Can it really be TRUE??
Yes. It can. And it is, which really blows my mind. It was brought home to me today, in some strange ways…
Let me do a wee bit of backtracking. I have let my blog, The Wind, languish here for a long time. Now, many of my long time followers (if there are any left! I know there is one and she is AWESOME: check out The Cricket Pages) know that I have bipolar disorder which can be and is very debilitating at times. For nearly a year, perhaps the entire pandemic, my mental health has been a fragile thread, pulled taught by isolation, lack of therapy and generally allowing myself to eat anything I want. So I have been slipping away by inches, sliding nearer and nearer to the drain. No longer able to keep up the facade, I have come to a breaking point:
I must take action. Today. This very instant. I am having thoughts I haven’t had for over 20 years. Ugly and hateful thoughts.
Sitting on my laurels has made me fat and irritable. Lying prone on this couch has given wobbles to body parts that were firm and strong yesterday…well, I thought it was yesterday. Worse than that is my creative deadness. But I feel the ground shaking and cracks starting to appear. (I just want the earthquake to throw paint onto canvas-not bodily fluids onto walls.) Too graphic a description, you say? I say , NAY-it has to be graphic. I must hear myself this time. I have always used this medium to say what I cannot say out loud: Susan!!!Help yourself!!!Call your therapist!!! Susan!!!!Reach out!!!!SUSAN TODD!!!This is YOU SPEAKING TO YOU!!!Get help NOW!!!
Whew. Ok, ok… I am, I will, ok. I’m done sitting in this Funk. You know, I’m a very spiritual person, and I owe everything I am and ever will be to my God. He gave his only Son to die for someone like me, no , not someone like me…ME!! Jesus suffered the most heinous torture and death for this sinner, and all others of us too. This unimaginable undeserved kindness from a God who I mocked and hid from, whose loving words I defied, whose laws I broke with glee. Who must just feel so hurt when we all forget him, He who created us.
He gives my life purpose. And joy. And the purpose is to get out of my own little quagmire and help someone else see His love, and His light. I just can’t do that sitting here in the dark. So I will keep praying, knowing that he hears, having faith that what I ask, in line with His Will, will be done.
So much of my gratitude had been circling the drain along with my self worth and zest for living. And we all know who it is that rejoices when a servant of the true God falters. Yes, that one does rejoice, and snicker and rub his dirty little hands together. But I remember what my Father said, and that Jehovah will come of victorious on the fast approaching final day.
I must remember that God imparts power to me when I feel tired and beaten up; at Isaiah 40:29-31 it reads: He is giving to the tired on power; and to the one without dynamic energy he makes full might abound.”
Yes. Yes, it’s true, he does…POWER. FULL MIGHT.
That sounds like exactly what I need. So… Last night I went to bed a wee bit early. Did some soul searching in prayer, poured out my heart to my God. I had called an elderly aunt right before bed…actually, I called her at 1:30am hoping to just get her answering machine, cause she’s deaf and I figured without her hearing aid I could safely leave a message without waking her… Wrong. She was still in her ‘Chair’ (you know the one-all elderly relatives have one) so I was caught, like a rabbit in a snare!
“Ahhello?”, the Ancient One spaketh, from The Chair.
“Hey, Betty! What are you doin’ up?”(darn it anyhow…)
“Ah the same thing you are! To what do I owe the pleasure…?” the Ancient One uses a little sarcasm here, a little nudge of guilt.
“Well, I was going to leave you a message, letting you know I was thinking of you…” Oh Susan, honesty will not serve you well here…
So ensued an hours-long conversation, catching up on ALL my elderly relations. And, to my dismay, my mother’s sister had been in the hospital with a ‘heart bleed’…this was quite distressing because I live about 5 minutes away from her and have made feeble attempts at contact, these have not been reciprocated…
So it went, and as a 22 year clean and sober person after a 23 year active addiction to drugs and alcohol, I understand there will be some who will never forgive. This auntie is that person. So, I love her, remember her from my childhood and try not to feel the Hurt anymore. The news of her hospitalization must have hit me hard.
After I finally fell asleep, I had the mist horrific nightmares. My dear Mom, who is my best friend, had gone across town to sell a piece of electronics on Let Go. I told her I would go with, but no she went alone. I was home with Dad, in a huge 2 story white house (dreams, right?) and Mom never came home. I cried when I called the police, I cried when they found her car, the bad guys, the blood evidence. I lost my mind with grief when I found out she’d been stabbed, I was hysterical, inconsolable… Thank God my sobs woke me up enough to realize it was just a dream…
As crazy as this sounds I was grateful that she was already dead; she had not suffered such a horrible end at the hands of strangers. It took me quite a long time to quit crying… Now I cried for missing her, missing my dad, maybe losing my aunt that I’m not close to…I cried for so many reasons. Such an outpouring of pent up grief, it flowed out of me in racking sobs, sobs like I only cried at each of my parent’s ‘real’ deaths. Oh, my. The loss, the catastrophic loss and pain that only death can bring. In my pain I cried out again to Jehovah.
And again, he wrapped me in the fuzzy microfiber blanket of Supreme softness that is His Love…again He held me close and let me rest my weary head.
Daylight seemed to come in an instant, but puffy-eyed from all the crying, I arose and prepared for my outpatient surgery today. Limping and hurting, as always, I waited in the chill morning air in front of my modest little mobile home. I looked at my lovely garden, saw the mist lifting, heard that loud mocking bird start his tirade. I remembered my little shih-Tzu, Kleo, still snoring away, warm and scruffy. She would gave moved onto the pillow my head had recently vacated. And the cats? Oh, they had all had their morning pets and were on the screen porch assuming their squirrel watching posts. All was well on my little farm.
When my ride came, she was cheerful and bright in her brand new brown Hyundai… We talked about surviving domestic violence, addiction and getting right with God. The day at the surgery center was grueling, and I’m in pain still, but the day showed me so many things.’l
Especially my ride home. My insurance company uses Lyft drivers for transport now, and as my impatient nurse urged me to call the service forva third time, my ride pulled up…an utterly gorgeous little black Mercedes four-door hatch back; all dressed up and ready to party! WOW! The driver was a zippy little number too, I hope he forgives me for forgetting his name, all I knew was The Car. It reminded me of a different time in my life. We had the greatest talk about supercars and Mercedes Factory trips to Germany, and his fine jobs in the super high-end auto industry, the man is just amazing and a climber. Well on his way to the future he wants. He goosed the girl a little and the “auto-stick” shifter just blew my doors off, and off all the cars around us!!
I do love a hot rod. So I talked to him about my muscle car history, and he’s actually met Supercar Blondie, and hooked up Matthew McConaughey with the Band in his famous Lincoln ads… Sorry, I forgot their name… Anyway! To put it all in a nutshell, I crossed thru all my past history today, in dreams, in real life, in conversation, in prayer, and all in all….I am so happy now.
I got out of the hot little Mercedes and it’s fine owner’s world, and stepped back into my humble one. With a smile, and a grateful sigh. One thing I told him was that sometimes I get tired of chasing a dollar, worrying about future wealth and all the burdens that brings. No, let me have my relationship with God and Jesus and my brothers and sisters. Let me have my tiny trailer and itty-bitty garden. Let me have my crazy kitties and dear, dear Kleo.
Let me have my life full of grace and purpose. I choose this, even with the pain, even with the tears.
Thank you for listening…
The Wind 