the elusive three

For the past week, I've been trying to compose the short version of my life, my journey. The 3 minute version. While the challenge was at first invigorating, it has become its own difficult obstacle. I start with a short idea in my head, but somehow in the transfer to paper, my commercial becomes a feature presentation.  Funny--that does not discourage me. Persistence will pay off in the end. But I find myself trying not to wonder when and where that end could be.

During the course of this week, I have been approached by two strangers, each of whom offered me a word; one wisdom, and the other love. Their intersections with my road are stories unto themselves, but regardless of the strangers' intentions, those two words have calmed me. Directly between these two strangers, I was introduced to a third person who somehow is a bridge. More to ponder.

Early last week, a friend of mine had a presentation to do. Silly me, thinking it had been prepared in advance, asked the night before about how practicing was going. As I shook my head and mock-reprimanded against procrastination and the all-too-familiar argument that best work is born at the last minute, I saw myself. I often find myself, as I did tonight, finding odd things to do--very important things!--rather than do "homework." We now have clean railings up both sets of stairs. And the walls look better, too. All in an effort to order my thoughts. 

Despite my words avoiding paper, I am prepared, to a certain extent--it is a story of me I'm delivering, after all.  Who knows it better than I? Just One, and from there will come guidance, should I follow. I'm subtly backleading in my efforts so far. The dance will be oh, so much more delightful if I just follow the lead, since I know the steps already. The words will come. When I let go and let them.

ask why

When I was in high school, I had a boyfriend I thought was all that. After dating him for about three months, I invited him to a New Year's Eve party that my parents were taking us to. I knew there would be very few kids our age there, and really didn't want to spend the evening with just my sister to keep me company. Did I "forget" to mention to him that there would be Mass at midnight? Probably--which means, of course I did! In my own awkward and unpracticed way, I was trying to invite him into something our family did together without it being weird. Did I realize that less weird for me might be more weird for him? Did I care enough to wonder? No way. I was 15--I was concerned more about me, and how I felt.

Everything was going great--we were hanging out with my sister, maybe we watched TV or played cards. The thing I remember most about that night was Mass. The adults started filing downstairs to the basement where we had been all evening, and that was his first clue that something was going on. I tried to play it off as something I saw all the time. In truth, I was a little freaked out at them coming downstairs--Mass in a basement with no windows is weird. And there is a ridiculous amount of discomfort associated with the realization that you purposely yet unwittingly tricked someone into being trapped in a basement with no escape. I tried to ignore the daggers he shot at me, until, about halfway through, he leaned over and asked, "Why do Catholics do that? Why do they sway like that? It's weird." I turned my head and saw what he saw: everyone swaying--not side to side as one would do when holding a baby, or dancing to music--forward and back. And so was I.

I answered him honestly. "I don't know. I never really noticed before." But it was the last time I did. For months afterward, focusing on not swaying occupied all my attention. Then it became habit to stand stock still. Save for the days (years!) when I baby-swayed, I haven't moved at church. I sit, stand and kneel, but no swaying.

At the time, I had all the answers. I had all A's in school, read a lot, and felt like I knew everything. That question that stumped me was hard to take. It made me doubt myself, my gifts, even, for reasons I may never understand, my faith. Up to that point, I had thought of faith as a given, but with one question, I was thrown. For one simple reason: I didn't know who I could ask. Even then, I figured it had something to do with equilibrium and some other physiological factors, but at church was the only place I ever saw it. I was never told I was supposed to, or that people do for various reasons, nothing. It was a void, a black hole.

Black holes suck in the stuff around them, and this one sucked in quite a bit of goodness. It sucked in just about all the faith that I had. I started asking some questions, but without a clear idea of who to ask, I wasn't really looking for answers. Instead, I was asking questions to point out what I didn't like, the quirks, the stuff I didn't understand--all in such a way that I really was making fun of what I didn't know. And it got to the point that I thought asking questions was a bad thing. If I didn't know, there must be something wrong with me. Funny thing is, though, I only felt that way about questions related to faith and its practice.

Fast forward. I met a great guy. We got married. Had kids. Went to church. Got busy. Time passed. Life was crazy, but good. We were showing our kids faith. They weren't asking too many questions. Nobody had to know what I didn't know--not even me. It was good. Or so I thought.

When Dad died, I started to realize there was something missing in my faith. It wasn't a given. I did a lot of taking in the days, months and years that followed. In many ways, I was still that 15-year-old girl, at least as far as my faith is concerned. Had I considered that might be a legitimate question to ask, had I had someone to go to, high school, for me, may have been very different. All that taking and selfishness turned me more and more inward. I still went to church, I still did the things I thought faith-filled people did, and eventually I hit a wall. And I kept hitting my head against it.

Fortunately, that was mistaken for knocking, and a door was opened. I was having a miserable time, feeling like everything was falling apart, and someone I didn't even know very well told me that if I wanted or needed to, I could call. Just the invitation opened another door: the one in my heart. Soon after, I offered to take Mom to Faith Matters at church, and, lo and behold! Within a couple of weeks, I heard that questions are good. Ask them. Look for answers. And don't stop until you understand. It didn't take long for me to realize that was my nature; in my "real life," I asked questions all the time. Relentlessly, sometimes!

I still don't know about that swaying, but I have had many questions answered--most of which lead to more questions. (I'm in heaven!) And my kids have been asking questions, which makes me so proud of them, especially when they humble me by asking one I can't answer. I love telling them we'll find out together, or to direct them to someone who might know. I've gotten to know the person who offered that invitation, and although I have never called, I have emailed, texted and messaged--a LOT!

And I am forever grateful. My heart dances.

not just a question

What's changed?

On the surface, if just reading the words, the question is simple. Further contemplation brought me to the simple answer, "Everything, it seems." I started making a list.

1. I haven't done any yoga in what seems like forever. (probably about a month)
2. I've been cranky at work, for a number of reasons (none of which really are my problem, incidentally)
3. Working at soccer games means that I have missed Adoration for a while.
4. I reprimanded myself for asking questions--for being who I am, for reasons I cannot even identify fully. (this was the most disturbing one, in all honesty)
5. I realized I was actively avoiding writing anything down. No blogging, no quotes, no notes. Nothing. (when I hit this one, I stopped. Something clearly was wrong.)

Looking at the list, my first realization was that I had been blaming outside stimuli for all of these things--too busy to exercise, others' issues, scheduling I had little control over, a book I wasn't prepared to read, a sluggish laptop--instead of looking at what in me was leaving me stranded.

So I turned inward.

And I realized I had allowed, for some reason, a kernel of doubt to settle in. Like a popcorn skin stuck between molars, that little kernel of doubt irritated and discomfited, until even the good stuff was not getting past to my heart. The doubt was not in any Big Ideas; it was my old arch nemesis, self-doubt.

I realized that I had been worrying more about stuff I didn't know, and that didn't matter in any Grand Scheme, or even (in all honesty) to me. In lieu of self-examination, I was frantically looking for answers I didn't even need. My fixes were treatment of symptoms, rather than looking for a cure. And my fixes were many. Mostly they involved more and more, until I was working myself into a frantic mess.

Then a question. And I'm finding Trust again. And Hope. And Love.

2. emotions: bliss

Warmth from the sun on the top of my head, as my hair flies freely behind then before me. Being pushed on a swing, high into the air by my father, I know, young as I am, how amazingly free Heaven must be.

Climbing onto the swing, anticipating what is to come even now brings a calming joy to my mind and heart. As he would pull the swing toward him, me moving backwards, blindly, trustingly, through space, I felt a safeness that was almost irrational. Trust that the hands would be steady and true, the arms strong enough to outlast my fascination with the combination of cadence, gravity and levity. Even when I learned to pump, and could have control over the duration of my adventure, I still preferred--or imagined--the experience of being pushed.

The first time I experienced bliss was on a common playground, flying through the air. When I see a swing, I remember, with every fiber of my being, that bliss, that joy, that time with my father. There are times when I feel that connection to my Father; times when I'm free falling in faith. Now is not one of those times. But I won't let go. The very fact that I can remember and recall, and feel the memory of that bliss means that it is not out of reach.