It's been awhile...

I tend to do this. 

Sorry.

Sometimes it's because I cannot get private access to the computer to write, sometimes it's because I just can't seem to put the words to black and white.

This last year as been full of losses and gains.

Losses have been many.  In a little over a year, I have buried several family members and many friends.  I am simply too young for this.  Two friends to suicide, a young girl who lived far longer than any of us ever believed, a mentor and cheerleader that I miss beyond words, a former friend and director of drama, a gifted bass player and man of generosity and simplicity, friends from church, old and young, too many not old, yet not young, saint and not-so much saintly.

Yet the joys are many.  Reuniting with my twins, getting to know my daughter and knowing that within the week, all of my children will be together for the first time.  Acquiring a new craft and love in my spinning wheel and finding solace and peace in the world of fiber.  I still have a job, my children are well, my marriage intact and hopefully growing.  Family, friends, food on the table, a warm house, a var that drives, money to pay the bills, a body that still works, a God I know deeply, who knows me fully and loves me any way.

I am blessed beyond measure.

So tonight, I hear the laughter of my family and I am content.

As content as a little lovebird names Zoe who has fallen asleep in thepocket of my hoodie.

If only we all could stay that way!

My heart aches tonight

just one of those things

no one around to really talk to

I just ache.

The sweetness of simple things...

It seems that when I release the need for control, God finds a way to fill me with the sweetness of simple things...

I finished the prayer shawl today.  I lovingly folded it and will find the perfect way to wrap it and deliver it.  The simplicity of prayer - the simplicity of knitting that created a tangible reminder - you are not alone, you are loved, you are prayed for, God's grace and mercy will be sufficient for the day...

An email in my inbox - newsy and personal  - filled my day with sheer joy.

A younger brother makes a glass of chocolate milk for his big brother and proclaimed it "perfect"!

A cool breeze on a summer night.

The warmth of the sun on my face.

The tired snuggle of an old bird, comfortable and easy with me.

A new knitting book.

A ball of baby alpaca yarn.

An I love you from a beloved 200 miles away.

simple.

and it is enough.

Emptiness Speaks

I think it does, in much the same way as silence.

When I began on the path of embracing silence in my life - I began to hear so much more than I ever heard before.

Take off your iPod ear buds and see what happens.

You begin to hear all manner of thing: a soft wind in the trees, the singing of insects, a far off wail of an emergency, the crack of the bat at the neighborhood ball park, the lonely whistle of a train.  You hear the movement of the family in your home, the dog snoring, the soft conversation of two lovebird settling down on their perches for the night, the neighbor coming home from second shift, the squealing of tires as a teenager pulls out of the drive in a last ditch effort impress the young lady of his current affections or to perhaps tick off her disapproving father...

Then, if you can manage, you begin to hear those inward thoughts and sense those inward feelings.  You find those places where you are comfortable in who you are, as well you should be.  You find those places where you are uncomfortable in who you are, as well you should be.  You find those places where the pain and joy of the past linger, the places that still need a healing touch, and the dark places that need light.

And then, if you are really still, you may even hear the still, soft whisper of the voice of God speaking to your heart.  They are whispers of love and comfort, conviction and redemption, rebuke and correction, affection and the love of a Father who loves you deeply and passionately and desire nothing but the very best.

And yet further into the stillness comes the words that cannot be uttered, but your heart releases what ever it is that those unutterable words speak to.

Perhaps the perspective of emptiness needs a new paradigm.

Rather than seeing the sense of emptiness as a deficit, a lack of fullness, perhaps it is what needs to happen in order for us to be filled with something new.

Something we need but were too full up with the busyness of our lives, the busyness of our minds, the busyness of movement designed to keep us from silence, from becoming aware of what we lack and the lack of who or what we perceive we ought to be.

And to fill that empty space on my own, for me, is to pretend that I am all I need, that I am all there is, that I can satisfy all that hungers within me by the illusion tat I am my own God.

So, I will sit with the emptiness, for it speaks to me.

And I will wait, patiently, on a Father who loves me, to fill me with his next blessing.

And because I am learning to sit with that deep void in the pit of my being, the filling will be all the sweeter.

what to do with empty space...

We usually try to fill it.

I got home from work and was ready to head to the local yarn shop - lots of excuses, even though I had just been there last night...

They were closed, so I drove to another one.

They were closed.

I turned on the radio in the car and found myself so irritated by everything that was on, so I turned it off.

And I realized, that just as I was trying to use the radio to fill silence, I was on a hunt to fill that empty space in my soul with stuff.

Good stuff, mind you.

After all, a yarn addict can never have too much good yarn, especially when it has a use in mind...

But I got the message.

Perhaps this empty space in the depths of my being just need to be left alone.

Perhaps, I am to sit next to it, as a friend with the heart of a learner, open to what that space has to say to me.

I spend so much time trying to fill in the holes in my life, trying to make it all look like its working for me.

But it isn't working for me.

So I will sit with the emptiness and accept it's role as teacher.

Can I be honest?

I'm not a very enthusiastic student.