Dear Friends,
This has been a long and difficult week, made much better by your love, comments, and interactions.
Sometimes I find it very hard not to take other people's pains to heart. There seems to be so much going on this week, even above "sadly", the normal. I have friends who aren't sure they are going to be able to make it to work due to the cost of gas. I have friends from my past who are right now visiting the ER getting ready for surgery for their young son's arm where many believe "daddy" is at fault. We are not sure how much Christmas celebrations we will be able to afford along with many of our friends.
All around us, when trying to see the joy of the season, I let my mind be blocked by the visions I see of greed and excess. Then I get down on myself for judging others. Maybe they did work hard for their money. Who am I to know and judge their story?
I take a deep breath and remind myself of how good my life is, money or no. Today was the day we increased the dosage of my seizure medication (thank goodness the LAST day for the foreseeable future). This day could have been a horrible day because of the place the medicine can put me in for this day. But instead of a bad day, I was awaken to a kiss goodbye from my Wubby who even brought my medicine to me so I could stay in the warm bed with the fuzzy puppies.
When I woke enough to check my phone, I had close to a dozen friends checking in because they knew, what I call, my "bad medicine day". With Teddy, my faithful canine companion, following me from room to room, I had breakfast and second dosage of meds. Teddy made sure I never felt alone or overwhelmed.
Climbing back into bed, with Teddy always at my side or on my back, I checked Facebook and found many wonderful comments to my blog and Facebook "hello's" from friends near and far. Before drifting off to sleep, I received several more texts from people who love me, including my Wubby, just checking in and saying they love me and seeing how I am feeling. While almost drifting off to sleep, my Mama (in law) called to check on me and make sure I didn't sleep through the snow flurries. We giggled together as Teddy and I checked every single window to make sure it was snowing all around the house.
So other than feeling a little out of it and a headache from the meds and the weather front, what could make this day bad?
Somehow on Facebook, a normally safe haven for me, I saw joke after joke of the poor victims of the Penn State fiasco. I saw big men built into bigger gods while young boys and men were made to look like envious, jealous fools. What's so hurtful is men, that I have come to trust and count as friends, are the one's posting these jokes. It is easy to say to block someone that's "just" a Facebook friend, but when you get up in the morning looking forward to seeing what they say, its not an easy decision.
How many of you are going to bed tonight, worried about a friend or a friend's child that may be beaten or worse during the night? We all know of the thousands upon thousands of homeless animals that were once pets that have no where to go. Its easy to get bogged down.
For me I go to a very positive time. One of those times was when I was a young teen going to church camps. (To be honest, I think I was pretty lucky. Looking back, I think many of my youth leaders were borderline hippies and they made faith and spirituality fun and intense.)
When I'm truly stressed, I'll sing on of the songs I learned during this time. Sometimes thinking all the meanings of the song helps. Sometimes just the rhythm and the memory helps. Hopefully, prayerfully, this will also help you.
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| ONE TIN SOLDIER |
Listen, children, to a story
That was written long ago
About a kingdom on a mountain
And a valley far below
That was written long ago
About a kingdom on a mountain
And a valley far below
On the mountain was a treasure
Buried deep beneath a stone
And the valley people swore
They'd have it for their very own
Go ahead and hate your neighbor
Go ahead and cheat your friend
Do it in the name of heaven
You can justify it in the end
There won't be any trumpets blowing
On that judgement day
On the bloody morning after
One tin soldier rides away.
Lyrics www.allthelyrics.com/lyrics/joan_baez/
So the people of the valley
Sent a message up the hill
Asking for the buried treasure
Tons of gold for which they'd kill
Came the answer from the kingdom
With our brothers we will share
All the secrets of our mountain
All the riches buried there.
Now the valley cried in anger
'Mount your horses! Draw your swords!'
And they killed the mountain people
Swore they'd won their just reward.
Down they stood beside the treasure
On the mountain dark and red
Turned the stone and looked beneath it
'Peace on earth' was all it said.
5 comments:
Carrie, I love reading you thoughts. Somehow it clarifies me or clarifies my thoughts. I too get bogged down in life's BS. I don't really keep up with the news so I am not sure what the Penn State thing is about. I find that ignorance is bliss when it comes to the news. Yeh maybe I am being an ostrich and sticking my head in the sand but if it keeps my mind from worrying then I will take it.
I often sit and think how much of life is unfair. I guess it's just a big ol poor me party of one. I think how hard I struggle and work and I seem to never get ahead. I would love to get financially stable, have a house, stop and be able to smell the roses. Then I think how selfish and self centered that is. I have my health (as bad as I hurt I know someone is worse off) and my little tiny messy house as bad as I desire something else, is paid for and no bank can take it from me, and a stressful as work is at least I am employed and have MAD SKILLZ :) and I am not lonely at night-I have the love of a great man.
I am not sure if I am even on topic as I type this. I may add more tomorrow, I think I am not done on this...but for now me and Jack will get off our soap box. Love hugs and good grooms to you!!!
Thank you for sharing your thoughts. Your compassion is your greatest strength. I am reminded by a quote by Maya Angelo ~ "I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."
C Rose xo
It is far too easy to get bogged down in thoughts. I've been pretty upbeat about my cancer diagnosis. Except I got a little down the other day. Why me? Why again? I've already gone through this once so why do I have to do it again? Then, Karen went to visit her friend in the hospital who is dying from cancer. Mine is nothing compared to hers. I felt like crap because of my short lived "woe is me" attitude.
Why do people make jokes publicly? I think they're probably insecure. I would never do such a think in a public environment. I think people are confused and want to break the tension and that's how they chose to do it. Do I think it's in poor taste? For the most part, yes. I think you have to look at the intent, though. Like you said, it's not easy to "block" someone when you look forward to hear what they have to share. If you disagree with other things they post, sure, block them. Hopefully this was a lapse in judgement.
I don't think I really answered any of your questions. It's far too easy to get bogged down by "stuff." If we keep reminding ourselves that other people have it worse than we do, that sometimes depresses me even more. Karen and my therapist (plus some other people) have taken a lot of time and energy to teach me to take life day-by-day, even sometimes moment-by-moment. I'm a bit of a perfectionist and I'm learning that everything doesn't have to be perfect. Stop sweating the small stuff and just live. Would you like to be able to have a big Christmas? Sure. But you can't (who can?) and that's fine. Do what you can with what you have. Karen knows that most of our presents are coming from Dollar Tree. Nothing wrong with that. I know Christmas isn't about commercialization, but who doesn't like to give presents to their loved ones? It makes us feel better. So we could allow ourselves to get bogged down with "man, my wubby would really like this and she totally deserves it." Then get discouraged when you wake up and know you can't make that work. That doesn't mean you don't care. It depresses me to think of all of the people who are abused, sick and homeless. I get sad thinking about homeless animals. I have to step back and take ME time. Mostly by listening to music and taking photos. This is hard since I'm such a huge news junkie.
I have always loved "One Tin Soldier"- and I think it's a wonderful touchstone for times like these when people seem to be beating on each other physically and/or psychologically for no apparent reason other than they can.
That God weeps with us, and shares our outrage helps. But that still leaves us with work to do, and it's not easy.
Jesus commanded us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us - and I think that's harder than any other commandment in the Bible. It's easy to feel kindly disposed to those who treat us with respect and dignity, and to return such treatment in kind. But that isn't what we're called to do. Our call is to extend that to those who infuriate us. We balk - and understandably so. Very often our anger is justified. Condoning despicable behavior is NOT part of our call. And herein lies the heart of the problem.
Fortunately, love in this context isn't about an emotion. It's not about the warm fuzzy feelings of goodwill that is the stuff of poetry and song. It's also a verb. It has to do with our behavior toward one another, and it operates independently of the emotional definition.
I daresay that the people who have perpetrated the hurtful deeds that Carrie has cited in her poignant post are themselves hurting. And this is where the human capacity for empathy come into play. We're all hurting. Without in anyway condoning the way that these individuals have acted out their pain, we can make this our point of connection, and if nothing else, find a way to pray for those who hurt us or others in an honest way. It won't necessarily be easy, but it at least becomes possible.
Now, we can still hold these people accountable for their actions. It is absolutely Biblical for actions to have consequences. We can get so focused on love, grace and forgiveness that we forget that God is also a God of righteousness,that are standards for human behavior, and we are accountable for our actions. We don't really act in a loving fashion if we allow others to act in a way that doesn't honor their own participation in the divine nature - let alone anyone else's. Some times we need to do some education. Sometimes we need to take legal action. That means we don't forgive. It means we do what we can to encourage a holier, healthier way going forward for the good of all concerned.
Peace on earth. That's the goal. Getting there isn't easy, but nobody ever said that it would be. Fortunately, we don't have to do it alone.
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