I've just started reading "Tracks of a Fellow Struggler" by John R Claypool, a book I have seen frequently quoted in many of the books I've read over the last 18 months. It's taken me quite a while to get hold of it but it is already proving worth the read.
A few days ago, I stumbled across a comment on another blog that referenced me. Essentially, the person (who doesn't know me at all) was saying that I could do with being helped by this other widow (whose life is entirely different from mine on all counts, other than the basic loss of a husband). I have to keep reminding myself that I don't know her and she doesn't know me. She is extremely unqualified to give an accurate opinion on my life and there is a lot I could say to her that would prove how ignorant she actually is about the topic. However, if I've begun learning one thing over the last 18 months, it's that I don't need (nor should I seek) everybody's approval and I am practising learning how to LIVE that and not just know it in my head...way, Way, WAY easier said than done. :P
So in a renewed battle against negative voices, I was encouraged by the following story:
I was deeply moved this week by an observation of Dr George Buttrick''s concerning the Dead Sea in Palestine. Again and again as a sermon illustration I have heard the Dead Sea compared unfavorably with the Sea of Galilee, which is fresh and sparkling and full of fish, while the Dead Sea is salty and no fish can live in it. The usual point is that the Jordan River flows through the Sea of Galilee, but only flows into the Dead Sea because there is no outlet. Dr Buttrick concedes the truth of this point about life through giving but then goes on to identify another truth of which I had never thought. He claims the Dead Sea does have an outlet--the upward one, toward the sky. Across the centuries, as it has surrendered itself to the sun, a residue of potash has built up and remains along its shores. Potash is a different form of life than the water in which fish can live, and is a main ingredient of fertilizer. Engineers have estimated that if the potash around the Dead Sea could be mined and distributed, there would be enough to fertilize the whole surface of the earth for at least five years. The point is, life never comes to a complete dead end. When no outlet is open except surrender to the sky in helplessness, even this response is not without its positive residue, for out of it can come the miracle of new life.
Nephew #2 (3 years old): Hey Aunt (read: Ant) Kristy, I can jump over 30 miles over a hippo's mouth!
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N2: Sssssssss...
AK (clueless): Ssssssss....
N2 (positioning his hands strategically in his lap): Ssssssss....
N2 (to Mom with a proud look on his face): I peed on Aunt Kristy!! Heeheehee.
Aunt Kristy is now hiding behind "Mom" trying not to be seen killing herself laughing over such naughtiness as he gets told off. :)
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N2 (hearing a jackhammer in the airport): Is that tootin'? (eg, farting)
AK: Man, I hope not--that would be some kind of chili!!!
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AK: What are you doin'?! (as I was laying across my bed)
N2: Just ticklin' you's butt...
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N2 (playing with plastic cattle): This cow's gonna jump on the mommy cow...
AK: Oh really? Did it hurt her?
N2: Nope. She has armour on.
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AK: Did you just toot?
N2: Yep. Now I 'mell.
AK: Yep, you do. You stink!
N2: You 'mell too--from liptik (lipstick)!
(Of which I was wearing none...)
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It's pretty funny around here... :)
So my sister and her family were over in Australia for three weeks and then I travelled back with them to their home in Texas! I will be staying with them for six weeks while some awesome people look after my house back home. It's really only the second time I've stayed with my Texas family and the first time that I've stayed for any length of time which is quite strange. That had never dawned on me until the last few days. After staying here for a week in July, it almost felt like coming home this time. :)
We had a long, drama-filled trip home. The drama was limited to the airport's errors, thankfully, and not sickness or hysterical children! The kids are actually pretty good flyers. I anticipated the plane trips possibly being miserable but they weren't. Dragging them through multiple airports was a little miserable at times but, really, they did pretty well.
On being dragged through multiple airports, let me tell you that a 13 hour flight is nothing. If all I had to do was get on a plane, fly for thirteen hours and get off at my destination, it would be a breeze. Seriously. It's the leg-after-leg-after-leg of connecting flights on either side (or both) of the 13 hour that makes the travelling a nightmare.
And the jetlag afterward...
After getting back to the house around 1:30am, we all slept till about 11:15am the next day. Sounds great, doesn't it? Until we couldn't really sleep last night. :P I was awake literally all night. I tried to go to sleep around 11pm and couldn't. Got up and read a book from cover-to-cover. Tried to sleep again (it was 2:30am by this time)--after having the living daylights scared out of me by my oldest niece who saw me walk by her room to the bathroom and decided to hop in my bed and scare me, VERY SUCCESSFULLY. Got up again an hour later and found my niece was also still awake. She climbed in bed with me and we watched a movie on YouTube until 5:30am when we tried to sleep again. Succeeded by 6-6.30 am for about 3 hours. Found out nobody else got much sleep either.
Other than that, though, I'm loving being here. :)
Yesterday was Steve's birthday...the second without him. It was also my oldest nephew's birthday...the first we've ever celebrated in person with him. So that was kind of weird.
On the 18 month anniversary, I saw "our truck" for only the second time since it was sold early in the year. It was very unexpected and like a bit of a gift. Yesterday, on his birthday and far away from town, I saw it again. So unplanned, yet timed so perfectly.
The other cool thing about seeing it yesterday was that my oldest niece was with me. That was special. I got to tell her it was the truck that "Uncle Steve" (who she never got to meet :() used to drive. She was quite surprised to hear that about a seemingly random truck as we drove the 5 hours back to Nanna's.
My sister from Texas and her husband and their kids are in Australia at the moment. I had nearly my ENTIRE family staying for three nights...that was an even dozen of us in my house. :) It was loud and crazy but fun. I do love all my family being together!
A friend told me about this song after my post this morning. I prefer it sung by Garth Brooks (who she knew it as) but I wanted a version with the music and the lyrics.
I don't take the word "chance" in the same sense as "luck" but rather referring to my knowledge and/or ability to control. I don't think our lives are left to chance. I'm not quite sure of the nitty-gritties of my theology on it anymore but I do still believe that God is in control of our lives--however that plays out, whether He directs all events or allows and uses them.
At any rate, it's a beautiful song and it's true. If we could see the future, often we would probably change it, but what else would we rob ourselves of in the meantime?
That's today and, strangely, I find there's really not much to say...
"I've made it to eighteen months..." but also "It's only been eighteen months..."
"I can't believe it's eighteen months since this funny boy was around to make me laugh or join our jokes...it seems like yesterday..." but "On the other hand, sometimes it seems like nothing more than a dream."
My life has definitely been moving into the phase of becoming "mine" instead of "ours"--it has to if you don't want to rot--but, man, I miss him...
I've been wanting to go to the movies for ages but there's been nothing on that interested me as worth watching. I got an unexpected invite to go tonight with a friend and her mum so I went. I'm really glad I did.
Charlie & Boots is a newly-released Australian movie (starring Paul Hogan and Shane Jacobson [Kenny]). It's way better to watch the trailer than it is for me to describe it, so go check it out. There's plenty of other interesting information on the website too.
We laughed and I cried and I really wished I could have watched it with Steve--he would have loved it. It does a heaps better job of showcasing rural Australia and the good ol' Aussie bloke than AUSTRALIA (the movie) did. I'm quite interested to see what Americans think of this movie, given their previous fascination with people like Paul Hogan and Steve Irwin. :)
It was particularly interesting for us as the start of their journey is just a couple hours' drive from here. Also, a lot of the places in the early part of the trip are ones I have been with Steve and all of us had interesting 'connections' (for lack of a better word) to the company Boots works for.
Charlie & Boots was a very funny but also heart-warming movie--and now I wanna go on a road trip!!! :)
I've wanted to read the book "Let's Roll" by Lisa Beamer for quite a few years now and a friend just lent it to me the other week. There was quite a lot in it for me to ponder. This is the section that struck me the hardest...
I had always struggled with the "why" questions in regard to Dad's death. Eventually such questions led me down the road of "It's not fair!" and became a swirling cauldron of anger, bitterness, and resentment deep inside me. I recognized the ugliness of those emotions and didn't want them in my life, but I didn't know what to do about it.
One day I was talking with Dennis Massaro, the director of Wheaton's Office of Christian Outreach, the organization that had arranged our summer mission trip to Indonesia. Somehow the subject turned to the upcoming trial, and I felt the cauldron seething within me. I dumped the whole mess on Dennis, who listened patiently without a word of condemnation.
When I was finally out of words, Dennis calmly said, "You know, Lisa, God knew the hospital they took your dad to wasn't going to have the right equipment to perform that surgery."
I gulped hard, as though I was going to interrupt Dennis, but he paid no attention and kept right on talking. "The Lord knew the first doctor they talked to was going to blow off the situation. At any time, God could have changed the circumstances. He could have healed the hole in your dad's heart. But for whatever reason, he let the natural course of things take place that day."
I blinked back tears as Dennis continued. "Knowing what the consequences were going to be for your family and for you, he nonetheless allowed it to happen. Maybe it's time for you to accept that."
Dennis's gentle words were a targeted arrow in my heart. I knew he was right. And at the same time I both loved and hated him for telling me the truth. But the truth set me free. (p82-83)
And therein lies my problem: I haven't accepted that...
a) God could have changed the circumstances but...
b) didn't want to yet...
c) that's okay.
Because it's not okay with me. All my kicking and screaming and searching and reading and crying and (little) praying has basically been an attempt to find something I could make peace with--primarily, in this situation and, secondarily, in the last ten years of my life. I've always known that, at the end of the day, God will win the battle--but I'm not giving up without a fight; I'm not submitting blindly. Steve's death put me way past being able to do that.
This excerpt zoomed in on my biggest problem and need. It brought it into a renewed focus and proximity that hasn't left since. I've given it a lot of thought. It's connected into other things that I've been reading and learning. There's definitely a conspiracy here. ;)
Anyway, on the back of all this, the phrase "God is God and I am not" out of a Steven Curtis Chapman song came to mind this afternoon while I was laying on the floor (I have my brother to thank for the education). I eventually got up and Googled it and found the following video on YouTube. Very confronting...
I am so much braver and my world is so much bigger than last year. That's great. Yet in the last few days, I've realised just how much my world is still carefully controlled. That's disheartening.
It's such a slow process to rebuild your world when it comes crashing down around you. What it does is makes you very vulnerable and hyper-conscious to the fact that nothing is "safe" anymore.
I am constantly doing things that require huge emotional reserves to fight fear and regain ground but yet I still have so far to go. Probably on the outside, I look pretty normal to the majority of people and particularly in everyday life. But introduce something that I haven't done since Steve died or haven't done alone or requires me to put myself in an unfamiliar situation...
It's exhausting. I'm constantly second-guessing myself and/or trying to balance the need to continually keep moving forward with taking a break from the constant stretching. I don't like to have to explain why I can't or won't do something because it sounds so silly to people who haven't been there and/or haven't seen how far I've come.
After 18 months (almost), it's weird that things can still affect you so much. As far as physical energy, I'd say I'm back to normal (well, other than how constant lack of sleep affects you). Emotional energy is an entirely different subject. I would struggle to do much more than I'm currently doing. I'm sure I'll pretty much get there eventually--I'm wondering just how long it's going to take!