LackLuster Faith and Keeping On

I know it's been a while, but geez, what a month. Sometimes it feels like this horrid month will never be over (I mean, it only just passed the two week mark), but then I realize that after next week it's December, and I think:

Well, Fuck.

This month has been such a challenge thus far, which is a nice change from all the boring months I've been having lately. Really. I mean, life is beautiful and breath-taking and brilliant and all sorts of other fantastic b-words, but it is also just plain hard. It is so unbelievably hard sometimes that it makes my breath almost hurt, and let's face it, there aren't any nerves for sensing pain in breath- it's just air after all, so life must be REALLY hard to be giving my breath pain receptors.

I mean, whose idea was it for me to take an ice-pic to my heart and split it into bits for scattering across the country? It's as though I'm a bit of saint that's been distributed to different churches for safe-keeping. This whole tri-coastal thing (if we're counting West Michigan, "the Other West Coast", and how can this royal we not?) sucks. I don't think there's a better or more eloquent way of expressing how much I dislike being separated from people and places I love by this much space. It sucks.

Then there's the murkiness. I've had a residual sort of gross, murkity-murk clinging to the insides of my pockets and hanging about my scarf lately. I can't seem to shake it. I stop and I breathe and I think about all the things I'm grateful for (which, by the way, is a whole helluva lot, like apple cider. . . I'm really grateful for apple cider) and I try to hold on to the feeling of gratitude, but the feeling never really takes hold in the first place.

I'm not depressed, I'm not downtrodden, and I'm not stuck in ennui, but sometimes I feel a little hopeless. Now I know right now you may be thinking all sorts of encouraging bits of advice. You may even already be pre-composing your comment for the bottom of this blog. Yes, that is what that giant white box at the bottom of this entry is for, so use it. It lets me know that someone reads this. Y'know, someone besides me and my teddy bear, who doesn't exactly count as I read it to hir, so it's not as though ze is a separate reader. At any rate, what I meant to say is that I'm not exactly looking for hope, or rather not from my faithful readers. I'm not completely devoid of hope, I just have been feeling a murkiness lately. This is not an attempt to trawl for pity or hallmark cards. I will ask for those more directly when they are called for (though if you'd like to send me a card feel free to do so at any time).

An example of what I'm trying to express:

I was walking home from school the other day. As I walked past one of the dingier deli/coffee shops in town I overheard a very loud exchange between two men. This particular shop always seems to have a small group of men hanging out outside, either smoking with the aura of AA break-time or chewing the fat between beers (pending on the time of day). Though this shop advertises coffee for fifty cents cheaper than my deli one block away, I have never even entertained the idea of going in to buy their coffee. So I'm walking by and this man starts yelling at this other guy. What he's saying doesn't seem to make a whole lot of sense. It goes something like, "What the fuck is wrong with you? Why did you have to say so? I was gonna fix the wheels. I was gonna fix the God Damn Wheels. Why the fuck couldn't you wait?" Somehow it seemed like the second guy had asked about the wheels on his laundry cart.

But the particulars of the situation really are pointless, as it so often it seems they are. What matters is how the first man's voice sounded. He was So Angry. Anger tainted with deep shame. Like he was angry because something the other guy said touched deep down to some old sense of inadequacy or worthlessness. Like this guy complaining about his wheels being broken reminded the first guy of being a little kid and getting yelled at for not being enough or not finishing his chores on time. Getting yelled at and being terrified that forgetting to take the trash out meant he wasn't lovable anymore.

Maybe I'm reading too much into a passing conversation, and maybe I'm imagining things too much, but I almost started to cry as I continued down the street. Because, I thought, when will the hurt stop?

When will we have learned that we are enough? When will we believe it and teach our children that they, too, are enough? That they are lovable for being children. Sometimes I wish I could take every person in the world and hold them in my giant, grandmother lap and sing them a song and hold them so close and just love them. And they would know that they are enough. And they would quit yelling at their bus driver and their check-out clerk and their server. And they would hold their children close, too. Sometimes I fantasize about this, imagining what kind of room such things would take place in and how long a person would need to sit and be loved to actually believe it. I imagine it in depth, mostly because I want this so desperately for myself.

I want someone, some gigantic bunny-rabbit great-aunt or something (I think it's a bunny rabbit because of a childrens book I read once), to swoop in and lift me out of the murkiness, to pick me up and cuddle me until I fall asleep knowing that I'm ok. That I'm more than ok, and that it's not because of something witty I said or which music I listen to or what social beliefs I hold dear, but because I am a child of God. A child of the Universe. Another beautiful, splendid conduit of truth.

I believe about 10% of this on good days, and this pittance of belief is slowly killing me. I also absolutely think this is what's basically wrong with the world. I think the root of all war and poverty and greed and hatred and violence is some gaping wound deep within us that compels us to go forth in the world with fear and shame and an everlasting ache. In saying this I'm probably being overly simplistic and incredibly self-absorbed, but I don't care. I think it's the truth.

And this just about breaks my heart some days. This is when the hopelessness subtly creeps in and sets up shop in the interior lining of my jacket. And I feel very tired and walking home seems like an endless endeavor.

But times like these, too, are times of faith. It's funny, because even when I am crying from lonesomeness or old wounds that seem never to dissipate, even when I feel hopeless, I feel certain that things are getting better. I walk down my street at 2 am and though I can't see the stars I can feel a stillness in the sky. I trust the chill on my nose as I breathe in and I know, I just know deep down that it's going to get better. Even though I don't see how. Even though I can't feel it. Even the the murkiness is enough to just about choke a girl.

The thing is, it doesn't choke me. I am still breathing, it is another day, and it is different today than it was yesterday. Somehow, it's all moving right along. It makes so little sense to cling to the belief that it won't always hurt this much or be this bad, but I cling anyways. It is a gift. And trust me, I'm grateful.

Currently Reading: (recently finished, finally) A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius now reading Operating Instructions

Lonesome Quotations

I needed, need, to be loved. To be loved for me. I am so scared of this. Scared that I will never allow it. Scared that if it comes it will disappear. That I will learn it wasn’t love. Or it wasn’t for me. Or that it was only for me if I wasn’t really me. Because when I let people see me, the real me that is- when I let people see the unkempt, un-brushed, teary-eyed, scared, desiring of love and support me, they realize that I am unlovable. Not even unlovable, perhaps, but that they do not love me. That I am loved only for the false impression people have of me and if I ever dare to let a little bit of the inside out I will become as unappealing as I was first attractive.

(quoted anonymously with permission)

While reading this tonight I was struck by how personally it comes off. Sentiments like the above always seem so individual and intimate, yet I am amazed by their universal nature. It's odd to think about how prevalent these feeling are amongst large populations. By prevalent I don't mean that large groups of people feel utterly lonely and unloved for most of the time, but that in a large group of people, odds are that a vast majority of them have felt as isolated and lonely as the above narrative indicates.

In other words, when one realizes such feelings one feels alone in the world (at least this is true in my experience). One looks about and sees others in the world carrying on as though nothing has happened, which of course only amplifies those feelings of lonesomeness. In those moments one feels as though no one could ever comprehend the depth of one's isolation.

This is the amazing part: for rather than finding such isolation as incomprehensible, one discovers that the experience of longing for real love is entirely universal. We all of us desire to be loved for who we are. And so many of us have had times of great distress wherein we could not find such love or comfort. These feelings are not so rare- in truth, I think most people experience feelings such as these from time to time.

I am reminded of a passage from one of my favorite stories, The Velveteen Rabbit:

“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”

“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When A child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.

“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, or bit by bit?”

“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

Other than the bit about not minding being hurt once you are Real, I adore this passage. It's comforting to read. Especially tonight, a time I will admit to feeling lonesome. Loneliness is inherently an individual experience, but there is something magical about the discovery of loneliness as a common thread.

I'm not sure that there's anything more for me to say at this point, so instead of dragging this narrative out I bid thee adieu.

Another Letter to the Universe

I don't even know what to do with these feelings. It's so terrifying to feel loose amid the waves. I really do believe that you've got it all taken care of- that I'll wind up floating about and landing wherever I need most to land, but. But. BUT. It's scary. It's exhilarating. This feeling of possibility. Of attraction. Of excitement.

These feelings come from everywhere. From everything that I'm doing. I feel urged toward vulnerability and movement in everything. in music. in friendship. in thought. in love. I am so excited about the possibilities but I can't let go of the fears.

The residual muck from every past encounter. The disappointment (mine) (others'). I am scared because I know that in the past what I have longed for has not been granted. I am scared that I will not be happy with what I get.

I know that I will be happier than I imagine. I know that things will be more challenging than I plan on. I believe you when you tell me, somewhere deep, to be quiet for a minute and just be here. now.



What else is there?



I need some help with the fears. coping. I don't need them to disappear- somehow a bit of fear seems appropriate and almost invigorating from where I'm sitting. I just need my fears to stand back when it's time to live. Which is all the time. I need your help, dear Universe. I can not do it on my own.


You know.