Come to the table just as you are,
addicted, grieving, broken, hopeless, traumatized, with mental illness, lonely and isolated,
come to the table.
Hearts of compassion and acceptance meet you,
Ears hear the depths of your pain,
Eyes see who you are,
Bread of community is shared and what was once hidden,
is illuminated, embraced, and gently felt.
Come to the table of love, where hope is restored and brothers and sisters bear the load.
The voice of a songbird an ear has never heard,
fills the sky with sweet possibilities.
She calls out to the air and her song is clear and full,
surprising the listener.
Notes of delight,
being,
present,
a song that must be sung because
She is a bird.
This morning I was preparing to take an online quiz from my Human Sexuality class which had a due date of 9/13/15. Being the conscientious student that I am, I double-checked last night to make sure I was correct with the date. After planning my weekend, I chose to wait until 9/13/15, to complete the quiz. I opened up the blackboard page today and noticed a “no assignments due” for today. I opened the quiz tab and there was “no content to display”. I obviously misinterpreted the deadline of the twenty point quiz, as it was now closed. Why didn’t I just take it the first day it opened up, or the second and third day? I wasn’t in the quiz-taking mood, I had plans with my grandchildren over the weekend, or I just plain avoided it until the last minute.
I am frustrated.
I am annoyed at myself.
I missed out on a possible, easy A in the class.
I am raising the question to myself, “how often does avoidance come up in your life?”
I have spent the last four years recovering from a traumatic life experience and am happy to say I am not where I was four years ago or even six months ago. Through the support of a loving community and my Higher Power, I am taking each day as it comes and doing the work I need to do to get healthy. That sounds so cliche’ and yet it works. My most recent task in recovery was given to me in May and I committed to complete it over the summer because, having a deadline motivates me to finish. My deadline has now passed. I am frustrated, annoyed and possibly missing out on the healing that will springboard me to the next step of freedom. So why am I avoiding it?
I have come to the conclusion, unlike a twenty point quiz, my task involves revisiting several years of life, where I became overwhelmed with terror, grief, and immense pain that I do not want to experience again. I just want to walk away and forget all of it. It’s in front of me like a dark pit of quicksand where I could drown and get lost. Willing myself to engage with this darkness, that could suck the life out of me is simply ridiculous. I am stuck. The deadline has passed. I feel alone.
Ernest Hemingway says, “The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places.” I love this quote as it reminds me that I am not alone. Everyone is broken and has walked in the dark. Life flows like that. All of us are faced with the harshness of life and deal with the aftermath of a sunami. This is unavoidable. The most helpful advice I can give myself or anyone is to “be present” to this moment, this day. Life is often turned upside down and is so uncertain and yet there is an organic flow that takes over and helps to bring grounding and to build trust in the process.
The process of healing is slow. There is an ebb and flow of light and darkness. Waves of grief come crashing into me like a sunami, often followed by the warmth of hope and love that renews my strength. The most difficult part is riding the wave. I don’t like water. I cannot swim. I am much more comfortable laying on the beach, under an umbrella with a picnic and good company. I am learning how to allow the waves and the pain that accompanies it without panicking because I know now that the sunshine from God is around the corner.
Avoiding it is one response to the harshness of loss and pain, but if I am totally honest with myself, I know the deadline is today. One day at a time. Today I can put a toe into the dark, murky place. Today I can check in with myself and choose to step into the task at hand and step out as well. Today I can choose to trust and hope in my Higher Power and the resources that have carried me through yesterday. I can choose to avoid the quicksand today. I will make mistakes. I will miss deadlines. I will take one day at a time, loving myself and others and take the next step.
I have attempted and accomplished many projects, the majority for little people under the age of seven. My latest is a scooter buddy, a small bag that attaches with velcro to a child’s scooter. It has a pocket for a water bottle or favorite stuffed animal and a zipper for even smaller treasures. The scooter buddy tutorial on Pinterest came with step-by-step instructions, including pictures. I decided that even the most inexperienced seamstress like myself, could successfully make a scooter buddy.
I arrived at the fabric store with my list and the bold confidence of an amateur ready to take on the task ahead of me. My detailed list however, did not prepare me for the countless bolts of fabric of various textures and colors, that were labeled incorrectly. Not one of them said medium weight fabric or heavy weight fabric like tutorial shopping list called for. After walking many times through each aisle, I started feeling like I was lost in a forest and was walking in circles. At this point I started to have a reaction in my body. I felt my heart start to race, my confidence was replace with panic, and I started talking to myself. “I’m in a fabric store! People who shop in a fabric store know how to choose fabric! What were you thinking? Turn around and walk out. You do not want any further humiliation than what you are already experiencing, at least no one else knows.” Then I thought about how happy it would make me and my grandson to see his Perry the platypus riding in his scooter buddy down the street. I swallowed, walked to the counter, and courageously asked for suggestions. It was a short exchange between me and the fabric guru and I hid my incompetence up until the point of choosing the interfacing. She laid three choices before me. I broke out in a sweat and thought, what is interfacing?! Well what was I to do? I asked her which one she thought would be best. The choices were made, she expertly calculated and cut the exact measurements from my list and I thanked her and started breathing again and had a renewed excitement and conviction that the hardest step was behind me.
I awoke the next morning, laid out all of my supplies, dusted off my sewing machine and opened my computer to the bookmarked page, Scooter Buddy Tutorial. With the determination of a grandmother longing to see the eyes of her grandson light up, I began my task. My journey in creating the scooter buddy did not look like the step-by-step pictures on my computer. I found myself following directions and yet had several instances where I laid the fabric incorrectly and had to do it over. My seam ripper and I became very close in the next two days. How did I find myself in this predicament when the tutorial was so clear? I don’t know how to “finish” an edge. Where is that zigzag stitch? Do I have to use a different foot to install a zipper? And for heaven sake how did I end up with a inch wider piece of fabric than I should have?! I was becoming overwhelmed and had a sense of dread that my scooter buddy might end up looking like a scooter disaster or worse than that, I might need to go back to the fabric store. I pushed through the setbacks and mistakes to the final step in the project, with a deep breath I turned it inside out to reveal the truth. Much to my amazement it was perfect! I couldn’t be happier.
I have been reflecting on the process of creating my scooter buddy and I realize that the journey of love has been very similar for me. I feel safe and courageous with my specific list of ideas of what love looks like and am confident that all of my loving traits will make me quite a catch. I am kind, gentle, forgiving, empathetic, caring, patient, and of course, a good listener. I am confident I am ready to love! That theory has been tested recently in a new relationship. Like the trip to the fabric store, I feel lost, overwhelmed, scared, panicked and humiliated, as I enter my later years and realize that I am an amateur at love. I like to be right. I don’t like to make mistakes. I am impatient when my lover doesn’t understand me. I keep making the same mistakes over and over again, with greater consequences than using a seam ripper. Many tears have been shed by my beloved, because I’m more concerned about my own needs. I want to run away and quit. I find myself frustrated at how little I know about being in a loving relationship. I’m often afraid of a love disaster. I have had many moments where I just want to have a chat with the love guru so that I have all I need to make sure all is perfect, especially me.
I am a student. Love is my teacher. I am committed to experience the pain and pleasure that co-exist in the journey. I am learning about myself and that love is hard. It takes work and time. I do not have a detailed instruction manual. As much as that scares me, it also has freed me to be human. I can make mistakes and cut away the unhealthy parts of me that keep me from receiving and giving love. It’s okay to not have the answers. I am more beautiful when I have questions. Love is a lot like my scooter buddy project, there are do-overs, mistakes, adjustments along the way. It takes humility and courage to love, and the truth that is unfolding is how perfect and incompetent I am. One day I hope to walk into the fabric store accepting that I will never be an expert and applauding myself for my courage.
Open palms,
seeing dimly and taking a step into darkness.
Letting go of invisibility
And listening to the flow of Spirit,
And my voice.
Letting go of religion,
To sit at the feet of Life,
And my desires.
Letting go of fear
To allow the Present as a Teacher.
Letting go of judgement
And jumping into the depths of Love.
Open palms,
Seeing dimly and taking a step into darkness.
The power to bring comfort when the world is too much,
Companionship,
Best Friend,
Soft, Kind, Gentle,
Like falling into a mother’s arms
And snuggling into her neck.
Just a touch of the shaggy ears or tail,
the favorite thumb to soothe,
All is well with the universe.
Round, safe, enclosed
Invitation.
Enter at your own risk,
Sacred community and wild unknown,
Warmth, laughter, anxiety, powerlessness,
Exit.
Precarious and powerless,
Swallow fear and trust
Simplicity of a step,
Finding the boundary,
One day at a time.
Thirty fours years ago I became a mother,
Nineteen and in love with a beautiful boy.
Strawberry blonde hair and pink skin,
My heart opened like a flower basking in the sunshine,
There was a “knowing” as he grew that he was created and formed
Protected, even in his suffering,
To become a beacon to the earth.
A sponge, competitor, kind and empathetic, seeker of knowledge, lover of people,
A powerful drive for more,
Moments of pride in all he has accomplished not because of me,
Often in spite of.
Beautiful boy with blonde hair, hazel eyes that squint when he smiles and laughs,
Prophet,
Carrying a legacy of justice, love, and peace
Like a river it moves through him,
Flowing like hope on all who step into it.
Cleansing the filth of complacency,
Renewing the mind
with Truth.
Beautiful boy, beautiful man.
Celebrating my son!
The Unmaking 