My Crazy Life
So...been awhile. Too much going on to think about writing anything, until now. I suppose now there is so much going on that I have no choice but to write. The stuff in my brain needs to go somewhere other than simply around and around in my brain. Today it is finally committed to word and expelled. No more swimming for you, silly thoughts.I guess the first thing that has been on my mind is pain--simply because it is constantly present in some form since my recent auto accident. Today I was hooked up to a silly little machine that I carry around in my pocket or clipped to my waist and it sends electrical impulses into the muscles of my neck, back, arm and chest in order to manage the pain. It is an odd thing to be walking around with wires attached to various parts of one's body, but I think it is actually helping. I haven't taken any pain meds for the first time in 5 weeks, so that is great.
I bought a new car--really new, not just new for me--and that was kinda fun. I've never knew I was so skilled at "haggling" over prices and I certainly didn't expect to get a new car that I like so much for such a good price. If only I had good credit to go along with the good price. Unfortunately what I have saved in dollars off the list price I will pay in finance costs. But I bought a car all by myself and I have no one else on the note but little ole me. I feel hopeful about my future independence. It feels weird to always need someone else to help out. This year marks my 10th anniversary of divorced bliss--and it has sucked to be trying to do this alone and I never could quite get where I wanted to be, but today feels like something closer to where I want to be. And I have gotten here by my own volition, though not without the help of tons of people who are loving and generous and caring. So thanks to all the people who have walked me this far. Of course, I still need people, and help. I always will. That is totally how we are meant to be--together and helping one another.
School is craziness times twelve and I think I am insane. I can't imagine how the next six months can leave me alive, much less feeling fine and managing life well. I will complete 32 units in two quarters, plus make up four from last quarter. That is insanity. Somehow I am loving it though. It doesn't seem bad until I think about the fact that it is insanity. It doesn't feel like insanity. Not yet anyway. Ask me in mid-July and I might be on meds and rocking back and forth talking to myself, but now I seem to feel fine. I think I've just let a lot of stuff go. Not like given up, but just ceased caring at some level. I'll pass everything. I'll graduate. I'll start a life more crazy and yet more normal than the one I now lead. Everything will work out fine in the end.
I think learning about cheong/jeong/chong (multiple transliteration found in my research) from Drew has helped the whole letting go thing. It was this huge affirmation that things are as they ought be in the end. He was telling me about this concept from a Korean word that kinda is more deep and more enduring than love because it has within it the capacity to withstand all sorts of trial and struggle and argument. It seems more like the way you are with your family, but not quite like that either. I think it may be a lot like the Hebrew "hesed" which is kinda love, but it really has a lot to do with the unfailing nature of that love. There is this fierce sort of loyalty and this beloved cherishing that go hand in hand. I think that my life feels fine because I'm starting to get what hesed and chong really are. I'm starting to understand that what endures is what is pure and that things that are not such are eventually exposed as impure and cast aside. So, in the grand scheme of things, whether I have a 96% or an 88% in my Islam class is really unimportant. What is important is that I understand how to love people who have very different views than my own and can connect with them regardless of the differences and learn from them. The part of life that expresses both love and struggle is the part that matters. So Fuller matters because this journey through the MDiv has been one of love and struggle, but grades don't matter because they are not the love and the struggle part--they are just letters that fill certain columns on certain sheets of paper. (But I still get pretty good grades.)
I miss people. Sometimes you forget who you are in the middle of the stressful stuff of life and I think I lost my center for a bit. Drew brought me back. That is good and sweet of him. But I still wish for people who know the good, bad and ugly and love to hold me and be with me and talk with me anyway. There are people of that sort here, but there are far more of them who are very far away. I long for them to be here now. I used to tell Julie about the day that I would begin my ministry and how I wanted her and Drew and Brian and Brenda to all move in and be a part of that mission/church/family. I have, of course, added Matt and Nic to that list. And I'll probably keep adding names and wishing for the wisdom and gifting that resides in the people I love to be present everyday in my community and in my home. I wonder as I write all of this whether the reason I miss people and long for them to join me is because they not only remind me of who I am, but they are what I am not. They fill in the gaps. They are what I cannot be and accomplish what I cannot accomplish and teach me what I do not know or understand. They don't just make me feel better, they really make me be better. I love that.
I'm tired. Going to bed now. My crazy life must resume in only a few hours. I had better hurry and enjoy what little semi-conscious time I have before the chaos of tomorrow.
posted by CT @ 10:24 PM
3 comments
