sweet and sassy girl

"...grace is found at the depths and in the death of everything." Richard Rohr, Immortal Diamond

Grace abounds, never more so than when faced with decisions that causes a crumbling of the heart.
We had to make a gut torn decision yesterday to put our inherited dog down.  We prayed and cried and screamed for signs that it was the right decision.  Looking back at all the moments that led up to the final one it is clear... that grace was the sign.  From the circumstances to the hands and hearts of the doctors to my drummer boy's tender heart (for a dog that pushed his buttons more days than not)...it was grace.  Grace has flowed this past week and continues this morning in every little memory.  She was the breathing loving thread that tied me to my mom (her mom).  I held her the same way I held my mom in those last few moments...yes... that too was grace.  And now I will depend on grace through the tears and heartache of letting go of that sassy little dog and I will depend on grace to be the new living thread.

Goodbye Ophelia...tell your mom, I miss her.

seeking shalom

"I have been surprised to find that I am given more life, more hope, more moments of buoyancy and redemption, the more I give up.  The more I let go, do without, reduce, the more I feel rich.  The more I let people be who they are, instead of cramming them into what I need from them, the more surprised I am by their beauty and depth." Shauna Niequist, Cold Tangerines: Celebrating the Extraordinary Nature of Everyday Life.  In this book Shauna speaks of shalom... the place she glimpses every once in a while.  She describes it as "the physical, sense-oriented, relational, communal, personal, ideological posture that arches God-ward."

I seek shalom.

Professionally...and personally.

Personally.  These last few months have been gravely.  There's been a wearing on my spirit that has weakened me. I've questioned everything. Suffocating regret. I've seen and felt and touched the effects of the choices I've made.  I've been humbled by it all and smashed to pieces by it all.  I've read the old and new of the holy book and prayed for wisdom and grace and forgiveness and beauty and might and hope...endless heaps of hope.  Indulgence.  I have wanted to stand in between it all, erase the pain I've caused, be the martyr, do anything to backspace it all.

It can't be undone.  Ever.

Professionally.  Transitioning has become this self-imposed tug of war with all my shattered pieces... Spent.

Shalom glimpses.

Maybe shalom is here.  Especially in this gravely can't be undone place.  It's in the richness of less. It's in the letting go... it's in the standing nakedness of it all.  It's in the girlfriends that know me and see me and protect the knowing and seeing. It's in the community that flourishes in the messy. It's in the raw gut wrenching honesty with my girls. It's in the delight and innocence of my grandchildren. It's in the melody of the 24 years with my drummer boy. It's in the terrifying beauty of what's next. It's in the believing of a mysterious provocative God.

Shalom is in the loveliness of the slivered pieces of my story. 

Shalom.