lost

If I am entirely honest, this past weekend was probably the most challenging one that I have had in some time. Pushing aside the standard procurement of beautiful weekend family images, I come to you with a little bit of what is also real life today. That is not to say that those beautiful moments are not real life. They are– but I think it’s tough because it is necessary to discuss the bad along with the good in order to understand what a full life is made of. No life is perfect, and the good moments are a heck of a lot easier to talk about.

Driving myself to work this morning included a lot of introspection- and faith-based radio- and I wish I could say that it all brought me clarity but as I arrived at my destination at 7:15am, I felt no clearer than I did on Friday… or yesterday… or at 4:30am this morning as I stood in front of my bathroom mirror. So much of my life since it became my own has been about regaining and holding onto control around the things that I can but there are some things that I just can’t control because they aren’t mine and I am not meant to be the keeper of them. And so, I am in the mud. I am down in it and as of this morning, I find myself unable to climb out just yet.

I think the hardest part of feeling lost today is the lack of emotion that I am feeling around it. The standard for me has always been an ability to feel the emotions– all of them– no matter how ugly and exhausting they are, and it is in the confrontation that I find healing and move forward. Right now, I just feel- nothing. I am separated from my emotions which I can’t help but notice must be some sort of defense mechanism. The dreaded wall is up.

I did have a brief moment last night where everything just came out. In the lateness of the evening, the exhaustion of barely sleeping all weekend… I couldn’t keep it buried just then. My little guy next to me in bed, watching his ipad. I just let it silently flow for a moment and turned to lay down. He switched off his ipad and turned to me, hugging me through the overwhelming feeling of loneliness. I can’t explain the feeling of it, like the transfer of strength from this little amazing human and he didn’t even realize the power of it. God knew what he was doing when he gave me this one.

Now I just ask myself– where do I go from here?

I woke up last night and you weren’t next to me. So I began to search for you.. the office, the spare room, upstairs. I couldn’t find you and in my half asleep state, I had this thought that you were gone for good. To where? I didn’t know. But I thought you were gone. I hurried downstairs thinking I’d look in the garage next, maybe your car would be gone. I would worry, I would text, you would ask that I please leave you alone. We’d argued, I’d cried, and you were angry. This was it. I had it all figured out… and then I saw you, coming from the basement. You were downstairs doing laundry.

And that’s what I know. That has been my reality. Sometimes you lay your head down on an unfamiliar pillow in some unfamiliar hotel room in a random city of a random state and you wake up and you’re suddenly alone because you’re only connection to family tiptoed out the door while you were sleeping. In the anger and the ice cold of the moment I see it, happening all over again. It’s the fear that runs through my head..As your downstairs separating darks from lights.

Tag: lost

What I know