Eight years since what, you might say, but if you have been reading, watching, observing, known me for any length of time, you probably already know, even if you couldn't have marked the date on your own. i'm going to be 26, and i feel so old, entering my late-20's. i know i'm young to so many others, but to me, when i look back at where i was, what i've done, who i've become, i feel old.
It's been eight years and i'm still paralyzed. i thought that night was freeing me, it was full of so much hope and promise, but instead it was plunging me into darkness. i used to be an optimist. Megan laughs at me, says that i was always a pessimist, but if that were so then i would not have made it the past twelve, thirteen, fourteen years. i would have committed suicide if i were a pessimist, but i held on to hope, as slight as it was. Now i feel as if i have no hope but i've come too far to change my mind, to change back to who i was, to undo what has been for what might have been.
i don't believe in killing myself, not that i think that i would go to Hell for it, but i couldn't look God in the face: i would die all over again for the shame of it, letting Him down like that for my own selfish reasons. As much as i am angry at Him i still fear Him, respect Him, love Him. i don't know how to hold on, keep going, rise above, but if i were to give up in such a final, fallible way, then i would cease to be.
We small creatures are caught in a black hole of nowness, of the sensation that the world will end if our lives are sad, or hard, or even happy, and easy. We think that death is the end. It is only the beginning. It blows the mind when one realizes how infinite the universe is, how it never ends, and never begins. i sit back and wonder how it can exist at all. God created everything, infinitely large, with one word, out of nothing, out of void, and yet He was in the void and knew. It is one of many contradictions that define Him. At that moment time began, before that there was no reason to mark it, and now time will always be marked but will someday lose all meaning. We feel the clock ticking now, but one day the clock will mean nothing.
For death will not be the end.
We will live forever and ever, whether in Heaven or Hell.
The weight of that staggers me. My mind will never stop reasoning, feeling, learning, wondering. My body will die but my new one will never fail me, even after millenia of millenia. Will we get tired of always being, way up there? Will we forget our old, lost life, or be able to relive it over and over again? Now i wonder what it would be like to be thin, to be able to see perfectly, to be blind, to be deaf, to be able to fly, will that matter at all in Heaven?
i can't go to my happy place anymore. i know, it's stupid, so Happy Gilmore, but it's important to me. The thing of it is, i usually went to my happy place when i was in church, or at class, during a particularly boring sermon or lecture. i would stare out the window, or at the ceiling, or close my eyes, and imagine myself twirling on grass, singing, walking on a beach, enraptured. That is too far away now. Now when i try to go it is tainted with what ifs, and dreams that are beyond my reach. Everything is beyond my reach. So many dreams but no talent or time or strength to accomplish them. Trying to go to my happy place makes me feel even more lonely and unhappy than i already do.
i cannot imagine being in my happy place, being in Heaven. i can imagine myself bowing before God, laying my crowns at His feet, bathing Jesus' feet with my tears and wiping them dry with my hair, flying through air, swimming through water without running out of breath, flying through space.... But those things, however true they may be, are too far away for me now. How i am ever going to get from tonight to tomorrow to next week to next year is beyond me. And it is all i have been doing for the last eight years, for hope long ago failed me. i am still a fool, and i still hold on, but i do not yet know what will be.
i wrote twenty-one months ago:
The trick to not feeling absolutely crushed is focusing on God. It's difficult to do this when i cannot see, hear, or feel Him, but i remember Him, i know Him. He loves me; i have faith that He's allowing all of this to happen to me so i can become a better person, so He can be glorified in my life, so He can use me in the way He chooses. It doesn't matter what i want, it matters what He wants.
It's so hard to hold onto that, to make sure that i hold all of that hope in my mind. Having hope is a struggle to me now. It blows me away that He trusts me enough to leave me in this place for over seven years when i feel lik i don't even have the strength to get through each day.
I'm not perfect, i'm making a fool of myself. I try so hard, but i end up trying to ignore all my hopes, dreams, and spiritual pursuits just so i can get through a day with a positive attitude. I constantly feel paralyzed, like even if i try to lift myself up off the ground it's an exercise in futility. i don't like who i am becoming, i don't see how this is glorifying Him, and it makes me impatient and angry and selfish. All i want is to serve Him and that just gets stripped away.
It's hard for me to write about this: i don't want anyone to know about the mask i still end up wearing despite my best efforts, i don't want to hurt anyone, i don't want anyone to know how weak i am when i have fought so very hard.
i read more of the things i have written here, and realize, my words are my art, and they help me even now. i am so much farther into the darkness than i was even then. My sentiments are the same, only multiplied who know how many times.
Why am i stuck here? Why can't i move on? Why doesn't my life get better when i have strained, and sweat, and cried, and bled so much??? i am still a little girl, hiding in the dark. On Grey's Anatomy tonight they said that "Fear is good, it lets you know that you still have something to lose." Does that mean that not everything is lost yet? Because i am afraid that it is lost, that i will never recover from this, that i will always be the little girl huddled alone in the dark. i want to be J.K. Rowling, Katherine Heigl, David Beckham, and i know that sounds ridiculous, but please bear with me.
David saw Victoria/Posh on tv and says: "Who is that? I'm going to marry her." Katie says that everything in her life is happening so fast that it's overwhelming, that there's so much good that it's hard to take in. Jo went through a divorce, was on welfare, and wrote the book that wouldn't do well, that wouldn't sell, and is now one of the richest people on the planet. i don't want money, or fame, just to be rich and famous; i want to be overwhelmingly happy, to be giving away my money, to be telling the world what God wants me to say and have people actually listen to me--to Him--because i'm famous.
In real life everyone ignores me, and they don't even realize it. i'll be excited about something, sharing it, and no one listens, no one cares, it goes in one ear and out the other. i'll need help, advice, have help, advice, to give, but they don't pay attention, they don't help, they don't take my help and screw themselves over in the process. i'm a nice person, but i'm not going to force you to listen to me, take my help, stop looking like an idiot. People tell me i'm too loud, then why is that so much of the time i'm inwardly screaming at the top of my lungs and outworldy whispering "Why won't anyone listen??? Did i just stutter? Should i have yelled out loud instead of talking in a normal tone? Should i have sweared, or insulted, or pulled your hair, or punched you, would that have made a difference???"
i know that there are some people who read what i write, but i still feel like i'm in a vacuum, a void. i hope you, the reader, get something out of my words, because so often i feel as if they are fruitless...
...but i have to write them.
i feel compelled to write.
i have to write.
But what do i have to say?
i've already said it.
Will i always be here, huddled in the dark? Will i ever truly fall in love? Will anyone ever fall in love with me? i have looked at men, said to myself, "He's the one," and he never was. How can a person move on when they are caged in the dark? How can they be loved when they are so ugly inside? On the outside? No matter how beautiful i am, will i always be the "fat girl"? Will i always be the girl with the lisp? Will i always be the socially backwards outsider that doesn't know how to connect with other human beings and feels miserable and hates herself for it?
i hate being sick and tired and alone and worthless. i want to be healthy, and alive, and beautiful, and loved, and a really useful woman (lol with tears streaming down my face). i'm afraid that i'll always be alone, that i'll never have children, and i know i'm not ready. i don't want my imzadi to see me like this. My hope is in God, not in a man, or a child, anyone but the Christ-child, the Messiah, the Redeemer, the Lover of my soul.
My wound is laid bare again. That is the way it should be. It hurts to breathe not because of my congestion or sore throat, but because of my need for Him. i will always need Him, i cannot stop needing Him, and that is why i wait, not because i have the strength, or wisdom, or faith, but because i have the weakness, the doubt, and the fear. i will always be His little girl.
It is four days until my anniversary. i cannot go on, i do not know His will anymore, if i was ever right, or if i have always been wrong, but i will still wait for Him, even if it takes another eight years. Do not be proud of me for that, i have done nothing at all... but give up.
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