Tuesday, September 06, 2011

Whole-hearted

There was a time in my life when I did not experience emotion. A person never would have known it by looking at me. I am sure that I seemed "happy." I smiled, chatted, could hold a fairly reasonable conversation, but honestly, I didn't feel anything.

I didn't realize it until one day, after removing myself from that which robbed me of my emotions, I suddenly felt something - in my heart - and I was struck by the power of the emotion that was suddenly there. It almost took my breath away.

I recall being in a church service some years later, after my emotions returned to me, when a beautiful woman stood to her feet and shared with the 50-some people there that she was grateful because that day she had experienced her own thought. She told the crowd that it had been quite some time that she actually had her own thought.

I cried. I cried maybe because I remembered my own joy when the ability to feel emotion returned to me - and I didn't have the courage to stand up and tell anyone - in fact I told no one - yet this woman rose to her feet and told a large group of people that she had her own thought that day. There were plenty of people who looked confused; I went and hugged her.

And I don't know why I am thinking of this today, right now. Maybe because it has been a particularly emotional week and I have had many emotional conversations - and I have cried more than I normally do over hard things - and good things.

This world can feel so overwhelming, so confusing, filling us with many emotions and thoughts. We can wake up and our circumstances seem exactly the same as they did yesterday - or our days are radically and painfully the opposite. And we rise to try and stand in the face of it all, without falling back ... or down. There are days this week when merely rising was a victory.

And I wrestled. 
And I tossed and turned. 
And I paced. 
What is it that was churning in my soul??

And then I read this: "A deep sense of love and belonging is an irreducible need of all people. We are biologically, cognitively, physically, and spiritually wired to love, to be loved, and to belong. When those needs are not met, we don't function as we were meant to. We break. We fall apart. We numb. We ache. We hurt others. We get sick." 

We numb? Do we pace? Do we toss and turn when we should be sleeping?

And then I read this: "The root of the word courage is cor -- the Latin word for heart. In one of its earliest forms, the word courage had a very different definition than it does today. Courage originally meant to speak one's mind by telling all one's heart." 

The words of Brene Brown suddenly spoke to my churning soul. Brene is a research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work. She has spent the past 10 years studying vulnerability, courage, authenticity, and shame. Brene spent the first five years of her decade-long study focusing on shame and empathy, and is now using that work to explore a concept that she calls Whole-heartedness.

Whole-heartedness.  

Whole-heartedness...

Brene writes that the word courage today is more synonymous with being heroic ... And heroics are often about putting our life on the line. "Courage is about putting our vulnerability on the line. If we want to live and love with our whole hearts ... our first step is practicing the courage it takes to own our stories and tell the truth about who we are. It doesn't get braver than that."

When I read those words I thought of the woman who shared with the congregation that she experienced her own thought - and the courage it must have taken - and her bravery... 

And I thought of my own unwillingness to be vulnerable yet this strong, pounding desire to live whole-heartedly. Her words pierced my heart as I considered one of the latest books I read on connectedness and my failures to live out the principles. 

Brene writes: "... Connection is why we're here. It's what gives purpose and meaning to our lives. This is what it's all about. It doesn't matter whether you talk to people who work in social justice and mental health and abuse and neglect, what we know is that connection, the ability to feel connected, is -- neurobiologically that's how we're wired -- it's why we're here."
 
Brene said through her measured research of collecting data, she began wrestling with how they, the whole-hearted, were making choices in their lives - and what they did with vulnerability. And why do those of the rest of us struggle with it so much.

"So this is what I learned," she writes (check out her blog http://www.ordinarycourage.com/). "We numb vulnerability ... And we live in a vulnerable world. And one of the ways we deal with it is we numb vulnerability."

Honestly, my heart sank as her words whispered to my soul because I KNOW numbness and what it means to shut off emotions and to be afraid -- and to want connection more than anything else on any given day.

"We are the most in-debt, obese, addicted and medicated adult cohort in U.S. history," she writes. "The problem is -- and I learned this from the research -- that you cannot selectively numb emotion. You can't say, here's the bad stuff. Here's vulnerability, here's grief, here's shame, here's fear, here's disappointment, I don't want to feel these. I'm going to have a couple of beers and a banana nut muffin. I don't want to feel these.


"You can't numb those hard feelings without numbing the affects, our emotions. You cannot selectively numb. So when we numb those, we numb joy, we numb gratitude, we numb happiness. And then we are miserable, and we are looking for purpose and meaning, and then we feel vulnerable, so then we have a couple of beers and a banana nut muffin. And it becomes this dangerous cycle."


But then, THEN, Brene starts meddling.
 

"One of the things that I think we need to think about is why and how we numb. And it doesn't just have to be addiction. The other thing we do is we make everything that's uncertain certain. Religion has gone from a belief in faith and mystery to certainty. I'm right, you're wrong. Shut up. That's it. Just certain. The more afraid we are, the more vulnerable we are, the more afraid we are. This is what politics looks like today. There's no discourse anymore. There's no conversation. There's just blame. You know how blame is described in the research? A way to discharge pain and discomfort."

I read those words over and over again. And over and over again.

Her 10 years of research found that whole-hearted people, very simply, experienced connection as a result of authenticity - they were willing to let go of who they thought they should be in order to be who they were.

And her research found that whole-hearted people fully embraced vulnerability. "They believed that what made them vulnerable made them beautiful. They didn't talk about vulnerability being comfortable, nor did they talk about it being excruciating ... They just talked about it being necessary. They talked about the willingness to say 'I love you' first, the willingness to do something where there are no guarantees, the willingness to breathe through waiting for the doctor to call after your mammogram. They're willing to invest in a relationship that may or may not work out. They thought this was fundamental."



The impact her research had on her own life was life altering - and how could it not be? "And you know how there are people that, when they realize that vulnerability and tenderness are important, that they surrender and walk into it? A: that's not me," she said. "And B: I don't even hang out with people like that. For me, it was a yearlong street fight. It was a slugfest. Vulnerability pushed, I pushed back. I lost the fight, but probably won my life back.
 
"We pretend that what we do doesn't have an effect on people. We do that in our personal lives. We do that corporate -- whether it's a bailout, an oil spill, a recall -- we pretend like what we're doing doesn't have a huge impact on other people. I would say to companies, this is not our first rodeo people. We just need you to be authentic and real and say, "We're sorry. We'll fix it. 
 
Brene points to the data, the 10 years of research that just might be a key to life: "We need to let ourselves be seen, deeply seen, vulnerably seen; to love with our whole hearts, even though there's no guarantee -- and that's really hard ... to practice gratitude and joy in those moments of terror, when we're wondering, 'Can I love you this much? Can I believe in this this passionately? Can I be this fierce about this?' just to be able to stop and, instead of catastrophizing what might happen, to say, 'I'm just so grateful, because to feel this vulnerable means I'm alive.' " 


I sat down and wrote to my new friend Brene Brown with gratitude overflowing, with a thawing numbness, and a growing amount of courage to live whole-heartedly, against the odds that there will be some great payoff - a payoff any greater than living life as it was meant to be. 


Whole-hearted ...  

Whole-heartedly ...



Thursday, August 25, 2011

Help, my brain won't shut off!

So when my mind is not otherwise occupied with the demands of my tenant who rents just a wee bit of space up there (jobs are like that, aren't they? Our bosses rent our brain space for their purposes?)

When I am not responding to our rental agreement, my mind this week has almost immediately gone back time and again to a spiritual wrestling about truth. And I consider myself a seeker of truth. I can never shake this gut feeling that there is something more, something deeper, some innate drive, an inner impulse.

I have to be honest, I have not found this truth in the church - or at least not that often. While I regularly attend, I often leave feeling as if I had a spiritual snack that doesn't always even taste good. The promise is always there, but for me, very rarely delivers. The hunger for truth remains - and I keep seeking.

This week I began reading a 21st century biography about Jesus - He was a person after all. No one denies that the guy lived and walked on earth. The author said this: Jesus was a revolutionary who tranformed the entire Judiac religious scheme into an affair of the heart and an adventure of the spirit. He did not exactly repudiate the law. What he did was to extract its moral code and ignore the rest. Instead of the law he spoke of the Kingdom of God or the Kingdom or Heaven. A faithful soul was not one who obeyed the law but one who, by transforming his spirit, "entered" the Kingdom.

And then I thought, why do we get this so wrong?
Maybe it's just me who gets it wrong...

And then I came across an article - because my brain won't shut off - Quitting Christianity to Follow Jesus. The same kinds of revolutionary thoughts were there: "Instead of living out the value of a Christian life, we cling to theology and short catchphrases on what it means to be a Christian ... We wear our Christian t-shirts, listen to Christian music and attend Christian concerts, where we have a true experience of emotion, and thus we buy a lot of Christian-themed shirts.  We go on retreats and return on spiritual highs. We buy devotional books that do nothing but gather dust.  We support Republican candidates because they’re fighting to save the family and to protect us from the evil that is homosexuality.  We abhor everything that doesn’t fit in our “Christian box” because of course it’s evil, and of course we’re supposed to flee from it, never mind that the actual person is a person.  When hard times come along, we cite verses that people normally cite and we say that God’s testing us, or we’re just going through a trial and we remind ourselves that if we just have faith, we’ll get through it all.
"


But get this. The author then writes: "Seems like we’re putting it all in a perspective that just makes us feel good.  It just makes us feel better about things.  Gives us warm and fuzzy feelings without breaking a sweat and putting on a fur coat.  We orient everything so that we don't have to change our way of life.  And we pursue what we want because it's our God-given desires.  We distance ourselves from the reality of Christ's call because that's comfortable."


Wow! I did not learn THAT in Sunday School!

"I quit Christianity," the author wrote.  "I'm no longer a Christian.  I just wanna follow Jesus.  I don't want the demands and the politics of being a Christian anymore.  I don't wanna follow the church.  The church could be great, but it's so uninspiring.  There's no longer any room for imagination, but there's plenty of room for theology and doctrine.  There's not enough space to be limitless and to believe in a limitless God, but there's plenty of time to chain God down into a series of statements and responsive readings.  

The reason that we chain God down and we no longer imagine the possibilities, is because we like to think that we can control God and we can control what the statements of Jesus say.  We can control the message of dilution.  But when we encounter something real, something mystical that defies theological and doctrinal beliefs, we realize that we can't answer things with our prepared cliche statements.  It's not enough."

Gandhi says:  "I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."

It's true isn't it? We don't look, feel, speak, smell like Jesus.

But I want to.

Honestly, so much of Christianity today seems foreign to me - at least this 21st century Christianity. I don't understand the language that Christians seem to use with fluency but feels isolating. I don't understand the judgment and condemnation. I don't understand the "bootstraps" we are suppose to use to help ourselves not one another. 

As I read about Jesus, I don't think he would either.

Is this part of that inner impulse, that drive for something more?


Seriously?? The tenant is calling with yet another demand. What time is it anyway??






Friday, August 19, 2011

Climbing out of the stormy sea

And so I struggle in this world … in this moment in time … with William Booth’s “dark and stormy ocean” and the mighty rock that rose up high above the clouds (http://bit.ly/oNvkoe).  It’s the platform that gets to me actually and those individuals who were able to climb out of the stormy ocean to its safety.

Booth describes how some, from the safety of the platform, industriously worked with make-shift ladders, ropes, boats and “other means more effective,” to help others still in the angry sea.

And I am so bored with me.

And there is so much more that is interesting, more compelling, more inspirational, more real in the dark and stormy ocean.

The stories of others reaching in to rescue another move me because in their darkness, those adrift in the sea often don’t see the hand reaching out to save them. Those being tossed to and fro are focusing instead on the waves – big huge waves. Pounding waves. Cold waves. Waves that crash over their heads and they wonder if perhaps this time they will drown.

Some almost did drown.

But a hand rescued them.
That so brings a tear to my eye still and I have been thinking about this for a ridiculously long time. Why does it still move me so?

But a hand reached down and rescued them. Someone – maybe God, maybe a friend, maybe a stranger, maybe an angel – someone reached down and grabbed their hand and rescued them. From the dark and stormy ocean.

I heard yesterday of yet another amazing rescue, from the dark, stormy, angry sea. As the story goes – in fact for many of us – in one horrific moment my friend’s world crashed. And broke into a million tiny pieces. And laid askew in those million tiny pieces before her. Suddenly, nothing was familiar. Or safe. Or comfortable. Disbelief morphed into denial into sadness into anger into disbelief again and again. And the waves of grief crashed over her head. And she wondered, I have to believe, if she would ultimately drown in those horribly cold and raging waters.

But she didn’t. She made it up onto the platform – a platform she wasn’t even aware was there. The darkness had hid it from view. Her sheer and fading grit helped keep her body from going under, even if just her head bobbed above it just enough to suck in some desperately needed air.

And a hand reached down and rescued her.

And I marvel really because every logical indication said her story couldn’t be so. Every data driven piece of evidence said such a story was impossible.

But a hand reaching down to rescue us from a dark and stormy sea isn’t impossible.


My struggle in this moment is what to do with those who have no need, those who have already been rescued, those who stand squarely on the platform with dry clothes, combed hair, full bellies. How do I fit in with people who seemingly have no need? How do I interact with those who have only answers and no questions?

And should I?

Should I?



Wednesday, July 06, 2011

Detroit News gets it right with identifying Flint's aura

She's so mean but I don't care
I love her eyes and her wild wild hair
Dance to the beat that we love best
Heading for the nineties
Living in the wild wild west
The wild wild west
         -Escape Club

Well, so it isn't the nineties, but I am telling you I SAW the mean chick and "her wild, wild hair" as I drove down Grand Traverse the other day. I'm telling you, she was packing heat! 

Heck, we ALL are! 

The Detroit News got it right today with their piece, "Rampant crime gives Flint aura of wild West." My only quibble - and I mean quibble - is what took them so long??

Francis X. Donnelly opened her the insightful piece with "Nine abandoned homes were torched Monday and Tuesday, and a dozen burned in a four-hour period last month. The week before, a civil rights pioneer was killed in his upper-income neighborhood. Two weeks earlier, one of the police mini-stations erected as a solution to rising crime was burglarized. 

"Once upon a time, these things shocked residents," Donnelly said.

She got that right!

Yippee ki yea!

We're not shocked any more - most people I know are locked and loaded, no longer waiting for our 124 police officers to respond to our 911 calls for help. Yup, that's 1.2 officers per 1,000 residents.

"Vehicle City, the nickname given Flint as the birthplace of General Motors, has become the state's version of Dodge City," Donnelly writes.

DODGE CITY!! Is that GREAT writing or what??

Donnelly's piece noted, "With all of the other troubles faced by Flint, manhole covers have been disappearing. Some 80 covers have been stolen in the past few months, probably for scrap, police said. For residents, the lowly metal objects are an example of how nothing is safe from thieves. 

"A feeling of lawlessness has seeped into the city's psyche, they said."


It's the seeping that has likely led residents to take matters into their own hands. The Detroit News piece described one man who bought two Magnums, calibers .22 and .44; and owns FOUR pit bulls.

Listen, he's not the only one!

Mandy's in the backroom handing out Valium
Sheriff's on the airwaves talking to the D.J.'s
Forty-seven heartbeats beating like a drum
Got to live it up live it up
Ronnie's got a new gun.

Living in the wild wild west
The wild wild west

Sunday, July 03, 2011

What 50 has taught me

At 50, I thought I would understand more than I do. I thought I would finally "get" people and better understand motives and drive and ambition. I thought I might care less for the things that promised so little, see more clearly purpose ... and right from wrong.

And love. and fear. and faith.

And what it means to care.

And care is different from love, you know? It is. I learned that at 50. Just because someone says they love another, doesn't really mean they care - because love can be selfish. We can love others selfishly.

I learned that quite some time ago.

It's the caring that's the revelation.

We have a legal term that defines when someone does not have a surviving parent to care for them - though to say it, for me, feels harsh and unkind and I would hope I would never be so thoughtless or insensitive as to use it casually in any conversation I might have. Just the word orphan pierces my heart.

... does not have a surviving parent to care for them...

In fiction we find that a lack of parents leaves characters to pursue more interesting and adventurous lives, by freeing them from familial obligations and controls, and depriving them of more prosaic lives. Authors create orphaned characters that are self-contained and introspective.


In the non-fiction of my life, however, I see it played out in other ways as there are many moments in our days where we feel as if no one cares. While we would respond wholeheartedly that we are loved, in the quiet of our hearts we all too often wonder if there is anyone who really ... truly ... cares.

I think it's that uncertainty that someone cares that has sabotaged the growth of humanity or community - heck, even our families and friendships and marriages - and how we raise our kids and our pets. How we are churched. How we are governed. It whispers to us when our assessments and achievements of life still feels empty. It lurks on the fringes of our minds and clamors to find a solid place in our hearts.

... But, BUT, does anyone really care?

50 taught me that.

50 taught me that my days suddenly seem and feel more numbered. I have fewer days ahead of me, for sure, than I now have behind me. It taught me that what I might have been even subconciously waiting for should be pursued ... with my whole heart ... because it might not happen.

50 taught me the value of friends ... friends that truly care AND truly love me. Lucky me. Lucky, lucky me.

50 taught me that our bodies really do change - and now it may take work to shape them the way we want them to be.

50 taught me that dragons can be slayed, that forgiveness is a force, that sometimes we have to go back before we can ever move forward. 50 forced me back and now I am moving forward.

50 taught me that fear has kept me from living life fully, that facing people and darkness and pain is better than turning away. That in the facing of fear we discover that fear itself is a coward and cowers when challenged. Sometimes it dissolves before our very eyes. Fear is far weaker than life.

50 taught me that.

And 50 taught me about faith, a life changing faith, an inspirational faith, a non-human powered faith, a faith that says, yes instead of maybe, a faith that takes risks instead of reserves.

I guess it's true then as one author has said, "... suddenly you find - at the age of 50 ... that a whole new life has opened before you."

It has for me. And I suspect it has for you...

Thursday, June 30, 2011

In memory of Jerrie Sue...

I started attending church with my husband just before we were married in 1994. At the time, I went to church, went to service, then left. I was overwhelmed by all of the new faces, my new mother and father inlaw, his grandparents, his first, second and third cousins. I felt like everyone knew me – and I knew no one.

Shortly after we had my daughter in 1996, I found myself taking her to the nursery. That nursery on the second floor of the church was where EVERYTHING happened! And I mean EVERYTHING! And everyone who attends that church knows it. If a new initiative didn’t make it past the nursery, it didn’t make it for the church as a whole. Within those walls, holding those sweet tender babies were the strongest women I have ever known.

Of course, it wasn't long after sitting in that room for the first time when I heard a voice that I pray today I will never EVER forget. It was loud. It, too, was strong. And I knew that whomever it was directed at was going to abide by the short forceful command, “STOP RUNNING!” I reached down and covered Isi with what I suddenly wished was a soundproof blanket.

I waited for David to come get us in the nursery that morning … In part because I was afraid… As I left, I peered into every single room up there on the second floor. Across the hall was this sweet looking grandmother, talking to what looked like the Pastor's sons. Surely it wasn’t her. Too sweet. Too grandmotherly.

It wasn’t long before I learned that IT WAS HER! If the nursery and the second floor was command central at that church, I quickly learned that Jerrie Sue was commander in chief … Well, honestly ... Jerrie Sue was second in command behind her mother, Doris, whom I also loved very very dearly. Those two women MADE.IT.HAPPEN.

By the time I had Colton, 15 months after Isabella, I quickly discovered I needed help. My parents and David’s parents were busy. I was overwhelmed with the responsibility of raising what suddenly felt like a family of 10. Jerrie Sue had already grabbed Isi from me plenty of times DESPITE my quiet request that she wash her hands first - and my follow up 20 questions about ALL exposures to ANY illness. I stood in amazement as she ignored all of my requests and inquiries. And I was even more amazed as Isi laughed and cooed at the Commander in Chief. By the time she grabbed Colton for the 25th time and worked her charm, I KNEW that Jerrie Sue was going to be a HUGE part of our lives. She loved my kids. She LOVED them. And they loved her, despite her sometimes loud barking commands that made ME want to run and hide. When we needed her most, Jerrie Sue made herself busy with us. I will never, ever forget that.

I remember asking the kids one day if Jerrie Sue ever scared them with her sometimes loud and forceful direction. They they looked rather puzzled and laughed at me; “NO! Why would we be afraid??"

After all, who can be scared of Mother Goose and her bag of movies and M&Ms? Who can be afraid of a Grandma who watched them whenever we called for however long we needed her, without hesitation? When we came home, we knew our kids had probably had more fun that evening than we ever had. And we knew that whatever note we had left about feeding them their green vegetables and NO M&Ms had been ignored … especially as we found Dixie cups of M&Ms all around the house. She ignored us – but she never ONE TIME ignored them.

I will close with this. Mother Goose wasn’t all just fun and games - and M&Ms. Also stuffed in her bag was all kinds of educational activities from word searches to math problems. She sat those kids down at some point during her stay and taught them to love learning. Any academic success my kids have today came because Jerrie Sue planted and watered that seed time and time again. Jerrie Sue was a teacher – sometimes whether she realized it or not. Jerrie Sue taught me how to be a better mother. Her long talks with me after everyone else went to bed taught me how to be a better friend. She taught me that sometimes – gloriously – the bark is so much bigger than the bite. That when your heart is in the right spot, nothing else matters. Jerrie Sue’s heart was so in the right spot.

This family will never be the same without Jerrie Sue. She is a part of us now even though she is gone. She is deep in our hearts and every single thought and memory is a treasure.

Rest in peace, Jerrie Sue... You were truly loved

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

In the autumn of the years...



When I was seventeen
It was a very good year
It was a very good year for small town girls
And soft summer nights
We'd hide from the lights
On the village green
When I was seventeen

When I was twenty-one
It was a very good year
It was a very good year for city girls
Who lived up the stair
With all that perfumed hair
And it came undone
When I was twenty-one

When I was thirty-five
It was a very good year
It was a very good year for blue-blooded girls
Of independent means
We'd ride in limousines
Their chauffeurs would drive
When I was thirty-five

But now the days are short
I'm in the autumn of the year
And now I think of my life as vintage wine
From fine old kegs
From the brim to the dregs
It poured sweet and clear
It was a very good year

It was a mess of good years




~ It Was a Very Good Year Lyrics
Frank Sinatra


 

Saturday, March 26, 2011

Personalities

I woke up this morning thinking about my friends Shari and Diane - well actually an incident with the two of them after Shari and I spent countless hours analyzing our personalities with various tests and charts and readings. Yes, we were totally confident in who we were - every response lined up. Shari ALWAYS responded this way; now we know why. I ALWAYS responded that way and my results said it was an affirming strength rather than the laughable fluke we often thought it was.

But then there was Diane. The tests and charts and readings didn't line up for her. We read the charts again. And again. And again, trying to understand our dear friend who we had known for so many years. Based upon our inarguable results with the two of us, it became crystal clear we did not know Diane. At all. She was not being honest about who she really was deep down inside. Why, oh why, would she not be honest with us?

So we confronted her - tests, charts, readings in hand. "Take this test, Diane. We want to understand you better." She looked at us as if we were once again scheming something bizarre. "Understand me? No one understands me better than the two of you." Shari and I look at each other knowingly; the lies have once again begun. "No really. Take it. We don't think we know you at all. In fact, we think you have been hiding your real person from us - we want to know the REAL you. Take this test. Read this chart. Look at this reading. If this were REALLY you, you would do it this way instead of how you have been pretending to do it for years. Diane, we LOVE you but who are you, who are you really??"

To appease us, she took the tests and Shari and I devoured the results, shifting them through our now expert filters. "See, she's not being honest with us! Her results say this yet she has always said that. Oh no, now what? What do we do?"

New results in hand, we confront. "Diane, your results say you are this and not that. Your results say you like that and not this. We have always ALWAYS thought you liked THIS."

For about 10 seconds she just stared at us with our tests, charts and readings. Then she chuckled and shook her head from side to side. "You guys are nuts. I don't know what you THINK you have discovered about me but, all I know is that I am me, that I have been genuine in showing - especially the two of you - who I am. I am not pretending. There is no one else hidden deep inside. This is me." It was touching, moving really.

Blink, blink.

I look at Shari, she at me.

Blink, blink.

"Poor thing," Shari says. "SHE doesn't even know who she is." I nod affirmingly knowing that the two of us now had a new adventure before us of discovering the real Diane.

Diane abruptly left the room, throwing her hands up in the air in total surrender - to our wisdom we were sure!


I went to bed angry at David last night because I figured out who he really is and HE also rejected my wisdom. He said he was something else altogether. So we went down the tests, charts and readings by every jott and tittle. "Nope, not me," he says. "Not you?? SOO YOU!"
"No way!" "Yes way and sooo way."

He went to sleep angry, contrary to scripture I might add since it says somewhere that we aren't suppose to go to sleep angry.

The tattered and torn heap of tests, charts and readings are lying in a heap in the corner of my room now.

... I wonder if Isi and Colt are old enough ...

Monday, March 07, 2011

Through the darkness...

I'm feeling rather dark this morning.

Trying to make some sense of death - and the end of life. Throughout the night, I found myself tossing and turning as I tried to find comfort physically and emotionally.

I thought of Patrick, my dear friend, my kindred spirit - my laughter for many years - who in the lapse of the busyness of our days, took his own life and I never was able to say good bye. Every sailboat I see - every. single. time. I. see. one. - I think of him and his passion for piloting and crewing graceful boats that glide with the wind across the waters of Michigan.

And then he was gone.

I thought of my father and how my life has never really been the same.
Nor has the lives of Isi and Colt who STILL talk about him - and love him - and miss him.

I thought about Celia who has buzzed around me for years - years - doing and doing, hugging and hugging - and how much I really took for granted that her presence would always be there.

And I thought about Joanne.
After many years, I first observed her again from the pew of our church - stunned really as I had no recollection of her interest in attending such a service. Our history was full of difficulties. As we parted ways many years ago, I breathed a sigh of relief. Our charged and conflicted interactions would now cease. And we never spoke again.

And suddenly, many years later, there she was. Week after week I observed her in church, trying to figure out her true motive for being there. I genuinely doubted it was pure. And I watched as she came in and sat alone, near the front, sometimes seeming to be moved to tears by the message or song. Sometimes we would leave from the same door, a few feet apart but never speaking, never even acknowledging a fleeting and knowing glance.

The Pastor announced from the pulpit a few weeks ago that Joanne is dying.

And I have tossed and turned many a nights now as I think of her.
In that pew, sometimes crying.
I think of what must have been going on in her heart.
And I think of what was going on in my own.

Sleep finally comes when I realize that God is that big.
And that we are that small.
That we can believe we have all knowledge about someone or something, only to be reminded that we have no knowledge at all.



"He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God." ~ Micah 6:8