My dear friend

What did it feel like?

I imagine you felt powerful because of the way you had a specific and obvious sway over people. And these people changed their behaviors, which in turn changed the occurrence of events. And soon enough – everything was different because of you.

If only it had been different in a good way.

Did you feel satisfied when you saw justice accomplished, correctness established and accuracy enshrined? You held everyone else to the exact standard of preciseness that you voluntarily prescribed for yourself. How wonderful it must have been to witness your personal definitions of “right” and “wrong” being embraced by those around you. You relished their eager looks of earnest yearning for your approval. Am I doing it right? Is this what you meant? And a slight nod of your head provokes tears of relief and floods their pitiful faces with pleasure.

Your idea of leniency was scrubbing the floor behind someone when they missed a dirty spot. Perfection would have demanded that you instruct them to clean it again. Your concept of grace was allowing someone to sit on your couch in your home. After all, they did not deserve an invitation.

So popcorn crumbs on the couch or honey smear in the kitchen cabinets was a clear indication that your goodness had been trampled upon. Your distribution of liberty was obviously not being respected by others. It was time to pull in the reigns. When people forget that everything they have is due to their subordinate position to you, a righteous slap in the face of truth will bring back their harsh reality.

Did you know that it was all fake? That every conversation we exchanged was bridled with fear. I was scared of you, and I had very good reasons to be.

I would never come before your folded towels or bleached linens. My person would never contain as much value as a correctly made bed. And it was crystal clear that my importance as a human being was negated by the fact that my everyday life was messy, complicated, and emotional. There was no relationship – only sustained interaction because of your “Christian” charity.

I reject you. I fight the way you made me feel insignificant, incompetent and undeserving. I rebel against the idea that the entirety of my self-worth is derived from orderly appearances.

My life is messy, and I love it. My God is forgiving, and I cherish him. I delight in the minutes of breath entrusted to me, clinging to the moments of joy I briefly experience as a molecular representation of the galaxy of brilliant eternity that will be the summation of my life.

And I do this, my dear friend, in spite of you.

If I could be a stranger

I wish I could be those people, the strangers who just walked into your home, welcomed with open arms and genuine smiles. The visitors who feel loved for their existence.

I hate being inside your home, where I am expected to feel approval because of my place in the family. Assumed to know you want me here because I’ve been here before.

Because I am not at all sure. I’d give anything to know it was true.

I don’t want to do anything wrong. That is what I concentrate on when I am around you. Step far enough. Not too much. “She didn’t clean up after herself” and I remember the shoes I left in the hallway. “He never cleaned the kitchen” and I scrub every dish in the sink. Please don’t let me be one of those people you talk about later, I silently wish.

Sometimes when I am desperate and especially vulnerable, I don’t care so much that you do want me here, but it would be so terrible to know for certain that you did not.

Take that away. Bring some of it back. Just tell me what to say and think and feel and I will do it!

And then you do, and I hate myself for responding like an eager puppet, lifeless without your dictation.

I envy your strangers, your guests, your friends. I wish I could be anything... other than your family.

Selfish

I must be the most selfish human being on planet earth.

I went to a funeral today for a sixteen-year-old girl who died in a sudden car accident. I cried along with everyone else, not because I knew her, but for all the lost potential. Moments she would never live.

And I imagined if it had been my own sixteen-year-old brother, and the instantaneous grief I felt over that thought made my stomach churn and my hands tremble.

I went through each of my brothers and sisters. And my mom and dad. I thought of what I would feel. What would be going through my mind if they were snatched from me, and if I sat in a church mourning their death.

And then I imagined my own funeral. And nothing hurt.

I did not grieve over the years I had left, or feel my soul wrenched by the pain of separation. My stomach stopped cramping and my breathing slowed. My eyes dried and my body felt firm, suddenly composed.

So I have decided that I want to die first, before anyone else. Jesus, it can be today or tomorrow, or years from now. But please let it be before anyone else.

And that is why I am a selfish person. I just don’t want to hurt.

Green Beans

Green beans. That was what the argument was about.

The options were green peas or green beans. She had already confirmed the reception menu items of meat, bread and dessert. We had reviewed the dress, talked about the flowers, fretted over the length of her veil and the song to be played while she walked down the aisle. The only thing left to decide was the green beans. I was sure they would be preferable to peas, and she passionately disagreed. Our conversation had escalated to loud voices, and it appeared the debate had ended when Dad poked his head in the room and told us to be quiet. But we didn’t – we just inched closer in bed together and whispered. After all, this had to be decided tonight. She was already ten years old, and I was seven. We didn’t have that much time left.

So many boys would probably want to marry us. Giggle.

But we would only pick the perfect ones. Serious.

I would be her maid of honor, and she would be mine. Smile.

None of it happened like we planned. I want to get over it, but I feel like I’m letting down those girls. They only believed the best would happen to them. They were manipulative and loving, mean and loyal. They slept in the same bed when they had their own rooms. They stole each other's clothes and fixed each other's hair. They hated that the other one always had the most romantic boy story to tell, and they secretly thought their sister was the prettiest girl in the world.

It was her wedding day. Late that night, I sat on the floor, leaned against the wall and cried. Thousands of miles away.

I am so sorry, little girls.

Closure

Do you love me?

Are you sure that you love me?

Do you?

Closure is a beautiful thing.

It makes me feel less guilty, when I finally ask forgiveness. Sometimes it makes me feel happy, because I clarify how I really felt all along. Other times it leaves me with a strange bittersweet twinge of regret, because time has vanished like sand through my fingers, impossible to retain. Although I wish I had done it differently, something inside urges me towards gratefulness, wrenching me away from condemnation. Could it all be for good?

Peter spent years of his life devoted to Jesus, making sacrifices, appearing ignorant, pushing forward. He was rash in his decisions and fervent in his devotion. He promised he would follow Jesus to the end, and I think in the deepest place of his heart, he believed he would.

But when the chains were shackled and the beatings began, Peter buckled under the questions. Of course he was not with this man. He had never been with him. Everything Jesus was experiencing—humiliation by the spiritual leaders, degradation by the mobs. This was not the promising kingdom of light and power that Jesus had spoken of! Maybe he had been wrong the whole time.

Across the courtyard, Jesus looked at Peter. Uncovered, bare and naked before the piercing glance of the Son of God, Peter knew. The depth of his betrayal was sinking in, and ashamed tears of self-hatred and bitterness fell like rain.

Three days later, Peter rushed into the sacred tomb of his fallen leader. Respect for the dead or reverence for the departed—no such thing entered his mind. He found the clothes lying there. Understanding of “I will rise again” started forming in his heart.

(I am going to insert myself here. It is a story, after all.)

Then Peter wondered. Will Jesus have anything to do with me? Will he even recognize my existence? If there was some way that I could get an audience with him, where I can talk and he can just listen… where I tell him over and over how I regret what I did. How I buckled under the pressure and all I need is one more chance to prove my extreme devotion to his cause. How I loathe the essence of my being. How I cringe at the memory of my words.

Early one morning, there Jesus was, on the shore. They were almost about to dock the boat anyway, but Peter jumped over the side, into the water, and started swimming. His desperateness obvious, his eagerness apparent. This was his chance.

And Jesus made them breakfast. Of all the spiritually-enriching, wisdom-imparting activities that could have taken place at this moment in history, one of the last times Jesus would ever walk the earth in human form—he made them breakfast.

Friends, eat with me. I know you are hungry. And so very fragile and weak. But fisherman, you are the foundation of my church that will last through generations, seeping into every fragment of human existence, preaching my life, loving my lost, beaming my light.

Peter sat and his heart bled inside. Should he start now? Was this the right time to begin his apology speech, carefully crafted and tastefully planned?

“Do you love me?”

Jesus asked and Peter affirmed, again and again.

I like to think that the third time, Peter took a step closer to Christ, contesting emotions surging through his being. Anger over the idea that Jesus so thoroughly doubted his devotion, pain since he had given Jesus reason to do so, and desperation that Jesus be convinced of his resolve.

And then it happened. Jesus said that not only would Peter be the rock of his church, but he would be crucified for his beliefs. Somehow, the man who denied Jesus in the courtyard because of possible implications arose as a leader who walked towards the same type of horrendous death Jesus experienced.

Complete reconciliation. Closure that marked the beginning.

You betrayed him, and then nails punctured your flesh because of the depth of your love for him. You feigned that you were unacquainted with him, and then the influence you had on others for him was a relentless torrent that could not be stopped.

Yes, it was all for good.

Regret

One shot is all you get.

No day can be relived. No moment can be reclaimed.

Regret and remorse are not a possibility, but a certainty. We are only human, after all.

I wonder what kind of regret it is easier to live with.

Regret that I did something, like a stupid choice, or a wrong decision. Regret that I went there and chose to say that, to release words of harshness, crudeness. Once I heard their icy hatred in the air, I knew I could never take them back.

That I formed a judgment against that person, without knowing their situation. That I treated them with the contempt and impatience of someone superior, clearly communicating that my estimation of my own value was far greater than theirs.

That I kept talking when I should have listened to her, because she was keeping it all inside. Or that I leapt when I should have paused, ignoring the voices in my head that told me to be still.

Or could it be that I will regret inaction. The times I didn’t pick up the phone and call. Maybe he wouldn’t have been so lonely if I had.

The questions I never thought to ask. I wonder what stories of my family’s past are lost forever, because they didn’t think I was interested in knowing.

The time I sat there motionless, observing the grief of loss. Even though I did not have the right words, nothing was the worst thing I could have done.

When I did not put anything in the offering plate as it passed. When I did not tip the waitress as much as she deserved. When I did not express my appreciation for what was given me, my respect for those who led me, my adoration beyond belief for those who think I am worth their investment.

One more “I love you” wouldn’t have been that hard to give.

Any kind of regret is difficult. But perhaps at the end of my life, I would prefer to know that I tried and failed, and crashed and burned.

Instead of sitting and waiting.

Dear Myself

Today I woke up at 9am, and made myself some coffee. Justin wanted sausage biscuits and gravy for breakfast, but we were out of milk. So I slipped on a sundress and flip flops and walked five minutes to Cupecoy Market to buy a half-gallon of whole milk. On the walk back, I searched for a cloud in the sky. I only saw blue. We had breakfast together and then Justin went to campus to study. I cleaned the dishes then packed a bag with a towel and sun block lotion. I walked ten minutes to Mullet Bay Beach, which was almost deserted. The waves were small today, gently lapping the sand and quietly crashing into the rocks. The warm sand and hot sun made me sleepy as I lay there. Just as it was beginning to get unbearably hot, I walked into the ocean. The sun was so bright that the water was literally sparkling. I dove in. I tasted salt water on my lips and felt coarse shells under my feet as I came up from under the cold waves.

Dear myself: if life ever becomes ridiculously hard or exceptionally stressful, remember today. And then smile, because at one time in your life, you had it all.