Love Is Ridiculous

I’m a flipper-outer.

For example, yesterday morning we were about to head out to meet friends at a nearby wildlife refuge for a lovely summer morning meander, and I was running a little late. The sock in one of my shoes didn’t feel quite right so I had to take it off and start over. The dog’s e-collar was giving me fits. The handle on the fridge needed wiping off so that our friends wouldn’t think less of us if they happened to open the door to grab a beer. I couldn’t find my water bottle. I dropped my phone. It was one of those days when every step of trying to get out the door came with some sort of hitch, and I could feel the inner tension growing. The faster I moved, the worse it got.

Putting a cup of coffee into the microwave I knocked the cup against the side of the door, slopping coffee on the counter………….

Fuck!!!!! I hate having to hurry, I yelled at no one.

Dumping my now hot coffee into the travel mug, I slammed the microwave door. For good measure, I slammed the open cupboard door next to it (because along with being a flipper-outer, I’m also a door leaver-opener). Turning around, Tom was simply leaning against the sink with his cup of coffee, a slight smile on his face. He is unmistakably not a flipper-outer because (A) he simply isn’t wired that way, and (B) I do enough flipping out for both of us.

“Thank you for never (well, hardly ever) making this (me flipping out) into a teachable moment. It feels like you are just watching me thinking ‘God, I love that girl’.”

Pretty much, he said.

And the ridiculous thing is, he means it.

It’s quite a thing to be loved not only in spite of my messiness, but because of it too.

God, I love that guy.

One At A Time

Every time I’m out on the trail I am reminded that the life we have is directly under our feet. Not a mile down the road. Not a mile behind us. Not behind that tree or over that hill or under that rock or around that bend. It’s right here. There is nowhere else for it to be, because life only happens one step at a time.

Real life is a messy mixture of the good, the bad, and the seriously ugly. I’ve spent a lot of time and energy wishing that I could have those served up one at a time. Just a heaping helping of goodness without having to make room on my plate for the bad, the ugly, the painful, the frightening, and even the awful that will inevitably land on my plate too. So rather than digging into the delicious, yummy good right when it happens, I’m already stabbing my fork into whatever else might get dished up, but hasn’t yet. It’s like those times when I’ve eaten a delicious meal that was prepared with love and care, and before I knew it my plate was empty and I had no idea what the food even tasted like. I’d missed the meal set before me that would have given me the joy, resilience, and strength meant to sustain me when the going got tough.

Just like hiking on the trail, life only happens one bite at a time.

What A Mess

We’re all a mess. Some of us may be better at hiding it than others, but trust me on this one, even the most buttoned up of us is a mess. Some days we’re a little less of a mess, and on others, a full-blown, all out, will-I-ever-get-my-shit-together mess.

So let’s get over it. We’re a mess. So be it.

Being a mess is hard enough as it is without making things even worse by wishing I was, it/we/they/life/things were different.

So let’s get over it. We’re a mess. So be it.

What we need, more than anything, is to be able to be a mess without someone try to fix us, coax us out of it, convince us that we’re not, or point out the silver lining.

So let’s get over it. We’re a mess. So be it.

I’m not saying that we should wallow in it, hang on to it, or blame someone else for it. But let’s not pretend that we’re not a mess when we actually are. Come to think of it, we shouldn’t be too surprised at the messiness of it all. I mean, it started out that way when we were born, what with the labor pains, pushing, gushing, bloody, gooey mess and all. We forget that before the doctor or midwife or nurse or whoever wrapped us up in a clean blanket and put a cute little beanie on our pointy little head, we were a slippery little mess. A miraculous one to be sure, but a mess nonetheless. In other words, life is messy. Always has been, always will be. So maybe, just maybe, to be a mess is simply another way of saying that we are alive.

So let’s get over it. We’re a mess. So be it.

Day 5 without a shower in the Wallowa Mountains

A Holy Mess

God comes to us disguised as our life.

Paula D’Arcy

Life is so messy right now. Maybe it always is, but this feels like mess on steroids. Nothing is how it was before the world went into lockdown, which isn’t such a bad thing. The part about nothing being the same as before I mean.

Because if we’re being honest with ourselves, things weren’t working very well before. We’d just gotten used to them.

But still.

Living in the chaos of the unfamiliar is not easy. In fact it’s downright hard and scary and batshit crazy. The way forward is murky at best, and so we are stuck in the mess that is today. So just what are we supposed to do with it? The mess I mean.

To answer that question I have to take you back to my front porch earlier this morning. It was pouring rain and I was listening to a song my niece sent to me called The UK Blessing. Actually, now that I think about it, I have to take you back inside and upstairs earlier this morning. I was on my yoga mat doing a plank while listening to this song on full blast, tears streaming down my face. It just reached inside and grabbed me by the heart and said, this message is for you. Maybe it’s one for you too. The message I mean.

So, back downstairs and out on to the front porch. The rain was pouring down in a cleansing-tears-from-heaven kind of way. I was listening to the song, again, when I got a text from that same niece. She said that she had been listening to it too, because like mine, her life felt a little more than messy. The power in their home had just gone out, and so she decided to light some candles.

Which is the answer to that question. The question of what are we supposed to do with the mess I mean.

We are supposed to light candles in our darkness, let music pour into our souls, and tears stream down our weary faces. We are supposed to make a sanctuary, a holy place, right in the middle of our messy, muddled, murky lives. Whether we believe in God or not, we all believe in Love. Tomato. Tomahto. Life isn’t holy and sacred someplace else. If life is holy and sacred anywhere, it is holy and sacred right here. In the mess I mean.

(With gratitude to Katie Meleney)

Photo by VisionPic .net from Pexels

Make A Mess

Embrace the glorious mess that you are.

~ Elizabeth Gilbert

“Don’t make a mess.”

How often did I hear that as a child growing up? How often did I say that to my own kids? From an early age most of us are programed to believe that making a mess is wrong. That if we mess up we will disappoint others.

Making a mess is essence of creativity.

Making a mess is at the heart of every worthwhile endeavor.

Making a mess is how we sort things out.

Making a mess is how we make a life.

Relationships are messy.

We are messy.

Life is messy.

So go ahead, make a mess.

Photo: Beanpole Pottery