sueeeus

be still my bleeding heart

My life has been a road of many twists and turns.  The paths I’ve traipsed over the past few years have led me to face some of the most arduous challenges of my life.  I’ve made hasty, monumental decisions.  I’ve put myself into difficult situations.  Backed myself into corners.  Wasted time, wasted money, wasted emotions, wasted life itself.  I could say, “Hello, my name is Regret.”  But I won’t.  No, because I’ve been thinking about the wasted time, the wasted money, the wasted emotions.

I’ve been thinking about the ripples.  All the ways that lives have changed because of the roads I’ve traversed.  Good things come!  Good things happen!  It’s absolutely concrete.  While I could say that I wish I never wasted so much of my life chasing a mythical love, and I might wish I’d never said those two fateful words (“I do”), I have two vibrant and beautiful testaments to the perfection of that journey right before me.  Every day I am blessed by the wonder of these two human beings entrusted to my care.  And they would not be, had I not walked down that particular path.  And since then, for all the painful twists and turns that follow divorce, I can see how other people’s lives have changed for the better, all because our lives intersected at some point along that path.  This isn’t to say that I take credit for anything; it’s only to say that providence allowed me to be in a particular place at a particular moment in which I could (and did) do something that would (and did) help another.

It’s real.  It’s tangible. I can name names.

A child in Bali.  A village in Cambodia.  A single mother with two young children.  A battered wife.  A young mother with four children.  A woman.  A family.  A man (or two, or three, or seven, not that anyone’s counting).  If I even start to dwell on why or how I am here , in this country house so far from the madding crowd, I can turn my thoughts to any one of these people and quiet my anxious heart.  I don’t care how much money is gone.  I don’t care how many days, months, years have passed.  I don’t care how many tears I’ve cried.  Lives have changed!  Even one of these would be well worth any of the suffering I’ve put myself through.  I won’t dwell on the pain.  I won’t entertain regret.

True, I’ve been losing myself all along the way, bit by bit, so that I don’t even recognize myself any more.  I do wish I’d been vigilant from the start and given my self greater care.  I’m recognizing this now, and slowly but surely I am taking steps to restore myself to my self.  I’m going through the fire.  The refiner’s fire.  I’m going to be shiny and bright, when I get back to me.

Hello, my name is Hope.

I’m glad for this journey.

You asked me if I wanted you to stay or if I wanted you to go.  I told you that I don’t like it when you give me ultimatums.  Where is the ultimatum in that, you asked.  It’s in the mere fact that you asked a leading question with only one acceptable answer.  Rather than just enjoy the fact that you are were here.  If you’re here, you’re here.  Why would I ask you to go.

You asked me if I was willing to do whatever it takes to keep this relationship alive.  I answered, “probably not”.  I answered that because I don’t know what you mean by “whatever it takes”.  No, I’m not willing to do whatever it takes.  If it means slitting my wrists, no, I’m not willing.  If it means compromising my relationship with my kids, no, I’m not willing.  It’s an absolute question to which the only answer I can give that won’t be untruthful is “probably not”.  It doesn’t mean that I won’t do anything.  I have done SO MUCH.  Do you even know?  But that was then and this is now.   And you said that was enough of an answer for you.  And off you went.  Again.

I can’t even count how many times you’ve walked out my door.  How many times you’ve hung up on me.  How many times you’ve lied to me.  Yes, I know you’ve lied to me.  Maybe not so many times that I can’t count them, but you have lied.  You speak of how much I hurt you, and I don’t think you have even a remote idea of the hurt I feel and have felt.  Nor do I want you to know.  That’s more than enough for one person.  I sense the pain you feel, and I have my own pain too.  It’s always magnified.

I wish you understood me.  You speak of partnership, and you see my unwillingness to go where you are, but it seems that you don’t see your own unwillingness to go where I am.  I told you where I have to be.  I am standing where I have to be.  I am a mother.  My children are demanding and I am trying to do my best to raise them well.  It doesn’t mean that I think  you’re not good enough for me, for us.  It doesn’t mean that I reject you.  It simply means that I choose them.  I have to choose them.  There. Is. No. Other. Choice.

Do you hear me?  They are demanding.  DEMANDING.  The stamina required of me to maintain composure and remain firm and kind and loving and gentle and solid and good and strong takes nearly every bit of will that I have.  I am weary.  I am ragged.  But this is my prime responsibility and this is what I must do.

This doesn’t mean that I don’t love you, that I don’t value you, that I don’t see your worth.  It just means that I have absolutely no idea how to balance life with a relationship, children and work.  I can barely, barely manage to hold it all together with just children and work.

What you need and want and require in a relationship I cannot give.  I am sorry.

I don’t know what else to say.

I am sorry.

What do I need?  I need a friend.  A shoulder to cry on.  Someone who’s interested in how my day went.  Someone who’s content in knowing that I’m a friend, that I have a shoulder for them to cry on, and I’m interested in  how their day went.

You’ve been distancing yourself from me for some time now.  Do you think I didn’t know this or feel this?  Of course I did.  You said you were doing this to prepare yourself to break up with me, because this relationship isn’t working for you.

So now you’ve said it.  And now you may go.

I wish you well.

You posted a quote on your Facebook wall this morning:

Watching you walk out of my life hasn’t made me bitter or cynical about love, but rather, it has shown me that if I wanted so badly to be with the wrong person, how beautiful it will be when the right one comes along.

I read it and thought, yes, how beautiful it will be for you when the right one does come along.  Because I am not the right one, as much as you think that I am.  And I think that somewhere deep down in your heart, you know it too.

Is this the last goodbye?  I don’t know.  I’m not going anywhere.  I am here with my kids.  This is where I will be.

If you ever need a friend, or a shoulder to cry on, or someone who’s interested in how your day went, give me a call.

I am happy to bid adieu to 2012.  I would say that 2012 took me for a ride, but it would be more honest to say that I let 2012 take me for a ride.  I could call it the ride of a lifetime.  Woohoo!  Put a bright spin on it.  A ride indeed.  I think I may have experienced some of the highest highs and the lowest lows of my life in good ‘ole 2012.

It’s all good, really.  My life is full.  My children are happy and healthy.   We have a roof over our heads, clothes on our backs, food in our bellies, and warm beds to sleep in.

There is beauty and wisdom in all things, no matter the circumstance.  It just takes a certain perspective to be able to see it.

I won’t say that losing one’s children to the slaughter of a mad man has any beauty in it, but the shock and the horror force (some of) us to take note of our family circles, be more vigilant, hold our children more, and be more grateful for every little moment, and embrace it all.  Even when we’re at our wits end and drowning in frustration.  All these things are trifles.  I want to drink it all in.  Treasure. Every.  Moment.

The time that the children are children is fleeting.  I blinked my eyes and see so many of my nieces and nephews and my friends’ children are already grown.  Grown!  Where did the years go?

My hair is turning (more) gray.  My skin is starting to show its wear.

Professionally, I did well in 2012.  I had some lofty goals and I had actually admitted defeat to myself as well as my boss that it was unlikely that I’d be able to finish the super project before the end of the work year.   I pressed on, and somehow (by the grace of God and the skin of my teeth) I did it!  I felt like a superstar, and it was a great sense of accomplishment.  I don’t think it really mattered much to anyone but me, that I finished by the deadline, but it did matter to me, and I was/am pleased with myself  –pauses to pat self on back.  I suppose I ought to acknowledge that being a superstar for a moment barely compensates for all the days that my performance was distracted and disjointed from the emotional fray that I was buried in for the better part of the year.

Spiritually I’ve had some growth in 2012.  Not the sort of growth that a mainstream Christian might acknowledge or agree with, but I’ve learned some things and for that I’m grateful.  I thought that I wanted to settle into a church family, but realize that I’m truly not drawn that way.  I love the people, I love the worship.  But I belong to a church that is not made with hands, and that church is my home, wherever I am.  I don’t hunger for the company of a congregation, and I’m secure in the knowledge that I am a child of God.

This year has been a rough ride for me emotionally.  I’ve endured much.  I’ve made my loved ones endure much.  I tried so very hard to do more than I am able to do.  Like that image of a circus performer spinning plate after plate after plate.  I had so many plates spinning, but I just couldn’t keep it up, and they all came crashing down.  Lord, how I tried.  I gave it a good shot, though!

Physically, the twists and turns and ups and downs have taken their toll.  Whereas I’ve maintained my weight for most of the year, the past few months have seen a dramatic change in overall physical well-being.  From the moment that I made the decision to re-find myself, I’ve put on weight and my blood sugar has climbed.  Something’s got to give, I suppose.  I’m trying not to panic.  I’m attempting to take it in stride and breathe deeply, knowing that things will settle once I get a stronger grip on the emotional side of my life.

So where am I now?  I don’t really know.  In transition, I suppose.  I’m not settled.  I’m not where I want to be.  But I’m changing and standing faithfully where I need to stand.  I tell myself not to be afraid.  I tell myself that everything will be okay.  And it is.

adieu 2012

crazy

He says nobody makes him more crazy than I do.  I’m just being me, and not conforming to the version of me he wants or needs me to be.  He’s out there, alone in a house, by himself, without me by his side.  He’s aching.  He’s lonely.  He can’t stand to be alone.  It makes him crazy.  It baffles him that I don’t understand how he feels (he thinks I don’t understand).  It rips his heart up to know that I’m not going crazy with loneliness and separation.  He may think that I love him less because I’m not missing him.  But I’m going crazy on my own over here.  My own version of crazy.

He has only himself to keep up with.  When his work day is done, he can rest.  I have children to care for.  Every aspect of their precious little lives is critical to me, and right now, their emotional health is even more so.  I remember being four and feeling like I was in the way.  I remember being eight and feeling like I couldn’t do anything right.  I remember, and those feelings, whether valid or not, contributed to the adult I became, and all of the emotional struggles I’ve dealt with along the way.  I find myself starved for time, racing through each day trying to scrounge up enough to give them at least a little attention, trying to lovingly direct them and instruct them when they’re bouncing off the walls and the furniture.  Literally.  They are boisterous little boys, and it’s their unbridled joy at simply being that compels them to jump on the furniture and play and have fun.  While I want them to respect property, I want to somehow teach them without squelching or scarring them.  God grant me the wisdom and patience to do this.  Truth be told, though, inside I rejoice that my boys exhibit such glee.  In my heart I say, “GO AHEAD!  Jump! Play! Laugh! Rejoice!”  (Please don’t hurt yourselves or anything, and please be respectful of others’ things, but don’t stop rejoicing, my beautiful little boys.)

loves of my life

I am exhausted.  It takes a great deal of time and energy to lovingly, patiently and kindly see to it that the teeth get brushed, the clothes get changed, the schoolwork gets done, and the bodies get clean.  Life with my kids is my priority right now.  They need me.  I need them.  I absolutely need to take this time for them and with them.  I need this for them.  I need this for me.

It doesn’t mean I love him less than I did before.  It only means that I recognize now that far too often in the past year I’ve shuffled them aside in my endeavor to be a couple, and that is something that I should never have allowed myself to do, and something that I want to ensure does not happen again.

I’m going my own kind of crazy, wondering when and  how I will ever have a little time to myself so that I can at least try to collect my thoughts and calm the storm that is raging in my head.

is patient

is kind

does not envy

does not boast

 is not proud

does not dishonor others

is not self-seeking

is not easily angered

keeps no record of wrongs

does not delight in evil

rejoices with the truth

always protects

always trusts

always hopes

always perseveres

~I COR 13:4-7

He’s moving out. Packing his things.  Hurting.  Angry. He wants me to fight for us if I believe in us.  He wants me to ask him to stay. And I don’t. 

I tell him I’m sorry. 

I let him down.  I wish I had been stronger from the beginning.  He says I used him and that he wishes we’d never met. It’s my fault.  I told him he could believe in me and trust in me.  And I let him down.  Father, I’m sorry.  He doesn’t believe that I love him and that I’ve always loved him.  But he says these things from his hurting place. 

I don’t want him to crumble and I dont want  him to fall.  I want him to rise up and shine, glorious and victorious.  To find himself, to find his peace, to find his joy.  All these things I want for him, and he doesn’t know or understand.  Only that I’ve just pulled the plug on his life.

I don’t have the means to tell him this, other than send it out in a prayer.  Dear Lord, bless him and keep him, make him healthy and safe.  Hold him tightly, tightly, tightly in your embrace and warm him with your love and fulness, through and through.  Heal him, Father, I pray.  Take the pain from his body and from his heart and shine in him and through him so that he can see and know and feel and understand that he is and always has been loved and precious.  Bless him, Lord.

These things I pray.  And forgive me for the sorrow I’ve caused by my own wrecklessness in thinking that I could be more than who I am.  I am sorry.

Nobody truly knows our hearts but you, God.  He doesn’t know my heart and intentions from the beginning were pure and full of hope.  Just as I don’t know his heart and intentions –my perception is so far off, and  maybe his is too.  We’ve not understood each other for so long.  

I’ve tried.  I feel as though I’ve tried.

I’m sorry that I failed.

All around me, the people I love are struggling.  I see my niece and nephew, teenagers without a dad.  I had a dad, but he wasn’t there for me, and when I was a teenager, I especially needed the love, support, affirmation, and validation of a dad.  My niece and nephew don’t have a dad, because their dad was my brother, and my brother is gone.  Who do they have in their season of need?  Who do they have to help them navigate these teenage years?

I get so caught up in my own world that I don’t even notice this struggle they have, yet, if I take a moment to be there for them, to be with them, I see their need.  My heart weeps for the gaping void that is the absence of my brother, their father, their dad.  They need a dad.

And what of my own children?  Their dad is not present, and is lost in his own reality that I simply cannot comprehend.  My love is there to be a dad for them.  My beautiful man.  We are a heavy load, and stepping into a broken family, trying to pull the pieces together amidst the insanity that is our situation is overwhelming.  Navigating the emotions and perceptions and differences in opinion is so very difficult.  Sometimes it seems like it’s too hard and too painful to try to continue, but if we can step back and take a deep breath for a moment, we might see the rainbow and the sunshine and realize that we are strong enough to prevail, and that love will find a way.

All around me, the people I love are struggling.  I see families in which the parents are exhausted and consumed by the demands of very young children coupled with the demands of making a living and staying afloat, simply trying to make ends meet.  Thresholds are short, emotions flare.  The love is there, somewhere, but it’s nigh on impossible to carve out together time in which to nourish and replenish and edify one another.  Who do they have besides each other in their season of need?  Where can they draw strength to navigate these toddler years?

I get so caught up in my own world that I overlook this struggle they have, yet, if I take a moment to step out of my own chaos, I see their need.  My heart weeps for the growing void in their marriage.  They need rest.

We gather together, each of us holding our own expectations for this family time, each of us hoping we will be nourished and that this time will help draw us out of the dark places where we find ourselves stuck.  And if we don’t get out of our own heads to see the struggles all around us, we are quickly overwhelmed and nearly crushed with despair.  But if we do find a way to look beyond our own suffering, to see that we aren’t alone, we can put our own troubles into perspective, and suddenly they don’t loom so large.

When we do this, and talk with each other, we reminisce about the good times when we’d gather.  We were younger, the collective stress seemed smaller, or at least different.  We laughed and sang and played and ate and painted and played and sang and laughed and ate.  We had so much fun.  Life for all of us is different now, but we try to step away for at least a moment, and stay up late to play board games, allowing the kids to mill around us, trying to recapture at least a glimpse of the way things used to be.

It’s a wondrous thing, how music can capture and convey so much heart.  I hear music, and I want to be a part of it.  I want it in me.  I want to be in it.  I want it to come out from me.  I want to be it.  Barry Manilow (laugh if you will) said it.  “I am music…”

Sometimes I feel as though I nearly am.  I feel that way with language and other things too.  Somebody once told me that is called intuition.  But I don’t know.  I just know that it feels as though I’m standing at a doorway.  I know what’s beyond that door; I can see it as clear as day.  And if only I could or would walk through that door, it would all become a part of me, and I’d be in it, and it would be in me.  I would speak forth in foreign languages.  I would play any sound on any instrument.  I would be one with music and language.

Alas.  What keeps me from stepping through that doorway?  I wish I knew.  Is it fear? Fear of failure?  Maybe.  Probably.  I don’t know.  I just continue on in my mediocrity.

There is a song that has been touching my heart lately.  It’s called “Rise“, by Shawn McDonald.

In a way, it captures some of the essence of me, and the things I’ve been going through for the past couple of years.  Me, Phoenix Rising.  I love the melody and the octave changes.

“Rise”
[Chorus]
Yes I will rise
Out of these ashes rise
From this trouble I have found
And this rubble on the ground
I will rise
Cause He Who is in me
Is greater than I will ever be
And I will rise

Sometimes my heart is on the ground
And hope is nowhere to be found
Love is a figment I once knew
And yet I hold on to what I know is true

[Chorus]
Yes I will rise
Out of these ashes rise
From this trouble I have found
And this rubble on the ground
I will rise
Cause He Who is in me
Is greater than I will ever be
And I will rise

Well I keep on coming to this place
That I don’t know quite how to face
So I lay down my life in hopes to die
That somehow I might rise

[Chorus]
Yes I will rise
Out of these ashes rise
From this trouble I have found
And this rubble on the ground
I will rise
Cause He Who is in me
Is greater than I will ever be
And I will rise

I have few answers. There isn’t much that I really know. I’m not necessarily that smart. I’m a little bit book smart, but life-smart? Not so much. I just live every day trying to be my best. One thing I do know. I know who I am. I am kind. I am gentle. I am good. I am patient. I am steady. I am faithful. I am peaceful. I am loving. I am upright. I seek to do no harm. I am [mostly] responsible. I avoid conflict. I am compassionate. I love everyone.

Am I a doormat? Maybe. I don’t know. I’m hyper-sensitive, yes.   It’s a character flaw, and I’m working on it.  I saw a bumper sticker today that said, “Jesus was a pacifist.” I’m a pacifist. For sure.

And all I want, which is all I’ve ever wanted, which is pretty much the same thing that almost anybody ever wants or has ever wanted from the dawn of time, is to love and be loved. Simply put.

I have children. They are my life’s dream come true. They need to come first, so I don’t even know what ‘me time’ is any more. I have to be strong and steady and firm and loving for them. I have to be everything they need. Because I don’t want them to ever feel, for even a moment, that they don’t belong or that they don’t matter or that they’re not important, or that they’re not wanted. I want them to be secure in who they are and how they fit into this big, chaotic world in which we live. It’s so hard, being a parent.

What can I do, besides what I’m doing?  I just go on loving.  I go on breathing.  I go on trying.  I go on being.  I go on praying.  I go on.

Lost
On a painted sky
Where the clouds are hung
For the poet’s eye
You may find him
If you may find him

There
On a distant shore
By the wings of dreams
Through an open door
You may know him
If you may

Be
As a page that aches for a word
Which speaks on a theme that is timeless
While the sun God will make for your day

Sing
As a song in search of a voice that is silent
And the one God will make for your way

And we dance
To a whispered voice
Overheard by the soul
Undertook by the heart
And you may know it
If you may know it

While the sand
Would become the stone
Which begat the spark
Turned to living bone
Holy, holy
Sanctus, sanctus

Be…

(Neil Diamond, from the Jonathan Livingston Seagull soundtrack)

~*~*~

Be.  It was my defining word for this year, and this year is nearly over.  I’m finding myself struggling again.  I’m over-extended and overwhelmed.  It takes all the strength that I can muster to hold it all together.  I’m suffering from the people pleasing blues.  And it’s not all that easy to be a full time working single mom. Blah blah blah. I know, I’m preaching to the choir (just let me have my pity party, please?)

People think that I am smarter than I am.  I can’t seem to fathom why people don’t just choose to be open and trusting and kind and loving.  How foolish is that?  It’s my default state and it leaves me wide open for all manner of attack.  The thing is, I don’t expect attack, and very seldom do I experience attack.  It seems ironic that the attack I perceive is not from those without, but from those within.  My own people.

“Only in his hometown, among his relatives and in his own house is a prophet without honor.”

That would be Mark 6:4.  Yep.  There’s nothing new under the sun.

I exhaust myself.  This reactionary emotional hair trigger is a beast that I have yet to master.  I’m looking for that quiet, calm place where I can have some clarity.

Sueeeus Maximus.  What does she want?  What are the desires of her heart?  What is she all about?

Guess what?  It’s so simple, really. She just wants to live joyfully.  To love and be loved.  To laugh, to smile.  To understand and be understood.  To listen and to hear.  To give and to serve.  So why all the scrutiny and judgement?

I just want to be.

And to be free to love the one I love.

Good grief.

What is it they say?  If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen?

Things of late are resolving, bit by bit.

Sometimes when you belong to a big, strong, loving family, and you want to bring someone into that family fold, the family will guard the fortress and bar the gate until it’s understood what it means to enter that gate.  It can be formidable to an outsider; it’s basically running the gauntlet, and not one bit of fun.  Once in, though, it’s a pretty great place to be.

If you survive, that is.

Oy.

~*~*~*~

Separating the men from the boys…   …I found this circulating on the internet…

Boys play house, Men build homes.  Boys shack up, Men get married. Boys make babies, Men raise children.  A boy won’t raise his own children, a man will raise his and someone else’s.  Boys invent excuses for failure, Men produce strategies for success.  Boys look for somebody to take care of them, Men look for someone to take care of.  Boys seek popularity, Men demand respect and know how to give it.  Boys will like you for a month, Men will love you forever.

…It makes me think of this (which comes from the love standard)…

1 Cor 13:11

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child.

~*~*~*~

I’m still shouting from the mountaintops!  I’m in love!  I am saying this carefully, and considering it deeply, measuring it against snippets of wisdom such as these:

Love is NOT…
1. Something you “fall into” – a black hole.
2. Infatuation. Emotional loss of control. “Flipped out..” “Couldn’t help myself.”Romanticism and sentimentalism. “Puppy love.” Boy-crazy; girl-crazy.
3. Evaluating another by external criteria. “She’s a #10”
4. Selfish. Interested in “getting” to satisfy my needs.
5. Taking advantage of another (age, height, weight, looks, intellect, emotional maturity,
spiritual maturity, social standings, social skills, psychological understanding, place of
authority, financial superiority, etc.)
6. Improper need fulfillment. Need for love, acceptance, relating, bonding, belonging, to be
valued, affirmed, excitement, identity, etc.
7. Lust. Hormones. Lasciviousness, sensuality.
8. Sex.
9. Idolatry. “……….is my life.” Totally preoccupied in attention and time.

Love is…
1. Respectful of the other person’s values, standards and opinions.
2. Unselfish and unconditional.
3. A decision to relate to the other person at every level – spiritual, psychological and physical.
4. Giving of oneself to the other.
5. Responsible to seek the highest good of the other person “for better or for worse.”
6. God in action. (Rom. 5:5; I John 4:8,16)

~*~*~*~

The bottom line?  My heart is at peace and it is well with my soul.