Just Another Day
I think the phrase “God doesn’t give you more than you can handle” is bollox. I, throughout my life, have felt very close to the brink and was positive I did not need this intense a lesson. My life contract in coming to the world feels truly intense and I often imagine that next time I am going to be some kind of warrior with all this soul’s knowledge. That is if you believe in a next time. I feel it’s important to say this. It is important to dispel the myth that God is piling on with full knowledge that you can take it…This is not a gym. We are not adding more weights to the bar. The reason I feel this way, and I sense all my religious friends bristling here, is that it prevents us from asking for help. It is an assumption that you are somehow fine. Well I know when I have not been fine, and friends, if someone reaches out to you and says something like:
“I am not good.”
“This does not work.”
“This is too big or much for me.”
PLEASE hear them. There is a lot going on out there. Many things have become an unforgivable part of our society and we are desensitized. Do not become that with those you love. In all honesty, I have said, “I’m not good,” over the last year to my family and a few friends. I am so fortunate to have a network of love in my life. Even then, folks are busy and maybe can’t get to you when you need the support most. What is a back up plan for you?
Life has been challenging, and Mom coming to stay is definitely a piling on. Sure we cook and drink tea but also we sit in the dark after 4:30 and with the shortest days of the year upon us it is REALLY dark out here in the country. We sit in the dark because “you always turn the lights off if you are not in a room”. Great in a house with rooms, but this tiny cottage is an open floor plan…..so it must all be dark or she will go around and find the outlet to make that happen. I finally gave up. Let’s sit in the dark. So I find a movie and we watch till she falls asleep and I can get up and move about again.
For some reason this part of the day is too much for me. I am tired and the questions and eternal loop is trying. It is then that I want to turn to my own coping mechanism, music and candles and a glass of wine by the stove as I cook. Giving up a personal way of healing for another person’s understanding of the world is brutal and after several years of loss, it is actually emotionally challenging. I get dark in the dark.
So here we are. My mom has outlived herself and I am looking for a different kind of love in the dark. I am trying to own my edges and ask for help as I get close to them. The bottom line is love. Love that is about giving not receiving and definitely not about ego. Love of self enough to ask for what I need and love of God enough to remind myself that he has given her to me for a time. Maybe to say goodbye, maybe to finally get the last word and run my kitchen the way she wants. That seemed to always be our contention in the light. She counted spoons and looked inside tea kettles. She rearranged drawers how they “should be” and I learned how to sneak booze into the pie and prepare some extra dishes she would never make during the holiday. I learned to get up early and just do it before she rose and knew better. (So, kinda like now.) Maybe we are here in this place in time to settle an old kitchen score. Any way you slice it, this is a journey not a destination. It is just another day at the garden gate.
And who knows, maybe I can handle it.