I stained a door today. More precisely, I stained half a door today. We bought the door (a bi-fold) a few months ago (before Easter) to replace the closet door in our bathroom. Since we brought it home, it has stood in our dining room, where I (we, and anyone else who came in the house!) could see it. I knew that if we put it out of sight, it would never get stained. Never get installed. Then swim team practice started up again, and I had nearly given up hope of ever getting it done.
Weeks ago, I had gone to get the stain and other materials needed, intending to--or rather, determined to--get the staining portion done while my husband was out of town college visiting with our son. Something got in the way--likely weather, possibly time, probably something else entirely--and here the door stood, waiting. Last week, texting with a dear friend, I finally came to the bottom of my hesitation. Her husband is the ultimate Mr. Fixit-DoItHimselfer. She told me that every family needs someone like him, and I told her, "That was my dad."
That's what it came down to: Dad would have had it done in no time, and I would have been amazed and impressed. After seeing how quickly I finished what I did today, even with the drying time between coats, I can see why he was always so modest about that kind of stuff. After I finished the second coat on the first side of the door, I found myself thinking, "Well, that was easy enough!"
Truth be told, I was hoping I wouldn't be the one staining the door. I took Mom this morning to meet up with my sister, who then took Mom up to her house for the weekend. Guy had swim team and lessons. Both of us were scheduled to be back home at nearly the same time this afternoon. The deal was, whoever got home first would work on the door. It wasn't until I pulled in the driveway that I realized that taking my lunch to go at Subway was my mistake! I had no choice but to get changed, and get started. Why it all seemed so daunting is difficult to explain; mostly because the reasons are not what most people see in me. I had read the directions again and again--at least four times in the store alone! And this was not even the first time I'd stained something. Grammy and Grampy's kitchen table and chairs had come out pretty well, but that had been about fifteen years ago. And somewhere in the intervening years, I had been reintroduced to some serious feelings of inadequacy and sadness. That's what I realized in the conversation with my friend: I needed to face those feelings once and for all.
Last summer, on a particularly bad day, I asked another friend a question about dealing with a problem. He told me to Face it, Embrace it, and Let It Go. I will never forget that. It was a real turning point for me, and has become quite a motto in almost everything I do. It'll take more than just a door to expel the demons from my past, but one small step is all it takes to begin a journey--or to continue on. In the Faith Matters group at church, we've been working through a personal retreat on Consoling the Heart of Jesus, and talking quite a bit about Mercy, and Love. I've learned that loving others is not enough; I need to face and embrace everything about myself, too; the good, the bad, and everything in between. The stuff from my adult life, I've been able to look at (fairly) clearly. It's the stuff from long ago that sometimes bubbles up, and then gets pressed back down by the parts of me that have not been ready to face them. Nothing is major, really, in the grand scheme of things, but I'm positive that at least some of it would help the boys tremendously if I could reveal it to myself enough to share with them.
Tomorrow I will finish staining the door, and hopefully by Monday night, we'll have a beautiful new door for the bathroom closet. And I will have vanquished at least one of the dark shadows in my mind.
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