Sometimes I feel like I'm fighting a war. Sometimes, the darkness that just wants to overtake everything perfect and everyone beautiful just overwhelms. Sometimes, I feel like love and loss just ebb and flow like the tide as does the surge of beauty and the pulling away as darkness sets in. I am eternally the shore at the mercy of the waves- but at least they're a thing to behold, an amazing thing to feel against you.
Lately, I've been closing my eyes and just listening to the sounds around me, opening my ears to the beauty whizzing by. Sometimes, if I just shut out all the distractions to my eyes, I can hear beauty so much better: laughter, the fluttering of papers, the rustling of the trees, the wind through the window, all the teachers and students voices all around the house, music coming from somewhere. Everything tinkles and rattles and rumbles around into some harmonic cacophony crafted by an eccentric yet wise Composer.
Today, all the sensations around me seemed to hold still so I could just see- true still lifes. I sat in church in groggy peace, so glad to sit through an entire worship service despite exhaustion/lack of sleep that I sleepily reveled in just being in God's presence. I got up to go to the bathroom and found a door open to our church backyard. No cold November air came in, I could feel no difference with the door being open. Only the sound of the church choir drifted into my consciousness- otherwise it was just me and this still, sharp colorful scene- a line of pine trees, so green, their bark so red and brown, the ground a rich earthy color, the sky somehow sharply grey. Everything was so clear- I felt as though I could just see. Then while driving home I stopped at a stop light and spotted a field of tall grass, their cottony tops waving in the breeze amongst grey skeletons of long dead and bare trees. Behind them was a backdrop of a pale blue sky- the color you only get when the light changes to winter light. It looked like some beautiful, barren blue wasteland. Yet so sharp, crisp and clear- everything contrasting and standing out against itself. The Painter truly has good composition.
I spend so much time looking at the future, I forget to take in all the moments that are right here right now- the good and the bad, silence and noise, brightness, clarity, color, blackness. Camaraderie as I watch grown women play a game with a monitor, crawling on stairs in weird positions so it doesn't go off. Friendship as I sleep over at a friend's and together we laugh about her trip to hell and back. Darkness as it turns a happy person into one who cannot function anymore. Curiosity across faces that long for God. Peace that comes in soft afternoon sunlight. Joy across teacher's faces at student progress. Relief at laughter that follows the screaming, normalcy that follows the madness. Meaning in conversations full of connection between people across generations, across cultures.
Sometimes it's not about where you'd going, it's about being present in where you are.
I walked through the grocery store parking lot like I was walking through the scene of some epic war movie. Orange dry oak leaves tumbled all around me epically in the wind and I heard cans rattle on the pavement, echoing inside their tin shells. All this week it feels like we've been walking in darkness, learning how much we need redemption- but all this darkness awakens me to open my ears, focus my eyes, sharpen my soul and truly experience all things bright and beautiful even when the night seems so long.
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