Breakfast with B

Today just might be a better day.  I hope I'm right. 

B (6yo) and I are eating breakfast and I'm glad.  I feel...better this morning than I did yesterday morning or yesterday evening.  Whatever that means, it means.

He's full to the brim with Honeycomb and I'm granola with yoghurt plus the deicious coffee that my boss made for me that I can't seem to replicate, even though all the ingredients are here in the house.

I like quiet mornings.  I can't lie about it.

I wonder about a lot of things.  Has it really been two weeks since I last blogged?

Yesterday I didn't feel like doing my job... Kids are a lot of work some times.  I just wasn't in the mood to be patient or nice...I would have excused myself if I could.  Even just on that plane, today is better. 

My brain is just too full. 

Yesterday we chatted.

Yesterday, while I was staring out the window with my hands over my mouth, deeply contemplating the drastic turn I suspected my life might be taking in the near future you came to my door with bright eyes and asked, "Do you want to see what your life is about?"

I outright gawked because you couldn't have known what I was thinking. Your feet weren't even on the floor; you were practically Flintstone-ing it, repeatedly turning and beckoning me with a scooping left hand. "Come on! Come and see this." You don't look that excited except about the biggest or the neatest things.

I think I asked you to repeat what you'd said because I was the superlative of incredulous. It wasn't a common question you'd posed but also your timing was too much.

You probably didn't read my facial expression as fearful and dreading but just caught off-guard because how could you know? How could you know what I'd heard in yesterday's sermon and what had just popped up in the video I was watching for research?

How could you know that I was sat at my desk telling Jesus that He knows I don't want to go? I wanted to tell Him all my objections...the things I hate and the things I would [lose]* but instead I asked myself without words, "how can I say no to You?"

I wanted to argue why I should stay (geographically) here but I had to admit that I would rather be wherever He wants to use me. I had to admit off the edge of a breathtaking cliff that I don't know what's best for my life and I don't know where He wants to use me.
*Jim Elliot

I care about the Kingdom and I care about the Kingdom most and now, when I don't know where I'll live or what I'll do, I need to tune up my life to Kingdom standards.

I need to tune up my life. It would be hard to leave.

But...because the Truth makes sense to me and because the base pairs shifted in my DNA to incorporate the sermon I heard yesterday, I confess that I "owe it to the nations because [I] owe it to the Lamb".

I tried to look out across to see that I could give up everything, to see that some things would really hurt to forfeit and to see that He must still and always be eternally worth it.

Big sigh.

I felt sadness and the terror that is pre-grief rather profoundly. (I knew I would ultimately say yes.) I know I can't detour around Nineveh.


So I tracked your scooping left hand. You showed me a website for an Unreached Peoples missions org. My breath caught in my throat. You continued talking - preambling - and were focussed on the screen enough to miss my bulging eyes and clasped hands.

I was desperately praying in my head, "Don't show me [this country], don't show me [this country]."  I wanted nothing confirmed.  I wanted nothing to come up over and over again "'in the craziest places!". 


I watched the video and, for a group that wants to recruit believers to go to the ends of the earth with the Greatest Message, I found they did very well.  They minced no words but bared the truth about risk, pain, discomfort, loss and whatever is the worst, by earthly standards.

I watched and my heart rate increased.  My leg started shaking.  I covered my mouth in all sorts of ways (ask a body-languageologist...there's a reason we do it).  I was relieved you never spun round because I didn't want you to see me freaking out.

The video drilled further and further into my soft spot for serving Jesus.  I started to cry.  Then the video stopped and you turned around.  I walked away a little bit.  I wanted to speak but the crying thing that I was fighting made it difficult.  I couldn't look at you because if you were mirroring any of my sadness, I would have lost it.

I finally blurted in a watery voice, "I don't wanna go," and promptly covered my mouth again.  I told you that you had impeccable timing.  I told you I was just thinking about this stuff at my desk when you came and called me over.

I told you I had heard, when we were praying to close the sermon - the best sermon on missions I've ever heard -, the name of a country to which I've always said I didn't want to go.  You laughed a little at that which helped.  Levity helped.

I probably tried to explain a little more why I was so emotional, standing there in your office, not looking at you.  But then I kept resorting to the refrain: "I don't wanna go....I don't wanna go."

And...
...I think you actually know me well enough that I didn't need to explain the layers beneath that statement.  You know I would go but that it would be unfathomably difficult.

You said, in the calmest voice and levellest tone, "Believe me: if you did go it would be a far greater loss for me than it would be for you."  At this I laughed and the tears were done.  (Thanks.)  I told you that wasn't possible.

You told me you didn't know where I'd end up but that you didn't think I was going to stay here forever.  I nodded slightly and "mm-hmm"-ed quietly in agreement.  [I do think that's true but I will fight tooth-and-nail to leave well.]

You told me for not the first time that you think I'd make a great missionary.  I don't know what that means and I secretly want you to be wrong. 

You told me what you also mentioned in the sermon yesterday, that you would never tell your own girls (your young daughters) not to go somewhere that God was calling -- no matter the cost, the risk, the probable danger.  This resonated loudly with a thought that's been rolling around in my head for a week or so.  The age difference doesn't work out but you seem to care for me like the father I never had.


You seem to be interested and invested and spiritually paternal in a way that I can't thank God enough for.  I can't.


It suddenly seemed fitting that I could cry in your office. I suddenly didn't mind and I was glad I wasn't posturing. 


We talked more and I felt better.  I told you a bit about the trajectory I thought my life would take, in terms of foreign missions.  We even talked about martyrdom.  You made some suggestions and encouraged me implicitly. 

I know you don't have the answer for me and I know that God is good.  I know that His timing is His timing; I know that He changes hearts.  I know that I want most to serve Him and I know that if I get uprooted, it's only a few more decades before I'm Home for good.

Well, it's after midnight and I should be asleep but I can't even tell whether I'm tired.

It has been a very emotionally-wrenching day but it's good.

There have been more ups and downs than I could have predicted but I thank God for enabling me to weather them.

My life seems different these days. It's hard to get used to. There is much to think about and consider. There are problems to tackle.

I'm too tired to sleep...

I have this big project at Work B that is eating my head. In truth, it's optional so I won't tear my hair out over it but I think it's a worthwhile project so I'm hacking away.

I think I got annoyed today because I haven't hit that sweet spot where the tools, the big picture and the process all become clear and I can develop an efficient system to blaze through to the end. (I adore hitting that sweet spot. It gives me stamina like you wouldn't believe.)

It may be right around the corner (I'll do a bit of work away from the computer tomorrow, to pool some patience) or it may never come. But, as I'm 1/3 finished, this should be OK. Hack, hack, hack.


Tensions in both workplaces has left me feeling trapped.

Reading Acts 8 has reminded me about the Gospel, that simple, glorious, priceless message.

Chatting with two dear friends on the phone this evening for a combined three-plus hours was both energising and draining.

The ol' eyelids are dropping. Let's call it.

[meant to post this just after 1am.]

It's a little bit like I should be asleep right now...but I'm not.

I feel weird and not overly tired so I'm staying up to blog.

I've had more freedom and free time in the past five days than I've really known what to do with. I'm not 100% sure what's changed but I'm not bothered. That said, Saturday afternoon surprised me when it wanted company but by around 10pm, I was ready for alone time again.

I've enjoyed being able to work through life with a not-overwhelming amount of pressure or demands on my time, emotions, performance, etc.

I think my life is in transition between seasons which does feel a little weirdy but is also neat and anticipatious.

(Or maybe I've just had a weird week.)



This afternoon I was struck with a thought that's popped up several times in the past little while and today it struck hard enough to prompt some writing.

(I would like to be less vague in this but I need to be careful.) For about six or seven weeks from late February into early April I dismally mishandled a situation I couldn't make sense of. I mishandled it day after day, week after week, decision after decision. I wasn't getting it.

When I finally clued in, I made adjustments, collected the three scraps of dignity I could find and drove my ego to the ER.

Things got better in the first week of April in a way that surprised and relieved me. There was a real patching up--but no removal of scars.


Today, at the beginning of May and for almost two weeks, I've felt glad for the scars. They're still tender from March but here in May they're tough enough to protect me.


[What is this peculiar sensation which quite resembles learning from my mistakes???]


I run my fingers over the gnarled flesh and brutish stitching and I feel gratitude. I'm glad they're serving a purpose and I'm glad I didn't need amputation.

I'm learning and this is better. It's still painful but it's OK. I'm OK. I'm future-sad, as I think there's a few more beatings on the horizon and then maybe big loss, but it's OK. [Christ-centred consolation with Scripture reference.]

summer is really not my favourite* season

but I noticed a few things this morning that made me glad for its advent this year.
*I am really hating converting to British/Canadian spellings in this instance.  Really disliking it.

When I came downstairs this morning to head out for work, I only had to slip on my Chucks. Until today I've been sweaters as well and it was still just last week when I was wearing my coat, scarf and mitts outside.  About a week before that I gave up on boots.
On top of this, the sun comes up earlier ("earlier"...) such that I don't have to turn on the light in the lobby ("mudroom") to find my stuff in the morning.  While flipping a switch is not a big deal on its own, the switch is as far out of the path from the door to our apartment to the front door that it's outright annoying. Like... it couldn't be more awkward.

So.. for an easy morning exit, Summer, I thank you.


The other thing I noticed over the past little while, gazing out the same window in the living room to the same tree in the backyard, is that buds are fantastic.  Buds are neat and amazing in some way.  I appreciate the budding trees I get to admire down the street to work at 6.30 in the morning.  There's a tree with white buds/petals/awesomeness on the opposite side of the street that I'm afraid to cross over and inspect because I already think it's stunningly beautiful from afar.  Nature is neat(ure).

---

Last night at music rehearsal I started playing the intro to a song we don't sing often but that I like loads and like to play on my own from time to time.  One of those pieces that is a great marriage between melody, chords and lyrics.  If I could write a book about the inner workings of that phenomenon, I would.  From all my playing around I've found cool things to add and one of them was a major-ninth (or major-second, as I usually think of it) for the opening Tonic chord (and the one four bars later).

So, doing something that I thought was cool to see if anyone else agreed, while people were still talking as we hadn't officially started the song, I dropped an Am9 (RH in 2nd position), with what I want to call a reverse-glissando (but I don't know if that term exists): I staggered (rolled?) the notes from highest to lowest pitch which is the opposite of what is almost always done.
All three vocalists turned and said, "Ooooh!" followed by variations of "I like that." It does sound a bit thunderous and brooding (which is what the lyrics evoke).


The only way I can really describe the choice is that is sounds like the song.  The A-minors in the verse of Praise Adonai sound like they want to have a major-second in them.


The guitarist agreed a moment later and said I should definitely "do that".  I was quite pleasantly surprised that they were so onside because it's legitimately out of the box.  There is very real dissonance in that chord and I think it works so well. They went with me and the song sounded wonderful.  One of those sadly-rare, gorgeous cases where we all seem to forget we're "rehearsing" and we lapse into corporate musical worship.  And imagine the coincidence that the song itself sounds technically better, anyway.