Life As an Afterschool Special

I have been sitting here looking at this very blank screen. There is so much on my heart and in my head that I want to share, but I feel like I have run out of words.

Iam weary. I am tired. In every way possible. I am sad, and I am drained, and I feel emtionally overloaded. I am so tired my whole body hurts. I am tired of thinking, and tired of feeling. I am tired of doubting, and tired of trusting. I am tired of fighting, and tired of letting go.

I need to sleep, because I havent slept in a while, but I cant make the world stop long enough to close my eyes.

What I am most greatful for at moments like these is the belief in something so much bigger then myself. I know that trials will come and go, and I will be stronger for them… and while I may feel very battle weary and tire at this moment, I know my strength does not come from myself

Isaiah 40
28 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The LORD is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
29 He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
30 Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
31 but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

I think to truly understand why my life is an afterschool special you need to spend the weekend with my family.

They are wonderful, and so much fun, but where my family goes adventure soon follows.

This weekend was no exception.

I was at my mom and dads house in Michigan. On Saturday night we had a house full of guests and my mother wanted to make something for dinner for all of them. She was cooking lasagna, spaghetti and meatballs, and garlic bread all at once while we played cards and caught up on each others lives.

She called for the girls to come and help her and as we walked into the kitchen we saw flames coming from the stove top. The oil from the noodles had spilled over onto the burner and ignited.

Oh yeah, it was on fire.

We all stood looking at it for a moment trying to decide how to put it out. We knew enough to know you couldn’t put water on it.

My little sister Staci was the first to spring into action. She grabbed a towel and started to fan the flame, which of course made it grow.

My Aunt Mindy yelled for my mom to put baking soda on the fire. My mom looked in the cupboard and yelled she didn’t have baking soda, so she reached in and pulled out a box of corn starch and threw it on the flames, which also made it grow.

My Aunt Mindy said “I said baking soda not corn starch.”

My mom yelled back “Its the same thing” and then yelled for my dad to help.

So now my mom, my Dad, my two sisters, my sisters boyfriend Ben, five of my cousins, my aunt, three of my uncles, and I are all standing in the kitchen watching the fire.

My Aunt Mindy yells for salt to throw on the fire and my mom reaches over the stove and grabs a salt grinder and starts twisting.

My aunt tells her that wont work we need baking soda and table salt.

My mom turns and yells. “I don’t have any. What do you want from me. Do you want me to go to the store and get some”

At which point my sisters and I start laughing and are of no use at all.

Finally my sisters boyfriend reaches over and grabs a lid to a pan and throws it over the flames, which causes it to die down but not extinguish, so he sets the lasagna on top of it too. Then me and my dad blow out the fire.

My mom opens the oven to get out the garlic bread and it is on fire too.

There is smoke everywhere, corn starch all over the kitchen and us, the dinner is burnt, and my sisters and I cant stop laughing.

In the end we survived. We laughed and ate burnt Italian. It was wonderful and it was family.

My mother called it the fire of 2005.

And every time we tell the story it gets a little better.

because that’s just part of having a life as an afterschool special.

these are my new shoes. they are bad ass. 

Its a beautiful day in the neighborhood

Stability.

We all long for it.

A place to call home. Somewhere we belong. Someone we know will be there for us regardless of the circumstance.

I have longed for stability all my life, but change has always been a part of my vocabulary.

I have moved 25 times in 26 years. I went to nine schools by the time I was in highschool.

I know how to start over, how to move on, how to reinvent myself. I know how not look back, not question and not doubt, how to ease the pain and lonliness by forgetting, and how to just go with life.

but the past year I have wanted more.

Oh how I have wanted more.

and stability always seemed just out of reach.

I was engaged to a man I thought could bring me stability. But he couldnt. He couldnt fill the space in my heart, and as much as I think he wanted to, he could not love me or make me feel loved or stable. But I stayed with him anyways. Despite the cost, and the tears and the pain, I stayed with him. Because I wanted stability more then I wanted happiness.

But this year I finally let go

I found a church with people who wanted to love me and help me and encourage me. I thought, surely this will bring me stability. ANd when things happened I didnt agree with I stayed anyways. Because I would rather have stability then growth.

But this year I finally let go.

And there have been other things.

I have watch death come and destroy dreams and hopes in the past month. I have moved, I lost my car, and just last week I was laid off my job I have had more then a year.

and so stability seemed elusive still.

and yet something is diffrent. Because I am realizing that sometimes you have to choice what is best, and healthiest, and safest, even if you think that will mean losing the foundations of your stability.

I have begun to realize that it was the very foundations that I was wrong about. I had put my all my hope and my trust in things in this world. I had begun to believe that stability came from man, or marriage, or people, or places or things. And that simply isnt true.

Stability doesnt come from circumstance or surrondings.

It comes from an unwavering peace that the price, and the conditions, and the circumstance of my life can not change.

It comes from knowing that God is in control, and that he works all things together for the good.

It comes from knowing that even when I feel weak I can do all things through Him.

I am learnng that I will stay strong. I will remain the same because God remains the same. I will take the good and the bad, I will take the blessings and the challenges, and I face them both head on.

And it doesnt matter where I work or where I live or who I am with.

I feel like like the scarecrow at the end of wizard of Oz. Because I am learning that I what I was searhing so hard to find already was buried deep within me already. Its not elusive at all. I have stability. I dont have to search it out. I only have to live it out. one step, one moment, one circumstance at a time.