges? Am I a cactus? Come too close to me with a balloon of freedom and I will pop it? Am I living in a box when God wants me to be free? Are you?

“Who knows? Maybe you were made queen for just such a time as this.” The Message

Lord, help us to stop groveling on the ground like common beggars. Help us to stand, while leaning on Your strength. Wash us in your love. Help us to have the courage to take hold of the royal robes that You hold out to us. Let us never live in the lie, that just because we are beggars, we aren’t also daughters and sons of the King. Thank You for adopting us into Your love. May we run free into our destinies, we pray.

After a few minutes of thanksgiving, ask God “What blinders am I wearing, so I am unable to see the next thing You are showing me?”