Bragging & Complaining Rights.

One of my favorite House policies is our "bragging and complaining rights." Jenelle and I started this sometimes this summer, when we lived together - just her and I - and it has broadened our world and allowed such great release and freedom.

It allows us to laugh and be joyous and grateful for incredible things that have happened at work, or great success' at something we've done, or honor shown to our gifts.

It also allows us to come home and just say what you've wanted to say all day but held in so you didn't loose your job, or feel like a gossip, or go hysterical.

This honesty and frankness is so great, we both relish at times the idea of coming home and getting to do so. I love not having to 'coat' my success with veiled humility, but being able to just brag about something good, and not feel embarrassed for being incredibly awed and proud.

And I love being able to have moments to just really say ... everything about the day.

I'm glad, I am thankful, for this house, this home. This friendship. And for bragging and complaining rights.

Love & Loss.

I feel like I'm walking on shifting plates. Like everything below is moving and tilting, in almost a sea-sick fashion. Because the people I love, I keep loosing. And I keep trying to be loving and gracious and let them go, but it leaves me feeling raw and vulnerable and empty and needy and sad all at the same time.

One of my greatest "heart" friends here is Amy. We're far apart in age, but close in life. She went to Taylor, 25 years before me, and lived in my exact same room -- 115. And now goes to my church and has me for tea and there is nothing like the feeling of walking into her house... We laugh like school girls, share like best friends, and connect sometimes like mother daughter too... But she may be moving. Her husband lost his job back in November, and the search hasn't been easy, which brings thoughts and interviews and plans and preparations for moving.

I bawled yesterday. Angry, tearful, pleading tears. She is my heart in so many ways, and a place of solace here. Her home and friendship is like a safety net, and encouragement. I feel like the air is sucked out at just the thought of her leaving.

And then my roommate. Jenelle. I love her. There were four of us. All together. Everyone knew each other's story, and most deeply, knew mine. So my heart was in the safety of the homes we lived and the relationships there. For a year and a half now, Jenelle and I have lived together and never had one sense of strain...

But she's at a job interview this weekend in Nashville, and is pursuing moving there steadily. It's not so much a matter of if, but when, now.

And the thought of loosing her, of tearing her out of my day-to-day interactions, and place of home, leaves me feeling lost in life. Like the bearings in Charlotte creep away... first it was Marilyn to London, then Angela to marriage, now Jenelle to Tennessee... These were my women, these were my heart and my home...

So I feel like I'm on this tilt-a-whirl of loss. Wishing these people could stay in my life in the same capacity, but knowing that there is a good possibility they can't. And wanting to develop other deep friendships, but now cautiously reading the future like a telescope, wondering how far away until that friendship is removed too. It feels like sinking sand, and I'm grasping for help alone. Because I have loved, deeply, and now am going through loss.

~~~

P.S. One loss, just highlights all other losses. So this week, the pain of earlier losses (friendships that are now geographically distant, and my mom) just blare and pull all the more painfully and deeply.

Penalized for Strength.

I don't know how to write this, but I guess I'm going to try... it's a mix of words and confusion and lots of unseen emotion that I haven't figured out or know how to deal with... so here's the sloppy vocabulary end of it...

I spent most the day today with one of my friends, and he repeated himself through the day with labeling "feminist" on me. Usually I laugh because I've already given him my "strong woman, soft heart" speech...

But by the end of the day, he got out of the car, and I felt.... vulnerable. Feminist? Me? That's the last thing I want to be -- some I-hate-men, anger-driven, unconcerned, hardened creature who feels the need to prove herself at every turn.

I have no idea how he defines 'feminist,' which obviously matters in this conversation, but it still pulled at me. He's a good friend, a sincere heart, and crazy guy, and our honesty of relationship is positive, but I still couldn't help but cringe at the term.

My mom was strong. Surely. But lovely and soft and caring and concerned and compassionate and giving and serving and humble and gracious. She was sure and moving and demanding and leading, but all in ways that complimented the earlier. And the mixture of these things, made her... wonderful... Her.

So to be called "feminist" unnerved me. It's the opposite of what I what to be. I'm a strong woman. I was raised to be. I was taught to work hard, to live purposefully, to use the hours well. To start the day with prayer and breakfast and then keep moving from there. To mow the law, power a stick-shift, drive a four-wheeler, budget finances. To not complain until I had taken action to correct the complaint. There wasn't an option to be weak, to be soft-spoken. For heaven's sake, all I got was crap about being "too sensitive." But now my friend instead sees my strength as assertive and strong and who-knows-what.

I don't like being punished for being strong. I don't enjoy being intimidating to men, and therefore not asked out... and, alone or unmarried, because men don't know what to do with the fact that I can get dirty, do chores, and think for myself. I don't like the fact that because I'm (using his words) "spiritually mature," I'm punished because other men aren't. And it leaves me alone because of this strength.

So anyway... my entourage... He wasn't meaning what-so-ever to be hurtful, and has no idea I took his flingings to heart... And I know that the godly man I desire will have strength enough to be beyond these thoughts or ideals or expectations... but in the midst, it left vulnerable me.

And lastly, though, what I must add here... is what left tears to my eyes. What was REDEEMED. Because after this encounter, amidst my insecurities, my dad called. And something about just talking to him affirmed me, as me. My strength and intentionality and purposeful use of every moment in time. Because my whole family is like that, and we all love being that way and understand it; it's familiar and true. My sister, my brother, my brother-in-law, my sister-in-law... we all are strong. We're leaders, we're decision-makers, we're risk-takers, we're do-oers. We're 7am up-and-at-um. We're work-hard, play-hard, rest-hard, pray-hard people.

So it's interesting, that my family somehow redeemed my fallen thoughts and sinking self-esteem. That my strength was breed from their strength today, and that is how it was redeemed.

So to strength, to soul, to softness, to me. I pray, oh Lord, make a beautiful woman of me.

Population: Me.

I've heard this song on my morning drive two days in a row. Both times, cringing and pausing and reviewing and wondering. Population: Me. Ouch. Yikes.

I stop and think. Do I live 'Population: Me'? Chances are, if you'd look at how I spend my time (outside of anything teaching) and my finances (outside of tithing), you'd sadly, admittedly, find a lot of that --population: me.

I've read that I should give 'til it hurts. I've also read I need boundaries. Some days I feel I have nothing left to give, other days I wish I was giving what I had.

All I know is, this song is playing around the chords of my heart, and it tweaks a bit off-pitch, waiting for life and purpose and gifting to find harmony in something bigger, something better, than population: me.

~~

Based on the song "My Own Little World" by Matthew West.

Fallen Leaves.

Written by my friend, Trish Jackson, this poem is an artful thought, a perfect expression, of life, love, loss and the greater - redemption. I read it and then re-read it with pauses and thoughts, gathering it in, and wondering what it all means and how it applies, and finding the joy in knowing each season, separately, as well as looking back at the whole. Blessing.

As leaves fall
into a stream
the current carries
away fallen dreams

The tree is left bare
from all that's lost
the winter winds
then bring the frost

All seems dead
for hope is gone
longing lies dormant
awaiting the dawn

The winter is passed
let the spring begin
for now is the time
to dream again

Let song burst forth
new buds appear
smell the sweet fragrance
of joy born through tears

Trust Me.

I loved these words from this morning:

‎"If you believe that I am sovereign over every aspect of your life, it is possible to trust Me in all situations... Trust is like a staff you can lean on, as you journey uphill with Me." ~ Sarah Young in 'Jesus Calling'

Been Loved.

I think, perhaps, once you've been loved, its even harder to go without.

Sometimes I think, sometimes I wonder, what it is like for those who have always grown up... alone. Without parents present either physically or emotionally. Or without a supportive school system, a church body, a presence of love in your life.

I've been loved. Deeply.

And sometimes, perhaps selfishly, that's what I miss the most.

I miss being loved.

I miss her phone calls. Her care packages. Her letters. Her meals. Her place of home. Her emotional safety. I miss the unconditionally, the no-restraints, the encouragement, the always-holding-you-in-my-heart.

I know I have friends. I know have other things, other people. But its different. It's different than the unconditional. It's different than the know-your-heart-history. It's different than the my-world-revolves-around-you love. It's different when you matter that much, everyday, all the time.

It's different, when you're loved.