I have so many things going on in my head and 12 of them (AT LEAST) I want to write on and each are different but of course totally connected...*DEEEEP Breath*
It started a month ago when I snagged a Joyce Meyer Believing God CD Series at the library to listen to on my way to school each night. The majority of it centered on what we of a Pentecostal background like to call 'stinkin thinkin'. Because we have the power to speak life and death (Proverbs18:21) what we say and how we think often effect our own blessings or the where our spiritual life is heading.
So it began...the collision course that lead my egotistical flesh to run head first into the truth of my heart. The realization that I go to school and everyone tells me I'm so sweet and that I really walk out this Christianity thing and then I come home and I'm short with my kids about the dishes, hard on my husband for not being up to my speed with the parenting thing, plain ugly with my best friend, and here's the kicker of it all...I didn't really feel that way!!! I could not wait until I got home to be with my family, but the second I walked in the door it was like a wave of annoyance washed over me. Oh and let's not forget that I am the QUEEN of Justification so aaaallll my actions and reactions were beyond called for, y'all.
The more I pressed in to the changing of my attitude the worse my behavior got. Emma had said on more than one occasion I was being a jerky (didn't go over so good...after all she is only 14 and I know everything cuz I'm bigger, right?). NiNi kept trying to gently call my attention to some details that just flat pissed me off at her. I was avoiding her and usually snippy and mean when I didn't. How come all she ever saw was the negative stuff about me? Isn't that why I gave her the CD to listen to too? So she could see herself? Why is it other people think I'm great and she's always cutting me down? I'm sick to death of her always pointing out every flaw I have. How come I can't grow around her? She just wants to keep me stuck and I'm tired of staying stuck for her!!! This was pretty much the tirade I went on in my head (you know, the place I was suppose to be getting away from negativity so it wouldn't poison my heart and hinder my walk).
Then one day last week she called and we started talking. I was immediately offensive and offended and any other adjective you wanna dot in here. Somewhere in that conversation where I was prattling on so I didn't have to listen to her, I told her how in the last week I had woken up three times in the middle of the night really angry with B. I mean hopping mad. Hurt. Rolling away from him in a huff. I didn't go to bed that way. I would have to fight to not stay angry when morning rolled around. But I would wake straight up in the dead of night mad as a March Hare. As I said it out loud something in me jostled awake. I felt like I was sluggish and just coming out of a really deep sleep which held very realistic dreams. I was operating a vehicle and completely lucid yet my spirit felt as Snow White must've felt when she finally came out from under that nasty spell. At the same time all this was happening in my spirit, I heard NiNi say with forceful alarm, 'That's not natural!!'
I had a vision of a sci-fi force field in front of me. It was iridescent and pliable. It had give but would not break. It muffled everything as if I was listening underwater. And most of all it seemed to have a numbing effect...except with irritation and/or anger which then was amplified.
I don't know if the field is dissolved or just weakening. I haven't seen it since. What I do know is that I went home that night and spilled my guts to my husband. We had a sort of spiritual confession session and it seems to be on the up. I'm still getting testy about stupid things that I have to stop and check if I'm truly feeling that or am I simply reacting in a way that was becoming habitual. Like Frodo in Shelob's web there were thin veils of cobwebby things that have been choking my heart, silencing my spirit, blinding my eyes, and binding my hands and feet....God is pruning the dead places.
I'd ventured off my path...not far...but enough that I've gotten a couple of thistles stuck in my feet. Out of clarity comes recalculating. Letting God reset the map and pull the splinters out so that He can bandage the wound and set me right.
December 12, 2011
December 06, 2011
Mirror Mirror on the Wall
There's a scene in The Neverending Story where Atreyu is having the 3 gates that he must pass through in order to get to the Southern Oracle. Gate 2 is a mirror. Falcor (eternal optimist Luck Dragon) is very Eh about it which prompts Engywook (the gnomish expert on the Southern Oracle) to become irritated and say to him the lines that keep looping through my head:
Engywook: Next is the Magic Mirror Gate. Atreyu has to face his true self.
Falcor: So what? That won't be too hard for him.
Engywook: Oh, that's what everyone thinks! But kind people find out that they are cruel. Brave men discover that they are really cowards! Confronted by their true selves, most men run away screaming!
I think marriage is life this mirror. There are things you thought for certain you just KNEW about yourself. Then suddenly you find yourself face to face with reactions you did not foresee being apart of your heart.
I think this may be doubly true for B and me since we're middle-aged when we are starting out. He's never been married and has 35 years of his own way under his belt. I have been a single parent for TEN YEARS!!! i.e. I raise my kids and keep my house MY way ....
B has always maintained that marriage is a mirror. Which is probably why these lines keep cropping up in my reveries. Mirrors show you that is not what you think. How often do we justify our actions? All the time. We constantly shift blame to say if so and so hadn't done this or that I wouldn't have had to say such and such. Justifying our own selfish behavior, but when we stare into a mirror and see that there is really self-serving ugliness behind it we can't hide....or at least it's not as easy. Marriage is perpetually dying to your own desires to serve another...another that is really our self as God joined us into One.
Right now, I feel like the people Engywook describes. I'm not as kind as I thought I was. I'm not gracious as I pretend to be. And I'm even harder on those I love than I realized.
My marriage is a mirror. One that shows me the hard things as well as the lovely ones so as not to leave me stuck in the mire of my fleshliness.
Mirror, Mirror on the wall...Thank you for loving me through it all.
Engywook: Next is the Magic Mirror Gate. Atreyu has to face his true self.
Falcor: So what? That won't be too hard for him.
Engywook: Oh, that's what everyone thinks! But kind people find out that they are cruel. Brave men discover that they are really cowards! Confronted by their true selves, most men run away screaming!
I think marriage is life this mirror. There are things you thought for certain you just KNEW about yourself. Then suddenly you find yourself face to face with reactions you did not foresee being apart of your heart.
I think this may be doubly true for B and me since we're middle-aged when we are starting out. He's never been married and has 35 years of his own way under his belt. I have been a single parent for TEN YEARS!!! i.e. I raise my kids and keep my house MY way ....
B has always maintained that marriage is a mirror. Which is probably why these lines keep cropping up in my reveries. Mirrors show you that is not what you think. How often do we justify our actions? All the time. We constantly shift blame to say if so and so hadn't done this or that I wouldn't have had to say such and such. Justifying our own selfish behavior, but when we stare into a mirror and see that there is really self-serving ugliness behind it we can't hide....or at least it's not as easy. Marriage is perpetually dying to your own desires to serve another...another that is really our self as God joined us into One.
Right now, I feel like the people Engywook describes. I'm not as kind as I thought I was. I'm not gracious as I pretend to be. And I'm even harder on those I love than I realized.
My marriage is a mirror. One that shows me the hard things as well as the lovely ones so as not to leave me stuck in the mire of my fleshliness.
Mirror, Mirror on the wall...Thank you for loving me through it all.
November 25, 2011
Alternative Lifestyle
Tonight I'm nestled all snug in my bed at the kick off of the Christmas Season with a sad and heavy heart.
Tonight, Brandon and I took the babies downtown Indianapolis to see the lighting of the world's tallest "Christmas Tree". I put it in quotes because what it really is is a monument at the heart of the Circle City that the electricians union suspends multi-colored lights in the shape of a cylindrical cone resulting in a pseudo-Christmas Tree.
Anyway, around here it's a big deal and usually quite fun. I take the kids every other year when it's my turn for Thanksgiving. I've even gone a couple of times without them. Every lighting a wonderful experience that makes me all glowy with the warmth and excitement of the coming festivities.
Brandon hates large crowds, so after laying it on thicker and heavier as I went, he finally consented to coming along. It was disaster. It was gridlock and madness. In all the years we've gone I haven't seen crowd this size. It was unseasonably warm so maybe that's why the numbers were at peak. All I know is that I saw that ugliness of humanity tonight. There was almost a fist fight. Two very intoxicated women with three children pushing their way through the crowd. A man in a colts jacket threatening physical violence in order to move into an area that was barricaded off. I myself had a confrontation with a man who was at least a foot taller than myself because he proceeded to get in Emma's face when she said excuse me as she was trying to not let go of Lily's hand and be separated from the rest of her family. "Sir, she's 14. She's just trying to not be separated," was met with vehement hostility. I was asked him to not be hateful to a child...I even said and I quote "It's Christmas!"
This was the pinnacle of a day marked with news of 5 smashed car windows at a local mall to steal presents. A woman who pepper sprayed several others in order to get the wal-mart deals she wanted. And stores who open at 9pm instead of letting employees be with their families.
The kindest person we came across tonight was a homeless man who sitting with his little black dog was wishing people Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas as they passed by. A man with little to nothing was generous with his kindness. I have wept openly with a heaviness in my spirit tonight.
Lord, Oh Lord, my heart cries out for the blackness in the hearts of your people. Lord, oh Lord let me not be one of those masses. Open the eyes of my heart that I can see where I am like these. Correct my steps and the words of my mouth so that the sweetness of Your Spirit pours from me. Let my life be an example of how we can be a different people. I want an alternative lifestyle.
Tonight, Brandon and I took the babies downtown Indianapolis to see the lighting of the world's tallest "Christmas Tree". I put it in quotes because what it really is is a monument at the heart of the Circle City that the electricians union suspends multi-colored lights in the shape of a cylindrical cone resulting in a pseudo-Christmas Tree.
Anyway, around here it's a big deal and usually quite fun. I take the kids every other year when it's my turn for Thanksgiving. I've even gone a couple of times without them. Every lighting a wonderful experience that makes me all glowy with the warmth and excitement of the coming festivities.
Brandon hates large crowds, so after laying it on thicker and heavier as I went, he finally consented to coming along. It was disaster. It was gridlock and madness. In all the years we've gone I haven't seen crowd this size. It was unseasonably warm so maybe that's why the numbers were at peak. All I know is that I saw that ugliness of humanity tonight. There was almost a fist fight. Two very intoxicated women with three children pushing their way through the crowd. A man in a colts jacket threatening physical violence in order to move into an area that was barricaded off. I myself had a confrontation with a man who was at least a foot taller than myself because he proceeded to get in Emma's face when she said excuse me as she was trying to not let go of Lily's hand and be separated from the rest of her family. "Sir, she's 14. She's just trying to not be separated," was met with vehement hostility. I was asked him to not be hateful to a child...I even said and I quote "It's Christmas!"
This was the pinnacle of a day marked with news of 5 smashed car windows at a local mall to steal presents. A woman who pepper sprayed several others in order to get the wal-mart deals she wanted. And stores who open at 9pm instead of letting employees be with their families.
The kindest person we came across tonight was a homeless man who sitting with his little black dog was wishing people Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas as they passed by. A man with little to nothing was generous with his kindness. I have wept openly with a heaviness in my spirit tonight.
Lord, Oh Lord, my heart cries out for the blackness in the hearts of your people. Lord, oh Lord let me not be one of those masses. Open the eyes of my heart that I can see where I am like these. Correct my steps and the words of my mouth so that the sweetness of Your Spirit pours from me. Let my life be an example of how we can be a different people. I want an alternative lifestyle.
November 08, 2011
Clan Maxwell
Brandon is Scottish in heritage. Being that I am Anglo/Irish Indian on my momma's side, we embrace the anglophile connection we share. In Scotland, families are divided into clans. Inside each clan are several different families i.e. several different last names. They are still apart of the Clan even though the name is different because they fall under the protection of the Laird of the Clan. How perfect is this. In this house we have 3 different last names, but we all fall under the protection of Brandon. He is our Laird. We are Clan Maxwell.
Here's a quick update on where every body's been over the past .... WOW! 8 MONTHS!
We bought a house! The kids and I left rural central Indiana and moved to the near east side of Indianapolis about 7 minutes from downtown. It's been an adjustment and there are times that I love the convenience of it. Then there are times I having corn fields for as far as the eye can see.
Brandon is working full time for Lowe's as a delivery driver. I'm still in school until February. Emma is in the eighth grade and we have started touring high schools (blech blech blech). Lily is living at her dad's right now. She really didn't want to make the move to Indianapolis, so in July she moved in with him in the suburb of Greenfield. Belle is Belle. She hasn't changed much...gotten taller. She still sings everywhere and thinks if she can't see you than you can't hear her....even at school! NiNi (who was laid off 6 months after me) went back to school at IUPUI. She's finishing up her first semester back. The best part about that (other than her following her dreams and all)? IUPUI is only 10 minutes from ma new place :)
That's a recap in a super quick nutshell...Just to get ya up to speed...
And Sarah, I'm glad to be back too! Thanks, Sweet Girl and congrats on the new cupcake!
Here's a quick update on where every body's been over the past .... WOW! 8 MONTHS!
We bought a house! The kids and I left rural central Indiana and moved to the near east side of Indianapolis about 7 minutes from downtown. It's been an adjustment and there are times that I love the convenience of it. Then there are times I having corn fields for as far as the eye can see.
Brandon is working full time for Lowe's as a delivery driver. I'm still in school until February. Emma is in the eighth grade and we have started touring high schools (blech blech blech). Lily is living at her dad's right now. She really didn't want to make the move to Indianapolis, so in July she moved in with him in the suburb of Greenfield. Belle is Belle. She hasn't changed much...gotten taller. She still sings everywhere and thinks if she can't see you than you can't hear her....even at school! NiNi (who was laid off 6 months after me) went back to school at IUPUI. She's finishing up her first semester back. The best part about that (other than her following her dreams and all)? IUPUI is only 10 minutes from ma new place :)
That's a recap in a super quick nutshell...Just to get ya up to speed...
And Sarah, I'm glad to be back too! Thanks, Sweet Girl and congrats on the new cupcake!
October 25, 2011
Ready to Fly
So it's back....not really "new and improved" since that usually (in my opinion) implies a change that inevitably effs up the thing that I once loved. It's just back.
Last year, about this same time, life was changing and... not complicated... just... not my life... but still kind of .... I don't expect that to make sense. I don't know that it made a lot of sense to me. I knew that QuirkyGirlx3 didn't really fit anymore, so I tried to create a new space to write that new chapter. It felt foreign. It felt like I was writing in someone else's space...which to a degree is kind of where my life was. In someone else's space.
I only just today realized what had actually happened. I had cocooned myself. I was insulating my heart trying to let wounds heal. I was securing myself to get a solid footing again. I squirreled away the joyous things and held them close so that only a few got to share them. It wasn't to exclude but I think to protect the sweet spot. I wrapped myself up in the warmness of the chrysalis I wasn't even aware I was spinning.
A week ago Sunday, Brandon and I were finally married in a ceremony that was lovely and perfect and represented us well. We drifted away for a weeks long honeymoon of a no destination road trip. When we got home, I made an appointment and immediately chopped about 9 inches of hair off. Here's the thing. Even before I started doing hair, I've always maintained that there is a complete psychology to hair. When a woman wants her life to change she'll change her hair, or if her life has already changed she'll want the outward manifestation so she'll change her hair. Then I ghettoed up ma nails in some Halloween fun-ness. I felt spunky and light. So on the last night of our honeymoon, with my new do and trashy tips, my husband took me to dinner.
The girls came bursting through the door at my dad's when we went to pick them up Sunday afternoon. They were all smiles and laughter. Emma said, "Oh you look like Mommy from when I was little!" (My hair was always short until about 3 years ago...bit of a female Sampson softening thing) On the way home we were all talking over the top of each other and telling stories and being .... us! Mid-conversation I interjected (we're a family of interrupters. We try to change it, but it never seems to stick) by shoving my glow-in the dark green nails with black tips at Em and saying, "Whattaya think about ma nails?!" Her response? "I think that my mom's home." I've sat in this statement for a few days. I realize that I am.
With it came the urge to write again. My fingers have been twitchy. I tried to return to Walking Out Loud but I chaffed at the site (pun intended) of it. I considered a new one...Mishaps and Misadventures with QuirkyGirl....but that wasn't it...that's the stuff I write about not the title. I am my own title. Like Cher. Or Bono.
Making a cup of tea this very morning and the uncluttering the files in my mind, I had the mental awakening that comes with the emergence of a renewed self. I've hatched. Bloomed. Entered gracefully into a new era in life. It only made sense to revamp QuirkyGirlx3. It's who I am. It's my home. I only know how to walk out loud. I don't need to do it under a banner that proclaims such. I just have to do it.
QuirkyGirlx3 is now QuirkyGirlx3+1
Same old address. Same old lot of things. The good stuff anyway. I hope I've left the ugliness with the discarded shell. This girl is ready to fly....ironically it was Learning to Fly that was the title of the 1st post on the original site. I love it when life works in perfect circles and brings you back around.
Welcome to our life.
Last year, about this same time, life was changing and... not complicated... just... not my life... but still kind of .... I don't expect that to make sense. I don't know that it made a lot of sense to me. I knew that QuirkyGirlx3 didn't really fit anymore, so I tried to create a new space to write that new chapter. It felt foreign. It felt like I was writing in someone else's space...which to a degree is kind of where my life was. In someone else's space.
I only just today realized what had actually happened. I had cocooned myself. I was insulating my heart trying to let wounds heal. I was securing myself to get a solid footing again. I squirreled away the joyous things and held them close so that only a few got to share them. It wasn't to exclude but I think to protect the sweet spot. I wrapped myself up in the warmness of the chrysalis I wasn't even aware I was spinning.
A week ago Sunday, Brandon and I were finally married in a ceremony that was lovely and perfect and represented us well. We drifted away for a weeks long honeymoon of a no destination road trip. When we got home, I made an appointment and immediately chopped about 9 inches of hair off. Here's the thing. Even before I started doing hair, I've always maintained that there is a complete psychology to hair. When a woman wants her life to change she'll change her hair, or if her life has already changed she'll want the outward manifestation so she'll change her hair. Then I ghettoed up ma nails in some Halloween fun-ness. I felt spunky and light. So on the last night of our honeymoon, with my new do and trashy tips, my husband took me to dinner.
The girls came bursting through the door at my dad's when we went to pick them up Sunday afternoon. They were all smiles and laughter. Emma said, "Oh you look like Mommy from when I was little!" (My hair was always short until about 3 years ago...bit of a female Sampson softening thing) On the way home we were all talking over the top of each other and telling stories and being .... us! Mid-conversation I interjected (we're a family of interrupters. We try to change it, but it never seems to stick) by shoving my glow-in the dark green nails with black tips at Em and saying, "Whattaya think about ma nails?!" Her response? "I think that my mom's home." I've sat in this statement for a few days. I realize that I am.
With it came the urge to write again. My fingers have been twitchy. I tried to return to Walking Out Loud but I chaffed at the site (pun intended) of it. I considered a new one...Mishaps and Misadventures with QuirkyGirl....but that wasn't it...that's the stuff I write about not the title. I am my own title. Like Cher. Or Bono.
Making a cup of tea this very morning and the uncluttering the files in my mind, I had the mental awakening that comes with the emergence of a renewed self. I've hatched. Bloomed. Entered gracefully into a new era in life. It only made sense to revamp QuirkyGirlx3. It's who I am. It's my home. I only know how to walk out loud. I don't need to do it under a banner that proclaims such. I just have to do it.
QuirkyGirlx3 is now QuirkyGirlx3+1
Same old address. Same old lot of things. The good stuff anyway. I hope I've left the ugliness with the discarded shell. This girl is ready to fly....ironically it was Learning to Fly that was the title of the 1st post on the original site. I love it when life works in perfect circles and brings you back around.
Welcome to our life.
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