Thursday, November 14, 2013

It's super Z Day...what's that? by Jamie Lightner

"It's Super Z t-shirt day!" I heard my daughter yell from the top of the stairs this morning. I couldn't help but smile. My kids had taken "Z-Day" very seriously and I thought it was endearing. When I came downstairs they were all four dressed in their "Super Zayne" t-shirts. Today was Tuesday, and the troops were ready. Tuesday is now known to us as "Super Z Day", also Zayne's chemotherapy day. About 3 weeks before he was to begin treatment, Dowding Industries(Zayne’s Dad’s place of employment) made him a metal sign to hang in his room. It was the superman emblem with the Z in the center rather than the S. I just loved it! Just looking at that sign made me feel like we could get through this, ‘cause after all Zayne was now a super hero! About a week later I was at my computer looking at superman shirts, I was gonna get one for Zayne to wear on chemo day. As I was looking at the shirts I had the fleeting thought, "I sure wish Dowding Industries could make a Super Z shirt." But their specialty was cutting metal, and I was pretty sure having Zayne wear a metal sign on the front of his shirt was not going to work as well as I'd like. And then I remembered my cousin is in graphic design. While she was working on the design I decided I wanted to put a scripture verse on it to seal our Faith to the shirt as well. My first thought was the scripture Matt 17:20, explaining that if I had just a mustard seed of Faith, I could move mountains. I called my mom and a few others to brainstorm the idea. After I hung up the phone I realized I didn't want our focus to be on the mountain. I wanted our focus to be on our Faith and our powerful God, and what powerful beings he made us to be just by working through us. And all at once the words, "I am, that I am" just dropped into my head. After calling "my people" over and over again, it was finally decided, “I Am That I AM” is how the shirt will read. And then as I typed the words to my cousin for the design I just couldn't click send. I felt like it was just supposed to be "I AM." I felt leaving the verse open ended, left the power to take whatever venue was necessary. I AM "Powerful". I AM "Healing". I AM "Peace". I AM "Comfort." I Am "Perseverance". All at once I knew, yup, it was to be “I AM.” I shot a text to "my people", typed the words I AM into the email for my cousin, and clicked SEND. Buy the end of the day the design was finished and the t-shirts were ordered for my family. These t-shirts would unite us as a powerful supporting force on Tuesdays, so when they were at the hospital it would seem as though we were with them. These shirts would remind us of our little super hero and how tough he is. And hopefully, wearing these t-shirts, we would feel united and strong. Just 4 days later I had the super Z t-shirts in my hand. That evening we all posed for a picture. A picture of our team. My mom, my dad and his wife, my husband, all my children, my sister, my brother-in-law, my nephew, and of course, little super Zayne.

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