sacred pathways

do you ever tire of this whole grown-up gig?

after our much needed and beautiful little vacation to the beach, from life, there are a myriad of things swirling around in my head this evening. i tell myself it is because now, in these quiet moments, when life is not full-throttle and lived to its fullest, when the air is still, and i breathe,
i have time to think on all these things.

all of a sudden i can't get enough of everything summer. warm breezes and sunshine and parched lips and cool dips in the creek. catching frogs and lightning bugs and picking fresh produce from farmers markets. smelling honeysuckles and lilacs and freshly mowed yards. .

all of a sudden, i want everyone in my life to know where i'm at, how i feel about them, how much they mean to me. and i don't have the words. all of a sudden, i wish i were a child again, if only for the day. i can't wait to go back home this summer for the reunion and the days don't seem to go fast enough.

my half-birthday is june 16th. mom started this tradition for my sister kim and i when we were young, both of us with december birthdays and inevitably getting shorted on the presents circuit during the holidays. so a *half birthday* in the middle of the year was a fun way of extending the festivities: one day out of the summer you got a do-over, of sorts. one or two fun little presents and you got to pick the meal of your choice. mom is and was and has always been, a great cook. i miss moms' cooking these days.

bella will be 8 on june 22nd. that doesn't seem possible.

i haven't had the money to get my NET book yet. which means i haven't studied yet for my test on the the 8th of july. which speaks volumes for how i still feel about my decision to go to school in the first place. i go back and forth so much on this subject, which goes much deeper than anything i could ever even begin to explain. people are full of encouragement and instead of accepting the praise genuinely, i want to shout, "but this isn't what i WANT"and somehow make them understand all the feeling that goes behind that.

in my down time when i'm not trying to think about these bigger things, these goals, i daydream of having my own little salon where people could come and have their "hair did", as they say. as i stand on the front porch after church, watching the wren build a nest in its tiny house and braid my mother in laws hair, running my fingers through, making curls out of bellas great grandmothers thin locks, i imagine it would be much like truvy's little shop in "steel magnolias". a gathering place. my home.

how silly and impractical.

money has been tight. so tight that sometimes i hold my breath so long from the frustration and the sheer immensity of the situation that i forget to breathe again at all.

we'll be in the red yet again, something i've grown accustomed to, by sometime this week when our rent check ever goes through. i can't help it and there's nothing i can do, but pray and trust that God will see us through or grant us mercy in the meantime. He always does. in ways i never fathom.

the only reason we were able to go to the beach was because of our yard sale. we had $80 to go on and linda slipped me some money in an envelope halfway into our trip down, at a rest stop. that money proved to be an absolute godsend and was stretched as far as we could possibly stretch it. we ate light during the day, on groceries we stocked in our motel room and had a few meals out, which linda refused to let me pay for. all of bella's what-nots were courtesy of *nana* too.

i don't think i could ever, ever thank her enough. sometimes, when i allow myself to ponder the immensity of our families' love, i feel incredibly guilty over all the times that both our parents have baled us out. i wish for us, it were as simple as learning from a mistake or "flying right." instead, circumstances and life spiraling out of our control have again and again, slapped us like so many waves against the rocks. without that unconditional love support, that seasoned "hand up", i don't know where we'd be. i hope, often, that one day, these moments will be our testimony. that one day, we can pay this, all of this, forward.

i'm so thankful for these blessings. and more so, on these days, when my heart is still but my mind races and hope is just a little hard to come by.

candace called last night. i saw her number on the caller id. and all of a sudden that number in black and white brought with it a flood of not-so-great emotion. i was at once, relieved that she at least still thought of me, this woman she called her best friend. and then disgusted, that she would even try to contact me after all this time. what's it been now, 2 months? since we spoke, and i made my feeble attempt at closure.

all of a sudden, this hollow aching hole, edged with hurt, emerged. and with it, contempt and anger, at the injustice. and i wonder some days, how long this will stay with me, this ache. how long will i have these moments, when i see a phone number or i bump into someone at the grocery store or some local event. how long will the unfairness burn a tangible hole in my heart, even spreading to my skin.. how long until my mourning is turned into dancing. how long before this, my testimony, can be used for good. for the purpose that i'm sure it is intended.

i don't think about the rape much anymore. but then, these small sharp reminders jab at me from unexpected corners and i'm forced to relive every insignificant detail in shadowed instances that find me unprepared. vulnerable. broken.

my therapy resumes this week, and perhaps this has me more insightful than anything,not knowing what to expect. what thoughts will surface. what things i must face.

in our short trips to the mountains and the forest this weekend, i've been thankful for the solace that east tennessee and north carolina offers, at times, and find the writing of annie dillard, encompassing:

" I think of this house as an anchor-hold. It holds me at anchor to the rock bottom of the creek itself and it keeps me steadied in the current, as a sea anchor does, facing the stream of light pouring down.

It's a good place to live; there's a lot to think about. First, the active mystery of creeks: Theirs is the mystery of the continuous creation and all that providence implies: the uncertainty of vision, the horror of the fixed, the dissolution of the presence, the intricacy of beauty, the nature of perfection.

And then the passive mystery of the mountains: Theirs is the one simple mystery of creation from nothing, of matter itself, anything at all, the given. Mountains are giant, restful, absorbent. You can heave your spirit into a mountain and the moutain will keep it, folded, and not throw it back as some creeks will. The creeks are the world with all its stimulus and beauty; I live there. But the mountains are home."

the message at church today was needed. we're starting a new series titled "sacred pathways" of our lives. how the bible talks about God in two major ways: his immensity and his intimacy. today, our pathway discussed was "secrecy".....our unconscious need for impression management, where we strive so hard to make these impressions in all aspects of our lives, donning a mask without even realizing it. all these parts we play, these roles we lead.

but our audience isn't dozens and hundreds and millions. its One.

taking advantage of these pathways, making our journey a deep one....this is something very much on my mind tonight.