This entry may appear many times over and I'm going to try not to edit it too deeply for the sake of my immediate. So, readers: patience.
I've been thinking of my mother and father since the beginning really, but moreso over the last ten years or so especially. You see, they are a part of the ruins for which I have no tools. It's okay because I'm not really the One to do that rebuilding. I just look over them once in a while and wonder, and question, and eventually learn something about my ruins.
Today, I look at them and I hear the things they used to say...the things that broke down my foundations:
"Clumsy"
"You'll run out of words before you're 20"
"The only reason those boys want to be your friend is so they can get some"
"Dreamer. Her head is always in the clouds. She doesn't really know what she wants"
"Prince charmings don't exist. It doesn't work that way."
"You can't always have what you want."
"Is that what you're wearing? Okay, if you want to look like a slut."
Today, I look at them and I see areas in myself echoed in the chipping from their faces and the paint peeling from their arms and legs:
My mother's longing for the feminine, but answering her pain with defiance and domination exploding in fear. My father's longing for strength, but answering his pain with passivity and silence exploding in anger.
I longed as a girl for some direct attention. Leave flowers in my room on special days. Keep hugging and kissing me after age 10. Say that I'm worth the stars and no man was worth catching me. Say that if I have faith, anything is possible. Tell me God made me to be a brilliantly beautiful reflection of Himself...then show me the way to His love. This is what I longed for, but God saw fit to write it a different way. Maybe to clear me away from their crumbling state; maybe to form me into something unruined parents could not even fathom fashioning a child into. Maybe both.
Today, I look at them and still grieve their state. Today, I look at them and learn that sometimes I do talk too much. Sometimes I am a clutz. But sometimes I speak light and salt. But sometimes, I run into something beautiful.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Monday, February 4, 2008
What Eve Tells Me
It's a bit scary as a woman to walk up to Eve in Genesis and stare her in the eyes and know..."I would have eaten it too."
She is the pinnacle of Creation, the completion of the Image-bearers, and Adam's ezer kenegdo. No wonder Eve was the target in this beginning story. She still is...in me.
She tells me I am supposed to be beautiful. What does that mean? When it comes to my beauty, I have a hard time knowing exactly what that is and what to do with it once I found it...so, you may find me ignoring beauty to the point of believing that it doesn't exist in me. Thwap! Arrow number one.
She tells me I was designed to be glorious. Eh? No, no. I was designed to do glorious things, right? To focus on being instead of doing? Thwap! Arrow number two.
Michaelangelo's statue of David, Renoirs painting of the people in the park, Alma Ta Daema's sleeping women, Degas' ballerina's...these are crowns of art to me. Indiana's farmland at summer's end, the red cliffs of the Northeast coastline, the clearest mountain streams..these are nature's beauty to me. It makes me catch my breath to read the detail and imagine the pure, untainted beauty of creation when it was spoken...and then, I am filled with humility and mute honor as Eve becomes the final stroke...formed not spoken was she. A combination of joy and terror grip me as I realize God chose mankind to bear His image...and He chose me to be the crown of that creation...not an "oh yeah" or "by the way" of creation...but the final "there" that makes it all right. Perfect. But, I'm anything but perfect...so, how does this work? I am staggered. Thwap! Arrow number three.
She tells me she has a role to play, a destiny of her own, a glory to show forth that only she can show. So do I. I am not just a frame around the rest of creation, a shining star at the top of the tree. I am more than the ornament or the vase for the roses...there is a crown to womanhood. There is a glory placed on her...on me, like a golden-threaded robe. I may have eaten her fruit, but I also wear her crown. Dink! Shield number one.
She is the pinnacle of Creation, the completion of the Image-bearers, and Adam's ezer kenegdo. No wonder Eve was the target in this beginning story. She still is...in me.
She tells me I am supposed to be beautiful. What does that mean? When it comes to my beauty, I have a hard time knowing exactly what that is and what to do with it once I found it...so, you may find me ignoring beauty to the point of believing that it doesn't exist in me. Thwap! Arrow number one.
She tells me I was designed to be glorious. Eh? No, no. I was designed to do glorious things, right? To focus on being instead of doing? Thwap! Arrow number two.
Michaelangelo's statue of David, Renoirs painting of the people in the park, Alma Ta Daema's sleeping women, Degas' ballerina's...these are crowns of art to me. Indiana's farmland at summer's end, the red cliffs of the Northeast coastline, the clearest mountain streams..these are nature's beauty to me. It makes me catch my breath to read the detail and imagine the pure, untainted beauty of creation when it was spoken...and then, I am filled with humility and mute honor as Eve becomes the final stroke...formed not spoken was she. A combination of joy and terror grip me as I realize God chose mankind to bear His image...and He chose me to be the crown of that creation...not an "oh yeah" or "by the way" of creation...but the final "there" that makes it all right. Perfect. But, I'm anything but perfect...so, how does this work? I am staggered. Thwap! Arrow number three.
She tells me she has a role to play, a destiny of her own, a glory to show forth that only she can show. So do I. I am not just a frame around the rest of creation, a shining star at the top of the tree. I am more than the ornament or the vase for the roses...there is a crown to womanhood. There is a glory placed on her...on me, like a golden-threaded robe. I may have eaten her fruit, but I also wear her crown. Dink! Shield number one.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Risk
"Then the time came when the risk it took
To remain tight in a bud was more painful
Than the risk it took to blossom.."
-Anais Nin
What do I do with risk? As a young girl, it wasn't ever really a challenge for me...not too much. I was a wanderer in stores, free-spirited with strangers, thought I could fly if I had enough faith. Oh yes. I would attempt flight almost every day, weather permitting. I would stand perched on the end bars of our metal painted swingset, close my eyes tight, stretch out my arms and repeat in my head "Faith as a mustard seed, faith as a mustard seed..." and then...Jump! Jump as high as I possibly could. My long hair would catch the wind as I fell gently to earth once more and landed with a thump and a tangle of arms and legs on the cool grass. I flew. I believed I flew.
So, what happened? Years would go by and risk became a real word to me. I would run inside afraid when people I didn't know would come to the door. They might kidnap me. I loved traveling to new places in highschool just for the opportunity to risk...but I rarely took it. I remember two significant times I had to muster up some bravery in me...interestingly enough, they were both with my best friend of those days. She was a girl who knew no risk...Risk was a puff of wind to her.
The first, I overcame a fear of drowning and went tubing down a creek. I was at our annual summer camp. Four girls and a counselor trampled over the gravel walkway, careful to not wake anyone as we each grabbed an innertube from the shed wall. It had rained the night before and we promised ourselves...I a little hesitantly...that if it stormed we would tube the creek early before anyone else was awake. So there I was, my jeans rolled up to my knees, innertube held up around my waist...looking down the long dark rolling water before me. It really wasn't that deep...but it was fast. And it was fun...until I got stuck in a stagnant pool of still water off to the side. I'm not sure exactly how it happened, but one by one the girls swirled past me laughing and shouting at me to push out. Push out? With what? My feet weren't touching anything below me, there were no branches close enough to give me any leverage. In my mind, I was stuck. I lifted myself to reach with my toes down as far as I dared...nothing but wet space. And suddenly, my heart froze. I would have to risk falling through my tube in order to get back into the current...nope. Not gonna do it. No way. Just then, my best friend came rolling by.
"Reach out for my hand!"
"You're gonna be too far for me." I yelled back. She laughed at my predicament. In spite of my fear, her laughter gave me courage and I pumped my feet back and forth below me, my innertube turning in circles...here she came....risk it...get up off your butt and lean out over that deep pool below you...reach, reach, reach,...
The second time was when I spent the night...the entire night...out in a tent in the middle of some woods. She was there with me and had even done this by herself. That night, it thunderstormed. Our tent blew around us and we huddled closer in half-sleep willfully making it until morning. When my eyes opened to sunlight peeking through the tent seams and I realized I'd made it, I felt that I had done something...I don't know...something significant
Neither of these scenarios may have been really dangerous, but for me at the time they were huge. I remember how the fear felt. I remember the moment of decision: I'm not giving in.
Had I not had these two experiences of little risk, I don't think I could have been brave enough to fall in love. I mean really in love...the kind of love that makes you walk that tight wire and jump out on the evidence of true faith you cannot see. But that's another story. Without these little steps of courage, I could in no way wake every day and face the incredible task of mothering my son, who by the way exhibits risk moment by moment.
Without the courage to reach over one of my deepest fears to catch my friend's hand...without having braved the storm in the woods...without risk...my faith would die. Without faith, I couldn't fly. And I did fly. I did.
To remain tight in a bud was more painful
Than the risk it took to blossom.."
-Anais Nin
What do I do with risk? As a young girl, it wasn't ever really a challenge for me...not too much. I was a wanderer in stores, free-spirited with strangers, thought I could fly if I had enough faith. Oh yes. I would attempt flight almost every day, weather permitting. I would stand perched on the end bars of our metal painted swingset, close my eyes tight, stretch out my arms and repeat in my head "Faith as a mustard seed, faith as a mustard seed..." and then...Jump! Jump as high as I possibly could. My long hair would catch the wind as I fell gently to earth once more and landed with a thump and a tangle of arms and legs on the cool grass. I flew. I believed I flew.
So, what happened? Years would go by and risk became a real word to me. I would run inside afraid when people I didn't know would come to the door. They might kidnap me. I loved traveling to new places in highschool just for the opportunity to risk...but I rarely took it. I remember two significant times I had to muster up some bravery in me...interestingly enough, they were both with my best friend of those days. She was a girl who knew no risk...Risk was a puff of wind to her.
The first, I overcame a fear of drowning and went tubing down a creek. I was at our annual summer camp. Four girls and a counselor trampled over the gravel walkway, careful to not wake anyone as we each grabbed an innertube from the shed wall. It had rained the night before and we promised ourselves...I a little hesitantly...that if it stormed we would tube the creek early before anyone else was awake. So there I was, my jeans rolled up to my knees, innertube held up around my waist...looking down the long dark rolling water before me. It really wasn't that deep...but it was fast. And it was fun...until I got stuck in a stagnant pool of still water off to the side. I'm not sure exactly how it happened, but one by one the girls swirled past me laughing and shouting at me to push out. Push out? With what? My feet weren't touching anything below me, there were no branches close enough to give me any leverage. In my mind, I was stuck. I lifted myself to reach with my toes down as far as I dared...nothing but wet space. And suddenly, my heart froze. I would have to risk falling through my tube in order to get back into the current...nope. Not gonna do it. No way. Just then, my best friend came rolling by.
"Reach out for my hand!"
"You're gonna be too far for me." I yelled back. She laughed at my predicament. In spite of my fear, her laughter gave me courage and I pumped my feet back and forth below me, my innertube turning in circles...here she came....risk it...get up off your butt and lean out over that deep pool below you...reach, reach, reach,...
The second time was when I spent the night...the entire night...out in a tent in the middle of some woods. She was there with me and had even done this by herself. That night, it thunderstormed. Our tent blew around us and we huddled closer in half-sleep willfully making it until morning. When my eyes opened to sunlight peeking through the tent seams and I realized I'd made it, I felt that I had done something...I don't know...something significant
Neither of these scenarios may have been really dangerous, but for me at the time they were huge. I remember how the fear felt. I remember the moment of decision: I'm not giving in.
Had I not had these two experiences of little risk, I don't think I could have been brave enough to fall in love. I mean really in love...the kind of love that makes you walk that tight wire and jump out on the evidence of true faith you cannot see. But that's another story. Without these little steps of courage, I could in no way wake every day and face the incredible task of mothering my son, who by the way exhibits risk moment by moment.
Without the courage to reach over one of my deepest fears to catch my friend's hand...without having braved the storm in the woods...without risk...my faith would die. Without faith, I couldn't fly. And I did fly. I did.
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