Hand
up against the face; winds screeching, rains trying to slap away all
and any protection. Lifting the woolen outer layers of my jacket up
in an attempt to add an extra protective layer, the sharp rain felt
like a million tiny daggers attacking my person. Everything about me
drenched as the relentless onslaught of weather was attempting to
take me out and add me to the victims of the storm. Trying to find my
way, squinting into the dark evening, attempting to move forward as
to find refuge; my feet submerge into the gathered waters as I
stumble as the rains and winds over take me...
I
rush towards the streets, towards the houses... row after row of
finely manicured lawns and houses seemingly lit up. Through windows
I can see people dry and warm, except as I stumble towards doors and
door bells nothing works. As I try to find my voice to cry aloud for
help nothing emerges. The darkness of the night and the raging storm
swallow up my cries for help and the thrashing and crackling of the
thunder seem to mock my every effort.
Stumbling
back onto the road, searching in the darkness liken unto a person
who is blind trying to find their way through an unfamiliar room.
The lightening streaking across the sky producing something akin to
some horrific joker's grin. Is this the joke or the punch line? The
evening continues to lay it's own punches upon me as my right hand
sweeps the rain and tears off of my face. Again my foot steps falter
into the waters swarming at them, pulling me into themselves as if
they were a riptide and there is no escape but to be drowned upon the
streets of suburbia. Going down.. gasping for air... trying to call
out.. everything is swirling.. rain, thunder, lightening, grass
lawns, living rooms lit up and seen into through picture perfect
windows... all is swirling into a massive spinning wheel of paint
liken unto those that one once found at the country fairs of old.
Sitting
straight up, I run my hands through my dry hair. Moment after moment
passes as I try to gather my wits about me. Where am I? What is
happening? Again minutes pass and I begin to catch up with my
breathing as to slow it down. I touch my bed. My blankets. My
pillow. I look around and the dream world fades as the reality of
the present presses into my person.
My
dreams are pressing in more and more. While I am awake my thoughts
end up being more liken unto time travelers. Traveling about,
thinking of the places where my feet have walked and where they keep
walking.
The
moments turn into hours as wonderment and countless questions play
around in my head. Whether I am awake or asleep there are words, like
“Awoken” and “Seen,” that haunt me. Questions of playing life
safe and moving forward quietly into each next day offer me their
answers about playing my roles.. my “part,” and stiff arming
anything from the past that would try to edge it's way forward.
Yet
it is then in my dreams that I am failed or that I fail. If while
awake I succeed in the realm of performance my slumber betrays me and
gets me every time. So then I have an option. Maybe more then I
realize. But the ones that I see, the ones I can grasp at... seem
few. Keep all at bay or open the bay windows and unfasten and swing
wide-open the doors and let the light in and let the sound out.
Sadly I have always been a very dualistic person. Currently trying
to remedy that issue. Black/white, right/wrong, silent/screaming,
blind and deaf/awoken and seen. Those are the thoughts I would like
to put distance between myself and (fill in the blank.. )whichever
dualistic pairing comes knocking upon my door.
This
journey into life, to open my mouth, say the things that would
rather remain silent has been an arduous one. At times I find myself
careless about consequences, so desperate to share while yet at
other times hungering for silence, stillness... quiet.
Yet
it is the “and yet” that gets me every time; it is having eyes
that see into the shadows and ears that hear the silent soulish
screams, that gets me every time. The dreams of storms chasing me,
catching me, destroying me taunt me and lay threats of my utter
destruction. Am I a storm chaser or am I the one perpetually getting
caught up into it's voracious path? Do I conquer or am I conquered?
Am I a silent shadow sneaking through life pleading to be invisible
or do I stand up as living proof that the valley of dry bones did and
does still exist? But I will not be it's prey and on the contrary I
hold it for the promise it must produce.
When
I lived through the days of silence, harm and darkness had their
victories. So now upon the days, when the familiar echos of silence
beckon me into their lair, the possible and well-known choices sing
the refrain I am the most acquainted with. Yet I see other so-called
pilgrims. I pass them every day. I actually do pause to look at
them, in their eyes and upon their persons. I look at them, wonder
about them, linger upon them. I want them to feel seen and known. I
want them to be engaged where they are and where they find
themselves. I want the essence of my presence and my participation
within the moment to communicate to each the dignity of life, their
life.. all life.
I
have traveled many streets. And I have lived in many houses. It is
the first six of them that begin this story. Six streets. Six
homes. The first one I have no memories of and yet it still is
there, on some road off near Boston. The next one would be in
Connecticut. Memories exist in that location. Then it would be off to
New Jersey back to Massachusetts and back to New Jersey. No, not
military. The world of business and climbing corporate ladders was
my father's world.
Upon
each street there is a house that was called our home. Upon each
street we had neighbors; other families, other people...
It
was suburbia after all and the picture perfect grand neighborhoods of
people escaping city living for the American dream.
Neighborhoods..
neighbors;
I
think upon those houses at times.
I
think about the rooms.
I
think about the walls.
I
think upon the hallways and the staircases.
Do
they remember?
Do
the people who live in those places ever think they hear lingering
whispers, shouts or cries? Do you ever think about the doors you
open and close? Do you look into the mirrors and wonder what faces
they have beheld?
What
tears they saw.. what other things did they contain? Did they see
happiness? Did they know joy? Did they see horror? Did they tremble
as did their inhabitants? Were doors slammed?
I
think about those things from time to time. As I remember, as I
think back.
I
think about conversations. The ones that were had. The ones that were
never had. The ones that I wish were never had. The times that the
words just sort of hung there in the air. The times the silence hung
thicker.
Some
of my favorite conversations happen after I have told the stories of
this life that I have lived. I've heard a variation of responses
throughout time. Many times. Most times I think that they are right,
it is pretty amazing that I am alive.
Sometimes
I find it laughable how the listener tries to take back that which
they have spoken. As if they said something insulting, true... BUT
insulting. I don't think I have ever been insulted per se. Left
feeling vulnerable but not insulted.
It
is after all my life. More accurately it was after all my life. So
when the words in some form or another come out that the listener is
amazed that I am coherent; alive and coherent, alive and coherent and
not sitting somewhere heavily medicated off in a corner somewhere
drooling, I guess I just sit with them in amazement rather than be
insulted or offended.
I
think it is pretty amazing.
I
think it is pretty amazing that for so many years so much went left
so unseen. I lived out in the open, but might have as well have
dwelt in the shadows.
I
walked to bus stops, ventured down hallways, spoke to people for
years but no eyes ever saw, no ears ever heard, no one ever stopped
to try to really take notice. But then I never looked up, I never
spoke up, I kept drifting further and further through life. I got
lost further and further into myself until I had more in common with
a vapor of smoke than any other human. Isn't it interesting, we
think we know someone, we think all the thoughts that we have about
them and what we perceive them to be or not be, but do we ever have
the time (take the time) to really see, really look, really hear..
Do we look beyond the surface and the surface that is presented, to
know or allow ourselves to be known?
Well...
so this is that, this is my spinning wheel of paint. This is my
attempt to share a life that wasn't seen and to awaken those of us
who see and hunger to be seen to live a life, this life differently.
To participate in the real. Whether it is Alice's looking glass,
Dorothy's cyclone, Narnia's wardrobe or the pill of Matrix; I hunger
to press the buttons upon each of our lives and implore us all to
engage. That we would use the eyes we have and the ears we have and
that we would engage more fully. Satisfaction wouldn't be attained
by just texts and social media blips, but that we would care to go
beyond scratching the surface and we would engage into the human
experience in way that each one would feel the movement.
I
recently passed a homeless man. He was asleep upon a bench and he
was cold. So much occurring within the confines of my life that I
was utterly out of control of the circumstances I was facing. But
this man before me, I could do something about him. I went home and
got a sleeping bag. I drove back to this sleeping human being, this
man whose dignity the economy of life had stripped. And laid it at
his feet. That wasn't enough for me.. I wanted him to wake up to hot
coffee and a breakfast. To the local coffee shop I ran and purchased
a gift card and some food. Again I went back to the bench. Back to
my co-pilgrim walking this earth, to this sleeping body of a man. I
wrote on the card... “From one who sees you...” I guess that's
that... I guess that is what fuels me...
I
wasn't seen, I wasn't heard... but then I own my part... I didn't
speak.. I didn't know how to exit the trance that laid it's dark
shadow upon so very many years of my life...
BUT...
Life,
ballet dancers, the Amish and a psych hospital would change all
that... deans of colleges, a husband, 6 children would eventually
change all that... but before it was changed it was... before I was
anything else all I was was the girl next door.
In
ways of an Introduction..
The
words sat there upon the page.
You
are my hiding place; You preserve me from trouble;
You
surround me with songs of deliverance. Psalm 32:7
I
traced the words on the page and stared at them long and hard. Hiding
places and preservation from trouble, songs of deliverance... what
can that all mean? What does that all mean?
Images
from days in the past ran through my heart and again I looked at the
words and traced them with my fingers. Thoughts and emotions
eclipsed and transversed across the decades in a split second and
then I was back, in the present.
What
did that look like back then?
Emerging
from the grasp of silence, deafness, blindness.. or whatever you or I
would call it? What I want, what it is that I desire more than
anything to unfold here, more than anything, is the passing on of
hope. I wish I could invite you to come have coffee, come and let's
spend time together. Come and let's share the story and the hope
that has been granted together. The hope that can be granted.
Safe
places.
Songs
of deliverance.
I've
written much of this with my laptop on my lap, sitting on my bed,
surrounded by my favorite blue and green comforters. I have sat
surrounded by color and softness and life.
Within
these pages, within this journey, I was grateful to have color and
warmth surrounding me. It has been a process of walking away from
lonely and scary and cold places. Step by step I have found my
confidence, I have found my voice, and I have awoken more and more
into life and living. There have been days and seasons where it felt
like the torrent of the storms from the past would continue to
overtake me, but each time I have learned to reach in deeper into the
core of who I am as well as reach out for the support I have needed.
Each season has been a knitting and a re-knitting of sinew entwined
with hope that has beaten back the efforts of despair. It is a
journey. I've been the pilgrim. For those who long to travel paths
into where help comes forth from mountaintops, and enter into dark
places in order to shine with light... Then journey forward with
me...
In
a day and age where there is such a need for a safe hiding place, a
refuge from times of trouble and sweet songs of deliverance, I didn't
want to create something that is trite. In the decades that I have
tried to write my story I hit road block after road block. I would
be able to write one part well and then stumble and stagnate over
significant portions I wanted to tell, and then shelf the whole thing
out of frustration.
But
safe places and songs of deliverance are so very much needed and so
in this season I pulled my laptop back onto my lap, grabbed my lime
green comforter and curled up upon my bed.
To
be surrounded by songs of deliverance. What does that sound like?
What does that feel like? What are they? How does one learn to
dance upon the notes of hope and joy when all that has been heard are
the dark chords of abuse and neglect? What could it mean for a mind
that has only known fear to be saturated by a sweet sweet melody that
brings its refrain forward into reality? And what does it mean for a
life when the clash between the sounds makes it war against each
other within the same heart?
I
think of many different types of scenarios, where the reality of
songs of deliverance is what is needed. I found within the
expression of words the desire for the melody of love and peace,
sanctuary and security.
That
is what I want to pass on.
I
believe my story and the reality of where my life has landed now
breaks forth with the reality that one can find sanctuary and peace
amidst whatever troubled waters are experienced and walked upon.
When
what you have needed was a hiding place, a refuge, preservation from
trouble or songs of deliverance, when what your heart hungered to
know was security and safety away from fear, and none of that was
around … What did you fall back upon? What are you to believe when
hiding places and preservation from trouble seemed far far away from
the realities you have known? What then?
I
think it has been thoughts like those that have caused me to come
back time after time to try and figure out how to write my story
down. How to write a story that includes the fact that the majority
of individuals who crossed paths with me believed that there were no
songs of deliverance for me to be had... that there was no hope. That
maybe I should just be written off as lost or gone. A song silenced
before it could ever really be sung.
Discordance
permeated all facets of the surrounding atmosphere of my days.. of
my life...
But
you see, even if very faint at first, songs of deliverance play
across the landscapes of humanity with a fierce tenacity that cannot
be matched. EVER!
The
reality of the fragility of one's mental state and the fear that at
any moment the horrors of the past and realities of the present are
going to steal away from you all that is hoped for in regards to the
future can haunt. They can tear at one’s soul and leave one
wanting. Except they can also be overcome.
A
most famous book begins, “It was the best of times. It was the
worst of times.”
What
if life was only the worst of times, for the longest of times,
without hope that anything would ever change. What if the reality of
the state of mind you found yourself in was full of hopelessness and
horror? What if you watched others pass you by and wondered what
does being human really feel like? What does “normal” feel like?
What if the agony of living with the reality that filled out the days
of ones life altered the capacity to think or feel? What if all one
became capable of was living in alternate realities? False hiding
places forged within ones own self? Does one lose oneself? What are
songs of deliverance for someone in that place? What does that
melody sound like?
Songs
of deliverance... Those three words aren't glib nor are they trite.
They have been life to me... Beyond this page you find a story... A
friend had come to me back in December 2012 and had shared her
thoughts, that if I stepped into fiction I would be able to write the
story of my life. She was right. Some of it I had to step into
fiction in order to write. In acquiring some space for my heart, my
fingers flew upon the keyboard.
I
would hit some places where the reality of the events and what it
felt like to live them needed that personal touch. When I began to
understand that truly I wanted to give hope both to the person who
suffered and those that loved them.
In
a culture where the “in” words of the day are; transparency,
vulnerability, and authenticity, I found within myself the need to go
beyond their cultural relevance. I journeyed deep into a place that
could offer real hope and strength and courage.
I
didn't want my story to just be about disassociation, abuse and
neglect. I wanted to write something that showed the power of what
can happen when someone awakens and speaks and sees. How many of us,
in some form or facet, are “The Girl(boy) Next Door?”
I didn't want to
share a story of a girl who learned very early to keep quiet, a girl
who kept her mouth closed and her eyes staring off into the distance.
This isn't a story of a girl, who might as well have been a shadow upon the
wall. It isn't a piece about a girl who lived a life imprisoned by fear. It is a story of how we all can awaken, see and be seen, hear and be heard.
I wanted to share a story that would open up those prison gates. I
wanted to share a story that would create an atmosphere and an
environment where eyes would open and awaken and mouths would open
and be heard.
These
pages are full of a life that could actually be being lived by a
person who lives right next door to you.
Seriously,
as far reaching as some of the stories within are, I was a person...
living right next door to other people. There are those people you
pass in the highways and byways of life... what is it that has
filled out their life, what really happens to the person who lives
next door? As I say at one point.. this is their story, this is our
story.. How we learn to see each other contributes into the songs of
deliverance that we will personally sing over our lives and over the
lives of those that surround us...
Consider
this story part of that overarching song of deliverance. My portion
in the cantata of freedom for others. What can happen within one
generation within a family, what can happen within one lifetime of a
person.. well, if one believes and listens .. that which can happen
is the beauty of deliverance, restoration and hope and peace.
Songs
of Deliverance.
A
song... a melody full of sweet and sorrow.. full of fear and full of
overcoming... the notes at one point melodious and at other times so
very difficult to listen to...
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