Grief Shadows

"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken."

~ CS Lewis

I have come to the conclusion that grief exists as a shadow to love and beauty. While we may love something because we find it beautiful, I think that often a thing becomes transformed into something beautiful once we love it: like the transformations in the stories of the frog prince or in beauty and the beast. I also think that sometimes beauty and love work together - not one causing the other - but both working in and on the heart in a mysterious, confusing, simultaneous nature.

And when that beloved, beautiful thing (or person) is taken away, lost, damaged, or hurt - our heart takes the beating. Because our hearts have become attached. In that beautiful, beloved person or thing, we get a glimpse and a taste of God's beauty - of the way that things were meant to be.

Grief, then, acts as a testament to the worthy nature of that for which we mourn. Grief points not only to injustice and the sense that this should not be, but also points to "that" was good.

The last time I reflected like this was when my grandpa died and my world was rocked by wave after wave of heavy grief - because I loved him, and he was gone.

* * *

I am angry. 
I never thought before that I would ever identify with the title of God as Judge. Although I'd never admit it, I subconsciously thought that the term was archaic. I did not understand it - because I am good and my friends are good people. Of my/our lack of goodness and the presence of pride and self-centered individualism in its stead, I am sure God will someday lead me to explore in a more honest way. But today, I am learning of standing before Him as Judge, demanding justice.

Today, and yesterday, and the day before that, and probably tomorrow, and the day after that, I stand before God angry at violent injustice. I am broken about active evil executed by a man against my heart's sister. I don't know if he was blind to how fearfully and wonderfully made she is; or if he saw how she had been crafted in the image of God and, filled with evil, decided to lash out. I don't know.
But I am angry.

It wasn't personal. He didn't even know her. But in violating her body as a woman, he violated my body, the body of my mother, my grandmother - the female body collective. It might not have been personal for him, but as a female, it was personal for me. And this isn't even about me.

And I want to stand before God and scream for justice. I better understand the Psalmists because I, too, want people dashed against the rocks.

And then, I reflect that Christ died on the Cross just for instances such as these. He died for rape, and bombings, and genocides, and theft, and assault, and racism, and institutionalized poverty; and for pride which leads good people to think, "Well, I'm not that bad..."

* * *

So, I stand in the shadows of grief, reflecting upon love and beauty; crying out for justice - and praying it does not fall upon me.
Lord, have mercy.

All Chains Broken

I had a vision that I was half stuck in the ground - like a zombie struggling to get out of the dirt, or like a person stuck in a hole of deep-holding mud. Suddenly, the power of chains being broken swept over me, and my inner self was freed. My spirit, clean, burst forth - swirling and dancing up into the sky above my filthy, still struggling body. As my spirit twirled in the air, the Holy Spirit swept and soared into me, colliding and spinning me into an even stronger, more exuberant dance. We turned back to my body, still gasping for freedom. My spirit peered into my body's eyes, tilting my body's chin up before kissing and breathing life into the parched, dried lips of my face. My spirit wiped away at the mud smattered across my body's cheeks. Then, the Holy Spirit and I worked to free my body from the ground - like restoring life to a body that was dead or near to dying. My body was firmly stuck - although neither impossibly nor eternally so. My spirit pulled, and my body was willing, but also resistant. Finally, not sure where I was in the process of being restored and brought to life, my spirit - now alive and resting in the assurance of the work of the Holy Spirit for my continued restoration - entered back into my body.


I'm not sure what that all means. And while I know that it toes the line of gnosticism, I also know that it's not. I just think it's significant.

Ghost Castle Pirate

Last night I had a dream that I sailed off the edge of the world in hunt of a giant octopus. The pirate king who captained the ship wanted me dead. His ghost castle (he was a ghost as well) was filled with poisoned tempting foods - like chocolate. Eating any of the food there would result in poisoning, death, and then belonging to the pirate king (slighlty remeniscent of the mythology of Persephone, Hades, and the pomegranate seed). But, I had resisted. At first he was shocked and disbelieving. Then, he believed - but he wanted me dead. He possessed an attitude of entitlement to me - but he could only "win" me as his prey through trickery. Thus, he decided to raise the stakes and take me on an adventure - sure where I would give into temptation along the way, die, and then be his.

So, we sailed on his ship into a magical port and over the edge of the world. And while I knew in my sleep that I was dreaming, I still felt my heart rise to my throat and the thrill of a long, downward fall. I don't remember how we landed. I only know that we caught the beast who cursed us for the abuse worked against him. The kraken was made as a god among men, and we had deigned to capture him with nets and ropes. If the pirate king intended to kill the beast or instead to enslave his power, I do not know. Because then I woke up.

Scratch-marks

There's something about having what (or whom) you love stripped from your life that leaves you feeling like clawing at the air.

Fast-forward two weeks and people expect that because you're acting "better" that, naturally, everything must be fine.

Oh, what a shock when the grief-wave hits again, complete with the undertow of anger. There's nothing like that to remind yourself (and everyone around you) that, no darlin', you're not "okay" yet.

But, Lord-willing, Lord-providing, and Lord-carrying-your-brokenhearted-little-body-through-it-all, you're at least on the path to healing.
And the up-shot is that your wounds will help you better love people in the future when their heart is chopped up like yours has been. It's comforting to know that your wounds will someday bring another comfort. (It's a picture of Christ, isn't it?)

Tribe

Today and yesterday (for reference, Sunday and Saturday) were surprisingly easy days for me. I woke up happy or at least neutral. The cloud of pain that has surrounded me - at times making it difficult to see - has been gone. I suppose that an honest conversation with people who love you (but who have still broken your heart) will do that for you. I suppose also that finally releasing the pain dammed up inside will do that for you too. After the torrential outpouring, my emotions are slowly subsiding. I don't think we humans are made to carry the pressure of that much pain. And when we dam up our emotions we damn ourselves. (No, I don't mean in a sort of heaven-hell sort of way. I mean that we destroy ourselves.) Again, this points to the necessity of being surrounded by loving community with whom we can be honest.
(I know also that grieving comes in waves [or cycles] so I may end up wading through pain again, but I've accepted these past two days as a gift. My appetite has slowly returned and I've been able to sleep better. Now I primarily feel physically exhausted - as opposed to physically and emotionally exhausted. For that, I am thankful and simply await what the next day will bring.)

It's hard to be honest. Especially about grief. I think it's because being honest about grief is dangerous. Going back to our society not knowing how to grieve, I think that society also does not know what to do with people who are in pain. "Feel better!" is an easy response. Instead of grieving with those who grieve, we try to throw band-aids on deep emotional lacerations, or we offer distractions and words of advice to "Don't think about it." We don't want to sit with those who hurt because we don't want to feel uncomfortable. We want life to be happy. So, we want others to be happy - especially if we do not understand why they are hurting. So, we further wound them by taking away their right to feel or by discrediting the validity of their emotions.

Because when we are faced with the real pain of others, we must be real about our own quiet despair. We must be honest about the paradise that we do not live in. The hurting person before us serves as a mirror for our inability to be perfect - especially if that person before us is hurting as a result of our actions.
The person who publicly grieves is not weak. The honesty of showing the broken and vulnerable places is an act of absolute bravery.



I didn't want to go to church tonight. I avoided it this morning, telling myself that I would go this evening. But as the hour approached, I felt my resistance deepening. I had spent the day reading about what it means to be the community of God and absolutely knew that I did not want to go to church tonight because I did not want to have to be real with people. But, I ate too many jellybeans while sitting on the couch and thinking over my desire to stay home and feel exhausted. I gave myself a stomach ache and thought, "Well, church has a free dinner. I guess I'll go and eat...I really should go anyway."
I know it sounds like less than "Citizenship of the Month" quality character, but I think God takes and uses what we give Him in order to get us to where we need to be. And tonight, I needed to be at Tribe.

Here's what Tribe was for me tonight:
A meal of fellowship. Eucharist. A warm welcome after I'd been gone for a long time. Worship sung in harmony and wild abandon. Hugs. Smiles and joking with kind eyes and gentle touch. Dogs running around. Stomping feet. Clapping Hands. A wine glass knocked over and broken. A drum circle. A violin. Quiet listening. A kiss on the cheek. Holding hands with fingers interlocked. Prayer. Honest hearts. Conversation over washing dishes. Blessing.

A dear but recent friend approached me after the service and asked how I was doing. I told him, "Tired."
"Tired?"
"Yeah, weary."
"Tired from not enough sleep, or tired from a week of shit?" asked the saint.
I told him, "Both."
And then we really talked.


I went back to Tribe last week after a year of being gone because I knew it was the place that was safe for me to go and be shattered - and have that be okay. I went back to Tribe tonight, because I knew I needed to be there, because I ate too many jellybeans and gave myself a tummy ache, and because last week another saint asked if I'd be returning. I told him, "Yeah...I mean, maybe."

Tribe lets me be a stray cat that wanders in and out of the warehouse where they meet. Tribe welcomes me with open arms, open hearts, and plates of food. Tribe never asks me of anything other that I come and simply be - knowing that when I get to a point where I am able to contribute, I will.
I've been asked if I'll be coming more regularly, and I say that I'm not sure. And I'm accepted.

Tonight, as I walked to my car, a man chased after me in the parking lot. "Hey!" He said, "I didn't get to introduce myself to you." We exchanged names and he asked, "Will you be back next week?" "Yeah!" I replied, "Well - wait - no. I'll be in Memphis." He rocked back, "Say whaaaat!?" We laughed and I asked him, "Are you a regular attender?" "I'm working on it," he answered. "Oh, how long have you been coming here?" (With the exception of last week, I haven't been to Tribe in about a year, so I figured it was a fair question.)
"Tonight is my first night."
And those are the kind of people who make up Tribe.

And somehow, I am one of them.

Leaks

*I sat in a small wooden boat on the shore near the edge of the sea, watching the tide roll in. Huge waves crashed in on themselves, sending up sprays of water that angrily hissed and roared each time. The water crept nearer, somehow maintaining the deceptive appearance that it had not reached me until, before I knew it, I found my small craft lifted by the inky black underneath and now surrounding me. My heart skipped a beat as panic and adrenaline shot through my body. The water surged around me, pulling at my boat like fingers. And my boat shuddered in return, fighting the force of the water, but too rickety to keep the sharp pokes at bay. Slowly, leaks sprang. With no bailing devices, I did the most natural thing possible: I tried to stop the leaks. I crammed the ball of my foot into one crevice while jamming my fingers into other dribbling pools. I'd been swept up in a surge that I dared not lose myself in, but my only floatation device was failing me. I did not have enough fingers or toes or hands or feet. Each leak gave to a spurting geyser, like a bleeding artery.
Finally, in my desperation, I called out for help - *


I'm not going to fake it and pretend that I've been sleeping well for the past week, or pretend that I haven't lost my appetite. I have trouble sleeping, and grief has left me with an almost perpetual sense of nausea. I've spent much of my time hoping for distraction, trying to focus on the work that I know that I need to be doing. If there ever was a way to break me, this week has been it. And yet, in my brokenness, I've finally been stripped of the ability to mask my pain enough so as to fool most people around me into thinking that I'm okay.

I've always been one to wear my emotions on my sleeve, but I don't really like it when my pain shows (refer to previous post about "Hilary Bean..."). I've tried to hide that I'm hurting, but the pain has shot through like water bursting through a poorly constructed dam - finding chinks and cracks in the seams so that I've practically been oozing. Finally being this tired has left me in a spot where all I can say is, "No, I'm not okay." And there's something amazing in that. Because from that spot begins a conversation or a journey in honesty. Granted, I don't want to wallow here; but there's something remarkably freeing about not trying to be so "strong" - as if I didn't need anybody around me to love, hold, and support me right now.

I have always made it a goal to be honest, but I cheat that standard when I am not fully honest so as to "protect" others from what I perceive to be something that they could not handle (usually, my emotions). But if we are called to tell the truth in love (another Scripture reference from some place in the Bible that I'm way too tired to look up), then I must balance the two.
I tell the truth in a manner of love. Telling the truth is a way that I love. I love, ergo I tell the truth. Knowing the truth, further allows me to know and be known - and to love. With this as context, I now share some wise words that I was told tonight, and which I hope to add to and shape my journey in becoming a loving truth-teller:

"Verbalize what is true. Don't verbalize what is 'safe' or 'comfortable' - verbalize what is true. 

(When you don't, that's what gets you into trouble.)"

Because Hilary Bean said I could...and that I should

(Get ready for some train-of-thought writing.)

I wonder what it would be like if glass could bleed.
When we hurt, we say that we feel "broken," "cracked," or "shattered." I feel like all that's left of my heart is a pile of broken bits - tiny shards of glass. For some reason, the pile sparkles like diamonds. The picture doesn't quite make sense to me, because I know that my heart is an organ...and if anything it's red.

Glass is sharp - especially when it's broken. It's something that we're careful to stay clear of because we know that it will cause us pain - that it will make us bleed.

But what would it be like if glass could bleed?

Would the shattered pile of crystals slowly turn blood red? Would there be an oozing puddle - something to clean up aside from the broken sparkly bits?


My friend wanted me to write again. I told her, "I can't. I'm blocked. And when I'm not blocked, all I generally have is pain."
And she told me that was okay.
And I am thankful for that. Truly thankful. Because, Lord knows, I have enough pictures and words in my head to fill a page right now.


I think we have trouble with grieving in our society. And I wonder if it has now become the responsibility of the artist to be the funnel for that emotion. I am putting my pain onto the page, or the canvas, or on stage so that those in the audience can be swept up in it. Sharing my pain allows them to feel theirs. We all feel together. We all cry together. We are all washed clean together.
It's a strange idea about being baptized in tears, and I wonder if it's slightly heretical. (I'm studying theology, after all, so this sort of thing matters.) But, looking at other claims in the Bible where the writer points an ugly finger at God (perhaps a theologically inaccurate finger at God), and seeing His response of gracious love, maybe my metaphor is "okay."

I've been praying a lot to God lately. It goes like this, "What the f*ck?" I figure that if God can handle a whole book of Job and several Psalms, He can handle my prayer. And I am thankful that He does. And I figure that if the Holy Spirit intercedes for me in my groaning (or in my simple, three-word prayer) then God can understand what I cannot fully express but can only hint at when I raise my fist in the air and shake it at Him in my pain. Really, it's not my fist that I'm raising - it's my heart.


Art is a strange thing. For it to be good, it has to be honest. That's what good communication is. And while I've so desperately wanted to write, I've been afraid to because of my desire to protect others. If this is uncomfortable to read, just think how it feels to write it. I don't want you, my dear reader, to be worried about me. And yet, as a human being, I want to be cared for. Maybe I do want to raise some concern.
There's a passage that comes to mind. I don't remember where it is, exactly (kinda like the one I referenced earlier about the Holy Spirit). But it has to do with bearing one another's burdens. What does it say when I refuse to let my family (extended beyond genetics) help me carry this burden? I say that I'm doing it out of protection for them...but let's be honest: I'm doing it out of the desire to protect myself. I don't want to be seen as broken. I want to be the girl with the smiling face - the girl who makes people laugh. I don't want to be the girl who has trouble walking because her (metaphorical) legs were just taken out from underneath her - who is now having trouble breathing after having the wind knocked out of her. (My view, as I gaze up into the sky from the position of lying on my back is of deep, dark, rolling clouds, by the way.) I don't want to tell people that my world right now is a hellhole of brokenhearted pain.
I would rather struggle under the burden of a broken heart, wrapped up in the smothering sheets of my pride. But that's how they lay people in tombs. And I want to live.

So, here I am: following the advice of one famous writer: "Writing is easy, all you have to do is bleed all over the page." I have a lot of pride.

Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner. And what the f*ck.