what Mary did

This is what Mary did:
she found what was necessary
resting at His feet, not too busy

to listen, and Martha did not
understand why Mary wasn't
doing the things she should

have been doing, may not even
have understood when Jesus
explained, and I, Mary and

Martha both, still struggle to
rest, be still, stop moving as if
motion is necessary to hold

everything together when, in fact,
resting is what holds it all together,
freedom from distraction, focus,

listening and hearing, being ready
to listen and hear, the truest busy-ness
of those on Kingdom business?

Family depression

The recent school shooting has brought mental illness and how families deal with it into spotlight once again.  The blame game has been played (the mother should have known, should have gotten her son help, the signs were there, etc.).  It's good to try to look for root causes to prevent future problems if at all possible, but her son was legally an adult.  And just because you want to help your adult children or adult siblings, doesn't guarantee that they get help, or that if they get help, they will be fixed by it.  The human mind is an unbelievably complex thing.

This is much on my mind as I watch and wonder if my sister is spiraling further into mental illness.  She is an adult, nearly 30, and she has suffered from depression (untreated) for years.  We have asked her if there is some reason for the way she treats my father (the kind of treatment one would expect from someone toward their rapist/abuser).  She has promised us that it's nothing like that.  He just sniffs, and she can't stand it.  That's all. 

Depression runs in my family.  (As Miles says, "We give it to each other.")  My mom has explained the briefest bit of her childhood struggles with it in her dysfunctional family.  She later sought treatment for anxiety and panic disorders, and her mental health has improved.

My sister has not sought treatment.  Instead, she has always had many excuses.  We are reaching the end of our patience for excuses. 

We, her loving family, are tired of watching her hurt us.  Some of us think she is fully in possession of her mental faculties and is choosing to act in cruel ways.  I think maybe this is related to OCD, depression, and maybe other mental health problems.  Either way, she needs help.

I think a reason I lean towards mental illness is because I don't want to believe that she is capable of deciding to act with such cruely while mentally balanced.  I don't want her treatment of my father and her distancing from my mother and her decision to end her friendship with me to be possible if she is in full possession of her wits.  That would hurt too much.  I would rather have something to blame it on.  I have that luxury because I live several states away and am naturally someone who does not need the company and affection of others. 

My parents who live with her do not have that luxury.  They just have the hurt.  And it's eating at them, threatening their mental health.  It has to be stopped.  But how?  I'm praying.  But I can't help thinking there is no right answer.  Having a loved one with mental health issues is not a simple situation with a single right answer.

If you are ever tempted to point fingers and blame when you encounter a situation like this, well, maybe hold that thought.  Humans and human relationships and love in a fallen world are messy, and it's always easier to point from outside, especially after the fact, to try to make neat conclusions once all the chips have fallen.  But inside, it is sad and scary and messy.  Please remember that.  Be careful how you judge.

And please pray.  Because I don't really know how to right now.

Why I'm not writing in February

I've been wrestling with the idea of when/whether it's okay to give up on your dreams because by inaction,  I am giving up.  It might actually be the right thing to do (or at least a right thing to do).  It might be time to choose new dreams or just focus on the present and survival.  To be honest, I really want to be wrestling with this on the page, but I've been in too much pain to type nearly enough.  So I put it off until next weekend, hoping I'll be in less pain, but I never am, and there is always something else that should be done that will make me hurt more, too much to type.

Feeling a tad claustrophobic with the jettisoning of dreams and the closing in of forces beyond my control and consequences that shouldn't be mine to deal with and the usual same old same old.  My asthma is the reason it's hard to breathe, but you'll forgive me the melodrama of wondering if dreams are like oxygen and letting them go leads to slow asphyxiation of something. 

Unfortunately, sometimes it's too hard to hold onto things I should hold onto anymore, hard to tell the difference between what is baggage weighing me down, sinking me, and what is anchoring me to something solid and sheltering, so I don't blow away in all this weird midwestern stormy weather.

Adulthood sucks, sometimes, children.  Hang onto your dreams for as long as you can.

Sometimes I miss me

Sometimes I miss the me I used to be what seems like a long time ago, half a lifetime ago.  I miss the me before I stopped enjoying the fellowship of the moment and started analyzing and looking at motives.  I miss the me who just trusted people, the me who knew all were sinners and not inherently good and still just blindly assumed that of course they would do the right thing!

Is it me I miss or my glorious, blind ignorance?  Hard to tell. 

What happened to that me?  Well, it's hard to determine cause or effect, but the me now hasn't the energy to invest in other people that the me then did.  Too many harsh looks at reality, mixed motives, lust/love/romance, and all that crap.  Too many revelations.  Too many regrets.  Too many betrayals, melodramatic as that sounds.  Too many people who want what I can't give, making me pull back until there isn't much to give, and no inclination to, and I like it that way, thank you very much.

But I still miss that old me sometimes.  She was kind of dumb and too honest, but, I hate to say it, for all that, her purity (again with the blindness) leaves me nostalgic.  All traces of that purity feel burned out of me now, but I still have my memories. 

I remember what it was like to have friendships I took simple joy in, before romantic notions got in the way and made me question my own motives in continuing said friendships when I was never going to provide what they craved.  I hate this new knowledge of good and evil.  I'd like to put that fruit back on the tree, thank you very much, and selfishly enjoy being with people I enjoy being with even if I don't want to ever marry or have sex with them, even if that's the only reason they hang around (hope springing eternal in areas with very low ceilings).  I want to go back to that world where people are friends because they enjoy being with each other, and that's that.

Maybe that world never, ever existed in reality, but it did in my head, and I liked being in my head then and there.  It was so much easier.

Are there any parts of you that you miss from long ago?

Down with Rings?

I was moving things around while lamenting to a friend about the fact that men fall in love with me when I allow myself to be friendly and interesting and social. I was a bit worried about what would happen at work since there were no doubt going to be men there, and I couldn't be my preferred, withdrawn, discouraging-to-men self since I had to start building a corporate persona and networking and generally being sociable.

As I tried in vain to move something on an awkward shelf, my friend asked seriously, "You know what you need?"

"A cabana boy to move things around for me?"

"No. He'd just fall in love with you."

(There followed a time of laughter and snorting.)

She had some good suggestions for t-shirts to wear all the time. "Jesus is my boyfriend, and the world is my nunnery," was my personal favorite variation. 

After we were done getting goofy, she ended up suggesting that I wear a fake wedding ring.

Setting aside that I really have no rings and that I don't actually know which hand you wear a wedding ring on (since it seems most of the rest of the world does know that one, and it would be easy to find out), I was kind of intrigued by the idea.

• It would definitely be less offensive (in a driving the sharks away sort of manner) than introducing myself by name and saying, "I'm happily celibate for life, so please don't fall in love with me ever."
• It would meet corporate dress code better than the novelty shirt.
• It would make a clear statement to every decent person who knows what hand a wedding ring is on that I am not available for relationships.

There are a lot of perks, honestly. But that's the rub: honesty. Isn't it a lie to wear a ring that says, "I am married to someone" when you're not and never plan to be?

Technically, it's not a lie; it's just jewelry. But it feels dishonest.

If I made sure to tell anyone who asked about it, "No, I'm not married. I'm just not interested in a relationship," I wonder if my conscience would be assuaged.  

Not quite. At least, not yet. (And it would be hard not to be really honest and yack on about celibacy and stuff that would turn me into an instant weirdo at the office: not the corporate persona I really want to create . . .  Maybe down the road when I get to know people better, and they really want to know what makes me tick, but definitely not now.)

I could be being my usual silly self here, choosing the hard road because it's the hard road. I mean, the ring solution is a very elegant one. So, if you think it is, please help convince me that it's not lying to wear a wedding ring when you'll never be married. I really want to be convinced . . .

What does love do when . . .

We were friends in junior high and the beginning of high school before he transferred.  He had broken glasses held together by tape and was awkward and bullied.  He thought he was stupid and worthless because he got bad grades and had a complicated home life.  He needed a friend.  He wrote me letters, and I wrote back.  We signed them in this silly way . . . 

I think I was the only person he'd ever interacted with on this level, which is why he told me some things that make me wish I could go back in time and do what I should have done (told someone else, an adult, an authority, someone who could have helped him and maybe saved him some trouble).

When he transferred away, I broke school rules to give him a hug.  I heard that he got really good grades at his new, public school, which made sense, since our school was much harder and more advanced.  That gave him some much-needed confidence, and I thought maybe things would turn out okay for him.

Later, I found out he married one of my other friends from high school, a girl who started attending after he left, a casual, lunch-table friend who told us that she would never believe in Jesus because of all the people at our private Christian school who said they did and treated her and other awkward outsiders like crap.  She always told us that we were an exception (and didn't say we were not enough of an exception to blot out the norms) and that we shouldn't blame ourselves for her Jesus-phobia.  I didn't blame myself.  I understood that logic and arguments can't force anyone to believe in Jesus.

When I heard they were married, I didn't know what to think.  Years later, they divorced, and it was messy.  Now he's tracked me down online, and he really wants to renew our friendship.  He is lonely and desperate.  He needs friends and help.

I am hesitant.  I've had some bad luck with adult men pursuing me for ulterior motives, and I don't really want to break any more hearts.  That couldn't possibly help him.  He's hurting enough.  Not to mention that now that I'm an adult, I am more legally responsible for anything he tells me.

I don't really know what love does in situations like this.  Do you have any advice?

The joys of being hit on in retail

I'm having a bit of a hard time at work.  I used to be the only female at the store that didn't get hit on.  I was allowed to use my natural reserve as a barrier.  I could help people without being ridiculously, fake-y chipper.  Recently, my RetailEstablishment instituted new policies, and I was basically told I had to harass customers in a specific, scripted fake-cheerful way, or I would get fired.

Since then, I've been hit on 2.5 times this week.  Once by a possibly senile man in his eighties, once by a semi-regular customer, and once by a new customer who asked another employee what my name was, so he could hit on me but was then overcome with shyness and only asked me if I was active on any internet sites or forums (should've given him this one, eh?).  I heard about that last one later.  Apparently, when I pointed out a not-well-posted sale I thought he might've been interested in, he thought I was kind of cute.

I wonder if I'm the only one not-at-all flattered when people hit on me, no matter who they are.


Why do you suppose so many people can't tell the difference between fake retail/sales friendliness and actual, genuine interest (possibly of the relationship variety)?

Potentially Injurious Trips Down Memory Lane (Part 3)

I met up with an old acquaintance from an anime club I have belonged to for years (he was a member about four years ago). We were both volunteering in the choir for a September 11 memorial event, and we chatted a couple of times during 10 minute breaks at two rehearsals.

Back when I knew him, he had no interest in music, so I was surprised to reunite with him unexpectedly in a church basement.  He explained that there was a bad breakup, and he was lonely, and he believed in God and someone asked him to be in a church choir, and he just fell in love with the energy of making something spectacular with a group that couldn't be made alone.

Before the concert tonight, he said something true and hilarious.  "I was thinking back to when I knew you in anime club, and the way I remembered it, you were . . .  Well, the few times I decided to talk to you because, well, because you looked kinda cute, you . . . didn't seem very interested in talking much.  But this time, you don't seem like that at all."  Very diplomatic for such a straightforward person.

I suppose I could have said

• that it was a normal reaction to being thrown into a situation where I expected to know no one and unexpectedly finding someone that I knew, mostly from conversations overheard in anime club years ago. 
• that I knew I shared music with all of the other volunteers, but it was a pleasant surprise to find someone with whom I had another shared interest.
• that I act standoffish for a lot of reasons, including a desire to prevent any boys from being attracted to me), but am a shameless eavesdropper who likes to know about but not interact with (probably causally related to my being a writer and my ability to sort of naturally tamp down my presence so tight that I'm constantly scaring people who don't realize I am there and accuse me of having ninja powers). 
• that my mentor recently suggested that I consider writing some sort of article about why being in choirs was so important to me and starting by asking friends with various levels and years of commitment to music why they love it, and finding a casual acquaintance who had suddenly developed a love of choral music could lead to some great research and maybe even a nice interview.

I just told him that in larger group contexts where I will be spending a lot of time, I don't have the energy to interact with people (true), and he nodded and said that he knew people like that, but he loved talking to people (obviously).

I'm afraid in my happiness at finding myself not alone among strangers, I have introduced him to that softer, excited side that seems to make men want to date me, and this is unfortunate because I don't have any interest in dating, just in friendship, but that's not enough for most men.

This is especially unfortunate in retrospect because apparently there has since been another breakup.  I learned this after I gave him my card because I shamelessly hoped he would contact me, so I could interview him for my choral music essay.  After I gave him the card, he said something like, "Ah, well, this certainly eliminates the need for me to come up with a cunning plan to ask if it would be all right for us to stay in touch after this."  Ha, ha, I laughed at the time because I didn't know about the more recent breakup and thus did not suspect any ulterior motives.

Do I set myself up for this stuff or what?!  I swear I don't do it on purpose!  I only notice later, too late.

It makes me angry.  It's like I can't let out any of the aspects of my personality and my self that are full of passion and enthusiasm because if I do so around boys, they end up liking me.  How ridiculous is it that this is a problem for me when so many others so desperately want people to like them like that? 

I get a little surly with my situation sometimes.  What, I demand, so I can't like people, have interests, and want to be friends at all, or this will keep happening?  That's just stupid.  But it keeps happening.  It's making me afraid to be me, afraid to make real friends.  It feels wrong that I should have to be so cold around half the population of the earth just in case.  Grrrr.  This is messing with my attempts to more actively love and care about the people around me and pry myself out of my beloved solitude.  Rawr.

So my thought--after he talked about calling me sometime soon (and after I then told him I respond to email better than cell phones, partially because this is true and partially because cell phone conversations caused my downfall with another male friend and partially because email seems less able to communicate whatever it is that makes people want to date me)--was that if he gets in contact with me, the first thing I should do is casually point him towards all my blogs with the hope that he will read the introductory essay to this one, thus saving me the need to

1. break his heart in the future or 
2. start our next conversation with "I'm celibate and happy about it and have no interest in dating, marriage, sex, or anything other than great friendship."  

I hope it saves us both some angst.

It just feels so wrong . . .

Any suggestions, points, comments?