The apartment is a mess, the tree sits dead and (for fear of fire) dark in the living room, absorbing the light that comes in through the windows, assorted fantastic presents litter the carpet, my suitcase lounges in unpacked waste on my bedroom floor, dishes pile the counters and sink for the first time in two months, and the cat keeps losing his milk jug ring in the tree. And with an aching sinus from what appears to be an allergy-induced cold, I don't feel like cleaning any of it.
I can't decide if I want to spend New Year's Eve alone or not. I have a couple of options, but I'm tired and don't feel up to driving the distances I'd have to drive to elect them. Besides, I'm tired of spending holidays away from Simon. I kind of want to knit on the couch, drink a champagne toast to Janus, pet the cat, and go to bed.
Christmas was different this year. It turned out well -- the visit with my parents prior to Christmas, and with my sister and her fiance at Christmas, went wonderfully. It was good to see them. But whether the shock of my experience with the sacred dulled my appreciation of the warm fuzzies that come with the commercial and secular of the season, or whether the travel exhausted me, or whether the change in tradition (not celebrating as a nuclear family) threw me, or whether spending so much time in the constant company of others wore me out, or whether being ill for most of the month of December drained me, Christmas felt weird. Like a good visit, like a pleasant mini-break, but not like Christmas.
Oh well. I'm glad to see the centrifuge of 2006 come to a close. I'm sure 2007 will come with its share of change, but hopefully it will be more pleasant.
Happy New Year, folks! I'm going to go hold a hot cup of coffee against the left side of my face to try to break up the congestion there.
Sunday, December 31, 2006
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Enough
Now my neighbors panhandle, on occasion, both me and my guests for "taxi money" for their shady friends.
Last night, my neighbor knocked on my door asking to borrow the basement key, since the Absent Landlord had told her she could have one for storage, but hadn’t given it to her yet. I complied; she then disappeared, with the key, for an hour or so. Doesn’t take a nuclear physicist to figure out that she was getting a copy.
I called the AL, to find what my suspicion had whispered to me: He hadn’t told her she could have one. Great. They were up and about well up till five this morning, slamming the occasional door and waking me up. And when I went back down to the basement this morning (having reobtained my key), I found some of my stored alcohol missing (at least, I'm SURE that one crate wasn't EMPTY when I last looked at it). And I know the boyfriend is an alcoholic.
So. Beating, lying, possible theft, and (I suspect) drugs. The porch light is always on after dark. Why would it need to be on? Why do I hear furtive whispers in the stairwell leading down to the outside door at 4:15 a.m.?
I’m finished putting up with this. Done. Terminada. I’ve sent out an email to the neighborhood Listserv, inquiring after apartments for rent. I have a few leads.
There is a fine balance of wisdom in a sticky situation. On one slope, it’s wisest to be stubborn and stick it out and try to complain loudly enough that the situation improves; on the other slope, once all complaints have fallen on officially deaf ears and the situation continues to worsen, it’s wisest to leave.
I think the balance tipped last night. Well, probably it tipped last week when I had to call the police. But having to worry about getting robbed on top of calling the police about domestic violence is, shall we say, too much.
It’s like an abusive relationship. There are plenty of red flags along the way, and if you keep ignoring them, eventually he’ll hit you. I’ve had more than a few red flags, and I’m afraid that if I stay, something horrible will happen.
And I’m tired of being edgy and nervous in my own home.
Last night, my neighbor knocked on my door asking to borrow the basement key, since the Absent Landlord had told her she could have one for storage, but hadn’t given it to her yet. I complied; she then disappeared, with the key, for an hour or so. Doesn’t take a nuclear physicist to figure out that she was getting a copy.
I called the AL, to find what my suspicion had whispered to me: He hadn’t told her she could have one. Great. They were up and about well up till five this morning, slamming the occasional door and waking me up. And when I went back down to the basement this morning (having reobtained my key), I found some of my stored alcohol missing (at least, I'm SURE that one crate wasn't EMPTY when I last looked at it). And I know the boyfriend is an alcoholic.
So. Beating, lying, possible theft, and (I suspect) drugs. The porch light is always on after dark. Why would it need to be on? Why do I hear furtive whispers in the stairwell leading down to the outside door at 4:15 a.m.?
I’m finished putting up with this. Done. Terminada. I’ve sent out an email to the neighborhood Listserv, inquiring after apartments for rent. I have a few leads.
There is a fine balance of wisdom in a sticky situation. On one slope, it’s wisest to be stubborn and stick it out and try to complain loudly enough that the situation improves; on the other slope, once all complaints have fallen on officially deaf ears and the situation continues to worsen, it’s wisest to leave.
I think the balance tipped last night. Well, probably it tipped last week when I had to call the police. But having to worry about getting robbed on top of calling the police about domestic violence is, shall we say, too much.
It’s like an abusive relationship. There are plenty of red flags along the way, and if you keep ignoring them, eventually he’ll hit you. I’ve had more than a few red flags, and I’m afraid that if I stay, something horrible will happen.
And I’m tired of being edgy and nervous in my own home.
Monday, December 25, 2006
Five Things You Don't Know About Me (And Were Probably Better Off Not Knowing, Anyway)
MP the Gnome-Killer tagged me, so here you are:
1.) As soon as it's cold enough to wear pants, I stop shaving.
2.) When I'm gone for a day or two, and I'm wondering how my cat is doing, I consciously have to remind myself that he can't answer the phone if I call him.
3.) In seventh grade I invented my own alphabet so that my friends and I could pass notes in class. I continue to use it for personal notations that I don't want people to read.
4.) When I was little I made my younger sister color all over the bathroom door with marker and color her arm black. I then blamed her for it.
5.) Often I find myself singing a hymn or praise song in the car, then breaking off mid-word to yell some terrible profanity at someone ahead of me. I am trying to work on this. Sometimes.
Okay, I'm tagging LAR and Matt Holman.
1.) As soon as it's cold enough to wear pants, I stop shaving.
2.) When I'm gone for a day or two, and I'm wondering how my cat is doing, I consciously have to remind myself that he can't answer the phone if I call him.
3.) In seventh grade I invented my own alphabet so that my friends and I could pass notes in class. I continue to use it for personal notations that I don't want people to read.
4.) When I was little I made my younger sister color all over the bathroom door with marker and color her arm black. I then blamed her for it.
5.) Often I find myself singing a hymn or praise song in the car, then breaking off mid-word to yell some terrible profanity at someone ahead of me. I am trying to work on this. Sometimes.
Okay, I'm tagging LAR and Matt Holman.
Friday, December 22, 2006
oh there's no place like home for the holidays
My incredible bosses (I can't believe the people I work for now -- it gets better and better every week) let me go home quite early, so here I am in Erie, typing while my dad naps on the couch and Mom is at work.
Tired as I am of being the single daughter who, at this stage in the game, cannot transition from four-year-old to real adult by means of having some sort of significant male other, it's good to be home. Our enormous gray cat, Alex (a/k/a Greubie) is as moody and delightful and catlike as ever...and, although he sees me extremely infrequently, he was ecstatic to greet me when I came home last night. He's getting old (no! no! he stopped aging at four!) but is still himself.
And I can never stop loving how I get my parents' old queen-size bed, which they put into my room once they upgraded their own. So coming home is like going to the Ritz. I get to take a break from my own ancient narrow mattress (which is, however, the perfect size for a me and a small furry Simon) and lounge around in luxury. And I find myself joyfully taking up the entire middle of the bed.
The tree is up, the traditional decorations are glowing, the usual Christmas music is playing in the background, the cats are curled up sleeping in Dad's LaZBoy, and I'm waiting for the coffee to finish brewing. Just another "break" when Sarah returns to the homestead.
Plus I got to listen to Sufjan the entire trip home yesterday...I had purchased his Seven Swans album for a Christmas present for Leigh Ann, but she bought it for herself a couple weeks ago, so I popped it in yesterday. Really nervously, actually, that kind of nervous excited anticipation you get when you're about to perform a song you know really well, or when you're going to see an old friend you haven't seen in years. Because I know that when I listen to something new and Sufjan, it's going to destroy me (in the best way possible), and I always wonder which song is going to do it, and how. Seven Swans is inspired by Christian church music, so a lot of it is purely acoustic, and purely dedicated to Jesus, and purely beautiful. I spent a lot of the drive tipping my head just right so the tears would run out the corners of my eyes without obstructing my vision.
It's so amazing to feel alive with God again. Like other things still matter -- matter more, in fact -- but nothing matters as much as that aliveness, that awareness, that communion, that closeness. And it's always right THERE.
Hallelu Yah.
Tired as I am of being the single daughter who, at this stage in the game, cannot transition from four-year-old to real adult by means of having some sort of significant male other, it's good to be home. Our enormous gray cat, Alex (a/k/a Greubie) is as moody and delightful and catlike as ever...and, although he sees me extremely infrequently, he was ecstatic to greet me when I came home last night. He's getting old (no! no! he stopped aging at four!) but is still himself.
And I can never stop loving how I get my parents' old queen-size bed, which they put into my room once they upgraded their own. So coming home is like going to the Ritz. I get to take a break from my own ancient narrow mattress (which is, however, the perfect size for a me and a small furry Simon) and lounge around in luxury. And I find myself joyfully taking up the entire middle of the bed.
The tree is up, the traditional decorations are glowing, the usual Christmas music is playing in the background, the cats are curled up sleeping in Dad's LaZBoy, and I'm waiting for the coffee to finish brewing. Just another "break" when Sarah returns to the homestead.
Plus I got to listen to Sufjan the entire trip home yesterday...I had purchased his Seven Swans album for a Christmas present for Leigh Ann, but she bought it for herself a couple weeks ago, so I popped it in yesterday. Really nervously, actually, that kind of nervous excited anticipation you get when you're about to perform a song you know really well, or when you're going to see an old friend you haven't seen in years. Because I know that when I listen to something new and Sufjan, it's going to destroy me (in the best way possible), and I always wonder which song is going to do it, and how. Seven Swans is inspired by Christian church music, so a lot of it is purely acoustic, and purely dedicated to Jesus, and purely beautiful. I spent a lot of the drive tipping my head just right so the tears would run out the corners of my eyes without obstructing my vision.
It's so amazing to feel alive with God again. Like other things still matter -- matter more, in fact -- but nothing matters as much as that aliveness, that awareness, that communion, that closeness. And it's always right THERE.
Hallelu Yah.
Monday, December 18, 2006
firsts
It's 12:55 a.m. And I just called 911 to report domestic violence perpetrated against my neighbor across the hall by her boyfriend.
TV does prepare you for some things, it seems. I heard the argument through the walls -- typical on a weekend night, particularly, for whatever reason, on a Sunday night, and just as I was thinking I would need my earplugs to sleep -- having, you know, work in the morning -- I heard the shouts and hollers turn to horrible thuds and thumps, and then I heard my neighbor scream my name through her door.
So I called the police, flagged them down from my window when they arrived (my house is hard to find), and directed them to the correct door. They resolved everything and sent the beater on his way. Then I talked with my neighbor in the entryway for a few minutes and told her to go talk to the police in the morning while she calmed down.
Then I called my landlord and left him a voicemail.
So now what do I do? I'm sure the boyfriend is pissed at me, and these are not the kind of people you want to be pissed at you when they know where you live. I'd like to be joking, or wry, but I'm not. These are some scary people. I've never had a reasonable sort of fear in my home before. The occasional wild paranoia, yes. Reasonable fear, no.
I don't want my neighbor tossed on her (bruised) ear. I like her. She's not a bad neighbor. But I know the pattern for abusive relationships, and eventually he'll be right back, and it's going to happen again. And each time I'll find myself awake and nervous and sick at some ungodly hour calling the police on some ungodly man, and then worrying about some ungodly retaliation. These things are cyclical.
I love my apartment. I love my home. I could scream at my landlord for this sort of management.
So what are my options? The chances of getting a quiet, solid, untroubling neighbor, with the landlord I have, are slim to none, barring some monolithic act of God. I shouldn't have to move. I have stubbornly refused to consider the option before. It's my right to be here. But it's also my right to be safe. And now that's being called somewhat into question.
But I love my neighborhood. I want to continue to live in it.
And I want to continue living in my apartment. The one I'm paying rent on. The one I'm living in right now.
I don't want to have to deal with crap like this. But now that it's here, how do I deal? Insist on getting rid of the neighbor right now? Give it another incident or two before I really start caterwauling? Wait out the next conveyor belt line of horrifying neighbor selections? Start apartment hunting? Start house hunting?
One thing I will do for sure. After I talk to my parents, I'm talking to my boss. He's offered to write my landlord a letter before. I think it's time to take him up on that offer. My safety is at stake here.
TV does prepare you for some things, it seems. I heard the argument through the walls -- typical on a weekend night, particularly, for whatever reason, on a Sunday night, and just as I was thinking I would need my earplugs to sleep -- having, you know, work in the morning -- I heard the shouts and hollers turn to horrible thuds and thumps, and then I heard my neighbor scream my name through her door.
So I called the police, flagged them down from my window when they arrived (my house is hard to find), and directed them to the correct door. They resolved everything and sent the beater on his way. Then I talked with my neighbor in the entryway for a few minutes and told her to go talk to the police in the morning while she calmed down.
Then I called my landlord and left him a voicemail.
So now what do I do? I'm sure the boyfriend is pissed at me, and these are not the kind of people you want to be pissed at you when they know where you live. I'd like to be joking, or wry, but I'm not. These are some scary people. I've never had a reasonable sort of fear in my home before. The occasional wild paranoia, yes. Reasonable fear, no.
I don't want my neighbor tossed on her (bruised) ear. I like her. She's not a bad neighbor. But I know the pattern for abusive relationships, and eventually he'll be right back, and it's going to happen again. And each time I'll find myself awake and nervous and sick at some ungodly hour calling the police on some ungodly man, and then worrying about some ungodly retaliation. These things are cyclical.
I love my apartment. I love my home. I could scream at my landlord for this sort of management.
So what are my options? The chances of getting a quiet, solid, untroubling neighbor, with the landlord I have, are slim to none, barring some monolithic act of God. I shouldn't have to move. I have stubbornly refused to consider the option before. It's my right to be here. But it's also my right to be safe. And now that's being called somewhat into question.
But I love my neighborhood. I want to continue to live in it.
And I want to continue living in my apartment. The one I'm paying rent on. The one I'm living in right now.
I don't want to have to deal with crap like this. But now that it's here, how do I deal? Insist on getting rid of the neighbor right now? Give it another incident or two before I really start caterwauling? Wait out the next conveyor belt line of horrifying neighbor selections? Start apartment hunting? Start house hunting?
One thing I will do for sure. After I talk to my parents, I'm talking to my boss. He's offered to write my landlord a letter before. I think it's time to take him up on that offer. My safety is at stake here.
Saturday, December 16, 2006
let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love
Yesterday's Itinerary:
5:00 a.m. Get up.
6:00 a.m. Depart for University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.
9:00 a.m. Check in to U of M ER.
8:00 p.m. Leave the U of M ER (having had bloodwork, multiple IVs, steroids, examinations by the neurological team which gave my eyes an Olympic workout, and an MRI)
9:00 p.m. Eat a huge steak and mashed potatoes meal at T.G.I. Friday's.
12:15 p.m. Arrive home.
1:00 a.m. Fall exhausted in bed.
Last night I went to sleep with eyes so sore my whole head was aching. This morning I woke up and except for a few faint twinges, the headache is finally almost gone.
I can't decide what the best part of yesterday was. The crazy drug addict on the other side of the curtain during the morning, who wouldn't stay in her bed and kept wandering around demanding Vicodin and whining at the doctors, "What did my urine show?" I nicknamed her Narcotica. She was a heavyset woman with a face like a wet sack of flour and stringy hair. My dad wanted to chain her to her stretcher. I thought it was funny.
Or was it the feeling of blood gushing over my arm while the nurse stuck my vein for the IV? No, that wasn't the best thing about yesterday. Taking a nap during the MRI, using Thich Nacht Hahn's conscious breathing technique to calm myself down? That was interesting, but not the best thing.
The best thing about yesterday was definitely having my parents right next to me all day. They kept talking and laughing and telling stories, getting angry about how long it was taking for my MRI results to be read, and making me feel taken care of and loved. Going up there would have been impossible to do alone. As it was, it was bearable.
And I think my headache is finally (finally!) going away. The good doctors diagnosed me with a migraine. (Still don't know why that was so hard. I'd like to ask the doctors at Memorial in South Bend why they didn't diagnose a migraine to begin with, since that hospital is about two blocks from my house.)
Thank you, Jesus.
5:00 a.m. Get up.
6:00 a.m. Depart for University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.
9:00 a.m. Check in to U of M ER.
8:00 p.m. Leave the U of M ER (having had bloodwork, multiple IVs, steroids, examinations by the neurological team which gave my eyes an Olympic workout, and an MRI)
9:00 p.m. Eat a huge steak and mashed potatoes meal at T.G.I. Friday's.
12:15 p.m. Arrive home.
1:00 a.m. Fall exhausted in bed.
Last night I went to sleep with eyes so sore my whole head was aching. This morning I woke up and except for a few faint twinges, the headache is finally almost gone.
I can't decide what the best part of yesterday was. The crazy drug addict on the other side of the curtain during the morning, who wouldn't stay in her bed and kept wandering around demanding Vicodin and whining at the doctors, "What did my urine show?" I nicknamed her Narcotica. She was a heavyset woman with a face like a wet sack of flour and stringy hair. My dad wanted to chain her to her stretcher. I thought it was funny.
Or was it the feeling of blood gushing over my arm while the nurse stuck my vein for the IV? No, that wasn't the best thing about yesterday. Taking a nap during the MRI, using Thich Nacht Hahn's conscious breathing technique to calm myself down? That was interesting, but not the best thing.
The best thing about yesterday was definitely having my parents right next to me all day. They kept talking and laughing and telling stories, getting angry about how long it was taking for my MRI results to be read, and making me feel taken care of and loved. Going up there would have been impossible to do alone. As it was, it was bearable.
And I think my headache is finally (finally!) going away. The good doctors diagnosed me with a migraine. (Still don't know why that was so hard. I'd like to ask the doctors at Memorial in South Bend why they didn't diagnose a migraine to begin with, since that hospital is about two blocks from my house.)
Thank you, Jesus.
Thursday, December 14, 2006
...and counting
No change for the better.
But my wonderful parents are driving up to take me to the ER at the University of Michigan tomorrow. It's about three and a half hours from the Bend, but it sports some of the best specialists in the world. My boss recommended that I go there, since no one here can figure out what's wrong.
Hopefully the morrow will bring word of good health.
Thanks for praying! Or for thinking well of me and hoping for the best, if you're not into praying. :)
But my wonderful parents are driving up to take me to the ER at the University of Michigan tomorrow. It's about three and a half hours from the Bend, but it sports some of the best specialists in the world. My boss recommended that I go there, since no one here can figure out what's wrong.
Hopefully the morrow will bring word of good health.
Thanks for praying! Or for thinking well of me and hoping for the best, if you're not into praying. :)
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Day 14
This marks the second full week of unending cranial pain.
I went to the ER again on Monday night. MP angelically came with her laptop and stories and kept me company and called her dad for advice and kept up a running stream of jokes while I got more shots in the ass and cried, and got a spinal tap and cried, and lay back on the bed for an hour and slept and cried.
Boo.
The good news is that none of the tests revealed anything wrong. Bloodwork: normal. CAT scan: normal. Spinal tap: normal. But the headache and the increasing pain in my shoulders and back remain inexplicable.
My family practitioner also practices osteopathy, so he gave me a neck and back adjustment yesterday, which relieved the pain for about four hours before it slammed back into my temples and rendered me practically useless. I dragged myself through the rest of the working day, and finally broke down and asked my boss for the day off today, just to sleep and rest and (as I'm discovering while typing this) not look at a computer screen, while lounging around out of my mind on Vicodin and Flexeril.
I don't know what happened to make this spring out at me suddenly. Undeniably it's been a horrifically stressful year. I haven't had a chiropractic adjustment since college. I rarely encounter physical contact from other human beings. I suppose all those put together exploded into my present situation.
Okay, ow. Really can't look at the computer screen any longer. So I'm going to thank everyone who has been so remarkably helpful, apologize for being a grumpy, bad invalid (I don't know what to do when people offer to help), and go see what kind of fun I can have stringing lights on my Christmas tree while under the influence of a narcotic.
I went to the ER again on Monday night. MP angelically came with her laptop and stories and kept me company and called her dad for advice and kept up a running stream of jokes while I got more shots in the ass and cried, and got a spinal tap and cried, and lay back on the bed for an hour and slept and cried.
Boo.
The good news is that none of the tests revealed anything wrong. Bloodwork: normal. CAT scan: normal. Spinal tap: normal. But the headache and the increasing pain in my shoulders and back remain inexplicable.
My family practitioner also practices osteopathy, so he gave me a neck and back adjustment yesterday, which relieved the pain for about four hours before it slammed back into my temples and rendered me practically useless. I dragged myself through the rest of the working day, and finally broke down and asked my boss for the day off today, just to sleep and rest and (as I'm discovering while typing this) not look at a computer screen, while lounging around out of my mind on Vicodin and Flexeril.
I don't know what happened to make this spring out at me suddenly. Undeniably it's been a horrifically stressful year. I haven't had a chiropractic adjustment since college. I rarely encounter physical contact from other human beings. I suppose all those put together exploded into my present situation.
Okay, ow. Really can't look at the computer screen any longer. So I'm going to thank everyone who has been so remarkably helpful, apologize for being a grumpy, bad invalid (I don't know what to do when people offer to help), and go see what kind of fun I can have stringing lights on my Christmas tree while under the influence of a narcotic.
Sunday, December 10, 2006
church
I attended again this morning. I found myself looking forward to it.
I love, I love, I love that there is Communion every week.
The pastor emailed me a few days ago, welcoming me to the church, asking if I had any questions, if there were any areas where I wanted to serve. I plan on signing up for a few things.
The people were just as friendly as last week, and in fact I discovered that two friends of MP's landlord also attend the church, so I have some unexpected familiar faces in the (delightfully small) crowd! My next-door neighbor, also a member, offered after church to let me carpool with him and his kids on Sundays.
It's really quite crazy. Suddenly I seem to be surrounded by a community. And I think I love it.
I love, I love, I love that there is Communion every week.
The pastor emailed me a few days ago, welcoming me to the church, asking if I had any questions, if there were any areas where I wanted to serve. I plan on signing up for a few things.
The people were just as friendly as last week, and in fact I discovered that two friends of MP's landlord also attend the church, so I have some unexpected familiar faces in the (delightfully small) crowd! My next-door neighbor, also a member, offered after church to let me carpool with him and his kids on Sundays.
It's really quite crazy. Suddenly I seem to be surrounded by a community. And I think I love it.
please, no more
This was the ninth full day of constant headache.
I had back problems in high school that led to terrible, unceasing pain for nearly a year. I was taking Lortab, I wore a back brace, and could only wear awful men's jeans because the brace eliminated my waist. I felt generally miserable, I cried as I did all my classwork at school, held the tears back when I was actually in company with people, and got to the point where my friends whispered strategies among themselves for getting me to smile.
It's starting to feel like a paler shade of that. I can only concentrate partially on what people are saying. My mental alertness is diminished. I'm annoying myself with my slowed responses.
And above all, it hurts. It hurts no matter what.
Time to find a chiropractor, I guess.
I had back problems in high school that led to terrible, unceasing pain for nearly a year. I was taking Lortab, I wore a back brace, and could only wear awful men's jeans because the brace eliminated my waist. I felt generally miserable, I cried as I did all my classwork at school, held the tears back when I was actually in company with people, and got to the point where my friends whispered strategies among themselves for getting me to smile.
It's starting to feel like a paler shade of that. I can only concentrate partially on what people are saying. My mental alertness is diminished. I'm annoying myself with my slowed responses.
And above all, it hurts. It hurts no matter what.
Time to find a chiropractor, I guess.
Saturday, December 09, 2006
sing a song of sixpence
So, my doctor surmises that my intense headache (still not gone, though I'm no longer staying home from work -- being at home all the time with no one to talk to is boooooooooring) stems from my spinal problems. I don't know why it didn't occur to me before. While I was on my parents' insurance, I had regular chiropractic adjustments to help me deal with a genetic condition (I have an extra vertebra...and, yup, it's cracked) and the neck injuries I received from at least three car accidents in which I, the passenger, hit my head on the door. But I haven't had anyone help me with my back and neck in two and a half years.
You may think chiropractors are crap, but I've found them helpful. I just haven't had chiro-practical (HAHAHAHA) insurance until now. So hopefully I can do something about it. Because this headache sucks.
Meanwhile through unforeseen circumstances (i.e. a clerical error) I find that my health savings account, which I began while I worked at the Center, contains considerably more money than I had anticipated. I have taken all the appropriate legal measures to rectify the situation, with the result that the extra money is mine to keep. Now I can get new glasses (worsening eyesight is, I'm sure, also contributing to The Headache That Will Not Die) and pay an outstanding doctor's bill from October, when I needed a stronger dosage of antidepressants to continue dealing with the stressors of the year.
I love how things work out. And I find, through no efforts of my own, that I have a little more than a pocketful of rye with which to care for my health.
You may think chiropractors are crap, but I've found them helpful. I just haven't had chiro-practical (HAHAHAHA) insurance until now. So hopefully I can do something about it. Because this headache sucks.
Meanwhile through unforeseen circumstances (i.e. a clerical error) I find that my health savings account, which I began while I worked at the Center, contains considerably more money than I had anticipated. I have taken all the appropriate legal measures to rectify the situation, with the result that the extra money is mine to keep. Now I can get new glasses (worsening eyesight is, I'm sure, also contributing to The Headache That Will Not Die) and pay an outstanding doctor's bill from October, when I needed a stronger dosage of antidepressants to continue dealing with the stressors of the year.
I love how things work out. And I find, through no efforts of my own, that I have a little more than a pocketful of rye with which to care for my health.
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
Ow.
This is Day Number Six of the Headache That Will Not Die.
I've been home from work the last two days with this, the first migraine of my life. (Those of you who experience them regularly are either wincing with sympathy or laughing at my wimpiness.)
When I woke up yesterday morning, I was so dizzy and weak that I feared carbon monoxide poisoning. I called my parents, packed a bag with a couple of Little House books (I adore Laura Ingalls Wilder) and my knitting, and drove to the hospital.
All of the attendants were pretty grumpy, but after a few cheerful quips and questions (the first always being, "Were you here all night?"), they loosened up. I sat in the hospital bed in my hospital gown (which happened to match my socks) and knitted under the roaring pressure in my skull while I waited for the doctor. The RN complimented me on my knitting. (Way to teach, MP!)
The doctor informed me that I'd get a CAT scan, blood tests, and a shot of painkiller. He looked kind of worried, so as I sat there knitting and waiting to be taken for the scan, I wondered if maybe something were really wrong. Maybe this was it.
Fine, then, I thought. There are a lot of things I wanted to do with my life before I gave it up, and I really wanted to grow old someday, but if this is how God wants me to go, that's okay. I'll get to see Him all the sooner.
But the CAT scan turned out to be normal. I made the technicians laugh when they asked me, as they eased me onto the narrow bench, if there was any chance I might be pregnant. "Pfffft. No way!" I said, with such patent resentment that they howled.
Being wheeled down the hallway on a guerney makes me motion sick, by the way.
And if you want to see me break down and bawl like a helpless baby, just stick a shot of something into my rump. Needles in the arm, in the gums, whatever, I can handle. But not in the rump.
So I declined a narcotic, took the next best thing, and drove myself back home, since there was no CO in my blood either. My boss made me stay home and told me I'd get an advance on my sick time (I can't believe my wonderful employers). So I lay around the house all day with the blinds drawn.
Today the headache is still around, but not quite as horrible, and I'm bored out of my skull, so I'm going back to work.
But I'm really glad there's nothing wrong with me. Except perhaps "adult onset headache disorder," which I've never heard of, but which the doctor told me is common among women in their mid-twenties.
I had to swallow that sharp "And they're all single, right?" that almost leaped out of my mouth.
Well, I'm holding to the hope that this was a one-time deal.
I've been home from work the last two days with this, the first migraine of my life. (Those of you who experience them regularly are either wincing with sympathy or laughing at my wimpiness.)
When I woke up yesterday morning, I was so dizzy and weak that I feared carbon monoxide poisoning. I called my parents, packed a bag with a couple of Little House books (I adore Laura Ingalls Wilder) and my knitting, and drove to the hospital.
All of the attendants were pretty grumpy, but after a few cheerful quips and questions (the first always being, "Were you here all night?"), they loosened up. I sat in the hospital bed in my hospital gown (which happened to match my socks) and knitted under the roaring pressure in my skull while I waited for the doctor. The RN complimented me on my knitting. (Way to teach, MP!)
The doctor informed me that I'd get a CAT scan, blood tests, and a shot of painkiller. He looked kind of worried, so as I sat there knitting and waiting to be taken for the scan, I wondered if maybe something were really wrong. Maybe this was it.
Fine, then, I thought. There are a lot of things I wanted to do with my life before I gave it up, and I really wanted to grow old someday, but if this is how God wants me to go, that's okay. I'll get to see Him all the sooner.
But the CAT scan turned out to be normal. I made the technicians laugh when they asked me, as they eased me onto the narrow bench, if there was any chance I might be pregnant. "Pfffft. No way!" I said, with such patent resentment that they howled.
Being wheeled down the hallway on a guerney makes me motion sick, by the way.
And if you want to see me break down and bawl like a helpless baby, just stick a shot of something into my rump. Needles in the arm, in the gums, whatever, I can handle. But not in the rump.
So I declined a narcotic, took the next best thing, and drove myself back home, since there was no CO in my blood either. My boss made me stay home and told me I'd get an advance on my sick time (I can't believe my wonderful employers). So I lay around the house all day with the blinds drawn.
Today the headache is still around, but not quite as horrible, and I'm bored out of my skull, so I'm going back to work.
But I'm really glad there's nothing wrong with me. Except perhaps "adult onset headache disorder," which I've never heard of, but which the doctor told me is common among women in their mid-twenties.
I had to swallow that sharp "And they're all single, right?" that almost leaped out of my mouth.
Well, I'm holding to the hope that this was a one-time deal.
Monday, December 04, 2006
Bits of Catching Up
I have had a headache for four days.
It won’t go away. It was bad all weekend, but today it’s so horrible it’s making me nauseous, and my vision is blurry. I’m not prone to migraines, so I don’t know what’s going on.
I’m trying to reach the doctor’s office, but the line is busy.
Look, I feel so awful that nearly every sentence contains a "to be" verb. Ugh.
In the meanwhile, I forgot to update everyone on my neighbor situation. The past month has seen an increased instability in my home environment. (Don’t worry, Simon and I are getting along just fine.) Smoking Neighbor Ted is gone. His cat of nearly twenty years died in mid-October, and shortly thereafter his family came and took him to an assisted living facility. I didn’t get to say goodbye or wish him well; he just disappeared.
So The Lazy Landlord prepared Ted’s tiny efficiency for new tenants. I waited in dread to see whom he would rent it out to.
My fears were pretty much confirmed when he leased it to a middle-aged woman and her teenaged daughter...and the teenaged daughter’s two-year-old daughter. Three people in a room the size of a generous kitchen. And our house is not built to accommodate a two-year-old. You could hear her every noise right through the walls.
I could have taught myself to live with that. But within twenty-four hours of moving in, they were knocking on my door asking if they could take my patio furniture off the porch and up to their apartment for awhile. I said, "Uhhhh...no. You can borrow these folding chairs for tonight, though." I didn’t get them back until I asked for them, two days later. (My philosophy, and that of most people I know, has always been, If you don’t have something, you buy it yourself, or you do without. Especially with furniture. MP and I sat on the floor for nine months in our first apartment.) Not to mention that every time I knocked on the door I heard a panicked and suspicious "Who is it!" Like I was the police.
I called the LL every day for a week about them. I informed him of the illegality of three people in such a small square footage, particularly with a small child. The next day he told me the teenager and her daughter had gone to a shelter. (Great. These are people to whom going to a shelter is a normal option.) I complained about the cigarette smoke pouring into my apartment from their vents.
THEN I began to see a man around. A big, scary, mean-looking man. He accidentally rang my doorbell one night, and when I opened my door I saw him coming up the stairs from the porch...by himself. You need a key to get in that bottom door. So either the woman across the hall was leaving the door cracked open (scary) or she’d given this strange man a key (terrifying). Since the LL said that she was from Pennsylvania and didn’t know anyone in South Bend, I began to fear a rotating circuit of creepy men. And, for the first time since the week after moving in, I began to fear a break-in, or worse.
Of course I called the LL about that. Finally, a week later, they were gone. Which I take as divine protection, because when the LL called to ask if I had seen them recently, he told me the big scary guy was supposed to take over the lease. (For an associate pastor at his church, the LL takes remarkably poor care of his tenants.)
So I was glad they were gone, and freaked out about who would come next. But so far the new neighbors aren’t that bad. Most of the time it’s a middle-aged woman by herself, and she’s energetic and friendly. Her boyfriend, a man in his fifties, is there quite often, and sometimes her son. She enthusiastically agreed to have the LL give her an alternate heating source, so that her cigarette smoke wouldn’t pollute my apartment. She aired out her apartment this weekend to clear out the smoky smell in the hall.
And if I ever forget her name, it’s tattooed on her neck.
Last night the first signs of trouble brewed...a lot of thumping and the sharp sounds of an argument taking place next door, and someone slamming his way down the stairs at 11:30 p.m. I’m hoping that’s only temporary, because I like her. She doesn’t bother me, or ask for my stuff. And generally she’s very quiet. At least so far.
I hope this one works out. I’ll call the LL again every day if I have to. But I’d rather not have to.
If crap like this keeps going down, I may have to reevaluate my get-a-house-at-the-age-of-thirty-one plan.
Oh and another recent bit of good news is that I quit smoking. (Yes, those of you who didn’t know: I smoked. Full time for about nine months.) Two weeks ago, cold turkey, haven’t looked back. I feel much better, and boy is it going to save me some cash!
A good year, this.
It won’t go away. It was bad all weekend, but today it’s so horrible it’s making me nauseous, and my vision is blurry. I’m not prone to migraines, so I don’t know what’s going on.
I’m trying to reach the doctor’s office, but the line is busy.
Look, I feel so awful that nearly every sentence contains a "to be" verb. Ugh.
In the meanwhile, I forgot to update everyone on my neighbor situation. The past month has seen an increased instability in my home environment. (Don’t worry, Simon and I are getting along just fine.) Smoking Neighbor Ted is gone. His cat of nearly twenty years died in mid-October, and shortly thereafter his family came and took him to an assisted living facility. I didn’t get to say goodbye or wish him well; he just disappeared.
So The Lazy Landlord prepared Ted’s tiny efficiency for new tenants. I waited in dread to see whom he would rent it out to.
My fears were pretty much confirmed when he leased it to a middle-aged woman and her teenaged daughter...and the teenaged daughter’s two-year-old daughter. Three people in a room the size of a generous kitchen. And our house is not built to accommodate a two-year-old. You could hear her every noise right through the walls.
I could have taught myself to live with that. But within twenty-four hours of moving in, they were knocking on my door asking if they could take my patio furniture off the porch and up to their apartment for awhile. I said, "Uhhhh...no. You can borrow these folding chairs for tonight, though." I didn’t get them back until I asked for them, two days later. (My philosophy, and that of most people I know, has always been, If you don’t have something, you buy it yourself, or you do without. Especially with furniture. MP and I sat on the floor for nine months in our first apartment.) Not to mention that every time I knocked on the door I heard a panicked and suspicious "Who is it!" Like I was the police.
I called the LL every day for a week about them. I informed him of the illegality of three people in such a small square footage, particularly with a small child. The next day he told me the teenager and her daughter had gone to a shelter. (Great. These are people to whom going to a shelter is a normal option.) I complained about the cigarette smoke pouring into my apartment from their vents.
THEN I began to see a man around. A big, scary, mean-looking man. He accidentally rang my doorbell one night, and when I opened my door I saw him coming up the stairs from the porch...by himself. You need a key to get in that bottom door. So either the woman across the hall was leaving the door cracked open (scary) or she’d given this strange man a key (terrifying). Since the LL said that she was from Pennsylvania and didn’t know anyone in South Bend, I began to fear a rotating circuit of creepy men. And, for the first time since the week after moving in, I began to fear a break-in, or worse.
Of course I called the LL about that. Finally, a week later, they were gone. Which I take as divine protection, because when the LL called to ask if I had seen them recently, he told me the big scary guy was supposed to take over the lease. (For an associate pastor at his church, the LL takes remarkably poor care of his tenants.)
So I was glad they were gone, and freaked out about who would come next. But so far the new neighbors aren’t that bad. Most of the time it’s a middle-aged woman by herself, and she’s energetic and friendly. Her boyfriend, a man in his fifties, is there quite often, and sometimes her son. She enthusiastically agreed to have the LL give her an alternate heating source, so that her cigarette smoke wouldn’t pollute my apartment. She aired out her apartment this weekend to clear out the smoky smell in the hall.
And if I ever forget her name, it’s tattooed on her neck.
Last night the first signs of trouble brewed...a lot of thumping and the sharp sounds of an argument taking place next door, and someone slamming his way down the stairs at 11:30 p.m. I’m hoping that’s only temporary, because I like her. She doesn’t bother me, or ask for my stuff. And generally she’s very quiet. At least so far.
I hope this one works out. I’ll call the LL again every day if I have to. But I’d rather not have to.
If crap like this keeps going down, I may have to reevaluate my get-a-house-at-the-age-of-thirty-one plan.
Oh and another recent bit of good news is that I quit smoking. (Yes, those of you who didn’t know: I smoked. Full time for about nine months.) Two weeks ago, cold turkey, haven’t looked back. I feel much better, and boy is it going to save me some cash!
A good year, this.
Sunday, December 03, 2006
The Lord's Late Breakfast
Today I cast my shadow, for the first time in almost a year, over the doors of a Protestant church.
Some months ago, a Notre Dame grad student named Sarah googled "i hate south bend" and found my blog. We struck up a correspondence about how South Bend is a difficult area, and how fed up and discouraged we've been with the church scene across the board. Yesterday I met her, her husband, and their two-year-old son at the Chicory Cafe, and we had (or at least I had) a great time, sick toddler notwithstanding. The told me they've been attending a Methodist church on the South Side that's pretty good -- with a congregation that believes in sharing itself with the surrounding community. At their invitation, I decided to attend.
It came at a good time: I had set a December 3 deadline for finding some church to attend, at least for the Advent season, because last year I slept through church for the entirety of December and felt not at all spiritually prepared for Christmas. It sucked. So this morning I rolled out of bed, drank my coffee and dressed -- a little nervously! -- and went to church.
It's tiny. Fifty people max. I hadn't attended a Methodist church before, but at least they're Arminian (har!), and this one is liturgical. With which, having gone the Catholic way for awhile, I was comfortably familiar -- and the extremely user-friendly bulletin helped further, even letting you know which word to use in the Lord's Prayer ("debts"). Two of my favorite Advent hymns ("O Come O Come Emmanuel" and "Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus") opened the service, the sermon wasn't bad, and the congregation were engaged with each other and friendly. A lot of people came up to me during the Passing of the Peace and after the service to introduce themselves, shake my hand, and ask what I do and how long I'd been in South Bend. During the announcements at the end of the service, they asked if I wanted to be introduced, so I stood up and Sarah introduced me, saying, "I met her because I read her blog." Everyone laughed.
But I liked Communion best. It's done every week at this church, and people go up in waves to kneel near the altar. The reverend went around and tore off a hunk of homemade whole wheat bread and placed it into each person's outstretched hands. She bent over each person as she did this and said, "So-and-so, this is the body of Christ broken for you." I knelt with folded hands and wondered what she'd say when she got to me, since I was new (and I hadn't yet been introduced to the congregation). She came to me and said, "Sarah, this is the body of Christ broken for you."
She'd taken the trouble to learn my name. Incredible. At the last Protestant church I attended, I shook the pastor's hand at the door at the end of my third month of attendance, and he asked me if I was a first-time visitor. (That ended my church attendance until my brief exploration of Catholicism this fall.)
The highlight of Communion was that the size of my chunk of bread about equalled the size of my fist. After dipping it in the wine, I stared at it for a second, thinking, Well, Body of Christ, what do I do with you? Do I nibble on you? Or do I cram you in my mouth all at once? I opted for the latter because it was kind of crumbly, so while the woman next to me picked at it shred by shred, I forced my lips to close around the huge bulge in my cheek and chewed as discreetly as possible, staring embarrassed at the floor and thinking I looked like a four-year-old chowing down on the Host. I was really hungry though, having not had time to make breakfast before bustling out of the house. The whole experience left me oddly joyful.
Oh, and my next door neighbors attend this church as well. Weird. There are about forty thousand churches in the South Bend area; that's not something one might ordinarily expect.
So now I have a church to attend, at least for awhile, and new friends to sit with. (And eat lunch with afterward!) The people seem warm and involved in each other's lives. Maybe the small size will suit me best.
What's happening to me? Is this a growing up thing? Where finding The Perfect Church isn't as important as attending a decent one? Where weighing disgust with the contemporary Church and the responsibility to participate in the Body somewhere tips the scales toward responsibility?
Probably. Whatever it is, it's kind of great. I feel hugely relieved. Problem solved (for now).
Some months ago, a Notre Dame grad student named Sarah googled "i hate south bend" and found my blog. We struck up a correspondence about how South Bend is a difficult area, and how fed up and discouraged we've been with the church scene across the board. Yesterday I met her, her husband, and their two-year-old son at the Chicory Cafe, and we had (or at least I had) a great time, sick toddler notwithstanding. The told me they've been attending a Methodist church on the South Side that's pretty good -- with a congregation that believes in sharing itself with the surrounding community. At their invitation, I decided to attend.
It came at a good time: I had set a December 3 deadline for finding some church to attend, at least for the Advent season, because last year I slept through church for the entirety of December and felt not at all spiritually prepared for Christmas. It sucked. So this morning I rolled out of bed, drank my coffee and dressed -- a little nervously! -- and went to church.
It's tiny. Fifty people max. I hadn't attended a Methodist church before, but at least they're Arminian (har!), and this one is liturgical. With which, having gone the Catholic way for awhile, I was comfortably familiar -- and the extremely user-friendly bulletin helped further, even letting you know which word to use in the Lord's Prayer ("debts"). Two of my favorite Advent hymns ("O Come O Come Emmanuel" and "Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus") opened the service, the sermon wasn't bad, and the congregation were engaged with each other and friendly. A lot of people came up to me during the Passing of the Peace and after the service to introduce themselves, shake my hand, and ask what I do and how long I'd been in South Bend. During the announcements at the end of the service, they asked if I wanted to be introduced, so I stood up and Sarah introduced me, saying, "I met her because I read her blog." Everyone laughed.
But I liked Communion best. It's done every week at this church, and people go up in waves to kneel near the altar. The reverend went around and tore off a hunk of homemade whole wheat bread and placed it into each person's outstretched hands. She bent over each person as she did this and said, "So-and-so, this is the body of Christ broken for you." I knelt with folded hands and wondered what she'd say when she got to me, since I was new (and I hadn't yet been introduced to the congregation). She came to me and said, "Sarah, this is the body of Christ broken for you."
She'd taken the trouble to learn my name. Incredible. At the last Protestant church I attended, I shook the pastor's hand at the door at the end of my third month of attendance, and he asked me if I was a first-time visitor. (That ended my church attendance until my brief exploration of Catholicism this fall.)
The highlight of Communion was that the size of my chunk of bread about equalled the size of my fist. After dipping it in the wine, I stared at it for a second, thinking, Well, Body of Christ, what do I do with you? Do I nibble on you? Or do I cram you in my mouth all at once? I opted for the latter because it was kind of crumbly, so while the woman next to me picked at it shred by shred, I forced my lips to close around the huge bulge in my cheek and chewed as discreetly as possible, staring embarrassed at the floor and thinking I looked like a four-year-old chowing down on the Host. I was really hungry though, having not had time to make breakfast before bustling out of the house. The whole experience left me oddly joyful.
Oh, and my next door neighbors attend this church as well. Weird. There are about forty thousand churches in the South Bend area; that's not something one might ordinarily expect.
So now I have a church to attend, at least for awhile, and new friends to sit with. (And eat lunch with afterward!) The people seem warm and involved in each other's lives. Maybe the small size will suit me best.
What's happening to me? Is this a growing up thing? Where finding The Perfect Church isn't as important as attending a decent one? Where weighing disgust with the contemporary Church and the responsibility to participate in the Body somewhere tips the scales toward responsibility?
Probably. Whatever it is, it's kind of great. I feel hugely relieved. Problem solved (for now).
Saturday, December 02, 2006
whole
A series of apparently unrelated events, taking place over the course of the last seven years, conspired to change my life on Thursday.
Seven years ago (perhaps eight) I wrote a story that centered around the hymn "Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing." I wrote it as an extemporaneous application piece for a summer creative writing program at the college that my sister later attended. The only prerequisite was that the story contain a truly cheesy sentence that went something like "her voice washed over me like clear blue water." After the time was up and all the applicants had turned in their pieces and left, I approached the moderators and asked if I could be mailed a copy of my story. I left them my address. They looked at me funny, a little irritated, but I got my story. I didn't get into the program.
My senior year in high school, I took Publishing Seminar, a class that produced my high school's competetive yearbook. That spring, once the yearbook was complete, some ambitious Pub compatriots, including myself, conspired to revive our high school's extinct litmag. Stacy and Christie and Molly slaved over the designs and layouts, and I developed a selection system for all submitted pieces. I also worked hard on my story about the hymn (oh, and yes, it's a crappy story, with a couple of good narrative seeds), and it was unanimously accepted.
So the hymn was running through my mind a lot that spring, as we printed submission fliers to stick into all the carpeted walls. It was running through my mind when my grandfather died of lung exhaustion from pneumonia at the end of March. It was running through my mind when a classmate died from a car accident less than a day later. It was running through my mind as we devoted an entire section of the litmag to commemorative pieces from her classmates, teachers and friends.
And then I shut it off, like I shut off the rest of the trauma, so that I could continue with my life. College was coming up. I had things I had to do.
Eighteen months later an indie pop/folk songwriter and musician I wouldn't hear about for five years began to rethink his hatred of the Christmas season. In December of 2001, Sufjan Stevens began, as a discipline to "make himself appreciate Christmas more," to create his own renditions of traditional songs and carols, and to write originals, as a private gift to his family and friends. This project continued over the next four and a half years.
Meanwhile, that same December, my sister was at her most ill. My family felt fragile. I was frightened and sad. Over the next five years, I witnessed the goodness of God in the circumstantial orchestration of my life. My sister stabilized. My family relationships improved. I graduated college and moved to South Bend. I found all manner of blessings in the jobs I landed. (Oh yes, jobs. I've had a lot of them in the past three years. Yay the rootless twenties.) In the friends I met. In the people who looked out for me as if I were their own family. I stopped attending church, but I kept the faith. I lived the way I knew I ought. I acknowledged God's obvious hand in my life.
But I didn't feel his presence. I used to, when I was little. All the time. Something completely inarticulable -- just a deep awareness of him surrounding me and filling me. It faded as I grew older, of course, and particularly during a difficult youth group experience that left me convinced God would rather not have made me because of how awful I was. I was sad for a long time. But still there were moments of that remembered connection, at retreats in particular, when God was there, when I felt him all through my being, and knew that he loved me.
The moments grew fewer and farther between. They seemed to vanish altogether. But I didn't notice, or I made myself not notice, until this summer. When the absence of connection threw me into a tailspin that almost cost my faith, except that I refused to give it up. I believed even when I didn't feel like I believed.
Then on November 21st, Sufjan Stevens, to whose music I had been introduced in the spring, and whose music I have come increasingly to love, for its genius and its strong, vivid, heartwrenchingly gorgeous undercurrents of faith, released his Songs for Christmas. Seven days later the mailman dropped it in the cleaned-out litterbox that serves as a catchall under the tiny rusted mailbox on my porch. That night I opened it and looked all through it, at all five albums, and rejoiced in the anticipation of hearing what he had to say and write and sing about the titles.
I read down through the track list on the back of the box. My eye stopped on "Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing." I had forgotten that hymn.
So when I came to it, Track 3 on Album II, I almost closed my eyes while driving the twenty-five minute commute to work. Simple. Choral. Tender, reverent, loving. Gorgeous connector chords between the verses. Lots of unembellished banjo and piano. And sung in the version I had always known and preferred, with the lyrics I especially loved.
When Album II ran out, I cycled it back to Track 3. I put it on repeat. I couldn't stop listening to it. It ran through my head while I made copies at work. It ran through my head while I forced myself to be polite to mean clients. It ran through my head while I knitted on my lunchbreak, alone in the upstairs office. It ran through my head while I cried, for the first time in six and a half years, for my grandfather.
That was Wednesday. Thursday I didn't listen to anything else. I harmonized with it all the way to work. Then, on the way home, as the last shreds of daylight faded from the prewinter sky, I felt some force compelling me to stop singing along. To listen, and be silent. So I did.
And started to cry. I wept the whole way home.
Because I felt God. I felt God beyond all need to grasp at faith, I felt God beyond all need to articulate to myself that he loved me. I didn't need to tell myself anything. God was there, surrounding me, inside me, all through me, and nothing else mattered. Not my stressful week, my single state, the trials of the past year(s). Everything was just God.
Once I was able to start thinking, I started thinking how his love was absolutely present, with his presence. I felt like I'd passed a long, arduous test. And I realized how much I'd missed that deep connection.
And thought about the timing of the events that were laid to bring me to that space in time.
Suddenly a lot of things are different. I have been able to be more understanding of the people who irritate me throughout the day. I've been able to step outside of myself. To stop worrying about the future and to stop being afraid. And to process various things that I haven't dealt with yet.
I feel like something in me that was broken a long time ago is beginning to heal. I know peace.
I don't know what it means, or what's up ahead, and I don't really need to. My longings to know God are being satisfied. I'm happy, and joyful, about the present.
Sufjan Stevens was the catalyst. And I'm immeasurably grateful.
Come, Thou fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace!
Streams of mercy, never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above!
Praise the mount! I'm fixed upon it,
Mount of Thy unchanging love.
Here I raise mine Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy help I've come.
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.
Jesus sought me when a stranger
Wand'ring from the fold of God.
He to rescue me from danger
Interposed His precious blood.
Oh, to grace how great a debtor
Daily I'm constrained to be!
Let that grace now like a fetter
Bind my wand'ring heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it --
Prone to leave the God I love!
Here's my heart -- oh, take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above.
Seven years ago (perhaps eight) I wrote a story that centered around the hymn "Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing." I wrote it as an extemporaneous application piece for a summer creative writing program at the college that my sister later attended. The only prerequisite was that the story contain a truly cheesy sentence that went something like "her voice washed over me like clear blue water." After the time was up and all the applicants had turned in their pieces and left, I approached the moderators and asked if I could be mailed a copy of my story. I left them my address. They looked at me funny, a little irritated, but I got my story. I didn't get into the program.
My senior year in high school, I took Publishing Seminar, a class that produced my high school's competetive yearbook. That spring, once the yearbook was complete, some ambitious Pub compatriots, including myself, conspired to revive our high school's extinct litmag. Stacy and Christie and Molly slaved over the designs and layouts, and I developed a selection system for all submitted pieces. I also worked hard on my story about the hymn (oh, and yes, it's a crappy story, with a couple of good narrative seeds), and it was unanimously accepted.
So the hymn was running through my mind a lot that spring, as we printed submission fliers to stick into all the carpeted walls. It was running through my mind when my grandfather died of lung exhaustion from pneumonia at the end of March. It was running through my mind when a classmate died from a car accident less than a day later. It was running through my mind as we devoted an entire section of the litmag to commemorative pieces from her classmates, teachers and friends.
And then I shut it off, like I shut off the rest of the trauma, so that I could continue with my life. College was coming up. I had things I had to do.
Eighteen months later an indie pop/folk songwriter and musician I wouldn't hear about for five years began to rethink his hatred of the Christmas season. In December of 2001, Sufjan Stevens began, as a discipline to "make himself appreciate Christmas more," to create his own renditions of traditional songs and carols, and to write originals, as a private gift to his family and friends. This project continued over the next four and a half years.
Meanwhile, that same December, my sister was at her most ill. My family felt fragile. I was frightened and sad. Over the next five years, I witnessed the goodness of God in the circumstantial orchestration of my life. My sister stabilized. My family relationships improved. I graduated college and moved to South Bend. I found all manner of blessings in the jobs I landed. (Oh yes, jobs. I've had a lot of them in the past three years. Yay the rootless twenties.) In the friends I met. In the people who looked out for me as if I were their own family. I stopped attending church, but I kept the faith. I lived the way I knew I ought. I acknowledged God's obvious hand in my life.
But I didn't feel his presence. I used to, when I was little. All the time. Something completely inarticulable -- just a deep awareness of him surrounding me and filling me. It faded as I grew older, of course, and particularly during a difficult youth group experience that left me convinced God would rather not have made me because of how awful I was. I was sad for a long time. But still there were moments of that remembered connection, at retreats in particular, when God was there, when I felt him all through my being, and knew that he loved me.
The moments grew fewer and farther between. They seemed to vanish altogether. But I didn't notice, or I made myself not notice, until this summer. When the absence of connection threw me into a tailspin that almost cost my faith, except that I refused to give it up. I believed even when I didn't feel like I believed.
Then on November 21st, Sufjan Stevens, to whose music I had been introduced in the spring, and whose music I have come increasingly to love, for its genius and its strong, vivid, heartwrenchingly gorgeous undercurrents of faith, released his Songs for Christmas. Seven days later the mailman dropped it in the cleaned-out litterbox that serves as a catchall under the tiny rusted mailbox on my porch. That night I opened it and looked all through it, at all five albums, and rejoiced in the anticipation of hearing what he had to say and write and sing about the titles.
I read down through the track list on the back of the box. My eye stopped on "Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing." I had forgotten that hymn.
So when I came to it, Track 3 on Album II, I almost closed my eyes while driving the twenty-five minute commute to work. Simple. Choral. Tender, reverent, loving. Gorgeous connector chords between the verses. Lots of unembellished banjo and piano. And sung in the version I had always known and preferred, with the lyrics I especially loved.
When Album II ran out, I cycled it back to Track 3. I put it on repeat. I couldn't stop listening to it. It ran through my head while I made copies at work. It ran through my head while I forced myself to be polite to mean clients. It ran through my head while I knitted on my lunchbreak, alone in the upstairs office. It ran through my head while I cried, for the first time in six and a half years, for my grandfather.
That was Wednesday. Thursday I didn't listen to anything else. I harmonized with it all the way to work. Then, on the way home, as the last shreds of daylight faded from the prewinter sky, I felt some force compelling me to stop singing along. To listen, and be silent. So I did.
And started to cry. I wept the whole way home.
Because I felt God. I felt God beyond all need to grasp at faith, I felt God beyond all need to articulate to myself that he loved me. I didn't need to tell myself anything. God was there, surrounding me, inside me, all through me, and nothing else mattered. Not my stressful week, my single state, the trials of the past year(s). Everything was just God.
Once I was able to start thinking, I started thinking how his love was absolutely present, with his presence. I felt like I'd passed a long, arduous test. And I realized how much I'd missed that deep connection.
And thought about the timing of the events that were laid to bring me to that space in time.
Suddenly a lot of things are different. I have been able to be more understanding of the people who irritate me throughout the day. I've been able to step outside of myself. To stop worrying about the future and to stop being afraid. And to process various things that I haven't dealt with yet.
I feel like something in me that was broken a long time ago is beginning to heal. I know peace.
I don't know what it means, or what's up ahead, and I don't really need to. My longings to know God are being satisfied. I'm happy, and joyful, about the present.
Sufjan Stevens was the catalyst. And I'm immeasurably grateful.
Come, Thou fount of every blessing,
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace!
Streams of mercy, never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise.
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above!
Praise the mount! I'm fixed upon it,
Mount of Thy unchanging love.
Here I raise mine Ebenezer;
Hither by Thy help I've come.
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure,
Safely to arrive at home.
Jesus sought me when a stranger
Wand'ring from the fold of God.
He to rescue me from danger
Interposed His precious blood.
Oh, to grace how great a debtor
Daily I'm constrained to be!
Let that grace now like a fetter
Bind my wand'ring heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it --
Prone to leave the God I love!
Here's my heart -- oh, take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above.
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