I spent a weekend at the coast with a friend recently. The weather was glorious – no wind and plenty of sunshine. We relished the opportunity to sleep, visit, eat, visit, exercise (err…walk 60 feet to the sand from our back door), visit, read, watch a couple movies, visit, clean, or anything we wanted, whenever we wanted. My friend recently married, and we both work full time jobs. Relaxation – and, perhaps more importantly, “vacation” from technology – was exactly what we needed.
Now, I’m a pretty blunt person, fairly open about most things, but I don’t have a lot of people in my life to whom I can completely ‘bare my soul.’ For me, Jenny has always been one of the few. We embarked upon a couple of our philosophical exchanges. I felt refreshed when I got home on Sunday evening: I’d been able to speak my mind to someone who cares, also to listen to her frustrations, and then laugh things off together while knowing that each truly did care about the other and would carry those concerns to the Lord in prayer as we returned to normal life.
Somehow, though, I woke up exhausted, burdened, discouraged, and completely confused two days later. There’s something about honesty that hurts. The spoken word forces us to recognize things, to acknowledge realities, to face the unknown. Apparently I’m a glutton for punishment, because I’m going to produce written words that will merely do the same.
We had sat on the couches Saturday night, and I blurted, “I don’t see a future.” In a way, this is a season in which I’ve already lived, yet this time it’s entirely different. At 18, one can rarely envision one’s future exactly as it will turn out, but who cares? One’s future has a safety net, so to speak, called one’s twenties. One is allowed to not know oneself until one has traversed one’s twenties. One can reasonably assume that one will spend at least a little time in college, work a job or two trying to figure out what one enjoys, get a few stamps in one’s passport, and the like.
I’ve done all those things. I’m not 18, bright-eyed and optimistic. I’m not 22 and ready for The Unknown’s challenges. I’m not 24, recently graduated and returned from celebratory adventures, chomping at the bit to endeavor on some new quest or find that perfect career.
I’m 30 and tired.
Don’t worry! I’m not saying I’m ready for afghans and rubber-soled slippers so I can shuffle out to the mailbox, scream at kids rattling down the street on tricycles, and retire with 8 cats and 14 dogs. Quite the contrary! I hate cats!
I am young. I have, hopefully, a long and healthy life ahead of me. I have all sorts of things I want to do and experience. Such as...I really want to go to Australia soon, and whether or not it makes me a dork, I need to go to Antarctica as well. Those are the only 2 continents I’ve not yet stepped on, and I want to be the only person most of you know who has been to all 7. I also want to see Israel, Turkey, Egypt, Scotland, Italy, Greece, Vietnam, more of Argentina and Peru, Chile, ride the Orient Express from Beijing to St. Petersburg, sleep in a yurt among Mongolian horse herders, own a small cabin on property in Montana or Wyoming, ride horses all day, hunt elk and bear, drive a racecar, hike in the Himalayas, learn how to make good fried rice, fish in Alaska, publish books, learn how to play a few instruments, become a songwriter, and a lot of other things. All this on top of making sure my nieces and nephew stay attached to me by visiting them in Brazil and/or beyond. (I’ve been very good to them all their lives so that when I’m old some day and need someone to wipe my drool and change my diapers, at least one of them will be fond enough of me to do the tasks.)
But I’m tired, and wizened. I counted off to Jenny how many different transitions I made in my twenties. If you add the transitions during my childhood, the number gets quite high. For instance: I never went to the same school more than 2 consecutive years (although sometimes we did return to a school, 2 year interludes at other schools caused continuous transitions). From my ages of about 6-9 years old, my siblings and I got pulled out of school for 2 months at a time, twice a year, to go on outreaches because my parents were DTS staff at YWAM. We moved back to the farm after that, and then sold the farm when I was 18. From 18-29 years old, I moved residences 5 times. I worked 3 jobs, went to Bible school, then 3 different schools while working a 4th job, and now I’m on a completely new job in a whole new setting. Every transition has thrust me into a new circle of people that I have to start at square one with. That gets exhausting emotionally and mentally! (I actually began the program at WOU with my heart purposed on not investing in any friendships with anyone there because I didn't have the energy to develop friendships for 10 months when, inevitably, I would simply have to begin anew elsewhere in the fall.)
“I haven’t felt like I had a home since we left the farm.”
That was my second statement to Jenny. She looked shocked.
I’ve lived partially out of boxes and tubs for my entire adult life. I didn’t realize how bad I was until right before Christmas. My parents, sister and I got our Christmas trees, but I had no idea where my ornaments were. It took me a week to find them – in their store packaging and Target bags on a garage shelf. The search had sparked a bedroom switch in my house, and that resulted in me digging through boxes to figure out: A) What in the world do I own? B) Why are my life possessions in boxes? C) Am I human??
There was my life, all boxed up, shoved into the dark recesses of a bedroom-turned-storage-dungeon. Pictures, knick-knacks, books. So many memories of people and things I love. All boxed up.
The fact that my mom hung a few pictures while I was in Brazil last fall probably should’ve clued me in to how Spartan I tend to live. (I still have the most random assortment of hand-me-down furniture you will ever see!) Granted, I’m not a big fan of over-decorated homes. I’m not the most flowery, perfumy, cluttery person I know. I prefer an open room sparsely decorated. It’s like the difference between the Willamette Valley and Montana: in one, I suffocate, and in the other, I can breathe.
Jenny asked me if I really thought I could settle down. “You don’t think you’d get bored?” Her question was pertinent. My family all tends to be a little…adventurous? Spontaneous? We like to see and experience new things. But for the first time in my life, I could look her in the eyes and answer, “No. I’m ready for stability.” Those were nearly impossible words for me to utter a couple years ago. I’ve grown tired of living in boxes, though. I’m tired of not wanting to invest in my residence because I know I won’t be there long-term. I’m tired of feeling like the only place I can really lean back and breathe is driving aimlessly around the countryside in my truck. Seriously, what does it mean when my truck is the closest thing I have to “home”?
This has been a very melancholy, if not utterly pessimistic, blog post. For that I apologize. Some people may have even quit reading already – or at least jaunted down to Safeway to buy me some cheese to help me wash down my whine.
Please, do not allow yourself to read this blog and think I am bemoaning singleness. I speak of nothing specific. Over whether or not I get married, I exercise little to no control. My word “stability” must not equate “husband” in your mind! Not that I object to marriage - quite the opposite. However, there are worse things than being a lonely single person: being a lonely married person. I attach no exact qualifiers to “stability” because first, as I said in the beginning, I can no longer envision a future; and secondly, God does not operate within human boxes. I have no idea what God has in store. I have preferences, but He holds he reigns. If God decides to provide stability through a man, great! I could use a lot of help around the house – seems like there’s always an abundance of dirty dishes, vacuuming, laundry, cleaning, yardwork…. I abhor ironing (and actually had my boss mention to me that my USTS shirt would look even better ironed), I use clean dishes out of the dishwasher because I hate unloading it only to give up and unload it because the dirty ones are piling up which I hate even more, and I use towels that I never folded because I also hate folding laundry. (I do love to cook and mow the lawn, though!)
Desire for a place to call home, to settle in and enjoy – desire for an avenue to utilize my gifts, to do what God created me for – could take many shapes and paths. I reject none, yet I rely on no specific image (no cookie-cutter concept) of “a future” and “stability.” What scares me is that I can no longer envision any future. Right now I feel as hopelessly distanced from a beautiful future as I’ve ever felt overjoyed by potential. And that’s pretty distant – because I’ve been pretty overjoyed in my life. (Finishing school was one of those times!)
About 18 months ago God spoke something to me: “You will go through a season of mourning soon, but this is not it. This is a season of rejoicing, of storing up treasured memories.”
The following 12 months proved to be just that – a season of rejoicing, of storing up treasures. Through the generosity of a couple family members, I was able to quit my job and accept a Graduate Teaching Assistantship for a Master’s program. This gave me a year with a fairly flexible schedule so that I could spend as much time as possible with my family before Ben, Melissa and the kids moved away. I was excited after getting home from Brazil in September. Though I missed Ben and his family terribly, I was full of hope and dreams of possibilities. (I almost packed up my truck and headed out for the unknown frontiers, but then realized winter starts much earlier in Montana and Wyoming. October probably wouldn’t be a grand time to be homeless and jobless there.) This is going to sound totally wrong, and I don’t mean it the way it sounds, but I felt free to start living my life. I’d spent my 20s making decisions I don’t regret – to stay in the Valley so I could be with family. I was living my life, but I was conforming the larger picture of who I am and what I wanted into a life consciously and intentionally prioritized in such a way as to be actively involved with my family while God provided the time to be together. Quite frankly, Ben and Melissa have been my best friends – numbered alongside Jenny on the short list of 3-4 people I rely on. Not having them here has been the hardest transition of all so far.
This was going to be my year to “start” my life: to break ground in unknown adventures.
Life hasn’t gone the way I intended over the last few months. I’m thankful to have a good job working for godly people. I’m thankful to have a roof over my head and money to pay my bills. I absolutely sense that these things are God's provisions at this particular time. But is this life what God created me for? What does one do if one feels trapped in a life that doesn’t reflect what/who God created them to be? It’s healthy and right to not put God in a box, but God does give us dreams and hopes.
I feel like the father in Mark 9:24 who exclaimed, "Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief."
I shared with Jenny an image that stuck with me from a trip to Recife back in 2001. Sitting on the beach, I watched the waves roll up to the shore, pummeling the sand. Those waves and that sand were different than in Oregon. Our water is much darker, and the beaches are wider, and the water and shore meet horizontally here. In Recife the sand sloped sharply and the water was light enough to see the billion grains of sand in each crest. Maybe this doesn’t strike you the way it struck me, but the sand being carried by the waves made me think of our lives in God’s hands. The sand is constantly thrashed and battered on the shore, but the wave never lets go. If you want to get all scientific on me, you can, no doubt, prove that the waves are not actually a continuous form and the sand clearly does not all stay carried by the wave or else there wouldn’t be a beach. The image works for me, though!
I take comfort in the Biblical lesson that we go through seasons in this life. Seasons end! The good ones, we cherish; the difficult…we anticipate God’s deliverance. I believe my challenge in the last couple years has been to discipline myself to resolutely focus my eyes upon God regardless of the season. This isn’t easy. In both situations, we can shift our gaze to our circumstances. Elation and worry are merely two sides of a coin: both can become idols, or at least stumbling blocks in our relationship with Christ. Our attention diverted from His sovereignty is sin, plain and simple.
I wish I had some astounding insight to close this blog entry. I’ve reviewed and rewritten a couple times, but the best close is a simple chorus from a song by Nicole Nordaman. Regardless of our situations, regardless of how “good” or “bad” our circumstances, whether or not we’re living our dreams or trudging through despair and hopelessness, God desires the same ONE thing from each of His children. Please allow the beautiful simplicity of these words to fill your heart with rejoicing as we turn our eyes to the risen, capable, loving Savior who treasures His creation – including our hopes, dreams, and longings. Our lives are not about self-fulfillment; our lives are about being
“Only me on my knees
Singing holy, holy
And somehow
All that matters now is
You are holy, holy.”
Singing holy, holy
And somehow
All that matters now is
You are holy, holy.”
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