Getting Past It

Awoke to owl sounds on this snow-covered wonderland, Neebish Island. Waiting for pancakes, coffee in hand, reminiscing with cousins about good times and growing older. Pretty sweet. Yesterday's mistake slowly wearing off, the refreshing of the biting cold air and laughter of eight children seeping into my soul, washing away life's agonies and replacing them with goodness.

Why am I surprised? As I fell asleep last night, I was incredulous that any of this beauty would reach me. I was muffled, trapped in mummy-cloths of my inadequacy. So much for being an artist, a poet, a “feeler.” So much for being a family-girl, a people-person. I wanted to run away from everyone. It was a very old and familiar feeling, like clothes I’d put on so many days of my forty-two years.

How can we step out of those "old clothes" that weigh us down and start every day with newness- really? When our hearts want to weep and our bodies want to crawl under a rock and we've lost hope of our success as humans (do you ever go there?), what is the next breath? The next thought, the next step?

I'm a firm believer in replacing the negative with the positive. Not that this works without fail for me; but I see in the little nuances of this morning that it can be so. The warmth of those who ever love us, those who see our backsides throughout our lives- our families- and still love us, that warmth is filling the little cracks in my heart as I sit to type. The frightening chill of my very human error is giving way to this. It is succombing. Soon it will fall like a mudslide, slipping and crashing away. This I finally know.

I was reading Hosea 11 this morning (I’m sure you won’t ask why I was there) and like what I saw: It’s God talking. And whether or not you believe in God you may find this sweet:
“But they didn’t realize it was I who healed them. I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love….All my compassion is aroused….Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.”

So my take in this is two-fold: It takes the heavenly and the human to reach us. God speaks and heals through people, through those with whom we surround ourselves. And then he heals the broken places in our hearts if we let him. I personally believe in a God who reaches down into our every moment in compassion and love. It certainly does not show in everything we experience, but those times I have “waited” for him, he does show up. In compassion. In love. In healing. He has been faithful. All is not lost.

So today I’m not only banking on this, but I’m already basking in this. Sweet love through moments with people around me in this cabin. This is how God restores me. Some are new acquaintances, some are cousins with whom I’ve spent every Christmas and summer break my whole life. The give and take between us reminds me that I am not all about my mistakes; I have much to give, and that I have much to learn from others. And I am not alone. Thank God. Share