born from crushed aluminum

{via flickr :: creative commons}

I crushed a soda can last night. you can see the exact shape of my hand in the aluminum, the swirling white letters bent inward to form something more akin to a prayer than a brand name.

my not-so-tiny girl needed stitches, right on the even of her second birthday. three small black lines, twisted up with flesh. she cut her foot last week. it wasn't so bad. there was blood, but it washed away. there was a scab, but it was closing. and then last night, she tripped. and it opened anew, worse than before. so we bundled into the car, my husband + me + Marian (her in squawking high spirits, us not so much).

and the doctor said "stitches," and something inside me dropped so hard that I thought it might actually come out through my feet. they washed her foot and I cringed, holding her hand. they said "needle" and "Lidocaine" and I  made a hasty and less than dignified retreat. he made me sit, the doctor did, pressing a can of soda into my hand for sugar. I was white, he said.

and I sobbed on one side of a clinic wall while my daughter wailed, clutched tight in my husband's arms as he bear-hugged our fierce fighting child. they were hurting her to help her, and it made my momma-lioness roar vicious. and I crushed that soda can in my fingers until they were white and the can was twisted metal in my grip.

then it was over, and she was drenched in sweat but bandaged, sniffling into my shoulder. I buried my nose in her head as I rocked her, inhaling the scent of tears and sweat and strength and bravery, as much as a little-yet-fierce creature can exude.

this morning, I pondered as she nuzzled into my breast, an eager face at 7:02am beside my bed. it's been two years with this child, nine months before that of her nestled under my skin. motherhood is a funny thing. you can read every book in the world, and still realize that you know absolutely nothing when that child is born. and you have to learn. and they say that you learn from experience and doing and "as you go." but really, it's your child that does the teaching.

cliche? maybe.
true? entirely.

and so, as my Marian-girl begins her second year of life, my heart is swelling full of  holy hopes + wishes for her.

 :: I wish for her bravery to be acknowledged. she is not fearless, she is brave. 

:: I wish for Holiness. 

 :: I wish for delight in small things and joy in big things

:: I wish for her pain to be allowed. I do not want her to hurt, but when she does, I want her aching to be FELT instead of being brushed over or dismissed. 

:: I wish for a drawing near to Grace and the Throne upon which it sits. 

:: I wish for might. not power or fame or glory, but might. 

:: I wish for laughter (have you heard this child laugh? music.)

:: I wish for Kleenex and ice cream and shoulders and companions and light and Glory abundant. 

:: I wish for LIFE.

happy second birthday, my beautiful girl. 

I love you. 

drop your coat

{via pinterest}

dear you,

you wanderer through the Valley of the Shadow
drop your coat.

you who haven't figured out how to process the change or the ache or the new or the rejection
drop your coat.

you who are finding yourself in the season of "no" or the season of leaving or the season of lots of taking and very very little giving back
drop your coat. 

// 

do you know what that looks like, to drop your coat and leave it there?

there is unspoken courtesy, ingrained in us from the very beginning. you do not just drop your bag, your coat, your shoes on the floor. not in another's house, not even in your own house. you pick it up. you find the hook or drawer or little nook. you hang it up. tidy, organized, everything appropriately tucked away.

even when the fabric is so heavy that it almost seems unbearable, this idea of crossing another twelve steps to the closet. even when the smile is pasted on, and the "let me take your coat" feels falsely cloying because you would just rather not lean into the pity (even though it's nothing more than your host being polite).

so I want to tell you something. I want you to look me in the eye.

I want you to rest. drop your coat. right there, in the hallway. shoes too. kick them off. let them thud against the wall.

I want you to find freedom. leave it there, on the floor, in a crumpled pile of soft fabric and silken lining. leave it there.

because it's not just a coat, is it, love? it's grief and heaviness and weight and confusion and a lack of knowing which direction to step next. and there may not be answers there between the hardwood slats. but there is a solid surface on which to rest. and sometimes that works better than answers. at least for now.

so drop your coat. leave it there. the world won't end while it lays on the hardwood.

dust washes off. you can use my machine.

for when there aren't many words left {#Furgeson}

{via pinterest}

as far as Ferguson goes, I've been silent. 

I mean that as literally as you can get. nothing on social media. not my Facebook or my Twitter or my Instagram or my blog. nothing. period. 

silence. 

and that, for me, is odd. there are very few social issues that leave me at a loss for words. this one, however, has done exactly that. 

I am at a loss for words. 

let me be very clear here :: I have not been silent because I am white. I have not been silent because I have an unpopular opinion. I have not been silent because I am afraid. 

I have been silent because it has been one of those moments where you are confronted with something so overwhelming that it leaves nothing behind. there have been so many amazing words shared already. {you can find a couple fantastic and powerfully gentle posts here and here.} there have been arguments on both sides, strong words flung and feet planted into the dirt. the Internet is good at controversy, after all. 

what could I possibly say? wouldn't I only be adding to the noise?

because let's be honest :: there's been a lot of noise. madness. tumult. 

all I can do is pray. 

and that's pretty much exactly what I'm going to do here. 

:: 

oh God. 

bring peace. 

oh Lord,

bring comfort. 

oh Jesus. oh sweet Jesus. 

bring clarity. 

Spirit of the living God,

fall fresh. 

oh Lion, 

breathe. 

oh mighty Father, 

sustain. 

selah. selah. selah. 

broken benches

{photo taken via VSCOCam :: by Rachel Haas}

writing is hard when you're writing.
you become a broken bench, in a way.

there are slats falling down
side
ways.
you're still a bench.
but there are holes and sitting


it's complicated.

writing a book is hard, period.
it's one of those things where you could jump up and down and pat your head and rub your tummy and walk across hot coals to bring back rubies clutched in your teeth

...and it would still be easier than getting those words down.
and yet we do it because we are it.
we are writers who write things.

writers who don't write things are benches made of fog.
you can see us
we just go away when you breathe a little too hard.

writing is complicated
with a lot of parts and pieces and bits and bobs
and upside down handstands.
and coffee.

and you can feel like a broken bench.
but you're still a bench.
when people fall on you, their hands connect with solid wood and scrappy frame.
you're plucky, you are.

they can rest there.
because broken benches are still benches.

krispie treats + grief

I'm grieving.

which conversely means that I'm in the kitchen a lot.

it's a thing I've always done. cooking is a sign of the placement of my emotional barometer. when I'm feeling things strongly, I bake and cook until the kitchen overflows and counters brim with goodness.

my grandmother is standing on the edge between earth's shallow pale and the glittering Holiness that is Aslan's Country. and she's ready to make the leap. and so we wait, wait for the appointed time.

I don't like to talk about grief. I really don't.
so I'll talk about Rice Krispie treats instead.

I'll talk about the way I stirred the melting marshmallows and butter together without thinking, a groove into which I fell so easily. because that's grief. it happens without thinking. it just comes and falls heavy and you find yourself doing the dance without understanding the steps. you just do.

I'll talk about the way I usually don't butter the pan, but this time, I did. because that's grief. you can't predict how you'll handle it, or if it'll be the same as it was last time or next time or the times before and after. when you find yourself bowing against it, you grieve your way. not his way or her way or your mother's way. you pour out in your own stream. no one else's.

I'll talk about the way I flung butter with my fingertips instead of neatly with a spatula. normally, cooking is tidy intricacies for me. little steps by little steps. but this time, it was just a little sloppy. a little haphazard. because that's grief. it's not tidy or ordained. we can try to make it that way, but it really isn't. it's greasy and slippery and creeps up your elbows and clings to everything it touches.

{via pinterest}

I'll talk about the way I burned my hand on the still-too-hot mixture of cereal and vanilla-aroma'd sticky goodness that poured from pot to pan. because that, that is grief. it hurts. even if you don't want it to, even if it was an accident and you would just rather not hurt at all no oh god no not even a little please...

grief hurts.

and I'll talk about the way it fell into the pan and filled in all the gaps. the way I used my hands, again, slathered in butter over the knuckles and over the little pale crease where my wedding ring normally sits. because that's grief. sometimes you just have to let yourself be buried in it, just a little, where you can still see yourself through the thin sheer coating that slips over your life. your hands are still there. just covered.

and then I'll tell you about the promise of deliciousness. I'll tell you about the way it seeps into my body through my tastebuds and fills me up with the knowledge that soon there will be treats. soon there will be sweetness. but there was burning and slathering and mixing and aching and weeping so that this particular pan of Rice Krispie treats might have a tinge of salt mixed in among the goodness.

because I know the ending. and oh, it hurts so bad that everything burns. but there is a promise. a whisper of what it will taste like when the door opens and I see it all, so clear and plain.

oh death, where is thy sting?
oh grave, where then is thy victory? 

twenty-three :: the year of shedding

{photo by dramaticelegance}

it's six'o'clock in the morning. being awake at this hour wasn't exactly my plan today. after all, it's my birthday. but there is something about this year :: this twenty-third year. it cries to be remembered. there's something impending, something important about this year. and i have no idea what it is.

// this is the year of shedding. 

i haven't seen a sunrise in such a long time. i treasure my sleeping. it's a very rare commodity in this house, what with a sweet small one who sets the time clocks with her precious voice. but this morning, i'm awake at six'o'clock. and i'm more than alright with this change of plans.

i've written a lot about thrashing in the past couple weeks :: this concept of letting go of answers and letting questions become acceptable, of having no idea what i'm doing...and it being okay. it's this flailing thing, dipping my arms to the elbow in the paint. it's that trying to dance, the learning, the splashing. and it might be more ridiculously awkward than i care to envision at this point.

i'm learning more about God than i ever did from my fundamental seat. i finding myself more undone by Him than ever before. i'm feeling like i've had a blindfold on, and i'm lifting it up, one inch at a time, and letting the Light in.

it's releasing my inner selkie soul. selkies are seals, magical and ocean-dwelling, emerging from the sea to be all woman, wild and beautiful. and that's what this twenty-third year will be for me. it's an emerging, a releasing. i'm reaching in deep and drawing my wild out. this time last year, i was holding a week-old baby girl in my arms, too overwhelmed and too afraid to mess anything up for any sort of awakening. i was where i needed to be.

{via pinterest}

and now i'm still where i need to be. it's all new and fresh, a one year old daughter curled into the curve of my arm, and my shoes left far behind on the path. it's holy ground, this venturing, even if i have no idea just how holy this space might be.

part of me is still sitting in grief from the loss of my grandmother on Saturday. my soul is still kneeling, sitting in a quiet shiva. but there is that low Voice in my ear ::

grief is great. only you and I know it yet.
let us be good to one another. 

and i feel the breath on my neck, and i know that twenty-three will be a year to remember. i am selkie girl in a year of shedding. and He still holds me there. not safe but good. He's been there for twenty-three years, curled at my back. i don't think He's going to stop now.

i'm right by the window.
and oh, this sunrise...it's luminous.

that wailing rhythm

the rhythm is a funny thing. it's an entity of its own. can't you hear it, thudding and pulsing slow below your skin, that gentle thumping by which our bodies sway?

there's one in the air, too. i can feel it, the rhythm of thunder crashing and lightning answering back in brilliance of light. it's majestic and strange and powerful. i don't think i understand it fully...will i ever?

life is a rhythm, one of those things that isn't really composed with ink and pen on paper. i wish it was, because my words seem paltry to sum up the inhale-exhale that seems to make up every second of every day until the day it just doesn't anymore.

:: but apparently vulnerability is the rhythm i needed to find. 

the very night after i wrote about releasing, we were struck with a strange sort of loss. we had been chasing a dream, a purple house tucked into a grove of green countryside and garden mermaid groves. and we had it, right there in the curve of our fingertips, and then it was gone, because that's how real estate works.

and i wailed. // oh, that wail. 

see, i write about the Lion's song a lot. it's a melody that hums beneath my skin and courses through my body like blood and electricity wedded together in the strangest and holiest of matrimony. i can hear it, that low growling hum to which my feet have found a rhythm to stamp and my lungs have found notes to cry and keen.

and yes, sometimes, you have to wail.

sometimes it's all we have to keep us going when everything seems a muddled blur and off-center to the point that even the melody seems to have faded. but there's always that rhythm.

sometimes it's hard to find your original self when everything under the sun has been done. and you watch yourself drumming on the side of your cup with a bamboo stick as the teabag bobs like a ship in the calm, and you wonder, am i in the calm too? 

i had never understood that expression until the day my life stood still and i caught my breath when i raised my hands and begged the moon to stand still over me. Joshua needed the sun to fight, but somewhere, the moon stopped too over some corner of earth.

before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,

you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.

you must wake up with sorrow.

you must speak to it till your voice catches the thread of all sorrows

and you see the size of the cloth.

:: naomi shihab nye

and perhaps in the calm is a place to catch your breath, when the crush and rush of the world is pulling you right and left and backwards and forwards and pinching off pieces of you until there is nothing left at all.

{via dramaticelegance}

and you need a minute to heal from the scrubbing, so you bury your nose in the tea and you breathe. the poking and the prodding leave fingermarks all over you in shades of invisible bruise, like starry-night constellations that tell a story, something glorious that might heal another when they touch the marks the world left behind.

so weave a crown of blooms from the basket by the door labeled "weeds" and peer up at the world through one-too-many loose tendrils of escaping hair. find the pool, still in the calm, and study the freckles like cinnamon sprinkled over something made with apples and dough and that whisper of love that you don't understand how you can taste, but you can.

and pick up your drum from beside the door and dive into that pool until the bottom becomes the top and out you emerge into glorious Light where the world hums in a fresh newness. and the rhythm of your heart merges with His.

and you and the Lion count the beats together.

Silence

There are two kinds of silence.

There is the beautiful kind...the whisper before the storm erupts, the wordless moments shared between two friends, the elegant emptiness of the night sky.

And then there is the heavy silence.

The silence that screams of loneliness, fear, desolation, and unspeakable sorrow and regret.

This is the most frightening sound of all to me.

And it was in this echoing silence in which the disciples lay.

Barely sleeping, barely eating.

Locked away in the upper room of an unknown house, huddled in tear-stained masses as their terrified minds replayed the events of the previous day.

The Man whom they had followed...the One in whom they had placed their faith, trust, and their entire existence...

...dragged away, beaten to an unrecognizable pile of blood and bruises, and then hung upon a splintered cross to gasp out His final breaths.

Yeshua -- their Master, their Lord -- was dead.

And they had fled.

The guilt they all must have felt...the regret and sorrow...for only John had stayed at the foot of the cross until the thunder rolled and the rocks broke into pieces.

The silence must have weighed as heavy as the stone that they had rolled over the mouth of the cave in which they had placed the beaten, lifeless body of their Rabbi.

Crushing.

Destructive.

Overbearing.

Wordless weeping, empty despair.

...but this was not the end...

...for in this silence, a mighty war was waging.

The war against Death. The war against Hell. The war against hopelessness.

For after the silence comes the storm...

...and this storm would rock the world.

DEATH

COULD

NOT

HOLD

HIM.

Silence. Broken.

Forgiven

"For this reason I say to you, her sins, which are many, have been forgiven, for she loved much; but he who is forgiven little, loves little." ~Luke 7:47

I know that this blog is prone to lean to the more poetic side of my life. Elegant musings on springtime, reflections on holidays, or just the delicate moments of my own life which I chose to make important for whatever reason.

But not this time.

This time I need to be raw. Real.

Because, to be honest, I've never realized ANYTHING like this before.

It's scary...but here goes.

I have an issue with letting myself be forgiven.

In fact, I think that I believe that I am entire unworthy of forgiveness.

That my past mistakes -- and even those I have yet to make -- have set me in a place where I past the point of being forgiven by anyone.

Not by those I love.

Not by myself.

Not even by God.

And then, I spent a nearly sleepless night, curled up with tears pouring down my face. Every time I closed my eyes, it was like a horrific home movie playing back behind my eyelids...replaying every awful moment, every moment of shame, every whisper of guilt.

But suddenly, someone switched off the projector.

There was nothing left but darkness. And the voice of Jesus Christ.

"I forgive you. You are forgiven. Your shame is gone. You have to let go. You have to let yourself be forgiven."

And so I let one finger slide off the edge.

I'm slowly letting go.

I'm accepting forgiveness.

From the ones who love me more than anything.

From the ones who could have given up on me...but didn't.

From the ones who would die for me.

And from the One who already did.