Dating... or not really.

For over two years I've 'tried' dating.  Well, tried if it means I put myself out there on dating sites (plural) and have talked to many, many men.  I've gone on dates with FOUR of them, alas there isn't one where there's that mutual connection and to be frank?  It's gotten old.

So, I quit.

IF there is a man out there, I don't know where he might be.  I realize that God is in control of this too... even this.  I realize that I am NOT in control of any of it at all... ever.  And that makes me pretty frustrated if I am honest.

So this too, I lay at his feet (again) and I'm tired of doing that.  I'm being a toddler again, but we are called His children so he must be used to it, but I don't want that to be me anymore, again.  I want to just trust that he has this and that I can, in fact, just trust him.

I know I'm not alone here, but I am really glad that no one is reading this right now.

The Aftermath of Cranberry

It's Sunday evening.  I just finished a three day weekend at work, so busy and so exhausting.  I'm worn to a fringe.

And I'm jealous.

I hate being jealous and so I am angry too.  Angry and jealous are not good looks on me.  I'm jealous because the world seems paired.  I'm jealous because the world seems paired and partners care for each other and there is no one who cares about me.  No one except God and it seems that God doesn't make dinners for us, not grab lunch when we are hungry and can't leave our booths, nor water.  There are no warm arms to rest in, no one to grab hold of, no one to fall apart with... it's just me and God who seems so far out there and not here and I still don't want to choose some insufficient human because God seems so very, very, very far away.

I know part of this is that I have had a hormonal shift and I'm getting to the age that my body needs more time to process that.  I know it is in part that I am exhausted.  In part I am lonely without a caring partner on the horizon, in part because I miss my husband who was in so very many ways my rock and rest.

But the truth is that I am jealous, and angry that I am jealous.

This man with whom I'd been speaking mocked me as I was willing to give him up because he is not a believer.  He suggested that it's better to not follow God and chase your needs.  I disagreed so we are not talking anymore... and I think it's a good thing, but it still stings.

So I still choose.  I still choose God's way over my own way, even though in the moment it is so hard.

I am glad that I don't know God's plan, because I'd do whatever I thought was best to get to what God has, and I know I am being pressed to trust him and trust that he has this all in hand.  I think I can do that, even if in the moment I get jealous and angry.  There is forgiveness for jealousy and anger.  I can trust.  I can trust a trustworthy God.

Even if it's so hard right now.  I can still choose.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

This is the fourth Christmas without David.  This is my third Christmas spending it alone and while that sounds so depressing to say, I am actually filled with JOY!

I haven't been alone all Christmas this year, just today.  I've been able to connect with friends, people I care about, some with phone calls or texts, most of Skype or Facebook.  (I have to say, as much as people moan about the digital age, I'm grateful for it... so many loved ones all over the world!)

I've been able to watch people get together with loved ones, and their children, happy faces, most of them are relaxed.  I'm so blessed to have this window into the joy of others. 

It brings me joy this year to see that life goes on.  In years past, that hasn't been the case.  I was jealous.  But today I am glad to see that in the middle of friends and family going through hard things that they take time to celebrate together.

I've watched dear people go through serious losses and hardships this year, and yet in this season of celebrating they are choosing to do so.  I have much to learn.  My loss drove me inwards, it's not such a surprise because I'm an inwards type of woman... but I realize that my hurting heart has healed.  Enough so that hiding away isn't what I need.  I'm realizing a new trend.

I want to help the hurting.

I know the depth of loss.  My heart has been broken like a clay pot, but I'm finding that like Japanese Kintsukuroi - the pieces have been repaired with gold... like this:



My pain my experience helps me understand a little.  Our experiences are our ministry.  Through my loss I can care about someone else's loss, or hurt, hope dashed, broken-ness, and JOY.

I don't know what all the next year entails, I know I'm not meant to know - but to experience it in it's fullness.  I'm looking forward to what will come, but even more I'm excited to be in the moment and just live it. 

My prayer for all of us is that we allow our broken pieces will be put together by our skilled craftsman.  Our God.  Jesus, as it has been said so many times, is the reason for the season.  But the whole of that is that we celebrate the advent of God made flesh to live among us... Jesus came to live, and then to die on our behalf so that we could have direct relationship with God.  So we can all be God's kintsukuroi.

Merry Christmas.

And the world flows on.

The world flows on and I am stuck in an eddy.  I'm close enough to the edge of it to feel the flow, to be turned by the flow, and then I am caught up in the swirling backwater again.  Ah, grief.

THREE YEARS and I'm still stuck.  I can't seem to get over the thoughts of what should be, why isn't he here?  why am I alone?

It's my birthday again tomorrow.  He will be forever forty and I am 45 tomorrow.  I have white hair and wrinkles he doesn't know about.  Can he see me?  Wherever he is, does he miss me?  Will I see him again?  My half was ripped away, his own violent action and I'm so angry and feel so guilty for being angry.

I want to move on, but the men I am interested in aren't available, so I take that I'm not really, really ready to move on or I would pick men who could have me in their lives.... well, I only want one, not a whole harem of men (wouldn't that be interesting?)

I wonder if I'll ever be whole.

And I'm so tired of holding my head up.  I'm tired of taking on the world.  I'm tired of getting up every morning and not being able to wake him, or rest against him at the end of a long day.  I'm tired of holding the world up.  Yes, I know.  God.  I know.  I do.

This isn't every day.  This is just a bubble.  I can ride the bubble.  I've ridden this bubble.  Yet, today I feel like I'm drowning.  And the world moves on, flowing on and on and I am stuck in this eddy.

It's the 4th of July this weekend.  I won't do anything.  I'll stand at my bedroom window and watch the fireworks till I am tired, or I'll dork around online until my eyes hurt enough to make me shut them to sleep.  Even if I go someplace, I'll be the add-on.  Thought of as an obligation to include.  I don't fit.

He made me match.  We were the oddballs and we matched and because we matched we fit places.  Or, I thought we did.  Maybe he still felt the oddball.  I'm tired.  I'm tired of swimming alone.

I'm afraid if I say I am tired like this, someone will decide I need intervention, and I don't really.  I'm not going anywhere and my debts make it unlikely that I'll stop living because I can't give up.

It's a pity party day.  Trust me, not only does no one else want to hear this, I don't want to hear myself.  THREE YEARS.  I am dog paddling in the eddy and the world flows on, floats on.

I promised a friend that after a year it gets easier, that her grief will get easier, and it does - it will..  These happen with much less frequency.  Family visits are a trigger for me.  And I had two last month.  Too many.  I love them but I don't want to remember.  I can't feel this sad all the time any more.

I've got next to nothing to give today... and I have to bake because it's the fourth of July this weekend and it'll be profitable.  People think you are brave when you are just responding to survival instinct.  I do not feel brave.  What man in his right mind would want to take this mess on?   I am not always here, but today I am stuck in this eddy.

I had better get myself into the kitchen.  I do not want to go.  But I will keep treading water because that's what I do.  I survive and sometimes I thrive, but I am still stuck in this eddy.  Oh, how I want to flow on.

Letting it go

I've been holding onto the promise of a specific thing.  I've been holding onto this hope for so long.  My fingers have been clenched around it so tight for so long that I am not sure how to let go of it.

But I think I have to let it go.

Not let it go in the hopes that if I do that God will make that thing come around to the way that I want them to be but to really, really let go.  And I don't know if I can do it.

What happens if I don't have the hope of this thing?  Am I going to free fall into nothingness?  Is there a point of life beyond this hope?  I am not sure.  I don't know.

What I do know is that I am loved.  I am loved so much more than this place of holding onto my own desire will allow me to acknowledge.  I've been holding onto this hope so hard that I'm not letting myself trust in the fact that I am loved so much and that there is a plan for what's next.... that I am loved.

So, I need to let go.  I need to close the door.  I need to say goodbye.  God is more than capable of reopening a door if I've closed it wrongly.

Happy New Year (and welcome January, the month of discipline and accountability)

Happy New Year!!

Hooray and be gone 2014, you year of lots of things that I didn't like and lots of things that I did.

Welcome 2015 and all of your adventures, big and small, hard and easy.  What will you bring?  Only God knows.  Literally, only God knows.

But here is January and the call on my heart is Discipline and Accountability.

For the last few months, perhaps the last 6 months I've felt like God was asking for everything.  I mean, he asks that of us always as Christians, to lay down our burdens and to take up his cross and follow - but somehow the call feels deeper again.  Back to Eustace and the removing of the dragon skin.  Another deep wrenching from me the things I put on to hold onto the things I want to hold onto and not be totally his.

So enters January, the month of discipline and accountability.  I should have been doing this before now.  I should have started in September.  It's been brewing since September, but I'm not always ready to be as obedient as I should.  I have control issues.  Oh, boy, do I have control issues.

I'm seeing where my lack of discipline is making me be so distracted by things that shouldn't be an issue at this stage of my life.

I sat down with a note book and made a list.  I made a list of the stupid excess in my life, where I am missing it, what needs to be done so I can be focused on other things.  I tried to be realistic, I know me.  I am undisciplined.

Today was day 1.  Day one.  Ug.  30 days to make a habit.  I need them.  I need good habits and accountability.  Sorry that you who read here get to be subjected to this.

Back here again...

It's five days since Thanksgiving.  My third Thanksgiving without David and I am acutely aware of being alone, again, for the holidays.

I know I am experiencing depression again.  The ending of a market season, the gray days, the prospect of alone holidays, the lack of prospect for the type of deep friendship that I wish for in my life... all of these aspects are weighing on me.  I understand why people become hopeless and despondent at the holidays.

I wish I could say that being a Christian removes all of the difficult things - hurts, loneliness, broken-heartedness, but it doesn't.  Yes, Yes, there IS hope, but belief in Jesus Christ doesn't magic one into automatic peace.

As Westly says in The Princess Bride, "Life IS pain.  Anyone who tells you differently is selling something."

So, I choose to breathe.  I choose to get up in the morning and make something of my day.  I choose to believe that there is purpose in my life.  People who used to be friends of mine would call this 'bootstrapping', and I guess I am.

Things get better when I push myself to be thankful for the good things I ca see in my life, the blessings that exist.

But for now, I'm honest.  I'm depressed.  Life is not the way I would like ti to be.  I have a little tiny sliver of hope, but just that.  It'll be ok.  I keep telling myself it'll be ok.  I hope it'll be ok.