One Whole Year

It's been a vast expanse of a day. Academic and personal developments... it all comes at once, seemingly.

Starting on a big fat wad of joy I have to say I think that for now I've come back to being on top of it all. So glad to be spending some ace quality time with God recently, loving reading the word again and generally feeling good! I say this straight because it ain't that common and it is fabulous when it seems as real and peaceful as this. I have even been working with an attitude of doing it for God despite what I can achieve wordlyly, which is not at all how I felt a few days ago... so I'm lovin' it while I can..!

I don't really know how much to share. I'm gonna do what I normally do and go for honesty over restraint, which I may regret later but the worst that can happen is I look stupid... and there is no shame in the Kingdom!

Today is a significant one in the personal calendar of Kat(i)e because it is exactly a year since the last time I saw someone who used to be one of, if not the, most significant person in my life (they're not dead mind). There is tons of history I have no interest in going into but the short version is that I feel I was moved to Switzerland because God was taking me out of this really unhealthy dependent relationship so I could get free! Which has happened in a huge way. So huge that I never in my wildest dreams would have predicted it and back then the idea of life without him was as scary and alien to me as scary aliens.

So this morning I wondered about if I should wonder about it. 3 years is a long time in the life of a 21 year old (especially as I don't remember most of the early ones) so part of me felt like I should register and ponder on what it all means. The truth was, I didn’t know how I felt. How should I commemorate this? Write a song, an extra verse for another song, a poem, a novel, a play? I still have aspirations for a musical but the plots lines are more befitting of a soap opera than an actual opera! A fake letter, a real letter, pour my heart out into a journal that nosey grandkids may read? Perhaps I should blog I thought; I dismissed this for a time but it seems I have cracked...! Thing is though, it all felt a bit like an obligation and as I tried to express I really had nothing to think. This memory belonged to someone so distant from me it didn't make sense to analyse. I wasn't interested. I wasn't even sure what was real and I didn't care either.

Of course this lack of interest interested me! I got pretty darn excited by the fact I didn't give a damn. A new sense of freedom flooded me and I wrote a journal, a poem, a song AND a verse about moving on! And now a blog...

So is that it? Well no, 'cause that's untested. I am fine, see me smile. Later in the day (about an hour ago actually) I came a bit more earthward and felt swamped by life (specifically the aspects pertaining to the philosophy of maths). Still impressively (not my ability but I am grateful for it) undespairing but kind of morose, I leave the library an unhappy mathematician. Momentarily overwhelmed I wanted to cry quite a lot. And so I settle into my ipod for the trudge home with this message ringing in my ears:

"It Must Have Been Love but it's over now. Save Tonight, 'cause I'm Lost Without You and tomorrow you'll be gone, Leaving me working my way Through The Dark. This Same Girl is Still With You so please just Stay Another Day 'cause You may be Forgiven but you'll never be Forgotten. I Still Miss Someone and They Can't Take That Away From Me."
You know what? Sometime random is just wrong. I kept skipping tracks and I kept finding numbers that wanted to indulge my inner Mood Indigo... but instead I Dried My Eyes. I'm well out of the dark actually, I Suddenly Saw a long time ago and have been On My Way From Misery To Happiness for ages. The only person I ever have and ever will be Lost Without is J.E.S.U.S., Yes! He is my First, Last, My Everything. I Walk Away and I realise that That's What The Love of God Can Do. That's what the love of God did do. Hence the feeling like I'm living in a Whole New World.

I'm always going to hit these low moments, especially when I am in the process of being refined, no sense in denying it. But how good does it feel to know that this particular era of self-indulgent misery is in the past! I can find plenty of other ways to throw myself a pity party but that door seems to be officially closed and I am so glad I got to both realise and confirm it. Also, I know that with the highs comes the lows and that is just the "egg-card" balance (obscure Brit-TVAd reference). I don't mind. When I'm up I'm too optimistic to fret it and when I'm down I can look forward to being back up!

So umm, I don't really have a concluding paragraph. Ah well, you can read the poem if you're that way inclined. It's one of them ones with 'looser structure':

One whole year
366 days
Such a lot can happen
Priorities change
Yesterdays fade and make space
To embrace a different Way
What a cliché
“Year ago today”
Do I really care?
Is it not just obligation that recalls?
The tiny details of the past
They make a nice contrast
But that’s all

The only use of pain as I see
Is a reminder of how I came to be free
Do not dismiss the reality of misery
But embrace it, to mark the path to liberty

A milestone
Who’d have thought that I was built for endurance?
Long distance seems so boring
And hard
It will surely wear me down before long

But long has gone
My legs grew strong
And as I came to love the run I looked around
At what I would have missed were I still underground
From the rising to the setting sun
Trees in fields, mountaintops, valleys glisten with dewdrops
Now I’d welcome that flock of sheep
That I once feared when lost
I was asleep
Eyes shut, arms crossed

Then suddenly they were opened
and the glare ached
Until the spots had cleared and revealed the Truth
I though my heart would break
but instead it was renewed

What would I say
if I went back
a year ago this very day?
Crocodile tears are all that I could offer while my former cried
Quite estranged

So I write to recognise the inconceivable distance I've come
Not to revisit some long gone strife
Done with that, I celebrate Life

Jolly Blogger

I was also reading another blog yesterday, in one of my this-doesn't-look-productive-but-it-may-be moments. It's entitled the Jolly Blogger and it definitely spoke to me.

A the top of the site is this quote:
Grace substitutes a full, childlike, and delighted acceptance of our Need, a joy in total dependence. We become "Jolly Beggars." - C.S. Lewis
You know it will be good when it begins with Lewis.

I don't know if it was what started the blog, but this guy David has been writing about having been diagnosed with cancer and the top post for yesterday day was about how he was supposed to find joy in that, despite not knowing what would happen. His hope was in healing but he's all to aware that that may not be God's plan in this.

And I don't want to sound insensitive to the gravity of his situation, I know that where I am at (3o hours till an essay is due in) is nothing in comparison, but the idea of the hope we have in God not necessarily meaning what we want it to mean yet still keeping joy in that was significant. This whole time I have not been about the joy at all. Honesty, yes. Remain hopeful and even accepting of apparent failure, partially. Joy... never even occurred to me. Yet here is a man facing death who talks about finding the greatest joy in the midst of the greatest suffering. I love joy, get it out all the time when I'm excited or glad, but this steps it up a gear.

It is also totally obvious when you remember the grace that Lewis mentions first and foremost. The grace that dawned on me yesterday. The grace that is so huge and amazing it is more than enough to keep joy in the most dire situations, nay so fantastic and delightful that joy couldn't escape if it tried. If we let it in that is.

So on my last day of this relatively small trial I am going to try and keep the joy as my top priority. That is, actually, I am up for keeping the joy and will now rely on God to bring it about. Not hard so far: waking to a fresh blanket of snow(!) and homemade pancakes with maple syrup(!!) are all good motivators... but then, so is Grace.

This is going to be a Christmas to remember

I am so excited about Christmas. Starbucks menu started weeks ago and the first taste I had of Christmas cake was magical. Now I feel like I am ready to start my own personal official Christmas season…

For this is my first real Christmas. The first one when I can know the joy of my dear Saviour’s birth – ‘cause now He is that. Where a nativity scene makes me go actually wow and I don’t think about consumerism or any of that crap but truly have a different priority (despite the Starbuck’s reference!). I’m going to have a Christmas that is all about what it’s supposed to be…

Except, really there isn’t a biblical model for Christmas is there? No-one from the New Testament went around on the 31st December (or any other date) saying let’s keep Christmas about the important things. There is no guidance on how to be a Christian at Christmas and, especially given the fact that it was first based upon a pagan holiday, one might suggest the best way to be is to take down the tree and carry on as normal. Or at least break with the world traditions and any habits that aren’t strictly “kosher”.

But I like the tree. And I love buying presents for people (get me I’m already four up and have a whole month to go! That is organisation…). Jingle Bells do make me rock and I have been listening to Christmas music for a while now with no shame whatsoever. Sparkly lights and port by the fire, could you want for more? Can’t wait for the open air ice rink so I can get out my skates from Geneva and I LOVE a good Christmas classic on the telly. The way I see it there is no set formula for Christmas cheer and I am not giving up my crackers and baubles on a whim.

I am going to be intentional though. Starting today it is Christmas season and I want to spread joy and good cheer too all mankind. Wishing peace, showing love, delighting in the good things of life. Really this is just all things that being a Christian is kinda about and I don’t want to limit it to seasonality so I’m going to kick start it now but the plan is that the attitude of Christmas remains around a long time after the tree comes down.

Talking of which, it goes up today (and is Hot Pink!). ‘Tis the first year in my own home and I am excited to be starting my own traditions… which include decorations going up a month before to enjoy the season all the longer and also because it will be my half birthday every year. That’s right, 6 months since the B and going strong!

There are some really wonderful ideals for Christmas that do go beyond the cheesy superficial overcommercialised notions. But honestly, they aren’t just great ideas every now and then are they? In the same way dog is for life not just for Christmas I don’t really get why we would limit hope, peace, good will, love, generosity, joy, celebration and (maybe) talking about Jesus to once a year. The one thing I would say is perhaps we need to add in to the mix self-control…

Bring on Christmas with all your manmade glitz and idealism. Man gets a lot of things right too and it can be all too easy to focus on the bad things. Made in the image of our creator I reckon this is the season to share these good things and I don’t want to slag off something which values loads of good things too. It is a shame “They” have taken the Christ out of Christmas and that people call in the “winter holidays” instead but that does not mean we can’t enjoy being people together and sharing the love of our kindredness.

Don't Be Happy For Me

It’s kinda hard for anyone to miss the fact that my life has changed. Ask anyone that knew me before I went to Geneva, before I found Jesus, before the light, and they will say that I am a hell of a lot happier. Well, they may not say “hell”, that would depend on who’s talking; and the word happier is a very deceptive one because it conveys more of an instantaneous emotion and doesn’t necessarily suggest depth. They tend to mean content, satisfied, a changed state of mind, I see it a bit like what the Ancient Greeks called eudaimonia and were all searching for (I like the wiki "human flourishing"). Anyway, the simple truth of it is that they have seen the Joy I found. Joy that supersedes the instantaneous emotions and drastically changes my outlook (I hope the verses don't seem too tenuous. I can't go into explaining them all now, this is just background). Joy that gives me strength. Joy, evidence of The Spirit, that brings me back to life.

I used to be angry. I used to be miserable. I used to make decisions that did not value me and would treat other people with equal disappreciation. I was selfish and yet had no self-respect. I used to get demotivated very easily, struggle a great deal to even get up in the morning and I hated switching my mind on in case the thoughts were too much to deal with. I spent all my cognitive energies on obsessive behaviour and would get caught up in depression with no way out. I used to scare people. I used to be scared by people. I used to scare myself. I had bought into the lies of the world to a terrifying degree and had a very inappropriate sense of humour. Most of these things have changed…! I still wear silly clothes a lot of the time and don't always quite know when to stop but, meh, you got to be true to yourself. I am a lot more grateful for everything now and let’s not forget the joy.

You know what? People have actually noticed. I’m not saying I have been giving a great testimony all the time, I’ve made some pretty major mistakes already and struggle with always conveying the truth of which I am not at all proud. Yet even with all this, close friends, old acquaintances even departmental secretaries see it.

But let me tell you what pisses me off. When people say “I’m really happy for you.”

OK, if you’re a Christian I think you can get away with it. Though perhaps, again with the “happy”, that’s a bit of an instantaneous and easily quashed emotion. My favourite reaction was from an old flatmate who said I should have a party when I got back. I liked that one – a ‘Kat(i)e Got Saved’ party with the tag line “because the angels are doing it”. It’s a bit fat rejoicement.

But if you’re not a Christian then why, in heaven or on earth, would you be glad? Don’t you see, I haven’t found something that “works for me”. I am single minded in my belief that what I have found is the truth and that if you are not in agreement you must, quite simply, be wrong.

I don’t judge you (will save that for if you become one of "us") but seriously, isn’t it the most patronising thing you ever heard that I pray for you and care to see you find the same thing. But it is clearly explicit in the Bible that Jesus is THE ONLY WAY and if I tell you I’m a Christian I am saying I believe this very thing: I am right you are wrong and I can’t be persuaded to compromise. I won’t always ram it down your throat but I can’t help having it as a very predominant silent thought most of the time. Unless I’m in a bitchy mood then surely that’s even worse – that I stop caring?

I’m not actually trying to persuade you to stop being friends with me now that I am crazy. I just want you to realise that being happy for me is stupid – what I have found only truly works for me if it works for everyone, so either I am deluded and you ought to be worried for me or I am right and you ought to be worried for yourself.