Story of Glory

"I never thought I'd make it here today." -Summer Wheatly, 

(from her Student Body Presidential campaign speech, Napoleon Dynamite.)

Let me tell you how I got to where I am today.

I drove here.

The date was May 2, 2012.  

After the trauma of 2010 and 2011, The Lord apparently saw me as not a complete failure after all.  I had determined that I was never going to get married again.  Ever, ever.  Unless I knew for sure that God had brought me the husband that He wanted for me.  

     March 17, 2012 (ish) I felt compelled to talk to someone I had known 13 years prior.  His name is Sam.  He had tried to say "hi" to me a handful of times since then.  I had only halfway noticed.  I only know this now because he has since told me.  

I don't always answer the clue phone on the first ring, if you know what I'm saying.  You know, the clue phone.  Like "Clue phone, it's for you!" Except by "You," I really and always and only ever mean "Me." 

     So I casually asked this person, 

"Hey, Sam, how's your life? Like, what's happening and stuff?"

-As you can probably tell, I'm paraphrasing here. From that moment, we talked without ceasing for 6 weeks....

     ...in which time, we only saw each other face to face twice, in which time we knew that we were supposed to get married, even though we lived hours away from each other, and how was that even going to work, in which time I quit the job I had been working for almost 2 years, but had recently felt restless, but I didn't know what the restlessness meant, until the Lord told me, in which time we found an apartment in which to live, in which time I told my four children "Hey look guys, I know you haven't met Sam yet, but here's the clencher: We are going to get MARRIED and VERY SOON!"  in which time my ex husband agreed to let me move out of the city in which I was currently living.

In short, The Lord showed us exactly how that was even going to work.

"Sam is your home now.  Move to Redding, marry him, and be happy."

-Said the Lord, to me, very clearly, the day before Easter, 2012.  

This is not a paraphrase.  Those were His exact words to me.

And so I would like to take this story telling detour to interject that folks, if your first husband has left you, and you have four children, it is probably not very wise to surprise them with the knowledge of a new step father who is about to enter their lives, though they have spent less than .01% of their lives in this man's company.  Unless it is that .01% time when the LORD indeed has told you to do just that. In which case, it will be the only perfect thing to do.

BUT ONLY if...

(you know where I'm going with this, so I'll just stop with this circular logic and over use of the word "only" right now.)

Ahem.

Some may ask, "Michelle, why would you move away from the city where your four children were living with their father?" 

The simple answer (The only answer) is that The Lord told me to. 

Beyond that, I was stuck in my job, yet unable to afford to live in the city on my own, let alone be able to care of the needs of the children.  The past year, I had been living with my parents and they had told me it was time to scoot on out of there.  So it was looking like a cardboard box on the corner of the sidewalk for me. 

I'm sure I have friends who would have let me sleep on their couches, but still.

     I also was aware that if I moved away, whenever I came back down to San Jose to spend time with my children, I would actually be able to spend that whole time actually with my children.  While living in San Jose, because I had to work all the time, I had virtually no time with my kids.  I was always going off to work. 

 Hi ho, hi ho, it's slave to work I go.

     And so it was with this peace and assurance from the Lord, after much prayer, and many details falling into place, that on May 2, 2012, I drove from San Jose, CA to Redding, CA in my white Lincoln Towncar which was loaded with my few remaining worldly possessions.  I had few remaining worldly possessions, namely clothing, make up, several pairs of shoes, a laptop.  Oh and lets not forget an old white down comforter that was impossible to clean because it would not fit inside any washing machine.  

     At one time, I had had a family, a green minivan, a house, in which there was full house furniture and various (some) decorations.  The cupboards were stocked with dishes, towels, more pots and pans than anyone ever actually uses. 

Cans of various types of beans and corn.

A front loading washer and dryer with handles that opened up to each other for easier transferring of laundry from washer to dryer.

 And now here I was, reduced.

     On May 2, 2012, I drove with my face forward and the sun shone brightly on my car.  The night before, Sam and I had prayed over the phone.  I had asked Sam to pray I would get a good, deep sleep.  I did.  But I was woken up at 12:34am.  And I heard the Lord say to me,

 "Well done, good and faithful servant.  You have been faithful with a little.  Now I am giving you a lot."  

This made me cry, because I did not know that the Lord was proud of me.  Or that I had been "faithful with a little," because as previously stated,  at one time I had been the owner of "things," and now here I was, reduced.

I hadn't even been able to keep my children with me.*

     I was again woken up at 2:28 am, which is significant because my birthday is 2/28.  I very clearly heard the Lord say to me, 

"I make new things."  

     Throughout the night, I kept hearing Him say this.  

"I make new things." 

 "I make new things." 

"I make new things."

     As I drove to the city I had only ever visited one time, I felt strongly that there were HUGE angels along the sides of my car, hurrying me along, ushering me up to my new hometown.  I could not see them with my physical eyes, but in my mind's eye, they were clear.  I also had a sense of the LORD, seated on the throne in Heaven, his throne filling the entire sky before me as I drove, and I could not see all of Him, but just maybe the bottom of His throne.

It was bigger than you'd even think it was, 

and you're probably thinking it was pretty big. 

So what I'm saying is, EVEN BIGGER THAN THAT.

     The next day, Sam and I drove to Reno to elope.  As we drove from Redding to Reno, I had that same sensation of knowing that there were angels along the sides, behind, above, below, and in front of our car, ushering us to our wedding, and the LORD, on His throne in Heaven, was filling the entire sky before us, so HUGE was He.  There was no other audience for our wedding, but Jesus our Savior and Lord was our only audience, giving His approval, and hurrying us along.  Yes, hurrying us.  

     After the 1 minute wedding,

 (Judge: Do you want the long version or the short version?  

Us: What's the difference?

Judge:The long version just has a few more words in it. 

Us: Ok we'll go with that one.)  

in which a judge pronounced us Husband and Wife according to the state of Nevada, with one stranger witness witnessing, Sam and I had a glow about us.  Yes, we did.  I can't explain that but I just know that we were normal people before the wedding, and after it, once we were officially married, we glowed.  For a few hours, I think, as we scoured the local antique shops for wedding rings to wear, so as to actually look like married people, and not just people standing next to each other, and then as we ate our first meal together in an out of the way cafe we found which happened to have delicious red velvet cake, we carried that glow around with us; we wore it.  Or it wore us.  However that works when the glory of God invades your veins and rests upon your future.

     This story is true and complete, world without end, amen.

     "Glory, come down,

sent from your holy place.

Come cleanse us now

Sovereign and Holy, Come make us holy now.

Straight from your Holy Place,

Lord make us Holy,

As You are holy,

Lord send it down

Just a little bit of Heaven here on earth,

Lord send your glory.

Lord we need you,

Lord I love you, 

Thank you Jesus.

(from the song "Glory Come Down," by Sara Groves)

P.S. I forgot to mention this one detail.  My husband is pretty cute.  So there's that, too.

AND He'd been in love with me from the first time we met 13 years before, and I had no idea, so he was especially shocked that it was ME of all people, reaching out to talk to HIM, of all people, soooooo....there's that, too.

Like I said,  CLUE PHONE RINGING.

-XOXO,

*This post will make a lot more sense if you have first read the story contained in my post entitled "We carry our sorrows and wear grief like a coat of arms," dated 9/11/14, which was very hard for me to write, but which I felt I was supposed to write.  Because the Lord told me to.

AND ALSO, IF you only have one audience member to your wedding, make sure it is the Lord Jesus Christ.  
And now here, after several fake outs, you have reached the actual end of this post.

Maple Syrup

Morning starts like any other
(sister yelling, baby brother)
token problems, lacking answers.
Lord, I'll wait until this cancer's
radiated from my soul and 
I can breathe, completely whole, and
I don't know when that will happen.
Maple Syrup's just tree sap that's
spilled out of the heart of trees
("I'll bleed out sweetly, too," said she.)

Something Golden Fallen Down

Something golden, fallen down.

The sky is gray,
and i wear shadow
like sweaters
There is nostalgia in the wind;
"remember," it whispers
(and if you listen,
 it is all around
in the something golden,
fallen down)

Heaven is still to come, more beautiful than anything we have yet seen.

The color of my hair is meaningless.

And yet I think about it.  The way an artist looks at a blank canvas and thinks.

I am my own canvas.

What I end up putting on my own canvas is sometimes something of which you might approve,

and other times something of which you would disapprove,

and usually there is an element of both.

Those who know they will never have perfect hair learn to become non perfectionists about hair,  in the "I embrace messy styles and beachy styles" way that rolls off of the tongue and makes us seem like we have always done it deliberately.  But no.  We have learned to be this way.

I am not a perfectionist about hair color.  

Six months ago, I colored it a darkish almost blackish with a cherry colored sheen.  The cherry color was surprising.  Overall, my hair looked somewhat purplish, mulberryish.  It brought out my green eyes, or so I told myself, and you, if you had been listening to me talk to you about myself just then.

But that's just the thing: I have a feeling that you would not necessarily care to hear me talk about myself as often as Social Media would have me believe.  

     Facebook has made us self obsessed.  Self worshiping.  Image protecting.  I never cared half so much about what I looked like in the frozen moment of pictures as much as I did circa 2008, when I joined the Facebookers of the world.  I am not here to bash Facebook; I like being able to keep up with friends and school buddies I haven't spoken to in years.  I like seeing their families and such.  It's just that I know it's not real life, real connections like sitting down with someone face to face and actually talking and hearing her voice.  I love a person so much better once I hear her actual voice.  Do you know what I mean?  I see her face, her expressions not unlined, and I love her more for it.  

I want to get back to that.

I want to be the change I want to see.  

But it's hard to hold myself to a standard.  

It's much easier to hold everyone else to that standard, and get irritated when they do not live up to the standard, the standard which I have just made up in my own mind, but to which I have not been living.  Or actually I have been living it, I have been living it for exactly 2 hours.  Do you know how easy it is to NOT post a selfie for two hours?  SO so easy.  So why can't you do it, too.  All of you, any of you.  Because I judge you, even though I don't actually care.  Do you know what I mean?  It's just that I don't want to have to feel insecure myself anymore, because your selfie is really all about me and how I feel about myself, because "loving myself" becomes "worshipping myself" if I let it. My husband brought this up to me a few weeks ago, and I have not been able to get it out of my mind.  He was not calling ME a self worshiper, per se, he was saying that Social Media sites are all about ALL OF US becoming self worshipers, and I wanted to argue with him, I REALLY DID, BUT.  I knew deep inside that he was right.  And it stopped me in my mental tracks.  And all of the words went away.

And I had to lay my face on the ground and repent and cry and weep before the Lord, not that He required me to prostrate and weep, but I needed to in my own way, to keep me from the distractions of NOT doing that, and this is when I got up determined to be better, to be less.

I think it was easy the way that post penance making is always easy.  For two watery eyed broken hearted days.

After that it felt more like deliberate sacrifice.  

Deliberate sacrifice feels like you are laid out on an altar, dying.

Slowly and painfully.

Day after day.

But you're actually still alive, so you can get up off of that thing, if you choose.

It's just that by that time, you have learned so much already that to get up doesn't FEEL right.  So the next question becomes, "How do I stay on this altar, yet continue to walk about and live my physical life?"

I don't know the answer.  Just that I am working it out every day, me and Jesus, me trying to hear Him  so clearly, and sometimes I think I even get it right, a little bit.

About the hair, anyway,  I know this:

That it's not really about the hair.

But we all know that about ourselves, don't we?

Because truth be told, I have never liked my hair, I have always felt it was my one feature that was a handicap, and that if I had only been born with better hair, the kinds of hair that most of the people around me were born with, then so many more doors of opportunity would have been opened up for me my entire life. 

There are people who live in the mud, at least I sure think there are.  I think so because I have seen pictures of them on the Internet and on the news and my entire life.  And yet I worry about my hair.  

I'm 38.  And a half.  Which is old enough to forget my age,  which I have discovered was a neatish trick to turning post 30.  ("How old are you?  I don't know.  Let me do the math.  Oh yeah, 38 and a half.")  I have spent 38 and a half years worrying about my hair.

And God is so good.  Because I believe that He actually cares about this.  He cares that I care and that I am in a process which He is so graciously taking me through.  He is a good Father.  A parent cares about His daughter's hair.  I know because I have daughters and trust me.   And yet.

It doesn't mean He stops the process and just gives me exactly what I want and when.

It means He walks me through it.

And over time, softens the edges of my (pride?) (ego?) (hurt?) 

until I can let go, just a teensy bit more this day than yesterday, and relax already.

Do you know how freeing it is to let go of caring about something and realize that NO ONE ELSE CARED ABOUT IT ALL ALONG??  Or maybe they did, but only in the way that it made THEM feel, because THEY were in their OWN process, and it wasn't really about ME at all, ever,  and so the process goes,  and continues, world without end, amen.

I wrote all of that to say that I finally lightened my hair color.

It's been four weeks now.  

I look at it every day and think to myself that it's too light.

And that I don't even care that it's too light.  I don't mind it being too light for a few weeks.  In fact, I sort of even rejoice over it.  

Victory of Vanity.

And also because I know that when I change it, which will be just slightly to a darker color, just slightly,

It will look THAT MUCH BETTER for having been THIS MUCH WORSE for all of this time.

Be whatever hair color you want.

I'm learning that my best hair color is actually 

basic brown.

The color I was born with, 

which is what it would be, probably, still, if I could see it under all of the layers of colors and highlights and colors I have put it through, in my attempts to change myself from the outside, in.

Outter inner beauty and some such.

To God be the Glory.

And I really mean that.

-XOXO,

(When you touch down with healing in your wings)

     Last summer, for one unusual week, our front yard was visited by magpies.  Do you know what Magpies are?  I'm going to tell you.  They are the bird version of ugly and strange. Magpies are blue, black, and white but they stand with their beaks partly open.  Have you ever seen a bird stand with it's beak partially open?  It doesn't look right.  It's not right.  It is never polite to show up in someone's yard and stand there with your mouth hanging open.  Magpies are rude and inconsiderate.  This is my professional observation.  Until they invaded my yard in groups of 6-10 at at time for one week last summer, I had never seen this type of bird, and had to look them up on the internet to figure out what they were.  Magpies.  For that one week, they invaded my yard.  It was only that one week.

I have not seen even one since.

     But this past year, I have seen many other varieties of birds in this yard. I have never lived in a house whose front yard attracted quite so many birds of so many varieties.  They land on the fence and hop about on the ground.  I watch them silently from the inside of the screen door.   Since the magpies, none of these birds have left me with a feeling of creepiness.  Besides the magpies, none of these birds has hinted to me that it wants to bite my memory and chew on my sanity for awhile.  Instead, the presence of the birds brings me comfort.  

I like to think they are little visitors from God.  That they have arrived at my house after flying around the Throne of God for a while.   That they wanted to stay there, in Heaven, but He sent them down to comfort my heart, and then
on their way to fly to my children, the four who are many miles away, who might just be sitting down to dinner right about the time it takes the birds to land on their doorstep and peck their particular yard worms.

My favorite bird visitor was the red breasted robin who perched on the fence and stayed there a while longer than most.

Probably the most consistent of my bird visitors are the black birds, and they are the largest.

This morning, When I looked out, the first thing I saw was a gray dove.  As soon as I looked at it, it lifted it's wings, then it's body, diagonally to the left in front of me as it flew up.  

-XOXO,

we don't change all that much.

Feather floating on the breeze
nests are just the thing for trees
every year, this is the style
think, "this will go on awhile"

Sparrow brown and small and meek
searching earth for what you seek
worms to feed your hatchling babes
open air, not hidden caves

feather falling on my brain
what's the use of summer rain
every year, with newfound guile,
think, "I'll walk a faster mile"

Pigeon gray and somewhat loud
stay aloft to please your crowd
worms to feed your hatching babes
open air or hidden caves

feather flying on the blue
you know me and I know you
every year this is our jam:
"I am still the way I am"

-XOXO,

Jesus, be my portion

"Just a little while ago,

I couldn't feel the power or the hope

I couldn't cope,

I couldn't feel a thing.

Just a little while back, 

I was desperate, broken, laid out, 

hoping you would come."

(From "Less Like Scars," by Sara Groves)

It's been a consistent almost 100 degrees these past few weeks.  Even though it's a dry heat, hot it still hot.  It cools down at night,  or so they say, I wouldn't know because the cooling happens during the wee hours while I am fast asleep.  But yes.  You do get used to it.  Tonight there is a chance of rain.  I cannot remember the last time I saw rain in the near forecast.  Rain feels appropriate. 

I want to eat something soft and sweet.

The trouble is it will not satisfy me.  It never has. It only leaves me longing.  

So I'd rather not eat and feel the longing I'm already feeling,

and maybe in that, there is a little bit of healing.  

-XOXO,

aftermath of the nuclear explosion

My youngest son has the attention span of a one year old.

He is one year old.

His three year old sister said she didn't want him playing in the play kitchen in her bedroom this morning because he makes a huge mess.  Just walking to her room to retrieve him, I had to step over a colander and a couple tupperwear lids.  I keep them in a low cabinet for him to rediscover whenever I am cooking and don't want him to hurt himself.

     I have the attention span of a mother who's entire insides have been messed up.  Hello child, you walked through my mind and left impressively large footprints all over my best plans, slobbered all over my heart until it was a leaking sobbing mess, turned my studied knowledge into self doubt and fears of what if I'm not doing this right, will I be good enough, AM I good enough, no I am for sure not, this is more than I can capably care for,  not so much the stewardship of his body but of the spirit and soul inside. 

 I do not want to drop and shatter it. 

      I have always been prone to walk into walls.  Sometimes my hip bumps the edge of the counter I so intentionally walked the rest of myself away from.  How did I not remember that my hips stick out like that,  just below eyesight.  

Once,

 (this only happened once) 

when I was pregnant with my first child, I scraped my baby belly on the counter of the narrow kitchen in the second story upstairs apartment where I lived  waited and did all I knew to prepare for her.  It left a mark on my skin, a long scratch that bled and looked worse than it was.

Skin is thinner than it looks yet it holds everything inside of us inside.

I remember marveling that she was in there, her own person, just on the other side of my skin.

So close, yet the scratch that caused me to bleed did not even almost touch her.

     My children are the thing of which I am the most proud.  

 And here's the thing about the youngest, the babiest of them all: the thing that makes me the most proud of him is that he is still little enough to fit in my arms.  Not only is he little enough, he is the PERFECT FIT for a hug, and when all of him is snuggly inside my embrace, just his little legs dangle and swing, just his arms hug me back.  Sometimes he even rests his head on my shoulder.  His chocolate chip eyes sparkle with mischief even as he wiggles out and down.  Off to go and create a life of tupperwear and strainers and all of the things that make up a kitchen and contain a life.

XOXO,

We carry our sorrows and wear grief like a coat of arms

"I don't know how to say this, 

I don't know where to stand,

I don't know where to put my feet,

or where to put my hands.

I've got them in my pocket,

My fingers are freezing cold

They're wrapped around a ticket stub

that's four weeks old

And I don't know how to say this..."

(-Sara Groves, from the song, "Conversations.")

I have not been able to put this into words.

There are times when you wish it was a dream and you could wake up.

There are things from which you cannot wake up.  Because you are awake.  Already.  And those things are the hardest to write.  

 Blink 

Blink

Like a deer in the headlights of my own life.

So it has been, so help me, GOD.  

In 2010, I was a stay at home mom to 4 children.  A frazzled and scheduled stay at home mom.  A good mom, but a frazzled one.  I remember feeling very much like a hamster on a spinning wheel...juggling.  And like if I stepped off of the wheel or let one of the balls drop, they all would drop.  I wasn't even fantastic at the things other moms are apparently fantastic at, such as decorating so cutely, and cooking from scratch.  While I had decorative home ideas in my mind, the trick was getting them out from between the walls of my creative skull bones and into the present physical home in which I lived.  

There were very few pictures on the walls.

I did have one cute corner on the mantle in the living room, which I was pleased with.  But that's about it.

     Meals? Often they came from a frozen box or package.  And then only a couple of the people would eat it.  The other kids would eat almost nothing.  I exaggerate but somehow in their pickiness, they still continued to grow.  

     Things I was good at: Knowing each of my children deeply.  Just sitting and being with them. I would sit with each of them and read book after book after book.  I took them to a lot of parks to run around and play.  Getting them out the door every morning fed, dressed, with their teeth and hair brushed.  I never missed a parent teacher conference.  

I was also good at laundry.  I did one large load every day in cold water and folded and put it away that same day.  Therefore it never piled up.  

     One of my daily challenges was that one of my children was high functioning autistic.  He was amazing.  He was brilliant and artistic, and he needed to live his life by a strict schedule to keep himself from basically freaking out.  There were strict ritual routines that needed to be followed, and I was the keeper of said rituals, and they were becoming more and more elaborate and they were taking over our day.  It meant I had to spend more time dealing with this and keeping this child calm than I did with my other three children.  (We did finally get professional help and therapies which worked wonders.  The ritual behaviors died away.  But for a period of time, it was very very intense for me.) 

     So this is where we found me in 2010.  Frazzled stay at home mom and wife.  

     After 11 years of marriage, my husband and I both made some decisions that lead to the destruction of our marriage.  

     There are so many times I have wished I could go back to that time and do it over again, the right way.  I wish I could have yelled at my 2010 self, yelled and told her what I know now.  Pounded it into her to GO LEFT THERE, not RIGHT, but to GO RIGHT THERE, not LEFT.  I want to shake her and wake her up.  But as I cannot do that now, I can only say that I do yes, have deep regrets and bitter sorrows and many of them are of my own doing.  

     I do believe that no marriage is ever truly beyond repair, not if both husband and wife are still breathing.  Where Jesus is, there is always hope.  He is the only hope.  I have known this my entire life, yet somehow I neglected to cling to it's deep truths, rooted in my heart, at critical times.  And the price that cost me was everything.  

      As a stay at home mom, which I had been for ten years, I had not made any money.  I had not advanced in any career.  So the fall out of the marriage left me without funds for a life of taking care of four children, plus myself.  Especially since we were living in one of the most expensive areas in the country.  I got a job, but it was in no way enough money to provide for a family.  

     The four children went to live mostly with their father and his parents.  Since the parents were willing and able to watch the kids while my ex husband worked.  They also had a home large enough to house all of them.  They also lived across the street from the school.  It was a good school, one of the best, in a good neighborhood, one of the best.  

What did I have to offer them?  Nothing.   My SELF, which they had always had, yes.  But as far as material means?  Nothing. My work schedule was also not regular.  I was working full time, yet the days and hours changed every week.  So it was basically impossible to figure out a regular schedule of child swapping.  I also found that when I worked, if the children were in my care, I was paying so much for childcare that it made working not worth my while.  So I let them live mainly with their father.

     By the time I was promoted to a position which would provide regular hours and the same days off every week, the children and their father were so into their schedule that there was not room for them to change it to live half of the time with me.  That is to say that my ex husband was not willing to change anything about the arrangement.  I asked, I begged, I pleaded with my ex husband for shared custody, and at this point, he calmly said to me, "Michelle, we both know that the children are going to live with me."  I was devastated.  

     During this time, the Lord had been working on my heart.  

     When my husband initially left me, I could not face the reality of the situation.  I surrounded myself with escape methods to try and keep my mind from truly understanding the magnitude of the situation, and a for a few months, it worked.  But that all came abruptly to a halt one day.  I remember clearly feeling like I was Rip Van Winkle, and that I had been asleep for several months, and that I was finally awake, and truly seeing my life and my family.  What I saw horrified me.  Inside, everything screamed, "NOOOOOOOOO!!!! This can't be happening!!!!"  I saw that my family had gone on without me, had created a life with a cavity in it where I used to be, and that the door to that cavity had been sealed shut, and that I was no longer welcome there.  The children loved and wanted me around.  But I was no longer wanted.  My ex husband made it clear that HE was in charge, that I was going to see the children when HE said, and on his terms.  

     I could do nothing but sorrowfully seek the LORD, beg, plead.  And I did this, oh I did this.  

     I was also repentant to my husband for my part in the down fall of the marriage.  Everything in me was repentant and begging for repair.  I longed for the marriage to be fixed, the family to be restored.  But all of my weeping and confessing were met with emotional silence.  

     I say this not to make anyone feel sorry for me.  I do not deserve anyone's pity.  I am sure that if my ex husband were to tell this story, he would tell it from a different perspective. I see it from various perspectives at different times, as well.  And what I see, through the eyes of time and grace and the shiny newness having been washed off of the edges of the memory, is that two people felt they were in between a rock and a hard place, and made decisions the best way they knew how.  When everything in front of you looks like impossibly different than anything you ever were expecting or even anything you believe to be possible, what do you do?

  What would you do?

   Don't answer that.

   Because whatever you think you would answer, it would be the wrong answer.

   You will never know what you would have done until you are ever in that exact situation

    And until you are, hold off your judgement.  

     But I pray that you never ever ever have to find out.

It is now 2014.  The past four years, I have learned to cling to Jesus more than ever before.  I found that when my heart was broken, open, laid bare, shattered before Him like never before, when my entire life had been pulled out from under me like a cheap rug, that HE was the foundation underneath it that kept me alive.  Literally.

I found deep forgiveness from Him.

There were many times you would have found me sprawled out on the floor, facing down, wishing to die, feeling my life was over, and so embarrassed of the way I had grieved the heart of God.  Not just in this situation with the downfall of my family, but over the course of my entire life.  The gravity of my sin felt like too much of a grievous weight to ever stand up under, and I cried in sorrow, "Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me," and I asked the Lord, "How can I ever get up off of this ground again, knowing what my sin has done to your son."  

(It was more of a statement than a question)

(But God answered it.) 

(And what He said to my heart in that moment was profound.)

He said to my spirit,

"You will get up and love whoever I put in front of you to love, because now you know the depths from which you have been forgiven and saved."

I will NEVER forget those words.

They were exactly that clear.

Thank you, Jesus.

From now on, that is all I can say.

Thank you, Jesus.

Incredibly, this is not the end of the story of my life.  It was a stepping stone to a different beginning. A painful and scar filled new beginning yes, but a beginning just the same.

I could tell you the story of how my relationships with my children are closer than they ever could have been, "before."

I could tell you how I told God I would never remarry, unless I knew beyond a doubt that He had brought me someone to marry, and how God did indeed do just that, exactly that, almost two years after my first husband walked out.

About how that courtship was so brief; we talked one day after not having said a word to each other in a decade, and were literally married six weeks later.

About how obeying God's call in my life and marrying my current husband required me to move 4 hours north of where my ex husband still lives with my four oldest children

but that I also know that I heard and felt God leading in every step along the way,

as funny and strange as that may seem, to our conventional linear minds.

And I could tell you the story of how God has allowed this physical distance to redeem things I do not understand, in ways I wish He would not, but that since He is God, I have chosen to trust Him in it.

I could go on to tell you the story of how God is using the fact that we cannot afford to live in the same city as my oldest four children to rescue a very small child, to mother her.  About how God placed her in my care, and I never saw it coming.  About how when I was grieving the loss of my oldest children, God did not immediately give them back to me, but he brought me new children.  One to rescue, (Oh how we have had to fight for her, and the battle is still waging)

and one I birthed last year.
(Oh baby Rocco, with your name meaning both "Battlecry," and "Rest," you are such a deep, deep comfort to the hearts of your father and myself.)
About how I am able to appreciate what I have now, having little ones underfoot,
in ways that one only can after having had her motherhood taken away.
IMPORTANT SIDE NOTE: Our two littlest children were never, and will never be a replacement of my oldest four children;  my heart grieves for the loss of those four EVERY SINGLE DAY, and I pray we can all live in the same city again SOON...but until that happens, I know not to take my youngest two for granted...as I wait for The LORD to restore us to our oldest four.)

In all, a mom who thought she was done having children at age 30, when she had had four and her cup was overwhelmingly full, 

and then again who thought her entire LIFE was over less than four years later,

to now being a wife again, and a mother to SIX children,

four of whom she does not see nearly as much as she wishes she could,

and two of whom are with her all the time...

...but those would be stories entirely of themselves, 

and those are all stories that will I pray have a very specific ending, 

which I do not yet know.

What I do know

What my whole being knows

Is that GOD is the one who directs my path

He is the one who redeems my life

And the lives of those I love

HE is the mender, restorer,

and HIS way of redeeming and restoring are different than I often wish they were,

the story HE is writing is much longer than I always wish it was,

BUT I TRUST HIM.

And so if you do not like the way I have lived my life for the past four years, 

you'll have to take it up with my Heavenly Father,

because He is the one who has brought me here, 

and 

I TRUST HIM,
I TRUST HIM,
I PLACE ALL OF MY TRUST IN HIM
JESUS CHRIST MY SAVIOR,

And that is the only safe place on this earth.

Praise be to God.

Amen.

Your heart knows more than your head knows

Today was a good day. 

I start out each morning with this prayer, "This is the day that the LORD has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it."  I whisper that into Rocco's ear when he wakes up in the morning.  I think he likes it.  He claps his hands in response.    

     My husband comments on the fact that I am very scheduled in how I run our home every day.  It keeps the kids and myself sane.  I like the routine and rhythm of it.  The kids like the feeling of predictability.  They feel it even though they have no word for it and in fact have nothing else to compare it to.  This is the way it's done around here, and we all know it to our bones.  

     I was tired today. 

     I was sad today. 

I missed my four older kids today.  

(everyday, the unspeakable heart bleed) 

     That is not the basis of today being a good or bad day.  

     It was good because God made it good, and I have learned through the years.  

     Almost fifteen years ago, I had my first baby.  Oh how I loved that baby, and it's interesting how things fall into place when you have a first child.  And now that it is so many years and experiences and traumas later, and now that there are two very little children still here with me in the home, I finally know how to put them down for a nap at the same time every day.  

I finally know how to savor having tiny children in the home.

     I did not know how to do that before.  

Well, I knew it a little but not as deeply as I know it now.

     It took until I had five of them before I knew that.

Lord, did I do all that you wanted me to do today, were you pleased with the results?

     Today was a good day.

     Tomorrow will be better.  

     Amen.

     XOXO,

Scarred

I am going to say this like it is: Divorce is like being cut in half, head to toe, with a very sharp knife.  It is a knife that pierces through skull, and brain matter, and heart matter, and all areas of spirit, soul and body. 

 It is not a straight cut, the pieces fall where they may, and it is very very messy. Some people (all people?) bleed out and never recover from that.  

Some people scab over and learn to walk with a limp.   At some point, you are able to look back behind you and see that your life has taken a course you never would have ever expected, and here you are now, in a very different place and with very different circumstances,

 (I would have never chosen these curtains.  Or would I.  Or maybe I did. Maybe I just did.)

hoping you learned.  Because it was too high a price to pay.  

     If you can avoid it, don't do it.

     This is very wise advice.  

     Jesus is the only healer, mender, fixer, restorer, and He is our only hope.

     I know this now more than ever before.  

This is the beginning of the middle of my story.

XOXO,

     

Hi, hello.  Good evening.  

     I haven't written in ages.  Which is sort of like saying I have been neglecting my heart.  Hello heart, I will ignore you for awhile.  Never mind that I still feel you I'll just ignore you in there until you explode.  Again.  And then I will write as I try to wipe the pieces off of the walls and furniture.  Excuse the mess.  We are under construction, still.  

     I have neglected to write out of fear.  Which is a terrible way to live, and one I do not recommend to anyone.  There are a hundred ways I am hashtag LIVINGOUTLOUD for goodness sake but it's the quiet silent ways I hide which are the ways in which I am robbing my life.  So sorry, life.  I will do better.  I will be better.  With God's help.  

XOXO,