Jennifer Smiles

Tomorrow may not be, or any other day

I have a lot of admiration for my wife. There’s a lot to her story that makes her who she is, but let’s just say that I ended up on the better end of the deal. She has been the most amazing mother to our boys, and all the while has given of her time and energy to so many others. We met 26 years ago, in August. She was working at a camp in Pigeon Lake, Alberta, and my band was playing the music for several weeks. A friend of mine ran the camp, and it was a great way to end the summer touring season. It was a free place to stay and free food, so, as a struggling band, it was a great reprieve from arguing with venues about getting paid or splitting up 10 bucks for dinner. When we arrived, my bass player said that one of the camp administrators had been at their music school in Edmonton and had asked if she could play with us. I had several bad experiences with other players joining for chapel time in the past, so I was a firm “no.”

Of course, she took the news with grace and understood my rationale and didn’t say anything more. On the second night of camp, I walked into the chapel to find her sitting by the piano playing and singing. I heard her play for a few measures and then interrupted her.

“Would you like to join the band?”

She was fabulous. Her voice was spectacular, and she played piano differently than anyone else I had heard before. Much more beautiful and concise than the standard church lady who used all 10 fingers to make the piano cover every register of sound. She could pick a spot on the keyboard and make the chords sound full and perfectly placed within the music. She was clearly a better musician than most of us in the band, and particularly me. We loved playing together over the next few weeks, and by the end of camp, there was clearly something developing between the two of us. I knew the band was planning to move to the United States the following summer, so I started making plans to have her be part of it. Selfishly, I wanted to make sure that she would be a much larger part of my life too.

That fall, we decided to date long distance. Her from Vancouver, British Columbia and myself in Colorado. Month after month, we would visit one another. Sometimes in Colorado, sometimes in Vancouver. Pretty early on, we realized that we had both found the right person.

On one spring trip to Vancouver, she introduced me to her closest friend: Jen. Jen has Down syndrome, but it hardly defines her. She and my wife met at the grocery store while they were both working there. My wife was the checker; Jen was the bagger. Anna knew that Jen’s life was much more difficult than her own, and, as a sign of how my wife would live the rest of her life, she befriended Jen, and they soon became lifelong companions. Anna, my wife, noticed something about Jen. Every time people would come to her till, Jen would inevitably brighten their day with her smile.

Jen is loud. She has no filter. And there is no one who can make a room laugh faster than her. We have taken her on a few trips over the years, and she always brightens everything.

My wife wrote this song about her. It’s touching and kind, but it also perfectly describes who Jen is. My wife understands what’s behind the way Jen lives. Jen lives as if today is the only day, and in many ways, that ultimately is the call from Jesus about his provisions for us.

From Matthew 6

²⁶ Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? ²⁷ Which of you by worrying can add one ^[a]cubit to his ^[b]stature?

²⁸ “So why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; ²⁹ and yet I say to you that even Solomon in all his glory was not ^[c]arrayed like one of these. ³⁰ Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?

³¹ “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ ³² For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. ³³ But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. ³⁴ Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

One final note on this creation of my wife and Jen. On that trip to Vancouver years ago, we took Jen out shopping. She loved the flea market, and she was especially fond of the Spice Girls. She wanted to collect any paraphernalia she could find related to all of those sassy lasses from the UK. Jen never has any money. We count on a call at least once a month from her for a little help with groceries, to cover rent, or to buy a mattress. We are usually hard-pressed to say no. But on this particular day, Jen had just received her Canadian government disability paycheck, and the flea market was full of Spice Girls swag. By the time we left, she had spent nearly everything on posters, ceramic plates, and plastic wizbangs adorned with the images of Posh, Ginger, and Scary. We knew that she had just blown her paycheck —and that it was going to make it pretty tight for the next few weeks—but Jen didn’t care. She was thrilled at her collection.

When my wife showed Jen this song, sitting at her out-of-tune piano in her cabin, Jen sat there and listened. After it was finished, she said, “It’s nice, but can we listen to the Spice Girls now?” It made my wife laugh. She didn’t need Jen’s approval. She had lived life with her, and they cared for one another deeply. My wife knew that it was her way of saying she was thankful for it.

We have been playing this song as a band lately, and it’s been fun to hear it come to life again. If you happen to live in Wyoming, we are playing at the WYO Theater in Sheridan in July. It’s a full-circle moment for me. The town I grew up in, in a theater where I watched Empire Strikes Back, my wife, sons, and I have the chance to play music about our lives. Songs like this express what it is like to live as a believer in a troubled world. Jennifer’s smile is one of the reasons we can rest assured that no matter how hard the circumstances, the provision for our lives is taken care of.