I wonder if I will have the courage to write this...and later to post it. I have waited nearly an hour. I have eaten an entire bag of sweet potato chips. I have tried to watch TV...but it's there in my face. Love. And I don't know what to do with it. This strange creature so foreign to my understanding of the world. It won't go away. So I better write about it. Even though some of the shine is off of it now...it won't leave me alone.
I can't explain much. This creature is so new and so foreign. And yet so very old. The powers that be are overwhelming me with moments of love...I wonder if they might have always been there...but invisible, creatures that moved around in my life but I could not see them. Too much pain, too much loneliness, too much disappointment and far too much expectation.
I thought I was rid of this horrible handicap, that thing called love. I decided at nine years old that I did not need it...well, because...it simply didn't exist. It was not a part of my life.
When something horrible happened and no one was there...no one to hold me, or tell me I had value. All my friends were taken away. No one talked to me...and I had all these feelings...that seemed to plug up my pipes...and it was difficult to breathe...so I simply decided I would never feel again. I knew that the animal never left the room, really...even though I did my best to starve it, to ignore it..to beat it until it wimpered and crouched in the corner...it would not go away.
It stayed there for a long time. I grew up. I was successful at nearly everything I attempted to do. I was envied and admired. I was desired. But I did not play well with others. Nerds enjoyed me, because nerds have a hard time with love, too. Being smart was all that mattered...and I had plenty of that. Oh..and I was really good at other things...because, well...love never got in the way.
I had been loved by others...but I honestly didn't know what to do with it. I had already trained it to stay in the corner...I certainly was not going to let it grow wild again with expectation or anticipation. I knew that pain of feeling unloved...no kindness of strangers would tempt me to risk another wound. To those people, I offer my apologies...to those who tried to take from me what I was unwilling to give, I forgive you. To those who took without asking, I forgive you, too. To those from whom I took because I was afraid of being hurt again, I beg forgiveness.
Such is love...and when it stays invisible.
But I have been redeemed...I did not earn it or even ask for it...not really. But someone came along, as I was growing older and weaker, and did not let the darkness of my soul frighten them. There was a smile and I said, "go away!" for I recognized it and knew what it meant.
But love was stronger than me that day...and a tiny piece of stone in my heart fell away...and my heart began to bleed...ever so slightly. Really? Was there something human in there? How could that be? Everything of flesh had been burned off...and a little computer clicked and whirred it's way through the world, looking very human and somewhat pretty...but not really real anymore. Where did this blood come from? Was it even mine? I guess I'll never really know for sure.
There is more to write...
But today...today I saw so much...and felt so much...love...I can't really explain it... it is like it pouring out of the walls and flooding the room. The invisible is becoming visible. I guess maybe it started at Mass. All the faces of all the people I saw...all the lives I knew...all the connections...and the promise I made two years ago, I made at Mass today...just in passing, a quiet word to God...one more Yes, I will. It was only between me and God.
Maybe it was at breakfast, when I was late...and we talked about loving broken people who sometimes need to not be treated like fragile objects, but need to own their own feelings and not expect others to fill in the gaps...
Perhaps it was the group of women this morning, sharing their faith...and watching a film that made me cry because, while nothing else made sense in my life, God made sense. Even in my plastic computer driven body, I knew that much. God made sense. And God is love, so I guess love made sense, too. I watched a friend blossom into the woman I knew she always was...I watched her miracle unfold. And another friend, who I had waited for for years to speak to me about God...finally say something that made me understand...perhaps it was that.
And then another visit, where someone I intended to comfort, comforted me. She had faced death and the glow of God was on her face. I knew it because I was looking into a mirror when I looked into her eyes...I just knew it...and it was more than I could handle.
The nails were driven into my hands yesterday...some of it I welcomed, some I worked hard to fight...but I begged God to tell me the truth...Have I hurt the people I love, or have I helped? And much more important...to God at that time, than to me...have I let them love me?
And I seem to understand, that, after all this time...of being strong, of watching over and out for, but mostly guarding my heart against suffering...
I realize, somewhere I must have let love in...because today, I feel it so strongly...I can see it without glasses...somehow, when I wasn't looking...it crawled out of the corner and up on my lap. And without my knowing, or completely understanding, I find myself enjoying it and realizing that, just maybe, it won't bite. It might even be nice to hold...for a little while...
Love, Cindy
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