The Desert Place

Oh, Monday can be such a bitch when she wants to be. Woke up to hear of yet another friend that is at the breaking point if not beyond that. My heart breaks for them, so many reaching for hope to find none. The person struggling with illness only to find more and more  different types of illnesses coming their way. The couple trying and trying for children only to loose one after another. There is nothing to say, there are no words that seem big enough, no actions seem to fit. It is killing my certitudes about life. I am Sue Heck at the core of who I am, I watched "The Middle" for the first time and knew, the girl who gets so excited to be a part of something and never makes it but has a bounce back rate of like mine is being tortured in me.

                          We have lost so much in the last years; I lost my health, my job, our house, my husbands job, my family and our money. We gained a few things. I would never never want to be without, we gained friends that are family to us. My husband found a job that he loves even if it pays just slightly above what he made on unemployment from the other one, and a deep deep appreciation for Jesus and a more honest relationship with him.
                         I mourn the things I lost. I have always been the Sue with an optimism that could not be kept down, that is fading a bit more to the side of being a slave to hope. I think it might be easier to be without but can't drop. I never was unaware of the bad like most people thought I was. I just chose to not entertain it. But when I go dark, I go very dark.

                     There are those that pull out the Christian phrases and Bible verses that seem in time of hardships; just mock and make one feel less than because "why is that not be true for me?"

       Or the GCB's in life gloating over people's pain because it proves them to be not worthy or flawed. It is hard to sit in pain with people, so much easier to sit in celebration with those celebrating. Facing the hard life sucking soul crushing things that everyone comes in contact with sooner or later is the things nightmares are made of.  This is why people feel so lonely in the face of the big ugly in life.
                            The end of certitudes in my life has been so hard on me. It is so much easier to cling to behaviors and rules of life; "if I do this this will happen" and if it does not then the beating of ourselves up at least gives us something to do in the face of it rather than the void of "I did what I was supposed to" and it still crushed. I mean there are things that have no reason when you do a + b you get c, but, What do you do when you add it up and it comes out duck, not even a freaking letter? There is no reason it should not be working, every story has an ark, right? It can't just keep plummeting. I have no answers for that. I can no longer say "I know",  there is much firm ground left. It is hard for me to go to this place. I have struggled to go to the sparkly happy twirly bow on it through writing  this whole thing: making the grand Disney ending we all long for: the Hallmark movie we could all write when we were 10 but love and watch anyway. I seriously every other sentence wanted to write the but now answer for it all. What does one do when there is none?

                                       Yes, Jesus will be with the person and us walking them through it. But to hurry through just to make others or your self more comfortable robs us and belittles the person going through it. Sometimes all one can do is sit next to the fire with the person in it, and when the time is right offer a little distraction and a lot of prayers. I have to say right now that sucks, I want to do more. To have answers that really work, some boot strap to offer that isn't busted off yet from pulling trying to get up. I am rung dry of tears and starved for the Knight in white saving at least one person I know from this breaking . Someone, anyone that is not kicked to death once they are down. I am left with so little answers and so many more questions.

                                     Sorry, this is so dark. I hate this view and fear the vulnerability of saying this and conclusions people will make of it. I felt I needed to say this and get it out of my head. The desert in life is not a fun place to be but there is life there. I look at the world God created for quest of life, the lush jungles are great but not without struggle, mountain meadows no one sees and think our lives are much like the land spaces God made but the desert place is such a hard place dotted with so few oasis . Be one for someone starving for it today while prayers that seem more like begging than firm ground it used to feel like. Certitude is starved but continues to cling to life and the Father holding all of you close.