SARA SAID…
by Becky Keller ♥ July 15, 2022
SARA SAID…
Some things about Sara’s life are harder than others to write about. Some people will disagree about writing about them. About me writing about them. But Sara was a real person. Sara had real struggles. She had real challenges and issues that she had to figure out and manage as she grew with her life. She also had real fun, lots of good times, many friends, and few people that I ever heard her say she did not like.
Sara was very loving and as was often evident, also experienced real pain and even heartache that she did not want to face.
Some things were easy for her to talk about – some things were hard for her to talk about. Even in death, Sara continues to tell me things. Sometimes I think she has told me more in death that she couldn’t say out loud in life. I want people to know Sara as a real person. As Payton gets older, I want her to know her mom as a real person – someone who was real and lived the very best life a mom could ever live. I want Sara’s daughter to know that her mom had questions just like she has questions, her mom struggled with decisions and life in the same manner as she thinks and struggles….and she stayed in the game to the very end. Sara researched her questions – just as I do. She wanted to know things – just like me and just like her daughter.
I remember when we moved to California after living in Korea her entire life, I researched the different school systems I thought we may be near depending on where we decided to live. Sara was going into the eighth grade – middle school. Her sisters were going into high school and elementary school. But she was going into middle school – the only age group that had to wear school uniforms in the city in which we were relocating. White tops, navy blue bottoms. This usually ended up being a white polo shirt or button up blouse paired with navy blue slacks (no jeans) or a skirt. For my fashionista daughter this was a travesty! The worst thing imaginable! Why did her sisters not have to wear a uniform? How did they get out of looking like everyone else? How could she start at a new school going in looking like everyone else? How could she be so…so…drab?! How? Why? Oh, the agony of it all! Drama, drama, drama.
So, she researched. She looked up the rules. She checked the policies herself (even though I had done it already). Okay. When it became clear to her that indeed it seemed to be just the middle school (for our area), that required school uniforms, then she really dug into her fashion sense. She needed to find a way to be her. If she was going to have to be plain as she referred to it at the beginning, she was going to at least make up for it in her own style.
This meant shopping as soon as our plane touched down in California. She had scoped out some shops. Come to find out, many stores had sections for “school uniforms” which contained many items in the navy blue and white basic clothing items.
We arrived in October. School was already in session, and I needed to get the girls registered in school as quickly as possible. High school and elementary school registrations went relatively smoothly. We did Middle school last as I could feel the stress build and the resistance grow. While getting her registered at her new middle school, we had an opportunity to see how other students dressed. Sara was not impressed. She had other ideas at other than the standard
“school uniform” stores. I knew what lie ahead if Sara was not at least given the chance to “shop” around. I agreed and off we went to find alternative stores with navy blue and white outfits. We found a few items that met Sara’s taste for her own style. Enough that she was able to compromise and get some of the basics to have enough clothes for the week. Even to be stylish, she didn’t want to do laundry every night. (We lived in a hotel at the time since we had just relocated to the area. Doing hotel laundry was apparently worse than having to be like everyone else for a while.)
The girls each started their respective schools and soon got used to dressing for success according to their school policies. Sara made friends easily and quickly. She soon had several new friends with whom I heard about around the dinner table in the evenings. She joined in school activities and attended events outside of school as she assimilated into her new surroundings. It appeared that the school uniform drama had dissipated, and she had come to peaceful terms with her navy blue and white.
Until one day when I received a call from the principal. That was not a bad thing. She just needed me to bring in a form that had somehow gotten lost among her pile of papers on her desk. No problem. I would just bring her a copy at lunch time.
I got to the school and was walking to the principal’s office as the students were going back to class from their lunch break. I saw a group of girls laughing together, having a good time after enjoying what seemed to be a happy and free lunch period. Then I realized that one the girls was Sara. Only the girl at which I was looking was wearing what appeared to be shorts or a “skort” – a skirt with a flap like front cover that hid what was really a pair of shorts. It was a short “skort” as well. Sara was laughing with her friends and oblivious to the fact that her mother was staring at her across the school courtyard. That was not a “school uniform” which I had purchased. It was also not the clothes my daughter had walked out of the house wearing that morning. It was probably good that Sara did not see her mother staring at her with steely brown eyes and pursed lips. It took effort on my part to keep myself from putting my hands on my hips and to keep my mouth shut. I was displeased to say the least. However, not to the point that I wanted to speak and risk embarrassing Sara in front of her new friends. She would be embarrassed enough later when I made her wash and give back the skort to the friend who let her borrow it. The school hadn’t caught her that time (the skort was too short for their policy on even skirt length). But mom did and consequences were endured. Life went on and Sara eventually graduated from the eighth grade and school uniforms. She was happy to start ninth grade on the high school campus the next year with no school uniforms required!
I want Payton to know that her mom didn’t like everything she had to do sometimes. That her mom wasn’t perfect and had to deal with the consequences of her choices. I want Payton to know that her mom didn’t always have the answers, and neither will she as she sometimes struggles to make the right decisions as she is growing up. That’s okay. Stay in the game. That’s what Sara did – she stayed in the game until her body just couldn’t do it anymore. She tried. That is what matters. No one has all the answers – that is what family, friends, teachers, and others are for – to help you when you hit those bumps in the road, whether it’s a new school, or cancer. It’s trying that matters. If something doesn’t work the way you want it to the first time, try a second time, ask for help. Keep trying and stay in the game. There are many games out there. Finding the one that fits you is a lifelong beautiful journey.
