Okay With Not Being Okay

The other day I screamed at a customer service agent over the phone.

Stop! Just stop talking! Be quiet and let me finish! Thankfully I stopped short of yelling Shut the F#@k up!, but just barely.

It didn’t make me feel any better. How could it? Yelling at him wasn’t okay. But then again, neither was I. My little interchange on the phone was a clue about just how not okay I’d been feeling.

Typically whenever something isn’t okay, my first response is to try and fix it. To try and make it better. To try and get over it so that I can get on with it.

I’m trying not to do that.

I’m trying something new.

I’m trying to be okay with not being okay. It’s a stretch.

After hanging up the phone from yelling at the guy who was trying to help me, I cried for about the ninth time that day. Then I laid on the couch for a while. Then I cried some more. Then I threw the ball to the dog. Then I took a nap. Then I watched the KC Chiefs beat the NE Patriots. Then I ate dinner. Then I watched the GB Packers beat the Atlanta Falcons. Then I took a walk. Then I went to bed. Then I slept. Then I woke up. Then I had a cup of coffee on the front porch in the early morning darkness.

Things weren’t suddenly okay, but somehow that seemed, well, okay.

As I write this, there is a little more breathing room around my not-okayness. And with a little more space, I’m less tempted to run from it and more inclined to reflect on it. Instead of trying to fix it, I find myself turning to face it. Rather than hurrying to get over it, I’m slowing down so as to get something out of it. Because it’s here for a reason, and there are things that can only be discovered when we are anything but okay.

We are in a hurt locker. All of us. We’ve been through hard times before, but not these hard times. We’ve navigated hard things before, but not these hard things. With no end in sight, it only makes sense that there are going to be days when we simply are not okay.

And when we’re not, it is fertile ground for growth.

And I’m okay with that.

Hope Is A Team Sport

I’m not sure when it started.

Maybe it was the year that we bought a piece of property, sold our house, and put everything we owned in storage, as we planned and began building our mountain home. While construction continued we split our time between the old airstream parked on our property, and a string of house-sitting gigs we cobbled together. Needless to say, we’d taken on a lot, let go of even more, life felt untethered, and I often needed reassurance that everything would be ok. As I often do when I am in need of hope that all is well, or at least will be, I would turn to my husband Tom, and after hearing my concerns, he would put his hands on my shoulders, lock eyes with me, and say…

“It’s gonna be ok.”

And I would believe him.

I’ve lost count of the number of times he’s said those same words to me.

“It’s gonna be ok.”

And I believe him.

Anymore, I don’t even have to explain what I’m anxious about. I just tell him that I need him to say it to me. And he does.

“It’s gonna be ok.”

And I believe him.

What I love about this little routine we have together, is that his words are always true. It doesn’t mean that things are always going to work out the way I want, or that there haven’t been and won’t continue to be challenges, heartaches, and difficulties. For me, it means that come what may, we will find our way through. That there is a deep and abiding love that supports and surrounds us, not to save us from trouble, but to travel with us in the midst of it. That in the long run, love and goodness always win.

When it boils down to it, hope is a team sport, and everyone can play. We offer hope to one another, taking turns putting our hands on one another’s shoulders, locking eyes and saying…

“It’s gonna be ok.”