Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Battered

I always find it hard to breathe when I'm thinking. When I'm thinking really hard, really deep into the edges of my mind, I just forget to focus. My head is feeling light and I realize I'm doing it again. My eyes come back into focus just as my lungs flood with warm, mid-day Arizona air. I see someone staring back at me. The blue marbles, pupils contracted, my head spins.

"Oh, sorry." I mutter, biting my tongue a little.

He laughes; his breath caresses my face. I'm lightheaded again.

"You okay? You've been kind of spacey." His voice is gentle, cautious. The eyes are guarded, poised, waiting.

I shake my head a few times. It reels. The dizzy spells have been plaguing me for days.

"No, I'm just thinking 's all." The words come out slow and I shift my stare to the other end of the diner. I let my eyes pass the tiled walls, the vinyl seats, the checkered floor, like a wave. They wash over each object and then back again, examining the details. The paint-cracks and the leftover crumbs from last night's dinner rush glare at me. There is a man across from us sipping coffee and reading a crisp newspaper. I try to make out the headlines, but give up as he turns the page. The rattle of pages startles me.

"Are you sure?"

He is still staring, I see the concern, but his jaw is set, like he knows what I'm going to say. He always reads me so well. I can't help but hate my own face for being so inconspicuous. I remember howhappy it made him to be right, to know what was in my head.

I decide not to give him the satisfaction.

"I'm truely and completely okay." I smile, but it tastes bitter and dry against the back of my teeth. I let it drop. I look down at my food, untouched. My stomach does a flip.

"Please eat something."

There's that concern again. I dare my eyes to cross the tip of his nose, to look at him square again. I do. My stomach is doing cartwheels. I know there's no color left in my face. He notices too and reaches for my hand across the table. I recoil, this time more out of reflex than actual fear. The polarities of our souls are finally repelling.

The bridge of his nose is wrinkled in frustration. He pulls his hand back and rests it in a loose fist on the table. My eye twitches at the sight. I wonder for a moment what my face looks like these days.

I push away my food.

"I can't," I whisper.

That hurts him. He looks at his own half-eaten burger, resting in greasy wax paper and bites his lip. It is the same expression as the day we left together. Only, somehow then his eyes were bluer.

He tightens his jaw, his mouth is a line now. "Then I won't."

I can feel myself tensing, my pulse rising, but I breathe hard and swallow it. This is what he always does, how he thinks he can reel me back in after the blow. Guilt. I sigh loudly. I can't look at him. I can't put his face back together, back to that velvet, sandy stone figure I used to love. I watch the man with the paper, just over his shoulder. I feel my eyes drift out of focus again.

"Please?"

My jaw tightens. "No."

"Listen to me."

I clench my fist atop the table. "No."

"I'm sorry."

I swallow hard and try to taste those words, try to feel the texture of his tone against the back of my tongue, grind the words between my teeth like gristle. They seem real enough.

But so does the twitch in my left eye, the soreness of my neck and shoulders, the heavyness of my head.

So does everything else.

He wraps up his food and puts it back on the tray. Then he takes mine and wraps it up, but he leaves it off to the side, obviously planning to take it with us.

With us.

I can't believe I'm leaving with him. But, I know that I am, and that nothing will stop me from following him to the car. What a magnificent lamb I have become, trotting along behind him, head down, watching the passing blacktop against my tennis shoes, trying to not look at him across the hood as we climb in. I forget who I was, where I went and who might have taken my sense from me.

And then I remember.

I remember how the dash used to shine in the early morning as we crossed the border into Missouri, Kansas, Colorado. I remember the air against my face from the open window and how soft it felt. I remember being jealous of that wind as it whipped his hair about the headrest and how comfortable it was to just be in that car. It's practically my home now. The passenger seat is where I belong, curled up with my books and cameras.

How can I get home without it?

Leave it, I could not.

Leave him...I was still trying to figure out.

Friday, February 20, 2009

Reflections on Valentine's Day.

Let me begin by wishing all of those with their "heart in a headlock", a happy (and very late) single aware-...oh, sorry Valentine's Day. I haven't been very on the ball with these blogs, but I promised...
 
For those of you still searching for the perfect prom date, no worries. I hope you had a wonderful day of sitting on your couch eating ice cream. (I recommend Cold Stone Creamery's quart ice cream. It has self-pity written all over it.)
 
Today, reflection.
 
It's amazing how many people spend today going out of their way for the people they love. Yes, I think it's great to show affection. Tis a wonderful thing to do.
 
But is it worth it?
 
First of all, personally, I'm not going to make my boyfriends suffer with those kinds of expectations. Your hand that's all I'm asking for. Your hand and your heart. I don't need a heart-shaped box or something chocolate to tell me your affections. I just need the words and actions that suggest it to me.
 
Secondly, is there any reason we shouldn't be treating people with this kind of affection every day? And if not just the people we love but all people. I mean, no, I'm no saint. There are people that I've been unkind to. I have said that I hated people. I'm not proud of it.
 
So this is as much reflections on myself as it is to the readers.
 
We shouldn't succumb to Hallmark's holiday and just love people on a day set aside for it. Yeah, it's okay if you want to do something special just because it's Valentines Day or whatever, but just make sure you're smiling a little more every other day. Love is universal. Love is forever. Love is Christ. And love is every day everywhere.
 
Then again, what is love? Most people think of love and they get this romantic picture in their heads. There's the guy, a dozen roses, chocolates...and (if you're looking from the guy's point of view) the hot girl with skimpy clothes. Love is something given to one special person (or several special persons who don't know about one another) and is a romantic feeling. Well, maybe for individual relationships there is a tad more intimacy, but love is not just a romantic thing.
 
Well, let's start in John, chapter 13. It's the time of the passover and Jesus is dining with his disciples. (CSB Version)
 
"(1) Before the Passover Festival, Jesus knew that His hour had come to depart from this world to the Father. Having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end....(3) Jesus knew that the Father had given everything into His hands, that He had come from God, and that He was going back to God. (4) So He got up from supper, laid aside His robe, took a towel, and tied it around Himself. (5) Next, He poured water into a basin and began to wash His disciples' feet and to dry them with the towel tied around Him."
 
Remember, at this time, you either wore sandals or no shoes at all, so your feet were pretty nasty. The job of washing feet for a dinner, because when you ate, you reclined, was left to the lowest of all slaves in the household.
 
Jesus, the savior of the world, and the one who everyone thought was going to come in as a great and mighty king, took a towel and some water, and washed his disciples' putrid feet. Just think about that.
 
Now, typical Peter, says to Jesus:
 
"(6) He came to Simon Peter, who asked Him, 'Lord, are you going to wash my feet?"
 
Peter, as thick as he had been, was aware of just how Holy Jesus is.
 
"(7)Jesus answered him, 'What I'm doing you don't understand now, but afterwards you will know.'
'You will never wash my feet--ever!' Peter said.
Jesus replied, 'If I don't wash you, you have no part with me.'"
 
Peter didn't realize how low Jesus would go for him. He didn't realize that in a matter of days, Jesus would carry a cross, beaten and broken, to Calvary and would die one of the most horrific deaths for Peter.
 
That is love. That is what love means. Love is not chocolates and talking for hours on the phone and it's not sex. It's not sexual at all. It is giving yourself to another and putting yourself third in life.
(John 13: 12-15;34-35)
Jesus said,
 
"'(12)...Do you know what I have done for you? (13) You call Me Teacher and Lord. This is well said, for I am. (14) So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet. (15) For I have given you an example that you also should do just as I have done for you.'
....
(34)'I give you a new commandment: love one another. Just as I have loved you, you must also love one another. (35)By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.'"
 
Love isn't just for one person and it isn't a sexual thing. Love is letting go of selfishness and becoming humble. Humility, self-sacrifice, and "washing feet". We, as Christians, are commanded to love all people with the self-sacrifice of Christ. Regrettably, I can not admit to portraying that amount of love very often. But, I am trying to find love for total strangers and those who aren't so strange through strengthening my relationship with Christ. His example should lead our lives, not sexual desires or little chocolate hearts.
 
Just keep that in mind.
 
 
 
 

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Leaving (written to the tune of Debussy's "Claire De Lune")

Forgive me, it still needs a fair bit of tweaking. I guess I need feedback or comments. "I really love this" or "this sucks" doesn't really help me though...


Her head turned ever so slowly to the window,
watching the lights stream by.
They said nothing to her eyes,
as she drifted past on the wet blacktop.
But, their rhythm whispered the same old rainstorm song,
soft and caramel in her ears.
The melody was familiar,
yet, not all the same.
To each new rain its own sound.
To each raindrop its own pitch.
They fell from the moon,
who hung clear and bright in the distance,
like a guardian, a guiding light.
They fell from the heavens,
angels of night-music.
The wipers broke the penny-shisle raindrops
and strung them across the glass of the windshield.
The quiet swiping lulled her to close her eyes
and press her face against the barrier
separating her from her choir lights.
They illuminated the insides of her eyelids in passing,
pinks and orange, red and white,
and they sang their goodbyes.
Goodbye city.
Goodbye to the sloshing of tires on a rainy day.
Goobye city lights.
And when they were all but gone,
fading like a great ocean liner
in the black-drop of her journey,
waving their white handkerchiefs in la belle noir,
only the penny-whistle raindrops
remained.