I’ve got a love that keeps me waiting

So, these past few days,I have spent a lot of time alone. I enjoyed it at first, because as a strong introvert, I really need time to recharge and be alone. I have a crazy next few weeks coming up, so I was thankful for this time of rest before chaos (but good chaos) began. But today, I started to feel just this desperation to do something with someone, to talk to someone. I tried calling a few people, but none of them picked up their phones. So, I decided to finish a book I had started late last night called “Redeeming Love.” Basically, it’s about this girl who’s forced into being a prostitute at a young age, and does some horrible things, before a man comes and rescues her from the brothel and marries her, because God has told him that’s the woman he’s supposed to marry. She pretty much does everything to make him hate her and want to divorce her, but, with God’s help, he continues to be patient with her, does everything for her, and loves her even though it’s hard. She runs away several times, and every time she comes back, he welcomes her so tenderly. And through his unconditional love, she begins to know God’s unconditional love for her, and be free from all the horrible things in her past. It’s a really good book…I cried a little bit in many places. It made me remember God’s unconditional love for me, and how He always rescues me and sees me as beautiful, even when I can’t see that. It was definitely something I needed to be reminded of, and it was better for me right now than anything social I could have done. So, here is a poem I wrote, pretty much based on the book and its message.

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The harlot

The prostitute

She longs to free herself from the shame,

The condemning shame

That attacks her every time

She starts to feel safe

She longs to be pure, cleansed, redeemed

Loved for something besides

The symmetry, the ornaments

That adorn her

That lift her pride for a moment

But leave her forlorn,

Ashamed, feeling more unworthy

Because they don’t know the ugliness

Lurking inside.

Until, one night,

He comes,

Takes her in his arms

And carries her away,

Wrapping her in white and giving her a new name,

Saying, “I will always love you

You are worthy, you are beautiful, you are MINE!”

I’m waiting for this cough syrup to come down

So, I have two unrelated things to discuss tonight.

The first is a bit less deep than the second. So this past Friday, as sometimes happens when I don’t get enough sleep during the week, I got kind of sick. I don’t really know how to describe all my symptoms–I guess just flu-like symptoms like being achy, coughing, having to blow my nose a lot, just being a bit out of it. So, I spent most of the weekend vacillating between feeling better and feeling pretty awful. I slept A LOT. And today, I got another good night of sleep last night, and started feeling better at work today because of some cold medicine that was working. I hardly ever get sick, so I foolishly thought I would be fine to do a light workout at the gym Saturday, Sunday, and today. I made it through all three workouts, but it was so frustrating for me because my brain was used to working out a lot harder than my slightly weakened body was ready to. Even today, I felt a lot better, but a cardio workout that usually is no problem for me was really hard and left me sweating like crazy. I just don’t understand how being a little sick for just a few days can make me lose strength so easily…

The second is a quality that I noticed again this weekend. I had lunch with two friends that I hadn’t seen in 6-9 months on Saturday, and it was amazing to see them again and catch up. But after it was over, I found myself a bit down, because I didn’t know when we would get to see each other again, and we weren’t ever going to be able to hang out once a week like we used to. It made me realize how much I wish all my good friendships could stay as they were at their peak, if that makes sense. I know things have to change and all that, but I don’t like that, to be honest. I would rather just bask in, just rest in and enjoy those friendships forever.

Through Painted Deserts

So, I’ve been reading Through Painted Deserts by Donald Miller, and here are some quotes that I really liked…

“God bestows three blessings on man: to feed him like birds, dress him like flowers, and befriend him as a confidant. Too many take the first and neglect the last. Sooner or later you figure out life is constructed specifically and brilliantly to squeeze a man into association with the Owner of heaven. It is a struggle, with labor pains and thorny landscape, bloody hands and a sweaty brow, head in hands, moments of severe loneliness  and questioning, moments of ache and desire. All of this leads to God, I think. Life is a dance toward God, I begin to think. And the dance is not so graceful as we might want. While we glide and swing our practiced sway, God crowds our feet, bumps our toes, and scuffs  our shoes. So we learn to dance with the One who made us. And it is a difficult dance to learn, because its steps are foreign.”

“It makes me wonder, now, how easily the brain can be tricked out of what it was supposed to feel, how easily the brain can be tricked by somebody who has a used car to sell, a new perfume, whatever. You will feel what you were made to feel if you buy this thing I am selling. But could the thing you and I were supposed to feel, the thing you and I were supposed to be, cost nothing?”

“And maybe when a person doesn’t buy the lies any more, when a human stops long enough to realize the stuff peoiple say to get us to part with our money, isn’t true, we can finally see the sunrise, smell the wetness in a Gulf breeze, stand in awe at a downpour no less magnificent than a twenty-thousand-foot waterfall, ten square miles wide, and know, This is what I was meant to do. This is who I was made to be, that life is being given to me as a gift, that light is a metaphor, and God is doing these things to dazzle us.”

 

Hey mama, don’t want no drama

So here’s a poem I wrote today while I was at Swami’s Cove in Encinitas, one of my favorite places ever : )__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Crashing

Crying out

Calling out

“I love you”

Washing peace over my restless mind

Infinitely stretching out

“This is how much I love you”

Je ne vous comprends pas

But I could remain

Here,

Quiescent,

Eternally.