Wednesday, November 23, 2011

dreadful independence

It was a long, slow day, made longer and slower by the white flakes drifting down from the rumpled sky. All the work was done--twice. The one male employee went outside, clutching a shovel, and blew back in, covered in snow and chill, more times than I counted. We girls zipped into jackets and huddled behind our registers until the heat came on. The owner arrived, then drifted away, with instructions to send someone home because there were too many of us and too little work. The plow truck ran through the lot, shoving the snow before it, building violent piles against the curbs and beside the lamp posts. Customers were few and far between.

We watched from the window, as the truck passed, plow scraping against pavement. "The other guy would come ask us to rotate our cars," she remarked to me. "This guy, he's just plowing us in." My heart sank. It was already going to be a tight day, timewise, I knew. I had to go from work to home, shower and change, and make it to my next job in the space of an hour. The snow made a quick drive impossible; now this plow man was making a quick escape just as impossible.

I tried not to think about it; I pushed trays through the dish machine and scrubbed pots and waited on customers and cleaned the lobby and chatted with lonely strangers and refilled all the paper products and made sandwiches and poured soup and coffee until I thought my head would burst with monotony. Then the clock said the magic numbers, and I was freed.

In the breakroom, I wrapped myself in my coat and scarf. I was wearing four layers and still shivering, even inside. My socks cut below my ankle bones; my gloves were flimsy dollar-rack buys. I hadn't even stuffed a hat into my pocket. I glanced out the window before I braved outside. It was as grey and steely cold as it had been the rest of the day. I hunched my shoulders and pushed open the door.

As I trudged across the parking lot, I fought the grumbles in my heart. It's not fair, it's really not, that so many other women have men to dig out their cars. It's not fair that I find myself having to physically, spiritually, emotionally, fend for myself, not just today, but every day of my life. It's not fair that You--yes, this is Your fault, too, God--have left me alone like this. It's just not fair.

By the time I reached my car, I was feeling rebellious and irritated. And then I saw it.

Someone had shoveled out my car.

For a moment, I just stood and stared. Then I glanced at my coworker, outside starting up his own car.
"Did you shovel out my car?" I asked. He shrugged, shook his head.
"That wasn't me," he told me, but as he walked away, he called back over his shoulder, ". . . maybe."
All I could do was smile and shake my head.

It is true, I am alone, unmarried and single and independent. And it is horrible at times. But, in those moments when I despair, when I cry I am not strong enough, not for this, and God is the only One Who hears . . . He provides. Whether it is a man to dig out my car for me, a woman to hold my hands and cry with me, a child to snuggle, a puppy to wrestle, a cat to feed, a job to do, He gives me exactly what I need.

Yes. He always, always provides.

Bless the LORD, O my soul; and all that is within me, bless His Holy Name!
Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits . . .




Thursday, November 17, 2011

you siwwy

We were in the kitchen, just us two,
        a strange moment when the other three were off making shenanigans elsewhere,
    or maybe they were actually playing quietly.
He was telling me a story,
    and for a moment, it was just like old times,
              like I'd never left,
        like we could just go back to the way things were.
Everything was just the same,
      his snapping blue eyes,
    his laugh,
         the baby teeth between his smeary lips.
I was just smiling to myself,
   reassuring my soul that things will never really change,
 when it happened.

He opened his mouth,
     and an L slipped out cleanly,
   over his tongue and between his lips,
          before either of us knew it.

He kept talking,
      totally unaware that he had just smashed open my heart.
  In a moment,
       in that L,
     I knew things were always going to change.
               I knew he would grow up,
            stop going to bed at dark time,
          stop calling me siwwy Katie! when I made a mistake,
        stop chuckling over Mrs. Gwidden's stories,
      stop singing the Five Wittle Fishies song whenever I told him it was my favorite,
     stop calling his pretend best friend Jame.
 Instead, I knew with certainty,
       he would become a big man,
                     taller than his daddy,
                  but just as good;
                         fairer than his mama,
                     but just as hilarious;
             smart as a whip,
                        but still kind and generous.
       I knew he would be a daddy, someday,
                   that I would coo over photos of babies just as blue-eyed,
                 and just as beautiful,
                               as he was.
But I knew, also,
      that the baby I loved so much
                   the toddler I snuggled and tickled,
                                    the little boy I read books with,
  were gone . . .
         and in their place,
     stood a little man
                   who said his L's perfectly.             

Sunday, November 13, 2011

beneath the skin

It is the rapist who is ruined,
                not the victim;
      the cruel parent who is marked,
          not the whimpering child;
   the master who is dehumanized,
               not the slave;
the torturer who is broken,
           not the prisoner.

It is when we crumble to our cruelest thoughts,
             our basest fantasies,
         our darkest selves,
  that we become the exact opposite
        of what God meant us to be.

        Light shiners.
    Hope bringers.
           Life givers.
    Image bearers.


   When we set out to destroy another human,
            we become anti-God.

It is the monster that is branded,
         not its prey.

Thursday, November 03, 2011

nothing more than wishes

When we are small, we have big dreams.
         Teacher, doctor, firefighter, policeman, missionary, president, world-shaker.
  It seems,
       somehow,
           the bigger we get
                        the smaller our dreams.

Why is that, do you think?

     Is it because we grow practical,
 understand we have limits?
  Or is it because,
              as we get older,
        we begin to believe the voices that say
                     No, you can't; you never will?

   How do we ever hope to keep dreaming
                                 without becoming dejected?

          Maybe, just maybe,
    it has to do with Who we choose to believe,
               with the Voice we decide to hear.

 Maybe, it's believing that Jesus takes the tattered smallness,
               and makes it grand and beautiful,
                    that makes us shoot for the moon,
              yet remain content with the earth.