Fade To Black

I looked up to see a teenage girl in the street, bags scattered around her, her pacing and watching nervously until a vehicle came around the corner, and she threw her things into it and rode away.  Several hours passed before it occurred to me that she was probably somebody else's zombie daughter and that I might have made a difference in that life somehow.  I might have just opened the door, stepped out into the yard, and asked her, "babe, are you about to make a regrettable choice?" Instead, I'd just watched the whole thing as if in a stupor.  

It's the same thing I do most days. 

Regrettable choices.  How many have there been now?
I'd ask who's counting as if to imply that nobody's counting but somebody is.
Somebody's always keeping score, at least in the game that I'm not even playing.
I'm losing, by the way.
Even though I have the most points.

I saw the girl through the window as I was sitting and staring, wondering what it's like to become a zombie, in fact.  Is it a slow fade?  Do you snap into it the same way that people snap out of things?

Like, I don't know ... denial, maybe.  Sometimes you snap out of that and what you get is a bite of red-hot reality.  I'm not really in denial.  I just really like the way that last bit sounds and sometimes I say things just because I like the sound of it.

But the real truth is that some parts of reality bite and I am regularly watching in stupefied wonder.  There are some situations still not getting better, some people still not coming home.  There are some places that I would bleed out if I thought it would make things better but I know better.  Knowing better might be making me bitter.  Just a bit.

I'm obviously writing mainly for myself now.  Except for the others like me.  I do know you're out there.  I saw your daughter yesterday in front of my house.  I'm sorry, so sincerely, that I didn't help her.

Call It What It Is

why oh why
my tiny heart cries
oh why can't i be a poet?

were i to be gifted with lyric and rhyme
perhaps i'd live better in difficult times

blech

maybe on those days that i wake up wrong
knowing better than to start the day
but having to do so anyway
and doing so
finding my foe
,anger,
hot on my heels
chasing me down
attempting to steal
you know...

maybe then i'd lose the urge
to drink dark liquor
to smoke and purge
to curse at the ceiling
like a mad woman.

i don't do any of these things
well, most any of these things
but i do wish i had a big stick
to beat the dog that's biting at my heels

Envy Schmenvy

So.

We've just finished a lovely, happy little series about the seven deadlies.  Coulda, woulda, shoulda written about each of them in turn as I struggle relatively with each.  I am a person, after all.

In case they're unfamiliar to you, and to clarify what I just said:

Mother, Mother

i have no shot at a career in writing. 
okay, i’m okay with that.


but were i even to try,
i’m pretty sure there’s no 
novel,
memoir,
screenplay,
or poem
that could tell it better for me 
than to just string together a series of 
song lyrics,
movie clips,
bits of art,
an occasional sound byte.

my story’s already been told.


mother, mother. are you listening?

I've Got Yo' Wonder Woman

I promise ~ I'll try to choose my words, because, God help me, I don't want this to come out like some kind of horn-tootin' ceremony ... but I'm also being stalked by a nearly two-year-old boy and that vastly impacts the quality of most things I set my my mind (partially) to doing.

So...

This past Vacation Bible School season, I was asked to lead the missions teaching portion for the kids that would attend on our church campus.  Uhhhhhhh.  It's one thing for my own kids to leave their own kids alone with me but the prospect of my having any possible influence on other peoples' kids... SHUDDER.

Well, I'd just been hearing something in a message series about doing for the kingdom of God and I'd been wondering if I really had been.  Doing, I mean. Anything, I mean.  Apart from playing dress-up, I mean.

So I said yes.

VBS wasn't too bad a deal, really.  I essentially hid behind my props and team members but nobody's ever gonna know that's how I got through it.

Anyhow, they asked me again to do a thing with kids!  Reeeaaalllyyy???!  
Am I being punked?!

Again, I gave my "yes" out of a sense of obligation and desire to bless God (just some teeny bit as much as He's blessed me!) and with complete trust that He'd get me through it.

And then ...

I could. not. bring. myself. to. the. planning. of. it.

Weeks passed.
Blips would cross my radar.
A random email.
A vague memory.
The stack of material gathering dust on my counter.

Admittedly (meaning, this is part of my excuse and I'm sticking to it), there's been more than a fair amount of drama on my personal stage lately.  I'm talking the brain-freezing, life-sucking kind of stuff that makes you forget where you come from.

There are other reasons.  Time management might not be a strong suit for me.  Or prioritizing my work.  (I'm writing this first thing Monday morning when I really should be doing payroll.  Sincerest apologies, employers, for real!)

But because I like finding the tootsie in the pop, I've decided that, really, God just wanted to teach me a right fine lesson in all of this.  And for Him to do it, I had to reach my scared witless stage.  (Anybody else do some of their best learning there?)

Here's how it went:

I got this email that said, "...and you'll be the first one up..." THIS SUNDAY.
I thought I had two more weeks to put it off.
I had my typical panic attack.
I unplugged and stepped away from everything and everyone.
I asked Him to tell me what I was supposed to do/say.
And He did.

I was pretty alright with His plan too.  It was a straight-forward and reasonable approach to instruction for children.  If it lacked anything, it might could have used a little personality.  I mean ~ no costumes?!  No team players?!

Truth is - and this is really the pinnacle part of this whole thing - for whatever reason, I knew that I had to take the message to them without any props.  No disguises.  No role-playing.  It would be important - for a reason that I did not sense or understand at the time - for me to be just plain ole' me.

Those last days before go time became more and more tense and when the morning came for me to show up ............. I could. not. stop. crying.

I ain't proud.

Really, it seems so silly in hindsight but everybody's got their own terrifyin', cold-sweatin', wanna puke, can't move kind of fear.  I reckon it turns out that mine is straight talking to a bunch of little kids.

At least two times during the morning (I had to do the thing twice and went to church in-between) someone made comments about my attire.  I don't mean, "I like your outfit." or "You look nice." or "You dress well." (when you're being yourself, remember.)

I mean, "Hey, you kinda look like wonder woman**."



Oh.


Ohh!


Ohh.  My.  Gosh.


Apparently, plain ole' me can't help myself.
Apparently, though it's one of the most peculiar things I think I'll ever say,
God means for me to play dress-up.
What's a girl supposed to say to that?
Well, okie dokie, Lord.
And thank you, most sincerely!!





I could probably carry on a bit more or, at the very least, do some better editing. However, the boy's just come to me with a tube of hand lotion that he found in my purse.  He's eaten half the tube of lotion!  I probably better do payroll.

**just in case you need a reference point

Left Behind

As I've been working this piece over in my mind these past few days, it's changed shapes on me several times.  At last, I'm left with the image of Dorothy in the lull of the storm and I realize, finally, what it is I want to say.



All hell is breaking loose around me.

There's unrest.  There's uncertainty.  There's fear.  Times are treacherous, I think, and then I know as certainly that the times have always been treacherous.

I'm just not always watching.  You may just as soon find me singing to the chickens and the pigs about my supposed troubles ~ like the fact that I can't actually fly, maybe.

I've said it before.  Were I to write it all down, we've had some actual, real troubles these last few years, but I promise that I know:  ours are naught compared to what's going on out there.

Out there.

Do y'all remember when I started this thing?  This writing thing?
Okay, well I do, obviously, and it had much to do with those already occupying this space - those good or Bad Teachers who were putting themselves out there, sharing their wisdom, their experience, or their lack of one or both.  They encouraged me to get on with it, my own version of bleeding out.*

But as the days have passed, it seems that they too - (many of) my favorite friends - have passed into the shadows.  And I feel a little bit left behind.

Have they given it up?  Have they given till there's none left?  Have they gone to the hills?  Are they busy digging shelters from the coming storm?  In any case, I have seen a few farewell posts and have also noted a few sudden, blaring absences.  My hope is that they are still out there and still clinging to our one, true hope.

The Coming Storm.

There are still blips on the radar.  One such is what Emily Freeman says here, and I keep thinking particularly of her bit at the end about her response to current events.

Current events are scary as all get-out!  (But then I know as certainly that they always have been.)  How, how do I not sense that the end is near?  Maybe you've sensed it too or maybe you haven't.  Maybe your momma did or maybe she didn't think the end was due in 1962.  Or '91.  Or last week.  Maybe your granddad had the same thoughts or maybe he didn't.  In any case, I have a hard time not wondering about the next big event and who might get left behind.  Will I get left behind?  (Remember, I'm bleeding here.)

But this is where I have to cling to my One True Hope, my shelter in every storm.

The Next Big Event.

For a long, long time, I had this notion down deep that I would do some kind of important thing in the world.  I used to be certain that I would wind up in the mix of inner-city kids - serving them, I mean.  And/or that I would travel to do mission work all around the ... well, depended a bit on the means of travel - but I really believed that I'd be going out there.

Nope, nobody needs comment about making God laugh and all that!  It's the ones whose lives actually do turn out as planned that are the marvel.  (To me, at least.)  So I've probably always known better than to have a solid plan.  (That just might be my most clever excuse so far!)

But I have had some ideas.  And some notions.  And some hopes that my life might go in certain directions.  Much of that now - you know - has been left behind.

But I do still have hope.

Certain Directions.

I recently and quite accidentally started listening to a new sermon series.  <-I just told a joke. 

According to Andy Stanley, I'm not so much in a lull as I am In The Meantime.  And it may just be that I'm here for a bit, unable to go in any real direction, unable to affect the changes I'd like to see.  I really do feel the way that I think Dorothy must have - frantic to see the chaos just outside her window, helpless to calm the storm.

The witch is on the loose.  The world is tossed about.  So little seems certain.

Certain.

Times are treacherous, that is certain.
But these times are not the everlasting Certainty wherein I place my hope.
These times, these uncertainties, these fears ~ they will one day be left behind.
That.  That is what I want to say.



*Writing is easy. You just open up a vein and bleed onto the pages.
–attributed to Red Smith

The Wire

I've been watching the news lately, keeping up with current events ~ and I mean actual, worldwide current events, not just what's coming across the social wire.

It's hard some days to keep my chin up, honestly.




I'm trying to work it out, to find the balance.

In every direction that I turn or look, there's trouble or dire threat.
Or the source of a hurting heart.
Or my own weakness.

In all directions, save one.

I will lift up my eyes to the hills—
From whence comes my help?
My help comes from the Lord,
Who made heaven and earth.
Psalm 121:1-2

Thank You, LORD, for your unending faithfulness to me, even when I am undeserving; and for keeping me steady, balanced, and hopeful as I continue to cross the wire.