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Alone, lonely

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I was at a restaurant once and a husband and wife were there with their two young children. The mom needed to go to the restroom. The dad was left in charge of the children while my mom was away. The children were fine for about a minute and then they started to lose their minds.

The children started crying and wailing inconsolably. They wanted their mother and their mother had simply gone to the bathroom. There was nothing that dad could do to make them happy. It was as if they had never ever been on their own and they didn’t know how to take care of themselves. It was as if they didn’t know how to live without their mother right next to them taking care of everything for them.

This isn’t limited just to children.

I know a guy whose wife has died recently. She was sick for year with cancer. They didn’t expect her to die. In a way, though, it was an expected death because it wasn’t an accident like a car crash or a tornado. They only knew each other for three years, and she was only 42. It is all very sad.

He’s had all the leave that his workplace can give him, but that never is enough. Five days isn’t enough to process a death, even if you’ve had some time to warm up to the fact that it might happen.

He forgot to eat for three days. His clothes started to smell and are rumpled. His hair isn’t combed.

He reminds me of those children. It’s as if he doesn’t know how to exist without her right next to him. Surely he knew how to feed himself and take care of himself before they ever met. But now he’s forgotten.

I’ve heard many stories of husbands dying or remarrying less than a year after their wife dies. Interestingly, the same isn’t true for wives.

All of his friends and coworkers are looking out for him, but he has to pull himself out of this and start taking care of himself. We can’t rescue him from his grief.

It reminds me of baby birds. Sometimes they can’t make it on their own. Sometimes they don’t have the strength to fly. Sometimes they die. Is it fair to them to rescue them, when they don’t have the ability to take care of themselves? That is only a sort of half-life.

3:30 crash

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Young children can only handle so much. Around about 3:30 in the afternoon they start to lose it. They start to become not quite human. Parents don’t seem to notice this because they don’t have perspective on the situation. I have worked in customer service for most of my life. I have had the advantage (?) of seeing this happen over and over again every day for many years. Around about 3:30 children start to have what is sometimes termed “a meltdown”. They start to cry and get whiny and fall apart.

One mother even said “I’m just going to smack him right in the mouth.” about her whining child. I’ve seen other mothers very impatient with their children and think that they are just being difficult. I’ve seen other mothers just stare at their children as they flop on the floor, crying and wailing loudly. They have no idea what is going on, and no idea what to do to stop it.

Children aren’t being difficult at that time of day. There’s only so much they can handle.

Do you expect to get a gallon’s worth of milk out of a quart bottle? It isn’t possible. Children are the same way. They just don’t have the capacity that adults have.

Children are not small adults. Children wear out a lot faster. Children need rest and food and water a lot more often than adults do. And by food and water I don’t mean candy and sugar and caffeine. That only makes it worse.

It isn’t fair to expect a small child to be able to go the whole day on limited resources without falling apart. You have to understand their limits and work with them. It isn’t the child’s fault that they have been out all day. Children don’t have control over their environment or what happens to them. They feel very frustrated and they don’t have the words to express their frustration. They express them in the ways that they have. With their limited resources they express that they are unhappy by crying or wailing or holding back from going anywhere. Sometimes they resist a change in their environment because it is a way to exercise control.

The whole issue is control. They don’t have it. And that is the problem. Around mid-afternoon they start to lose their self-control so they try to exert control over whatever they can. Sadly, at that point, nothing will soothe them because they just don’t know what is wrong. Sadly, many parents don’t either, and they don’t notice that their child’s inconsolable wails have little to do with anything obvious. It looks like they are crying about their dolly, or their shoe, or their brother, but really, they are crying because they are at the end of their rope because they are worn out.

When I was working at the Chattanooga Choo-Choo I often saw families that were all worn out come mid-afternoon. They had small children with them and they had been adventuring all day long. The children were not about to sit down and be still and calm while mom was looking through the craft store. I learned to dread that time of day because the parents always got frustrated with their children.

The children were just being children. There was nothing wrong with them. They were doing what comes natural to them when they are worn out. The problem is the parents who weren’t parenting. The parents were not taking into account the natural limitations of being a child.

The parents were not being kind to the children. It wasn’t fair to the children or anybody else around them. In order to travel or be around small children, you need to plan ahead to avoid problems. It is good if the whole family can have a nap some time shortly after lunch. If that isn’t possible, then at least have everybody sit and be quiet in a cool, darkish place for at least 30 minutes. People recharge better if they are away from the harsh stimuli of heat and light.

Most of all, make sure that they have had enough food and enough water. This does not mean candy bars and sodas. You have to give them the right fuel in order to keep going. But it’s also not fair to push them beyond their limits. Don’t get frustrated with them – they can’t help it. Learn from it, and plan ahead.

Exercise exorcises

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I don’t exercise to fit into my clothes. I exercise to fit into my body. I exercise to fit inside myself.

My body and brain don’t feel right when I don’t exercise. I feel sluggish and stupid. I feel out of sorts.

I exercise so my joints work without hurting. I exercise so my muscles are strong enough to lift what I need to lift. I exercise so I can sleep well.

I exercise so I don’t get angry all the time, so I can think more clearly, so I can have some space in my head for the thoughts I want to think.

Exercise shakes out all the rusty bits. Exercise stops me from feeling rusty in body, mind, and soul. Things just work better when I move.

Every now and then I’ll take a break. Every now and then I “cheat” and I’ll not walk at lunch, or I’ll sit while checking in the inside book drop. Every now and then I just don’t want to go to the Y. Usually I’ll spend the same week eating sea salt caramel gelato, sour cream and onion potato chips, and drinking Yoo-hoo chocolate drinks.

The only person I’m cheating on is myself. I feel fine for a bit, and then it catches up with me. Then I feel terrible, and I hate being inside my body. I’ve put bad stuff in it and I haven’t done anything to get it out.

Exercise exorcises.

Jealousy leprosy

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Jealousy is a terrible emotion. It makes you think that you are not in control of your life. It makes you think that other people have stolen something from you that is yours. Rather, something that you think should be yours. But the bad part is the reason you are stuck in the place you are is because of your jealousy. When you start to blame other people for your problems, that is your problem.

Eleanor Roosevelt said “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” Likewise, all of your emotions are up to you. Someone else cannot make you feel angry or sad or upset or even happy. You choose to feel these feelings when they say or do whatever they say or do. You are entirely responsible for how you feel, not other people. For you to make your happiness or sadness dependent on someone else is to give away all of your power.

Taking care of your parents when the relationship is bad

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There is nothing about being an adult child that means you want to take care of your parents. There is nothing about the situation that says you even know how to.

You didn’t enter into this relationship voluntarily. Nobody asked you if you wanted to be the child of these people, and nobody asked you if you wanted to take care of them as they got older.

Just because they raised you doesn’t mean you are obliged.

What if they did a poor job of raising you? What if they were abusive? What are your obligations and responsibilities then?

Sure, there is social pressure and Christian guilt to deal with. Society expects you to drop everything and take care of these people. Forget the fact that you barely have enough time money or energy to take care of yourself.

Getting married is a legal commitment. You swear before your friends and family and a witness that you will take care of each other, no matter what happens. You make no such commitment to your parents. It is all passive. You are born into this family. You have no choice, and you haven’t promised anybody anything.

But yet you are expected to drive them around when they can’t anymore, to cook for them, to spend the night at their house when they are afraid…the list goes on and on.

Taking care of your parents is like taking care of children, but in reverse. As they grow older, they grow more needy and less able to care for themselves. As they grow older, they grow less independent and more dependent.

The really big problem is that unlike children, they remember being independent, and they don’t know how to receive help. They certainly don’t want to get help from their children, regardless of their age. They feel that something is wrong with this situation, and that they are losing control and power. That only makes the situation more difficult.

Another problem is that nobody trains you, the adult child, how to take over responsibility. Nobody tells you that now you are the parent and they are the child. So it is hard for you and for your parents.

If there is a history of abuse or neglect it is even harder.

People who had a great relationship with their parents cannot understand this.

Gift

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I’m trying to see every experience as a gift, as something special. I’m trying to trust that God is in charge of everything and that everything is going as planned.

It isn’t easy.

I feel trapped in someone else’s madness right now. Some dumb decisions have been made by others and it is affecting me. It is only going to get worse. I want somebody to take over, take charge. I want somebody to rise to the occasion and be an adult. I’m not seeing it happen yet.

And then I remember how much I love the story of Jonah, praising God in the belly of the whale. While in the middle of the problem, Jonah praises God.

And I remember Jesus saying in Matthew 5:43-48
43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you salute only your brethren, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (RSV)

I’ve come to understand this to be about everything – situations, feelings, ourselves – not just people. We are to act in a loving manner all the time.

And I remember Job saying that if he only loves God when he gives us good things, then he doesn’t really love God. His wife has just told him to curse God for all the afflictions that have happened to him.

Job 2:10
10 But he said to her, “You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” In all this Job did not sin with his lips. (RSV)

OK, so what do I do about all these feelings? How do I handle them? How do I act in a loving way towards my anxiety right now?

I was talking to a friend about all of this and she told me about this quote from Thich Nhat Hanh. “Breathing in, I calm body and mind. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment I know this is the only moment.” (Being Peace)

Sometimes this feels like AA. “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference” (Reinhold Niebuhr)

If I believe that God is a loving God, and that God is in charge, I have to trust that everything that happens is part of God’s plan, and that it will all work out for the good.

The problem is trusting that.

I feel like I did when I was in a river rafting trip with a boyfriend many years ago. He was a guide, and we’d taken a raft with some friends down the Ocoee River in the off season. He knew of a spot where we could “surf” – we could ride the river, sort of stuck in this one area for a bit. Some of the water started to come into the raft. I started to get terrified and went to leap out of the boat. My boyfriend knew that would be a terrible idea – I’d get stuck under the raft in that area. Unbeknownst to him, it really would have been a terrible idea – I wasn’t a great swimmer either. All I knew was that something bad was happening and I wanted to get away. He held my shoulders down so I couldn’t leave the boat. He explained it all when we were away from that situation. He didn’t have time to explain it then.

I want to get away from this situation.
God is holding down my shoulders.
It will all make sense later.
Breathe, trust, and give thanks.

I’m fine.

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Why do people even ask “How are you doing?” They don’t really want to know. They want you to say “I’m fine”. They want to then go on to the rest of the conversation.

They don’t really want you to say “Things are terrible” or “My foot hurts” or “My husband is driving me crazy.” They don’t want the truth.

So why ask?

It is a bit of a transition phrase. It is a demarcation point. It is a way of saying, “Hey, I need to have a conversation with you, and this is how we start.” It is seen as polite.

But is it really polite, when nobody cares what the answer really is? To not really care about someone you are talking with is not polite. Now, sure, you may not have the desire to know what is really going on with your waitress or the guy who changes the oil in your truck. So why ask?

We ask because that is what we do.

And every time we do it and don’t really want the truth, we become more and more un-human, and more and more like zombies. We aren’t being conscious or intentional about our lives or our speech.

Finger-painting and leaving church

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I finger-paint. I’m 45, and I finger-paint. I admit it. I’m getting in touch with my inner 5 year old – but I’m skipping the tantrum part. In fact, by finger-painting, I’m doing my best to avoid a tantrum.

So far, it is working.

I’m not a great artist. I admire people who can paint or draw better than reality. Right now I’m just learning how to get the paint somewhere near where I intended. That is a good start. I’m trying to be patient with myself. I’m trying to just enjoy the process.

I’ve figured out how to save money on canvasses. I go to Goodwill and buy a large canvas there. I paint over what was on it. So instead of paying $50, I pay $4. Then I don’t feel bad about smearing paint around. It frees me to have fun.

I used to paint on the interior walls of my house, but I’ve run out of space to work. It is a small house. Painting on my walls with my fingers gave me that delicious feeling of going against my parent’s rules. They used to get so upset when I’d draw on the walls. Instead of providing me with paper or canvas, they just yelled at me.

This was my normal.

I’m glad to be painting again.

When I think of it this way, I feel that finger-painting, whether on walls or on canvas, is similar to me leaving church.

I left church when I got chastised by the priest for daring to rethink church. I dared to say that organized religion is in direct opposition to what Jesus meant. I could have gone silent, and played the dutiful, obedient church member. I could have been a drone, like so many others are.

I didn’t stop writing or thinking about what church should be, about what Jesus meant it to be. It just gave fuel to my fire.

Something about finger-painting feels the same. I was told not to, but for no good reason. It wouldn’t have hurt for me to draw on the walls of my room. They could have painted over it when it was time to sell. Heck, I’m the one who had to sell the house. I could have done that. But no, the walls were pristine. Well, except for thirty years of cigarette smoke, staining everything yellow. My doodles were far safer.

I wasn’t given another outlet for my creativity. I wasn’t given a choice. I wasn’t asked. My feelings didn’t matter.

Obey. Obey. Obey. Parents and priests have a lot in common.

Get me away.

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It is very hard for me to be any part of the madness going on with my husband’s family right now. I write about compassion and serving people like they are Jesus. I also write about boundaries and dysfunctional families.

These two things don’t go together very well sometimes.

Dealing with them is like dealing with alcoholics. It is as if I have a friend who is a drunk. I say “Don’t drink and drive, because you might have a wreck” and they think they know better, so they drink, and drive, and total their car. And then they say “Hey, I don’t have a car anymore, can you drive me around? Or lend me money for a new car?”

They aren’t drunks. They are just needy, and manipulative, and making bad decisions. They want things done for them that we don’t have the time, energy, or money for. They want things done that I told them we would not provide, yet they are getting them anyway.

The only trips they took my husband and his brother on were of the guilt variety. Lots of abuse – physical, verbal, emotional. It is hard to muster up the desire to take care of someone who harmed someone I love. It is hard to want to help them when they have not admitted to or apologized for the damage they did. They continue to manipulate and control, even now.

And I just have to get away from all of this. It doesn’t require the skill of a prophet to see where all of this is headed.

I told them not to get a house with a yard when they moved up here. I pushed for them getting an apartment. They are both old and not as able to take care of themselves, much less a house with a yard. Plus, when they die or have to move into assisted living, that house will have to be dealt with. That mortgage will still have to be paid.

By us.

I told them that my husband barely has time to take care of our yard and house, and they said that they wanted a yard because she wanted to garden, and he needed the exercise. Neither has happened. They call my husband or his brother over to work on their yard and to maintain their house. Electrical switches, plumbing issues, hedges trimmed. So work doesn’t get done at our house.

A year ago my mother in law finally started to admit to herself that her cancer diagnosis was terminal. In the meantime, my father in law’s Parkinson’s has gotten worse, and he’s starting to get dementia.

I said they need to move into assisted living, ASAP. Nobody listened to me. They are toughing it out at their house –their house which is too big for them. That house is impressive, a show. It isn’t practical. It is bigger than they need. This is normal for them, always having to impress people, always having to have the best.

She’s in rehab right now. She passed out, hit her head, got a concussion, and broke her leg. Rehab, to teach someone how to walk again – someone who will be dead in probably three months because the cancer has spread to her lungs.

They are not thinking ahead. They are about to leave a big mess for us to have to clean up.

See? They didn’t listen, wrecked the car, and we are having to pay for it.

I’m trying to be Christ-like in this. What would Jesus do? What should I do?

But then I remember that Jesus didn’t have to deal with his parents in law, or even his parents. Jesus never got married, and died before his parents did. He raised people from the dead. He didn’t have to watch them die or bury them or sell their stuff. And he certainly didn’t have to do any of that while working a full-time job.

I finally realized that my parents-in-law or my husband or his brother, or even his wife – none of them have been the caregivers for a dying person. I’m the only one who has. I’m the only one who has also handled an estate. I’m giving advice on what to do next because I’ve been there, and they are ignoring me. They think they know better. They are pretending like this will all go away.

Meanwhile, everything that I said was going to happen has happened. I can see the train on the tracks, headed right for us.

I’m trying to stay out of it. I can’t handle any of this madness.
I hate it.
I’m angry and sad and tired.

I want to do the right thing. I also don’t want to be seen as a hypocrite – someone who talks about Jesus and compassion and service and then bails when the going gets rough, when things get real.

But there is also codependency and enabling to consider too.

If I rescue them, if I essentially say that it is OK for them to screw up their lives and drag us down with them, that isn’t being very loving.

Sometimes there aren’t any easy answers. Sometimes there aren’t any answers at all. Sometimes there isn’t a happy ending. Sometimes it just sucks.

Bell towers

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I keep being drawn to bell towers these days. Not real ones, but images of them. I didn’t even realize they were bell towers. I just knew they were four-sided tall towers, with window-like openings at the top.

What did I think they were? I didn’t. I just thought they were pretty. Now that I know what they are, I have to meditate upon it, because apparently it has a meaning and a message for me.

Anything can be a useful thing to meditate on. Anything can give you insight and teach you. But I find it especially significant to focus on things that repeat, because I see them as a sign from God to pay attention. God is saying “Here is something you need to notice.”

One of the images was at a friend’s house. Her husband had taken a picture of a bell tower at a church in downtown Nashville. It is just the bell tower, the sky, and birds. Something about it reminds me of the Episcopal retreat center on Monteagle Mountain. That place is old and musty and quaint and a little falling down. It has a Spanish mission style architecture, with red-tile roofing and white stucco exteriors.

This bell tower is like that, but I think there is more to it. There is something that hints at the idea of the Holy Spirit, with the birds flying nearby. There is something about the angle of the picture that makes me think the eye was suddenly jerked upwards, noticing this structure for the first time.

I’d admired this picture several times when I went over to visit, and then it was missing. They’d taken it to an art show to try to sell it. I felt the loss of it more than I realized. I didn’t know that I liked it that much until it wasn’t there. I asked my friend to have her husband make me a copy of it so I could have it at my house.

Then there is another picture. There is an etching that I’ve admired for at least eight years. It was tucked away under the stairs in an art gallery in Banner Elk, North Carolina. Every year, for years, I’d gone by this gallery and noticed that it was still there. I hoped that they would put it on sale. It was $100. I couldn’t really justify $100 for an etching. They can make more – it isn’t an original, a one-of-a-kind. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that if I didn’t have it, I would feel the same loss, the same emptiness that I felt when my friend took that photograph away.

I remembered that I’d paid more than $100 for that photograph. That too can be reproduced. That too isn’t a one of a kind. But, hey, artists have to eat and pay bills, and I sure wish that people would pay me full price for what I make. So it was time to pony up and buy it.

It wasn’t until I saw the title written on the back of the etching that I knew it was of a bell tower. Two bell tower images, purchased within a few months of each other, both now in my house. I’d admired the etching for years and not even known what it was.

So what about bell towers? They are where the church uses to call the faithful to prayer. But “the call” can also mean the call from God. It can mean about the call to ministry, the call to service.

I need to listen to this message.

If I don’t respond to the call, I’ll feel empty. I’ll notice that it isn’t there and feel lost. This isn’t about iconizing the image of a bell tower – it is about heeding what it points to. It is about hearing the call and responding to it. It is about realizing that if I don’t respond, I’ll feel like I’ve missed out on my life’s purpose.

Does this mean I’m being called to the ordained ministry? No. Most certainly not. The more I read of the words of Jesus, the more I know with all certainty that the ordained ministry is a direct affront to Jesus’ wishes.

Jesus came to take away the power from the authorities. He removed all divisions between God and people, and between different groups of people. Jesus says we are all good, and we are all ministers, by virtue of our baptism.

So what, exactly? I feel like I’ll know when I get there. It would be nice to follow along a path that others have trod. It would be nice to be able to say what I’m headed towards, but there aren’t words yet. Perhaps it should just suffice to say that I’m headed towards God, and forget about the how or the what or even the when. Just do it, you know?

Meanwhile I’m going to fall and fail and trip a lot. Meanwhile I’m going to tick some people off and alienate some others. In short, I’m going to be human.

Basically, I’m like a bell tower. I want to call others to prayer. I want people to go towards God. If I can show them a path or light the way, awesome. Meanwhile, I have to hear and heed the call for myself.

But bell towers crumble, and get dirty, and birds start to nest in them. They stop working right.

Just like how I don’t want to get stuck iconizing the image of the bell tower, I don’t want people to focus on me. I don’t want people to think I’ve got all the answers, because I certainly don’t. I want people to know that they are forgiven and loved, and that they are supposed to go do the same.