Joy to the World?
“Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened.”
"Maybe Christmas, the Grinch thought, doesn't come from a store."
"Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple." --Dr. Seuss
My favorite gem is a pearl. It is formed around agitation within an oyster--more organic than a diamond. Thinking back at my manifold dysfunctions; sexual, interpersonal, experientially self-denigrating--malevolently so. I see the armor of an oyster's shell better describes my defenses than any other thing or process.
The first quote is healing, salvific, unitive. Healing is not something you can buy it is process and transformation. At this time of year I know this from people who casually ask; "Are you ready for Christmas?" When I reply in a sincere and transparent way, I find that they too find this seasonal event: The Kid's Birthday!
Difficult.
A child does not know these things. Randy, my son did. On Black Friday I took him to purchase a remote controlled toy Porsche. He looked up at me when I handed it to him and asked; "Why?"
I cannot now remember, thirty-five-years later, if he could see my tears or maybe he was as intuitive as I am.
He replied; "Oh." We had been told that he would not see Christmas that tenth year of his life.
I could not find work as a photographer, my reputation at the time precluded any confidence that I would do menial job-lot photography for any employer. I was working, happily so, as a carpenter compelled to take a salary of $75.00 @ week by Supplemental Security Income received for my son. I refused to "work under the table" (receive my normal pay) but would occasionally take, or assist in, "spare time work." We lived by the gifts given us by friends from our Christian community: car, rent, food and finally a donated plot, head stone and Styrofoam coffin.
Advent is difficult for me yet I rejoice that I had the time with my children. I am even more joyous now that I never followed though cutting my throat in the bathtub or flicking my Bic while drenched in gasoline.
Grief is a very personal, specific and explicit experience. It did not help that I was summarily informed that I was a "Kill Joy" throughout my dysfunctional family times. Then I heard that I had F**ked Up the Christmas of my wife for years; implied or inferred before and after Randy's departure.
I was an emotional cripple eating the dreck of my parents, then wife(s) lovers, et cetera. I had learned when in conflict to shut down. The feeling was electrical, like a short circuit; a white noise that eclipsed everything. Yet I persisted in pretending to still be alive. Love can heal that but it only works if you accept yourself totally. Breaking though the defenses and becoming fertile soil for love to grow.
Recently I discovered: "But faithfulness can feed on suffering, --George Eliot.
. . . axiomatic to me, now, looking back, never to return. I chose my mates and if they did not replicate the distrust I had of my mother--I made them so.
Do not harm yourself, as I continue to smoke, as I said malevolently self-neglectful. It is difficult to receive love since I am constantly trying to define what love actually is. The best I can do, reductively, is accept myself exactly as I am. Becoming more fertile ground by the grace of All Creation, The Kid whose birthday is celebrated tomorrow and the loving friendships given and received.
Adapt, improvise, prevail.
If you cannot negotiate a settlement; Walk away.
Healed/healing I can heal others something like The Kid . . . and there are others but you need to ask, look for and care enough to do something besides cry. Always remember there is no quick fix or magic bullet. God loves you just as you are but you need to work on growing large enough to receive it.
“When another person makes you suffer, it is because he suffers deeply within him(her)self, and his suffering is spilling over. He does not need punishment he needs help. That's the message he is sending.”
"Peace in ourselves, peace in the world." –Thich Nhat Hanh
"No price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself." --Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
. . . my take on Matthew 13:45-46
It all starts with you.
Stop being a victim.
NOW! . . . do no harm, love your enemy as yourself.
I spent time with a woman doing a life sentence for setting her sleeping husband on fire after dousing him with lighter fluid.
Only God knows true justice.
