"Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul." -Psalm 143:8

I spent a deal of time yesterday thinking about the losses in my life. By losses, specifically loved ones gone home. No secret that this time of year tends to do that to me, but of late there are a number of people in my life dealing with death or illness and I always identify with their fears and sadness. The list of things you go through is not only endless and in constant shift, but often unexpainable to even those who have buried someone and had to make that walk back to the car. Loss is completely a personal thing and the way we navigate its scars on our internal skin can't really be shared or understood by anyone else completely, no matter how much they love us or want to share or understand.

Sorrow waits for us while we sleep. She doesn't lose interest or wander away in the moonlight. And as intense as the relief waking from a nightmare to discover it was only a bad dream is the disappointment to realize it wasn't. That moment you figure out you're right where you left off before you finally managed to fall asleep and your heart sinks as you step back into the horror film in progress. Let the morning bring word of Your unfailing love. It doesn't say let the morning bring answers. Let the morning bring some type of explanation, or miracle, just love. And when my head hits the pillow at night it is His love I count on. I know He loves me.

It eventually gets better. The sadness seasons the rest of who we have become and we notice one day we don't want to throw up anymore and the tears, though unpredicatable, become an almost welcome assurance that these people are still a part of us and that despite the temptation to castle our hearts, we still love and feel and believe it's worth the heartache.

And so I love and I trust in His. And I pray mightily for those who are in the middle of their sadness...

lend me thine ears...

I made the mistake of politely asking him if for the duration of breakfast at Sprouts we could talk about something other than his transitions at work, which for the last several weeks has been our sole topic. (save for the commercial breaks to talk about the economy) Big mistake.  In addition to the tongue lashing I received (hurt feelings packaged as anger) was the awkward silence as he pouted across the table from me. Noted.

I then reasoned that I am his only safe human audience and that saying 'I do' meant promising to listen to his ever-rotating topics whether they captivate me or not. And so I ask him what he was using my laptop for last night, already knowing the answer.

 

He can talk for hours about his job and what it requires of his unique mind. The hardest part of listening to it all is staying mentally present without speaking. If I've learned anything about him in all these years it's that he's rarely seeking answers. The answers are already there in his beautiful mind. It's just that they are usually buried beneath the clouds of worries or countless files of experience and knowledge that have accumulated there over the years. He just really needs my ears to help him organize things until he gets there on his own. I absorb the chaos. And I promised him I would. Not in so many words, and without realizing it at the time. When I see him working it out, word-by-word-by-word, I realize how very intelligent he is. I realize that he may well be some type of genius in his arena. And if someone isn't there for him to let him verbally sift through the mounds of information he has to deal with, he'll burst. I am that someone and forgive me for the times I'm not up for the job. 

"Once you become self-conscious, there is no end to it; once you start to doubt, there is no room for anything else." ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

The call came Friday morning. The voices started arguing immediately. In my right mind there is no possible reason I would even consider declining but in my left mind- the one where the voice reminds me in bulleted points why I should or at least want to is as usual shouting so loudly I can barely hear what she's saying. This makes me sound emotionally unstable I realize but it's how I navigate this life of mine. I freeze. I incapacitate myself all. the. time.

I don't know if the voices accompanied the weight gain over the years or if I was always this way but I wonder sometimes how I ever managed to direct anything. I peek at the people I have been over the years and am amazed at how she did it. How I did it. These days if I can't hide behind a band or laptop I just want to dissolve. And the right mind patiently holds her arms out, begging me to trust her, to jump and the left side shuts. me. down.

Fortunately the mind is only one (or two) of the whole and the heart and soul have matured enough to recognize the struggle and begin the process of matter over mind. And what matters is saying yes to opportunities that have God written all over them, which my whole mind already knows but is too busy batting fears back and forth to make a move. I'm hopeless, I know.

The voices know I'm on to them and the heart will rub her victory in their faces until I feel that water on my feet. I'm already imagining the rapid pacing of my pulse, the stifling awareness of my self and the possibility the voices aren't going to give up. But I am going to defy them and allow myself to participate in the eternal. I am going to do my best to forget about how I may or may not look to people who may or may not notice and baptize two very special people God has trusted me to shepherd. They will lay everything on the line and I'm not about to do anything less.

"Spirit can walk, spirit can swim, spirit can climb, spirit can crawl. There is no terrain you cannot overcome." ~Irisa Hail

Save me a seat.

Simple request at face value, but from the perspective of where I'm actually sitting it's anything but simple. And the road to get here, to this seat, in this stretch of the road isn't really all that simple either.

I sit here trying to concentrate on what is being discussed and all my head can think about are the odds of me sitting next to my son-in-law in a Bible class. Odds? Well, nothing I could have ever imagined a month ago let alone years. God is just something else. I'm still not sure if I have the goods to make it through an 18 month program without my colleagues discovering I know a lot less than maybe they assume, or if all this homework will get the best of me. And as much as I fear both those things, I also kind of hope for both. That I can just come clean and say, I don't know much. And every time I think I do, I figure out I know even less than I thought I did. And I hope all this homework (Bible study on steroids...) gets the best of me, it needs to. I think I'm pretty great at regurgitating the poetic thoughts of other thinkers and rule at quoting one author after another, I'm just afraid of admitting that without that fount of babble I got nothing. And they will know.

But I saved his seat. And I prayed over him, asking God to impart Himself to him and grow him, even more than I want that for myself. And I thanked Him for letting me enjoy this chance to come clean, to begin where the real me meets the real Him and to let Him teach me. I hear Dr. Lowery's words about humility ringing in my ears and that's what I want. I want to begin in humility, knowing God will teach me with new eyes, new ears and new hope. I want to know Him like never before. And getting to do this with my son-in-law sitting next to me overflows my heart and blows. my. mind.

Good is God.

really blew it this time...

I have settled into the pace of updating my FB status and haven't thought about my AOTS for.ever. Me thinks it's time. I'm going to add updating her to my growing list of personal goals for the fall. We'll see if anyone cares.

pet supply catalog...

  An "exercise" fence and a "muzzle".  Is it just me or are there some significant marketing flaws here?    

deja view...

him: I just watched "Luther" upstairs. 

me: It's really good. We watched it before.

him: No I didn't. I've never seen it before.

me: We watched it together. You liked it.

him: Nope. Never seen it.

pause.

him: So we could watch it again in a month if you want.

him again: you ever write on that blog of yours anymore?? you were all about that stupid thing a year ago...