Slave (A poem I apparently wrote but had forgotten and just now discovered)

So the title explains this post fairly well.  This poem is something that I wrote, according to the MSWord timestamp, on October 9, 2012.  I don't remember what was going on in my life on October 9, 2012*, but this apparently was something that just hit my mind with that quiet voice that says, "Write me....write me....write me...." so I wrote it.

Slave 

They tell me I cannot begin to fathom what it would be like

To be a slave, to be controlled by someone else,

Do this, do that, do my bidding.

What they don’t realize is that even though the color of myskin

And the era in which I live dictates I am not a slave toanother man

I am still a slave, a slave in my own mind.

I am a slave to the thoughts that plague me,

Constant streams of lies, no, rivers of lies, longer thanthe Nile.

“You can eat this, but don’t even think about that.”

“You can watch this movie, but make sure you compensatedowntime by exercising.”

Unless you’ve been there, you have no idea.

My shackles are not visible, yet they are just as heavy asmetal chains

Dragging me down with feelings of guilt and fear and shame,

Never ceasing to burden my mind with thoughts of things Idid wrong,

Things I could’ve done better, and how skipping a meal willhelp me achieve

Perfection.

In every area of life.

*Author's edit*
During a therapy session several hours after posting the above poem, as I was explaining the poem, I realized what exactly was going on in my life on October 9, 2012.  That was 5 days after my granddad died.  They had been the 5 days of my life, up to that point, where I had felt the most heartwrenchingly sad.  That entire time is a blur, and I had blocked most of the negative parts due to necessity of living my life as well as a result of other severe heartache we have dealt with as a family since then (which was, for me personally, on the same level of heartwrenching sadness

The Sadness Monster

[I wrote this poem on March 2 of this year--exactly 2 weeks after my Aunt Neni went home to Jesus.  Know that while I reference "a couple of weeks" in the beginning of the poem, everything in it still holds true, now almost 2 months after we lost her.]

The Sadness-Monster

I lost a loved one today.
Or maybe it was a couple of weeks ago
but it feels like today.
I can still picture myself with her,
sitting, talking, laughing...
Laughing was the best of all.
I still go to my phone to call--
and then am reminded no one will answer.
The number I've known since I was pre-memory--gone.
I'm sure someday I may dial that number and find a stranger on the line.
A stranger who has no idea how much meaning in engrained in those seven digits,
and in my memory.
A stranger who will not know how fun that number sequence is for a little kid to dial,
and how much that fun escalated when the line was answered--
and how sad it got when the line fave its NAAA NAAA NAAA NAAA--
and how it was a game for a kid to see how many times she could make the call before the line was free and answered with the "hello" that transcended all negative emotions.
"Hey Neni!!" was always the child's greeting; always my greeting; always ours.

Since I lost a loved one, I oft still sit on the recliner int he middle of a UK game,
screaming in either ecstasy or anger, and mentally note to call that number and talk about the play and how good the Cats are--wait--
You can't call, Becca, she's gone.
That is when the sadness comes.

Or in the middle of watching a program-that-is-not-Dr.- Oz on TV
and for whatever reason have the urge to dial those digits that don't even merit concentration anymore.
I actually never saved them into my phone--because who needs it saved when you've had a lifetime of dialing-fun?
Again, the sadness comes.
Again, I remind myself it can't happen.
Becca, she's gone.  She's not there waiting for you to call.

SHUT UP!
I say to my inner critic--the tormentor who is hell-bent on forcing me to fully acknowledge, and deal with, the reality.
A reality better off left alone, I think.
A reality I refuse to feel.
A non-reality.

The sadness-monster comes and goes and comes.
She is good at leaving me for a day-long vacation which sometimes, if I'm lucky, extends to a weekend.
But when she makes her rounds and knocks on my sternum, the door to my heart, if I even peek through the cracks, she intrudes and invades,
saying only, cry, regrets, ache, longing, gone.
Many times she ends with one word--you.

It's the "you" that get me most.
I masticate the you until its full meaning is ready for digestion.
But when I swallow the you my mouth is cotton and sandpaper and I choke and spit out the you,
only now the you has evolved into an "I" and it is in my lap and I understand, now I understand. I.

I purposely didn't answer that last call because I was not up to talking.
I justified it by naming my "not up to it", "sick", and let the call go through to voicemail.
The voicemail.
The last voicemail.
The last voicemail to exist on my phone with the
"It's just me" greeting--
a greeting that tells me more than using a name.
A greeting I've known uniquely for her for 24 years.
A greeting I now only have saved in my phone archives along with guilt for not calling back--
and in there also is the guilt and failure I have saved and pent up
when I brushed off her question in the hospital--
when I went to the mall or the cafe or just drove around for no reason at all,
instead of visiting her.

Visiting her on the street two blocks away from OUR cemetery with pretty fall leaves and bike rides,
and two blocks away from the house where I grew up with her in the mornings and my mom and dad in the afternoons and evenings.
Those visits I had, there will be no more.
The visits I didn't make, there is no way to rewind time and ensure I make them.
All I have left are regrets for the time I chose other things above the visits and memories of the visits I did make.
Memories are nicer.
They don't make your heart bleed as much.

I lost a loved one today.
I lost a loved one a couple of weeks ago and I still lost her today.
I lose her all over again, sometimes several times a day,
but at least once.

I lost a loved one today.
A loved one with whom I cannot count the number of times we stood in her kitchen,
always the kitchen,
and I voiced my fear, "I just get sad and worried that I'll be in heaven when I die and I want you to be there but I have to know that you're saved because I can't be there without you."
And she tried to assure me, "Oh honey, don't you worry about me, I'll be in heaven,"
and I always wondered--even when I was as young as seven or eight--how she knew that
when the topic of salvation was typically changed quickly to a conversation about the dangers of Mountain Dew or how she was going to write a letter to the President that he himself would probably read or how Dr. Oz never talks about the heart.

Assurance never really came until the days surrounding the un-returned call, before and after.
Conversations were had between mom and great-aunt-grandmother
during which the latter mentioned God and His healing power more than ever before.
A devotional with a green ribbon bookmark on February eighth--
the day of the un-returned call--
An acknowledgement of a special Christmas gift--a personal bible--
"I've never had one like my daddy's since I was a little girl."

These are the things I choose to remember right now because God sends signs to those who need comfort when they need it the most.

She always worried about me--
tearful conversations on my way out of her house,
a beyond-sad expression in her eyes as she pleaded with me to "eat more, you have to, I can't stand you going away again."
I always felt like a cold, emotionless person when I'd assure her, "I will, I promise,"
even though sometimes I knew I didn't intend to.
Strangely enough, one of the most comforting things since I lost a loved one
is knowing, finally, that even though I lost her, God gained her--
and more than that, she no longer has to worry about me--
no longer has to worry about anything at all.

And then, for a moment, the sadness-monster leaves me.

And I smile.

Conditional Surrender

"All to Jesus I surrender.  All to Him I freely give.  I will ever love and trust Him.  In His presence daily live.  I surrender all.  I surrender all.  All to Thee, my blessed Savior, I surrender all."

Think about those words for a minute.  Let them sink in.

If you're anything like me, you may have been singing this song longer than you can even remember--sometimes you may find that you sing it because you know it or because it's being sung in your church service, but you may not let the words really take full meaning.

Also, if you're like me, you may have had specific times in your life when you were really, truly, deeply singing those words, whether in church, at home, at youth camp, in a hospital, anywhere, and you may have REALLY meant that you were surrendering your all to Jesus.

But do we ever follow through with the ALL part of the equation? I know I don't.  Or I may think I do and then find that I don't.  Often, I find that when the song affects me, I am thinking about one particular situation in my life.  And in that moment, I truly mean I am surrendering that portion of my life to God.

What I find happen in my situation more often than not, though, is that I essentially modify the title of the hymn.  I change it to "I Surrender All IF...."  Feel free to disagree with me if you think I'm off-base here, but I personally think this is probably a more common phenomenon than any of us *want* to admit.  Some examples of the conditional statement:

"I surrender all IF You promise to heal me from these physical health issues I am having."
"I surrender all IF you make recovery easy for me; I don't want to be uncomfortable so I will surrender it to You if You make my mind decide to like my body and if You make my anxiety go away."
"I surrender all IF you tell me I am going to get a job in the next few days."
"I surrender all IF you let my relative who is so near and dear to me live instead of die."

Any of those hit home to you?  If not, don't worry, those are just 4 examples, there are innumerable others out there.

The hardest thing about the Christian faith is that we can't live with this premise of conditional surrender.  If we have faith--true Hebrews 11:1 "confidence in what we hope for and assurance of what we cannot see" faith--then we MUST exercise UNconditional surrender.

Do I think we don't mean the song when we see it? Absolutely not.  I believe that if the song affects you in the innermost part of your being, Jesus is working on your heart ("He's still working on me, to make me what I need to be....").  This means that He is calling you to surrender ALL to Him.  Not just the things that are EASY to surrender, but ALL.  Everything.  Anything you have struggled with, are struggling with, or will struggle with in the future.

The hard part of being human is that surrender is a choice we are called to make each morning before we start our day, as well as however many times throughout the day we need His help to make it through.  It's not easy.  Let me repeat, it's NOT easy.  And God KNOWS we won't always be able to surrender every single struggle in our lives every single time a thought related to the struggles come into our head, and this is because we are human.  We are not, however, exempt from the call to surrender.  We are expected to surrender because of the sacrifice Christ made for us on the cross.

If you feel like things are out of control in your life and you feel powerless to take hold of them and fix them--don't worry--that's because you are powerless to fix them.  We are ALL powerless to fix our own situations.  The power we get comes from Christ, and Christ alone.  Which again boils down to today's key word: surrender.

Have you surrendered? Are you surrendering? Do you wish you could surrender but you don't feel like you can?  Have you surrendered in the past and things didn't quite go the way you planned?  Good news--surrendering to God ALWAYS works for the best.  Always.  But that again comes down to faith and trusting God's time table and not our own.  Which is a discussion that can easily take up ten blog posts in and of itself so that's all the mention I'll make of it right now.

The next time you hear this beautiful hymn--whether it's your first time hearing it or your 500th time hearing it--think about those words and thing about surrendering your all to the One who made you.

And for one of my current favorite renditions of the song:

Broken People

Good Friday, everyone!

I'm going to get right into this post, so if you don't want to read something that is intended to be deep but might just end up rambling.  But it's Good Friday, so it may be something to inspire introspection.

So today's topic as designated in the title: Broken people.

How many of you have ever felt like a broken person?  If you are honest with yourself you probably hear your mind screaming at you, "Me! I've felt broken! I'm broken right now! I was broken last week! I have been broken for longer than I can remember!" but most of us leave that inner monologue where it takes place--in our minds--and don't share the burden with others.

The past few months have been rough for me.  Heck, in some ways, the past decade has been one heckuva roller coaster.  Outside of the typical issues (Including but not limited to my eating disorder, OCD, severe anxiety, and juvenile idiopathic arthritis) I've had an onslaught of symptoms that have led to a myriad of doctors and traveling and medical mysteriousness.

During these past few months, several times my gut reaction has been to get angry or frustrated or start screaming and crying and asking God, "Why me? Why do you let this happen to me? WHY? WHY?"  But the past three or four weeks, once I was able to physically get back to church, I have come to a new level of  reflection and appreciation and humbleness for Jesus' death and resurrection and exactly how it relates to our human struggles.

When you look at Isaiah, chapter 52, where the prophet predicts the crucifixion and resurrection of the Son of God, and when you see verse 14, you will find that it says:

Just as there were many who were appalled at him—his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any human being and his form marred beyond human likeness (NIV)

Just take a minute to let that sink in.  This was how Jesus, the Son of God, our Lord and Savior, spent the hours leading up to His crucifixion.  He was broken beyond human likeness.  Another translation says he was marred beyond recognition.  His body was so broken--so much that we can't even begin to comprehend it with our human minds.  And then think of the significance of the Last Supper--Jesus breaking the Bread of Life--His body.  This isn't just a regular little analogy that someone comes up with when writing a book or story or poem.  Jesus, KNOWING THAT HE WOULD BE BROKEN, symbolized the very breaking that happened to Him, by breaking the symbolic bread and handing it to His disciples, signifying the sacrifice He was making for humanity--a sacrifice none of us deserved.

When I think about how broken our Savior was; when I stop to consider how little pain I am experiencing compared to the beating and suffering and death, "even death on a cross", he WILLINGLY took to save me--to save us--I can't justify complaining about any physical maladies or medical mysteries I may be facing.

Does this mean that I never complain? Absolutely not! Does this mean that I fully understand God's plan and timing and reason for allowing me to go through all of this? Definitely not.  I do get frustrated.  I do cry.  I do complain.  However, I've found that if I truly take my attention and focus it on the cross--the symbol of our Savior's devotion to the world and to saving the world and to being the sacrifice for our sins so we may have eternal life in heaven--my battles, even though they are significantly strong to me and hard to fight, pale in comparison to the pain, suffering, and marring beyond recognition Christ endured on the cross.

My human mind feels abandoned sometimes, but that's because I'm human and only have the mind of a human.  My human mind also yearns for things to happen when I want them to happen.  But I have to remind myself that my life isn't in my hands--it's in God's hands--and while it's frustrating, I recognize and acknowledge and hold true to the fact that I'm living on God's time, and the time that I am here on earth is only borrowed until the day I see my Savior face to face in paradise.  

I'd love to leave you with a song full of hope and affirmation.  We are not worthy, but Jesus thinks we are people worth dying for.

If we keep our eyes and minds and heart set on Jesus and the sacrifice he made for us, to SAVE us, we may indeed find the strength to leave our fears and worries and stressors and battles at the cross.

(photo credit: http://lisanotes.blogspot.com/2012/02/lay-it-down.html)

Jesus: The ultimate commiserator

As I was brushing my teeth before bed last night, I had an 'aha' moment (which is not so rare an occurrence for that time of night--such things like to pop in my head while I'm unable to share them immediately because I'm brushing my teeth , etc.).  This 'aha' moment was one of the simplest variety, but as with other such moments in my life it was really exciting to me because it involved a revelation about WORDS.  Or more particularly, a single word: commiserate.

The train of thought went something like this:

[I thought about someone saying commiserate in some context, but I don't remember which, and directly after that my thoughts started racing.]

"Commiserate.  Hmm....have you ever thought about what commiserate means?? We can all probably correctly use it in a sentence, but the word in nature seems like it would have to stem from something like comiserable....is comiserable even a word??....well if it's not it should be....it makes sense....because if you are "comiserable" with someone it means you are sharing their miserableness with them, either because you are also experiencing said miserableness or you shave experienced something very similar and you empathize and FEEL for them....but seriously how many people have thought about where commiserate comes from??  I should address this with Rog to see if he's ever thought about it." [End train of thought, sort of]

So then I did just that, as soon as I got into the bedroom I asked Rog, "Have you ever thought about the word commiserate itself?" And of course, since my husband is hilarious in his own right, he said, "Oh yeah, all the time.  I've thought about that a lot." (I'm not sure my text can convey the sarcasm so just trust me, it was there, and I, as always, laughed and then told him to shut up :-) )

And I explained to him my train of thought.

We both agreed that it makes sense, but I wanted to further investigate the word origins and with a very (very) quick Internet search I found this:

 'Commiserate is used in the context of sharing sadness or problems. It is closely related to the word misery and has its roots in the Latin miser, "miserable." When you add the Latin prefix co-, "with, together" with the Latin root miser, "miserable," you get commiserate, "to share someone's misery." People usually commiserate because they are in the same situation. The related noun commiseration refers to compassion, sympathy, or the sharing of problems.'  http://vocabulary-vocabulary.com/dictionary/commiserate.php

So I wasn't completely off-base with my raw analysis.  Not that it was exceedingly difficult, but I enjoy when I have these moments of "I kind of sort of feel validated as an English major now even though I already have my degree and that should be good enough but it's not so I rely on things like this (which  most others have probably already pondered and discarded) to validate said English degree.

But then I got to thinking....Who is the 'best' person to commiserate with?  The question sounds odd, I know, because in an ideal world no one would have to commiserate at all.  But as soon as I had the question, I knew the answer--Jesus.

Who else can we say knows the inner workings of our heart, and more than that knew the exact miseries we were going to feel since before we were individually created.  So it makes sense that the ultimate commiserator is Jesus, the ultimate empathizer is Jesus.  Think about this:

Jesus, who knew His set path before He was born in that stable in Bethlehem, who willingly was ridiculed, persecuted, mocked, beaten, tortured, and died on a cross (the worst of the worst of ways to die), who was God in human form, was not immune to feeling alone.  He was not immune to feeling abandoned.  In fact, while He was hanging on the cross, Matthew 27:46 tells us, About the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?"--which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"  

So we see that the Savior of the world who knew the entire plan still felt forsaken by God.  So when we are feeling abandoned and frustrated and alone and forsaken, instead of crying out in anger toward God (which is a natural, human response and is a response God not only expects from time to time because of how He created us, but is also a reaction He knows we're going no have at exact moments in our lives and He just allows us to feel our frustration, but He then expects us to then trust that He knows exactly what He's doing), we can try to focus on the fact that Jesus (aka God aka the Holy Spirit) understands EXACTLY how we feel and He can truly give us the peace that passes understanding (because we often do not understand how God's plan is going to work out but instead we just know that it is--this is where our 'certain of what we cannot see' faith comes in), and we can only receive aforementioned peace if we lean on the Everlasting Arms which can, and do, keep us safe and secure from all alarms, but we have to make the choice to fully trust Him every day.  Choosing to fully rely on God for your every need can be a difficult thing to do, but when you are able to consciously make that choice in the midst of life's trials you will receive the ultimate comfort that extends more than we are even able to comprehend with our human minds.

Lifesleep

So I haven't been on in a while, and my first post is actually dedicated to my wonderful husband,  Rog, who I don't think could possibly be a better match for me.  Also, I enjoy being corny on Valentine's Day.  So I have a poem with the working title 'Lifesleep' (emphasis on the WORKING TITLE because I'm not quite satisfied with it yet).

Lifesleep

It's nights like this that give me the chance to feel like the protector instead of the protectee.
A typical drifting into dreamland, for you, not me, tonight.
Standardly the order is you-me;
Tablespoon-teaspoon;
Or sometimes soup spoon-teaspoon.
Or sometimes mismatched spoons back-to-back as being played on the knee of someone else in Appalachia.
But not tonight.

Tonight I am a ladle.
Tonight I hold you in my arms, such as they are.
Usually weak, lying like this makes me feel strong, needed,
Like a comforter for someone in the subarctic,
Or a straight jacket buckled so tight the wearer's dopamine is engaged; or is it another chemical? I can't remember.

Tonight, as you lie facing your alarm clock after a long day's work of teacher, nurse, housekeeper, driver, husband--and prepare to begin the cycle again in a few short hours,
I am also facing your alarm clock, but my view is obstructed by the faded graphic tee you reserve for sleeping (I do, too),
And I love every second of it.

I drape my free arm over your shoulder,
Getting as close as I can without my wet hair dampening your pillow.
Between my hand on your upper arm and my knees bent at such an angle they aren't touching you but are still close,
I try to unbreathe on your neck for fear of waking.
Every half-minute or so I feel the involuntary jolts your body has as its going through that asleep-yet-still-awake phase.
It doesn't bother me.

I listen to your breathing, the even rhythm brings me peace.
In for 3, out for 3.
Only you would do that to me.
Not 4, not 2.
3. Almost as if sleep-you knows it.
I try to make my breathing match yours breath for breath.
I last for one inhale and a quarter of an exhale and am aware that my breathing patten is quicker and my breaths more shallow,
So I abandon my quest.

I settle with keeping my arm draped over you as I hear you sleeping loudlessly,
Until, of course, I must roll over and face my neon alarm clock (set 14 mins ahead of satellite time.
At which point I must relinquish my role of protector and try to make sense of the yet-as-well-as-already happened tragedies and mysteries and wonderment of life.

In the glow of my clock and the faint sound of sportscasters on TV recapping this win and this loss and that injury,
All I can think is lucky.
How lucky I am. How blessed I am.
To have these moments to cherish,
And I can't help but feel sad that you're not awake because I would greatly enjoy gloating and letting you know that I have gifts you can't have--
And that's because I stole them from you--or maybe sleep-you gave them to me.

Victoria's Secret, Body Hate, and Confused Thoughts

Greetings, all!!  I know I haven't posted in a few months, but work has been so hectic I haven't had a spare moment to allocate to the blog.  That said, I do have a moment now and would like to address a phenomenon in our culture.

Today is Thursday, December 6, 2012.  On Tuesday, December 4, 2012 millions of viewers across the nation tuned into CBS to watch the yearly spectacle of scantily clad Victoria's Secret angels parade themselves down the catwalk amid performances from today's superstar icons, Justin Bieber, Bruno Mars, and Rihanna.

I don't know why, but I look forward to this show every year.  I don't know if it's the overall production spectacle of the thing that makes it an "oh my goodness can that possibly be real life??" hour for me; I don't know if it's the fact that I  have a need to further ingrain self-deprecation and loathing into my mind's constant record player by watching the models, lamenting over their bodies; I don't know if, deep in the recesses of my consciousness, the only reason I watch it is because I enjoy complaining about it the following ~364 days until it takes place again.

Here are a few thoughts on the entire situation, and while they may seem opposed, understand that's because minds are complex things and I don't feel they should be censored (well, to a degree!!).

1.)  I get frustrated with people (myself included) who tweeted things such as "Their bodies are so perfect, it gives me motivation to [insert diet and exercise regimen here]" because I want everyone (myself included yet again) to come to the realization that beauty is not defined by your weight, muscle mass, height, body structure, or anything else physical, and that everyone is beautiful in their own way because God made them like that (Psalm 139:14).

2.)  I also get frustrated with the people who tweeted (I was a bit of a twitter troll during the entire show) things to the effect of, "That girl is too skinny, someone feed her a hamburger." or "I like my girls to be real, not to be fake twigs who all have eating disorders and who look horrible."

The statements in number 2 above are the ones that irritate me more than any, even though at first glance they seem harmless or even possibly positive.  The thing that bugs me with those statements is that okay, yeah, there are probably some of the VS angels that have eating disorders, but if you take any group of 12 (or so) women, statistics show that approximately (or at least) 3 of them will have eating disorders of some kind.  And no, I don't like it when girls' and women's only desire is to look like the rail-thin models, HOWEVER what I think a lot of people don't realize is that there is a large probability that several of the models do not have eating disorders, despite being thin.

The thought process behind that last statement is that if all the models were doing was starving themselves, a.) they wouldn't have the energy to showcase their lingerie with such powerful walking and emphatic posing (all in 5-inch heels) because they would have no energy on which to draw.  ALSO, the majority of the models, if not all the models, have extremely toned muscles.  Note I didn't say *big*, I said *toned*.  And if you are just starving yourself a la eating disorder, yes, you will be most likely be thin, but your muscle mass will be depleted and you will just look sickly.  These VS models have rigorous exercise regimens that they have to follow in order to maintain their "angel" status and get paid millions of dollars a year (yes, that's right).  So they work hard and it's not right to hate on them.

It's also not right to hate on yourself.

One last thought, and this is just because it bugs me--I personally HATE the objectification of women we see far too often.  However I LOVE watching the VS Fashion Show.  Tell me how THAT makes sense!!  This is a concept I'm still trying to unpack, so I may write about it later, but I just briefly wanted to make note of it here.

So....VS Fashion Show....what are you thoughts either on it or on anything I've written above??

God bless,

Becca