he called me "dramatic."

I think one of the most hurtful things I ever heard from a guy I was dating were the words, "I just can't deal with your drama," after we had gotten into an argument about something that I considered to be of great value (and he didn't).

I've spent most of my life shying away from labels such as "drama queen," and had actually been commended by a previous ex-boyfriend on what little drama I ever caused. Yet, that sentence felt like a slap across my face and carried the judgement of, "I can't handle you. You're too much trouble and not enough value to me." Setting aside the question of femininity and fear of being "too much and not enough," as described by John and Stasi Eldredge in the book Captivating, I have come to grapple with the accusation of being "dramatic" simply as a person (gender aside).


Tonight, I walked with a new friend after class through a freshly wet campus that smelled of rain. We discussed the intersection of art and theology and the role that they play in one another. We shared stories and compared experiences of life, art, how we create, what we do with "blocks" to creative production, and how we find God in the midst of all of it (among other things). I made a comment that she agreed with: 


Artists, whatever form they specialize in, are storytellers. They have something to convey. It's what they do. The drama is okay - even necessary. Nobody wants a boring story, anyway.


So, there you have it. It may be simple or obvious enough, but it's something that I come back to repeatedly when those nasty words haunt me. I want to feel. I want to see or hear about the glory of the sun blazing across the sky at the breaking of dawn, green buds bursting forth on a tree branch after a winter's sleep, or how love could send One to the cross to pay for sins committed by the beloved. Give me the drama, yes, because in the drama there is life.