a look back

I was just looking back at some things I wrote a little over a year ago. I think it is good to pull out the rear view mirror from time to time and see how things have changed. Anyway, this is what I came across...I'm not even sure I remember writing it.

My head is full of memories I didn’t have. Sun bleached images of a blurry face playing with the dog in the park or boy feet and girl feet all mixed together in the grass. The still frames of happiness that are somehow so elusive. In reality, my mind is full of years of happy memories, so many I can scarcely separate them into distinct moments. Nonetheless, I can’t shake the nagging thought that maybe those times are past. That the life surrounded by the ease of friendship that requires nothing, of smiles and hugs that are warm and heavy with a history of love and acceptance is something to look back on fondly, but not a present reality. And when the future makes no promises the solitary life of eat, sleep, work is a bitter breath to breathe.

The rich depths of solitude are quick to become the dark lengths of loneliness. And right now I stare blankly into the darkness. Knowing that the journey is my own and it will not always be this way, but also overcome with the understanding that each day my shadow is the only one keeping pace with me, the only one aware of my pace and stride. Though others see from a distance and speak words of encouragement and support there is no whisper in my ear of the love that knows and still loves. That doesn’t just love me generically but precisely because of my particular hue, for the gestures I make and the way I think and give those thoughts away.

It's so funny how life changes. I was in a crappy job that I hated and had 5 friends when I wrote this. Even though I am in a MUCH better place now I still long for some of those same things. I think deep down it really might be a longing for some consistency and sense of permanence. I haven't been anywhere I planned to be for more than a year or two since I graduated from high school.  I look forward to the day when I am settling somewhere and don't have a pre-existing plan to leave. And even though I enjoy my job now I know it is not what I am made to do. So I look into the future hoping to see beyond the low beams and distinguish what is lying in wait a few days, months, years out.

 I know too I had a desire for companionship and although there are a few hours in a plane between us I am beginning to experience the deep waters of another and allow her to know "my pace and stride" and it is more than I ever hoped.

Ultimately though, like most 20 somethings I know, I am still figuring out how I do life well. I'm learning how to not let my job take over my life, how to cultivate and maintain freeing relationships and how to "give up my life for His sake" and I'm learning how I do this as me. I've certainly had my fair share of blunders, probably more than I recognize now, but at this very moment I am confident in the One who makes promises and keeps them. The One who finishes what He started. But it's tricky sometimes (maybe most of the time) and lately I've know the acute pangs of need for His presence, His healing, His peace.

So I ask for those Jesus and trust that you will continue to reveal this journey to me as only you know how. 

- If you are a praying person please pray for Joyce Luy, my boss, and her husband Chris. Chris recently found out he has cancer and things are very serious for them. 

goinpeace.