Word Finds and Hidden Truths - 8-13-09

Word finds – terrible, addictive things. Once they get you in their clutches, there’s nothing for it but to go with it – the hours wasted, the bleary eyes, the ink on your fingers. It’s just too fun.

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And enlightening, too. I discovered this Monday night when I was livid at B____ for so stubbornly keeping his distance. Calling me “kiddo” in his voicemail? What the hell. I’d already been tossed around for a month by the unpredictable and undeniably slow-moving waters of this resurgence of our relationship, and I was just done. I was ready to take him to task for not being clear about his feelings and being aboveboard with me about them. Turned out to be a good thing he kept not answering the phone.

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I was laying across my hotel bed at the Homestead, stewing in my own juices, calling him terrible things in my head, and determinedly doing word find after word find. My focus kept splitting and my word finds were taking longer to do.

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And I noticed a trend emerging. Inevitably, you’ll come across a word you just can’t find and you think, “Well, the creator of this puzzle made a mistake and obviously forgot to put the work in.” You’re frustrated and irritated and all you can think is, “I can’t find this word!” I find when this happens, the only thing that works is to step back a moment – because invariably your focus has narrowed to each letter you’re looking at and you’ll never find the words that way – and start again with a new perspective. If you’ll look again for the word as if you just started looking, with the assumption that you will of course find it still intact, suddenly there it is. It was there the whole time. The creator of the puzzle didn’t make a mistake, didn’t simply forget to include a vital piece. As long as you’re focusing on how you’re not finding it, you’ll keep not finding it. But if you change your perspective and remember what it felt like with you started, when you were still unquestioning and certain you would find what you were looking for easily, you find it like a lightning flash.

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And it occurred to me, sprawled there on the bed, my knuckles white with strain and anger around my pen, that I love B____. B____ R____ M____ is my choice. The only one I want. But I’ve been so cautious about choosing the right one that I didn’t know how far my own choice carried me. How much say did my fallible, short-sighted human desires count in the grand scheme of “God’s plan,” and what would prove itself as the right choice in the long run?

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But I recognized that at every blind turn and hesitant step since summer and the demise of my relationship began, I have actively sought God’s wisdom, God’s plan, and God’s will, at the expense of my own. How many times have I thought of how much I want B____ but prepared myself to accept that he was not the right choice for me? And you cannot seek God so consistently and so humbly and still be acting out of accordance with his will and wisdom. It doesn’t happen. When you align yourself with God so diligently, you don’t have to stop and study every action, every desire, every choice as closely as you would if your will and desires were still wild and rebellious. And I had already over the past several weeks come to the startling realization that while all my l ife I had waited for God to point to the One – already planned out with no input from me – perhaps it isn’t so fatalistic. I had known that God knows what man is destined to be my mate, but I believe now that part of what makes that man the chosen one is because I actually choose him. It does make a difference that I point and say, “Him. That one right there, I want him.” Sort of like those time-travel stories where you can’t figure out which comes first, the chicken or the egg. So maybe it does make a difference that I love him. Maybe the fact that B____ is the one for me isn’t just a matter of God choosing for me, and then I’ll love him, then I’ll feel it. It’s an amalgamation of the two. But I was still a little unsure of how much I could do to make him indeed the one.

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And then two nights ago, I realized there’s no need to keep hesitating, waiting for God’s wisdom. I already have it. This whole summer of fire has aligned me with it. God isn’t going to just leet me drift into a relationship where for the rest of my life I’m doing all the loving, where I’m left neglected and unsatisfied by a man who just doesn’t really, passionately love me. It’s not possible that I would hold onto B____ out of sheer rebellious stubbornness, more concerned with what I want than what will make me happy in the long run. That’s just not who I am, first of all, to keep my head down and not think and hold onto something out of fear or habit. And second, that’s certainly not going to happen when I’m consistently praying for wisdom to let go of what I want “if it’s right.”

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Seeking God so much means that I come under his protection. I don’t have to constantly look in all directions to ensure I don’t wander or slip down the wrong path because someone’s doing that already. I’m letting someone do that for me. So (1) I have a pretty good chance after so many months being refined in the fire of wanting the right thing, and (2) I can focus on my desires and follow them single-mindedly because someone else is taking care of curveballs and upsets coming from other directions.

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And all this time still doing my word finds which allow my mind to wander down this path, I’m thinking and thinking. And I land on the final piece of the puzzle which answers my long-held question: What do I do?

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Be stubborn.

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B____ is, hands-down, the most stubborn person I have ever met. And I’m more stubborn still. I want him. I know that my love for him is the kind that will outlast both of us. It’s been refined in the fire. And I have the conviction that I can, indeed, hold onto him even if he’s not holding back yet, because my wanting him makes him the one for me. And all the awkwardness and terrible uncertainty fall away. I can talk to him and not obsess about the lack of clearly romantic signals. They’ll come.

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I am going to be stubborn about this because every time I hold it up to God, ready to hand it to him and face life without it, I look down to find it’s been left in my hand. Too, God and I both know at any moment, if it’s done and needs to end, I’ll let it happen. So knowing God’s taking care of me and knowing I’m in the right place for the “right thing” to happen, I can be stubborn and know that he will come to me sooner or later. No more fear, no more doubt, no more wondering if I should hold onto it. I’m holding on till it’s ripped from my fingers. Brock on!!

My Worth - 8-5-09

My worth is great, as is what I have to offer. I am precious and worthy. I deserve to be loved truly and without reservation. I deserve to be pursued, to be made a fuss over. I am worth great effort, hard compromises, and no secret wonderings of whether I am wanted or not. I deserve truth in the inner parts and no guards. I deserve to be wildly loved and greatly cherished. And I deserve these things because I am willing to give all of this in return.

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Whatever happens with B____, whatever comes of this critical mass to set our courses once and for all, I will have what I want, one way or another. I am cared for and planned for. I am a well-watered garden.

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Wisdom is mine. Knowledge and understanding, too. A discerning heart as well to make use of it all. These are mine because I ask for them.

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And at the end of the path these bricks form – love. Love with abandon, the love that requires all your weakness and flaws to make you strong and true. The love worth all the risks because it will repay a hundredfold. This love is mine. It is mine now. And it will be mine for always.

My Creed - 8-4-09

My life has a purpose. What I do is not my job. It is who I am. What I do is do what I love. Create, learn, say “yes,” and move forward. I will continue to do these things and remain steadfast in my commitment to be amazed.

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You give me wisdom, God, and I will not stagnate. This is my covenant with you.

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I am here for a reason. My life has purposes and “becauses” I can’t even imagine yet. They have crystallized from my pain and been stitched into my DNA. My life matters. And nothing will change that. This is my creed.

Unexpected Development - 7-20-09

If there is one thing I have learned from this past month and a half, it is to trust God. It is to trust his will for my life and to believe absolutely that all things are being worked for my good. After all the heartache, questions, crying out, and going under, from the death of my love to the unexpected opportunity of letting it flourish again, the one constant has been God’s strength. My one consistent focus has been on wisdom, whatever form it should take and whatever it should do with me. Wherever it may lead me, wisdom will carry me through to a safe harbor where I am wanted and loved unequivocally, where I am free finally to let out all my heart’s stores and have them take root.

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Whatever happens with this latest development, when B____ unexpectedly texted last Saturday night, I will be cared for. My feet will find the right path and God will take care of me. Whoever the One is, God will lead me to him and into his ready heart. I will have what I dream and God’s own wisdom will guide me to it.

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What unexpected peace I feel at a point where I have no idea which path will rise up to meet me. God does answer my prayers.

Defenseless - 6-26-09

I love him, I love him, I love him. With each passing day that he holds himself away from me, I love him and face my helplessness. It’s been over two weeks since I’ve seen him, and sometimes, he takes on an air of unreality, like I conjured him out of my loneliness. But then I think of his quirks and flaws and know that I would never have made those up, and I feel almost a gratitude for those flaws, those differences from me – they mean he is real, that he exists.

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It is breathtaking – a little more of my breath stolen every day and not given back – to see how defenseless I am to him. Whatever he does to me, whatever comes of this trying time for him and for me, I am laid open, not even an inadequate hand to flutter protectively over my bared chest. I would give him everything. Everything. I love him, I love him, I love him. I love him so helplessly it is difficult in this shadowy time to use his name – it has too much power over me. There is at present too much potential for destruction in that name. His name is locked in my heart, branded there. I have two tattoos now – his name, like his scent and his voice and his mouth, has marked me for his.

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In the blessed intervals between my crippling uncertainty, my wobbly patience is laid over thickly and securely with my glowing conviction that he is mine. He was made for me. I am for him and I claim him. In this difficult time he is going through with his family, of which I know almost nothing and of which he shares nothing with me, I cover him with my love. I speak my love over him, wrap him up with it from my side of the ocean he filled with his doubts and his weariness. I protect him with that rare thing – my love, that which I have held from every other male I have ever known or tried to know. Will he ever know the crushing value of what I offer? Will he ever truly understand, should he ever take me in his arms again, what it is that he holds? He would have laid at his feet in silk and ribbons and patience and awareness the sum total of all this woman holds within herself. Worlds within worlds within worlds. A love that would burn for him and him alone. A lively brain and instinct for miles and a quick-learning wit. For all my flaws, I can love well and I can love long. His children are in me. Does he know this? Does the idea occur to him in unexpected flashes before he pushes it away in his uncertainty?

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Can all the wanting and almost awed wondering I saw in his eyes truly dissipate so quickly, so suddenly? It is rather debilitating to have gone for thirty years never being made to feel wanted and beautiful and finely made, innocent and good to be so, and then within a few weeks have all my defenses dashed in his open admiration and tender care, only to have it all sucked away into an unknown void like a star going supernova. It leaves me shaken and waiting and so silent and always wondering. My head hurts with all the questions. And all I am left with is prayer. It is all I can do.

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I spread my love over him like Boaz’ cloak over Ruth, claiming him and standing for him in all the unknowns that lash me. Surely my love and God’s love are enough to bring him through this and back to me. Surely this is not all to be wasted. Surely I was not laid open like Christmas turkey, utterly defenseless against him, after all these years, just to pray for him for a couple of weeks. Surely God is far more efficient than having to sacrifice an already teetering, dying heart that so easily came to life, for the sake of a man who could feel honestly before leaving just as honestly. Surely, all of this, all of the startling coincidences, all the tiny pieces snapped into place, all the love I was never able to give until this big, warm, kind man unlocked it with his inimitable scent – surely all those harmonious pieces are not to go dashing about the board with no hand to draw them back together again. Surely, surely, it must mean something that I, who has never come close to loving a man before, who stayed untouched for so long I came to think I was untouchable, have chosen, or been chosen, to love this man with all the heart, all the need and passion and purity, that I’ve been harboring for so many years.

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I was made for him. The fact that he cannot warrant how wonderful I find him shows that all the other women were wrong for him – not because they were bad or more flawed than me, but simply because they could not see him. I can see him, like I have the only set of lenses that can focus on him, or I’m the only one who speaks his language. I see him as so wondrous precisely because I can see him so clearly, as he cannot yet believe. He is a marvel, wrought by God’s own hands, just for me. He is for me, and no woman will ever be able to love him as I do. I think he is exhausted by stress on all fronts and scared of the quickness and surety of my love. I think he went on Match.com with the right idea of what he wanted, but didn’t realize he wasn’t ready for what that was to be dropped so quickly and easily into his lap. I think he was not prepared to be loved so well, or so truly, or so quickly. He does not know – as well as he knows me – how sure and true a thing like that is precisely because it’s me who is giving this to him. He knows but still doesn’t accept that it has never come close to happening for me before because he is the only one with the key.

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And so I keep grasping for faith where I have none, somehow finding bits and pieces of it that weren’t there before in the waves of love that sweep over me. I love him. I love him, I love him, I love him. And someday, this torture of wanting what doesn’t want me will be over and I will be truly loved back.

Is It Coming? - 6-24-09

Oh, God, I don’t want to hurt anymore. I don’t want to call this into existence, but I have such a feeling in me. I don’t quite recognize it. What is this expansive, airy horror, this great big, still, spreading thing? I think it’s fear. Fear of the coming pain if what I am afraid is true is, indeed, true. It’s the anticipation of the agony. It’s seeing the torturer coming, seeing the despair in the distance that has no obstacles to stop it from reaching me. After so many years of pain and despair and loneliness, barely making it through sometimes, I can’t bear the promise of more of it. I’m afraid of the pain. I can hear the boots ringing out as they come for me, the sound of the key in the lock, the grating of the door. I’m so afraid of the pain that could be coming for me. It’s going to hurt so much.

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And my heart will not break. It will not rip or tear or fall apart. It will merely shrink back, lose the volume it took with love. It will take on the hardness of porous coal or the tough stringiness of a piece of gristle. And I may not even cry. Thirty years of being alone trumps a few glorious weeks of being in love and feeling safe and whole and free. And I will not speak of it to my friends or to my parents. I will not even speak of it to myself. It will be as if he never existed. And if this love does end in pain as it must if it does end, then I, who has valued even pain and trial for the truth of the experience, will say it would have been better never to have loved, never to have met him and seen the locked door of my dreams creak open at last to shower me with the warmth and light of possibility. A few weeks of love are not worth more pain after a lifetime of it. And I will survive and not weep and have nowhere to go from the pain of the loss. And no one will see the crack. Because there will be no crack. You can’t be alone for thirty years and not have learned how to be alone again. Force of habit.

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But oh, God, please, I don’t want to hurt. Please say you will not go from my side, that you will not leave me for one moment if this comes to pass. Bring him the love he is looking for, peace and joy and wisdom in his every decision. Fill him up with life and hope and faith. I love him, I love him, I love him. Does it make any difference that I love him? I love him. I lift him up to you and pray that he makes the right decision and has unprecedented wisdom straight from your head. Oh, give him the life he deserves. He is so wonderful and so honorable and worthy of such respect. Show him the path to what he wants, even if it is away from me. And should it indeed lead him away from me, shore up my heart to bear the reasons for it from his mouth, and please don’t leave me in the echoing silence left in his wake. I am afraid of the pain.

Pulling Away - 6-17-09

I wish he would come to me now. I wish he would take me into his arms and murmur to me that he wants me, that he wants only me, that he will want me for the rest of his life. I want him to listen to me, to hear my need, and to tell me he wants me to belong to him and him alone. I want to be wanted, more than anything he has ever wanted. I want to be loved.