At the age of 9, that last weekend of May as we planned to leave on a family vacation, I broke both arms and tore myself up pretty good. I've blogged that in the past and you can find it in my Multiply archives if you care to look. But that summer of healing was also a summer of re-creation of a little girl's mind and heart. I cannot explain all that happened, but like May 9, 1996, it was a pivotal time in my life.
The war of good and evil had begun in my heart and body way too early. I knew inward struggles at the age of 9 that many children do not know - nor should they. I had frequent nightmares and a horrid shameful incontinance born of psychological disfunction. I was introspective and yet my hyperactive nature kept me from isolation in many ways. I was already becoming a weird little kid. I prayed to a God that was really too good and too far to listen to my personal terrors and malfunctions. Yet, I still prayed.
I was a creative kid even then. My walk was really a dance. My drawings were really dreams. My music -ah my music was a personal vendetta against repression. I'd taken piano lessons two different times and disliked both experiences immensely. I toyed with contriving melodies. I wouldn't call what I did back then composing. But it was something akin to composing and I had enough knowledge that I often tried to write the music down.
Yet during that summer of healing I tried my hand at a new thing. It was several weeks after the accident before I was cognizant enough to care about how bored I was. The piano was an impossible thing, though I could pick a little here and there. The one fingered approach was far from satifying. My dance was slowed to a creep without bounce and a pencil or brush was out of the question for the greater part of a summer.
But we owned a typewriter. It was an old black typewriter with a carbon ribbon and a hand advance on the side. Corrections were made by big XXXs or starting on a fresh sheet when it got too bad. It was a creative media that really worked okay one slow pick at a time. That summer, I learned to write. Of course I knew my alphabet and how to spell and make sentences, but I had never really written anything that did not already exist somewhere in the world of abc's. I wrote small poems and short stories. It became a way to give solidity to my fantacies.
I already had been given a love of books, aquired by my mother's persistance at reading to me nightly. It was the one thing that we truly shared in an amiable way as I was growing up. And I had learned to entertain myself during my common insomnia by making up stories. Yet they were always done and gone when I finally fell asleep.
That summer I learned to save a story, to create a rhyme and make it better. It didn't fix anything, but it changed something deep inside that made life a little more doable. To this day, when I get so full of question or anger or joy or frustration that I cannot concentrate, I take to page: sometimes for expression, sometimes for diversion and sometimes for answers.
Yesterday was a very busy day. I was making dinner for a friend who lost her husband. I had to teach. I wanted to work on my house. I wanted to take dessert with the coffee to fellowship. I needed to clean my kitchen. I didn't really work on my house, but I did get the rest with some success.
Just before I left for fellowship, my granddaughter called to say she was sick and in a lot of pain. No she didn't need me to come by right then. I would pray for her and check on her. I did along with assuring her that I would come in a heart beat.
I got to fellowship a little tired and scattered and was greeted by our leader who looked totally haggard. His brother-in-law had collapsed last week and had a mass on the brain which of course they feared was cancer. The report I got on Tuesday was that it was a concentration of blood vessels that had gotten tangled and was easily removed with no brain damage at all. I asked how Joe was and was told "Gary's brother died."
Gary is one of my favorite teddybears as is his wife. They are fun and funny, excellent christians, boundless servants and wonderful friends. More?? How can we take more? This has been such a hard week. Betty was there. Gary was in Texas. The funeral is Saturday in another town at the same time as my friend's funeral here. I hugged Betty a lot. Told her to tell Gary I loved him. We all did.
As we were sharing needs, one couple in our group began to cry. Finally the man stated flatly "M........ and I have separated. We had people pray for us Monday night. It's what has to happen right now." We were all stunned. We've been through so much with this family in the past few years. We all love them both. We prayed and hugged and cried. Some tried to convince them that there had to be another way. They left and went to their own places in the end.
Before going home, I texted my girl to see how she's feeling. She didn't reply and I knew she was finally resting. We discussed that earlier.
I went home feeling stunned. I cried for Bill and Gary and for Cindy whose husband died of cancer this week and for my friends who are living apart. I wanted to run, to scream, to kick the doors in when I got home.
I have much to do today. My mind is scattered. My heart is torn. My prayers seem hollow. But I know that God is the only one who can meet any of this with answers and power for change.
I am waaaay too verbose.
Sometimes it just gives people the wrong idea about me. Sometimes it truly clouds the issue. I will begin with a warm fuzzy and after explaining, end up creating diversity. Then I say -later of course- why did I do that? I am a ramifier. That's part of my intrinsic make up. I tear things apart mentally and then hopefully bring them back together with depth and clarity. Yeah, sometimes I forget the parts. Especially the 'sweet' parts that I intended from the beginning.
One time I went to visit my sister. When I arrived at her house, her car was sitting hood up with a string of parts in a long line on the ground beside it. She was putting in a new something or other (my mechanical lingo) and her way of not losing or misplacing anything was to put every screw and bolt, every little piece and part in a line the way she took it off. Then, when she put it back together, she reversed the order. My obvious question was "What if one of the kids or their friends kicks a piece out of line and puts it back in the wrong order?" Her reply was "They don't." No funny stories, no exceptions.
I wish my mental mechanics worked that way. Other ideas always come in and kick my pieces around. Maybe that's why I like poetry so much. I list the things that are important to communicate in the poem and when the words start coming, that list keeps me honest and true. Of course, sometimes I'm working and a poem just writes itself in my head. I have my word processor in my tray so I can get to it quickly.
I'm reminded of the time when my mom and dad bought a new 'record player - radio'. It was so cool. Mom liked new and modern. It didn't go with anything we had stylewise, but it was cool. It changed the records for you -yeah. It would play record after record in the order you put them onto the little metal rod. Okay, I'm old. But it was cool. One day I took it apart just because I was bored. Needless to say, I was alone. I didn't put the parts in the order I took them off. I just scattered them around and relied on my own fantastic memory and intellect. When I put it back together, it looked fine. It worked ah- somewhat differently than before. I didn't have any pieces left over. I didn't have time to take it apart and 'fix' it. Frankly, I wouldn't have known what to fix. My mom was baffled. "Why is it doing that?" But that was in a day when you didn't just box it back up and take it back to the store if it still operated. I didn't have anything to say.
My thoughts are sometimes like that record changer. All the stuff is there. It still works, but not the way it should. People get offended. I love reading Paul's letters to the churches because he does this and I understand. He gets to writing, chases a rabbit and a squirrel, and comes back to the subject he started with a wrap up. Some of the squirrel chasing becomes our fondest passages. We can lose the whole point if we aren't astute.
Today I was listening to a very inspiring piece of music which was true and functional in the spiritual realm and my mind began to ramify. I found myself taking it apart and ready to criticize because a point was left out -an important consideration which made no difference to the message of the song. Should the writer have clarified? My conclusion after some thought is 'no'.
I'm reminded of a verse where Paul told his readers. We are not going back into all the workings of redemption because you already know that. We are moving on...(my wording: you can't reference that statement, but its in there) See how I am?????
I need to accept that some things go without saying just fine. I should not try to preclude every possible question. If a person has a misunderstanding, hopefully he or she will bring that up and I can explain. For the rest of you, the player will work just fine. But life may lack a little interesting quirk here and there.
