On a Winding Path to Happiness

Being a teacher of middle school students, a divorced mother of mentally ill children for more than a decade, and having a spirit of wanderlust that makes me want to get into a car and drive away into the sunset on the quest to find some happiness.  While I loathe those pensive, "whoa is me" types who clearly haven't much to be definitively unhappy about, I fear that lately I have been down that trek.  I have friends who are worried about me and I dearly appreciate the concern.  Too much life has taken me by storm lately and I am getting old (middle-aged, as my father likes to call me) and I'm not bouncing back as fervently as I used to.  My old philosophy of stuffing things down under the proverbial beach ball and just sitting on top is no longer a viable solution (as though it ever was).  I slipped off and everything that I had been packing away emerged, now waiting to be dealt with instead of avoided. 

I've spent most of my life waiting to be happy; childishly hoping that someday, that I would earn enough points and that the confetti would fall from the sky and I would then be happy.  I would pep talk myself into thinking, "This is the year that it is going to happen."  I often re-read journals that begin with , "This year....."  Then I would see people who truly had the spirit of happiness that flowed from deep within.

Once when I was really sick with undiagnosed hydrocephalus, two girls came over and cleaned my house.  It was horrifically embarrassing and just opening the door to the mess left me mortified.  They spent hours cleaning while I sat on the couch feeling guilty- and at the end, they thanked me for letting them come and clean my house- that it was a joy.  I spent the rest of the day pondering upon how cleaning could be joyful and rewarding.  While I still do not find peace or joy when I clean, I do like the result. It took me a while to realize that the joy was in serving others, and not necessarily the act of cleaning-which is clearly not my spiritual gift.

Growing up in the family that I did, I never understood the value in serving others.  I learned that you did things for some people so that when you needed something later, you could repay them- tit for tat.  I never envisioned encountering people who were happy and giving just as a part of their nature.

Recently, with my mother's passing, I have seen true servants watch over my father without his realizing it.  I had the opportunity to thank them for being such great neighbors to him.  In his own oblivion, he has people who make sure that he is ok on a daily basis, which makes me be ok with him being so far away from me.  My father is only 62, but he has a number of health problems, including an anyerism on his aorta and diabetes.  I am trying to not think about the horrific things that could lead to his demise, but try to take cue from the happiness and patience that he seems to have acquired since my mother's passing.  But getting that phone call in the middle of the night to tell you that a loved one is dead is something that I will never get over.  

Before my son had his psychotic break back in January, I finally had a glimmer of happiness.  Before, I had always been waiting on the other shoe to drop, so I had some discernment that usually revolved past experience that the bottom would drop out.  One day, I recalled feeling that my life was finally slowing down and that every day did not seem as though I were in crisis mode.  Those who have always live in a tornado alley of crisis sometimes do not know how to function outside of the tumultuous and constant upheaval.  Life was feeling comfortable and my cynicism and skepticism were beginning to pull back every so slightly and slowly.  I was in uncharted territory, and began to enjoy coming home to putting up my feet and watching a movie with my kids.  And even though the bottom did drop out, I am still here and we are still moving forward.  It is the unpacking of all of the things that have never been fully addressed that keeps the sadness with me at this time.  Coming and going, I know that in time, this will hopefully pass.  I wish I had money for therapy and all of those things that make the process move more transitionally and smoothly, but for now, I will just have to continue to write as my catharsis and take as much love and advice from those who care about me as a substitute. 

Even though the past six months have been some of the hardest in my life, with the most significant episodes being my son's diagnosis with schizo-effective disorder and my mother dying unexpectedly, I am still focusing on the light at the end of the tunnel.  I have been in worse places without supportive people who loved and cared for my well-being.  Many of the good friends that I have now did not even know me in those times where I thought that I would have never made it through. I intentionally kept people from my life and from access to my love and heart because it had been abused and broken.  Alone, I have endured and made decisions and the fact that I do have others who show concern and want me to have happiness and contentment is worth more to me than words can say.  The truth is, however, that God is the driving force behind my life.  The trials and tribulations that I endure are the result of my decisions that have put me in a position where I can learn something that I am supposed to know.

I am certain that my difficulties in life have given me the most profound knowledge and understanding.  I see people who live lives that revolve things, status, looks, money, cars, and what the world thinks of them. My mother was one of these people.  She looked for gratification from others and what others thought of her.  She was the life of the party and took care of others because it made her look pious.  I have tried to no longer look for fulfillment in such things, as they are untruths told by the world to those who do not know of a God who can bear all.

I have never had my nails done  or my hair dyed in a salon.  I try to live as much as possible from a view of practicality and scholarship, investing in the knowledge that no person could ever take from me.  I have lost every extrinsic object that I have owned at one time or another and pull myself back up from the abyss and move on.  Things are just things and I am still learning to part with objects that do not have meaning.  Relationships and humility are the true treasures where I choose to invest my time and effort these days.  Trust is a hard thing when it has been broken by every person who has supposed to trustworthy with life's most intimate details.  I have been the ridicule of many and have built up a callus that will take years to whittle away, but I am not giving up hope that my life is worth something important and my purpose is not a small one. This, perhaps is one of the hardest things for me to let go, the walls that I have built to keep others at bay.  Because while it keeps others from penetrating my wall as a protection mechanism, it also keeps the love that can be shared with others out.  Learning to let people into my life is terrifying and gratifying, yet necessary for me to move forward. 

 I feel too deeply and powerfully for my purpose to be one without meaning.   However,  I no longer care what people think of me.  I would be lying if I didn't say that it doesn't sting a bit when people judge me by what I look like or make jokes regarding my appearance, but I move on and let it flow over my shoulders, looking for the truth in my existence.  I try to not get caught up in the pettiness of drama and scorn, as it does not serve a purpose in moving on (which is one reason that I avoid my ex-husband..lol).  You cannot change people.  You cannot save people.  You cannot be Christ for other people.  You can only live your life and hope that by the end of it, you served as an example and your influence is what has left the most profound mark and evidence of life.  Right now, writing, humor and photography are those things for me. 

Yesterday, I was greatly troubled by my mother's passing and dealing with her baggage.  I now realize that those were her bags to carry, not mine.  I cannot put her insecurities and sadness onto my shoulders.   I do not have to maintain relationships with people who do not love and respect me, even if they are related to me.  And I do not have to accept a life that is less than what God's purpose if for me.  A very wise woman reminded me today that I may not have been able to choose my family and where I came from, but I do get to choose where I go from here. 

My Mother is Dead...

She died almost five months ago and I cannot find resolution in my heart or mind.  On Mother's Day, I sent her half a dozen of chocolate covered strawberries in the mail.  She called me on Monday to thank me.  She died on Friday.  The last time I saw her was back in March on her birthday when we took her out for dinner.  A quick cell phone picture and a strawberry plant that kept blooming long after she died, were all that was left of that day.

I'm fairly certain that she overdosed herself, but am not sure whether it was intentional, accidental or a mixture of both, however, still a selfish act of a selfish person.   I am angry, hurt, and disgusted that a person who was my mother didn't realize the path of destruction that she left behind.  The death certificate says that she died of natural causes, but there was so much there and no autopsy to get a definitive answer.  She was cremated and now resides in a small black box that holds her ashes.

We were left behind, having to pick up all of the pieces of a shattered life with shards of broken promises and dreams that never seemed to fit together.  The different levels of importance seemed to be attached to those things or people who held her in high esteem or recognized her, but not for the value of having done something for helping someone else, but the good personal feelings that she got from being recognized or patted on the back.  She held on to everything that meant nothing and let everything go of that and those who had the greatest significance; an act of defiance or desperation that I will never comprehend.  While I stand back and want the love was given to strangers so freely, I never seem to find it from her in my own life.  She haphazardly shoved it away, picking and choosing the best of it all and leaving the rest behind like the pieces in a box of chocolates that didn't have the right filling that you get on Valentine's Day.  

Pawing my way back through the stages of 61 years, I am so torn because I see the lives of these separate people that were mutually exclusively all her.  At some a some point, these all converged and the one who came out on top was the one that seemed to see me as a hindrance. The more that I learn of her childhood, I understand why she ended up the person that she was, and am even more confounded that the strength that I saw in her from time to time was not used for a greater vehicle to a bigger life. I do know that a big life does not mean that one has to move to find greatness, cure cancer, split the atom, or create a famous work of art.  I also know that many people who have chosen to live small lives, are often very happy and contented.  But a life that is spent inside of a house everyday being a voyeur instead of a participant seems like the antithesis of a life well-lived. It is not my place to stand in judgement of my mother as that is God's right, but I sometimes feel is my right because of the tumultuous relationship that we had. However, I am on a journey of trying to understand the circumstances that led us to this path.  I don't know if I will ever have peace without this understanding and closure. But I will go on and know that I have lived a different life, not in spite of her, but because I wanted to not be like her.  Even typing this acknowledgement brings me deeper sadness.  

I believe in a God that is just and good while having explicit expectation for us in our lives.  He is a selfish god, as He has the right to be. While knowing all of this, I too know that there is a lesson to be learned, gleaned, and a resolve to be inherited through these iron sharpening iron times that must be personally experienced.  I am perplexed or am trying too hard to allow this to happen in the due time in which it is supposed to happen.  I am an "answers" person; if there is problem that needs to be fixed, you fix it by finding an answer and moving on.  Unfortunately, this mindset doesn't apply to real the existential questions of life or dealing with people in general.  I have produced an internal fallacy that has deceptively worked in times of crisis of my life (which has mostly been all of it) and now that I finally realize that I was never in control to begin with, there is another type of grief that has to be acknowledged and rectified. 

There always has been some type of crisis, conflict, or dilemma that was immediate and life altering in our lives.  I never understood how many kids had things so easy and our lives were so hard. I knew that a lot of kids that I went to school with never had the experience of heating their own water in an electric kettle every night to wash up in a sink because of not having running water in a house for over a year.  Sneaking out at night in my dad's truck to a fresh water spring to fill 5 gallon buckets of free water to flush a toilet and wash up became a daily occurrence that eventually did not seem out of the ordinary.  Not having friends over in the house or letting anyone know that we never had water also became ordinary.   In gathering items for a recent yard sale, I couldn't touch the electric kettle.  It would be too heavy to lift and would open a wound that I might not be able to close again, so I left it on the shelf to be a relic of the past. 

Forgiveness is a place that is supposed to be the paradise that comes after climbing a dastardly and incredibly harsh mountain full of sharp rocks and imminent danger.  I know that forgiveness is supposed to be as easy as just saying it out now, but my faith is too bruised to take the easy way out.  Right now, I am broken and weakened, but still holding and pressing on to find the lush land of forgiveness.  Perhaps, my own sin is in the way of this process, but it's my path to sojourn.  The truth lies somewhere in between here and there and it is possible that I may not need to know all of the details to arrive there.  For what I am certain is that which every path is chosen, there will be difficulty and grief.  Too much has transpired for there not to be.  I hope that it is true that what doesn't kill us makes us stronger.  My storehouse of strength and endurance is a bit on the short side as of late.