Pain is a teacher

This thought seems to be on repeat in my head lately. Pain is a teacher as I've titled this set of thoughts. My jaw pounds and is sore like ripped up fresh torn meat, I can only imagine what surgery in other places must feel like. I have given birth to two son's. And I must admit tooth, and mouth pain are up there beyond even childbirth level pain. It is a road of endurance when it comes to the healing of the mouth pain. And so this time what it is it that Pain is trying to teach me? For this isn't my first go round with it. And each time there has been some sort of lesson tucked away in the physical process of healing I've often easily found the spiritual need and comparison. I feel my way through much of my life only in the last few weeks, months and years even consciously aware and trying to practice not allowing my emotions to rule me, finally learning to practice mindfulness and intentionality with my thoughts. And so on this yet again painful journey I'm embarking on with dentists and periodontist visits so frequent I've begun to think of the people in these practices as a grou pI should seriously pray for. That they are involved deeply in my life now of my choosing to find a healthier mouth. So I think praying for them is one of the least things I can do. Anyway

Fears

Dare I write whatever comes into my head? I want to. As the author of The Artists Journey suggests I want to have no place to go. No end in mind no form, just get it out of me free thought. The next step leading to the next step. In this case it's the next letter typed leads to the next word. And as she spoke about the unknown and the knowing I felt it. The artist in me wants to be reborn and grow and become who she is meant to be. But the regular old me with a life, and children and a family. Well that girl just go so tired she had to go away for seven days. No biggie right?

 Who wouldn't want a rest for seven days of no a/c no sleep a busted up kitchen falling in around me house, smells of dead rat and chipmunk on the regular from the cats cleaning out the basement and the yard. then there is the dog hair and the green carpet which you can never hide the white dog hair from. And to top it off a queen size bed in the Living Room because that is where the a/c unit needs to be most of the day and James isn't moving that thing around any more. 

Not after Sean broke one when he was trying to move one in for daddy that we had been given. Yea that day Sean yelled at me for having to go to the bathroom, tried it anyway without me and then he dropped the unit out the window breaking it. It might have been fixable but James never went out and got it, I bet expecting that Sean should do it but never telling SEan to do it. Boys, all of them. Even the animals are male. Male dog and 3 male cats...

 I've been over this. It's not new news You want the new news? Well it made me crumple over in laughter just now in the bathroom after I got a look at myself in the mirror. YOu want crazy I thought to myself and then died my h air bleac blonde and then added sapphire blue on top. Not at all k Ning what I was doing or even really following the instructions on the box that well. Fuck it I thought It'll be my way and I need this rebellion, it is just hair and it is my hair and I went away for seven fucking days so fuck everything I want to make my hair blue. This is fun and I see why my sister has her moments. She is locked into medication routine now, because of her antics. Why did I think acting like her would change something for the better.That thought in and of it self is enough to tell you things didn't go well. And while I want to get back to creative writing exercises and all that jazz, for now every single time I try to free write I journal about the events that lead me to seven days away. 

D-22 it'll be called in my book I said. That was the painted office number on the walls. Do the nurses even see that number? I cleaned that hall. I cleaned my own room, and bathroom. they were filthy when they stuck me in there to watch. I mean what crazy person cares about if the bathroom is filthy or not. This one did. My hotel or incarceration whichever I choose to call it, well it was worse than a jail cell. I had no idea where I was or why I was there really only that they kept giving me shots and I had bad reactions to this shot. They gave it for anxiety but I was so sleep deprived I was fighting sleep at that point and no drug seemed to knock me out. Until they found Zyprexa and didn't tell me what it was. I took it finally after 3 days no sleep inside. I had to clean that bathroom to use it. I had to move my bed over to think of even getting any sleep on that horrible bed.My worn out 18 year old bed is a damn shame of a bed, but it rocks compared to the piece of shit they call a bed in that place. D-22 my hall, it was filled with nurses and Dr's and assistants and jobs I could've had with a high school diploma, the watchers, the baby sitters. Yea I could've had her job. 

Dana one of the watchers couldn't stand me. It was obvious. And she didn't know how to remember anyone's name. Inside those walls it was my job to know everyone's name. Once they put me or rather I finally accepted going into population I made it my business to k now and remember anyone I talked to. I had nothing to do but observe and so as I watched I memorized their names and I was good at it. The other watchers were more kind than Dana. I coulnd't figure out why she didn't like me, but there always seemed to be one, who either played the role of bad cop because sometimes I really felt the roles were mapped out for them in some secret manual. I saw things when I got there. I saw things differently when I left. They can say it was the meds, but they can also say it was my brain. I say it was the sleep I finally got. One night 10 hours of sleep. 

I left populations worn out from it, overwhelmed even  and they locked me in that private watchable room and covered me up with 10 blankets. And added a heater, thank you Ashley and I slept 10 whole hours. Ashley was hard for me. She was Snow White beautiful and her name just happens to be the one that is the girl at the work that I feared my husband at least had a long conversation on the phone with by the snooping I stooped to at one particularly hard part in our relationship probably a few years ago now. And so I associated this nurse. Associations are my strong suit and inside that place it became my way of navigating the unfamiliar world. I was forced to call home for seven days. Truly thinking about it now that isn't that long compared to the hours of sleep I have lost over the last almost 5 years of my youngest son's life. I cannot count the hours. it is too hard, but when he was born my whole world change, and I didn't go for help I wish I had gotten help after that. The dog became my enemy when we finally got home after a 1q0 day hospital stay. I thought my sweet and loving Brittany spaniel was out to eat my baby alive, he seemed like a wolf not a dog to me. Those thoughts should have gotten me to a counselor, but in this house we don't do insurance and doctors and dentist. We do preventative eating healthy and taking olisl. Not cheap either way , but my husband's family has all but. Been killed by Dr's according to him and his view of life, so we don't pay ahead for insurance when we may never even need it. I wonder how much m y medical bills are now. A seven day stay and a state funded hospital can't be cheap and over night at Kenedstone Hospitla to get me to said state run facility called Riverseide HIlls in Cedartown. The country side is beautiful. That ride up that way was something. My mind was falling out. I had no idea where they we're taking me. My mom and I Had colored pictures in a Looney Toons book together. She had come bac, but my husband hadn't come. No one was taking me out of the Hospitla as I hoped. She even said the picture she colored me was about going to Greece she heard it was cheap to go there. But it wasn't to be. It was all a false dream to comfort me. And so I away I went on a vacation to the mental hospital. Only this time it wasn't a private run hospital cushy, and a place I barely survived a four day stay 21 years prior. NO it was state run, because that is where people with no insure and no money go. Riverside HIlls was nice enough in appearance. But I f you looked inside as I did. Fully insane in one way and yet aware of everything on the other hand, no one would believe her we will give her some good letters after her name and no matter what she says it'll all just be like it was a dream. What do they think about the insane? Should their place be less than, just because of mind trouble. I had sleep deprivation. I was dangerously close to returning to the monster I had been 21 years ago., only I Had experiences,  I had stories of my sister and her getting out of trouble with the law. I had her running away and going missing under my belt. I knew the extremes of insanity ... And for a while I was pl.aying aw game. When did the game end and my control lost? When they police came the final time and I was taken to the hospital. When they wheeled me int here and I was calling on every famous person I knew to come and get me out. Even Oprah and Gelennon and my beloved Reese. Witherspoon were not immune to my ratings. One nurse at first I could see her pity and then her sadness that someone like me was going through this. This , this thing that I was going through the was so loud and painful that women are crying it so loudly that I had to turn off the news. I gave up. Morning news shows because women like me are crying out and saying it is enough that we do everything for our men and they get away with raping and misusing us and taking advantage of us and paying useless. And and and. And became my cry on social medial. I lived just enough to of this descent into madness online that I have a pretty good suspicialn most folks think something was up but not sure if they should as me or not.I was not ever suicidal and for making anyone think I was for that I am sorry. But I had to go away. Just as the wind must blow the flames and the fire must spread where God lead sit. I felt like I was in total control of the HOly Spirit at one point. I was out of my mind and thinking Jesus was leading me to his hospital to save it. So I cleaned up. I wrote them an note. Book. I wonder if they kept it. Things changed after I wrote that note book. Maybe it was me who changed, but something changed I saw Achmed as kind, even though I knew his faith was different than mine I made my own shirt that read #LoveWins in sharpie on a plane white T they gave me. I wore borrowed clothes. I wore things from my sister and finally the shoes my husband brought me. The shoes after getting ant bites from goin in the garden barefoot and getting a nasty thing in my foot and pulling it out and. Washing my feet and using tooth paste to clean them. He finally brought me my ballet flats he had bought me and I was better. He showed even though eh wouldn't visit me while I was so crazy at Kennestone he came and brought me shoes. I hung up on h I'm in ther I would talk to him and he'd make me angry and I would just hang up. I treated him horribly. But he brought me shoes and then the next day he brought me my tooth brush and by then I knew I would do whatever it took to get back home to my men. To my boys, house of boys. Yes, but it is my house. I clean it, I wash the clothes and the dishes I do my own laundry and theirs, I keep up with dinners and appointments and bills. I pay the phone bill when he says and the gas bill, I take care of a household of men. I wear the dress and pull the strings 

as ATwood says in her book The Handmaids Tale, I watch it on Hulu and it is a picture of a future she hopes won't come true and yet a statement of today and what is true. America is on it's knees to the gods of greed and fear and shame and regret and punishment. The powers of this world are taking us to new lows and the ones rebelling are not helping they are only pushing us further back into a century we don not want to go back to

Sunday Thoughts

I think about Palm Sunday, and the palms laid before Jesus as the king the Jews were hoping for. I also think about my palms being open to Him. The Jewish people wanted an earthly King, they wanted someone to come and fix their problems on earth right now. Their circumstances found them under the rule of the Romans when Jesus walked this earth. And they were looking for a messiah of political and military proportions. They were looking and they missed Him because they couldn't see that He came to bring a whole new Kingdom about, one that our earthly minds can't begin to understand. I think about my garden and all the parables Jesus told about planting sowing reaping and the condition of the soil to accept the seeds planted. This has been the season of preparing the soil for me and my little patch of dirt. It's not a big garden, but enough for me to feel like I've planted something and can watch it grow and see the beauty of creation and hope for at least one homegrown ripe tomato sandwich from my garden this year. I'm no farmer, certainly a kind of new gardner. I've been playing around with patches of dirt since I went home from college the first time, and even more the time I was home with a new baby during the day and working at night. My mom just has a natural green thumb, and as I watched her I saw something besides all the hard work, and I wanted it. I hoped one day to have my own patch of dirt. My own family, my own home, my own husband, my very own. I was blessed to have their support while my oldest was a baby and until he was about four years old. But even during that time of great blessings I wanted more... I envied any woman I saw with a wedding ring on. I thought to myself "how did she land a man, and I can't" when truthfully I had landed a few men by that time in my life, only I'd gone about it all my way and ended up in all the messes you can make going your own way. I found one after another that couldn't hold a candle to a love that I held as perfect. And truthfully that love was more flawed than I can even begin to describe. But as one of my favorite authors Glennon has said, I was young and I forgive myself. I know God has long since forgiven me, it's just the me, I have to keep forgiving. But the condition of the soil parable is ringing in my mind as I was hand hoeing up the dirt in my little garden. Not even a very big spot, mind you, as a lot of my garden is covered in cilantro and mint that I don't want to stop growing, so my patch for planting new things is really small. But I live in GA, and on the NW corner of the ATL area and the dirt is orange, and filled with clay. So this soil isn't rocky but it might as well be. It has plenty of rocks and tons of clay and very little good black dirt as I call it. But it was time to break it up as Easter rapidly approaches late this year in comparison to the last few, I wanted to plant at least by then. Hoeing dirt is hard work, especially by hand. And maybe because I'm reading through the scriptures or maybe we'd talked about it at church recently or maybe just The Holy Spirit whispering while I hoe, see this dirt, do you think if it could feel that it would like what you are doing? And the earth felt like a heart, and I saw hardened hearts getting hand hoed by God, and his love. I love that dirt, I want it to grow the plants I have for it. The weeds can stay in the entire rest of the yard, but that patch, I have plans for it. I have saved seeds from last season, and I think about them as I sweat and get that dirt to yeild to the work of my hands. And I think to myself, Lord thank you for working on my own hardened heart, thank you for the pain, for the heartache, for the suffering, for the distance in friendships and in my marriage, for not being able to trust anyone it YOU. I can hear YOU whispering I only have plans for you my child that are good. There are beautifully flowers to grow and fruit and vegetables to sprout from that dirt, but my dear child your dirt has to be ready, and I'm sorry but this won't feel good for a while. This won't feel like love maybe for a minute. I raise the hoe over my head and come down hard on that patch breaking of the clods of clay. I hear you Lord I whisper. I trust you. No it doesn't feel good to have a softened ready pliable and ready to grow heart, but I trust you. I trust you to plant just the right flowers and just the right fruits and vegetables, so that when others see me they'll see that something that I saw all those years ago watching my mother plant her own garden. I wonder if she knows what I know? I think perhaps she does and maybe every gardner with imperfect soil knows that the hoeing up  and preparing of the soil for the seeds is just as important as following the directions when placing those seeds in the ground.  April 14,2019 ojm Published Sunday June 16 2019

My mother has a great YouTube video to share

I am only writing a few intro lines in hopes you will go watch the video on YouTube my mother did for CBN. My mother wrote a book. No One Visits the Mother of a Drug Addict In it she tells the story of my brother's addiction and then redemption story. We have a miracle story. Now my brother and mother have both had interview's on CBN. Please watch and share this it could save a friends life. The books are available on Amazon. I can get signed copies but I do need about a week's notice to get them signed by mom before mailing them to me. If you'd like to know more please comment or send me an email. 

Find the link here:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=TP9bHVplpyI

The Dream

This line either from a book from a favorite author or from the Bible I can't be sure about He will redeem you in front of the very people with whom you hid in the dark, is on repeat in my head, just as the song line from Cornerstone "I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but only trust in Jesus name" is on constant repeat. It is a comfort to have those words with me now with all that is swirling, all the things I see, and all the things I seem to just know now, and that God seems to keep showing me again and again through my devotional and His word as I read through the Bible again this year. It is different this time reading through. I've had 5 more years of experience and trials tribulations as well as many many miracles to think about. I've seen my infant son born a preemie go from tubes everywhere and with in only a few days out of NICU and with me and then home in 10 days. I've seen my oldest spared disasters that he can't even begin to understand by the cops stepping in at his young age of 18. I've seen him quit marijuana and obey the rules of his probation. I've seen my husband go from so selfish I was beginning to hate him and think there was no way that we would make it one more month much less another year to a servants heart, serving me and my family on Mother's Day out of kindness in his heart, understanding and not because he had to. I've seen God continue to change me, a wretch like me who doesn't deserve any of the grace and mercy He keeps affording me. I've seen so many miracles in just 5 years. A field of dreams in Haiti, once just an idea to help orphans have a home and food education and care, to a reality. And now maybe God will choose to do one more miracle. Maybe He will choose to allow me and my girlfriends from over 20 years ago, who once partied and hid in the dark to go to Haiti and love those very orphans. Maybe He will choose to honor one more. Miracle in my life. Either way I will choose to trust in Him. I will continue to place my faith in the one true Living God. I will ask continually for His help with the idols I continue to hide under my garments and excuse by my period as RAchel did. I will continue to give him all those I love and seek His will fist in my life and ask that He continue to finish the work He began in me and in my family and each person I love. That He will indeed redeem all those I love and care about. From the closest relative to the furthest friend. Even my very enemies, the ones I'd rather never speak to again, I pray that He will do the work necessary to turn them towards Himself. Even those from my past who hurt me, and those whom I loved and chose to do the wrong things with. My heart aches for everyone I know to give their lives to Jesus. Because I've seen how He's made a difference in my life. Because getting to know Jesus better every day is the very best thing I can do for myself is do my devotional read the word, pray, breathe in The Holy Spirit, Rest in His loving arms at the start of each day. I can choose to keep busy and not stop right now, it's an easy one to excuse in THE Spring, after all anyone above 20 can see that this is how the cycle of a year goes. That each Spring just as new life and green begin to pop out everywhere, 

For the love of the word

The WORD was with God in the beginning. So Jesus was in the beginning of the beginning.... And the word that is written represents THE WORD in one way or another so in reality all created things point to THE WORD being Jesus. All creation sings Jesus... And yet the written word is powerful, the pen more powerful than the sword it has been said. And worth remember because certainly the tongue holds the power of life and death. So the words that we put upon the page matter. And as one who creates in my mind pay homage and honor to God our creator with what we write. As we learned some in choir this past season about our excellence before God as singers and musicians and so with the writing there is the honor and glory due God in all we do. As unto The Lord is the phrase that reminds me from His word that everything, every single thing I do can be done as unto the lord and in that case be done for excellence as a sacrifice of praise and thankfulness that God just woke me up this morning. I was given breath, life, limbs, home, food, water, sunshine and rain, earth to dig and yeild it's fruit trees and flowers and animals to brighten my day. Is there not something for which I can find to be thankful? Even in, even so, and especially so in those times of hard, those times of distress, the one where the rug is ripped right out from under your feet. When you are no longer dealing with one thing, it turns into three so fast then might as well be ten because soon you are swimming in shit so deep you can barely see above it let alone breathe anything but shit any more. So float I said, float above that shit, for now go basic, find thankfulness for the air you are breathing and the water you are drinking and that it is another day which is another chance for something that could help to change your life for the better if you'd only open up to the things that are right in front of your face. See the beauty in the baby kitten, not just glance and keep going, see it, deeply look and undo the moment only to rebuild the moment again in order to fully examine it for all the beauty ands splendor that this little creature brings to your life, then see the sunshine again appearing after a fresh rain, how green everything is this time of year, the earth screams life, even in the middle of great despair and unimaginable pain the flowers still bloom the trees are growing new life it is spring and time to remember resurrection of life and the true power there is in knowing what Resurrection can truly mean for someone suffering so deeply and purely as you. I said be the kind of friend to yourself right now as if you were helping your best friend through the a time of greate distress. Be extra good to yourself. Give yourself credit for every tiny thing you do today. You got your work done check, you took a shower, check, you ate something check, you read something, check you talked to your friend again, check and so on and then give yourself grace for everything else that needs doing and just focus on what you have done check check check and the day will again turn into another new day and you will find your way through the garbage that has tried once more to bring ou down, but not you, you are too strong for that and this one will not take you under either. As sure as anything I pray that you find your way to God, I hope He will meet you in a way that you didn't think humanly possible and that the prayers of your mother would be answered as you surrender your will to the will of Jesus.As I pray for Him to draw you it is my request that He use His loving kindness to do the drawing but as I am not God I confess to Him once again for you that I know His will is best and that I can trust His ways are higher and timing perfect and that all I can continue to do is surrender my desire and wilt o Him and ask that He honor