My favorite place to be is under my covers. I nap every day I can. It’s a favorite pasttime. Often as I drift off I think of the proverb: “A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest, and poverty will come on you like a thief.” But then, I fall asleep. I’m okay with that.
Being under my covers reminds me of being a child in my parents’ house. I feel safe. I feel hidden. I feel at peace. As my family says, I feel “cozy in my bozy.” What is a bozy? I’ll never know. But there’s no better feeling than to have a cozy one.
Being with a strong, good man feels the same way. As a little girl with my father, I felt safe, hidden, and at peace. When I grew up, one day he asked me: “what do you look for in a spouse?” I answered, “to feel safe.” On this first and most important requirement, many a boyfriend failed. Some were too violent, some were too inconsistent or unpredictable, some were too foolish. Some were compromised by giving me my way too much. These things kept me from feeling safe.
My favorite love story of all time is the one in the book of Ruth. In it, a strong, salt-of-the-earth and destitute widow works and serves her way into the field of a rich, powerful, older and less attractive city leader. He falls in love with her character, and she falls in love with his. One night she puts on perfume (this is getting good!) and goes to where he’s lying down and says, “Spread your covering over me, since you are my kinsman-redeemer.” (And here is where I cry, every time, like the women do in Sleepless In Seattle watching An Affair To Remember). Here she is asking for him to extend his provision to her: to take her under his wing and under his roof and under his covers. It’s beautiful.
I think the reason I love my covers so much is because that was God’s design. The feeling of being covered is one He wants us to relish. It draws us to Him, our Kinsman-Redeemer. He set up that incredibly sexy, “cozy in my bozy” metaphor as a way to show us what it is to be desired by a redeemer, to be under His banner of love, to be safe. This is the role of the husband, and this is the role of the father.
I have been fortunate in my life. As a woman who specialized in child abuse prosecution back in her career days, I know how twisted the role of father and husband can be, how selfish and perverse the world can make it. But my father, Norton Anderson Colvin, Jr., was a good, good father to me. And my husband, Derek Taylor Rollins, is a good, good husband to me and father to our children. And both point me and my children toward a richer and deeper appreciation of what it means to be under the covering: safe, hidden, and at peace.
The job is hard. The world says that for a woman to be under the covering of a man is an antiquated and sexist notion. That man and woman, even when joined in marriage, have the same job to do. I believe that my job is equally important, necessary, and difficult. It requires gentleness, long-suffering, patience, and a thousand other attributes of God that require His Spirit. But I am not the captain of this ship. If we run aground on these waters, God will call out: “Derek, where are you?”. It is an awesome and huge responsibility he carries.
I sleep better at night when Derek’s home. I think: “He’s got this.” Derek lays his head down at night and has to think: “I’ve got this, because God’s got this.” I appreciate all that feminism has done for pioneering women’s rights, I really do. Because of their efforts, I went to law school, and I vote, and I have a voice, and I can write this blog. Praise where praise is due. But I also hold fast to God’s original design: the beautiful love story he wrote into the lives of men and women all over the world. The one where a woman and a man find their destinies when she says to him, “spread your covering over me,” and he says, “I will.”
To all the good husbands and fathers, to all the captains of the ships on whom the mantle of responsibility falls: I salute you. Because of you, we sleep well.
Happy Father’s Day.