On the Stable Wall

I recently took my teenaged son on his first college campus visit. (I know. Believe me, I could hardly get my head around it myself.) We had a great time together, actually, and we loved the school, but if you know my son, you'll already know that the last thing he wanted was a lot of individual attention. So instead of scheduling a personal visit, we chose to attend an official campus visit day, along with hundreds of other prospective students. This meant traipsing around for a day and half, attempting to keep up with a whole pack of excited, exhausted teenagers and their enthusiastic student guides, as they attended classes, department open houses, Q&A breakfasts, all-campus guest lectures, and residence hall events.

Frankly, I am just too old for all that kind of nonsense.

But my son needs to develop independence, right? To learn how to competently navigate and direct his own educational experience! After all, I'm not going to come to college with him. It's for his benefit that I skip some of those things in favor of a stroll over to the union coffee shop, or a comfy seat in the library. Or at least just sneak out repeatedly to look for a bathroom. (Hey, I already said, I am old!)

It was on one of these covert excursions, while the other students and parents were being herded off to some lecture hall or other, that I found myself in the most depressing, most institutional, most typical college bathroom of the trip. You know the type--outdated tile and fixtures, lots of stray paper towels, the flickering lights reminiscent of Tom Hanks' office in Joe vs. the Volcano. And it was there, on one of the graffiti-covered walls inside a stall, that I encountered the following message: "You are loved. You are chosen."

Today, as we celebrate the holiday, for many of us, our thoughts will turn to the true meaning of Christmas. Nothing, to me, conveys it more purely than this. Our lives are filled with both joy and pain. We live in a world of brokenness. The struggle is real. Every day, we are bombarded with messages from every side, pressing us with their urgency, persuading us of their truth, exhorting us of their importance. "You are not this. You are not that. You must have more, do more. Work harder, be smarter, do better, because there is only you. And you are never enough." But the God of the universe came to us, not in the trappings of state, or even the everyday surroundings of the store or the street, but in the grime and squalor of the stable. By no accident, in the place where things were least inspiring, most gritty, least triumphant, most real, he entered our world with only this message, the same one he has for us today--"You are loved. You are chosen." The writing on the stable wall is the only thing that matters. Today, as every day, you are the Beloved. Not just in your triumph, but in the place where things are most bleak. In a setting knowingly, decisively devoid of splendor, you are the treasure he comes to seek. Wherever you are, even in the grime, the waste, the graffiti, let his message break through.

You are loved.
You are sought after.
You are chosen.
Merry Christmas.

Pass It On

At some early point in my grandparents' marriage, my grandfather bought my grandmother a fur coat. This has always been a fact that fascinated me. Having never known them when they were young and in love, it seemed to me an act so out of character, so at odds with what I knew of them. They were the ultimate practical midwesterners, a farm family whose values of thrift, hard work, and utility saw them through the Great Depression and eked out a living from their land for their family's future. The coat was beautiful. I don't know what kind of fur it was--nothing exotic, I'm sure, most likely rabbit. It had a burgundy lining that was a satiny material, and the one time I put it on, it slipped on so effortlessly and felt so light. And I always imagined that my frugal grandmother, with her warm, sentimental heart, when she wore it, must have felt completely wrapped in such extravagant love.

My grandparents' move from their enormous farmhouse to the tiny apartment where they spent their final years necessitated a major downsizing of their possessions, and the coat was one thing that had to go. As it turned out, there was an acquaintance of the family who had a special skill--she was able to take fur coats and turn them into teddy bears. So my grandmother's coat became several very warm, very soft brown teddy bears. The satiny ribbons around their necks were made from the coat's burgundy lining. Most went to family members--Grandma and Grandpa kept one.

I don't know for sure what Grandma did with it, I only know it was on her bed as long as I can remember. That doesn't mean she slept with it, but I like to think she did. I hate to think of her sleeping alone. I have always hated sleeping alone, even when I was a child. I'm raising at least one child who hates to sleep alone too. After the divorce, when his father had been out of the house for only weeks, it was a first line of attack. "Mom, I've been thinking. Your bed is made for two people, and I really wouldn't want you to be lonely." No. You are not moving into my room. "But Mom, wouldn't it be great if we could just use my room as a playroom? It could be so neat and organized!"  Good try, but still no. I suppose some day he will eventually get too old, but in the meantime, while I feign obligatory mild annoyance at being occasionally woken in the middle of the night for a storm, or a nightmare, or some other reason, I am still just as satisfied that there is space for him to lie down in my room until morning.

There is something telling to me about that moment at the end of the day, when all that's outside retreats and we are left with only our nearest and dearest, pulled close in the place of both our greatest vulnerability and greatest safety. I like to think that on those long nights after my grandfather was gone, it was the bear that kept Grandma company, with the same warm love as the coat he bought her always had. When Grandma died, her bear came to me, and it sits on my bed too. She may not have slept with it, I guess, but I often do. I think about how it must have been for her, sleeping without her friend and partner of 73 years, and how I hope the bear was like having a hug from him again. I think about how, for me, it is like having a hug from her. I wonder, what are the tokens of extravagant love my boys will have from me, the talismans that will keep them company in the night when I am gone? And maybe Grandma and I are both too old to sleep with a teddy bear, but I know she wouldn't have minded about a thing like that, and these things I also know--there is love in the world, and we are not alone. And we must keep passing it on.

Who's Your Daddy

"Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets

and stones those who are sent to her! How often

I wanted to gather your children together, the way

a hen gathers her chicks under her wings,

and you were unwilling."    ~Matthew 23:37

The recent days in America have been difficult ones. Last Tuesday's election results plunged a good portion of the nation into a fog of disbelief, fright, and mourning that is proving difficult for the other half of the country to understand and, failing understanding, to sympathize with or even tolerate. On social media and in other forums around the country, phrases like "crybaby", "whining", "sore loser", and "suck it up" have begun to loom large in the national conversation.

For Christians, this has looked slightly different. (Although, unfortunately, not as different as one might rightfully expect.) A bit less name-calling has happened, but instead there have been repeated admonitions to remember that God is on the throne. For the most part, I've heard these delivered with what I believe to be the best of intentions--reassuring those who fear, and comforting those who mourn. But there is an underlying assumption here, and it concerns me. The implication is that to be angry, afraid, or sad in this situation demonstrates a spiritual weakness; that if Christians really believed that God is in control, if they were truly placing their trust in him, there would be no place for their grief.

To be honest, my household has been struggling with the election results, and for me, the outcome has been cause for immense disappointment and sorrow. I don't believe, however, that a lack of trust in God can be blamed. It seems to me that for Christ-followers, a devout faith may actually be the basis for those feelings.

Many people and groups who have been historically (and are still) at risk in this country have found in our President-elect someone who causes them to fear for their safety, their welfare, their families, and even their lives. In this last week, they have not been consumed with political disagreement, but with the questions, "Am I safe? Are my children safe?"  The call of the church is to be the hands and feet of Christ to just these people--the forgotten, the marginalized, the disenfranchised, the stranger. Christ has charged us with the task of being his ministers of reconciliation, and he tells us that it is our love, more than any other characteristic, that will be our testimony of him to the world. The church has embraced Donald Trump, for many and varied reasons, and some even reluctantly; however, the fact of that embrace means that all of those reasons have been judged more important than his demeaning, threatening, and endangering those that we are supposed to love, defend, and advocate for, and this failure to put love for others ahead of our own concerns has undone me. Here are some of the reasons I grieve.

For people who call themselves followers of Christ to have so failed to love according to his example has done perhaps irreparable damage to our credibility as a church and our testimony for Christ. My sadness is great that, far from carrying out the ministry with which we've been charged, we have most likely driven many away from the church, and even away from Christ.

My heart breaks for those who have been embittered, disillusioned, shocked, and angered by the actions of a church they believed was there to love and support them. Even for those outside the church, I think this expectation existed, but for those within the church, the betrayal has been particularly sharp. Someone has attacked their personhood, placed them in imminent danger, and we, their brothers and sisters, have not risen to their defense--have not even considered it a dealbreaker for doing business.

Most of all, I have mourned for a church who seems, in some respects, to have lost her way--to have traded her spiritual birthright of eternal purpose for the earthly trinkets of power, comfort, and privilege. We have become inextricably tangled in the web of our own desires, priorities, and self-interest; we have ignored the call to stand apart and be witnesses to a separate truth. Honestly, I did not realize we had come here.

The reactions that were sparked in about half of you on reading that last paragraph are yet another reason for my grief. This election has shown that we are not only a country, but a church sharply divided. (And white Christians, we must be honest here--when 90% of our black brothers and sisters have voted against someone that 80% of us have voted for, we cannot continue to talk blithely of racial reconciliation and being one body in Christ, and pretend that this division is not a gaping chasm along racial lines.)  The kingdom of God in which every tribe and nation worships together in harmony is a promise of the future, but those of us who have opened the door and accepted the invitation to walk through should understand that it is meant to begin among us right now. We are intended to be living in that kingdom, but we are so far away.

 

And I believe this, all of it, grieves the heart of God as well--our pain and struggle, our failure, our fallenness, our foolishness, our contentious disunity. I do not doubt for a second that he is in control, as always. But he is generous with grace, adamant about free will, and we have chosen our own path, one that brings harm to ourselves and others, all of whom he loves. And like all of humanity, all the fallen creation, I long in earnest for a better world. My heart suffers together with every other in the agony of childbirth, as we look with expectation to a day when what is broken will be made whole again, and we lament with inconsolable grief for the time and distance we see still to cross.

So yes, make no mistake--my Jesus is King. But he is a king whose fatherly heart has been broken by the grief, fear, oppression, and self-destructive faithlessness of his people since time before time. Don't make the mistake of shaming those whose hearts, however briefly, follow his example.

Step

"Change has to come for life to struggle forward."

  ~Helen Hollick, The Kingmaking

I wrote, some months ago, about the new reality that can be created in our lives by "hit-and-run" experiences.  In that post, I talked about how the survivors of these experiences must work to get to our feet and walk away, to live in the new "after". The thing that is necessary to do so, I said, is constant forward motion. 

Sometimes that forward motion comes in sudden, drastic jerks and leaps--sometimes in small, subtle increments--but either way, as we put one foot in front of the other, we move farther and farther away from the conditions, relationships, and surroundings of the past, and into a new and changing landscape.

In the wake of life-altering moments, many changes tend to come in rapid succession, and often they are unwelcome, unwanted, and even unpleasant. When this happens, we tend to look for refuge in stability. We neither want, nor make, any unnecessary changes—we have all we can do just to adapt to the ones that have been thrust upon us. And for a time, this resistance provides a good and necessary protection.

The refuge of stability has been my watchword for the last four years. I have kept my house, raised my boys, done my job. I’ve devoted myself to the making of a home, the welfare of my family, and the things that are mine to sustain and care for. I have minded my business. But the present becomes the past with surprising speed, and almost before it seems possible, we survivors can find ourselves living in what we once--seemingly such a short time ago--considered the unknowable future. And in the future, where we are now residents, change must come.

Many of you have asked me, over the last couple of years, about seeing someone new. You have known that I’m not out looking. I’ve told some of you—probably all of you—“I’m too old to date.” You’ve argued with me. (And I love you too, kind people.) But I meant it. To be clear, what I have meant by this is that I am no longer in a season of life where it is appropriate, desirable, or in any way appealing to seek out a stranger, whose character, history, and integrity are unknown to me, for the purpose of starting a relationship. I am not a young woman with my life ahead of me and nothing to lose. Too many of my years have already passed, and the ones that remain are too precious to gamble away in that manner--or maybe I simply understand their value better than I did when I was young. Besides, I am no longer traveling alone. I have my boys, and not only do I no longer have the time or the interest to spend in discovery, but any risk to my traveling companions is an unacceptable one. Any possible new relationship for me has meant someone who would be a known quantity--in character, in faith, in integrity, and as a friend and advocate for both me and my children. But I have believed, in the past four years of living and parenting alone, that in the future there would somehow be room for a new relationship in my life. In some ways, I suppose the future is where I expected it to remain. However, the future, almost without my knowing it, has crept up on me.

Stepping out, however slowly, into change, is a good development. Moving forward is what accomplishes the work of healing. But the work of healing, for all of us, is messy, and even when it brings long-term rewards, they are not without accompanying risks. Confusion, fear, grief, and pain are the companions of the joy, gratitude, and healing that are within reach if we can embrace the change in front of us.

It’s easy to understand, I think, how intimidating the future can sometimes seem. Navigating the unknown is always uncertain, often confusing, and sometimes downright scary. For example, the practical considerations in learning to approach an existing friendship in a new way are puzzling. A lot of odd conversations happen, especially around events of common interest, or with mutual friends, that we are now going to together, but both would have attended separately in any case. (My favorite? “How Will We Know We Are At This Thing Together”. Notice who we are concerned about making it clear to. We just do not know how to do this.) But change creates complexities for everyone, and this means that in addition to the confusion and uncertainty of finding a new path forward for myself, there can be anxiety and even fear when it comes to involving others. There is something intimidating about initiating a change in the way others understand my situation; and I’m discovering it can be even more complicated for friends and family to absorb the shift in an existing relationship than it might be to simply accept the presence of a whole new person in my life. Other people’s reactions to change in our lives can be a scary-seeming unknown that rivals, or even exceeds, our own.

In the face of all this, staying safely in the status quo can seem appealing. But not only would that mean missing out on what the future might have to offer, it’s only in moving forward that we discover the hidden things that have been holding us back. The older I get, the more I learn that approximately 73% of conquering fear is just figuring out what you are afraid of. In my case, I have been both surprised and alarmed to discover how much I have believed that moving into the future would somehow demonstrate proof of a lack of commitment to the past. I remind myself forcibly of someone who has suffered the death of a person close to them, and who fears that letting go of their grief will say to the world—and to themselves—that they never really cared for the one they have lost. I have had to realize, as I find myself waiting with fear for that judgement to come, that it exists only in my own heart. It has been difficult work to learn that, unless I can free myself of its expectation, staying safely sheltered in the sameness of the present is simply a way of making my life a shrine to the past.

And the past—oh, the past. Braving the uncertainty of the future and rejecting the false security of the present can be nothing to facing the pain of the past. Healing from old hurts is difficult enough when they are the only things in view, but they can bring pain in a whole new way when they are thrown into sharp contrast with new experiences. That first confirmation of a reality that has never been yours is like nothing else I know of; little compares to the surprise, the disbelief, and yes, I might even say the wonder--but few things can cause you to realize more deeply the extent of your loss. As a result, every moment of joy that comes with a step forward into the new and good can bring with it deep accompanying sadness over wounds inflicted and time lost; tears of gratitude are often equally mixed with those of grief. And yet, as always, there is no way out of our past but through. Full healing can never come until we have discovered the full extent of our wounds. And often, it's our very woundedness that refines us for the life that follows, deepening our wisdom, and heightening our appreciation.

Long after we have picked ourselves up, dusted ourselves off, and walked away from the wreckage, the promise of what might be requires us to keep moving, forward through struggle, uncertainty, and fear, feeling our way into the unknown, and ready to meet whatever obstacles we find there. If that's to be possible, this is what we have to know--our past doesn't need to define our present, but we can use what it teaches us to work toward our future. And thankfully, we don't have to have it all figured out to take a step.

On Politics And Promises

I have a favor to ask. But before you get nervous, don't worry, what I have to say may not apply to you. For the moment, I want to speak only to my own faith community, to those who consider themselves Christians of any denomination, and are therefore my spiritual family. Brothers and sisters, this is for us.

I try, so hard, not to talk about politics. But this year, things are different. They have escalated to the point of being unavoidable, and there is something I really need to ask. It's about the way we are talking during this election season.

You may be voting, or not voting, for any political candidate for any of the following reasons:

• National security 
• Globalism or nationalism 
• Constitutional interpretation 
• Tax policy 
• Education 
• Military spending or deployment 
• Fiscal conservativism 
• More/less expansive role of government 
• Second amendment issues 
• Border security 
• Healthcare 
• Supreme Court concerns

I'd like to ask you to remember, as you speak publicly about your choice, that all of the above are political issues, not spiritual ones.  There is no Scripture anywhere that dictates a stance on these matters; they are subjects of liberty, not of doctrine. They are important issues, to be sure, and your opinion on them is important also, but it is just that--your opinion. Be intentional about making the distinction.

Also, when you talk about opponents of your candidate, or you disagree with others who support a different candidate, please do so with a respect that is becoming of you, whether or not you think it is deserved by the person you're speaking of or with. Choose substance and compassion over insults and mockery. Avoid name-calling. Don't openly revel in things that cause harm or pain, even to those with whom you disagree. Be intentional about using language that shows your allegiance to your King, not your candidate.

You may be wondering why I think I can ask you this. And as a sister in our shared faith, I would have ample grounds to implore you not to jeopardize the reputation and integrity of the church, by binding her to such concerns, or doing so with loose and unbecoming talk. But the reason I am asking is actually much more personal.

You see, you are helping me raise my children. You are the community of faith with whom I have surrounded them, the models I have given them for growing up to be faithful men of God in a broken and hurting world. We are a team, you and I. This business of raising them is hard work, and I can't possibly do it on my own; it really does take a village, and you are the village we live in. And what I want for them is to be strong and healthy, to be independent and mature. I want to raise men who think deeply and carefully about the important things, and consider all points of view. I want them to know that there is sometimes more than one right opinion to have about things, and there is always more than one worth understanding. I want them to learn from you, not what to think, but how. I want them to use the language of love and respect, not the language of hate and fear.  I want them to cling, tenaciously, to the essential truth of the Gospel--which means knowing that the way of Christ is grace over law, compassion over dogma--and when what they're hearing isn't Gospel, I want them to know the difference.

They will learn these things, not just by looking to me, but by looking to you. When you conflate political opinion with spiritual wisdom, you confuse and mislead them. When you talk to and about others in ways that we would correct and discipline in the classroom or the schoolyard, you invite them to do the same. These are the ways we break their trust, let them down, lead them astray. We cannot continue.

I understand it is a lot to ask, for both of us, but this is our responsibility to each other. This is what you promised me, what we promised each other, when we accepted each other into this family, this body of Christ. When I stood there before you as a new mother, hopeful and terrified, with my babies in my arms, I asked for help for a task that was beyond me, asked for a host of mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, to nurture and teach and raise my sons in the faith, and the preacher asked for the ones who would watch over this child, and all of you answered with one voice, "We will." You pledged yourselves to me, and I trusted you with my little ones, who are little no more. Please, church. Keep your promise.

That's Just Perfect

This OCD joke is everywhere now--mugs, memes, t-shirts, and even on an embroidered pillow I saw--but the first time I encountered it was at least 10 years ago, before all that, when it was a cartoon in Reader's Digest. A friend of mine, waiting in the dentist's office, read it, and told me later, "I saw this--it made me think of you!" I guess maybe it was because she had been present to see the look on another friend's face when, on an earlier occasion, they were browsing through my recipe box, and the second friend suddenly asked in consternation, "Wait. Are these in alphabetical order?"

OK, so I have a bit of a reputation. I like things a certain way. The right way.

I like to think of myself as a "recovering perfectionist", however. I hope I'm getting better. After all, I only spent *cough numberofminutes cough* looking for a version of this meme with proper punctuation! Seriously, though, I admit that the siren song of perfectionism has always held a certain lure for me. There is something so appealing about the idea of doing everything perfectly right. And perfectionism, although a futile pursuit, is one that our culture affirms and even idolizes.

Sometimes I think that those of us who are prone to perfectionism tend to think that the only thing wrong with the desire to be perfect is that it's impossible. We all know we can never get there, and that trying will ultimately prove futile. But the truth is, I think it doesn't even matter that perfection is impossible to attain, because even if we could accomplish it, I think we'd find that the accomplishment would let us down. Here's why.

1.  Perfect doesn't touch what we need it to touch.

When we think about being perfect, we have the idea that it means always being right, and always doing right. But in actual fact, to be truly perfect requires something different. Real perfection is not about "rightness"--moral self-improvement. That kind of perfection is actually a lowering of standards, because it's only superficial; it's on the outside. Real perfection would be through and through. In order to be truly perfect, we would need something to touch much deeper--to perfect our hearts, our souls. To make us patient, kind, joyful, humble, forgiving, unselfish. We would need not only to be right, but to be good.

Our real struggle for perfection, then, is over the primacy of self. Removing ourselves from the place of greatest importance is the only path to genuine goodness of heart. And, in a supreme irony, this is the one act that perfectionism will never allow us, because at its heart, perfectionism is all about self. The relentless pursuit of our desire to justify ourselves by our own means, through our own efforts, will yield nothing but an obsession with ourselves and our own outward appearance.

2.  Perfect can't grow what we want it to grow.

But what if I'm mistaken? What if we can achieve goodness through striving for perfection? People smarter than I have certainly thought so. Benjamin Franklin, for example, went to great lengths to record his detailed plan for mastering 13 essential virtues of the heart, including humility. However, I think on deeper examination, we have to acknowledge that even Franklin had to accomplish his plan through trial and error--and it turned out to be a lot of error. In fact, if you read Franklin's journal, you'll find that one of the primary things he learned during his attempt was finding himself "so much fuller of faults than I had imagined", and that is a very important piece of discovery. And in the end, not only does Franklin conclude that it is impossible for him to reach the perfection of virtue he has been striving for, but that, with regard to the problem of pride in particular, "even if I could conceive that I had completely overcome it, I should probably be proud of my humility."

So we see that even if we look deeper, past external self-improvement, to a higher standard or different definition of perfection, the virtues we then value can't be developed through a self-focused act of the will. We might, as Franklin says he did, make some improvement in the mastering the appearance of them, but not the substance. Patience, humility, perseverance, resilience, grace--all these are traits borne of suffering, trials, discomfort, surprise. In order to really grow and change, we have to mess things up, make fools of ourselves, fall down and get back up. We can't become the person we envision without making mistakes. True perfection--or the closest thing we can reach--is only arrived at through the experience of our own imperfection.

3.  Perfect won't do what we want it to do.

But why do we really want to be perfect anyway? I think it's because the idea of perfection isn't appealing only as an end in itself--its attraction is in what we think it will do for us. Deep down, we somehow believe that if we just do everything right, we can somehow make everything else go right too. Perfectionism is an effort to gain control, over ourselves and over our circumstances. If we can just do everything exactly right, we can make sure of the outcomes for the people, interactions, situations, and relationships that make up our lives. Things will always go the way we hope. Certainly, at least, no one will ever be able to look down on us, criticize us, be angry with us, or dislike us if we are perfect. Being perfect will make us good enough, in our own eyes and in the eyes of others. In other words, we believe that our perfection will protect both our loved ones and ourselves from the unexpected, the undesirable, and from failure, pain, and rejection.

The unfortunate truth is that perfection can't cause any of this to happen, or keep any of it from happening. Life is unpredictable, and the world is sometimes a painful and scary place. Bad things happen. They happen to us, and to the people we love. Sometimes this is because we make mistakes, but not always. Sometimes it's because other people make mistakes. And sometimes it's just the way the world is. It's broken, and we can never fix it all on our own. We can only do our best, and even then, even if our best was perfect, it is no guarantee that things will go right, or that others will love us, accept us, or approve of us. As long as we live as broken people in a broken world, there will be tragedy and loss--we will hurt each other, and things that no one understands will sometimes happen. No matter how perfect we are, nothing can change this.

So what can we say then? If the pursuit of perfection is empty, what good can we take away? I think there is still something. The beauty in the complete barrenness, the empty promise that is perfectionism, is that it reminds us who we are. We are the Beloved. And as the Beloved, it is not our job to do any of the things we have tried to accomplish through our own perfection. We cannot save ourselves from pain, failure, or loss; we cannot make ourselves loved, accepted, respected; we cannot ensure that everything in our world will go right; and we do not have to. We were not created for this purpose. As the Beloved, we were created to be loved. And so we are. We need do nothing to earn it, and nothing that we or anyone else can do, say, or think, can change it. Our value is secure--our welfare is assured. Perfection can never offer us either.

Turn It Down

 

I don't know about you, but sometimes, I feel like nobody's listening to me. I talk to my kids--or at least I try--but it seems nothing's getting through.

"Are you even listening to me?"

"Am I talking to myself?"

"Have you heard one word I've said?"

"Hellooo! You!"

"Is my voice invisible?"

 

Now that I have teenagers, the most common scenario (and my least favorite) is the one where I try to get their attention but they have headphones on or earbuds in. This one often starts with my talking to them from the other room, so I don't realize they have any reason other than the usual for not answering, when I say something that requires a response.

 

I get no answer, so I say it again, this time louder.

 

Still nothing. The third time I don't want to waste my breath saying the whole thing over, so I just call out their name.

 

No answer. Now I have stopped whatever I was doing, I'm on my way to find them and figure out what the problem is, and I'm on the fourth attempt to get their attention, so it's easy to call their name pretty loud. It's also pretty easy to tell that I'm annoyed.

Getting within view and spotting the offending headphones doesn't dispel any of the annoyance, but it does make me call them even louder the next time. By this time I'm usually standing almost right next to them. Aaand I'm pretty much shouting. Even then I still often have to do it more than once. And finally, about the time I get to THIS LEVEL OF FRUSTRATION AND VOLUME, they turn around, pull off the headphones, and say, in an offended and angry tone, "WHAT!" 

 

Because I'm yelling at them. They don't like yelling.

Actually, I don't like yelling either. I don't like yelling, and I don't like being yelled at. Honestly, I don't like it when someone is angry with me, period. And I especially don't like it when they are angry with me for being The Yelling Mom, when I feel it's hardly my fault that it takes 8 minutes and a brass band to get their attention.

This isn't the only time this happens, of course. There are other times when they think I am Yelling Mom. For example, any day that I straggle home exhausted from work to find chores undone, trash everywhere, dirty dishes galore, and them in front of video games, I am that mom. And every time, they are angry.

Why do I have to yell at them? Why do I have to keep telling them what they're doing wrong? Why am I interrupting them right when they were about to win? Why do I always have to be so mad??

I get it. Nobody likes to have their fun interrupted by an unpleasant reminder of how they have messed up, or how that mess-up has disappointed, hurt, or angered someone else. A reminder delivered by the disappointed, hurt, and angry someone is even more unpleasant. But the conversation we keep having is, can they expect anything else? If they ignore me when I speak or give directions, if they choose not to take responsibility, if they disregard basic rules of conduct for the household, isn't it reasonable to assume that I will not be happy? And when this happens, guess what? You don't get to be angry about it. Mom's displeasure is a logical and expected result of your actions. 

Right now, every day, as I watch TV or read Facebook, I see this same dynamic being played out all around us, on the stage of race relations in this country. And there is something I want to say to those of us in the white community.

I get it. It's not pleasant to hear about the wrongs that have been done to others on our watch, and it's especially unpleasant to contemplate our own responsibility in them, even if our complicity is simply our own obliviousness. It's tempting to avoid doing so by taking issue with the way the message is being delivered. But friends, please realize what's happening--we have had the headphones on.

We have had the headphones on, and it is time now--time to turn down the music of our own comfortable narrative, and listen to what our brothers and sisters of color have been trying, repeatedly, over many long years, to get our attention to tell us. Time to stop being angry about the tone of voice or the choice of words or the forum used to communicate the message, and take the time to understand the hurt, anger, and frustration that is a result of not only others', but our own actions. Time to stop dictating to people of color the ways that are acceptable to us for them to express their responses to our behavior. We just simply haven't been listening, not for a long, long, time. It's time to start.

True Story

One of my favorite pieces of writing, recently, is a blog post by author Sarah Bessey entitled Off Brand. In it, Bessey uses her marketing background to explore the idea of branding--the way that companies try to define their corporate identity by establishing parameters that say, "this is who we are, this is what we do, this is how we do it"--and how it also applies to individual identity. A brand, she says, is the story we are telling about ourselves to the world, and it is reflected in both the way others think about us, and the way we think about ourselves.

The concept of identity is a fluid one, and as such, it can change many times over a lifetime. As we grow and change, as our circumstances shift, or as events require, the primary way we define ourselves must naturally evolve to fit. Sometimes this process is gradual, an expected part of our life trajectory; sometimes it is desired and even highly anticipated. Sometimes, it is mandated by the advent of tragedy, the circumstances of necessity, or simply the fact that life contains surprises that even the most prescient of us cannot hope to foresee. In those cases, Bessey says, we can sometimes experience an impulse to hold to our brand--to keep telling the same story--even when it no longer reflects what is true or best for us or those we love. "Sometimes," she says, "the story we tell ourselves about our own lives can become a prison, it can keep us from the real life that is waiting for us."

This idea resonates so strongly with me. Bessey's own story of struggle with brand transition is one of mothering, of how the experience of both birth and parenting with her youngest child was so different than the story she had previously told of herself as a mother that she believed she had failed both herself and her daughter. But I have experienced some of this same struggle many times in my life, as I have gone from wife, to teacher, to mother, to homemaker, to....well, whatever it is I am right now. I remember my shock at realizing, almost a full year after the change had happened, that someone who is working full-time hours probably should no longer think of herself as a stay-at-home-mom; somehow, my brain had failed to make the transition. No wonder I felt like such a terrible stay-at-home-mom. I wasn't one. And lest you think I learned my lesson over time, don't forget how recently you have heard me speak in these pages about sitting down with my sons and concluding that maybe it was no longer a reasonable expectation for us to gather at the table around a home-cooked meal every night; being a full-time (or more) working single parent of teenagers is yet another shift in brand from being a working wife, partner, and co-parent of young children. I was trying to tell an old story, and failing--the inevitable result when the story we try to tell about our lives no longer matches the reality.

Of all the times my brand has changed, however, none was more difficult than the realization that I must close the book on the story of teaching as my lifetime calling. I was a teacher, from a family of teachers, and I had known from my earliest days that I would always be a teacher. Those of you who know me have probably heard me talk about how, when I was very young, I didn't know that a person could grow up and be anything else--I thought everyone was a teacher. This was not about a career. This is who I was. That remained true as I finished my education, as I worked odd jobs looking for my first employment, and when I finally reached that milestone, my own classroom in my own school. I loved every student, every experience, every minute. I was where I belonged. But life, as it has a way of doing, intervened. My husband got a new job out of state. We had a baby, and then another. When people asked, "What do you do?" I still kept saying, "I'm a teacher," but I fretted about how many years I was missing in the classroom, how few I'd gotten to spend there, how few would be left to me. Time passes so quickly; so soon, I wasn't young anymore. And at some point it came time to realize that I would not only take, but had already taken, a different path. I was not a teacher. I would not be a teacher. It's hard to describe the depth of my lament for this loss--I was inconsolable.

As more time has passed, I have had the opportunity to do many other things, none of which would have been possible had I held to the story I had always imagined instead of the one that presented itself. I even had the opportunity to teach again, this time in a completely different setting and a completely different way, and it is an experience so close to my heart that I would never trade it for anything else I can possibly envision. And when the possibility presented itself of returning to the classroom in the way I once dreamed of, I found that not only my life, but even myself, had changed in ways that meant I would no longer choose that path, even if I could. I work now at a job I love, for a cause I am passionate about, with incredible people, and in a way that is perfect for me and my family, the way we are right now. And I suppose I believed that my past identity was in the past.

In fact, I suppose the reason I have so often had difficulty with telling a new story to myself and to the world about who I am, is that I have believed that all my past identities are in the past--that embracing the new story means replacing the old. But this week, I've had cause to reconsider. 

On Facebook, I got a message. "Miss Sheltra, were you my fourth grade teacher?" A former student, now grown, of course. And I cannot tell you what it has been like to look at his pictures, hear about his amazing life and accomplishments, and to be told that, in his story, I am remembered. So I have been thinking about what happens when our lives change, when circumstances shift, and our story changes. Until now, without evidence to the contrary, I have felt that each new story represents a loss of the old--that all the previous people I was, stories I told, must be discarded as no longer valid, having no more value, now that there is a new and better version. But I have been wrong. A good story is always a good story.

My student's voice has been, for me, like a marker that proves the ongoing existence of that other, former me. It testifies to the continued reality of a story I am no longer living. "You were the best; I always remember you." I am someone else now; but I was there, and I am still a player in that story. All is not lost or forgotten. I was there, and all the stories are still true.

Life is unpredictable, and time and circumstances may create of us a different parent, spouse, friend, or simply a different person. In our lifetimes, the story of who we are will change, and change, and change again.  But all the stories remain true; all still hold value; there is room for all to be beloved. No matter how many times you may find yourself re-invented, you are still all the people you have been. You have not lost yourself. The work you have done, the lives you have touched, the time you have invested--their worth has not diminished. You have made a difference. You matter. Not just the you in the story you are telling now, but the you in all the stories you have told or will tell. Everything good that has come out of each of them remains, and you carry it with you. You were there, and all the stories are you--they are still you.

Parenting: Communications from the Front

Txt: Mom can I go to Dairy Queen, (friend) is driving
Rply: Who else is going?
Txt: (Friends)
Rply: OK, that's fine. Four people in the car is enough. Don't do anything stupid and don't die. And stop rolling your eyes at me, I'm your mother.
Txt: Mom its fine
Rply: Have fun.

Txt: Forgot key
Rply: OK, I'll drop it off for you. Where is it?
--------------
(Later, at the school)
M: "This is an extra key, I couldn't find yours. Where is it?"
B: "I don't know." (Shrugs, puts hands in pockets)
B: "Wait. I think I found it."

Txt: I should not have to text you from inside the house. Come downstairs.

(At end of school day, after being informed that I will come to pick him up)
Txt: Am I supposed to get on the bus?
Rply: No
Txt: Ok where are you then?
Rply: DRIVING
Txt: Oh. Sorry.

Txt: Why are you on the way here or was tht meant for sombody else
Rply: I didn't tell you I was on the way there.
Txt: ok
Rply: Worse news--unidentified person on way there.
Txt: Lol no I just flipped through the previous txts on accident

(Leaving for work in the morning, beef jerky stick is discovered under windshield wiper of truck)
Txt: Have a nice snack. --annanymous

Txt: Are you alive?
Rply: Yes mom im alive
Txt: I assumed so, but it never hurts to check.

You're the Hero of Your Story

Marriage is a fairy tale.

At least according to Facebook. There are so many photos with sunshine, and flowers. Mostly in fields, it seems. And the people are always laughing. And then there are the quotes. Oh, the quotes. "A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person." "My husband is a promise that I will have a friend forever." "I look at you and see the rest of my life in front of my eyes."

Whew. That's a lot to live up to. 

But here's the thing. I am from what some would consider a fairy tale family. A few weeks ago, my parents celebrated the anniversary of their 50th year of marriage. Both of them come from similarly happy and life-long unions, one set of my grandparents actually having been married 73 years. And here's what I know, having been raised and surrounded by folks who pretty much have a handle on making this marriage thing work. It is much more gritty, difficult, and complex than all that stuff makes it sound. I've written about this before, but relationships that work involve such a complicated interplay of so many factors, and the quotes, tweets, snaps, and sound bytes that are the passing tokens of superficial acquaintance cannot possibly communicate them. Marriage is a story, but it's not a fairy tale.

For some, that story is truly a romance, and a happy one. Even below the surface of the appearance created by carefully curated social media, there is a strong, healthy, happy, and rewarding relationship that will go the distance. For some marriages, however, this is not the case.

I'm not suggesting that any relationship is perfect, or perfectly easy. But there is a different reality for relationships that are fundamentally working, and those that are not. Just like a healthy person, a healthy marriage can have a lot of room for improvement--but if you are ill, you know it, and if this is the reality of your marriage, you know this post is for you.

A struggling marriage is not always destined for divorce--these partners may have commemorated many years together, and may continue for many more--but it is also not necessarily guaranteed healing, and this makes things complicated. An anniversary is a reason for celebration, but it cannot always be met with pure joy and gratitude. Relationships that do not offer the rewards of a healthy partnership, or are in some way fundamentally dysfunctional, can cause every anniversary to bring mixed emotions. Not only is there the sadness of the inescapable reminder that this occasion is not what it should be, or what you wished or hope for, but others' congratulations can seem out of step and inappropriate--even hypocritical. Anniversaries are not the only time this happens, of course. Weddings, other people's anniversaries, marriage sermons at church, things published by friends on Facebook, even just regular, everyday conversations, can inspire a complex cocktail of guilt, regret, longing, resentment, shame, and even anger.

I understand. I have friends. I go out in public. I read Facebook. I see all the advice, the testimonies, the memes. I've been told, just like you have, to be married to my best friend, and vow to laugh together every day, and have a marriage that makes my kids want one just like it. All those things exist for a reason, and they will likely always exist, and they are meaningful to someone, but it doesn't have to be you. Here is the thing I want you to know.

You don't have to have a perfect marriage, or even a good marriage, to be doing a good job at marriage.

Marriage takes two. Two imperfect, broken, vulnerable people. You are the only one of those people you can control. If you have remained a willing partner, if you have done all in your power to make yourself able to love, if your faith, though battered, has remained unbroken by loss, pain, and disappointment, then you are doing the best that anyone has ever done at marriage, in the face of daunting odds.

You will go on hearing the happy romances, and even sometimes the fairy tales. But know that you are telling a different story, and you can honor your own narrative. Your story is no less real and right. Your story is no less beautiful and powerful. You are telling a story of love, faith, endurance, and sacrifice. You are the hero of your story.

For the Single Moms

I admit, right up front, I am far from an expert at the single mom thing. For one thing, I have only been a single parent for four years, which is a blink of the eye compared with many of my friends who have raised their children alone, maybe even from the beginning, and are still going strong all these years later. Also, my kids do have a dad in their lives, so, unlike many moms I know who are truly going it alone, I do have someone who shares some of the cost and time involved in raising kids, and is invested in their safety and welfare. All of which is to say, I know that there are many mothers out there whose strength, tenacity, courage, and endurance I have not been called upon to match, and I'm sure any one of them is better suited to share these thoughts than I. But since I am all I've got right now, I intend to give it a shot anyway. I've learned a lot in these last four years--here is what I want to tell you, all of you, the single moms who are my friends, companions, support group, inspiration, and sanity, as we walk this path together.

1. You can do it. 

Seriously. You can. I know, I know, my texts say otherwise. They say, "I can't do this," and "Seriously. I can't," and "Please come and get them, someone else should do this." But don't listen to the texts. They are sent in moments of duress, they don't mean anything. We all have those moments. Right? (We do all have those, right? That's not just me, right?)

Believe me now when I tell you, in this (reasonably) sane moment, that you are so much stronger and better than you think, and you can do the things your kids need from you. It's so hard sometimes, I know, to take the high road. It's hard to make the choices that are in their best interests when those don't always coincide with the choices that are in ours. It's hard to act intentionally rather than react emotionally. It's hard not to come home at the end of a long day and yell, because there are dishes everywhere, and they were supposed to start the laundry but they "forgot", and no one but you has EVER emptied an ice cube tray, and after all, we can't do everything ourselves. It's hard to remember in that moment that they couldn't possibly understand the weight, and that we wouldn't really want them to--hard to remind ourselves that it isn't their fault that we are the only ones, and they are children, just children. It's hard to do the full-time day at work and the full-time night at home and the all-the-time activities at the school, and still listen politely, through bone-deep exhaustion, as a part-time parent talks about how difficult things are. It's hard to bite our tongue and swallow our tears and wave them out the door and say only, "Have a good birthday!" or "Have fun!" on Christmas Eve. It's hard to have them so close, every second of every minute of every day, and it's hard--so, so hard--to let them go.

But one thing I know is that when it comes to them, you can do anything. You have made it this far, and everything you have done and are doing is for them. Maybe even the reason you are doing it on your own is because of them. And you have an untold reservoir of strength that even you do not know the depths of, and you will draw on it when the moment comes, and you will not be disappointed with what you find. You may stumble, and you may fall, and it may not feel like it, but I promise--you can do this.

Except when you can't. Because....

2. Sometimes, you just can't.

Honestly, there are things that are just beyond one person's capacity to bear. There is only so much of us to go around. There won't be time, money, energy, or emotion to spare for everything--it's just not possible. Check the homework folder? Nope. Return email? Uh-uh. Clean up this atrocious mess? That would mean I'd have to get up off the couch. Sometimes we just can't go to one more track meet. NOT. ONE. MORE. Sometimes we have to say no to things, things we once did or always wanted to do, things that are important to us or to the kids. Sometimes we have to sit down and have a family meeting to decide that there will be no more cooking dinner--ever--because we just can't do it anymore. (Completely hypothetical. Never happened.) (OK, fine. That one's real.) Sometimes we simply cannot listen to one more second of conversation about the most amazing fun and awesome family game night at Dad's, or force ourselves to smilingly accept the warm, homemade, organic, fresh-baked, chocolate oatmeal cookie from the new woman in our kids' (and ex's) lives. We just can't. We can't even.

But here's the thing. And listen carefully, because this part is important. That's OK.  That's been hard for me to get to, but there has never been a time when it wasn't true. Your kids don't need you to be invincible. They don't need you to be perfect. In fact, they need to know that you sometimes can't. They need to know that you need their help. They need to know that you feel the hurt and pain in your lives together, just like they do--that you are all in it together. They need to know that you sometimes get sad, tired, and angry, sometimes make mistakes, that you are human, just like them and just like everyone else, and that these things are survivable. You are doing more for them by modeling healing, grace, and resilience in the face of all you cannot do, than you ever could by making them think there is nothing you cannot do. One of the most important things they will ever learn in life is that true strength comes only from acknowledging our own weakness--if all they see in us is an unattainable perfection, how will they not simply become discouraged and give up when, inevitably, there comes a time when they just cannot? 

So when you're at the end of your rope, just tie a knot and hang on, because even then, especially then, you are doing what you need to do for them. And, most importantly of all...

3. You are enough.

I know it will never be possible to do everything for them. We can't take away the events of the past. We can't get them all the things we will never afford. We can't give them the father or the family we always hoped they would have. No matter how much time and attention we had to offer them, it would always be possible to find a way that we could do more, give more. But right now, we are giving them the thing they need from us the most, which is ourselves. We are giving all we have, and that is not only sufficient but is actually abundant--many others have so much less. Even though it feels as though there is never enough time, never enough energy, never enough money or resources or sleep to go around, we are doing it, friends, and we have got this. Even when we haven't.

You are enough, just the way you are. You're all the mom they need.

#MaybeHeDoesntHitYou

Maybe his eyes are warm and his smile is kind,

When he wraps you in the glow of his attention.

Maybe he talks of the future,

A future with only you in it,

That the two of you will share.

Maybe he is different, one of a kind,

And you love him for that,

And you understand him, he says, like no one else.

Maybe he loves it that you are strong, smart, confident,

But you could be a little less stubborn at home,

Maybe just ask less questions once in a while,

Maybe not talk so much.

 Maybe he doesn't want to hit you,

So when you do those things that make him so angry,

He just breaks things instead.

Maybe he doesn't hit you, but he's hurt

Because when he's angry, you are afraid,

And that means you don't trust him,

And whose fault is that?

Maybe if you went to the gym and lost some weight

Or grew your hair longer like he wants

Or wore more makeup

Or got someone to help you figure out how to buy some decent clothes,

Or just worked a little harder to please,

He wouldn't have to be this way,

Because after all,

How can you expect to change the way he treats you 

If you aren't even trying?

Maybe you try as hard as you can

Because you have kids and parents and friends and rules

And he is the broken one and you are the strong one

And everyone is depending on you to make this work,

And that's your job.

Maybe he knows you'll never leave.

Or maybe,

None of the things he said about you were true.

Nothing But the Truth

I've always felt, for some reason, ever since I was a child, a pressure to answer any question that was put to me, as accurately, truthfully, and correctly as possible. Unfortunately, sometimes accuracy, truth, and "correctness" have been in conflict with each other. When that happens, I have never known what to do. My seventh-grade science teacher said to me, with a pained sigh, "Lisa. Just go back to your desk, and mark. true. or. false." 

I am caught between all my felt obligations--to give the questioner the answer they are looking for (correctness), the actual facts of the situation (accuracy), and the real heart of the matter (truth). I try hard--often too hard--to reconcile all three, to package the truth together with the facts and make it fit in the correct box. But sometimes there just doesn't seem to be any box that will hold the answer that is true.

Nowhere have I felt this more keenly over recent years than when it comes to my divorce.

When bad things happen, it's only natural that people have a lot of questions. Painful things are hard. They are scary, and not just for the person they have happened to. We are afraid, and we need answers. Sometimes, we look for the answers that will comfort us in doctrine, research, or teaching. Sometimes we simply find them in our own opinions. Sometimes we look to the person who has been most affected, to tell their story, to supply the facts. Knowing the answers lets us feel like we can make sense of it all, like we have it figured out--even that we can protect ourselves from suffering the same outcome.

The questions I've experienced surrounding my divorce have come from all of these places. They've sometimes been asked as questions, and sometimes been expressed as certainties, but even when they are made as pronouncements of fact, there is still a query behind them that is directed with expectation at me. Which answer box does my situation fit in?

Was the divorce my fault? Was it his fault? Which one of us divorced the other? Was it because of an affair? Maybe even one of those dreaded "emotional affairs" we are so fond of warning about? Was it because we thought we could just give up when the going got tough--because we didn't remove "divorce" from our vocabulary? FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, DID WE LET THE SUN GO DOWN ON OUR ANGER??

"Teacher, was it this man who sinned, or his parents, that he was born blind?" 

We know these are the possible correct answers. Please choose one. We are waiting.

The problem is, I am being asked a question that I can't answer. Not because I don't know the answer. No. I know. In fact, I am the expert. I know every detail, every moment, every memory and scar. I can't answer because it's an impossible question, it's a trick question. No one could answer it.

I didn't get divorced because I wasn't open to reconciliation, or because I didn't pray the Scriptures for my husband, or because it was never a true Christian marriage to begin with. (All of which, in case you are wondering, have actually been said to me.) I didn't get divorced because I knew someone else who got divorced, even though statistics show that people are much more likely to get divorced if they know someone who has, because seeing others who just give up when things get difficult can make you think it's an easy option to give up too. (Yes, also said to me.) I wasn't just unhappy with my husband and decided to get rid of him--in doing so, by the way, making a friend who is currently struggling in marriage think that maybe she can do the same. (Yep. This one too. Not by the friend, of course.)

I know this isn't what people want to hear, but the truth at the heart of my divorce will not fit into any of these preconceived theological certainties. You won't find the answer to it in any article with five easy tips for keeping your marriage happy, or five terrible mistakes to avoid. No marriage class or seminar would have fixed it. Please understand, if any of these things have been valuable to you or are relevant to your experience, I am not dismissing that. I am speaking only of my own situation. The sweeping generalities are part of the problem. But my story, my counselor tells me, only I will truly know, and that will have to be enough, both for you and for me.

So people. Christians. Friends and acquaintances, brothers and sisters, family. We have come from the same place, you and I; we've walked the same, familiar spiritual path, and I understand. I know that not one of you means me any harm. I'm sure that most of you, if you are aware of having had these questions for me at all, stopped asking them long ago, and do not even realize that I am still struggling to answer them, every time I hear you talk about marriage, divorce, and relationships. I'm just learning, myself, how much I still feel the pressure to answer correctly, in a way that will satisfy you, and I know that much of that pressure is coming from no one but myself. I do love you, and I believe we have a responsibility to each other.  I believe we are accountable to each other. I do. Nevertheless, I am finally coming to know, probably too late in life, that sometimes the problem is not with the answer. Sometimes it is with the question. And I have reached a point where the effort of trying to make the truth fit into one of the boxes is tying me in knots. It is hindering my forward motion. There's a problem with the question, and it's time I stopped trying to answer it. It's time, as my counselor says, for me to learn to honor my narrative, not to defend it. It's time to tell myself, and everyone else, the truth. The truth is, it's a bullshit question. It's as simple as that.

Diagnosis Day

As the parent of teenagers, I'm accustomed to having my kids think that the majority of what I do is weird. Most of the time, I figure this is just biology doing its job, but sometimes I have to admit that they might have a point.

A couple of weeks ago, I was having a conversation with my son, and I started talking about an idea I had to mark this year's Diagnosis Day, my annual commemoration of the day cancer became a part of my life. "Mom," he said, "no offense, but Diagnosis Day seems kind of weird. I mean, I could see if you were going to celebrate, like, when it was over or something. But diagnosis seems like a bad thing. Why would you want to celebrate that?"

I think this is actually an understandable question. So, instead of the day I got cancer, why not celebrate the day I beat cancer?

One reason is that there really is no such day. In my own case, I was officially "cancer-free" as soon as my surgery was completed, but I had in front of me another 18 months of multiple types of chemotherapy, radiation, and several years of drug therapy that is still actually ongoing. There was no time in that round of bruising, scarring, body- and soul-battering struggle for survival that seemed the appropriate moment for celebration.

Not only that, but I believe in every case, not just mine, even once treatment is over, even once someone has uttered the magical words like "remission" or "cancer-free", only if you have not had cancer can you believe that there is ever, ever a moment when it is completely and conclusively behind you. Just last week, I had a volunteer in my office at work, telling me about his relief that his oncology appointment that morning had gone well. He said, "I mean, I already know I'm in remission and everything, so I know it was fine, but...you know." I said, "It's always there." We nodded, knowing.

Newly diagnosed, I had a veteran say to me once, "It just walks right in and pulls up a seat, doesn't it?" And that is still the best description I have ever heard. Cancer pulls up a seat at the table of your life, sits down like a family member, makes itself at home. It moves in and out of your spaces, occupies your thoughts, becomes your closest companion, at least for a while. Although the chair may sometimes be empty, it remains, always a reminder of its absent occupant. Diagnosis is the beginning of a lifetime relationship, in a way you can't realize until it has begun. It reminds me of the way some friends of mine, years ago before any of us were parents, after winning a long battle with infertility, around the beginning of the second trimester of their much-longed-for pregnancy, asked their OB, "So, when can we stop worrying?" (Parents of adult children, I can hear you laughing.) Once you've become a part of each other, there will never again be a time when the thought, the worry, the awareness, will be absent in your thoughts, even when you are no longer united in body.

But there is a reason for marking Diagnosis Day that is about more than just having no clear end-point to commemorate. While my son is right that a cancer diagnosis seems like a bad thing--and I won't argue that it is a positive experience that everyone should have--those of us who have sat in its company know that it brings along with it other, more welcome guests. The lessons, people, and events that accompany it will change your life in ways that are painful, beautiful, and unexpected. You will grow in ways you didn't know you needed to grow. You will learn something important about the people and relationships in your life, even if those lessons are difficult. Things will be revealed, refined, clarified. Whatever else happens, you will never be the same again.

When I had just received my diagnosis, on the long, exhausting day I met my whole medical team for the first time, I stopped on the way home for Chinese food and caffeine. Too tired and overwhelmed to be hungry, I picked at my food; finally, before leaving, I opened the fortune cookie to the tiny slip of paper that read, "You will have much to be thankful for in the coming year." I put my head in my hands, there at the table among the sauce packets and chopstick wrappers, and sobbed outright with relief and gratitude. The words that penetrated my numb, shocked heart and mind that day are still on my refrigerator where I see them daily, and they are as true now as they were then. That year, and every year since then, has been a gift--a bittersweet gift that cannot be explained, and that I would not trade for anything either more or less, even though it is not a gift I chose. And that, every year, seems like a thing worth celebrating.

Happy Diagnosis Day.

After

"Whenever you take a step forward, you are bound to disturb something.

 You disturb the air as you go forward, you disturb the dust, the ground."

~Indira Ghandi

One of my favorite artists, Carrie Newcomer, has a song titled "Before and After". In it, she describes the way that trauma and tragedy strikes us--"The dust settles after a hit and run, bewildered by the damage done". The metaphor always catches me, with its sense of shock, bewilderment, confusion, and, if you have had a moment like this, that unique sensation of time coming to halt. Everything stopping. An end to the world as you know it. It seems as if nothing will ever be the same again.

And, in fact, it won't be. It will never be the same.

This is the first, maybe the hardest piece of learning--that it cannot ever be the same again. As Carrie says, our lives from that moment onward can be framed in terms of "before" and "after". These moments, seasons, experiences, are the watershed moments of life. They change us. They change everything.

Sometimes, it seems as though it takes everything in us just to get from before to after. We put our energy into surviving. We are not sure if we will make it. We keep on, maybe only because others are depending on us and quitting is not an option. We get up another day. Others move around us as if in a dream, as if life continues as always. We keep getting up again, another day and then another. And eventually, to our great surprise, we are through. Everything is not made better, things are not fixed, our loss has not been returned to us. But there is life on the other side of our pain. The question is now, what shall we do with it?

Everything has changed, and we are faced with choices. What does our path forward look like in the new world that has been created? One thing is clear--we can't remain the same. We can try, of course, and some do. But the space that used to hold us has shifted, and any attempt to go on living in the "before" will simply be a painful reminder that "before" is gone forever. As the circumstances of our lives change, our choices and responses must adapt to things as they are, not as they once were. 

Seeing things through new eyes, making new choices, is hard too. Now, not only must we realize that things will never be the same again, but we must learn to want something new. We must do battle with the lie that wanting something good for ourselves in the present is a betrayal of the past; we must tell ourselves the truth, in spite of what our deceitful hearts whisper--that the past is no longer here, and that it no longer requires our devotion. We must know that our love for what was torn away from us in the past is not diminished by our ability to find new life, new love, as our wounds heal and we begin to live in "after".

What happens to "before" then, once we are walking the path of "after"? Immediately after my divorce, someone close to me said, "Now it's time to take some time to heal before moving forward." How nice that would be.  :)  Unfortunately, the healing can only happen by this constant motion forward. Just sitting still or rolling up in a ball, thinking, "Now I'm going to get all healed up before I do anything else," while it sounds very appealing, is not moving away from "before" and toward "after". Healing is a process more like walking across a live minefield. We will only know what's out there when we come across it. "Before" does not disappear. It will never go away, nor should it.

What this means is that the dividing line between before and after is not a clear and bright one. They are inextricably intertwined with each other. Healing from the tragedy and trauma of the past can only be accomplished by moving steadily forward toward the future; the path to the future will always wind through the memories, losses, and fears that are the landmarks of the past. 

So if, like me, you're moving on today, know that moving into our "after" is not a betrayal or an abandonment of our "before".  We can move forward with no harm to what was worth keeping. And if, as we go, we sometimes encounter the pain and loss as well, we can't be discouraged. The dust that has settled in the wake of the impact will inevitably be stirred up again as we survivors struggle to our feet and begin to move away. But never fear--we are on the right path.

How's That Working For You?

I am not a morning person.  And by "morning", I actually mean "before noon".  If I'm going to get up and get going in the morning, I need something, as my friend and director Julie used to say, "to take the sting out", and that usually means food. Fortunately, one of our regular receptionists subscribes to this same theory of mornings, and whenever she's in the building before noon, she comes bearing donuts.  LOTS of donuts.

In my workplace, many people do not regard the donuts as a positive development.  I am surrounded by co-workers who meticulously track their weight, body measurements, miles run and walked, calorie intake and burn rate, and various metrics of food ingestion.  People monitor their daily grams of protein or sugar, eat "meals" of carefully measured amounts of cottage cheese and peanut butter, and replace food altogether by drinking mad-scientist-looking concoctions that they create in the break room blender or bring from home in a Mason jar.  One of my co-workers appears to subsist completely on a diet of popcorn and grapefruit--when I asked him if he eats anything else, he said, "Lettuce?"

This, as you can imagine, leaves me alone with a lot of donuts.

It's a problem.

A couple of weeks ago, I was in the break room with my friend Victoria, contemplating the vast array of fried sugary goodness.  She was saying that she had been really disciplined and hadn't eaten one.  I was saying that I had eaten one, and that the last thing I needed was another.  Victoria laughed.  She said, "You skinny people. Small people always want to be smaller.  I'd be happy if I was your size."

All I can say in my own defense, is that at least I had the grace to be embarrassed about it.  I told Victoria, "I'm sorry.  I do get the problem. I actually wrote a whole blog post about it. But it's hard, when it's yourself."  Victoria, always gracious, agreed.  "It is."

And I walked away kicking myself, but even then, even then, here's what I was thinking.  I was thinking about how many times I have told myself exactly what Victoria said.  That there are people who would be happy to be my size, who would consider themselves skinny and beautiful, who would accept and love themselves in my body, so why isn't that enough for me?  If so many other people would be happy with what I have, I should be happy with it myself.

I thought about it, off and on, for the rest of the day, and until now.  And I'm happy to say that at some point along the way, my thoughts about it changed, when I suddenly realized something.  If being my size would really make people happy, then why doesn't it work for me??

I know.  You think I already said that, right?  You think I'm just repeating myself.  But listen.  Just hang in there with me for a minute.  The words are almost the same, but follow me--think.  Think about it differently.  Victoria said she would be happy if she was my size, and I believed her.  We both believed her.  But let me ask you a really important question: would she??  Would any of the people I was thinking of earlier--if they became my size, would they really be happy with it?  Because I think that if being my size (or any size) is really what makes people happy, then it would be working for me. And not just me, but all the small, skinny people Victoria is talking about who always want to be smaller.  It would be working for every woman I wrote about in that blog post who is 25 pounds lighter than me but still thinks she needs to lose 10 pounds.  And for every woman I see at the gym and think, "I'd be happy if I was her size," but she's still frowning later when I see her on the scale. I have been thinking of it backward.  It's not that if other people would be happy being my size, that's proof that I should be happy with it.  Instead, it's that if I'm not happy being my size, it's proof that no one else would be either--at least not if size is what they were depending on for that happiness.

And the people I am really envying?  The people who are at peace with themselves, body and all?  If they are happy, it's not because they are smaller than me. It's because they are smarter than me. Because at that moment, I see, in a blinding flash, AGAIN, the lie that has crept in yet another crack and obscured this truth:  If being any certain size would really make us happy, make us love ourselves, accept ourselves, become witnesses to our own beauty and power, then it would already be working for all of us.  This lie--that skinniness equals happiness, or worthiness, or lovableness, or even beauty--has so deeply pervaded our cultural and individual consciousness that even when we have seen the falsehood in it, even when we are vigilant in our attempts to combat it, it still lurks there, just under the surface, secreting itself in the hidden places we will not see, camouflaging itself in the cleverest disguises, manipulating even our attempts to diminish it into mind-bending tricks that unknowingly grow its power.  It is evil. And I am not exaggerating.  If being the Beloved is indeed the core truth of our existence , the sacred truth on which everything rests, then this is its true unholy opposite, this lie that says we can never be perfect enough, pretty enough, small enough to be loved.

Almost every morning when I eat breakfast, I see this tagline on the back of my cereal box:  "More whole grains, less you!"  Let me ask you this, what kind of a message is that?  Whose voice is it, that we still, in spite of everything, are allowing to say to us, "You know what would really be great here?  Less you.  If you could just kind of shrink down a bit.  Just keep getting smaller. The closer you are to non-existent, the better that will be. We'll all like that.  You'll be happy then.  Trust me."

Make no mistake, people.  It's not the donut that is our enemy.

10 Things That Are Not Actual News

1.  A celebrity couple starts a relationship

2.  A celebrity couple ends a relationship

3.  A celebrity posts a picture of something on social media

4.  Donald Trump says something stupid or insane or outrageous

5.  Someone made up a new hashtag

6.  A celebrity has a child and gives it a name

7.  Some people are reportedly upset over some trivial daily matter (drink cups, holiday sayings, clothing trends)

8.  Some people are upset over people being upset over trivial daily matters

9.  A celebrity does pretty much anything that constitutes normal, everyday life

10.  Something crazy-sounding happens in WalMart