I came close today. Too close. Scared me, but I am glad that it happened because it helps me to remember I must stay vigilant. It also is a reminder of how much progress has been made this past year. Not too long ago I would I have been sitting here wondering how this happened and feeling guilty for failing to stay clean once again.
Today’s main event? Nick’s funeral. What a waste of such a wonderful and gorgeous man. His sister asked me to sing at the funeral. Now those who may be reading this who have known me a long time may remember that I used to sing quite well. Some readers may know why I can’t anymore. I have been told that my voice is not bad now, but since I can’t do what I used to be able to do, I hate my voice. As a result, I haven’t sung in a long time, leaving my vocal chops weak and out of shape. But I agreed to do it. It’s not about sounding professional or even good as much as honoring the wishes of the family and the memory of my friend, right? Whatever.
Two funerals in two days. It’s too much. I hate the way drugs and alcohol have taken so many people from my life, and I’m not even thinking about all the people I pushed away while active in my own addiction. Too many faces too many times. The stress has been so high. I had forgotten how much this hurts, partly because I did everything I could do to add to my body’s chemicals to avoid said pain in the past. So, I was already a wreck by the time I stood up mere feet from my friend’s coffin.
Even when you have a good voice and it’s in good shape it’s hard to cry and sing at the same time. I fought it as much as I could, but even that effort effects the voice. I butchered it. Both songs. And as I did, regrets flooded my soul. I destroyed my voice. I did it, and did it on purpose. Sure, I was messed up when I did, but that doesn’t change the result of my actions. I hurt my throat not far into the second song, which made the whole thing that much worse. It took everything I had to stand there and attempt to finish the song as anger and, yes, self-pity overwhelmed me. What a stupid way to act and think. This was not about me. It was about Nick and the people he left behind. I feel so ashamed that I sunk so far into myself.
Within a half-hour of the disaster I just described I had some magic feel-no-more powder in my pocket. I know what I was feeling, but what was I thinking? I couldn’t say. I need to reflect on that some to help make sure it doesn’t happen again any time soon. I carried that crap around in my pocket for about two and a half hours before I brought myself to flush it. So close to blowing it less than three weeks before I hit my one-year mark. But I am not beating myself up over the close call. The fact is that I did stay clean. I didn’t use it. And that is a miracle. There was a time when even hesitation would have been impossible. Alcohol and drugs were my Borg….Resistance is futile, you will be assimilated. But today I am free. Not well, not immune, but free. And as long as I keep working toward improvement, making positive steps and changes in my life, and most importantly, maintain my relationship with God I can remain free. As long as that happens, I will only grow more able to handle the curves life throws at me without having the temptation to try to escape.
Monday, December 7, 2009
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Shadows
I should be asleep. I want to be asleep. I need rest so badly. I feel as though I haven’t slept in a week, and considering that I have only had about 12 hours of sleep in the last four days, that’s a lot closer to the truth than I care to admit. I’m not twenty anymore, and I simply do not hold up well going on and on like the blasted Energizer Bunny. Especially since I no longer engage in the use of chemicals to aid in such craziness.
It’s been such a horrible and devastating and long and draining week. As if I needed any, I received not one but two reminders in three days that addiction is deadly. A very good friend of mine lost his fight with this beast early this week. I went to his visitation at the funeral home tonight, and I can’t tell you much I felt like I had stumbled in to a bad Twilight Zone episode. It just doesn’t feel real. It damn sure doesn’t feel right. No, all is not right with the world tonight. Telling the girl my friend loved that she’d never see him alive again broke my heart. I have been told I helped her as she received that horrible news, but I don’t feel like I did. I felt so helpless and powerless to do anything that would make it right. Because that just can’t be made right.
And one was never enough with my drinking and drugging, so it shouldn’t surprise me that it didn’t stop with one when it came to the addiction monster taking lives from me. Yesterday, I found out that an old friend of mine, something of an ex actually as we had hooked up a few times and partied together many, overdosed and died. His funeral is coming. I’m not sure how I’m supposed to handle this. It’s too much too soon too close together.
I feel my world has been spun and tipped over and shaken. It’s like fate picked up the snow globe of my life and gave it a good shake to see what would happen. As my life splits into pieces and I see everything spiraling out of control I imagine a twisted fate fairy watching the scene and going, “Cool.” I just need a break. I can’t take much more of this.
I have a song running through my head that just won’t go away. It ends with a prayer that is my prayer, because this is so how I feel right now. Hurt, scared, confused, afraid, angry, scared, determined, afraid…..
“Shadows” performed by Rez Band, written by Glenn Kaiser
…You, you chased the shadows because your hopes and dreams have been lost to the night…
Johnny's dead and buried now out on the edge of town
Drove by his grave the other day, that's when the fear came down
I hate the night that took his life, but now it's haunting me
I may be young, may be confused but I gotta be free
God, are You there, can You hear me now?
Show me how to hope
Lost in the dark on a dead end road, please save me from myself
Lord, You, You took the shadows - all my fears and doubt and brought me out of the night
Lord, You , You take the shadows - give me hope and love and turn my darkness to light
That's the part of the song that I was talking about, but the whole thing speaks to me. If you want to give it a listen here's a link...Shadows by Rez Band
It’s been such a horrible and devastating and long and draining week. As if I needed any, I received not one but two reminders in three days that addiction is deadly. A very good friend of mine lost his fight with this beast early this week. I went to his visitation at the funeral home tonight, and I can’t tell you much I felt like I had stumbled in to a bad Twilight Zone episode. It just doesn’t feel real. It damn sure doesn’t feel right. No, all is not right with the world tonight. Telling the girl my friend loved that she’d never see him alive again broke my heart. I have been told I helped her as she received that horrible news, but I don’t feel like I did. I felt so helpless and powerless to do anything that would make it right. Because that just can’t be made right.
And one was never enough with my drinking and drugging, so it shouldn’t surprise me that it didn’t stop with one when it came to the addiction monster taking lives from me. Yesterday, I found out that an old friend of mine, something of an ex actually as we had hooked up a few times and partied together many, overdosed and died. His funeral is coming. I’m not sure how I’m supposed to handle this. It’s too much too soon too close together.
I feel my world has been spun and tipped over and shaken. It’s like fate picked up the snow globe of my life and gave it a good shake to see what would happen. As my life splits into pieces and I see everything spiraling out of control I imagine a twisted fate fairy watching the scene and going, “Cool.” I just need a break. I can’t take much more of this.
I have a song running through my head that just won’t go away. It ends with a prayer that is my prayer, because this is so how I feel right now. Hurt, scared, confused, afraid, angry, scared, determined, afraid…..
“Shadows” performed by Rez Band, written by Glenn Kaiser
…You, you chased the shadows because your hopes and dreams have been lost to the night…
Johnny's dead and buried now out on the edge of town
Drove by his grave the other day, that's when the fear came down
I hate the night that took his life, but now it's haunting me
I may be young, may be confused but I gotta be free
God, are You there, can You hear me now?
Show me how to hope
Lost in the dark on a dead end road, please save me from myself
Lord, You, You took the shadows - all my fears and doubt and brought me out of the night
Lord, You , You take the shadows - give me hope and love and turn my darkness to light
That's the part of the song that I was talking about, but the whole thing speaks to me. If you want to give it a listen here's a link...Shadows by Rez Band
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
My quest for acceptance changed direction
I believe that God wants, no intends, each of us to have a life of contentment and joy. I just don’t know very many people who seem to have found that as a normal state of life. I know that I didn’t. And still don’t, at least not to the extent that I would like. I have tasted this contentment and joy at times, and like any good addict, I want more and more and more.
For almost as long as I can remember I have lived as a hunter, seeking to fill an inner yearning I didn’t quite understand. Trying to fill the God-shaped hole in my life that I didn’t even know I had. That emptiness in my life forced me, when I couldn’t bring myself to see God as the answer, to look everywhere, anywhere, for people who would love me. My desire for the acceptance of others transformed me into a performing monkey, making myself miserable and destroying my life doing whatever I could to find that fleeting moment of satisfaction, contentment, hope for love in the praise and attention I found in others.
But no matter who or how many times I found “love” and acceptance from others, no matter how much attention I received, it never satisfied for long. I don’t believe it is possible to find lasting fulfilling peace while continually trying to prove myself to others, to be who or what someone else wants or needs. This desire to be loved and accepted that drives me all too often is a symptom of the root of my emotional pain, my need for self-worth.
My significance, my validation, my self-worth can not be found in the acceptance or attention of others. It must come from knowing that I am special to my God. My Higher Power wants me to have a life joyous, happy, and free. But that happy, joyous and free life is lived in a real world filled with pain, rejection and failure. So God never said that happy, joyous and free meant problem free. I can not find that wondrous trio if my expectations take me to an unrealistic place of thinking my life should be, will be, or even can be problem free.
No, life is a voyage through problems and stress that interfere with my personal search for value and worth, but a life worth living is experiencing the love, forgiveness, and power of God in my life in the midst of these problems and stressors. It’s not life without storms, but the freedom to dance in the rain.
My life today, that life worth living doesn’t consist of being able to avoid problems, but on my ability to apply specific solutions to those problems. Not solutions of my own design or birthed from my own ideas, those solutions have failed time and time again over the years. No the solution that works in my life today is the one that comes from my relationship with my Higher Power.
Today, thanks to the tools God has given me and the relationship I have found there, my idea of self-worth goes far beyond the idea of simply feeling good about myself. While I am not entirely there yet, but more and more each day, more than I ever have before, I am finding my self-worth based on a more truthful picture, an image that has both strength and humility, my strong points, which do exist, as well as my character defects which are also still there. I don’t need to inflate my ego by enlarging the perception of the strengths, nor do I have to beat myself up over the shortcomings. I am who I am today. Tomorrow I hope to be a better man. But regardless of if I succeed or fail to improve over the next twenty-four hours, I know that my God loves me, just as I am right now, and that is the attention and acceptance I need today. I can love myself because of that love I know my Higher Power has for me. I don’t need the attention, acceptance, or approval of other people to determine my self-worth today, and for that I am grateful.
For almost as long as I can remember I have lived as a hunter, seeking to fill an inner yearning I didn’t quite understand. Trying to fill the God-shaped hole in my life that I didn’t even know I had. That emptiness in my life forced me, when I couldn’t bring myself to see God as the answer, to look everywhere, anywhere, for people who would love me. My desire for the acceptance of others transformed me into a performing monkey, making myself miserable and destroying my life doing whatever I could to find that fleeting moment of satisfaction, contentment, hope for love in the praise and attention I found in others.
But no matter who or how many times I found “love” and acceptance from others, no matter how much attention I received, it never satisfied for long. I don’t believe it is possible to find lasting fulfilling peace while continually trying to prove myself to others, to be who or what someone else wants or needs. This desire to be loved and accepted that drives me all too often is a symptom of the root of my emotional pain, my need for self-worth.
My significance, my validation, my self-worth can not be found in the acceptance or attention of others. It must come from knowing that I am special to my God. My Higher Power wants me to have a life joyous, happy, and free. But that happy, joyous and free life is lived in a real world filled with pain, rejection and failure. So God never said that happy, joyous and free meant problem free. I can not find that wondrous trio if my expectations take me to an unrealistic place of thinking my life should be, will be, or even can be problem free.
No, life is a voyage through problems and stress that interfere with my personal search for value and worth, but a life worth living is experiencing the love, forgiveness, and power of God in my life in the midst of these problems and stressors. It’s not life without storms, but the freedom to dance in the rain.
My life today, that life worth living doesn’t consist of being able to avoid problems, but on my ability to apply specific solutions to those problems. Not solutions of my own design or birthed from my own ideas, those solutions have failed time and time again over the years. No the solution that works in my life today is the one that comes from my relationship with my Higher Power.
Today, thanks to the tools God has given me and the relationship I have found there, my idea of self-worth goes far beyond the idea of simply feeling good about myself. While I am not entirely there yet, but more and more each day, more than I ever have before, I am finding my self-worth based on a more truthful picture, an image that has both strength and humility, my strong points, which do exist, as well as my character defects which are also still there. I don’t need to inflate my ego by enlarging the perception of the strengths, nor do I have to beat myself up over the shortcomings. I am who I am today. Tomorrow I hope to be a better man. But regardless of if I succeed or fail to improve over the next twenty-four hours, I know that my God loves me, just as I am right now, and that is the attention and acceptance I need today. I can love myself because of that love I know my Higher Power has for me. I don’t need the attention, acceptance, or approval of other people to determine my self-worth today, and for that I am grateful.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Crossroads
It seems I am very good at praying thy will be done…except in this area or that situation. I can’t quite come to the place where in every choice, at every crossroad, my question is what does God want for me. Which option is more likely to take me closer to where God wants me to go?
I don’t believe God really cares what I have for dinner tonight, so even when I say every choice, I obviously don’t mean it. God gave me a mind for a reason. He’d like me to use it. I do have the capability of making some choices for myself, some things just don’t matter on the eternal level. God doesn’t care what deodorant I use, so I feel perfectly within His will to simply pick the one I like to wear. I don’t believe God wants to micromanage my life, or anyone else’s.
I used to be the chief photographer and photo editor of the Pine Log. In that position I hired photographers to work for me and gave them assignments. Each had his or her own areas of excellence, their own artistic eye and talent. I often tried to assign shoots based on who was better to shoot that particular subject or style. If someone had questions about how to do an assignment I would answer them, and I always tried to give a general this is what we need kind of guideline. Then I allowed the photographer shoot how they wanted. I didn’t say only shoot from this angle. Or use this shutter speed. I didn’t micromanage. Sometimes that meant I saw an unexpected result, and sometimes that unexpected result amazed me.
I think God is sometimes like I was as a photo editor. He gave me certain gifts and attributes that I can use to accomplish His will, the next assignment, the next right thing. But how I go about it, sometimes there is some leeway to do something the way that most suits me. But sometimes I know the assignment calls for a two-column horizontal face-on shot, and the lighting demands a certain shutter speed to attain that, and there is little to no room to put my own flair into doing what my editor wants.
But life isn’t a photo assignment. And I don’t always know exactly how the editor has the layout planned. What image is needed from this day in my life. Which shots I am free to choose to make on my own and in my own style and which ones I need to call and get clear-cut directions on what and how. Those are the scary places for me. Choices I want to make for myself, but can’t because I don’t know which is going to get me where I need to be, where I want to be. But choices I am too impatient with to wait for clear guidance from my editor.
I feel I am standing at a crossroads in the middle of nowhere, clueless as to where I am now or which direction to choose. I am not entirely sure if this is a choice I should make, or if I need to wait for a text from my editor to tell me which road to take. I jumped from a crashing plane of chaos, confusion and manipulation and landed right square in the middle of this back-country four-way.
One direction I wanted to try, but I know that it’s the wrong road. And someone put a great big road closed sign in front of it. I am grateful for that. Knowing saves heartache, and for more people than just myself. So the road to my left is closed. Then there’s the road in front of me, familiar and comfortable and safe. Should I take it? Should I go in that direction? But the next path to the right, the third road, offers much of the same country to drive through as the road I am so comfortable on. But a little less safe. And a little less of the beauty and joy and inspiration that fills my soul as I travel. I believe the journey is more important than the destination, and there’s just some landscape I prefer over others to drive by. Then there’s the fourth road, which I know nothing about. The great unknown. Could be wonderful. Could be hell. Could be the path I’ve always dreamed I could travel on, or it might be the road to loneliness and despair. The signs are missing, and I can’t see past the first turn to get a look at what exactly I’d be traveling through.
And for some reason that I can’t quite put my finger on, I’m afraid to ask my editor which road I need to take. And I don’t feel capable of making the decision on my own with the information I have. And I’m afraid that if I don’t pick a direction and start moving down a road, any road, if I just stand there in the middle of the crossroads trying to wait for a clear indication of which way to go, I’m going to get hit by a truck. I’m afraid to stay where I am, to not move, and I am afraid to pick one of the three roads that aren’t closed and start the next leg of my journey. It all boils down to the same essence. I am afraid.
I don’t believe God really cares what I have for dinner tonight, so even when I say every choice, I obviously don’t mean it. God gave me a mind for a reason. He’d like me to use it. I do have the capability of making some choices for myself, some things just don’t matter on the eternal level. God doesn’t care what deodorant I use, so I feel perfectly within His will to simply pick the one I like to wear. I don’t believe God wants to micromanage my life, or anyone else’s.
I used to be the chief photographer and photo editor of the Pine Log. In that position I hired photographers to work for me and gave them assignments. Each had his or her own areas of excellence, their own artistic eye and talent. I often tried to assign shoots based on who was better to shoot that particular subject or style. If someone had questions about how to do an assignment I would answer them, and I always tried to give a general this is what we need kind of guideline. Then I allowed the photographer shoot how they wanted. I didn’t say only shoot from this angle. Or use this shutter speed. I didn’t micromanage. Sometimes that meant I saw an unexpected result, and sometimes that unexpected result amazed me.
I think God is sometimes like I was as a photo editor. He gave me certain gifts and attributes that I can use to accomplish His will, the next assignment, the next right thing. But how I go about it, sometimes there is some leeway to do something the way that most suits me. But sometimes I know the assignment calls for a two-column horizontal face-on shot, and the lighting demands a certain shutter speed to attain that, and there is little to no room to put my own flair into doing what my editor wants.
But life isn’t a photo assignment. And I don’t always know exactly how the editor has the layout planned. What image is needed from this day in my life. Which shots I am free to choose to make on my own and in my own style and which ones I need to call and get clear-cut directions on what and how. Those are the scary places for me. Choices I want to make for myself, but can’t because I don’t know which is going to get me where I need to be, where I want to be. But choices I am too impatient with to wait for clear guidance from my editor.
I feel I am standing at a crossroads in the middle of nowhere, clueless as to where I am now or which direction to choose. I am not entirely sure if this is a choice I should make, or if I need to wait for a text from my editor to tell me which road to take. I jumped from a crashing plane of chaos, confusion and manipulation and landed right square in the middle of this back-country four-way.
One direction I wanted to try, but I know that it’s the wrong road. And someone put a great big road closed sign in front of it. I am grateful for that. Knowing saves heartache, and for more people than just myself. So the road to my left is closed. Then there’s the road in front of me, familiar and comfortable and safe. Should I take it? Should I go in that direction? But the next path to the right, the third road, offers much of the same country to drive through as the road I am so comfortable on. But a little less safe. And a little less of the beauty and joy and inspiration that fills my soul as I travel. I believe the journey is more important than the destination, and there’s just some landscape I prefer over others to drive by. Then there’s the fourth road, which I know nothing about. The great unknown. Could be wonderful. Could be hell. Could be the path I’ve always dreamed I could travel on, or it might be the road to loneliness and despair. The signs are missing, and I can’t see past the first turn to get a look at what exactly I’d be traveling through.
And for some reason that I can’t quite put my finger on, I’m afraid to ask my editor which road I need to take. And I don’t feel capable of making the decision on my own with the information I have. And I’m afraid that if I don’t pick a direction and start moving down a road, any road, if I just stand there in the middle of the crossroads trying to wait for a clear indication of which way to go, I’m going to get hit by a truck. I’m afraid to stay where I am, to not move, and I am afraid to pick one of the three roads that aren’t closed and start the next leg of my journey. It all boils down to the same essence. I am afraid.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Peniel - Day 4...11:57pm
I’ve been putting off this last Peniel entry all day. I just don’t know how to say what I feel I need to without it just sounding so blasphemous. Maybe it is just that so there’s no way to describe it as otherwise. But I explained it to my pastor/father this morning and he understood what I meant and agreed, or at least didn’t disagree to the point that he felt he needed to advise me to rethink or do something different. But I can’t remember what or how I explained it to him. The discussion was intense, emotional and actually quite informative. When I shared with him what I have discovered and concluded this past several days, he remembered some things that happened when I was four that helped me get a little further down the maze. An idea or two about what caused that four or so year old boy to start believing he is a bad person, and we discussed the effects. It all fits. About a half an hour later, my mother added another piece of the puzzle.
Why oh why did I wait so long to do this, to delve these depths, to admit how I felt and fears, to talk to my parents about my early years in a non-avoidance way and see what the three of us together might discover. The healing I feel is beginning now could have begun when I was still a child if I had been able to just voice my need for help, to voice my feelings and fears. But the lie had me trapped and caged. And the fact that I never did expose the lie, that core belief of my horribleness and worthlessness, not even as I got older, is my part in the pain. It’s what I did to keep the wound fresh and alive and effecting my life. I have to accept my part, learn from it, and forgive myself.
Then there is the part that belongs to the people who damaged and broke a defenseless and sensitive young boy into pieces. Some of them were children who had obviously been damaged in much the same way. They were victims themselves, sick and broken. I don’t believe it’s a continuation of the pattern of letting it be ok to damage me to not hold them responsible. What they did was not ok. But I have to forgive them. From what I’ve pieced together from what little I remember and from what my father remembers, I don’t believe malice motivated them. I blame whoever abused them. So, what about whoever that is. Well, he or she must have been sick to do that, but I don’t know anything about what happened. What I do know is that hating them will not make what happened go away, it won’t damage or punish them in return, it won’t provide justice for that innocent little boy who had his innocence obliterated. But it will kill me. So once again, I must, in self-defense, choose to forgive.
And that is the attitude I must take in the case of the crazy lady next door who quite probably was the initial source of trauma, the first speaker of the lie, who wielded the words that destroyed me emotionally. Sick bitch. Looks like there’s some anger there. But what kind of damage makes a woman attack a barely four-year-old child? God, she must have been hurting so badly. I have to forgive her.
And God’s part. God didn’t do anything wrong, unless it was to make humans with free will. Since I happen to be quite fond of the whole free will concept, I can not fault my creator for that. And since each of us does have free will, he could not, without overriding said free will, force any of those first abusers not to hurt me. He could not force me to ask for help instead of holding all the pain, guilt and fear inside. He could not force me to quit believing the lie. He was there the whole time ready to begin the healing the first opportunity I gave him to do so. But I had to stop pretending and hiding and be honest for that to happen. The adult me knows all this. Understands it to an extent, and believes my God is innocent of wrong doing. The child I was felt totally abandoned by the God he believed in, trusted, loved more than anything. That child felt hurt by God. That feeling was legitimate, even if the understanding was flawed and therefore placed the blame on the wrong subject. And so, brace yourself for the blasphemy, I must forgive God. I must release my maker from the guilt, real or imagined, of the boy I was being broken and for that broken and cracked foundation being used as the blueprint for the actions and reactions for three decades. For allowing a life to be so destroyed.
Why oh why did I wait so long to do this, to delve these depths, to admit how I felt and fears, to talk to my parents about my early years in a non-avoidance way and see what the three of us together might discover. The healing I feel is beginning now could have begun when I was still a child if I had been able to just voice my need for help, to voice my feelings and fears. But the lie had me trapped and caged. And the fact that I never did expose the lie, that core belief of my horribleness and worthlessness, not even as I got older, is my part in the pain. It’s what I did to keep the wound fresh and alive and effecting my life. I have to accept my part, learn from it, and forgive myself.
Then there is the part that belongs to the people who damaged and broke a defenseless and sensitive young boy into pieces. Some of them were children who had obviously been damaged in much the same way. They were victims themselves, sick and broken. I don’t believe it’s a continuation of the pattern of letting it be ok to damage me to not hold them responsible. What they did was not ok. But I have to forgive them. From what I’ve pieced together from what little I remember and from what my father remembers, I don’t believe malice motivated them. I blame whoever abused them. So, what about whoever that is. Well, he or she must have been sick to do that, but I don’t know anything about what happened. What I do know is that hating them will not make what happened go away, it won’t damage or punish them in return, it won’t provide justice for that innocent little boy who had his innocence obliterated. But it will kill me. So once again, I must, in self-defense, choose to forgive.
And that is the attitude I must take in the case of the crazy lady next door who quite probably was the initial source of trauma, the first speaker of the lie, who wielded the words that destroyed me emotionally. Sick bitch. Looks like there’s some anger there. But what kind of damage makes a woman attack a barely four-year-old child? God, she must have been hurting so badly. I have to forgive her.
And God’s part. God didn’t do anything wrong, unless it was to make humans with free will. Since I happen to be quite fond of the whole free will concept, I can not fault my creator for that. And since each of us does have free will, he could not, without overriding said free will, force any of those first abusers not to hurt me. He could not force me to ask for help instead of holding all the pain, guilt and fear inside. He could not force me to quit believing the lie. He was there the whole time ready to begin the healing the first opportunity I gave him to do so. But I had to stop pretending and hiding and be honest for that to happen. The adult me knows all this. Understands it to an extent, and believes my God is innocent of wrong doing. The child I was felt totally abandoned by the God he believed in, trusted, loved more than anything. That child felt hurt by God. That feeling was legitimate, even if the understanding was flawed and therefore placed the blame on the wrong subject. And so, brace yourself for the blasphemy, I must forgive God. I must release my maker from the guilt, real or imagined, of the boy I was being broken and for that broken and cracked foundation being used as the blueprint for the actions and reactions for three decades. For allowing a life to be so destroyed.
Peniel - Day 4...8:28am
Dalyn is not my given name. It is a nickname, a chosen name. It is a combination of my given first and middle names David and Glyn. I remember when I began using it I told my father that it hadn’t anything to do with not liking my “real” name. I do. David is a good name, but that’s always been him, not me. I am a junior. But I felt like God was giving me a fresh start and with it a fresh, new name. That was years ago, and I never really thought much about it again. Dalyn is my name now, and it was simply a combination of my given names. Nothing more, nothing less. But I never quite lost track of the idea that God gave me that name.
This morning, after I read my daily reflection, topic “stepping into the sunlight”, I suddenly had the urge to see if my name had a meaning attached to it. So I hooked up the good old wireless laptop to the internet and looked it up. There it was, Dalyn, a boy’s name originating in Scotland, meaning from the little field. My heart burst with joy.
That probably sounds foolish. Allow me to try to explain how much that simple phrase meant to me. I am not a country boy. Those who know me can attest to this. I love the city. The shopping, shows, galleries, streets, lights, everything. I love it. And I doubt I could go long without a little dose of it. Wilderness living is not for me. The pioneers did not have it good, thank you very much.
That said, my best moments in life, my most conscious contacts with God, have always been in nature. My greatest moments of peace, and the times I can remember being truly happy in the moment - not from engaging in some activity that allowed me to escape like shopping, or a concert, or a show in the city, but moments of being totally rooted in the moment on this earth and content to be so, from my childhood until now, have almost always had a field involved.
My best moments as a child, when I felt closest to my father, when I never doubted his love and acceptance for me, where everything was right with the world and good and life was worth living even if the work was hard took place in hay meadows all over Nacogdoches county. Later, as a preteen and young teenager, when I hurt so bad I couldn’t stand it anymore and didn’t happen to have anything chemical to change the way I felt, I would slip out of my house at night into this field behind it, climb this one particular tree at the edge of that little field and gaze out over the clearing and up at the stars. I cried up in that tree more times than I could count. It was the one place I could always find release, where I could usually be able to find a moment of peace. It was where I felt close enough to talk to God more honestly than I ever could in church or anywhere else and tell him how much I hurt and how angry I was with him. No, he didn’t strike me down for that, he gave me peace.
And now, when I had to find a way to connect with God on a deeper level before I died, I didn’t run to the city and its distractions, I went to the wilderness. I camped in the woods on the edge of a field, and walked often in the field feeling like I was closest there to what Adam had in the garden when he walked with God and talked with God. The night the neighboring property owners ran me out, I spent my last moments in my new special place, on the edge of that field, talking to my father, awed by the big sky full of stars overhead, and, full of pain and anger, peace creeped in. There’s just something peaceful about a field to me. They are little islands of contentment.
Even now, in the place I retreated to after having to leave the very isolated, I am on the edge of a field. It’s the one part of this place I love. It’s the one aspect that made it acceptable as a place to continue my quest. And the fact that I get a better signal here didn’t hurt. But I digress.
It’s like God was saying to me you are Dalyn. You are the part of the little boy that came from the field. That connected with me. That knew and believed that life was good. The one who knew peace. You are the man born of that place. And when you leave the field you can take it with you, because you are from it. After all these years using this name and never even thinking it might have a meaning, I feel like it was God telling me that he wants that connection as much as I, that I can have that peace and contentment and connection and closeness and permission to feel all the pain and all the joy and not have to run from it.
I don’t know. I imagine that may look quite foolish from the outside. But from the inside it feels like God reaching down and touching the deepest, most special places and moments of my childhood, the times when I experienced respite from the pain without engaging in one form of escapism or another, concentrated all of those fragments of peace and contentment and said this is what you are from, this is what you are meant to be, this is where I want to take you, inside, this is what is at your core, under the wounds.
You are from the field.
This morning, after I read my daily reflection, topic “stepping into the sunlight”, I suddenly had the urge to see if my name had a meaning attached to it. So I hooked up the good old wireless laptop to the internet and looked it up. There it was, Dalyn, a boy’s name originating in Scotland, meaning from the little field. My heart burst with joy.
That probably sounds foolish. Allow me to try to explain how much that simple phrase meant to me. I am not a country boy. Those who know me can attest to this. I love the city. The shopping, shows, galleries, streets, lights, everything. I love it. And I doubt I could go long without a little dose of it. Wilderness living is not for me. The pioneers did not have it good, thank you very much.
That said, my best moments in life, my most conscious contacts with God, have always been in nature. My greatest moments of peace, and the times I can remember being truly happy in the moment - not from engaging in some activity that allowed me to escape like shopping, or a concert, or a show in the city, but moments of being totally rooted in the moment on this earth and content to be so, from my childhood until now, have almost always had a field involved.
My best moments as a child, when I felt closest to my father, when I never doubted his love and acceptance for me, where everything was right with the world and good and life was worth living even if the work was hard took place in hay meadows all over Nacogdoches county. Later, as a preteen and young teenager, when I hurt so bad I couldn’t stand it anymore and didn’t happen to have anything chemical to change the way I felt, I would slip out of my house at night into this field behind it, climb this one particular tree at the edge of that little field and gaze out over the clearing and up at the stars. I cried up in that tree more times than I could count. It was the one place I could always find release, where I could usually be able to find a moment of peace. It was where I felt close enough to talk to God more honestly than I ever could in church or anywhere else and tell him how much I hurt and how angry I was with him. No, he didn’t strike me down for that, he gave me peace.
And now, when I had to find a way to connect with God on a deeper level before I died, I didn’t run to the city and its distractions, I went to the wilderness. I camped in the woods on the edge of a field, and walked often in the field feeling like I was closest there to what Adam had in the garden when he walked with God and talked with God. The night the neighboring property owners ran me out, I spent my last moments in my new special place, on the edge of that field, talking to my father, awed by the big sky full of stars overhead, and, full of pain and anger, peace creeped in. There’s just something peaceful about a field to me. They are little islands of contentment.
Even now, in the place I retreated to after having to leave the very isolated, I am on the edge of a field. It’s the one part of this place I love. It’s the one aspect that made it acceptable as a place to continue my quest. And the fact that I get a better signal here didn’t hurt. But I digress.
It’s like God was saying to me you are Dalyn. You are the part of the little boy that came from the field. That connected with me. That knew and believed that life was good. The one who knew peace. You are the man born of that place. And when you leave the field you can take it with you, because you are from it. After all these years using this name and never even thinking it might have a meaning, I feel like it was God telling me that he wants that connection as much as I, that I can have that peace and contentment and connection and closeness and permission to feel all the pain and all the joy and not have to run from it.
I don’t know. I imagine that may look quite foolish from the outside. But from the inside it feels like God reaching down and touching the deepest, most special places and moments of my childhood, the times when I experienced respite from the pain without engaging in one form of escapism or another, concentrated all of those fragments of peace and contentment and said this is what you are from, this is what you are meant to be, this is where I want to take you, inside, this is what is at your core, under the wounds.
You are from the field.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Peniel - Day 3...10:14pm
Right now I don’t feel angry about my past. Instead I feel exhausted and saddened by what appears to be a life of destruction built on the reactions of a four or five year old boy to something, I don’t even know what. Somehow a child became convinced he was bad and worthless and that false understanding provided the base from which all future choices and reactions were launched. It doesn’t seem fair or right. Ok, I guess I was wrong. I do feel angry. A little child’s reactions should not hold enough power to direct the course of a lifetime. A child has no understanding, no wisdom to build on, no way of knowing that the instinctual reaction is one of error and destruction. How could God let my choices and reactions of that time lead step by step to the pain and misery that has been my life? How dare you hold a child responsible for his actions to such an extreme? Why didn’t you do something to change it, to stop it, to redirect it. If you loved me, how could this be allowed to happen. Even the law doesn’t recognize a child’s free will or their ability to make decisions of any importance. How could you?
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