Blind to the daily gifts I was given, I shuffled about unaware of them and risking it all.
Drunkeness overtook me. Guys overwhelmed me. Temptations nearly seized me. Anger nearly wrecked me.
I craved ending it all. Listening to the lies became comfortable. Trusting someone different, perhaps Truth, was a risk I wasn't sure I could take. A direction I knew not how to follow.
Sitting here now, on a mid-winter afternoon, the sun pours through the windows of this spacious house that has been gifted to me as a home. A little boy, my son, plays out in the snow piles surrounding our castle, keeping himself busy with conversation and thought of his own. A man, my husband, spends time with a friend. And I am here, just relishing the moment and thinking of how it is so wrapped with Grace.
The life I live now could have looked so differently. And it's a wonder it doesn't. It should, actually. When I think of the reckless way I lived, I think that I should be pushing up daisies somewhere. It really is a wonder I'm not.
Such Grace.
So many times when fear overwhelmed me, I wanted to test my powers and see if I could end it all. Confused, hurt, angry, sad - these were feelings I knew I couldn't handle. Feeling worthless was a gutteral cry that I somehow knew wasn't true.
It wasn't a preacher's message or a mentor's shoulder, it was simply the Grace of days given to me, adding up to life lived. And though this life still has a lot of life to live, or so I believe, it's the collection of the days I awakened to that together created sweetness to see the beauty. Of course it was so much more, but the simplicity of it all overwhelms me.
A collection of Grace-filled-days.
Lies became residents in my head - whirling and twirling with each thought - telling me that I was wrong, always wrong. Always doing something wrong. Needing to grow up. Needing to see things differently. Needing to forgive. Needing to get-over things. Needing to THINK.
And then one day, the lies lost their power. They still visit and sometimes they still seem to have some juice, but they aren't what they once were.
My heart is stronger now. Again, Grace.
I think of the people who don't know my Heavenly Father - the God who created me and the boy who calls me Mama, and the God who comforts the Orphans. I wonder how they cannot know Him. How they cannot trust Him. How they cannot acknowledge His Grace.
And then I remember.
I was an Orphan, too. I didn't belong. I wasn't comfortable in the family He provided me.
I didn't see.
Maybe it is that thought that gives me a longing to adopt. Only He knows.
He reminds me of the years lived.
Of the bucket and the collection of rainy days
that watered my soul
and grew beauty.
I'd tell those who don't see...who don't believe...
...the teenager who doesn't believe she's beautiful...
...the girl who just wants to be told she's beautiful, and to believe it...
...the little girl who longs to have someone spend time with her, and to believe they want to be with her...
I'd tell the future bride who is looking for her Prince Charming to rescue her...
...the newlywed who is afraid she can't love so perfectly...
I'd tell the new mom who feels incapable and who feels out of place in her own body as she adjusts to the responsibility of raising a young life...
I'd tell the ambitious young professional trying to earn her way...
I'd tell the woman who still hurts and still longs for a father to show that he genuinely cares about her...
I'd tell the mother who is haunted by the pain of a choice and who fears for her own children's future hurts...
I'd tell them all that it'll come - the Grace they don't know now is there,
and Grace will cover them and lead them to tomorrow, and they will heal.
You will heal.
You will see the beauty.
It will come.
Keep breathing in...Grace...each moment as it comes.
I don't deserve this moment. But I didn't seek it, either. It was given to me. A gift. Grace wrapped in days, now seen as lines on my face.
The reflection of my face appears on the screen as I type and I see beauty. Truth speaks now. And I see Love.
Life churns on.
The boy-man comes inside and chatters about the Smartboard that his classroom will have when he returns to school after this mid-winter break. "Everyday it will be there," he smiles. "It will be stuck in the wall." And I smile. His joy. His life. His days. Beauty from my life.
He finds another Valentine's card he made, found under the couch, this boy who will someday be a man. It talks about giving me a big hug.
Such Grace.
Such Love.
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Gifts of Gratitude...
...the truth that all is grace, and how it settles on my heart...
...a child's excitement for a smart board in his classroom......
...anticipation of spring and trying a different sport...
...a decision to choose a new keyboard over a well worn piano...
...strength to run...
...knowing what my groom did was for me...
...conversation with the boy-man while he was brushing his teeth and I was in the shower...
...how the boy-man can finally blow his own nose, and does it so well...
...a day just for us - my groom and me...
...saying "no" to a want...
...a Spring-like walk...
...half-moon cookies...
...sweet grapes...
...a child's excitement for church...
...friendliness of a fellow runner...
...the boy-man playing by himself...
...sun pouring in windows...
...how the boy-man tries to make me laugh when he seems to sense I feel down...
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